Chapter 29 Guo's Spicy Hot Pot (Bug Fix)
So, on the day before the winter solstice, Guo Ji Mala Tang officially opened for business in a lively atmosphere on Chengbei Street in Xiuning County.
To celebrate this day, Guo Baiwen even specially asked someone to buy a small string of firecrackers.
The once empty shop now features a specially designed hot pot counter in the center, with two large square pots on it.
One pot is specifically for cooking meat, and another is specifically for cooking vegetables. Each large pot also has a nine-compartment wooden grid inside for dividing the food.
The rectangular countertop has three outward-facing sides, and the edges are made of thick wooden planks. A long table was built directly on the edge of the countertop.
The empty side of the countertop faces the small door behind the storefront, making it convenient for them to move around and get replacement ingredients.
Worried that the three long tables might not be able to seat many people, two more long tables were added along the two sides against the walls.
In the space between the hot food preparation counter and the main cooking area, a small table was squeezed in to serve as a checkout counter.
The sign hanging at the entrance, "Guo's Spicy Hot Pot," was written by someone Guo Baiwen specially went to the bookstore and asked the young shop assistant to have it written.
Although some money was wasted in the process, the signboard that was finally polished based on those characters was indeed very beautiful.
A small string of firecrackers can't compare to the excitement of a dragon and lion dance, but the festive sounds certainly attracted many people from the street.
Although Guo Baiwen felt that the main reason was that the aroma of the hot pot broth was attractive enough.
And their mala tang prices are indeed very reasonable.
There are many hot pot restaurants on the street, but there really aren't any like theirs, where you can get a taste even if you only spend two or three coins.
Since it's just opened, there's likely to be a lot of people coming to try it out.
But not everyone who tries it will like the taste of their food.
Once they've been operating stably for ten days to two weeks, and everyone who wanted to try it has done so, those who still come to eat there are truly fans of their food.
Therefore, Guo Baiwen did not order too many wooden bowls in advance, fearing that they would be unused and left unused later.
I bought a lot of bamboo tubes directly from carpenter Hu to make bowls, because they are easy to make and bamboo is a common material.
Fortunately, Hu the carpenter had enough carpentry apprentices, so that not long after the pine wood tabletops were completed, they were able to quickly finish all the bamboo bowls and chopsticks.
He originally thought that a custom-made countertop like this might take a long time to complete.
To his surprise, as soon as he spoke to Carpenter Hu and roughly drew a sketch on the ground with a pebble, Carpenter Hu suddenly slapped his knee and exclaimed, "This is easy!"
It turns out that when they don't have any work, their carpentry workshop is filled with tables, chairs and benches because they have many apprentices. Guo Baiwen only realized this when he learned that they would make some everyday furniture in their spare time and store it up to sell in town during the market.
The countertop he requested wasn't difficult to make, and it wasn't picky about the type of wood, so with a few modifications, it could be made for him quickly.
It was faster than the furniture in his main room.
Seeing the endless stream of people entering the store, Grandma Guo, who was originally worried, waved the strainer in her hand as if she were possessed by an octopus, even though she knew that in a few days, just as Wenzai said, there might not be many people coming to eat at the store.
But right now, they're still cooking the vegetables with extra enthusiasm.
After all, everything is difficult at the beginning!
A good start at least shows that the food at their restaurant is indeed appealing.
Guo Xiaohua ran around clearing away the dishes and chopsticks, cleaning the table after the guests had finished eating, and helping to pass on the food ordered by the guests next to her.
There was no time to wash the used bamboo bowls, so they were temporarily stored in a large wooden basin that had been prepared in advance in the backyard.
Fortunately, there were enough custom-made bamboo bowls and chopsticks, so even so, it didn't delay serving the dishes.
While keeping an eye on everything around him and calculating the bills for each diner, Guo Baiwen also kept an eye on everything around him and collected the money.
The brushes, ink, paper, and inkstones I bought before, which I haven't used for practicing calligraphy yet, have come in handy here.
Today is the first day; it's just a trial operation.
The shop hadn't been open for very long. They had originally planned to open for an hour around noon (11:00-13:00), but before noon was even over, all the ingredients they had prepared in the morning were running out.
They had to close the door immediately.
The announcement stated that the next business hours would be from 5:00 PM to 9:00 PM.
During the two hours between noon and 5 pm, the three of them hardly rested.
One person was busy washing the used bamboo bowls, chopsticks, and tabletop; another was busy kneading dough to prepare more batter for making dumplings; and yet another went out to urgently purchase the necessary ingredients.
After a hectic day, the three of them collapsed on the floor, exhausted, almost as soon as they closed the door.
Three pairs of eyes looked at each other, but neither could utter a single extra word.
Even as he lay in bed that night, Guo Baiwen still felt like he was frantically keeping accounts, and his temples were throbbing.
The next day was the winter solstice, and the number of people coming to the restaurant increased explosively.
