Ma Hua rode his bike around the market first, then hurried home carrying the groceries. His mother, Chen Hongmei, saw the things Ma Hua was carrying...
She couldn't help but scold, "You're just wasting money! Let me tell you, this won't do. This isn't how you spend money."
"Hehe, I know, I just bought a chicken to help you recover from your hard work!"
Ma Hua smiled obsequiously, saying that her mother had been frugal her whole life, and she couldn't argue with that, but there was so much meat in the system's courtyard, she couldn't just not eat it.
I can't just eat meat and fish all by myself every day, MCA (Malaysian Chinese Association) wouldn't do that. I can only bring some meat home every now and then.
"Hmph," Chen Hongmei, the mother, almost squinted when she heard Ma Hua flatter her like that.
He angrily yelled at his father, Ma Jianguo, who was inside the house: "You heartless bastard, all you do is smoke all day long. Look how much Xiaohua loves me, and you're still smoking. Hurry up and come and clean up."
Hearing his mother's scolding, the father sighed and then looked at Ma Hua with a somewhat resentful gaze.
Seeing his father like this, Ma Hua couldn't stop laughing to himself.
Seeing the resentful look in her father's eyes, Ma Hua immediately said, "Mom, Dad has been working all day. Let me do it. It'll be a good opportunity for me to try my cooking. I've learned a new trick."
It's not that MCA wants to do it, it's that I really can't stand my father's resentful gaze. My father is good in every way, except that he's extremely afraid of his wife.
Sigh, how come my family are old Beijingers, how come my father is such a "laborer from the Shu Road"?
It's rare, extremely rare. In those days, women had a low status, unlike in later generations when they were delicate fairies who could carry heavy loads but couldn't lift water.
Women are said to hold up half the sky; they have to do all the work. If they don't do it well, it's common for the men to beat them.
When Chen Hongmei saw that her son had said that, she immediately gave a haughty snort, "See? My son still loves me the most."
Actually, the chickens that Ma Hua had prepared had already been slaughtered and cleaned in the system's courtyard. There was no other way; Ma Hua was just cleaning the chicken feathers while waiting to get something else.
There are also those crazy, silly guys like Zhu, but the MCA is too lazy to deal with them. Isn't eating meat more appealing?
Ma Hua cleaned the prepared chicken, chopped it up, and then prepared scallions, ginger, garlic, bay leaves, star anise, Sichuan peppercorns, and chili pepper pieces.
The mother looked at Ma Hua with some surprise: "Xiao Hua, what are you planning to do?"
"This is a new dish I learned, Dapanji (Big Plate Chicken)," Ma Hua said somewhat sheepishly.
Big Plate Chicken didn't exist back then. Although Zuo Zongtang of the Qing Dynasty (with queues) won a victory in Xinjiang and rewarded his troops with a dish made from local free-range chicken and chili peppers, which was the precursor to Big Plate Chicken...
However, Dapanji (Big Plate Chicken) didn't truly emerge until the 1980s. But now, if you make it yourself, then you invented it.
"Oh," the mother watched Ma Hua's movements with interest; she had never heard of this dish before. She also wanted to see how it was made.
"Mom, don't just stand there watching. Have some noodles. This dish is meant to be eaten with noodles, preferably wide noodles," Ma Hua said as she prepared the side dishes.
"Jianguo. Jianguo, what are you doing!" When the mother heard Ma Hua say this, she immediately called out to the father. She was really curious about how this thing was made.
"What's wrong?" Ma Jianguo walked in from outside with a helpless expression. He had already hidden outside, so why was he still being called?
"Your son wants wide noodles, so hurry up and knead the dough," the mother said bluntly.
When the father saw the mother intently watching Ma Hua cook, he sighed inwardly. After so many years of marriage, how could he not understand? His wife was just curious again. She was wonderful in every way, except for her obsession with cooking.
Xiaohua was just saying that I was also curious about what this "big plate chicken" dish was. I'd never heard of it before.
I was just curious about the taste, while my wife was curious about how it was made. Oh well, what can I do? My wife is a woman, and the skills are passed down from father to son.
Ma Hua peeled and washed the potatoes, then took a knife in his right hand and a potato in his left, and began to chop them. After chopping the potatoes, he placed them in a basin of water for later use.
While mashing the potatoes, Ma Hua explained to her mother watching from behind, "You can actually cut these potatoes into chunks, but I think it's better to mash them."
"This braised chicken is made just like braised pork, with plenty of oil and caramelized sugar."
Pour oil into a wok. Once the oil is hot, add rock sugar and stir-fry until it turns a deep reddish-brown color. Add the prepared chicken pieces and stir-fry quickly. Once the chicken skin tightens slightly, add Sichuan peppercorns, star anise, and bay leaves and continue stir-frying.
Once the spices in the pot have released their aroma, add the scallions, ginger, and garlic, then add water and simmer for 15 minutes. Next, add the potatoes and continue simmering for another 15 minutes.
The wok at home no longer has a high or low flame setting, which is what bothers Ma Hua the most. He insists on getting a gas stove for the family because this stove is really difficult to use.
Soon, a delicious aroma wafted from the pot. The father smelled it and frowned, saying, "It smells so good."
Hearing her father's words, the mother snorted coldly: "That's right, don't you even know whose son he is?"
Ma Hua saw her parents bickering again: "Ahem, Dad, are the noodles ready? This goes especially well with noodles."
"Wow! It's so delicious! It smells amazing!" Ma Zishan and Ma Ziming, who had just come home from school, rushed to the stove without even greeting their grandparents.
Seeing their helpless expressions, Ma Hua felt secretly angry. "I treated you so well before, and you two ungrateful wretches didn't even bother to greet me. You were just busy eating."
Ma Zishan immediately sensed Ma Hua's somewhat unfriendly gaze, rolled her eyes, and rushed to Ma Hua's side: "Wow, Uncle, your cooking smells so good. Zishan really wants to eat it."
Before Ma Hua could reply, the mother said to Ma Zishan with a displeased look, "Oh, Zishan, so you mean Grandma's cooking isn't good?"
Ma Zishan, who was initially in high spirits, was immediately dumbfounded when she heard her grandmother say that. She was so busy praising her uncle that she forgot about her grandmother: "No, Grandma's cooking is just as delicious."
The Ma Hua family is living happily together, but things are different over at the courtyard house.
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