Jiang Yuwei divided the wolf meat into several pieces. This time, the family needed to cook and serve the workers, so the wolf meat couldn't be sold and could only be used for the family's consumption first.
Jiang Yuwei first took a few pieces of meat, marinated them with salt, and hung them on the beam in the kitchen. She then made braised dishes from the wolf's internal organs and offal, and used the wolf bones to make a large pot of soup to be served to everyone the next day.
At this moment, Jiang Yuwei was extremely grateful that she had someone build a stove with multiple cooking pots in the yard beforehand; otherwise, with so much wolf meat, one stove would not be enough.
Although she was busy processing wolf meat, Jiang Yuwei kept an eye on the movements outside.
Jiang Yuwei looked at the two ribs of wolf meat and was a little worried. Suddenly, she thought that she could roast them over a fire in the yard. So she put them in a basin to marinate and left them to roast over a fire the next morning.
After finishing her work, Jiang Yuwei was naturally delighted to see the large amount of wolf meat, which saved her the money of buying meat.
In fact, for someone like Jiang Yuwei, who has already been paid, there's no need to serve her so well. Even if they just make wild vegetable porridge for the villagers, as long as they're full, no one will say anything.
However, Jiang Yuwei thought that everyone was here to do physical labor, so they should not be shortchanged in terms of food. Of course, she also had some selfish motives. Now that she had separated from her family in Ningjia Village, she had no relatives on her mother's side.
Ning Huaizhi's legs are not good, and she will need the help of the villagers to do many chores in the future. Now that her reputation for generosity has spread, the people of Ningjia Village will naturally think well of her. She will be content if they can lend a helping hand when her family is in trouble in the future.
Jiang Yuwei was busy until late at night. She went outside to check again and rekindled the torches that had been extinguished before entering the courtyard with peace of mind. She took a bath in the spiritual spring water, and her strength was restored considerably.
However, Jiang Yuwei was still afraid that the wolf pack would come down the mountain again in the middle of the night, so she woke up Ning Huaizhi, helped him into a wheelchair, and pushed him to the kitchen in the outer room to keep watch before she went to sleep.
Jiang Yuwei felt that she had only been asleep for a short while when she heard Ning Huaizhi shouting:
"Yuwei, Yuwei, wake up! I hear noises outside!"
Jiang Yuwei immediately woke up and hurriedly woke up the two children as well. The four of them looked tense. Jiang Yuwei took a pitchfork from the yard, Ning Zhao took a stick from the side of the kang (a heated brick bed), and tightly protected Ning Wan behind her. Ning Huaizhi also nervously took out his slingshot and mud balls.
Jiang Yuwei first walked to the courtyard gate and peered through the crack in the door to observe the activity outside. After looking carefully for a while and not seeing any wolf pack, she boldly opened the door and cautiously walked out. Jiang Yuwei had only taken a few steps when a loud rooster crowed.
Even though Jiang Yuwei was quite brave, she was still quite frightened. After she came to her senses, she followed the sound and found that a pheasant had fallen into a trap. Jiang Yuwei was overjoyed and quickly went down to catch the pheasant, bringing it back to the yard and smiling at Ning Huaizhi.
"It was a false alarm; it was just a pheasant."
The sky was already beginning to lighten, and the four of them had no desire to sleep any longer. Jiang Yuwei instructed Ning Zhao and Ning Wan to cut some grass to feed the rabbits and pheasants. Since there was still so much wolf meat at home, the pheasants should be raised for a few days until the wolf meat was finished before killing them.
Seeing that there were only a few steamed buns left from yesterday, Jiang Yuwei decided to steam more today since she got up early. She prepared the dough and let it rest while she gathered firewood and set up a fire in the yard to roast wolf ribs.
After Ning Huaizhi helped scoop the braised food out of the pot, he cut a small plate, put it on the table, took out the few leftover steamed buns from yesterday, and the four of them sat together and ate breakfast.
Jiang Yuwei counted down the days; tomorrow she would be going to town to sell fried cakes again. She started a fire and asked Ning Huaizhi to watch over the roasting of wolf chops, while she hurried to grind soybeans and cook red bean paste.
