Chapter 154 Next time I'm doing Su'er, maybe I can go to Jiangnan.

"Twelve silver dollars, with gifts for the three festivals a year to be calculated separately."

Aunt Pang's heart was pounding, but her face remained calm.

Cooking is a skill that earns a living. Anyone who can cook can earn at least eight silver dollars. Aunt Pang's skills can rival those of a master chef in a restaurant. This amount is quite low for a private chef. The master chef in a restaurant earns a minimum of twenty dollars, and the private chef's salary fluctuates around that price. The rumor that he earns twelve dollars a month is just to fool outsiders.

The world is sometimes so strange. When it comes to cooking at home, it's always considered a woman's job, but when it comes to a respectable profession like chef, it's always men who are sought after. In the past, female workers in England were paid only one-third of the wages of male workers. In Shanghai today, it's not quite that extreme, but it's not much better either. Even if they do the same amount of work, women are always paid less than men.

Just like the family where Aunt Pang works now, the chef's skills are clearly worse than hers, but he can earn eighteen yuan a month and receive 30% more during holidays than Aunt Pang. Even though this chef has to support his wife, daughter and parents, while Aunt Pang only has herself to eat and no one else to worry about, she sometimes feels aggrieved.

If she could work for another company, it would be better for both her and the head chef who had many children. Aunt Pang didn't expect a raise, but she saw that people in the same industry who benefited from their gender could still live happily. At the very least, changing environments might allow her to find some people to talk to.

"So little?"

Aunt Pang was calculating in her mind, but Yao Xiaoyu was already stunned by the number. When she went to restaurants for a treat, she would casually ask about the wages. Most places wouldn't ask, but some places were not stingy with their questions. In comparison, Aunt Pang's salary was indeed a bit...meager.

Yao Xiaoyu hadn't tasted many of Aunt Pang's cookings, but her cream chestnut cake was no less delicious than the signature dish of a large restaurant. Even if Aunt Pang's other dishes were just average, this dessert would be a hit in any restaurant.

“The host family has been very generous.”

Yes, although the price is completely unworthy of her skills, she is already among the top female chefs in terms of treatment. This is also why Aunt Pang feels conflicted – when she was a street vendor, her food prices were no lower than those of male vendors, but once she was hired, she naturally had to be treated as inferior.

"..."

Hearing this, Yao Xiaoyu hesitated about her idea of ​​poaching someone else's girlfriend. If Aunt Pang wasn't happy there, she could ask to change jobs, and even if it wasn't accepted, it wouldn't be too awkward. But now... Aunt Pang's knowledge of foreign things was really useful to her. If they couldn't make an appointment for next time, Yao Xiaoyu really felt that she would suffer a great loss.

"...You mean there are special cheap markets in foreign countries?"

After much hesitation, Yao Xiaoyu finally decided not to extend a job offer to the chef she had her eye on. She planned to wait until she had talked to him a few more times and gathered enough information before sending him an offer.

The chef's absence wasn't a one- or two-day thing, and she and Tao Xiaoxiao didn't have a particularly high demand for a private chef, but if they missed out on Aunt Pang's resource library, Yao Xiaoyu was absolutely certain that she would regret it for more than just a short period of time.

Moreover, after calming down, she realized that her decision had been somewhat hasty—at least the middleman's recommendation knew about her family background, while Aunt Pang's recommendation was entirely based on her words. Even if she looked convincing, she shouldn't have trusted her so much.

Aunt Pang was a little disappointed that she didn't hear what she wanted to hear, but she still answered Yao Xiaoyu's questions in detail. The two chatted until just before dinner before ending their conversation. Yao Xiaoyu then arranged a time for their next meeting and gave Aunt Pang a round-up payment.

Pi Kangxiu's contacts were all tailored to the specific needs of the conversation. Some of the people she spoke with felt that money was an insult to them, but most were willing to exchange information for payment and were also willing to take the conversation seriously. Aunt Pang was one of them. She hadn't originally planned to agree to talk to Yao Xiaoyu, but the middleman swayed her with his money.

Yao Xiaoyu accepts all of this well. Making money is not difficult for her now. She is willing to pay for knowledge. To put it somewhat like Versailles, she really doesn't know how to spend her monthly manuscript fee of two hundred yuan. According to the agreement, after "The Record of Changing Fate" is published, Yao Xiaoyu's remuneration will increase to five yuan per thousand words, and it will never increase again.

"Next time you come, I'll make you some sour."

Aunt Pang looked at the reward that she had specifically requested, which included silver coins, small coins, and copper coins. While happily tallying it up, she whispered to Yao Xiaoyu that she liked this girl quite a bit and didn't mind putting in a little more effort.

What is Sur?

Yao Xiaoyu was a little curious. She had tasted at least 50 or 60% of the snacks in Shanghai, if not all of them, but she had never heard of this term before.

"It's a type of flatbread that foreigners eat."

