border cook

The soup had to be stewed two hours in advance. As soon as Jiang Yanyi mentioned the ingredients to be used at noon, Mrs. Liu hurriedly ordered the kitchen staff to go out to buy them.

Jiang Yanyi found time to visit him in Jiang Yangui's yard. When she entered the room, she saw him holding a book in his hand, and there was a thick stack of books piled up beside the bed.

The room was a bit stuffy with the charcoal pot burning, and there was a small gap in the window, but this made the warmth in the room dissipate a lot, and the air didn't circulate much.

Jiang Yanyi couldn't help but think of Dilong who sealed the mansion. If he could recuperate in such a yard, it would be of great benefit to Jiang Yangui's injury.

"Is the leg pain better today?" Jiang Yanyi asked.

Jiang Yangui was really concentrating on reading, and he didn't realize that someone had entered the room until Jiang Yanyi said aloud, "It doesn't hurt much anymore."

When Jiang Yangui laughed, there were two small dimples on his cheeks, showing a bit of shyness.

Jiang Yanyi asked him, "What book are you reading?"

"I'm reading all sorts of miscellaneous books to pass the time." Jiang Yangui hesitated for a while, and said, "Sister, I want to hire a teacher, and we can pay the money ourselves."

He wanted to study, Jiang Yanyi was naturally happy, she said: "Okay, I just happened to be looking for Fang Yazi to look at the house these few days, and then we will move out."

Jiang Yangui frowned: "Didn't you mean to move to the house behind Sister's shop?"

Jiang Yanyi said: "There is a lot of noise there, which is not conducive to your recovery. If you start studying, it is even worse to live there."

Jiang Yangui was afraid that the expense would be too high, so he hurriedly said, "As long as I can stay with Sister, I am willing to live anywhere, Sister doesn't have to waste money just to accommodate me."

"I originally planned to change to a bigger store, not all because of you." Jiang Yanyi comforted him.

At this moment, the guard Chu Zhong who took care of Jiang Yangui's diet and daily life came in and said: "Miss Biao, there is a girl at the gate who brought a fish to the house and said she was looking for you."

Jiang Yan was surprised, he didn't know many people in Xizhou, who came to the door, and went to the gate to have a look, but it was okra.

She was dressed like a ball, and she was holding two perch in her hands. When she saw Jiang Yanyi, she grinned: "Huahua, Master Yao bought fish, and asked me to send you two."

It's freezing cold now, fishing is not easy, and it's hard to buy fish in the market. Chef Yao is able to do this, presumably because the fishmonger who used to work with him often brought fish for him when he got it.

"Master Yao has a heart. You came here in a snowy day. You must have been frozen. Come in and enjoy the fire." Jiang Yanyi smiled and led the okra into the door.

The okra was like a little tail, Jiang Yanyi was going to the kitchen to deal with the pork bones bought by the servants, the okra was still in the shop as before, and consciously followed.

Jiang Yanyi thought she was afraid of strangers, so she let her do the same.

As soon as Liu Shi heard that someone was coming from the antique soup shop, she followed Jiang Yanyi to the kitchen. She suddenly thought that Jiang Yanyi didn't know how to cook soup at all, and she specially invited that person to help her get away with it.

Mrs. Liu hurried from her yard to the kitchen in a hurry.

The first thing she said when she entered the door was: "Hey, I heard that there are guests coming to the house?"

Qiu Kui's identity is not considered a guest to the Chu family, and Liu's words will only embarrass Qiu Kui.

Jiang Yanyi has always been protective of the calf. Before, she didn't look at the face of the monk or the face of the Buddha, and was willing to play tricks with Mrs. Liu, but now her attitude is obviously tough and alienated: "It's the girl who helped me in the antique soup shop who came to deliver the fish. In cold weather, I let her come in to enjoy the fire."

Seeing Jiang Yanyi's sudden change of attitude, Mrs. Liu was secretly happy, and became more and more sure of her guess.

She smiled and said: "Since you are in Ayi's shop, you can't be negligent, let this girl go to the guest room, how can you let her stay in the kitchen."

