Yang Donghu caught a cold a few days ago, so the agreement to send peach blossom cakes every three days was broken.
When Zhao Luochuan went to the town to get the medicine for him, he explained the reason to the shopkeeper. The shopkeeper was easy to talk to and said that it was not a big deal if it was delayed for two days. Peach Blossom Cakes were loved by young ladies from wealthy families, so as long as it didn't miss Miss Zhang's banquet, it would be fine.
The shopkeeper had few peach blossom cakes left, and they had all been reserved. He wrote a sold-out sign to replace the original peach blossom cake sign.
A cousin of Mr. Zhang came to stay at his house for a while. Miss Zhang Baoyu liked this cousin very much. When the cousin arrived in five days, Zhang Baoyu wanted to welcome her in her own courtyard. She sent someone to ask the shopkeeper early to order peach blossom cakes for the banquet.
This was already a done deal and there was no way to refuse. Besides, the Zhang family was one of the richest families in town. If he broke his promise and made Zhang Baoyu angry, it would be extremely difficult for him to sell peach blossom cakes in the future, and the shopkeeper would also be implicated.
Zhao Luochuan thanked the shopkeeper for his tolerance and arranged to deliver the cake two days later than the original date. By that time, it was time for him to go up the mountain. The peach blossom cake should have been delivered by the Zhao family, but the shopkeeper took into consideration that Yang Donghu was ill and asked the waiter to go to the Zhao family to pick it up on that day.
After Zhao Luochuan returned, he told Yang Donghu about it. Yang Donghu knew that doing business was not easy, and credit was especially important, so he agreed.
Zhao Luochuan had just left yesterday. Yang Donghu chatted with Zhu Cuilan for half an hour in the afternoon, and in the afternoon he and Zhao Fangchu made peach blossom cakes with all the fermented dough.
This time he didn't leave any for his family. When the waiter came to pick it up the next day, Yang Donghu took out some of the extra food and gave one portion to the shopkeeper to thank him for his patience. He didn't charge any money for it and considered it all a gift to the shopkeeper.
There was another one for the second brother. Delivering the peach blossom cakes should have been his job, but the second brother didn't complain at all. He felt bad for troubling him to come all the way from the town to Yang Donghu, so he thought of giving him some cakes.
The waiter is married with a virtuous wife and a well-behaved son. He works in a restaurant. Sometimes, the owner will let the waiter take the food home to eat with his family even though the customers have hardly touched it.
The customers always ordered good things, with a table full of chicken, fish, meat and eggs. Moreover, restaurants are different from hotels. They do not serve home-cooked dishes. Things like braised venison and wild chicken stewed with fir mushrooms are delicacies that only rich people can eat.
The restaurant was full of oil and water, and most of the guests drank alcohol, so there was always a lot of meat left over. The waiter had taken some roasted venison back home before.
If there are any peach blossom cakes left, the waiter can take them. However, the peach blossom cakes have just been released, and Yang Donghu has not delivered them to the town many times. There are almost never enough to sell. The waiter has given many portions of peach blossom cakes to customers, but he has not tasted them himself.
Peach blossom cakes are not cheap for him, so he would never be willing to spend money to buy them. Now that someone has given them to him, he might as well take them back and let his wife who takes care of the household have a try.
The waiter took the cakes handed to him by Yang Donghu with a smile. After thanking him, he carried the load towards the town. There were so many cakes now that the basket could no longer hold them all.
Everyone in the village knew that Zhao Luochuan would sell the wild animals he hunted in the mountains to the restaurant in town. They were also familiar with the waiter in the restaurant, but they didn't know why the waiter carried a load of food from their house and left when Zhao Luochuan hadn't returned from the mountains yet.
Although some people were puzzled, they only talked about it behind his back, but some people dared to ask Yang Donghu in person.
Zhu Cuilan and Yang Donghu walked a few steps forward to help the second brother, but were stopped by a woman in the village.
"Cui Lan, who are you sending off in such a hurry? What goodies did your Dachuan sell in town?"
Several women sat in a row. Sitting at the edge was Aunt Song, who had exchanged water celery with Zhu Cuilan last time. She was holding a little girl of five or six years old in her hand and smilingly made room for Zhu Cuilan to sit.
Aunt Song has two sons. She now lives with her second son, and the girl she is holding is the daughter of her second son.
In a few days it will be time to harvest wheat. By then, no one except Zhu Cuilan will be so leisurely.
"It's not Dachuan, it's Donghu who made pancakes at home and asked people in town to collect them. They came to pick them up today." Zhu Cuilan pulled the little girl to sit in her arms, and teased the child with a smile.
Another aunt who was sitting nearby pulled Yang Donghu to sit down and interrupted, "Oh, they sold them all to the town. They must have made a lot of money."
Yang Donghu smiled shyly: "No aunt, I just did it for fun."
Some people would be able to find out about this matter if they asked around. It was true that Yang Donghu didn't want people to know before it was successful, but now that business can be done, there was no need to deliberately conceal it.
As for some people who are jealous and like to be sarcastic, he can't control them. Let them say whatever they want. Anyway, he won't lose any money by saying a few words, and he still has to make money.
As expected, some people were skeptical and said, "I don't think so. Otherwise, can't people come to my house in person to pick up the goods? It would cost hundreds of coins a month. If I sell an extra ounce of silver, I think I can make money."
Everyone knew the prices in the town. The person who spoke was a young lady from the Lin family. Yang Donghu called her Sister Lin.
Mrs. Lin was being conservative, but even so, there was still envy in her tone.
The Lin family are all farmers, and only the harvested crops can be exchanged for money. She is a woman from a poor family, and she is not good at embroidery and does not know how to make money. She can only pick things from the mountains and sell them.
However, there are things everywhere in the mountains, and it is impossible to sell them at a high price. Thirty or fifty cents is enough. If you knew that Yang Donghu sold a piece of cake for eighty cents, you would probably feel even more jealous.
She always spoke like this, and she meant no harm. Zhu Cuilan laughed and said, "It's just a kid making pancakes for fun. How much money can they make? You're better off. Your Huzi is very capable. He cultivates more than ten acres of land and has more than enough food to eat in a year. It's nothing like us. We have to pay money to buy mixed noodles."
When Mrs. Lin heard what she said, she smiled and looked a little proud. There were not many families in their village who had more land than hers.
The villagers would never use all white flour for steamed buns, so they would mix white flour with other flours. But the Lin family was different. Whether they were steaming buns or rolling noodles, they always used fine white flour, which made them envied by many people.
"No way! You don't know how tiring farming is. The summer harvest is almost here, and just thinking about all this land makes my scalp tingle. Every year at this time, I can't get a good night's sleep for almost a month, and I'm so tired that I can't even stand up."
Although Mrs. Lin complained, the smile on her face did not diminish at all.
Others felt the same way after hearing her words. When they got busy, they didn't even have time to eat. The whole family, young and old, rushed to harvest wheat in the fields.
The women talked about the hard work of farming, and said that the weather had been good recently, and prayed that it would not rain in the future.
Zhu Cuilan and Yang Donghu didn't farm and didn't say much, they just listened and agreed. They changed the topic quickly and soon they were back to talking about family matters.
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