Chapter 93 Delicious Mooncakes
The reason why the Su family's holiday gift was still placed on the table was because the outer box was as beautiful as a picture, and Mrs. Fan wanted to let Lord Fan take a look at it.
Fan Yanjia had tasted sugar-roasted chestnuts before, so he opened the mooncake box directly. Inside were exquisitely crafted mooncakes that made him hungry. He first took the Cantonese five-kernel mooncake, broke it open and saw that there were walnut kernels, almond kernels, melon kernels (there were no sunflower seeds at that time, so they used local melon kernels), and sesame kernels. At the moment, Dayin Dynasty had neither olive kernels nor peanut kernels, so Su Ruojin put chestnuts as one kernel.
Although it clearly has four kernels, Su Ruojin still calls it five kernels. At this moment, although Fan Yanjia noticed it, he didn't pay much attention to it. At such a young age, he loves sweets. After taking a bite, his eyebrows flew up at the delicious taste.
"Su's dim sum is delicious."
Mrs. Fan frowned as she saw her child's greedy look. This child...
Seeing that his mother was disgusted, Fan Yanjia quickly stuffed the other half into her hands, "Mom, try it, it's oily but not greasy, sweet but not choking, sticky and sandy, and the taste is really good. It's really delicious."
Seeing her son praising this small piece of cake to the heavens, Mrs. Fan glared at him. He had even eaten tribute given by the government, but he acted like a poor child from a humble family who had never seen the world. It was really... she didn't know how to describe him.
While hating my kindness, I took a small bite and put it in my mouth. The sweetness and stickiness of the mooncake instantly slid down my teeth and palate. The taste... was really good.
Fan Yanjia raised his eyebrows proudly, "It's different from what we usually eat!"
Although it tasted really good, Mrs. Fan didn't want to make her son proud, so she deliberately didn't say whether it was delicious or not. She was a little hungry at the time, and after eating half a piece, she felt unsatisfied, so she reached out for the egg yolk pastry.
There is no one who doesn’t love egg yolk pastry after having it. It is crispy on the outside and the egg yolk is salty and crunchy on the inside. The crispy, salty and fragrant taste is hard to describe. It can be just two words: delicious.
Mrs. Fan was no exception. A small snack was not enough for her, so she bought eight snacks in a gift box. In a blink of an eye, they were all finished by the mother and son. When Mr. Fan came back, he saw his son and his wife competing with each other to see which snack to eat.
He sniffed, "Salty and fragrant, what is that?" He had just finished his shift and was hungry. He smelled such a fragrance, and his appetite was aroused. He could not resist, so he reached out and took a five-nut mooncake and took a bite. "It's not this fragrance, but this one is not bad either."
The food was delicious to begin with, and as he was starving, Lord Fan couldn't stop eating.
Fan Chengcan smelled the fragrance, luckily his calves were fast, otherwise he would not have had any mooncakes. He ran over, stood on tiptoe, stretched out his chubby little hands, grabbed one in each hand and started biting, chewing happily.
When Fan Hongjia and his wife came over to say goodnight to their parents, they saw that the four generations of grandparents and grandchildren could not stop eating.
There were sixteen small mooncakes. If it were in modern times, half of them would be eaten and the other half would be wasted. But now, not a single one was wasted and all of them went into the stomachs of the Fan family.
Rich families prefer small and exquisite things. The egg yolk pastry is not big to begin with, and men usually eat one in one bite. Su Ruojin did not make the five-nut mooncake bigger, but it is slightly larger than the egg yolk pastry. It is not big, but not small either. You can eat it for two dinners without eating it.
Mr. Fan was still savoring the taste, "Which shop has new products? Let's buy some tomorrow to try, especially the egg yolk crisps that I didn't get to try."
There was actually some delicious food that he hadn’t eaten yet. Fan Chengcan couldn’t bear it anymore and opened his mouth to howl, “I want… I want it now…”
Mrs. Fan and her son: ...
Fan Yanjia touched his nose guiltily and ran away quickly, adding, "Father, this is a holiday gift from the Su family. After eating the cakes, you can appreciate Mr. Su's paintings." He pointed to the packaging box on the table and ran away.
