"You're wrong." Ye Xu shook his head. "As long as they drink the soup, I've already made a profit."
Drinking free soup can also generate a pleasant mood and earn him points. So, at most, he's exchanging copper coins for points; it's not entirely charity.
Moreover, Ye Xu didn't believe anyone could resist the temptation of the soup base. Apart from those who had already eaten and were out for a stroll to digest, everyone else would probably be tempted to come in and have a few more bites.
Shuangshuang suddenly realized, "Manager, you're so cunning..." She realized she had used the wrong word halfway through her sentence and quickly changed the subject, "So what kind of base are you planning to use? Or are you going to cook several different bases?"
After asking, I realized I'd made a fool of myself. What else could I choose besides tomato soup? If I wanted to buy another soup that I liked, but they hadn't unlocked it yet, where would I buy it?
To ease the awkwardness, Shuangshuang chose to quietly get to work. Because of her small size, Ye Xu was worried she might get crushed by the weight of the materials, so he quickly followed to help, while also carefully selecting the base ingredients.
Ye Xu had just bought the hot pot base that the shop used before. He was so hungry at the beginning that he didn't have the time to choose carefully and just searched for the brand he used to eat and placed an order.
The broth at that restaurant was alright, but Ye Xu felt he should be more demanding; having a cheat code meant he shouldn't waste it.
The system panel provides a fair and rigorous score for each product, considering only quality and disregarding other factors. Ye Xu previously used this scoring system to buy ingredients, selecting products scoring 90 points or higher and sorting them by price from low to high to find the best value for money.
After careful consideration, Ye Xu discovered that the prices of items scoring 95 points weren't high, but those above 95 were too expensive and not worth buying. Therefore, he focused on items scoring 95 points. The next step was simply to select the lowest price based on the ranking, which was straightforward, and he quickly found a supplier.
There are countless suppliers, and even if one has a problem, a replacement can be found quickly, so there's no need to stockpile inventory just in case. Ye Xu nodded in satisfaction, thinking that the system was indeed somewhat useful; this procurement panel was quite good.
After purchasing the base ingredients, Ye Xu officially began his soup delivery service. He also had the robot employees help cook a pot of tomato base on the stove, so that if the event outside was popular, a replacement pot could be delivered in time.
The soup pot that was taken out boiled in no time, and its sweet and sour aroma wafted out and traveled far along the open door.
The aroma was so enticing that even though Ye Xu had just eaten his fill, his mouth watered again. He couldn't resist picking up his bowl and taking a spoonful to taste it, only to be stunned by the flavor.
The broth, which scores 95 points or higher, is truly amazing, completely crushing the previous restaurant I ate there!
If Ye Xu remembered correctly, the previous score was 83. A difference of only 12 points felt like an eternity.
—Food anime is real; when you eat the most delicious food, you really feel like you can take off and your whole body is bubbling with excitement.
Shuangshuang didn't dare to speak, afraid that if she opened her mouth, saliva would drip down. She loved tomato hot pot the most, and she couldn't stand the aroma.
"Here you go." Ye Xu quickly ladled a bowl for her and placed it at the cashier, letting her drink it slowly. He then changed the sign that read "Grand Opening Tomorrow" to "Free Soup Giveaway."
Just as Ye Xu was about to put the revised sign at the entrance, he turned around and saw that a group of people had already gathered around the tomato hot pot, drawn by the aroma. Seeing Ye Xu looking over, they asked repeatedly, "Boss, what kind of soup is this? It smells amazing!"
Fat sheep? No, the customer has arrived so quickly.
Chapter 10 Busy and Chaotic
"This is tomato soup." Ye Xu quickly put up a sign at the door and went over to introduce it. "You can drink it directly, or you can add fresh ingredients to it and cook them. After the ingredients are coated with the soup, it tastes very delicious and is perfect for eating on a cold day."
The guests were already eager for the aroma of the soup pot, and upon hearing this description, they could hardly contain their excitement and couldn't wait to taste it.
Seeing this, Ye Xu ladled out a bowl of soup and handed it over: "Today, the store is having a promotion. Everyone, whether they dine in or not, can have a free bowl of hot soup to warm themselves up. Our store has just opened, and we're not sure if everyone will like the soup. We'd like to ask for your feedback."
After hearing this, everyone who had drunk the soup was seen as a helpful bystander offering feedback on the taste, rather than someone trying to save money and take advantage of the situation. The customer was indeed very pleased, readily accepted the soup, and eagerly took a sip.