Although Qiukui was a bit stunned, Liu's words still made her feel uncomfortable, she pinched the corner of her clothes and said, "I won't go, I'm here to help Huahua."

She glared at Liu Shi angrily, and decided that Liu Shi was a bad person who bullied Jiang Yanyi. Her thinking was different from ordinary people, but she had her own small world in her head.

After Jiang Yanyi left yesterday, Chef Yao shook his head and sighed a lot with the old scholar. Qiukui could hear that they were saying that Jiang Yanyi was not doing well here. She felt that if she left now, Jiang Yanyi might suffer from this lady. "People's anger.

Liu Shi was stared at by Qiukui, and instantly thought that Jiang Yanyi said something bad about her outside, but she also found that this girl seemed to be out of order, so she looked at Jiang Yanyi: "Ayi, the people in your shop... "

Jiang Yanyi didn't want the okra to be treated like a fool, so he interrupted Liu's words: "Auntie, would you like to help me? Peel some garlic for me."

When Mrs. Liu used to cook, the ingredients were all handled by servants, and the chef on the stove gave instructions on what to do every step of the way. She only needed to put all kinds of ingredients into the pot with her own hands, which was almost considered as her own cooking. that's it.

Jiang Yanyi asked her to peel the garlic, but Liu was stunned, "Peel...peel the garlic?"

Jiang Yanyi originally just wanted to find something for Liu Shi to do, but seeing Liu Shi's expression, she thought it was Liu Shi's reluctance, so she didn't say anything, and called a kitchen servant to help her peel it.

In the kitchen, because Jiang Yanyi and Mrs. Liu cooked in person today, it was very fresh in the eyes of the servants, so many servants looked around at the door of the kitchen.

Liu was afraid that what happened here would reach the old lady's ears, and the old lady would have a bad impression of herself, so she hurriedly stepped forward and snatched the garlic from the little maid's hand, "Isn't it just peeling garlic, I peel it."

She glanced at Okra and sneered in her heart, feeling that Jiang Yanyi was just delaying time with her, trying to drive her away, and then let the girl who rushed over from the shop cook for her.

Therefore, when peeling the garlic, she felt a little better.

It's just that Liu's hands are rarely touched with spring water, and he has to apply various ointments countless times a day to maintain his hands like a double ten girl.

The skin on her hands is fragile and she has no nails. When peeling the garlic, she cut the garlic cloves several times in order to remove the thin skin. The garlic juice soaked into the nails, and it hurt like fire.

Mrs. Liu had never suffered such a crime before, but felt pain and burning in the seam between her thumbs, and couldn't help crying: "My hand..."

Jiang Yanyi had just finished blanching the pork bones, when she turned around and saw Mrs. Liu peeling garlic, she was about to cry, she didn't know what to say for a while, and said, "Auntie, go down and soak in cold water, and put some medicine on it." "Bar."

Mrs. Liu felt that this was Jiang Yanyi's scheme to distract her, and it was just a bit of garlic juice. Compared to exposing Jiang Yanyi, this pain is nothing!

Ms. Liu endured the pain and said, "A little redness and swelling, it's okay, Ah Yi, hurry up and cook, I'm still waiting to learn!"

Jiang Yan suggested that Liu Shi wrapped her thumb in silk with one hand and tightly covered it, her face was pained, but she still refused to leave, she was quite puzzled.

The process of boiling pork bone soup was the same as yesterday. After Jiang Yanyi put the soup into the pot, he began to process the two fish brought by the okra.

She weighed them with her hands, and both of them weighed more than three catties.

Thinking that Mrs. Chu and Jiang Yangui didn't have a good appetite, she decided to make pickled fish.

The weather was too cold, and the fish had been out of the water for too long, and had already frozen to death. This also saved Jiang Yanyi the trouble of knocking the fish unconscious with a mallet.

The cook of the Chu family wanted to help Jiang Yanyi handle the fish, but saw that Jiang Yanyi opened his belly with a knife and scraped off the fish scales in two or three strokes.

After washing the fish, separate the fish meat and fish bones, and wash off the black mucous membrane on the fish skin. A large part of the earthy smell of grass carp comes from this mucous membrane.The fish bones are chopped into sections, the fish meat is sliced, and the knife skills can be said to be very exquisite.

