Chapter 50 (Lantern Festival Birthday)
The power of the cream cake was something Guo Baiwen hadn't anticipated at first.
The store, which was not crowded at noon, suddenly attracted many people with a sweet tooth after they tasted the sliced cream cake.
Many people, after tasting it, even inquired where they could buy such pastries.
Upon hearing that Guo Baiwen had accidentally created it himself, many people excitedly slapped their thighs, exclaiming, "Wow! With such great skills, why are you even selling hot pot here!"
"You should open a pastry shop!"
Guo Baiwen initially thought it was a joke, but as more people asked about cakes, he gradually began to wonder if selling pastries in the summer would be a viable business model.
However, nowadays, the variety of pastries in pastry shops is quite considerable.
The cloud-shaped cakes he had given to Granny Sun and Hu Qingshan, as well as other snacks like translucent rice cakes, jujube flower cakes, and bean cakes, were all made by master craftsmen who had passed down their skills for many years.
Although he had tried to make a steamed egg cake at home in his previous life using a rice cooker, he almost passed out from beating it with chopsticks because he didn't have an automatic egg beater.
His biceps were well-developed, but the cake that came out of the rice cooker wasn't the one he had envisioned.
Instead, it was a half-successful, undercooked egg pancake...
Not to mention, even rice cookers and ovens are unusable here.
Think about it, that is, think about it first.
After saying goodbye to the customers who were still asking him how to make cakes, he closed the door of the mala tang shop and finally got to enjoy a half-day holiday for the Lantern Festival.
Fortunately, because they were worried about not having enough cakes for business, they used all the cakes except for those they ate themselves, and didn't give them to Lin Niangzi and the others.
Otherwise, if you really asked him how he made it, he'd be lucky if he could even explain how to make the cake base.
At this point, I really had no idea how to make whipped cream.
Yang Qiaomai had already washed the dishes in the kitchen and was sweeping the shop when Guo Baiwen asked, "Have you seen Grandma?"
"Grandma Guo was carrying a lot of things and said she was going to Hu the carpenter's house."
Today is Xiaohua's first day learning from Madam Lin. Although it was said before that there would be no tuition fee, it wouldn't be good to give her nothing at all.
Grandma Guo thought to herself, and decided to do what she had heard from the diners before, like the tuition fees collected by the school, and prepare a little of each kind to give to Madam Lin.
But Xiaohua got up very early today, which was unusual for her, and went out without taking anything with her.
She had been busy with the shop opening until this hour, and only just now had a moment to spare, so she hurriedly grabbed her things and went to find Madam Lin.
Guo Baiwen nodded upon hearing this.
He saw it when his grandmother was preparing cured meat, pastries, and dried fruit.
If I go to Lin Niangzi's house at this time and stay for a while, I'm afraid it will be a long time before I can come back.
This is a good opportunity for him.
So he patted Yang Qiaomai on the shoulder and said, "Okay, once you've finished cleaning the shop, hurry up and go eat. The food is all ready and is laid out in the back room."
“I have to go out for a bit now. If you see Grandma coming back, just tell her I’ll be home soon.”
"Hey, shopkeeper, don't worry."
Fearing that his outing would take too long, he gave Yang Qiaomai a few more words of advice.
The Lantern Festival gifts were placed on the chair in the main room. If Grandma and he didn't make it back in time, Yang Qiaomai should remember to close the small gate in the backyard when she brought the gifts home.
He had the key to the small door with him.
After confirming that nothing had been missed, Guo Baiwen finally left the house with peace of mind.
So when Grandma Guo said goodbye to Madam Lin and walked home along the alleyway with a sense of satisfaction, she saw the gate that was tightly shut.
She was a little stunned.
First, he reached out and pushed the door, but when he found that it wouldn't budge, he knocked on the door twice.
"Wen Zai?"
Buckwheat?
She called out twice, but no one answered from inside the door.
I was momentarily stunned.
Grandma Guo was in a hurry when she left home. She hadn't even had lunch yet. Besides the things she was carrying to give away, she even forgot to bring the chair stick she usually used.
She was a little confused at suddenly not being able to get into her house, but she wasn't too worried.
Just as they were pondering whether to go back to Lin Niangzi's house or continue waiting at the door, Guo Baiwen came over from the other end of the alley.
Grandma Guo waved to him, and saw him rushing over from the other side in a hurry. She couldn't help but feel sorry for him. "Look at you, it's just a few steps. It's not like Grandma can't wait. Running is so tiring."
Guo Baiwen found it somewhat amusing, "Grandma, it's only a dozen or so steps, it won't tire me out!"
His body isn't that weak yet.
As he spoke, he took the key to the small door out of his sleeve pocket and prepared to open it.
This was the first time Grandma Guo had been locked out. Watching him act, she couldn't help but sigh, "I should also carry a key like this with me."
When she moved, Guo Baiwen gave her a handkerchief, but she kept it, thinking that she didn't go out often and there were usually people at home.
This is unnecessary.
As a result, I was locked out today.