After the family of four finished breakfast, the villagers who came to work also entered the yard. They couldn't help but swallow their saliva when they smelled the aroma of the braised food. After glancing at the meat in the pot, everyone was even more motivated to work.
When Ning Huaizhi was roasting wolf ribs in the yard, everyone's eyes widened, and some even drooled.
Jiang Yuwei put the kneaded dough into the pot and instructed Ning Zhao to take charge of steaming the dough. She then busied herself soaking soybeans and red beans and preparing wolf bone soup for the villagers at noon.
That evening, Jiang Yuwei thought she would cook some soy milk to quench everyone's thirst. So she soaked a lot of soybeans today, since she could sell more at the market tomorrow, and the family really needed money right now.
Jiang Yuwei had been busy all morning. Seeing that Ning Huaizhi had finished grilling the wolf ribs, she invited everyone to come and eat.
Everyone had been eating meat for several days in a row, so when they saw the wolf ribs, they lost their previous excitement. They quickly finished eating and went back to work.
In the evening, the village head came to check on the progress and was very surprised:
"Eldest daughter-in-law, you've done a really good job. You've built a house in just a few days. It's all worth it for you to put in so much effort to entertain the villagers."
Jiang Yuwei smiled gently and said:
"I also want to thank the village head for finding some suitable people to do things for me. Otherwise, how could I, a woman, handle it? Tonight I'm going to make fried cakes and soy milk. There are also leftover wolf ribs from lunch. The village head will stay and we'll have some to eat together."
Upon hearing that there were wolf ribs to eat, the village head swallowed hard and agreed without hesitation.
Jiang Yuwei prepared two buckets of soy milk and two baskets of fried cakes as usual. She originally wanted to take the braised wolf offal she made yesterday to the market to sell, but when she thought about how many helpers at home needed to eat, and that Ning Huaizhi couldn't go to the market to help tomorrow and had to stay home to supervise the work, she realized that even if she brought the braised food, she wouldn't be able to handle it all, so she gave up on the idea.
night
Jiang Yuwei finally prepared all the food for the market trip the next day and the meals to leave for the villagers. She also gave some instructions to Ning Huaizhi and the two children before finally going to sleep peacefully.
The next morning, Jiang Yuwei hurriedly ate breakfast and thought about going to the village entrance to catch the oxcart. Unexpectedly, Uncle Ning drove the oxcart directly to her doorstep to pick her up first.
Jiang Yuwei said, quite embarrassed:
“Uncle Ning, I was thinking that since Huaizhi isn’t going to the market today, I wouldn’t have to trouble you to make this trip.”
Seeing this, Uncle Ning quickly got out of the car to help her move her things, laughing as he did so:
"It's alright, our two families don't need to worry about these things. I figured you'd be carrying a lot of food when you go to the market. And since I'm getting old and don't need much sleep, it's no problem for me to get up early and come pick you up."
Hearing Uncle Ning's words, Jiang Yuwei was deeply moved. She immediately took out eight coins and stuffed them into Uncle Ning's hand, then smiled and said:
“Uncle Ning, you’re right. It’s really hard for me to move all this stuff by myself. I’ll give you an extra three coins for my ride in the future. I’ll have to trouble you to come and give me a ride. It’s not much money, so please don’t refuse. I’m going to the market to sell goods, and I’m carrying more stuff than others. I should have paid you back a long time ago.”
Seeing that Jiang Yuwei was resolute, Uncle Ning could no longer refuse. He had to hurry to the village entrance to pick up other people, so he drove the oxcart away.
Ning Huaizhi witnessed everything from the courtyard. He only regretted that his crippled legs couldn't heal quickly. At the same time, he was very grateful to the villagers for taking care of his family. But then he thought that if his wife hadn't been so generous and grateful, why would others have treated his family this way?
After thinking it over, Ning Huaizhi was still grateful that he had married a good wife by accident. He smiled and went back to the courtyard to busy himself with the tasks his wife had given him.
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