Jiang Baichuan hadn't expected his nephew to get him such a big job after just one trip. He opened the door, both amused and exasperated, and told him to move the eggs into the yard first.
To pickle salted eggs, the eggs must be washed clean before pickling, so we have to use the school's water tank.
Fortunately, tomorrow is Friday. After Friday, there will be no classes on the weekend, giving Jiang Xiaoman plenty of time to do her thing. And they didn't just lend the space for free—Jiang Xiaoman also provided the school with seven large boxes of eggs nearing their expiration date!
"Uncle, let me use the kitchen this afternoon. Before school lets out, I'll cook two pots of tea eggs for everyone to take on the way." Jiang Xiaoman skillfully requisitioned the school kitchen, taking two boxes of eggs nearing their expiration date inside to prepare for making tea eggs.
Tea eggs are quick to make. First, wash the eggs and boil them until cooked. Then, take them out and crack the shells one by one. Next, add water, star anise, dark soy sauce, bay leaves, and the like.
There was no rock sugar in the school kitchen, so Jiang Xiaoman stole a few small jars of brown sugar from his uncle and threw them in. He also grabbed a handful of last year's stale tea and put it in. After boiling, he poured in an egg, turned on a low heat, and simmered it for an hour. When the firewood inside burned out, he didn't add any more firewood and just let it simmer using the residual heat of the charcoal fire.
This way, the tea eggs will still be warm when school lets out in the afternoon, and the flavor will have penetrated them, making them perfect for the children to take home and eat on their way home.
"Sister Chunhua is such a kind person! She said these were eggs nearing their expiration date, but the yolks weren't even broken yet, and a few were just overcooked." Jiang Xiaoman took out the overcooked and cracked eggs separately, made two bowls of brown sugar eggs, and shared them with his father.
After finishing the eggs, Jiang Xiaoman let his father rest at school for a while, and then rode his uncle's electric tricycle to town to buy salt for pickling eggs.
You can't use regular fine salt to make salted eggs; you have to use coarse salt. And this time, the quantity is large, so Jiang Xiaoman directly bought five large bags of loose coarse salt. A 50-kilogram bag of coarse salt only costs 55 yuan, which is much more cost-effective than buying small packages of fine salt.
He wouldn't waste any of the eggs; he had already arranged with Sister Chunhua that once the batch of eggs was pickled, she would keep a hundred hens for him, and he planned to pickle some more dried chickens to sell.
Although these cured chickens are not easy to sell in the city, they are quite popular in the towns and counties of their county. Jiang Xiaoman plans to carry them to the county to sell once they are cured.
Dragging five large bags of coarse salt back to school, the students had already gone home. Jiang Baichuan and two student teachers who had accompanied the students who lived far away hadn't returned either. His father was also busy; seeing that the manure pile at the school hadn't been touched for a long time, he took a large iron shovel and scooped out two baskets, and was now fertilizing the konjac plants growing by the wall.
While spreading fertilizer, he also criticized his brother, saying that he couldn't even farm properly after teaching. The konjac was so thin that it was even thinner than the ones he grew in the mountains. If this continued, how would they have any konjac tofu to eat at the end of the year?
Jiang Xiaoman was speechless for a moment, then quickly called his father over to help carry the coarse salt to the kitchen. The father and son took all the large wooden basins and stainless steel basins in the kitchen to the sink, one soaking and the other washing, and soon they had washed a large pile of eggs.
"Dad, can you dig up two baskets of yellow soil for me? I'll prepare the brine." Jiang Xiaoman stood up, rubbed his lower back, and told his father to stretch his legs too.
The most important part of making salted eggs is the brine; the flavor of the brine directly determines whether the pickled eggs taste good. Fortunately, his family was poor when he was a child (and still is now), and they couldn't afford to buy pre-pickled salted duck eggs. Jiang Xiaoman figured out several ways to pickle salted eggs on his own, but this time he plans to try two different flavors first.
