Chapter 980: Imperial Examination Essay: The Evil Mother-in-law (3)

"It seems that we need to wash the rice first?" Han Ji said hesitantly, but he had no idea how much rice should be put in a meal, so he took it for granted that one bowl of brown rice could be cooked into one bowl of rice, so he simply served three bowls of brown rice and sighed, "It turns out that so much rice is needed to cook a meal, no wonder people's lives are difficult."

Zhang Luoyi nodded like a chick pecking at rice: "My husband is right. No wonder my father also said that buying rice costs a lot every month."

After washing the rice, the two were dumbfounded again when they saw the cold stove.

"Madam, can you make a fire?" Han Ji turned around and asked Zhang Luoyi with difficulty.

Zhang Luoyi shook his head in shame: "No, I have never made a fire or cooked at home..."

Han Ji had no choice but to squat, bend down, and clumsily rub the tinder. The flame rose up instantly and almost burned his eyebrows. He was so scared that he immediately dropped the tinder. Zhang Luoyi also screamed in fear and hurriedly stepped back to dodge.

The tinderbox fell to the ground and the flame went out instantly, but the firewood next to it remained intact, without any sparks.

"Madam? How about you try it?" Han Ji picked up the fire starter and asked Zhang Luoyi.

Zhang Luoyi's expression froze. Seeing that the fire starter had been handed to her, she had no choice but to take it and try it herself.

The result of this attempt was that her thumb was burned. She burst into tears immediately. Han Ji felt very distressed and had to bite the bullet and learn how to make a fire himself.

Finally, after getting covered in dirt and even accidentally burning their fingers, they finally managed to start a fire and successfully light the firewood.

The two men stared at the burning firewood as if they were facing a great enemy, maintaining it carefully, fearing that the fire would go out accidentally and they would have to go through the difficult process of lighting it again.

After half an hour, the aroma of rice finally came out of the pot. Zhang Luoyi was immediately excited and said to Han Ji with sparkling eyes: "Husband, the rice is ready!"

Han Ji was also very happy, but in order to maintain his usual calm image, he pretended to be very indifferent and said, "It seems that we still have a talent for cooking. We succeeded on our first try."

"Should we cook now?" Zhang Luoyi looked at the vegetables in the bamboo basket, and then searched in the cupboard. He found some meat and vegetables left over from their wedding banquet a few days ago. They smelled a bit sour, so he said to Han Ji, "Why are there still some leftovers from our wedding banquet? Eating them will make you sick, so why not throw them away?"

"Then pour it out." Han Ji answered nonchalantly. He knew that his wife had never eaten leftovers, so after marrying him, how could he let her live worse off than when she was in her parents' home?

So the couple happily threw away the leftovers, washed the vegetables perfunctorily, and began to cook. However, they had no idea how to control the heat, nor did they know when the vegetables were cooked. As a result, they were not careful and the vegetables turned yellow and dry, and the bottom part was even burnt, which looked extremely ugly.

But this was the only dish for today, and they couldn't throw it away even if it looked ugly, otherwise they would have to eat dry brown rice. And what if this dish only looked ugly but tasted good? They thought with a fluke in their hearts.

After Zhang Luoyi put the dishes on the plates, he breathed a sigh of relief. The two of them brought the food to the table. Han Ji served the rice and took a look. He felt that it was a little different from what he had eaten before, but he thought maybe it was just because the person who cooked was different?

However, as soon as the rice entered his mouth, Han Ji chewed it and spat it out with a sound of "Puh": "Why is this rice undercooked?"

Zhang Luoyi quickly scooped up the rice in her bowl and found a very obvious white spot in the center of the rice grains, which was obviously not fully cooked. She asked in embarrassment: "What should I do now? Cook it again?"

"Cook it again." Han Ji frowned tightly. He never thought cooking was so difficult!

Finally, after a lot of effort, it was not until the afternoon that the two men finally ate the half-burnt rice. This time they insisted on eating it, so they didn't want to cook it again.

"I forgot to leave some food for Mom!" After Han Ji barely swallowed a bowl of burnt rice, he finally remembered that Wu Shichu had not eaten yet.

Zhang Luoyi looked at the burnt rice in the bowl and said hesitantly, "Can mother eat this kind of rice?"

"Forget it. When Mom feels better in the evening, she will be able to cook something delicious for herself. We should not spoil her appetite with these." Han Ji felt guilty for a moment and then said as a matter of course.

The two men also hoped that Wu Shichu would recover soon so that he could cook for them.

Unfortunately, Wu Shichu was determined to be "sick" for a while, so when it was time to cook dinner in the evening, Han Ji knocked on Wu Shichu's door again: "Mom, mom, are you feeling better now? Is your back still hurting?"

"I feel weak all over, my head is still dizzy, and I still can't get up." Wu Shichu replied in a weak voice.

"What about our dinner?" Han Ji asked without thinking. However, he realized something was wrong as soon as he said it. If he said that, wouldn't it mean that he didn't care about his mother's health but only cared about the fact that no one would cook his own dinner? This made him look too cold-blooded.

So he quickly added: "Mom, what I mean is, you didn't eat lunch, are you hungry now?"

"Did you finally remember that I didn't eat lunch? Then why didn't you bring me some food? Not even a glass of water..." Wu Shichu asked quietly, his words full of vicissitudes, disappointment and sorrow.

Han Ji blushed with shame when he heard this: "Mom, I am an unfilial son. I thought you were asleep and I didn't call you to eat because I was afraid of waking you up..."

"Okay, if you're willing, please cook me a bowl of porridge. I haven't had any rice all day and I don't have much appetite. I can only eat soft and mushy things." Wu Shichu ordered.

"Okay, Mom, I'll go cook porridge for you right away." Han Ji felt guilty and agreed immediately.

However, when he got to the kitchen, he realized that he didn't know how to cook porridge. He even ruined the rice at noon. He would never naively think that porridge was easy to cook again.

But no matter how difficult it was, he had to cook, so he could only hurriedly cook porridge with Zhang Luoyi. Fortunately, they learned how to make a fire at noon, so now they don't have to worry about not being able to make a fire.

"When will mother's health get better?" Zhang Luoyi finally couldn't help but ask.

Han Ji shook his head: "I don't know, she has been overworked in arranging our wedding and her body can't take it anymore. Her health wasn't very good before, and now she's exhausted all of a sudden."

"Then what should we do about our meals? We can't eat these hard-to-swallow foods every meal, right?" Zhang Luoyi said unhappily, "This is the first time I've eaten such a bad meal at noon!"

(End of this chapter)