Chapter 40: Selling Oyster Mushrooms

Lu Zecheng pushed Xia Ning’an into the house to rest. He was heartbroken after she ran up and down the mountain twice. If his leg hadn’t been healed yet, he wouldn’t have agreed to let her come back and call for help. Now, his first priority was to let her rest well. He and Xia Ninghao still had to go to the mountain. They hadn’t chopped the wood yet.

Although Xia Ning’an had run up and down the mountain twice, she didn’t feel particularly tired. But after washing up, she lay down on the kang and fell asleep.

When she woke up and opened her eyes, it was already dark. The house was quiet, as if no one was home. She turned on the light and walked out of the room. There was no one in the courtyard either. It seemed they hadn’t finished yet.

She washed her face and went into the kitchen to prepare dinner.

Looking at the wild donkey meat on the stove, it was said that “donkey meat is as good as dragon meat from heaven,” which shows how delicious donkey meat is. She decided to make donkey meat dumplings for dinner. She would also stir-fry some green vegetables, stew a wild chicken soup, and make a spicy rabbit dish.

She got to work. She cut 5 jin of meat and put it in the space for Bond to process into minced meat. She prepared some scallion and ginger water to remove the fishy smell from the minced meat later. She heated oil in a pot, added cinnamon, bay leaves, Sichuan peppercorns, and star anise to the oil and fried them until fragrant. Then, she removed the residue, added soy sauce, and made a sauce. Then, she added five-spice powder, chopped scallions, and donkey meat filling and stirred them together. She added salt and continued to stir.

She took a large ball of kneaded dough from the farm’s kitchen and made dumpling wrappers. She hummed a song that didn’t exist in this era and happily wrapped dumplings. She also gave half of it to Bond in the space and asked him to wrap dumplings with her. She said it was more lively with more people working.

At dinner, Xia Ning’an mentioned that she would go to the county tomorrow to build a kitchen. She also wanted to take the mushrooms from home to the state-owned restaurant to sell them. It would be a way to promote the oyster mushrooms in the village. If the response was good, the large batch of oyster mushrooms that the village would plant in half a month could be sold to the state-owned restaurant and the supply and marketing cooperative at a good price.

She believed that after Zhang Dagang’s recent promotion, her oyster mushrooms would definitely sell for a good price at the state-owned restaurant. It all depended on whether Zhang Dagang’s people were reliable.

Xia Changhai and Xia Ninghao said they would go too. Xia Ning’an asked Li Fang to go to the county with the whole family tomorrow. They could do some major shopping after the house was built. Li Fang repeatedly waved her hands.

“You guys go. I won’t go. I’ll stay at the new house tomorrow. It’s almost ready to be topped off. I’ll go help. I can’t help you in the county.”

Seeing Li Fang’s insistence, Xia Ning’an thought that it would be the same if they went after the house was built, so she didn’t force her. It was still Xia Mu who was worried about money and didn’t want to spend it. It would be better to wait until they earned more money.

Back in the space that night, she prepared to practice making braised lion’s head. Following Tong Dawei’s instructions, she made 100 portions today and put them on the system. Little Meow was so happy that it was spinning in circles. Seeing it so happy, Xia Ning’an made another 100 jin of watermelon and 100 jin of strawberries produced by the farm. These two were farm products. The system detected special nutrients and gave her a lot of gold coins. After seeing this, Xia Ning’an suddenly felt reluctant to give the system farm products. She would give it the copied materials instead. She would keep the farm products for herself. Such delicious watermelon, she had to find an excuse to bring it out for her family to eat.

She looked at the vineyard at the foot of the farm mountain. Bond had already transformed it into a large vineyard. She could take some grapes out to eat sometime. After all, grapes could be picked in the mountains at this time. They wouldn’t be available after they froze in a few days. She could also take out some apples, persimmons, oranges, and pears.

The braised lion’s head was considered a success.

She took a spring water bath, put on a face mask, and did her skincare. Standing in front of the mirror, she realized that her appearance was basically optimized. She was 169 cm tall, and her measurements were also satisfactory. The places that should be full were full, the places that should be thin were thin, and the places that should be perky were perky. The gene optimization agent not only optimized people’s physique and appearance but also developed the human body, such as brain capacity, learning ability, reaction ability, skin elasticity, body flexibility, and so on. She had only completed the appearance part. Recently, she had noticed that her eyesight and hearing were very good, and her memory was also very good. She could remember what people said when she went out, as long as she thought about it. When she went to the black market to trade, she could calculate the final price immediately without using a calculator.

Such good physical conditions would be wasted if she didn’t study. She couldn’t take the money she earned in this world with her, but she could definitely take the knowledge and skills she learned. The knowledge she learned in this world would be her most valuable asset. In the real world, she didn’t have any special talents. So, why not recharge herself here? She could be more at ease in her work in the future.

She got to work. Her academic performance in her previous life wasn’t particularly good. Otherwise, she wouldn’t have studied directing to get into a top university. It was just that she was particularly bad at science. Now that she had time, she could strengthen her physics and chemistry. There were so many books in the space, and Bond was such a good teacher. Learning wasn’t difficult. She made a plan for herself. Unless there was a special reason, she would study for two hours every night in the space. She would start from the first year of university.

When Xia Ning’an got up, she found that everyone in the family had already harvested the oyster mushrooms and packed them in baskets, covered with plastic sheeting to keep them warm.

She quickly washed up. Li Fang had cooked millet porridge, made a few oil cakes, and stir-fried potato shreds.

Xia Ning’an had to say that she liked millet porridge. The millet porridge cooked in the north was soft and glutinous, especially the rice beans in it. She particularly liked them. Even without sugar, she felt it was tastier than eight-treasure porridge. She ate a large bowl of porridge and a potato shred pancake. Then, she got on the ox cart that Xia Changhai had rented. They loaded the materials and 200 jin of oyster mushrooms and set off.

When they arrived in the county, Xia Ning’an asked if everyone’s stomachs could handle a little more food. They said they could handle a little more, so she went straight to the state-owned restaurant.

When they got there, Xia Ning’an asked Xia Ninghao to carry a basket of mushrooms inside and deliberately left it open. She went to the counter and ordered soy milk, fried dough sticks, and wontons. Xia Dad, Xia Ninghao, and Lu Zecheng had big appetites. After walking for a while, they could easily eat another bowl of wontons each.

There were few people in the restaurant now, and the waitresses were bored. They watched the group eat and chat.

Suddenly, they saw a basket of mushrooms next to them. She had often encountered people stir-frying mushrooms recently. This was a good opportunity to see mushrooms. She quickly ran to the back kitchen and found the person in charge and explained the situation.

The person in charge immediately rushed to the dining hall. He saw a large basket of mushrooms on the ground. He had never seen this kind of mushroom before. It was big and fluffy, and it looked very tempting. At this time, there were no artificially cultivated mushrooms. Ordinary people had never seen such a cluster of mushrooms. He was immediately fascinated.