In the cook's business, laymen watch the excitement, while professionals watch the way.

Liu Shi watched it for so long, even though Jiang Yanyi had already put the soup on the pot, she still didn't see any tricks.

Now that he's gone, all previous efforts will be in vain. Mrs. Liu is determined to monitor Jiang Yanyi to finish the lunch.

She felt that now it was a question of who could wait better. Jiang Yanyi wanted to wait for her to leave and find someone else to do it. She was waiting for Jiang Yanyi to make a fool of himself.

Jiang Yanyi didn't have time to guess Liu's little thoughts. She marinated the fish bones and fish meat separately, washed the sauerkraut and cut it into thick slices half a finger wide. .

Fish with pickled cabbage is a classic Sichuan dish. When Jiang Yanyi cooked it before, it always had a fishy smell, but she had already completely removed the fishy smell. I learned there that sauerkraut also has an earthy smell. If you want to cook this dish authentically, you don't have to be afraid of trouble.

After processing the sauerkraut, Jiang Yanyi heats up the pot, puts in the oil, and when the oil melts, add some sesame oil and heat it together, stir-fry the onion, ginger and garlic, stir-fry the ginger and garlic with vegetable oil and animal oil, the aroma is really overbearing, the kitchen Everyone in the room was sniffing and looking into the pot.

After Jiang Yanyi stir-fried the green peppercorns until fragrant, put the fish head and fish bones in the pot first to release the water vapor, and then add the sauerkraut to stir-fry the sour gas. Sprinkle a spoonful of rice wine on the edge of the pot to cook the aroma of the wine, and finally pour a pot of boiling water, and the pot will start bubbling in an instant, the fish soup is thick and white, and the aroma rises straight up along with the heat of the boiling soup.

After Jiang Yanyi finished adding the seasoning, he cooked for a while, then fished the fish bones and fish head into a soup pot, and began to fillet the fish while the soup was boiling.When the fish fillets are marinated, they are coated with egg whites, and the taste will be smoother and tenderer. There is also a thin layer of starch on the skin, which can fully lock the moisture of the fish, and it is almost cooked in the pot.

After she poured the fish fillets, soup and meat into the soup pot, sprinkled minced garlic, minced green onion, green peppercorns, and dogwood, and poured two spoonfuls of hot oil on top, and it burst into fragrance instantly with a "sizzling" sound.

The aroma attracted people to gather together at the door, praising it again and again.

Liu's face was dreamy, she had been staring at it the whole time, but when this pot of pickled fish with aroma was placed in front of her, she still felt like a dream.

Jiang Yanyi wiped her hands on the apron and asked her, "Auntie, have you learned these two dishes today?"

Mrs. Liu said as if waking up from a dream, "Huh?"

The eyes seem to know it, but the hands seem to have not learned it yet.

Guiltily, she covered her thumb that didn't hurt much, and sighed, "Oh, my hand hurts so much, I'll go back and get some 'medicine' first."

As soon as Mrs. Liu left, Qiu Kui saw that it was time for dinner, so she also told Jiang Yanyi that she would go back, but Jiang Yanyi kept her for dinner, but she refused to say anything.

The servants in the house always looked at the okra with strange eyes, and Jiang Yanyi knew that she was uncomfortable here, so she packed a plate of snacks and brought them back for her to eat.

Jiang Yanyi only made these two hard dishes, and the servant came to report that there will be guests at the house today and they want to add more dishes.Jiang Yanyi didn't have the time to continue working in the kitchen, so he gave up his position to the cook on the stove.

When it was time to eat, only the female relatives were eating together in the inner courtyard. The men of the Chu family seemed to be accompanying the distinguished guest in the front hall, and Chu Changping also rushed back from the outside.

Mrs. Liu didn't know what news she had heard. When she left the kitchen, she still had a calm expression on her face, but now her brows and eyes are filled with joy.

Jiang Yanyi guessed that it might have something to do with the distinguished guest in the house, and she also found that more than half of the pot of sauerkraut fish she made was taken away!

She didn't pick up a few chopsticks when eating, and there was only soup left in the pot of pickled fish.

