Eat in Song Dynasty

Chapter 8

Nowadays, the trend of generous marriage is prevalent. When ordinary people marry their daughters, the dowry is at least [-] guan, and there is no upper limit. Therefore, when Aning was three years old, he started to save for her dowry.

Now that 13 years have passed, he still has a small amount of savings, but last year when he spent [-] guan to buy this shop, the money left in his hand was less than [-] guan.

And because of the current emphasis on cultivating the culinary skills of daughters, if someone's young lady has superb cooking skills, then she basically doesn't have to worry about it for the rest of her life, not to mention being hired by a high-ranking official and wealthy family to be a cook. , In the in-law's house, you have to be looked up to a few times.

It would be even better if, in addition to being able to make good tea and rice, you can also know how to read and write or some poetry, calligraphy and painting, but those who can support their daughter's family to learn these are generally wealthy families, and the writer family is obviously not among them.

But Wentai thought about his daughter's cold treatment, and thought about it for half a month, finally gritted his teeth and spent thirty pennies to send her to the Jingzhen School in the north of the city, just to make her happy. She has learned a good cooking skill, and she can read some words.

In this way, when the matchmaker introduces each other in the future, people will be able to look up to him a little bit. This way, he can marry a good man and have a good skill. Even if he closes his eyes someday, he doesn't have to worry about the rest of the child's life.
He was secretly worried, but Wen Shu in the kitchen over there had already rolled up his sleeves and started kneading dough.

Pouring meat noodles, as the name suggests, all important dramas are toppings, but Wen Shu thought that he hadn't eaten meat for nearly half a month.

In order to make the noodles taste better, she was not stingy anymore, and immediately took out an egg from the bamboo basket hanging in the air, and beat it into the flour mixed with water.

After kneading the eggs, water and flour into a ball, put it aside to wake up, then pick up the piece of pork belly, wash it, cut it into small pieces of moderate thickness, and then heat the oil in the pan.

When the oil is hot, fry the dried peppercorns until fragrant, then take them out, then put the meat slices in and stir well, when the water of the meat slices is fully fried and the surface is browned, then add the chopped onion, ginger, garlic, rice wine and noodle sauce stir fry.

After the meat slices are evenly colored, pour them into a washed casserole aside, then put them on a small stove and simmer slowly.

Add a few ladles of water to the big pot that came out, and then add some firewood under the stove. After a while, the fire will flourish.

At this time, the noodles on the side are almost awake, take out the dough, put it on the chopping board, roll it into large pieces with a rolling pin, and then cut them into thin and long strips with a knife. When these are done, the water in the pot just boils.

Put the cut noodles into the pot and boil. Taking advantage of this spare time, she went to the jar in the corner of the kitchen to get the pickled radish and cut it into thin shreds.

After a cup of tea, Wen Shu brought two bowls of delicious meat-filled noodles to the wooden table in the courtyard.

Wen Tai had already smelled the smell of meat coming from the kitchen, and seeing her coming out now, he washed his hands and sat down at the table without calling.

Thick oily red sauce, soft and tasty meat sprinkled with green onion, burnt red and emerald green, the color alone is very gratifying, and the neat pickled radish next to it makes this bowl The topping noodles look very appetizing.

"Come on, Daddy, try it and see if my skills have improved?" Wen Shu handed the clean chopsticks to Wen Tai.

Wen Tai took it, took a piece of meat and chewed it carefully. After a while, he nodded slowly: "Not bad, it seems to be a little sweeter than the last time, and the taste is much softer."

"Isn't that right? The cook in the school taught it newly. She said that adding some vinegar to the stew would make the meat rot faster. She also said that she will teach us how to make fish soup this afternoon?"

Wen Tai nodded with satisfaction: "From this point of view, those thirty guan were not in vain. You have indeed improved your cooking skills a lot after studying for a few months."

Hearing this, Wen Shu smiled triumphantly: "That's right, your daughter is so smart, she can learn it in no time."

