Chapter 21: Earning Money

“Liyun, why didn’t you wake me up earlier?” Feng Yi couldn’t help but ask when he saw that Jiang Liyun had already made two pots of dumplings.

He was too tired yesterday, fell asleep as soon as his head touched the pillow, and only woke up when Jiang Liyun came to get him. He had no idea that Jiang Liyun had already gotten up early to make so many dumplings.

Jiang Liyun replied, “I was too excited last night, so I woke up early. You didn’t need to get up so early.” Most of the tiring work yesterday was done by Feng Yi. He needed proper rest.

“I wanted to get up early,” Feng Yi said.

“Alright, I’ll wake you up next time,” Jiang Liyun said with a smile, leading Feng Yi to have breakfast.

Jiang Lame made a pot of porridge as usual.

Before Jiang Liyun’s rebirth, their family used to drink porridge and eat pickled vegetables every morning, and often porridge with pickled vegetables in the evening. The meals were very poor.

After Jiang Liyun’s rebirth, she couldn’t bear it.

Her mum and sister weren’t in good health. When eating meals like that, where was the nutrition?

At her request, these days they have been eating eggs every day, and occasionally they have meat.

As for today… Jiang Liyun scooped some dumpling filling, cracked in four eggs, mixed them thoroughly, and fried them in a pan.

Then, she scooped some more dumpling filling and stir-fried it with pickled vegetables.

Minced meat fried with eggs and minced meat stir-fried with pickled vegetables… Jiang Liyun and Feng Yi had a big appetite and ate quite a lot.

As for Jiang Lame and Wu Xiaochun, they planned to wait until Jiang Liyu woke up before eating.

Jiang Lame and Wu Xiaochun actually felt that eating like this was too extravagant. On a regular day, they would definitely say a few words about it, but with Feng Yi here today…

In the end, they didn’t say much, only suggesting, “Liyun, from now on, your dad and I can help you make dumplings in the morning. We usually wake up early.”

Jiang Liyun replied, “Sure, then in the evening, I’ll teach you how to roll out the dumpling wrappers.”

Since the dumplings were meant for sale, they had to be of a certain size. She needed to teach them.

“Great!” Wu Xiaochun smiled.

Jiang Liyun suddenly resigned to set up a stall. Her mom wasn’t in favor of it, but Jiang Liyun had already done it. They could only do their best to help.

After breakfast, Jiang Liyun and Feng Yi, pulling a cart loaded with various items, headed to town.

In the past few days, Jiang Liyun has inquired in town and learned that it is allowed for people to set up stalls freely. However, to secure a good location, one had to go early to grab it.

For those selling vegetables, having a good spot meant selling more produce. But for Jiang Liyun, who was selling pan-fried dumplings, a prime location wasn’t essential.

However, with a variety of items, she needed a more spacious place.

They left home a little after five, and by the time they reached town, it was almost six.

Fortunately, Jiang Liyun had already lit the coal stove at home.

Under the coal stove, there was a “small door” for oxygen intake. She left a gap in this “small door,” ensuring the honeycomb coal inside burned slowly.

In town, Jiang Liyun noticed that the early market was already bustling with many people selling vegetables. Fortunately, the secluded spot she had in mind had few people.

On the most lively street, there was a fork at an intersection. Next to it was an old basketball court, and adjacent to that was the “Workers’ Club” of the town. Further ahead was the town’s elementary school.

The vacant land next to the basketball court was usually devoid of stalls.

Jiang Liyun parked her cart there, unloaded various items, and opened the small door under the coal stove to make the fire burn brighter.

Of course, the signboard had to be displayed. Jiang Liyun also brought out a small folding table and a few plastic chairs she had bought a few days ago, placing them nearby. She also placed a bottle of vinegar on top.

If someone wanted to eat the pan-fried dumplings there, it was possible, but the space could only accommodate a few people. Most customers would have to take their orders to the store.

Feng Yi had already started making the first batch of pan-fried dumplings.

Initially, Jiang Liyun was a bit worried, but after watching for a while, she felt reassured.

Feng Yi was quick to learn anything, and by now, he was doing a great job.

“Feng Yi, it’s better for the dumplings to be slightly crispy than undercooked,” Jiang Liyun reminded him, and she took out the plates and other items she had prepared in advance.

While they were still working on the first batch of pan-fried dumplings, someone came over and asked, “What’s this Northeastern pan-fried dumpling?”