Thankfully, I didn't have to wait in the cold wind for too long.
The two entered the house, and because there were people inside, the small door was not locked, but simply closed.
Guo Baiwen placed the things he brought back in the main room and watched as the food on the table was divided into two portions, which he then placed in the kitchen stove to keep warm.
It seems that Yang Qiaomai noticed that neither of them had returned before she went home.
They were worried that the food would get cold and not taste good, so they put the food in bowls and heated it up.
He's a very thoughtful person.
"Is Xiaohua not coming home for lunch today?"
"Lady Lin asked her to keep her company, saying that she would practice her needlework after dinner and go home around 1-3 PM."
Come back at 3 PM...
Grandma Guo washed her hands and brought over the two sets of bowls and chopsticks that were still warm from the stove. Seeing the pile of things he was carrying, she couldn't help but ask curiously, "What did you go to buy again?"
"If Grandma is curious, she can open it and take a look herself."
Guo Baiwen handed over the box in his hand; it was good that Xiaohua wasn't here at this moment.
These cufflinks turned into earrings were a one-of-a-kind pair, even though he had picked out a pair of silver earrings for Xiaohua at a jewelry shop.
However, the silver refining process is not as good as it was in the previous life, so the color is not as clear as those cufflinks.
What matters more is the craftsmanship; the jewelry shop staff praised the pair of cufflinks he sent as being the best in the world.
Seeing that he bought new earrings, some people, still not giving up, asked him if he would be willing to sell his cufflinks to the store.
Guo Baiwen rejected all of these kinds of cultural ideas.
As for the origin of this item, they only said that it was passed down from their ancestors, and because they polished and maintained it every day, its color appeared particularly bright.
Qianzhou is quite far from the capital, so the jewelry shop owner assumed that his family was a wealthy old family that had migrated from the capital.
After all, during the previous dynasty, Qianzhou was a popular place of exile for those banished from the capital.
Although it was exile, some people would secretly store some good things on their person or in the corner of their clothes to take with them on the way.
Therefore, many good things were brought over from the capital.
There are at least eight hundred, if not a thousand, families like this with some standing in Qianzhou.
These cufflinks are valuable, but not extremely rare. The combination of silver and mother-of-pearl is of excellent quality, but the craftsmanship is somewhat lacking.
The shopkeeper just clicked his tongue in regret a few times, but didn't insist.
Since it was just a matter of changing cufflinks to a pair of ear hooks, it wasn't a very troublesome thing. After receiving the money and handing the item to the craftsman next to him, the shopkeeper then started promoting his shop's silver earrings to Guo Baiwen.
I heard it's for my younger sister.
The shopkeeper avoided fancy designs like gourds or the Chinese characters for "fortune" and "longevity," and instead recommended designs featuring flowers, animals, or simple geometric shapes.
Guo Baiwen looked around and picked out a pair of plain silver lilac earrings with scrolling foliage patterns.
This size matches Xiaohua's face shape somewhat.
Moreover, the design is simple and pleasing to the eye, making this pair suitable for various occasions. If you take good care of it, it might last a long time.
So after making the decision, I asked the shopkeeper about the price.
The shopkeeper immediately asked for one tael of silver. Guo Baiwen was about to haggle when he heard the shopkeeper's flowery words.
'What?! This is a design that my family's master craftsman, with fifty years of experience, spent ten years perfecting!'
'Although the design is rather simple, the materials used are top-notch, amounting to half a tael of silver. Combined with the craftsmanship, charging one tael of silver is already quite cheap—'
"What? Since this is your first time in the store, if you agree to buy something from them today, they'll help you adjust the condition of your jewelry and perform repairs once a year for free!"
Guo Baiwen only managed to say two words, but he couldn't respond at all in this conversation.
In the end, I mustered all my strength and negotiated with the shopkeeper for a long time. It was true that I paid one or two taels of silver, but the labor cost for altering Grandma's earrings was also included in this amount.
It was because of the scuffle in the store that he came back late at noon.
Grandma Guo had no idea what had happened in the jewelry store; she only saw what was inside when she opened the small red cloth bag.
She couldn't help but exclaim "My God!", "Oh my God Wenzai!", and "My Goddess of the Mountain!" repeatedly, but she was very careful when picking up the earrings.
"Is this for me?" Grandma Guo's eyes were a little red, and her hands holding the earrings seemed a little helpless. "But today is clearly Wenzai's birthday, why are you giving Grandma a gift instead... Grandma didn't prepare anything for you."
Why did giving a gift in the first place end up making Grandma cry?
Guo Baiwen looked at the tears welling up in Grandma's eyes and frantically searched for a handkerchief, but couldn't find one.
She could only pull out the softer sleeve from inside her own clothes and carefully wipe the corners of her grandmother's eyes. "Grandma—"
He felt bad watching it.
I always thought Xiaohua was a person who loved beauty, but I never thought that although Grandma is old, she was probably just like Xiaohua in the past...
-----------------------
Author's note: My heart is still with the National Day holiday; going back to work is so painful! [laughing and crying emoji]
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
