Chapter 433 Don’t Grind the Donkey-hide Gelatin
The chef nodded quickly when he saw her: "It has been delivered and placed on the table. I haven't had time to clean it up yet."
"It's okay, you go ahead and do your thing, I'll take a look first." Wen Zhen started to check the ingredients on the table and sort out the dishes to be cooked today.
Mrs. Wen saw her picking out some ingredients: "Yi Yi, what are you going to cook today?"
"Cai Die needs to replenish her Qi and blood right now. I asked the purchasing boy to buy some mutton for me yesterday. I plan to make some dishes with it today."
"I think you need some nourishment too. Confinement is the best time to recuperate. You've been lying there for a long time, and we can only make various soups for you, but it's still not enough."
"Grandma, I'll be back soon."
Old Lady Wen smiled and shook her head: "You kid."
Wen Zhenyi asked the chef to cook the beef bones, as she wanted to use the beef bone broth to cook mutton.
Remove part of the mutton and chop it into minced meat to prepare mutton fried dumplings.
Mrs. Wen saw that she wanted to chop the lean meat: "I'll do this."
Wen Zhenyi didn't refuse and handed the knife to her: "Grandma, if you are tired, take a rest."
"I know, I'm not a child."
Wen Zhenyi cut the mutton into pieces and asked the servant to light a charcoal fire to make grilled lamb chops. They would eat mutton today.
Put the lamb chops in a bowl and marinate with seasoning for a while.
Dice celery, potatoes, and carrots. Dice the lamb and season with salt and pepper. Peel the onions and finely chop the parsley.
Then wrap the celery, bay leaves, thyme, parsley stems, and green onions and tie together with twine.
While doing his work, Wen Zhenyi asked Chef Fan, who was helping to knead the dough, "Chef Fan, can I buy donkey-hide gelatin here?"
"Yes, Miss, do you need donkey hide gelatin?"
"Yes, please find time to ask someone to buy it for me and grind it into powder for me."
Chef Fan thought for a moment and said, "Donkey hide gelatin is not easy to grind into powder. It will take some time."
"Just help me grind it out as soon as possible."
"Okay, I'll arrange for someone to buy some right away." Chef Fan took a few steps and then stopped. "Young Madam, do you want to buy a lot?"
"You can buy more. Please also buy me some jujubes, wolfberries, sesame seeds, walnut kernels and yellow rock sugar."
"Other mansions have it. Does the donkey-hide gelatin need to be ground into powder?"
"That's not necessary. Just grind it into about three ounces. The dates need to be pitted."
"Okay, I'll have someone remove the pits from the dates later."
"You go and arrange it."
Chef Fan, with flour on his hands, went to find someone to buy what Wen Zhenyi had asked him to do.
Mrs. Wen was a little curious: "Yi Yi, what are these things used for?"
"This is used to make Guyuan Ejiao cake."
“Will it take more time?”
"Well, this donkey-hide gelatin is a bit troublesome. After grinding it into powder, it needs to be soaked in rice wine for two days."
"That's quite a waste of effort."
"But donkey-hide gelatin is a good thing."
When Chef Fan came back, he heard her say, "Donkey hide gelatin is good, but it's expensive and has a smell that many people don't like."
"You mention that smell. I actually quite like it."
"Miss, why don't you let us call you Princess?"
"The title of Princess is given by the Emperor. In reality, I am just an ordinary peasant girl, and I married an ordinary man."
"My uncle is not an ordinary person. I know that he is the top scholar in the imperial examination. He is much better than other top scholars."
"No matter how powerful he is, he is still an ordinary person. He doesn't hold any official position now, right?"
Chef Fan thought about it and agreed. However, all the servants of the princess liked their family very much. As long as they didn't make any mistakes, they would not put on airs.
Wen Zhenyi asked the kitchen servants to help process and wash the other ingredients. After the ingredients were clean, she began to cut them into the shape she needed.
"Yiyi, do you think this is okay?"
Wen Zhenyi turned his head and looked at the minced mutton: "Grandma, it's done. Put it in my bowl and I'll season it later."
"Okay, I'll help Chef Fan roll out the dumpling wrappers."
"Don't you want to take a break?"
Mrs. Wen's eyes were shrewd: "Do you think I'm too old?"
"No, it's nothing. I just saw that you were standing for a long time, so I wanted you to move around a bit, otherwise your legs might become numb soon."
"Aren't I walking back and forth?"
When Wen Zhen saw that she insisted, he said nothing more and seasoned the minced mutton.
Cook Fan smiled and said, "The old lady is in good health, but it's not fun to be idle now."
Mrs. Wen nodded: "I'm used to being busy, so I should move around a bit."
Wen Zhenyi wrapped the mutton in dumpling wrappers: "My grandma always finds something to do at home. When she was in the village, there were many workshops and shops, and she would go here to help or there to help."
Chef Fan smiled and said, "Then you must have been very busy all the way here."
"My grandma is very busy. She has cleaned almost everything on the boat. If the boat wasn't moving, she would have gone down to clean the outside of the boat too."
Chef Fan laughed heartily. "When my mother was around, she was like this too. She was always busy all day long. When I asked her to take a break, she would nod and then turn around and continue tinkering with other things."
"You didn't see it? Even the boatman felt bad about it. He scooped water from the river every day to wash the deck."
As Mrs. Wen rolled out the dough, she said, "Look, I'm trying to encourage them to be clean."
"That's good. The workshops and shops are clean."
"It's been so long since we came out. I don't know if they've been lazy."
"Don't worry, with Brother Lin Jie here, there's nothing they can do even if they want to slack off."
"Lin Jie is a very steady kid."
Several people were making dumplings while chatting.
Wen Zhen saw that the time was almost up, so he started to cook the mutton.
Add mutton to the beef bone broth, bring to a boil, and simmer over low heat for half an hour, constantly removing any foam.
Wen Zhen would check on the mutton cooking in the pot from time to time.
Others who had nothing to do also came to help in the kitchen, and the spacious kitchen suddenly became a little crowded.
Wen Zhenyi saw Feng Qianlan coming too: "Sister-in-law, who will accompany uncle now that you are here?"
"Brother-in-law, Lord Meng, and the two grandfathers are playing chess."
"Who is better?"
Seeing that no one noticed, Feng Qianlan leaned over to Wen Zhenyi's ear and whispered, "My father is a terrible chess player, but he loves playing chess. Everyone knows his flaws, but because of his status, they let him win."
"He didn't notice?"
"They're not stupid, how could they let him know? He still thinks he's the best chess player in the world."
"How did you know that?"
"My brother and I heard those ministers say it in the palace before. We were hiding behind the flowers at the time, so they didn't know."
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