Liu's youngest daughter poked around in the soup bowl with wooden chopsticks, and finally only picked up a chopstick of sauerkraut, and her eyebrows drooped.

Seeing that she seemed to still want soup and rice, Mrs. Liu scolded in a low voice: "Hui Bao, please eat less for me. In two years you will have to discuss marriage. Who will marry a fat girl like you?"

Chu Huibao bit her chopsticks and looked at her sister pitifully.

Chu Shubao was gnawing on a big bone, and when he received Chu Huibao's gaze, he said, "Mother, my little sister is still growing up."

When Liu thought about what Chu Shubao had to do for a while, seeing that her belt was already tightened, she said with a headache: "You also give me less to eat!"

Mrs. Chu also enjoyed this meal today. Seeing Mrs. Liu scolding her two granddaughters, she said, "How can you be a mother like you? Now the children are girls who want to eat as much as they want, and when they get married, they will serve their parents-in-law There is no other day like this."

Mrs. Liu was reprimanded by Mrs. Chu, so she had to answer.

Mrs. Chu had finished eating, she wiped her mouth with a silk handkerchief and said, "You have learned the dishes from Yi girl, and from tomorrow onwards, you will also cook these dishes for my old lady to taste."

Mrs. Liu could be considered to know why Mrs. Chu was silent when she was in trouble with Jiang Yanyi before. It turned out that she was here waiting for her.

Liu groaned secretly in her heart, she said that she wanted to learn how to cook to honor Mrs. Chu herself, and now Mrs. Chu said the words intact, even if she wanted to refute, she couldn't refute them, and she might have to memorize them all. an unfilial reputation.

Not to mention how hard it is to cook, the key is that she doesn't know how to do it at all!

Mrs. Liu knows what it means to lift a rock to shoot herself in the foot.

***

Jiang Yanyi went to see Jiang Yangui after dinner, but Mrs. Liu didn't know whether she was taking her two daughters to digest food or what, so she didn't go back to her own yard, but stopped and stopped at the hanging flower gate leading to the front yard.

Jiang Yan was puzzled, and frowning, he went to Jiang Yangui's yard.

Chu Shubao had enough to eat and drink, and just wanted to go back to her room to read a book, and was dragged here by Mrs. Liu to blow the cold wind, and she was full of reluctance: "Mother, it's so cold here, let's go back to the room .”

Mrs. Liu glanced around and saw no one passing by, so she hated iron and said, "Do you know who is the distinguished guest who came to the house today?"

Chu Shubao yawned and asked, "Who is it?"

Liu shi leaned close to her ear and said, "Liaonan King! The one with the greatest military power among the vassal kings!"

Chu Shubao gathered her cloak and walked back directly: "Mother, let's stop dreaming? You want me to go to the palace to be a servant girl?"

"Bah, bah, bah! What are you thinking!" Mrs. Liu dragged her daughter back, "There is a military advisor next to the King of Liaonan. I heard that he is very valuable. I just saw it when I went back to the yard from the kitchen. He is really a good-looking person. Your third uncle is his colleague, you deserve him, no matter how much it is enough, you go and see him with me, if you are willing, I will talk to your third uncle when I turn back."

Chu Shubao touched her chubby stomach, "Mom, I'm so overstretched."

"Let you eat nonsense!" Mrs. Liu became angry when she mentioned this, but she still dragged Chu Shubao out.

They walked through the hanging flower door, and when they were about to go to the side room of the front hall, they saw a plain skirt under the eaves.

"Thank you." Jiang Yanyizhu's round and jade-like voice came from under the eaves.

"It's easy to do." The voice was clear and gentle, but it obviously belonged to a man.

The mother and daughter squatted under a cedar tree, saw Jiang Yanyi holding some kind of bottle in his hand, bowed his knees to the man in the bamboo green robe and bowed, then retracted his skirt and stepped back, and the man also turned around. Leave through the porch.

Liu's teeth were itching with hatred, and when the person walked away, she said fiercely to Chu Shubao: "Let you dawdle, let someone take the lead!"

The son-in-law she had chosen after thousands of choices couldn't just be cut off like this!