The boiling tomato soup was still a bit hot, but this guest was clearly not afraid of getting burned. It was probably a habit formed after the cold snap; food cooled down quickly if not eaten immediately after cooking, and over time, everyone's tolerance for heat had greatly improved.
Ye Xu didn't say anything discouraging like "eating food that's too hot can easily cause esophageal cancer." It's best not to be too intimate with someone you've just met, especially since there's no such thing as cancer these days, and nobody would believe it anyway.
Ye Xu waited a while, wanting to hear the guest's opinion. But the guest had no time for idle chatter, holding the bowl and drinking one sip after another, unable to stop. Finally, after finishing the small bowl of soup, he let out a long sigh, feeling warm and comfortable all over.
"It's so delicious!" the customer exclaimed.
Ye Xu smiled and briefly mentioned that "hot ingredients taste better," then said nothing more. Over-promoting might offend customers; their appetites were already whetted, so there was no need to rush.
Perhaps worried about the price, the first customer hesitated after hearing Ye Xu's words, standing there holding his bowl, unsure whether to come in and eat. While he lingered, several more people entered, and Ye Xu quickly handed them hot soup and began to introduce the restaurant again.
That's the downside of fresh food; you have to explain it to every new customer. Ye Xu began to realize the importance of service robots; if he had to handle all the new customers himself, his voice would definitely be hoarse in less than three days.
The new customer repeated the first person's actions, burying his head in his soup and gulping it down. He finished, still wanting more, but hesitated to sit down and order. The soup was so delicious, and the restaurant was so luxuriously decorated; it was clear the food wasn't cheap. At this hour, no wealthy people were out and about; everyone was struggling financially.
Ye Xu sighed inwardly. If things continued like this, he would have to enlarge the menu and hang it at the door. In the current situation, he couldn't just tell people, "We have cheap food in our shop," because that would make the customers seem stingy and would embarrass them.
After thinking for a moment, Ye Xu called over the dishwasher who had finished her work to help her serve the soup. Although Qiu Yi was a professional dishwasher and didn't know how to entertain guests, she could still handle serving soup.
With the robot's assistance, Ye Xu was freed from the table. He walked to the signboard by the door and added a line, specifying the price of the soup base.
The soup base isn't expensive; everyone can afford it. Once customers see the price of the soup, they should have a better idea of the overall cost and know that the ingredients won't be too pricey either. Even if they are expensive, only some ingredients will be; it's impossible for every ingredient to be exorbitantly priced.
Most customers who saw the new information promptly chose to sit down. There were only eight empty tables in the restaurant, making everyone feel a sense of urgency, afraid that they wouldn't have a seat. Unlike other street food stalls, strangers cannot share tables at hot pot restaurants. Even if the natives of Transi Continent didn't know this kind of common sense, they could guess what was going on just by looking at the fact that there was only one place to put the pot on each table.
With several customers sitting down at once, the restaurant was suddenly short-staffed. Ye Xu and Shuangshuang quickly went to greet them and taught everyone how to use the ordering system as fast as possible, which finally gave them a slight respite.
Next, Shuangshuang volunteered to go to the kitchen to buy ingredients. Customer orders were directly summarized on the purchasing panel, saving a lot of trouble.
Having Shuangshuang as the purchasing agent wasn't enough for the kitchen, so Ye Xu transferred Qiuyi back to help use the skewer machine. It wasn't difficult; Xia poured all the prepared vegetables into the machine's chamber, and the machine automatically identified them and skewered them according to the appropriate quantities.
Since Qiu Yi only needed to pour the vegetables, its workload was very small, so Ye Xu also assigned it the task of rinsing the vegetables with clean water. It couldn't pick and peel the vegetables, and Xia Yi couldn't do that either, but Ye Xu was always busy.
There's no other way but to use up the last employee voucher I have ahead of time. None of the three cards currently available in the card-drawing interface are specifically for washing vegetables; I'll have to spend points to refresh them.
Fortunately, the free soup he gave away earlier brought Ye Xu some points; otherwise, he wouldn't even be able to accumulate 10 points from the refresh.
I don't know if my luck hasn't run out yet, but I got a vegetable washer on my first refresh. At this point, I don't care that it's an R-rank instead of an SR-rank; having an employee to help me wash vegetables is already pretty good.
Ye Xu had previously thought the shop was well-prepared and had enough staff, but now she realized that wasn't the case at all; the shop needed manpower everywhere. Looking back now, she realized how impressive it was that a small restaurant could be run smoothly by just a husband and wife.
Thankfully, I worked overtime tonight to entertain the guests and was able to catch up on any oversights. Tomorrow will definitely have even more guests, and the thought of being overwhelmed and disorganized then is utterly disastrous.