Thinking about how he would sell these salted eggs online later, Jiang Xiaoman quickly went to the office to get the tripod and gimbal used by the school. He set up his phone and prepared to shoot a video of making salted eggs, and at the same time, do some pre-sales promotion. This was a sales skill he learned while working part-time at a supermarket when he was in college. Usually, supermarkets would do some pre-sales promotion before promotional activities, such as issuing some coupons through social media, or doing a lucky draw.
Jiang Xiaoman also plans to hold a giveaway in the comments section. The prizes are all ready-made, including salted eggs he made himself. This is a way to give back to his fans and also to promote his own salted eggs.
Chapter 76
There was a small hillside with loess soil next to the school. Jiang Youliang carried a load of loess soil to dig up two baskets and poured them into a large basin. Jiang Xiaoman prepared the brine. One basin contained the original flavor, with only coarse salt added. He planned to make the other basin with five-spice and oily brine.
"Let me share my family's method for making salted eggs. This is a traditional rural method. We mix coarse salt evenly with loess, and then pour in cooled boiled water. Here's a crucial point: never use tap water to pickle salted eggs. Trust me, the salted eggs will smell terrible!" Jiang Xiaoman skillfully explained to the camera.
"Stir clockwise like this. If you find it dirty, you can use a small shovel for gardening or a rolling pin. After stirring evenly, drop the washed and air-dried eggs one by one into the mud, roll them evenly in a layer of yellow mud, and then you can put them into jars."
"If you're just eating them at home, you can put them directly into the jar. But here, to make it easier to pack and ship them later, I plan to wrap each one individually with plastic wrap. That way, I can unwrap them as needed and only open a few at a time without getting my hands dirty."
Jiang Xiaoman and his father had a clear profit-sharing arrangement. He was in charge of pickling the eggs, while his father, who was skilled with his hands, was responsible for wrapping the pickled eggs one by one with plastic wrap and then putting them into the large bamboo basket they wove themselves.
"Here, I marinate the eggs first and then seal them with plastic wrap, so you can put them directly in this kind of bamboo basket. Well, the main problem is that my family is poor and can't afford to buy so many large jars for pickling eggs. If you're making them at home, you can buy those small jars, put the pickled eggs directly into the jars, and then seal them with the remaining mud. The taste will be the same if you do it this way."
The pickling process is rather tedious, so to avoid running out of footage for later editing, Jiang Xiaoman habitually started sharing his "money-saving methods" for managing daily life on a tight budget with netizens in front of the camera.
“The big vats for pickling vegetables in our town, yes, the kind used for pickling sauerkraut in Northeast China, cost 120 yuan each! Goodness! If I were to actually buy one of those vats to pickle eggs, the cost of the vat would be higher than the cost of the eggs.”
“I don’t use this jar to pickle sauerkraut and bamboo shoots at home. Let me tell you, you can go to the second-hand market and buy those big plastic buckets for thirty yuan each. I bought six at once. Then buy those thick plastic bags that you used to carry quilts for eight mao each. Put them inside the bucket and put two layers inside. They won’t smell bad. After you finish eating, just throw away the plastic bags and wash the inside of the bucket. It’s super convenient!”
"I didn't expect to buy so many eggs on my way down the mountain today. I plan to pickle some first. I borrowed my uncle's bamboo basket to put them in, and I'll go back up the mountain tomorrow to get plastic buckets to pickle them. Don't complain about the plastic buckets being unhealthy. My eggs are already covered with a thick layer of mud, and then wrapped with two layers of plastic wrap. Actually, it doesn't matter where you pickle them. External bacteria can't get in, let alone plastic pollution."
After explaining the food safety issue to netizens, Jiang Xiaoman suddenly realized that he would need to undergo a food safety test before selling food online. He immediately wrote this down and planned to pickle a small jar of samples for testing. Once he received the test certificate, he could put the food on the shelves for sale.
