Chapter 379: Jiang Chuan’s Past

Translator: Dragon Boat Translation Editor: Dragon Boat Translation

Zhou Lan cooled the steamed sweet potatoes with cold water before adding them to the fluff-like dough, continuing to explain, “The sweet potatoes are now very glutinous and crumble at the touch of a hand. The moisture and starch in the sweet potatoes will also help the dough set better. What we need to do at this point is to ensure that the sweet potatoes and flour are fully integrated. It’s difficult to achieve this with chopsticks, so we need to wash our hands and knead the dough with our hands.”

Jiang Xia obediently followed the instructions and carefully kneaded the sweet potatoes into the dough under Zhou Lan’s direction, gradually forming a smooth, pale yellow dough.

Zhou Lan nodded in satisfaction. Her daughter was indeed smart and caught on quickly when it came to cooking.

Zhou Lan instructed Jiang Xia to sprinkle flour on the cutting board to prevent the dough from sticking, then to roll the well-kneaded dough in the flour to form a long strip, cut it into equal lengths, and after rolling each piece into a round shape, to flatten it with a rolling pin.

At this step, the task was essentially finished. Next, only frying the sweet potato pancakes until cooked was left.

Jiang Xia, already very familiar with stir-frying, didn’t need Zhou Lan’s guidance and quickly placed the sweet potato dough cakes into the hot, sizzling pan.

Seeing her daughter had fully mastered the process, Zhou Lan reminded her, “Remember, they’re only ready when both sides are golden brown. Take them out and place them on a plate without stacking them, or they won’t be crispy.”

After finishing her instructions, Zhou Lan confidently went to prepare the ingredients for pickles.

Zhou Lan had an idea; if one always eats pickles, they would eventually grow tired of them, so she planned to make some kimchi to take to the supply and marketing cooperative. They had white radishes and carrots at home to use for making kimchi. Kimchi tastes sour and is more appetizing.

She had previously had Jiang Xia pile all the radishes that had grown in the interspace in the kitchen. Now, all she had to do was simply tally up how many kilos of radishes they had, how much pickle they could make, and from there estimate the amount of white sugar needed for making the pickles and kimchi.

After calculating, she instructed Jiang Chuan to take the amount to the commune to inform Tian Zao, to make sure the matter was settled as soon as possible. Perhaps they could receive the white sugar by evening, and then they could start preparing tomorrow.

Zhou Lan estimated that they would need about two and a half kilos of white sugar. After finishing the calculations, she went to check on Jiang Xia’s work.

She found that Jiang Xia had made the sweet potato cakes very well, golden brown on both sides, filling the kitchen with the aroma of sweet potatoes. Moreover, as the sweet potato cakes were made with water from their interspace realm, there was an additional hint of sweetness beyond the fragrance of the sweet potatoes.

Zhou Lan poked the surface of a sweet potato cake with chopsticks, and the crisp sound was very appetizing.

After frying seven or eight cakes, Jiang Xia had become skillful, no longer needing to watch the pan intently, which left her free to chat with Zhou Lan. They started talking about the events of the previous afternoon.

Jiang Xia briefly recounted how she dealt with Wang Niu and the incident of buying wild vegetables and clay bricks from the children.

After hearing Jiang Xia’s account, Zhou Lan first became angry that Wang Niu had been instigated by Jiang Hong, speaking without restraint. But she couldn’t help praising her daughter for her cleverness. Indeed, this solved the problem of the shortage of clay bricks for building their house, and it could be said to have saved them a lot of trouble.

Jiang Xia had another idea, “Mother, since we have enough clay bricks, why don’t we go ahead and build a large house, with five rooms and a big courtyard, all in one go?”

Zhou Lan was puzzled, “Your sister and brother-in-law would take one room, Zhang family forth son will have another. Even if we were to build a large house, three rooms would be enough for them to live in. Why would we need five?”

Jiang Xia explained her thoughts to Zhou Lan, “Isn’t it because I was thinking, what if Zhang family’s second son and his mother decide to come to our senses in the future, and are willing to settle down in our village? They would need a room to live in, wouldn’t they? And we could reserve another room as a guest room. If friends from Locust Tree Bay or Grand Cloud Mountain come to visit, they’d have a place to stay, right?”

Zhou Lan thought that Jiang Xia’s idea was good; the spare rooms could also be used to store food supplies. She had just felt a headache upon seeing the pile of obstructive radishes on the ground; they did need storage space.

However, Zhou Lan became worried again, “You think the clay bricks found by the children are sturdy enough? I am afraid they might not be strong enough to build a house. What do we do then?”

Jiang Xia comforted her, “These kids are very handy. Maybe they’ll have delivered them by noon.. Won’t we know if the clay bricks are sturdy enough after we’ve seen them today?”