While Song Bo was out buying tofu and salted duck eggs, Su Qingluan took another inventory of the ingredients in the kitchen. She had to admit that the types and quantities she could see were more than she had imagined.
She even felt a little regretful: why could she only cook one meal? Why were there only three diners, including herself and even Song Bo?
With three people, it is impossible to make too many dishes.
What's more, Su Qingluan has always accepted the concept that it is acceptable to waste ingredients appropriately in order to improve the quality of the dishes - such as the chicken and duck meat puree needed for the soup; however, if you know that there will be only a few people dining there, but still make a lot of dishes, resulting in a lot of waste, then it is unforgivable and you will be beaten on the head by the chef.
Therefore, Su Qingluan’s principle is that the finished dishes that have been served on the table must be basically “cleaned up”.
Although Su Qingluan knew that Song Bo could not dine at the same table with Mu Xingzhi, she also planned to set aside a separate portion of all the dishes. However, even for a meal for three, the amount and variety of ingredients that could be consumed were limited.
What's more, Su Qingluan is the only chef and has no helpers, so the number of dishes she can prepare in a day is even more limited.
After all the calculations, whether from a subjective or objective point of view, most of the ingredients displayed here were destined to be unused, which made her feel very sorry - just like a painter who hasn't touched a paintbrush for a long time and wants to paint a few strokes of every color; a musician who hasn't listened to records for a long time and wants to listen to a piece of every record.
However, no matter how much she wanted to show off emotionally, Su Qingluan knew that these were not her own things after all - not to mention that it was easier to waste her own things - so she could only selectively "give them up with pain".
In fact, Su Qingluan was a native northerner in her previous life, so her taste was naturally strong. However, this time, Su Qingluan asked Song Bo about Mu Xingzhi's taste preference in advance, and it was said that he preferred lighter food.
In addition, Su Qingluan felt that although Mu Xingzhi was not really disabled, he had to sit in a wheelchair to perform every day, and most of the time he might not be able to move enough. Therefore, the fried dishes originally planned this time were removed from Su Qingluan's menu, and lighter cooking methods such as steaming, boiling and hot pot were used as the main cooking methods.
Although Su Qingluan once wanted to make some crispy large intestines...
But she finally held back her "evil claws". After all, not everyone can accept such heavy-tasting ingredients... Although the crispy large intestine is really delicious.
Fried dishes were deleted, dishes with heavy oil were deleted, stir-fried dishes, and dishes with strong flavors... After deleting and reducing them, Su Qingluan initially concluded: Mu Xingzhi is really picky about food! Or he's not hungry enough!
After complaining like this, Su Qingluan obediently reached for the bag of flour - today's staple food, Su Qingluan planned to make crab meat and dragon beard noodles.
Su Qingluan first scooped out a bowl of the soup from the steamed crab roe and set it aside to cool. She then added salt and the water from the steamed crab roe into the flour and stirred it with chopsticks until it became floc-like. The dough then had a light and fresh flavor of the crab meat.
The temperature is relatively low now, and the dough is hard to knead. The surface is bumpy after a long time. Su Qingluan turned around, found a piece of gauze, wet it, covered the dough with it, and turned around to wash the pumpkin.
At this time, Song Bo came back with tofu and salted duck eggs.
"Madam Su, do you think these salted duck eggs are enough?" Su Qingluan turned around and looked over when she heard Song Bo ask her. Then -
"Mr. Song, have you bought all the salted duck eggs?" Looking at the number of salted duck eggs, there must be at least twenty of them, right?!
Song Bo paused and said, "Isn't that a bit too much?"
Su Qingluan nodded stiffly, then persuaded: "It's okay, this thing won't go bad in a short time, just eat porridge or other dry food and it will be delicious."
"Is it delicious?" Song Bo was a little curious.
Su Qingluan was shocked: "You haven't eaten it before?" What kind of isolated food is this! Or are salted duck eggs too "common" a delicacy to be seen by a noble like you?
Perhaps the expression on the girl's face was too obvious, so Song Bo had to explain: "It's really because the owner has a light taste, and Mr. Mu is a frail and sickly person, so..."
Su Qingluan nodded and understood immediately: "Although salted duck eggs are considered "light porridge and side dishes" by modern people, for a small mountain village where even "boiled eggs" are considered a "luxury nutritional product" in this era, salted duck eggs, which are rich in flavor, need to be pickled in salt, and even have oil flowing out, are definitely not "light".
"So you bought so many at once..." Wouldn't that ruin Mu Xingzhi's character?
"Don't worry, after all, I'm a healthy person here." Song Bo said with a smile.
Although there was a little incident, there were still salted duck eggs for sale, which made Su Qingluan very happy.
She weighed the amount of salted duck egg yolks she needed and began to peel them.
By the time the egg yolks were peeled, the dough had relaxed. The dough, which was originally as bumpy as the surface of the moon, became much smoother and softer. Su Qingluan kneaded it for a while, and the dough became about the size of a grapefruit.
Because some of the juice from the steamed crabs was added, if you smell it carefully, the dough has a faint smell of river seafood.
Su Qingluan pressed a hole in the dough and found that it had a tendency to rebound, so she put the dough under the wet gauze and continued to relax it.
At this time, the ten crabs in the first pot were steamed - yes, Su Qingluan weighed the crabs casually a few times, and each one weighed about half a pound, and each one was as big as an adult's fist. It was difficult to steam all of them in one pot.
So Su Qingluan thought about it and simply divided it into two pots.
The crabs are fresh and meaty, and even the juice is sweet, which makes people's appetite increase. However, if you want to eat crabs in a variety of ways, you really have to resist this delicious temptation.
Although there were no suitable crab dishes, at least there were substitutes such as scissors, thin spoons and rolling pins. Su Qing steamed the second pot of crabs while she neatly cut the crab legs and began to peel the crab meat carefully and quickly.
Peeling crab meat requires some skills. If you cut it open lengthwise one by one, it will be extremely slow and difficult to peel off the crab meat cleanly.
However, use scissors to cut the joints of the crab legs, then use a rolling pin to squeeze one end of the crab legs and roll the crab meat towards the opening at the other end. Under the pressure of the rolling pin, the crab meat will be squeezed out of the crab leg shell as a whole.
As for the crab meat, you need to use a long and thin spoon to clean each grid of crab meat to avoid missing any.
At first, Su Qingluan couldn't find a spoon that was thin enough to enter the crab's exoskeleton. Then she had an idea and looked at the bottles and jars where the seasonings were stored - the small spoons used to measure the seasonings were just right for scooping out the crab meat!
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