Considering the staff shortage, Ye Xu decided to stop accepting new customers once the restaurant had eight tables full. So, after the eighth customer sat down, he turned off the heater, went to retrieve the signboard, and closed the door. He then placed the signboard behind the glass door, changing the message to "Fully Booked".
A customer with a good order waiting for their food asked, "Boss, aren't you going to keep serving the soup?"
Ye Xu gave a wry smile: "The shop is short-staffed and can't keep up with the demand. I'll continue serving after all the dishes have been served to everyone."
It's freezing cold, so there's no way to make people wait in line; otherwise, he wouldn't have rushed to close the door and block out the aroma. He was just busy preparing the soup, and hadn't even had time to put the pot on the table of the first customer who sat down yet. The kitchen should have already prepared some of the dishes by now.
The busy store manager, who had no time to spare, turned around and went to the kitchen to get soup. As soon as he entered, he was overwhelmed by the pungent smell of onions and hurriedly bought a special mask from the store to put on.
This was originally intended for kitchen staff, to protect them and prevent droplets from contaminating their food. However, the robots here don't produce saliva, so they don't need the masks.
Without the onion problem, Ye Xu felt completely revitalized. He walked to the sterilizer, took out the cleaned pot, and remembered that Xia Yi had followed his instructions to cook a large pot of tomato soup.
The soup base was originally intended to support the soup delivery service outside, but before the first batch was even finished, the restaurant was already full. Fortunately, this batch of soup wouldn't go to waste; it could be poured directly into a pot and served to the customers.
Unfortunately, the staff didn't cook enough; they only filled two pots, leaving six empty. Seeing this, Shuangshuang quickly ordered tomato base and went to get a flour sieve.
With no one making noodles or pastries at the moment, the flour sieve, which was sitting idle, was put to good use to separate the ingredients and seasonings from the bottom of the pot. And you know what? It worked remarkably well. It fit perfectly in the pot, allowing you to pour the ingredients in, then remove the sieve—clean and done in one smooth motion.
Eight pots were quickly prepared. Ye Xu picked up one pot and took a couple of steps, then remembered something and quickly went back to put it down. He thought it would be better to pick out all the skewers the customers had ordered and put them into the pot before taking the pot out, otherwise he would have to run around with a bunch of skewers in a while.
"Shuangshuang, read out the order from the first customer."
Shuangshuang quickly opened the list on the panel and began to read: "Table 7, 20 skewers of potatoes, 10 skewers of onions..."
The finished skewers from the machine were sorted by type and placed on different plates by the dishwashers, making them easy to distinguish, though counting them was a pain. No wonder skewer restaurants display the skewers in the main dining area for customers to choose from.
Ye Xu's shop can't do that for now; if orders aren't placed through the ordering system, the self-checkout program won't work. He'll have to figure out a solution later.
How do other shops do it? It seems they weigh or count the skewers? If so, different ingredients would need different skewers, otherwise pricing would be uncontrollable. Alternatively, the portion size of each skewer could be adjusted, with meat and vegetables on one type of skewer and vegetables on another. Expensive ingredients would need to be ordered separately through a kiosk and delivered by a server.
This is just a preliminary idea; Ye Xu is still racking his brains counting the skewers. While counting, he wonders if the bamboo skewers in the machine are enough. He received 10,000 skewers as a gift with the machine purchase; if that's not enough, he'll have to buy more. One hundred skewers for one point—it's a bit pricey.
The bamboo skewers were all disposable, and Ye Xu couldn't bring himself to reuse them against his conscience. He planned to give the ones he had collected to the system's recycling center, even if the recycling price was only half of the retail price in the store.
Seeing that the manager was having difficulty counting, Qiu quickly went to help. After finally managing to gather enough orders for a table, the pot couldn't hold them all, and most of them ended up on plates.
Ye Xu first took the hot pot out, and then brought the remaining ingredients to the table one by one. Qiu Yi stayed backstage to continue counting the skewers; the robot wouldn't make mistakes, so Ye Xu only needed to carry the food.
Finally freed from this torment, Ye Xu breathed a long sigh of relief. Everyone says that working in the catering industry is exhausting, and he had experienced that firsthand when he worked part-time before, but this experience only deepened his understanding.
Fortunately, the customers didn't cause any trouble while dining, so Ye Xu didn't need to pay much attention. The restaurant seemed to have some spare capacity, so Ye Xu decided to continue the free soup promotion, with new customers able to queue for a table.