Jiang Liyun, who was busy making dumplings, showed the person the dumplings in her hands, saying, “These are dumplings. People in the North like to eat dumplings during festivals and celebrations. Pan-fried dumplings are a way of making dumplings, and I learned it from someone from the North-east.”

“How much is it sold for?”

“Ten for one yuan, six for fifty cents, and twelve for one yuan,” Jiang Liyun said with a smile.

The aroma of pan-fried dumplings had already filled the flat pan. The person immediately said, “I’ll buy one yuan worth.”

“Alright, but the dumplings aren’t ready yet; you’ll have to wait a bit.”

Not long after the first customer, the second one approached.

If Jiang Liyun were selling common buns or steamed bread, people might not be so interested since the town always had vendors for those.

However, these pan-fried dumplings were something they had never seen before!

The person making the dumplings moved a large iron pan around the coal stove, and just watching it seemed interesting to them!

Most people were having meals at home at this time. Many cook porridge before coming out to buy groceries. Now, seeing these pan-fried dumplings they had never encountered before…

Well, it wasn’t expensive anyway. Buying some for fifty cents to let their family try was reasonable!

These pan-fried dumplings had meat filling—quite a deal!

When the first batch of dumplings was ready, Feng Yi scooped them out of the pot and placed them in an enamel basin.

He wasn’t very skilled, and some of the pan-fried dumplings were a bit crispy at the bottom, while others weren’t at all.

Feeling a bit embarrassed, Feng Yi, but Jiang Liyun didn’t mind. She smiled and asked the customer in front, “The dumplings are ready. Do you want some slightly crispy ones or not?”

“I want them slightly crispy!”

“I want them, not crispy.”

“I’ll buy one yuan worth of dumplings.”

“I’ll buy fifty cents worth.”

…

People started buying pan-fried dumplings one after another.

Because Jiang Liyun had written “six for fifty cents,” almost no one bought just one; they all bought in increments of fifty cents.

As people were buying, some whom Jiang Liyun knew came by, like the families of workers from the brick and tile factory.

Sun Cuicui is Sun Jinshan’s sister.

Sun Jinshan doesn’t live in the brick and tile factory; he stays at home. After returning home yesterday, he kept praising how delicious Jiang Liyun’s dumplings were. He even gave Sun Cuicui two yuan and asked her to buy some pan-fried dumplings when she went grocery shopping in the morning for the whole family to enjoy.

Sun Cuicui remembered this and started looking for the pan-fried dumpling stall as soon as she arrived in town. Unfortunately, when she found it, Feng Yi had just finished selling a batch, and she had to wait for the next one.

Anyway, she’s not in a hurry, so she’ll wait… When the pan-fried dumplings were ready, Sun Cuicui quickly handed over her enamel cup and said, “I’ll buy two yuan worth of pan-fried dumplings!”

This time, it was Feng Yi who served the dumplings. Jiang Liyun couldn’t keep up with the speed of making a pot of dumplings compared to Feng Yi, so now he was selling the pan-fried dumplings while Jiang Liyun continued wrapping dumplings behind.

Pan-fried dumplings are made on the spot and require some waiting time; there were always people waiting in front of their stall.

Many people love to join in when they see a crowd, and after realizing they were selling something fresh, they wanted to buy…

This made Jiang Liyun’s business exceptionally good.

Sun Cuicui emerged from the crowd with twenty-four dumplings, relieved.

Her brother expressed concern yesterday, fearing that Jiang Liyun and Feng Yi’s dumplings wouldn’t sell, but now… Her brother was worried for no reason.

Their business was thriving!

And these dumplings were truly delicious.

Sun Cuicui hadn’t had breakfast when she left in the morning. She couldn’t wait to grab a dumpling and take a bite.

Pan-fried dumplings, like egg-fried rice and fried noodles, are irresistible concoctions of sugar and oil!

The crispy dumpling skin outside, enclosing the rich pork filling, brought immense joy to Sun Cuicui!

If this were thirty years later, a young girl like Sun Cuicui might consider the calories before eating pan-fried dumplings. However, this was the oil-deprived 1980s for most people’s stomachs!

Although Sun’s family was well-off, they didn’t eat much meat. After eating one dumpling, Sun Cuicui couldn’t resist and had another, then a third, fourth, fifth…

Rural girls have hearty appetites. Sun Cuicui devoured twelve dumplings in one go, then, belchingly satisfied, she queued up again and bought another yuan’s worth of pan-fried dumplings.

Well, consider the ones she ate before as her treat for herself!

Riding her bicycle home with the pan-fried dumplings, Sun Cuicui continued burping along the way.

