Chapter 44 Dumplings
Zhao Yeqing thought of the rabbit skin from before. After soaking it in alum that day, Mu Xi tanned it and hung it up, saying that there was more fur at the back, so he could piece it together to make a carpet for her.
Thinking of this, she felt she couldn't bear to look at these little rabbits anymore.
After putting fresh hay in the rabbit pen, Zhao Yeqing picked up the snow cake at his feet and went back to the living room to sit and enjoy the electric fan.
Huhu followed Mu Xi to the mountain. Xuebing preferred to stick to Zhao Yeqing. When she was busy, he would squat nearby and play by himself. Only when he saw that she was done would he walk over to her.
Zhao Yeqing picked up Xuebing and rubbed her hard in its soft fur. Xuebing loved cleanliness and didn't move at all during bathing. Huhu would always splash water all over her and Mu Xi.
Then Huhu was severely punished by Mu Xi - he was not allowed to stroke it, no matter how much he acted coquettishly.
Every time, she couldn't help but want to hug Huhu, but was stopped by Mu Xi. But even so, Huhu still liked Mu Xi more.
Zhao Yeqing was so angry that he poked its forehead lightly and scolded the little white-eyed leopard.
Huhu and Xuebing have grown a lot now, and I can feel that they are noticeably heavy when I hold them in my arms.
The two have also begun to develop some interest in meat. When cooking, they would move their noses around the meat and sniff it, but would not bite it. Mu Xi said that in another month, they can start feeding minced meat mixed with milk.
Mu Xi had been back for so long, but she had never been to his house. He had been busy since the day he came back, and she had never seen him organize things at home. Zhao Yeqing pushed open the door of his house holding a snow cake.
The old wooden door creaked open. The layout of the Mu family was almost the same as hers. The tables and chairs in the living room were covered with dust-proof cloth, and the doors of the rooms and kitchen on the first floor were not opened.
The second floor is a little different. The Mu family does not have a terrace. There are three rooms on the second floor, and the doors are all closed. It is almost dark and the light is dim, making it look gloomy.
There was still a stale smell in the whole house.
Zhao Yeqing opened the door to the living room on the first floor and all the windows facing the corridor on the second floor for ventilation.
Only then did she notice that cracks had appeared on the walls inside the house, probably caused by the ground cracking.
There was a lot of white wall dust on the floor. Zhao Yeqing put the snow cakes in the yard, took a broom and mop from home, and cleaned the upstairs and downstairs.
The room was not cleaned, and she felt it was not appropriate to open it to others.
She hadn't been home for many years, and hadn't been to the Mu family's house for even longer.
Every little detail reminded her of the two elderly people in the Mu family who were very kind to her, and her grandparents, and her nose felt blocked.
The four elderly people all died at home, but she was not afraid at all as she stood in the house without turning on the lights.
In fact, she used to be very timid and never dared to turn off the lights before going to bed at night. But after her grandparents passed away, she was no longer afraid. She felt that if something really happened, her grandparents would definitely be there to protect her.
Mu Xi has been busy these days since he came back and has not yet gone to the graves of the four elders to pay their respects properly. Zhao Yeqing plans to make some dumplings tonight, place chopsticks at home for the memorial service, and then kill a chicken to offer the sacrifice another day.
Dumplings are a favorite of all four elderly people. They are soft and chewy, and they also symbolize reunion.
We eat dumplings every Chinese New Year. She likes pork and cabbage, while Mu Xi likes pork and green onions. We have all the ingredients at home, but I don’t know if the dumplings will taste weird if made with wild boar meat.
She didn't grow cabbage, but only Chinese cabbage in the small vegetable garden. The cabbage she grew was crispy and sweet. She threw the outer layer to the rabbits and kept the tender inner part for herself.
Pick fresh onions, ginger and garlic from the field, add a small bunch of Sichuan peppercorns, and soak in warm water for half an hour.
Zhao Yeqing chopped the wild boar meat into pieces. He chose the part with the most fat, but the thickness was only as thick as a finger. Minced pork still tastes good when it has some fat.
Add onion, ginger, garlic and pepper water to the chopped wild boar meat in batches to remove the fishy smell and odor. Add a small amount each time and stir with chopsticks after each addition until the water is absorbed by the pork before adding the next time.
Mincing meat is a physical job that requires constant stirring in one direction. After the water is absorbed, the meat filling becomes more and more compact. Your hands will become sore after every few minutes, and you will need to rest for a while before continuing.
Add all the water in a small bowl, add a little sesame oil, beat an egg and mix well.
The chopped green onion and cabbage need to be sprinkled with salt in advance to extract the water, squeeze out the water with your hands, and mix them evenly with the pork.
When I worked in the city before, if I wanted to make dumplings myself, I would buy ready-made dumpling skins from the market. Now I don’t have the conditions to be lazy, so I have to roll them myself.
The dough for dumplings does not need to be fermented. You just need to add salt and warm water to the flour and knead it. It saves time.
The water should be added little by little to avoid adding too much and then being unable to recover. You will have to keep adding flour to absorb the water, and finally you will have a large bowl of noodles that you cannot finish in a week.
This is her experience of failure.
Add water and stir with chopsticks until all the flour becomes flocs, then you can start kneading.
Your hands must be free of oil and water, otherwise the dough will stick to them.
There is no table in Zhao Yeqing's kitchen, only a large cupboard connected to a cooking table. This is a common combination cabinet in rural areas. There are many seasoning jars placed on it, so the space is relatively small.
In the entire kitchen, apart from the cupboards, there is only a large stove and a sink, and there is only a wooden shelf for putting things.
The older generation doesn’t pay much attention to these things when cooking. If there’s nothing to put, just put it on the ground.
Zhao Yeqing felt it necessary to build a table in the kitchen, as he could only knead dough on the dining table in the living room.
Knead the floc-like flour into a ball. This time the proportion of water is just right. It can be kneaded in a few times and it is not sticky yet.
After kneading the dough, put it in a bowl and cover it with plastic wrap. After twenty minutes, the dough will become very smooth.
At this time you can take it out, sprinkle flour on the kneading pad, put the large dough on it and knead it a few times, dig a hole in the middle, roll it into a donut shape, and then cut it into a long cylindrical strip. This is simpler than rolling it directly into a long strip.
Divide the long strips into small pieces, roll them into balls, and then use a rolling pin to roll them into round shapes for dumpling skins. She finds this step the most difficult part.
After working for a long time, the dumpling skins they rolled out were still square and diamond-shaped, and the best ones were a few relatively round ovals. Zhao Yeqing looked at the table full of strange shapes and his forehead twitched.
She gave up and just wrapped it up.
She had to turn all these strange-shaped things into dumplings before Mu Xi returned home.
In order to distinguish the two fillings, the pork and cabbage are wrapped in a gold ingot shape, while the pork and green onion are wrapped in a willow leaf shape.
She worked so fast that she finished wrapping both kinds of dumplings just before Mu Xi came in, and placed two large plates full on the table.
There was a lot of mud on Mu Xi's trouser legs, and his body was also covered in dust.
Zhao Yeqing was surprised, "You two went to dig a tunnel?"
The words coming out of Mu Xi's mouth seemed to be squeezed out from between his teeth.
"Can you explain to me what that big hole at the intersection is?"
Oh no
She knew now what she had forgotten.
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