There probably wouldn't be many people willing to queue up so late at night, Ye Xu thought, his plan was simple: he just wanted to earn some points from passersby who drank the free soup. He hadn't expected to underestimate the allure of the 95-point soup base, and with the shop also heated, most customers were happy to stay and wait for a table.
There was no waiting area in the restaurant, so after consulting with the diners, Ye Xu arranged for everyone to share tables. Gradually, most of the tables were filled with people.
The customers who had nothing to eat stared at the diners, swallowing their saliva, which made the diners feel a little pressured and slightly regretful for having given in to their kindness by letting others sit down. But after being stared at with envious eyes for a while, they gradually got used to it and even felt a little pleasure in tempting others late at night.
They deliberately feigned ecstasy, eating slowly and deliberately to showcase the deliciousness of the food. Everyone watching felt an urge to punch them, but since they were complete strangers, they couldn't just make a move.
With the restaurant almost full, it looks like the customers who arrive later will have to wait a long time to get something to eat.
Ye Xu was a little worried and couldn't help but think of a good solution. After a moment, he had a flash of inspiration, went to the kitchen and took out a four-compartment pot, and walked to a table full of four people.
Chapter 11: The Routine
Ye Xu asked the three customers who were waiting in line for their food, "The restaurant has these four-compartment pots that can cook food for four people at the same time. Would you mind sharing one pot? That way, you won't have to wait in line individually, and you can eat together."
The three of them glanced at the pot; the baffle completely blocked the bottom, preventing any soup from leaking out. The temptation of not having to wait in line was too great, and without hesitation for more than a few seconds, they all nodded in agreement.
Seeing this, Ye Xu breathed a sigh of relief and gave one last reminder: "Then remember to use the ordering device in front of you to order, and put the copper coins in the small drawer in front of you when you pay the bill."
Ye Xu initially planned for the group to take turns ordering, with each person paying before the next person ordered. However, Shuangshuang told him that there was a small cash register drawer in front of each seat, so it wouldn't be so complicated.
This setting was originally intended for convenience, allowing customers to pay regardless of their seating position without needing to move. However, it can also be used to separate bills for individual payment. As the store manager's assistant, Shuangshuang has some permissions and can modify the store's existing procedures.
So Ye Xu had her separate the ordering devices for each table and attach them to a separate cash register drawer. This way, one table could be used as four tables, which was perfect.
After persuading one table of people, Ye Xu quickly went to other tables.
Most people agreed, and there was nothing Ye Xu could do about those who disagreed. He could only relocate the agreeing customers to other tables. For example, at the initial table, there were only three customers in line; they could easily add one more.
While Ye Xu was busy, new people kept coming in, and he had to go over and greet them every now and then. Fortunately, as time went by, the number of pedestrians on the road gradually decreased, and eventually there was no one left.
Finally, the evening's activities were over. Ye Xu put away the soup pot, clearing a table for the last few customers. At this time, the first group of diners paid their bills and left, and the second group of customers took their place, bringing the restaurant back to its busy period. Ye Xu ran back to the kitchen to help again.
The first wave had eight guests, but the second wave had almost four times that number, making the workload incomparable. Ye Xu felt that if he didn't hire more help, he would probably collapse from exhaustion.
I was just trying to gain some experience to level up when I opened the interface and was bombarded with all sorts of rewards.
Ye Xu almost forgot that entertaining just one table of guests had already raised him two or three levels, and now that he was entertaining so many guests, it was time to raise him again.
It was probably the first time they'd tasted such delicious new food, and many people couldn't resist ordering several portions of almost every ingredient. Some even added extra orders after experiencing the exceptional flavors, ordering quite a few of the more expensive vegetables. As a result, the in-game currency earned was substantial, making the points seem insignificant in comparison.
Ye Xu claimed all the rewards at once, successfully leveling up again. Getting employee vouchers without spending any money—how awesome!
Because he had plenty of points this time, Ye Xu didn't waste them like last time, having to set a hiring target immediately after only one refresh. This time, he gave himself 10 chances; if he didn't get an SR in 10 tries, he'd let it go.
Shuangshuang was busy placing orders and couldn't come over to watch, but she looked over from afar, glancing at the scene again and again, seemingly even more nervous than Ye Xu.
They really need help right now, preferably delivery drivers or servers. These two types of robots can help with a lot of work, from counting skewers to delivering food. If an SR robot is released, the pressure on the kitchen can be instantly reduced by half.
As the two waited in vain, the first refresh didn't yield an SR, the second didn't, and the third still didn't. Ye Xu remained remarkably calm; his composure remained intact as he calmly clicked the fourth refresh button.