When Aunt Pang first went out, she started her business by selling sesame seed cakes. The sesame seed cakes she made were the common round and flat type, and they came in two flavors: sugar and minced meat. They were fragrant and crispy when they came out of the oven, but they would get hard if left for a while. However, because of her excellent skills and the reputation of being an oriental snack, they sold quite well.

At that time, she envied the Turks selling flatbread next to her—the girl called herself Susie, and was also a stowaway, but all of this was said by Susie herself. Aunt Fatty didn't know how much truth Susie had said, nor did she know if the "flatbread" was really a Turkish snack.

In short, when Susie left the street to try her luck elsewhere, Aunt Fat traded her pancake recipe for a pancake called "Su'er," and from then on, she ran two businesses, quickly accumulating a small fortune to grow her business into a large and successful enterprise.

This is not a typical baked flatbread. It is more like the flat, round Huangshan baked flatbread. After it is made, it is not directly stuck to the oven wall, but is placed in a support that extends out of the oven, similar to a basketball hoop, to cook. The outside is a crispy crust. If you cut a hole in the top, you can see that it is full of soup and filling.

"Susie usually uses potatoes and onions, and I didn't change it much afterward. I just replaced the water with meat broth, and it sold very well."

As Aunt Pang spoke, she drifted into memories. Although that period was tiring, it was the happiest time of her life. The money she saved each day piled up like upward steps, and she could clearly see how much closer she was to her next goal. Later, as she earned more money, she lost that simple joy.

"I'll make you some beef stew, stewed until it's very tender. It's so comforting to eat in winter."

Aunt Pang lowered her voice and spoke in a breathy tone. Yao Xiaoyu was infected by this inexplicably tense atmosphere and nodded solemnly. After the two discussed what to eat when they met next, they finally said goodbye. Aunt Pang returned to her master's house and saw the little girl rushing to greet her.

"Auntie Pang, Madam said she wants your braised beef in a pot to entertain guests today."

Because of Hua Pang's own request, everyone in the manor except the master calls her Auntie Pang. Braised beef in a pot is Hua Pang's signature dish. It is made with butter and is similar to Western stewed beef. It is both a foreign dish and a dish that suits Chinese tastes. Others are all traditional chefs and they are not very good at handling this kind of Chinese-Western fusion dish.

"By the way, Madam also said that your name is really difficult to say..."

Hua Pang's face darkened. Seeing the little girl about to cry, he couldn't bring himself to be angry, so he could only suppress his anger and ask:

"Can't we just call him Flower Chef?"

Other chefs might accept being given their surnames, but she insisted on having a given name?

Besides, what's wrong with being fat? Back when she went to sea, she almost starved to death on the way because she was too thin. The granddaughter of the grandmother who saved her, the girl with a well-proportioned figure who was bullied at school for being called fat, if she were really fat, her intimidating figure would be enough to teach people a lesson.

"They're supposedly foreigners over there, and they value first names more than surnames."

The little girl said timidly, "Auntie Pang has a good temper and a kind heart. She is usually very kind to them. There are only two things she can't touch: her name and her wages."

"This is a bit troublesome."

Hua Pang knew that the host wasn't deliberately making fun of her, so she calmed down. Her name was half of someone else's and couldn't be changed, but given the circumstances, it wasn't impossible to be a little flexible.

“Tell the lady that when the flower chef was in the West, he had a name called Heavy.”

This name can only work for a while, but it doesn't matter. The number of banquets held in the manor is limited. As long as she gets away with it this time, it will take a long time before she asks again. That's enough time for her to dump the contents of her belly on Yao Xiaoyu.

Well, she still needs to prepare her resignation in advance. After leaving Shanghai, she wants to go to Jiangxi. Jiangnan has been known for its wealth since ancient times, so it shouldn't be difficult to find work there. If she can't stay in Yuzhang, then she can go to Guangdong and Guangxi. The Thirteen Factories of Guangzhou were still famous a few years ago, and her culinary skills won't go unnoticed.

...

"Has there been no new chef recently?"

Yao Xiaoyu looked at the middleman, who immediately cried out in distress.

"Good cooks are in high demand..."

Yao Xiaoyu has many demands. If it weren't for the fact that she offers enough money, and that she keeps refusing every offer and waving each one away, the middleman would have given up long ago.

"So you mean you can't find it?"

Yao Xiaoyu ignored the advice of the middle-aged man and only looked him in the eyes. If he uttered a single word, she would immediately turn around and leave.

Anyway, her standards are not going to be lowered; she's already discussed it at home many times.

"...Three days. Come and see me in three days!"

The middleman naturally didn't want to give up this business. Pressed by Yao Xiaoyu, he gritted his teeth and gave her a specific time. Yao Xiaoyu nodded and left without delay, leaving the middleman scratching his head in the house.

With such high requirements and such a short timeframe, where is he going to find people?!

"Everything else went smoothly, but we got stuck on finding someone."

Tao Xiaoxiao got into the rickshaw and said with some emotion, Yao Xiaoyu sighed, she could only be thankful that her bad luck hadn't affected her house, otherwise she would have really cried.

These are just minor details; let's take it slow.