Chapter 1369 - 538: Lamb Offal Soup and White Water Lamb Head! Lunar New Year’s Eve Arrives, Preparing the Reunion Dinner!

Chapter 1369: Chapter 538: Lamb Offal Soup and White Water Lamb Head! Lunar New Year’s Eve Arrives, Preparing the Reunion Dinner!

"Xu Baobao, what pairs well with sheep offal soup?"

After cleaning the sheep intestines, stomach, and other offal with flour, Shen Jiayue hopped into the kitchen, holding a stick of candied haws with walnut fillings.

Lin Xu wiped his hands and responded:

"Usually it goes well with flatbread; if you’re not particular, you could have it with dense dough pan cake or naan. What do you want to eat?"

Shen Jiayue offered Lin Xu a bite of the candied haws before saying:

"I don’t mind; I’m not hungry yet. Yuanyuan asked me to go boating, saying it’s good for digestion. We’re planning to try, so we can eat more sheep offal in the afternoon."

"Be careful, don’t fall into the water."

"I won’t. There were flood rumors years ago, so my dad got someone to teach me kayaking. I’m good both on and under the water."

She fed Lin Xu another piece of candied haws, then went boating with Chen Yuanyuan.

Lin Xu put the cleaned sheep stomach and intestines into a pot of cold water, added strong liquor and scallion and ginger to blanch, trying to remove the offal odor as much as possible.

In the yard, Chen Meijuan reopened the oil pan from lunchtime and prepared to fry some festive treats.

She had actually fried a batch in the morning, including dried tofu, large chunks of roast meat, pork ribs, fish pieces, and such, but some meatballs still needed to be fried separately.

The old lady likes glass noodle meatballs, Lin Hongqi prefers mung bean flour meatballs, Lin Xu enjoys meat meatballs, and there are also sweet potato meatballs, radish meatballs, tofu meatballs, etc.

It’s New Year, so the food needs to be thoroughly prepared.

The blanched offal boiled, first skimming off the foam with a spoon, then fishing it out and cleaning it with warm water.

After blanching, the smell was much reduced.

Lin Xu switched to a new pot of water, added the sheep intestines and stomach, added scallion and ginger, then added peppercorns, Sichuan peppercorns, Angelica dahurica, galangal, and cardamom to start simmering.

To make sheep offal, you need to cook the offal thoroughly first, then put it into the mutton soup for further cooking.

If you simply put raw offal into the mutton soup, it would impart an odor to the soup.

Among the offal, sheep lungs and liver don’t tolerate cooking for long, so they need to be added last. Typically, once the intestines and stomach are cooked through, the liver and lungs are added, then cooked for about fifteen more minutes before serving.

While the offal was being cooked, Lin Xu took two sheep heads that he chopped off in the morning and went to the yard, using a blowtorch to burn the wool.

Traditional sheep offal soup includes sheep head meat, but Lin Xu felt it would be a waste to just boil it in the soup, so he planned to prepare it into a traditional Beijing delicacy—White Water Lamb Head.

This dish is similar to sauced mutton, but sauced mutton is thinly sliced and dipped in sauce, while White Water Lamb Head is thinly sliced and sprinkled with pepper and salt.

Because the sheep head is eaten with skin, it has a chewy texture and is fragrant and delicious, a food that many people remember fondly.

The sheep head was completely burned black and soaked in warm water for a while, in order to thoroughly clean the exterior black soot.

At this moment, the sweet potato meatballs were fried, Lin Xu washed his hands, picked one up to taste, and couldn’t help but say:

"These freshly fried meatballs are the best."

Chen Meijuan was busy and said:

"Don’t just eat by yourself, call Yueyue over to eat together. You’re married now, you should think about your wife, don’t always act like as long as you’re full, the whole family isn’t hungry."

Lin Xu chuckled:

"She went boating with Yuanyuan. She ate a full lunch and had date cake and candied haws, she can’t eat anything now."

"Boating now? Be careful, with thick winter clothing, even a swimmer might not be able to move if they fall in the water."

Winter clothes are highly absorbent, falling in the water can quickly soak in dozens of pounds of water.

This weight increases the body’s burden, combined with panic and hypothermia, even someone skilled in swimming might end up capsized in the gutter.

Chen Meijuan’s reminder brought Lin Xu back to his senses; he was about to head to the reservoir to remind them, only to find Dundun was nowhere to be seen.

Just then, Han Shuzhen returned with Old Lady Shen after a stroll outside, speaking as she entered the farmer’s yard:

"I was holding Dundun while strolling, and Yueyue insisted on taking it boating. This girl has become more daring since getting married."

Lin Xu: ??????

Dundun’s involved?

Then I’m relieved.

With Dundun on the boat, the chances of capsizing approach zero.

My clever baby has learned well, using Dundun to enhance their fortune.

Nice, better than my sister-in-law!

He picked up an empty bowl, served some freshly fried meatballs for his mother-in-law and Old Lady Shen to taste, then went to clean the sheep head.

He cleaned the black soot from the sheep head’s surface, then used a small brush to clean areas like the ears, mouth, and even nasal cavity thoroughly.

Once cleaned, he took a knife and made an incision from the sheep’s skull all the way to the tip of its nose.

The purpose of this is twofold: it facilitates faster cooking and allows the sheep skin to retract during cooking, naturally exposing the skull, making bone removal easier.

With everything cleaned, Lin Xu didn’t immediately start cooking.

Instead, he soaked the sheep head in clean water to remove as much blood as possible, enhancing the sheep head’s flavor.

Since no seasoning is added during the cooking of White Water Lamb Head, soaking is crucial to prevent the meat’s odor from ruining the dish.

After half an hour, when the sheep stomach and intestines were almost done cooking, he added the thoroughly cleaned sheep liver and lungs, cooked for another fifteen minutes, then took them out to cool.