Wen Tai has long been used to hearing this kind of self-boasting words, and he bowed his head and ate noodles without changing his face.Seeing this, Wen Shu couldn't help swallowing, and without speaking, he lowered his head and began to eat noodles with a sigh.

In a short while, the father and daughter ate up two large bowls of noodles with toppings, and the bottom of the bowl was so clean that there was not even soup left.

After eating the noodles, Father Wen went to the neighboring uncle's house to discuss the rebuilding of the shop, while Wen Shu washed the dishes and went back to his room to take a nap.

Now there is less than an hour before starting school in the next afternoon, taking a nap in the afternoon, so as not to be sleepy in class in the afternoon, and being caught by the master to beat her hand, thinking, she loosened her hair and took off her coat.

It's just that before falling asleep, I was still thinking vaguely in my mind, I don't know how much money the government can subsidize this fire?
When I fell asleep again, it was already the beginning of the end, and the sky was still gloomy at this time, and it was still raining lingeringly.

Wen Shu got up and yawned, hung up the tent, got out of bed and walked to the east wardrobe, took out an autumn-colored embroidered camellia short jacket and a crimson purple long skirt, and changed into it.

The fabric of this outfit is all high-quality Hanchunluo. After entering school, her father was afraid that she would be ridiculed in school because she was out of business, so he specially spent three pennies to buy it for her. In addition, there is a set of lotus color dress.

Because of its preciousness, she usually doesn't want to wear it at home, and only wears it to show off when she goes to school or occasionally when someone comes to see her.

After putting on the dress, she took out a pair of silver-red and white plum embroidered shoes from under the closet and changed them on. Then she went to the dressing table and took out the wooden comb. She recombed the hair that fell out during sleep, and tied a pair of incense sticks on the top of her head. bun.

After all this was done, a pretty, lively and beautiful little lady was reflected in the bronze mirror.

Turning around, seeing that there was nothing wrong with her body, Wen Shu nodded in satisfaction, put the books on the table into the bamboo box, put the bamboo box behind her back, took the green cloth oil-paper umbrella behind the door, and went out up.

Slanting wind and drizzle, entering the house through the alley.

She was holding an oil-paper umbrella and walking slowly in the drizzle wrapped in the breeze. The broken walls on both sides gave off a burning smell, and the shouts from the market in front came faintly.

Wen Shu looked at the ground very intently, for fear that the newly worn satin embroidered shoes would be splashed by the muddy water on the ground. Naturally, the walking speed would not be fast. Fortunately, the private school is not far from here. It is still early, so just walk slowly In the past, it was also possible.

After about two cups of tea, we walked through two busy streets and three narrow alleys, and arrived at Jingzhen Private School by the Qingshui River.

At this time, it was less than two quarters of an hour before the class started, outside the gate of the private acquaintance, little ladies with bamboo boxes on their backs entered in groups of twos and threes.

As soon as Wen Shu turned the corner of the alley, she heard someone calling her. Looking up, she saw a young lady standing under the main porch of the private school, stretching her neck to look this way.

Seeing her turn around the corner of the courtyard, she hurriedly raised her hand to greet her, with a bright smile on her face: "Sister Wen."

Wen Shu responded with a smile, walked a few steps quickly, put away the umbrella under the porch, and asked, "Why did you come so early today?"

　Tips for reading: The consistent money in the Song Dynasty was equal to [-] Wen. According to historical data, the annual income of ordinary people and hawkers in Tokyo was about [-] Guan.

　　An adult laborer earns about [-] cash a day.

　　In the Song Dynasty, housing prices in Tokyo were extremely high. It is said that many officials below the seventh rank could not afford to buy a house and had to rent a house.

　　Xiaogu’s setting here is that housing prices are equally high, but officials can still own houses, it’s just that the houses are good or bad, and the location is good or bad.

　　But ordinary hawkers and small people still rent more houses.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)