The first thing I did was to find out

Chapter 498 Everything is ready
Qin Huai's words aroused a lot of hatred in Grandpa Wang. Just as Qin Huai had expected, Grandpa Wang's reaction was both embarrassed and that since Master Qin had asked me for help, I, Wang Gensheng, would definitely do it.

At this point, all the spirits and monsters at the tea party had been gathered.

Just a little something extra.

In the morning, while making breakfast, Qin Huai tried making a few of the snacks on the list that he doesn't usually make, such as milk tofu, thousand-layer oil cake, and coconut mooncakes. Zheng Siyuan was a little surprised to see Qin Huai making coconut mooncakes and asked him why he was making mooncakes when there was still some time before the Mid-Autumn Festival.

Qin Huai explained that this was something they had planned ahead of time, and they just did it as soon as the idea came to mind. Zheng Siyuan, on the other hand, was very enthusiastic and asked Qin Huai if the Yunzhong Canteen would be selling mooncakes before the Mid-Autumn Festival.

It's the end of August now, and the Mid-Autumn Festival won't be until the beginning of October, so there's about a month and a half in between. Zheng Siyuan originally planned to work at Yunzhong Canteen making pastries for another half month before returning to Suzhou to open a pastry shop. However, if there are Mid-Autumn Festival activities in Qinhuai, Zheng Siyuan wouldn't mind staying for another month, returning the day before the Mid-Autumn Festival.

Zheng Siyuan had to set aside a day to go home for the festival. Although Zheng Siyuan and his biological father Zheng Da were not particularly close, their Zheng family had a strong festive atmosphere. Every year, for important festivals such as the Mid-Autumn Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, and Lantern Festival, they would gather together to celebrate, along with Zheng Siyuan's sister, brother-in-law, and sister's parents-in-law.

These are very rare holidays when lazy Zheng Da will personally cook desserts and get a few dishes from Huang Shengli to take home. In the words of Zheng Siyuan's brother-in-law, even if it's raining knives, the family must still get together for a holiday meal.

Of all things, eating is the most important during holidays!
Qin Huai said no need, he was just doing it casually to practice. The business at Yunzhong Canteen is already good enough, so good that it can't afford to launch any more promotions. After all, Chef Qin only has one life, and so does the mayfly.

When Qin Huai saw the +1000 popularity boost reward in Gong Liang's side quest, he wanted to ask the game system if this reward could be canceled, because it really shouldn't be used to boost popularity anymore.

Unfortunately, this damn game system has no customer service, so there's no way to communicate with them.

Garbage system!
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Qin Huai's practice this morning went very well. Both the coconut mooncakes and the milk tofu were at least a B+ grade delicious. Qin Huai can now consistently achieve an A grade with the pastries she makes more often, and even with these less frequently made, casually prepared pastries, she can achieve a B+ grade, demonstrating that Qin Huai's skill level is very stable.

Zhao Cheng'an quite likes coconut mooncakes. In his words, although the filling of this mooncake is just coconut flakes, which can be a bit greasy if you eat too much of it, Qin Huai has a very good grasp of its sweetness. It is quite delicious to eat as a snack occasionally.

The only regret is that Qin Huai used ready-made coconut flakes, and the quality of these coconut flakes didn't match Qin Huai's craftsmanship. In the early years, Zhiweiju had a master chef from Hainan Province who was very skilled at making various coconut juice and coconut flake desserts. His own coconut flakes and coconut oil made from fresh coconuts were also considered exceptional.

At that time, Zhao Cheng'an was still young, and making coconut flakes was just preparing the ingredients, so he would make a large batch at a time. Moreover, making coconut flakes was relatively simple: just chop the coconut meat, add a small amount of coconut juice, blend it into a paste, squeeze out the excess water, stir-fry over low heat until the color lightens and the texture becomes fluffy and delicate.

As long as the coconut desiccator is careful enough, the quality of the raw coconuts is excellent, and the chef has good control over the heat, the coconut desiccator will definitely be very fragrant and suitable as a snack to enjoy occasionally.

Zhao Cheng'an often sneaked food back then, so he left a deep impression on me.

After Zhao Cheng'an's reminder, Qin Huai thought it made sense. Anyway, making coconut flakes wasn't difficult, and fresh coconuts could be bought this season. Coconut flakes were needed for both coconut mooncakes and "Fan Po" cakes on Luo Jun's list, and coconut milk cakes also required coconut meat and coconut milk.

Gong Liang mentioned that he loves coconuts, so it's not surprising that his list included three coconut-based desserts. Putting more effort into coconut desserts would be more helpful in completing the task.

Qin Huai assigned the task of purchasing fresh coconuts to Huang Xi, and in the afternoon, he and Zhao Cheng'an studied chestnut pastries together.

This research lasted three days.

Over three days, Qin Huai made all the pastries on the list, including the Fanpo cake, which he had never tried before. Qin Huai didn't know what authentic Fanpo cake tasted like, but the ones he made were quite good. They were very fragrant after baking and perfect for afternoon tea.

Qin Luo and He Cheng couldn't stop eating the Fanpo cakes the first time they tasted them. The two unlucky kids ate at least three jin (1 kg) together, and each of them packed a large box to take away.

Ouyang also liked it very much; most of the pastries sold at the Cloud Canteen were sweet. The Fanpo cake was also sweet, but it had a very mild sweetness, making it more suitable as a snack than coconut mooncakes—the kind you could eat whenever you felt like it, the kind you could keep eating.

