Yun Qiao agreed and walked to the vegetable patch to pull out four or five green onions.
She peeled off the muddy onion skin, pinched off the yellowed leaves, walked to the water tank, scooped half a bucket of water and washed it clean.
Washing the green onions, Yun Qiao walked into the kitchen: "Auntie, the green onions are washed."
Li Baiqiu had already chopped the chicken into pieces neatly and was taking out the hazel mushrooms that had been dried years ago from the cupboard and soaking them in water.
Li Baiqiu had already sorted out his mood and smiled at Yun Qiao: "Yun Qiao, give me the green onion and help me light the fire."
"Of course." Yun Qiao agreed and asked, "Do you want to burn it now?"
Li Baiqiu nodded: "Let's burn it. While you're starting the fire, I've also prepared the ingredients."
Li Baiqiu moved quickly. While Yun Qiao was using the match to light the fire, she quickly sliced the ginger and chopped the green onion, and also washed some peppercorns and star anise.
Yun Qiao lit the fire and heated the pot. Li Baiqiu scooped a little rapeseed oil into the pot to lubricate it.
Li Baiqiu didn't pour too much oil into the pot, because the big chicken today was fat and had a lot of yellow chicken fat on it.
When she was frying the meat, she would pull out a large lump of chicken fat. If she refined the fat, the oil she would get would be enough for frying chicken.
Chicken fat has a high oil yield, and soon after it was put into the pot, a layer of chicken fat covering the bottom of the pot was produced. Li Baiqiu then added green onions, ginger, peppercorns and star anise to the pot and stir-fried them. After the green onions turned slightly yellow, he poured the chicken pieces into the pot and stir-fried them until fragrant.
When the chicken pieces were almost fried, Li Baiqiu poured in a little bit of white wine to remove the fishy smell and cook it for fragrance, then added a large spoonful of soybean paste diluted with water and salt and stir-fried.
Stir-fry until the chicken is colored, then add enough water to cover the chicken. Bring the water to a boil, skim off the foam, cover the pot and start stewing.
While stewing the meat, the hazel mushrooms that had been soaked earlier were also soaked. Li Baiqiu changed the water twice to clean the hazel mushrooms, put them into the pot and stewed them with the chicken.
Both the chicken and the hazel mushrooms are quite difficult to stew, and they take at least half an hour to stew.
While the meat was stewing, Li Baiqiu removed the heads of the small river shrimps, washed them and set them aside.
I also added some cornmeal to keep it warm in advance, and then put it into the pot when the chicken is almost ready.
At this time, He Tingjun also came from the village chief's house.
Yun Qiao was in the kitchen and heard Ye Yuanzhang ask him, "What did the village chief say when you sent Hu Lei over?"
He Tingjun replied, "The village chief was very angry and scolded Hu Lei. He also punished him by sending him to the Xishe quarry to dig stones for two weeks."
Ye Yuanzhang was satisfied.
The work in the quarry was hard, and even though he only worked there for half a month, it was enough to make Hu Lei very tired.
Yun Qiao was a little worried and threw a handful of firewood under the pot. He couldn't help but run out of the kitchen and asked, "What was Hu Lei's reaction after being punished? Did he show any dissatisfaction?"
"That's not the case." He Tingjun said, somewhat puzzled, "Because he's... a little drunk and unconscious, he hasn't reacted yet. If you want to know, you have to wait until he sobers up."
The incident where Hu Lei got drunk and used the village chief's kang as a toilet and urinated all over the place was too disgusting, so there was no need to tell Yun Qiao about it.
Yun Qiao said worriedly, "Brother He, Hu Lei seems very irritable and doesn't seem like a straightforward person. Do you think he will retaliate against my uncle and the others after he sobers up?"
He Tingjun didn't know Hu Lei's character, so he shook his head and said, "That's not something to talk about."
Ye Yuanzhang wasn't too worried. "It's okay. Hu Lei only gets drunk and gets mad. He usually seems pretty bad-tempered when he's not drinking."
Yun Qiao was still worried. "Is he really okay? I noticed he got drunk and had a bad temper. He's also very petty and narrow-minded. Yuan Qing was just running too fast and accidentally bumped into him. I apologized immediately, but he still wouldn't give in. He hits people at the drop of a hat, regardless of whether they're adults or children."
"I think it's okay. Hu Lei has had many conflicts with villagers when he's drunk, and he's fought with many people. I haven't seen him retaliate against anyone after he sobered up. I guess he loses his memory when he's drunk, and forgets everything when he sobers up."
Ye Yuanzhang thought for a moment and said, "At worst, I can just avoid him from now on."
"Then you must be very careful and try to stay away from him." Yun Qiao warned: "Brother He and I will leave today. If anything happens in the future, we are far away and can't help."
Ye Yuanzhang smiled and said, "It'll be fine, don't worry."
With the previous experience as a lesson, how could Yun Qiao feel at ease?
She agreed on the surface, but she was still worried in her heart.
He Tingjun noticed and said, "Yunqiao, don't worry too much. I have a good relationship with Captain Zhang of the village logging team. All the machinery the logging team needed recently was brought to me from Shanghai. He owes me a favor, so I'll go find him first and ask him to look after the family."
"Brother He, I'm sorry to bother you again." Yun Qiao looked at him with gratitude.
He Tingjun chuckled: "As long as it can make you feel at ease, it doesn't matter."
Ye Yuanzhang felt that there was something wrong with the atmosphere between the two people and gave them a strange look.
But both of them behaved very normally, and Ye Yuanzhang didn't notice anything. For a moment, he thought that he might be overthinking it.
Tingjun is his friend, how could he have anything to do with his niece!
Isn't this a generation difference?
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