Zhao Hai is a teacher at the town’s junior high school. Not being a local, he had recently been assigned there and lived alone in the teachers’ dormitory.

Their school had lunch and dinner in the cafeteria, but there was no breakfast. Zhao Hai usually buys breakfast in town.

He usually had buns and soy milk, but today, before reaching the bun shop, he was drawn by a small stall.

Northeastern pan-fried dumplings? It smelled quite good!

Zhao Hai, being a scholar with a modest appetite, glanced at the size of the pan-fried dumplings and only bought fifty cents worth. Holding his own cup, he went to the bun shop and spent an additional dime on a cup of soy milk.

Arriving at the school, he first took a sip of soy milk and then took out his chopsticks to pick up a pan-fried dumpling.

These pan-fried dumplings were incredibly fragrant and much tastier than regular meat buns!

“Mr. Zhao, what are you eating here?” a curious colleague asked, as they hadn’t seen this type of food before.

Zhao Hai replied, “These are pan-fried dumplings, said to be from the North-east.”

Another Chinese teacher said, “I usually read articles and essays, often coming across mentions of dumplings. I’ve always wanted to try them but didn’t know how to make them. I’ll go buy some tomorrow.”

“I’ll go buy some and try them too.”

“Where did you get them?”

…

The teachers in the office were all curious, asking questions one after another.

Their staple food was rice, and the majority of them didn’t know how to make wheat-based dishes.

Despite knowing more than the average person, they were well aware of the tradition of eating dumplings during the Chinese New Year in the northern regions.

Now, with dumplings being sold in town… They wanted to taste them!

In the dormitory of the fertilizer plant employees, a woman in her fifties returned home with a bag of pan-fried dumplings.

Her precious grandson didn’t like porridge, and their family usually had egg-fried rice for breakfast. However, they had gone out to visit relatives last night and didn’t cook, so there was no leftover rice for egg-fried rice this morning.

She had initially planned to buy some buns or steamed bread for breakfast, but when she saw the pan-fried dumplings, she bought fifty cents worth of them and also bought the usual buns and steamed bread.

“Sweetie, time for breakfast!” The woman started calling her grandson to eat breakfast as soon as she entered the house. As for the other people in the house… That wasn’t important!

Her grandson rushed out, “Grandma, I want to eat meat buns!”

“Grandma bought meat buns, and today, Grandma also bought pan-fried dumplings. Sweetie, do you want to try them?”

“Pan-fried dumplings?” The little child who had just started kindergarten looked curious, but after taking a bite of the pan-fried dumpling… “Grandma, this is so delicious! I want to eat it again tomorrow!”

“Okay, okay, Grandma will buy it for you tomorrow.” Since the rest of the family would have porridge tomorrow, she decided to let him enjoy the pan-fried dumplings!

Similar scenes were happening all over town. In just one morning, many people had already learned about the pan-fried dumplings.

Jiang Liyun prepared a lot of ingredients, enough to make about eight hundred pan-fried dumplings.

She intended to sell them slowly, from morning until noon, if necessary.

At this hour, there weren’t many people living in the town, but she thought a shoutout should be enough to sell all eight hundred pan-fried dumplings.

However, to her surprise, all eight hundred dumplings were sold out by just a little after eight o’clock.

The reason for selling out wasn’t because of a few customers but because they couldn’t wrap and fry dumplings fast enough.

Eight hundred dumplings! Jiang Liyun’s hands were almost cramping from wrapping so many. If it weren’t for Jiang Lamei’s concern, bringing Jiang Liyu to town to help, they might still be wrapping dumplings along with Feng Yi.

Jiang Liyun was experienced, and she could wrap and roll dumpling skins very quickly. But without needing to roll out skins, she could only wrap about three hundred dumplings in an hour, without any breaks!

She really needed Jiang Lamei and Wu Xiaochun’s help to wrap dumplings; she and Feng Yi were a bit overwhelmed.

With the dumplings sold out, Jiang Liyun felt a bit tired but didn’t rush home. Instead, she counted the money she earned this morning.

In the morning, she had brought twenty yuan in loose change, prepared for giving customers change. Now, counting the money in the cash box, she had eighty-nine yuan and three cents.

In other words, they had sold around sixty-nine yuan worth of dumplings.

According to Jiang Liyun’s earlier calculations, by selling pan-fried dumplings, even conservatively estimating, she would definitely have at least one-fifth profit. This meant selling ten yuan worth of dumplings would earn her a nett profit of two yuan.

So, today she earned just over fourteen yuan.