Speaking of this, Jiang Xiaoman thought of the local honey he had sold on his WeChat Moments that didn't have a testing report. Although it was sold on a small scale and mostly by acquaintances, the risk was actually quite high. Luckily, he didn't get sick from eating it. It seems that he will have to get a testing report when the new honey from his home comes in.
After pickling two boxes of eggs, and seeing that it was getting dark and Jiang Baichuan and the others should be back soon, Jiang Xiaoman wiped her hands and prepared to go inside to cook.
When he came over just now, Fang Xingchen and Chu Mengluan gave him those little glances. Tsk! They've probably been tortured by his uncle's boiled dishes these past few days. After all, he's the one who lured these two over, so it wouldn't be right to leave them to be tortured like this by their uncle.
Before it got dark, Jiang Xiaoman took a vegetable basket and a machete to the vegetable garden. At this time of year, there were quite a few edible vegetables in the garden. Seeing that there were quite a few eggplants, Jiang Xiaoman picked three large eggplants, dozens of green peppers, five cucumbers, a few loofahs, a few ripe tomatoes, and chopped a cabbage. That would be enough for the five of them.
First, wash the rice and put it in the pot. Then, wash about ten long, red sweet potatoes and place them around the edge of the pot. This way, the side of the sweet potatoes closest to the pot will develop a crispy skin, which makes them especially delicious.
Prepare the main dish, place the bamboo steamer rack on the pot, put a few eggplants along the edge of the pot, then wash a few red potatoes and put them on as well, leaving a large empty space in the middle. Crack six eggs, add salt, soybean oil, a little lard and light soy sauce, stir well, pour in hot water, stir well again, sprinkle a layer of chopped green onions, cover with a layer of plastic wrap, and poke some air holes in a bamboo strip. This way, the steamed egg custard will look nice and taste delicious.
He put the lid on the pot and asked his father to help light the fire and cook the rice. He then started preparing the dishes for dinner: a cucumber salad, a bowl of tomato and egg soup, a stir-fried loofah with eggs, a tiger-skin green pepper, and a dry-pot hand-torn cabbage.
Once the rice is cooked, uncover the pot and use a spatula to scoop the steamed eggplant and potatoes into a large bowl. Then, put a few older chilies into the charcoal fire to roast briefly, take them out, brush off the ash, and mash them together with minced garlic. Place the mashed chilies on top of the eggplant and potatoes. Finally, heat the soybean oil, add a few peppercorns to sauté until fragrant, pour it over the eggplant, and quickly mix well. This makes a perfect summer dish: roasted chili eggplant.
Jiang Xiaoman learned how to make this dish by looking at his phone. Later, he tried adding steamed potatoes and found that it tasted pretty good. His dad also loved it, so this dish has now become a staple on their family's summer dinner table.
"Ahhh, Brother Xiaoman, did you cook? That's great! I'm starving o(╥﹏╥)o" Fang Xingchen rushed over, deeply moved, and sniffed the aroma of the food in the air, feeling as if his soul had been redeemed.
Chu Mengluan was also moved to tears as she leaned over the kitchen doorway.
Since coming to Langshan to teach, Chu Mengluan has never suffered from insomnia again.
She used to often post sentimental updates on her WeChat Moments about gazing at the moon with melancholy or being sleepless at night. Now, just the two round trips up and down the mountain road to take students home every day have exhausted all her energy.
What's even more tragic is that Jiang Baichuan is utterly inhuman!
They've all worked so hard. At lunchtime, they can at least have some egg drop soup with the students, but by evening, when it's just the three of them left at school, wow! They either reheat their lunch and make do, or they tear off a few vegetable leaves, wash a dozen potatoes, and make potato rice. He doesn't even dare to add any cured meat! He only gives each of them two spoonfuls of his homemade chili sauce at mealtimes…
Even electronics factory owners wouldn't dare mistreat assembly line workers like that anymore, okay?
Fang Xingchen and Chu Mengluan now pray silently every day in the direction of Jiang Xiaoman's home, hoping that their Xiaoman brother can "occasionally" come to the school to cook them a meal with meat when he goes down the mountain to run errands!
