Chapter 57: Engel Knows Jack Shit About Food

Chapter 57: Chapter 57: Engel Knows Jack Shit About Food

Seeing that Chen Jingle wasn’t very interested, his eldest uncle added, "You remember Guang Wu from our village, right, Sis? His son and daughter-in-law opened a breakfast shop near City Seventh Primary School. Now they’ve bought a house and a car, and the whole family has moved to the city. They only come back to the village occasionally for the holidays. So, you see, even though a breakfast shop might not look like much, it’s actually very profitable."

Chen Jingle felt somewhat helpless listening to this. Breakfast shops could make money, but it was purely hard-earned cash. An average person really couldn’t handle it. You had to get up at three or four in the morning to prepare and open the doors by five. For someone like him who slept until six, he probably wouldn’t open for business until seven. It would be a miracle if he could make that work. His eldest uncle and the others meant well, but unfortunately, their perspective was limited. Often, good intentions didn’t necessarily translate to actual help.

His youngest uncle was a bit better in this regard.

"The economy hasn’t been great these past two years, so the food and beverage industry is tough," his youngest uncle chimed in. "Even if the food tastes good, people’s consumption levels have downgraded, so they’ll consider the price. Steamed buns that cost a few bucks a piece probably won’t sell well around here. If you set the price too low, you lose money. If it’s too high, customers will complain it’s too expensive. And if you use frozen ingredients, the taste will be lacking. If you really want to do this, don’t open a shop right away. Set up a stall first to test the waters."

They chimed in one after another, talking as if Chen Jingle were actually about to open a restaurant.

Not long after, his second aunt arrived, and everyone pitched in to prepare lunch. Chen Jingle also helped out. Relying on his skillful techniques, he quickly helped prep the ingredients. As for being the head chef, he could forget about it. In front of his eldest uncle, a major task like manning the stove wasn’t his turn to handle unless it was during the New Year when they were too busy to cope.

There weren’t many people today, so they only prepared one table with eight dishes and a soup. With the ingredients prepped, cooking didn’t actually take much time. Therefore, lunch was served just after eleven o’clock.

At this time, the potato and beef stew that Chen Jingle had brought in takeout containers once again won everyone’s endless praise.

"I now think Jingle doesn’t need to open a breakfast shop. If he opens a fast-food joint in front of a school and just makes this potato and beef stew—only selling this—he could make a fortune!" his eldest uncle started offering ideas again.

The key was that everyone strongly agreed.

"It’s really fragrant and delicious. It’s much better than what restaurants and hotels make out there."

"Those hotels nowadays are too perfunctory with their cooking; they’re just scamming people. Last time at so-and-so’s daughter’s wedding, they said it was two thousand a table, but a lot of people didn’t even get full."

"It’s all a sham, just fooling around!"

"That’s why opening a shop with this potato and beef stew could really take off. It’s just that beef isn’t cheap around here. If it could be made into a pork version of potato stew, that would be great."

Originally, Chen Jingle had braced himself for being interrogated and pressured into marriage by his elders. Instead, from beginning to end, everyone just discussed food. He breathed a sigh of relief. Sure enough, nothing in the world was more important than eating! To ordinary folks, there was nothing more important than filling their stomachs.

After eating at his eldest uncle’s house, Chen Jingle left first.

He still had another gathering to attend at home. He rode his electric scooter swiftly, twisting the throttle to full speed.

When he returned to his second uncle’s house, his eldest aunt saw him and immediately beamed. "Oh, the young master has finally appeared! I was going to bring some things over to your place, but Sister Xiu said you weren’t home."

Chen Jingle wasn’t annoyed and cheerfully greeted her. "Hi, Eldest Aunt. I just went over to my eldest uncle’s place. By the way, did you come alone or...?"

"Yun Sheng tagged along too. Your uncle went to haul some goods, and she refused to stay home alone."

Hearing the conversation, his younger cousin, Lu Yunsheng, came out of the house and shyly greeted him. Chen Jingle smiled and waved his hand.

"Where’s Youngest Aunt? Is she here yet?"

"She’s upstairs supervising Li Wenrui and Chen Qiyun while they do their homework."

Hearing this, Chen Jingle facepalmed. His youngest aunt was a typical tiger parent. Couldn’t the homework wait until tomorrow? Today was a holiday, after all.

"We just tasted those sauce-marinated meat buns you made. They’re seriously delicious," his eldest aunt leaned in and whispered. "How did you make them? Teach me."

Chen Jingle didn’t hide his secrets. "Sure. Other than the meat filling, it’s pretty much like making normal bread. The meat filling is just the standard way of making sauce-marinated meat. You can even just make this meat to eat at home normally."

He rattled off a whole bunch of instructions.

His eldest aunt hurriedly interrupted him. "Hey, I can’t remember all that. How about you write it down?"

"Uh, alright. I’ll write up a digital tutorial with the steps and send it to your WeChat."

"That works!"

Chen Jingle strolled over to the kitchen to take a peek. "Second Uncle, is there anything else I can help with?"

Chen Jingle’s second uncle was the short and chubby type. If he stood next to Chen Jingle’s father, they would look exactly like a comedy duo of fat and skinny monks. Back in their hometown, it was basically the men who cooked during holidays and festivals. His second uncle’s culinary skills were strictly average—passable when it came to home-style cooking.