Mr. Fan: ...Eat and be rewarded? What a nice concept. She is indeed a talent he values.
The Su family didn't know what was going on with the Fan family, but Yang Siniang and Xue Wulang had tasted the Su family's mooncakes and chestnuts, and they both ran over to stand in front of Su Ruojin and flattered her.
"Ajin, the food you make is always better than other places. Why is that?"
Su Ruojin could tell her that thousands of years later, ingredients were abundant and people had taken cuisine to the extreme. To make a delicious mooncake, a lot of auxiliary ingredients had to be added just to make the dough, not to mention what to put in first and what to put in later and how to ferment it. How could something made with so much care not be delicious?
"So are you still doing it?"
The Mid-Autumn Festival hasn’t arrived yet, but the gifts sent by the Su family have already been shared and eaten by her family, and she still hasn’t had enough!
Su Ruojin: ...
Of course good things take a lot of effort, and she doesn’t want to make them again!
The next day, when Nanny Qin from the Fan family delivered a generous return gift and tactfully suggested buying some mooncakes, Su Ruojin of course would not take the Fan family's money and agreed with a smile.
When Nanny Qin saw that Madam Su Er agreed, she went back to report with a smile.
Cheng Yingzhen looked at the gift list sent by the Fan family and said, "Ajin, this is too expensive."
Mrs. Fan gave a fifty-year-old ginseng, which was estimated to be worth dozens of taels of silver, a box of high-quality donkey-hide gelatin which cost nearly twenty taels, and several colors of top-quality brocade and several styles of pearl flowers. At first glance, this gift basically took care of everyone in the Su family, big and small. The old ginseng was for Su Yanli, the donkey-hide gelatin was for Cheng Yingzhen, the brocade was for making clothes for the whole family, and the pearl flowers of course were for Su Ruojin. In this way, the gift for one festival was almost two hundred taels.
Even if the Fan family gave gifts to other wealthy families, they would probably be of this level.
The gifts that the Fan family sent back were both thoughtful and valuable. Su Ruojin felt both surprised and expected.
"Ajin...?"
Mrs. Fan is here to report Li during the Mid-Autumn Festival.
Logically speaking, as a family that has enjoyed real benefits from Lord Fan, the Su family would not suffer any loss by giving them two more recipes. However, Mrs. Fan still slowly reciprocated the favors during their daily interactions. Many times, especially when dealing with people of status, favors, gifts or benefits cannot be repaid immediately, which means that the other person is willing to repay you and does not want to do business with you. On the contrary, those who are not in a hurry to repay favors are the ones who can maintain a long-term relationship with you, which means they are willing to interact with you.
This is also what Su Ruojin slowly figured out after dealing with people of status in later life.
Shu Tong asked, "Second Madam, since mooncakes are so delicious, why don't you make some and sell them?"
Su Ruojin shook her head. "If we can't form a scale, we won't make much money just by doing it piecemeal."
If you want to make delicious mooncakes, you need real ingredients, which is very expensive. So just wait and see when there’s a chance.
With the help of Cheng Yingzhen, her daughter, Mao Ya and Shu Tong, they worked for three days and made nearly a thousand pieces. Five or six hundred of them were given to the Fan family, and the rest were distributed to family members, servants, Yang Si Niang and others.
At the end, only a little bit was left, which I kept for watching the moon at home.
Mrs. Fan sent five or six hundred mooncakes packaged in the same way as the Su family's to the people they had dealings with, and of course also to the palace. Even the emperor got to taste the delicious mooncakes made by Su Ruojin.
When Zhao Lan was attending the Mid-Autumn Festival banquet in the palace, he noticed the mooncakes in front of the emperor and frowned.
Santai went to inquire immediately, and soon found out that it was a festival gift sent by Madam Fan to the palace. "I heard that the father and son of the Fan family thought it was delicious, so they asked the Su family to make a few hundred more."
Delicious? He thought it was delicious too! Zhao Lan's mouth twitched slightly.
(End of this chapter)
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