However, they are destined to be disappointed today.
Perhaps wary of Jiang Xiaoman's influence, Jiang Baichuan had somehow hidden the cured meat that was originally in the kitchen. Since Jiang Xiaoman couldn't find the cured meat, she could only use the ingredients she had on hand to prepare an egg feast for them.
When a pile of lush green vegetables was placed on the table, even netizens couldn't help but feel sorry for them.
Fortunately, Jiang Xiaoman was an excellent cook and was generous with the amount of oil she used. So even though it was just vegetarian dishes and eggs, Fang Xingchen and Chu Mengluan were so moved by the food that they almost shed tears.
Both are potatoes, but Jiang Baichuan's boiled potatoes are almost like pig feed, while Jiang Xiaoman's braised chili peppers with eggplant and potatoes are fragrant and spicy, and taste especially good when mixed with rice.
The steamed egg custard was golden and tender. Although the hand-torn cabbage didn't contain meat, he added some pork cracklings, making it incredibly fragrant. The tiger-skin green peppers and stir-fried loofah with eggs were also delicious. After a satisfying meal, a bowl of tomato and egg soup would be the perfect way to enjoy a meal while teaching in a rural area.
At this moment, both Fang Xingchen and Chu Mengluan, two city kids who had been pampered since childhood, felt for the first time the importance of learning to cook. After all, parents and takeout might not be reliable, and when it really matters, you still have to know how to cook for yourself!
After the meal, the two student teachers reciprocated by offering to help Jiang Xiaoman wash the eggs. The washed eggs were to be air-dried naturally, washed again that evening, and then pickled the next morning.
After washing more than a dozen boxes of eggs, everyone was exhausted. Jiang Youliang had already gone home to feed the pigs. Jiang Xiaoman would stay at the school tonight. Tomorrow, his father would bring down the bamboo baskets and plastic buckets for pickling the eggs. It would take them two days to pickle all the eggs.
"Brother Xiaoman, so you've been at school these past two days?" Fang Xingchen looked at him with a surprised expression.
"Okay! You guys help me wash the eggs tomorrow morning. I'll go to the market in town first to buy some meat, and then I'll buy two chickens for us to eat. We can't rely on my uncle for this, otherwise we can just have another whole egg feast." Jiang Xiaoman was very disgusted by Jiang Baichuan's act of secretly hiding the cured meat.
He has made so many contributions to the school, doesn't he deserve to eat a couple of pieces of cured meat?
Besides, the school's video account is starting to make money now. Although it's not much, it should be enough to buy meat, right?
"Hey! Don't even mention the money in the account. The principal said that all that money should be saved up, and during the winter break, we'll hire workers to tear down and rebuild this kitchen, and then buy some materials to renovate the second floor and make two dorm rooms." Fang Xingchen didn't realize that his tone was already full of admiration.
Although he and Chu Mengluan had been eating vegetarian food with Jiang Baichuan for days and were practically becoming immortals, they were still willing to eat vegetarian food because they knew that Jiang Baichuan had saved up money not for himself, but to repair the canteen and dormitory for the children.
Chu Mengluan even discussed with him that after the teaching stint ended, they could take the footage they had taken in Langshan back to the school and hold a fundraising event to raise as much money as they could, which would also be a way to contribute to building a cafeteria for the school.
"Forget it! We have to rely on ourselves to eat meat! Don't worry about this. Tomorrow you guys help me wash the eggs, and I'll treat you to meat." Jiang Xiaoman made the decision.
In any case, in the countryside, you have to provide meals when you hire someone to help with chores, so Jiang Baichuan didn't dare to say anything if he bought more meat and vegetables.
Chapter 77
The next morning, Jiang Xiaoman rode Jiang Baichuan's electric tricycle, carrying two woven bags, to the town market.
I miscalculated yesterday and didn't buy enough coarse salt. I need to buy three more bags today.