His second uncle glanced at him. "We’re still missing the garlic sprouts stir-fried with meat and the stir-fried rice noodles. Do you want to take over?"

"Sure, I’ll do it. You go take a break," Chen Jingle said, accepting the task.

"Oh, looks like you’re quite confident. I’ll leave it to you then."

Although his second uncle had never seen Chen Jingle cook, thinking of those delicious meat buns and the mouthwatering potato and beef stew, he decided to trust him this once. The worst that could happen was a failure. It wasn’t a big deal. As long as it wasn’t completely inedible, it would be fine.

"Is there any beef?" Chen Jingle wanted to make dry stir-fried rice noodles with beef.

"Where would I get that? Your grandparents don’t like beef, so I rarely buy it."

"What about lean pork? Rice noodles without meat just feel like they’re missing something."

"There’s some in the fridge. I’ll get it for you."

His second uncle waddled out of the kitchen, his little paunch leading the way. The refrigerator was kept in a first-floor room of the main house. At the same time, he shouted, "Sister Xiu, come help scoop the soup! We’re getting ready to eat."

"Oh, coming!"

Chen Xiuyun and Lin Yaoheng, those two rascals, had actually run off to the vegetable patch, doing who knew what. They came skipping back. Seeing Chen Jingle wielding a spatula in front of the stove, Chen Xiuyun instantly burst into laughter. "Wow, Student Chen Jingle, you’re cooking?"

"Yeah, is there a problem?"

"No, no. Looks like we’re going to have a few more delicious dishes."

"They’re just average. I’m just throwing something together. Where did you two run off to?"

"We were looking at the vegetables, thinking about how many to pick and take with us later," Chen Xiuyun said with a grin.

Geez, was she here to restock her inventory or something?

"Hurry up and come help set the table!" his second uncle urged again.

Chen Xiuyun shouted as she ran over, "Coming, coming!"

Unsurprisingly, Lin Yaoheng followed her to help.

With the final dish of stir-fried rice noodles with lean pork coming out of the wok, it was steaming hot and full of wok hei.

Done!

"Time to eat!"

Hearing this, everyone couldn’t wait and hurriedly grabbed their seats.

The young and old of the family totaled twelve people, sitting around a table completely filled with dishes. Since there were more people, there were also a few more dishes than at his eldest uncle’s place.

There was the most classic and indispensable white-cut chicken, the essential steamed leopard coral grouper and boiled prawns for major holidays. There were also braised pig trotters with peanuts that his second aunt had learned to make online, crispy roast pork belly made in the oven sponsored by Chen Xiuyun, the potato and beef stew brought by Chen Jingle, the garlic sprout stir-fried pork and lean pork rice noodles he had cooked himself, as well as a rich, slow-simmered soup that had been brewing on the wood-fired stove for two hours, among other things.

They were home-style dishes, but their flavors were far from ordinary.

Smelling the overflowing aroma, Chen Qiyun had an intoxicated expression on her face. "This is absolutely amazing, bro!"

This meal was definitely the most sumptuous one she had eaten all year! It wasn’t just about the number of dishes, but the fact that Chen Jingle had personally cooked several of them. Coupled with what her parents had made—which, although not as good as Chen Jingle’s, was still passable—today, she absolutely had to stuff herself until she was satisfied! As for the few sauce-marinated meat buns she had eaten earlier? That was just a warm-up for her stomach!

Although the income level of the people in the non-Pearl River Delta region of Lingnan wasn’t high, they were truly willing to spend money on food.

Some people always brought up the Engel coefficient, but the problem was, had old Engel ever eaten anything good? Could he even begin to comprehend the Eight Great Culinary Traditions of China? He definitely wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation of a 100-minus-50 discount on a two-person buffet combo! Did they really think that ordinary Chinese folks gnawed on dry bread every day like people overseas?

Just looking at those bland Western meals made Chen Jingle feel full. To put it bluntly, his grandparents’ dog, Big Yellow, was eating better today than those international students studying abroad.

The older generation might still be used to frugality, carefully planning what vegetables and how much meat to eat each day. Chen Jingle’s mindset, on the other hand, was much more radical. He bought whatever he wanted to eat. Whether it was fish, shrimp, crab, chicken, duck, goose, beef, mutton, or pork—as long as it pleased him and he wanted to eat it, he would. He wondered why he would eat the same things as before when he was already making his own money. Wouldn’t that mean he had earned all that money for nothing?!

"Wait a minute, let me take a picture first!" Chen Xiuyun shouted loudly.

"Boooo!"

This drew a chorus of boos from everyone. Before the booing even finished, his eldest aunt, youngest aunt, and second aunt also took out their phones one after another.

"Okay, all done."

Everyone picked up their chopsticks, full of endless praise. Among all the dishes, the one that received the highest praise was naturally Chen Jingle’s potato and beef stew. After all, potatoes were never bad no matter how they were cooked. After fully absorbing the aroma of the beef, the chemical reaction between the starch and the meat’s fragrance far exceeded a simple one plus one equals two.

In a word: phenomenal!

Chen Qiyun fiercely picked up food and shoveled rice into her mouth, so much so that her second aunt looked at her with a strange expression. Was this still her usual picky and anorexic youngest daughter?

Chen Jingle smiled as he watched this harmonious scene at the dining table, silently sipping his cordyceps black-bone chicken soup.

Occasionally acting as a chef seemed... not too bad at all.