This number seemed very small, but if she could earn fourteen yuan every day, that would be almost four hundred and twenty yuan a month!

A solid four hundred plus!

Previously, working with Feng Yi, the two of them together didn’t even earn two hundred yuan a month!

Jiang Liyun suddenly felt full of energy.

If Wu Xiaochun and Jiang Lamei could help wrap dumplings, she might be able to sell over a thousand dumplings in a day. Making five or six hundred yuan a month would be no problem.

Then, she could give Jiang Lamei and Wu Xiaochun a hundred yuan each as payment for helping wrap dumplings.

In her past life, Jiang Liyun slowly earned money and gradually became prosperous. During this process, she witnessed many people become overnight millionaires only to suddenly go bankrupt.

She never expected to become wealthy overnight.

Jiang Liyun believed in accumulating wealth bit by bit, taking advantage of opportunities to earn a bit more when they arose.

“We earned thirteen yuan today,” Jiang Liyun said with a smile.

“So much?” Feng Yi was extremely surprised. After all, he earned just over three yuan for a day’s work at the brick and tile factory!

“Today is the first day, and we sold a bit less. If we make more dumplings in the future, we can earn even more!” Jiang Liyun explained.

Feng Yi’s eyes lit up.

His sister, Liyun, was really amazing! On the first day of setting up a stall, she could earn so much money with him!

“Let’s pack up and go back. I woke up early today and feel especially tired. I want to go back and get some sleep,” Jiang Liyun suggested.

She planned to take a nap in the afternoon and then prepare for tomorrow’s business.

Setting up a stall was actually quite hard work, especially without the help of machines.

Jiang Liyun suddenly recalled an incident from her past life.

Back then, her nanny enjoyed listening to stories. Once, she listened to a historical novel where the female protagonist set up a stall, selling both buns and wontons, often hundreds of large meat buns. It left her completely dumbfounded!

Based on her experience, in a situation where the female lead was alone, just kneading the dough and chopping the meat for so many buns would take several hours. Steaming hundreds of buns would also require many steamers and a lot of firewood for a long time.

As for wontons, that would be even more troublesome! While dumpling skins were easy to roll, especially for someone as skilled as her, wonton skins… Those were not easy to roll!

Rolling the skins was just the beginning; they still needed to be filled. The female lead would need three heads and six arms to manage all of that.

Modern bun shops can produce so many buns, mainly because they have machines for kneading the dough and grinding meat.

In the future, some shops even buy frozen dumplings and just steam them and sell them to customers.

Because making things is troublesome, in her past life, she initially sold things that were not so troublesome, like noodle soup; she could just ladle a bowl when customers arrived.

Speaking of these things, in her past life, she used to sell tea eggs, which she could consider selling again in the future.

Tea eggs weren’t popular, but they were easy to make!

When Jiang Liyun and others finished packing up, it was already past nine, and the morning market had dispersed.

Seeing Jiang Liyun tired, Feng Yi wanted her to sit in the cart, but with more items than yesterday, the cart was already full.

Feng Yi sighed and could only follow behind Jiang Liyun, pulling the cart.

He didn’t know when he would be able to pull Jiang Liyun along.

Although Jiang Lamei had a limp, with a crutch, she could walk quite fast. However, Jiang Liyun, being petite, couldn’t walk as quickly.

The group slowly walked back, occasionally meeting acquaintances.

Jiang Lamei was reserved, responding with a nod at most, while Jiang Liyun could chat with anyone.

“Hello, Uncle Zhang.”

“We’re back from setting up a stall in town.”

“I sell pan-fried dumplings in town. Next time you go to town, you can buy from me.”

…

People who knew Jiang Liyun’s stall increased.

Some were curious and asked about their earnings.

“Today is the first day, and it was chaotic. I didn’t earn much; we’ll see in the future.”

“The cost of setting up a stall is not low.”

“I’ll try for a few more days.”

Jiang Liyun’s words were carefully chosen.

Of course, when talking to others, she continued to “paint a rosy picture”: “Feng Yi, let’s work hard. Maybe we can earn a thousand in a month and build a house in the village, a house for the two of us!”

She wanted to buy a house, but Feng Yi might not understand that, so she mentioned building a house in the village, which he would surely look forward to.

Feng Yi was indeed looking forward to it.

Their house! Their two-person house!

If they could build a house, he would have a home!

Feng Yi’s excitement couldn’t be contained. He couldn’t help but pull the cart and run far ahead.

Jiang Liyun: “Truly a young person, full of energy!