It was probably the people who ate at the restaurant on the first day and thought it was delicious that spread the word.
On the second and third days, I gradually adapted to this hectic pace.
On the fourth day, just as Guo Baiwen had said, there were fewer people coming to Guo's Spicy Hot Pot than in the previous three days.
The total number of guests that day was probably around a hundred.
So everyone understood the situation, and the amount of food prepared for the following day was reduced accordingly.
On the fifth day, although the customer base gradually stabilized, Guo Ji Mala Tang's business hours were finally settled.
Grandma Guo originally wanted to open at the same time as when the new store opened, but Guo Baiwen persuaded her not to, saying, "Grandma, we are just a small food shop after all, and we only have this one kind of dish. It's not a proper restaurant."
Most of the people who come to their restaurant for lunch are those who are short of money but love the spicy and savory flavor. They bring their own fried dough sticks or flatbreads and order only two or three coins' worth of dishes to go with their dry food.
There aren't that many people who actually make a living from this.
"You can never earn enough money. There are only three people in the family, three mouths to feed. If we work ourselves to the bone and get sick, wouldn't that be a bigger loss?"
Grandma Guo had never done this kind of business before, but now that she knows she can earn a lot of money by boiling vegetables every day, she feels like she has tasted some kind of sweetness.
She still harbored the idea of sending Guo Baiwen to a private school, which is why she wanted to work hard from dawn till dusk to earn more money.
But what Wenzai said is indeed correct.
She had been boiling vegetables for several days in a row, and although she hadn't told her two children, she had indeed felt that she couldn't lift her arms properly these past two days.
Knowing that it was because she had been holding that strainer the whole time, and after being coaxed and pleaded with by Guo Baiwen and Guo Xiaohua for a while, she finally nodded.
So Guo Ji Mala Tang posted a notice at the entrance, and thereafter only opened the store at noon and 7 pm every day.
It's perfect as a side dish for lunch or a late-night snack at the dinner market.
At these two times, not many people want to add dough balls, which makes the daily preparation of kneading dough much easier.
Although the restaurant is only open for two hours, the taste and reputation of the mala tang have already made a name for themselves in the past few days, and quite a few people choose to come to the restaurant to eat during this time.
After tidying up the shop that day, the family was finally less tired than they had been in the previous days and were able to sit down at the table and properly calculate how much money they had made in the past few days.
Because both meat and vegetable dishes in mala tang are priced very cheaply.
So what was poured out of that earthenware pot were mostly loose copper coins.
Grandma Guo specially brought over all the hemp ropes she had made at home, intending to count out one hundred copper coins and then string them together.
Unlike cooking vegetables, counting money has a unique kind of joy that makes you happy even if your arms ache from counting.
As Guo Xiaohua nodded one by one, her smile unconsciously widened.
She was afraid of miscounting or missing anything, so she not only unconsciously called out the numbers aloud, but also tapped her feet on the floor under the table with each number.
It's as if this way, it's less likely to miscount.
But she wasn't the only one like this in the house.
Turning to look at Grandma Guo and Guo Baiwen, the two were exactly the same, counting money while grinning from ear to ear.
After all the loose copper coins were finally counted, there were forty-two strings of strung copper coins on the table, and sixty-seven loose copper coins.
Guo Baiwen brought out his daily transaction records, calculated them, and found that the total amount he counted was almost exactly the same as the amount he had recorded.
While he was doing the accounting, Grandma Guo quietly looked up at the ledger that Guo Baiwen was keeping.
Although she was illiterate, she had never seen such tadpole-like symbols before, which were completely different from the ones pasted on the couplets on her front door.
I don't know if Wenzai drew the symbols for counting himself to make it easier to keep track of the accounts.
When the new store first opened a few days ago, at least two or three hundred people came to eat there every day.
Even though there were far fewer people today, I still earned a little over six hundred coins.
In just five days, she earned 4 taels and 267 coins. Grandma Guo knew that she had cooked a lot of vegetables and earned a lot of money in the past few days, but she never expected that cooking vegetables would be so profitable.
Moreover, this money feels completely different from the money Wenzai got by exchanging white fungus before.
They earned every single penny of this through their own hard work.
Even knowing that after deducting the cost of the custom-made chairs, bowls, and chopsticks, and then deducting the cost of vegetables and meat, Grandma Guo suddenly felt something after hearing Guo Baiwen calculate that the net profit for the past few days was two taels and seventeen coins.
It's just a mere three taels of silver for tuition at a private school!
If she could sell hot pot vegetables for a few more days, she could definitely send Wenzai to school!
She can even send Xiaohua there to study too!
She might even be able to go and study there!
-----------------------
Author's Note: Bonus chapter is here!!! Hehehe, won't you add this to your favorites? (twisting into a heart shape)
I like the character cards I made more and more each time I look at them, even though they're a bit rough because I drew them with my fingers, hehehe (proud face).
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