After buying the salt, I went to buy a few pounds of pork belly and a large piece of lard. I saw some fish farmers selling farmed black carp for 4.5 yuan a pound, so I bought two of them.
On the way back, they even made a detour to the chicken farm to buy chickens from Shan Chunhua.
Chicken is really cheap these days. A whole, un-slaughtered, factory-farmed chicken is only four yuan per pound, which is even less expensive than silver carp.
Jiang Xiaoman bought two chickens for only fifty yuan, but Shan Chunhua forcibly threw two more roosters that wouldn't lay eggs into the car.
"Consider it a gift from your sister-in-law. Take it and kill it for your uncle to eat. Your uncle is a good man. If it weren't for him, the children in our area would have difficulty even going to school!" Shan Chunhua had great respect for Jiang Baichuan.
Great! We have meat, fish, and chicken. Our meals for the next couple of days will be perfect.
When I got back to school, I saw Jiang Baichuan also getting up to help wash the eggs. The yard was full of eggs in basins of all sizes.
Fang Xingchen and Chu Mengluan sat on small stools eating sweet potato porridge, which Jiang Xiaoman had casually cooked when she got up that morning.
"Hey, eat slowly. I bought fried dough sticks and sugar-coated fried dough balls, as well as fried glutinous rice cakes and chive dumplings." Jiang Xiaoman parked the car and carried several breakfast items into the kitchen.
There are no breakfast vendors in the village, so if they want to eat breakfast, they have to ride their bikes to the market to buy it.
Today happened to be market day, and Jiang Xiaoman bought a little of everything to bring back. Anyway, there are many of them, so they won't have to worry about not being able to finish it all.
In the past, Chu Mengluan would never have eaten high-calorie breakfasts like sugar-coated glutinous rice balls and fried glutinous rice cakes.
After Jiang Baichuan's lavish boiled meal, Chu Mengluan felt that she could easily devour half a plate of pork cracklings without batting an eye, having gone without eating much oil or fat for several days.
After breakfast, the group got busy.
Many hands make light work, and they finished washing and pickling half of the eggs in one morning.
Actually, pickling eggs isn't difficult; the most important thing is preparing the brine, which is handled by Jiang Xiaoman.
Jiang Youliang was responsible for carrying loess and mixing the prepared brine with the loess to make mud.
Jiang Baichuan and two intern teachers were responsible for rolling the dried eggs in the plastic wrap before wrapping them up.
With five people working on an assembly line, it looks like it won't take two days, at most one day, to finish.
"How about we slow down? Otherwise, when Xiaoman goes home tomorrow, we'll have to eat the principal's boiled vegetables again," Fang Xingchen whispered to Chu Mengluan.
"You just realized that? Oh dear, I need to go have some tea and rest." Chu Mengluan stood up, rubbed her lower back, and slipped into her office to drink tea and enjoy the breeze from the electric fan for a while.
It's too hot; even fairies can't bask in the sun.
"I'm going to the toilet too, and I'll feed the pigs." Fang Xingchen also went off to slack off.
"Uncle, why don't you go and rest for a bit? I'll go cook." Jiang Xiaoman stood up, grabbed the little rooster that Shan Chunhua had given to her uncle, and went to kill it.
Although it's called a young rooster, it actually weighs over four pounds. This kind of chicken doesn't lay eggs, so it's probably raised by Shan Chunhua for her own consumption. We'll save the chicken blood and use it to make a stir-fried chicken giblets with green peppers later. We'll chop the chicken meat into pieces and cut half a bowl of potatoes to make a potato and chicken stew.
Cut the black carp head down three fingers' width, then cut the carp head in half. While cooking rice, steam a fish head with chopped chili peppers. Cut the fish body into pieces and braise it. Add the konjac tofu they brought with them, and it's absolutely delicious.
There wasn't time to cook the pork belly and lard at noon, so Jiang Xiaoman wrapped them tightly in a plastic bag, threw them into the spring behind the mountain, weighed them down with a large rock, and planned to clean them up after finishing her work in the evening.