In addition, the process of making Fanpo cakes is very simple and does not take long. A large batch can be baked at once, and they go very well with tea. Qin Huai simply put them in Ouyang's Xiao Ou Handmade Lemon Tea Shop.

Sold alongside hand-whipped lemon tea and various other beverages, Xiao Ou's hand-whipped lemon tea shop's already booming business has become even more popular.

Ouyang used to have time to sneak out of the lemon tea shop in the afternoon to the Cloud Canteen for some snacks, but now that's completely impossible. He can only ask An Youyou to pack up Ouyang's special snacks and bring them to him when she gets off work.

Of course, Ouyang couldn't eat the packaged drinks right away; he could only grab a couple of bites while shaking the milk tea. As the owner of Xiao Ou's Handmade Lemon Tea Shop and the sole holder of the four secret recipes for the drinks, Ouyang spent every day at the shop preparing beverages, and the act of shaking milk tea alone provided him with a workout for his hand muscles.

Having experienced the hardships of entrepreneurial failure, being scolded as a spendthrift, having his spending restricted, and being forced to live a miserable life as a poor rich kid who occasionally had to go home to borrow game cards and vouchers from his parents to get by, Ouyang has now tasted the bitterness of entrepreneurial success and making a fortune every day.

When Ouyang was a poor guy, he could still sit in the Cloud Cafeteria and eat snacks every day. Now that he's made it big, he can't even afford snacks anymore.

Whenever Ouyang shakes the milk tea, thinking of this, she can only swallow the tears in her heart.

Woo woo woo woo.

It's too bitter. Let me have a sip of milk tea and a bite of a traditional Chinese pastry to soothe my wounded soul.

Damn, I ate so much sugar and calories again today, I have to go to the gym tonight.

Never mind, I'll just have one more bite.

Ouyang, who was growing stronger every day and was already on his way to becoming a burly man, ate two more bites of pastry.
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Qin Huai quietly made pastries in the Yunzhong Canteen for five days. During those five days, he did nothing else, did not try to get close to Wang Gensheng, and did not see Luo Jun.

Occasionally, Chen Huihong would come to the Yunzhong canteen to sit and chat, but Qin Huai would only say a few words. It was mostly Zhao Cheng'an who was slacking off and chatting with Chen Huihong.

Qin Huai makes several rounds of pastries from the list every day, making 12 different kinds at a time, in small quantities but with many varieties.

In addition to practicing the quality of the 12 kinds of pastries, Qin Huai also practiced the combination of the 12 kinds of pastries.

He needs to make the most suitable quantity in the shortest amount of time, and it would be best to make a few other kinds of snacks to mix in, so that it won't seem abrupt that there are only 12 kinds of snacks at the tea party.

Gong Liang was a smart man, but he was a smart man who had never attended a proper tea party.

If the first tea party Gong Liang attended featured a table laden with a dozen or even twenty different kinds of pastries, he would feel that every tea party was of the same standard. Among them, there were 12 pastries that he liked because Qin Huai had taken special care of him.

Qin Huai took special care of Gong Liang when he was in Suzhou, and Gong Liang should have gotten used to it.

What Qin Huai needed to do was make this special attention seem normal, and make Gong Liang feel that he, Qin Huai, was simply able to make the most snacks in the shortest amount of time at the tea party, and not that he had any ulterior motives for making so many.

Furthermore, Qin Huai must strictly control the time spent making the pastries; it absolutely cannot be too long. If it takes too long, Qin Huai and Zhao Cheng'an will truly become chefs making pastries at tea parties, rather than participants. What kind of people attend tea parties who don't chat about gossip or drink tea, but instead bury themselves in the kitchen making pastries?

Meanwhile, to avoid being discovered by Gong Liang that Qin Huai had been practicing the 12 types of pastries he had listed, Qin Huai was making sure that none of these pastries were sold. Even Xu Tuqiang, who was the most well-informed, didn't know that the reason why Master Qin spent half a day in the kitchen every afternoon making only a few pastries was because most of them were not being sold.

A small portion of these snacks, which were never sold outside the store, ended up in Qin Luo and He Cheng's stomachs. The rest were packed up and sent to close associates like Ouyang, Luo Jun, Qu Jing, Chen Huihong, and Wang Gensheng. Incidentally, Qu Jing has actually been quite busy these past few days. Qu Jing has completely integrated into the side of her biological parents from her previous life. While supernatural explanations are unbelievable, Qu Jing's biological parents from her previous life, influenced by her hints, firmly believe that Qu Jing is the reincarnation of their daughter from their past life.

And he couldn't help but tell other relatives about it.

Qu Jing's uncles and elders certainly didn't believe it, but they didn't mind treating Qu Jing as a junior who had been adopted as a godparent. They thought, "She's already this old, what's wrong with wanting to be willful and live in her own world for once?"
These past two days have been Qu Jing's uncle's birthday. As a newly promoted junior member, Qu Jing has been frequently going there to have meals with his family. Sometimes, when Chen Huihong goes to Qu Jing's house to deliver fruit, she can't even find him. Qu Jing also rarely has time to participate in the group chat.

Seeing how much Qu Jing was enjoying herself, no one said anything. As long as Qu Jing could stay true to herself and not fail her tribulation, in Shi Dadan's words, since it was her last life in the human world anyway, she could do whatever she wanted.

Zhao Cheng'an agreed with Shi Dadan's idea, saying that they, the mayflies, thought the same way.

Qin Huai told him to stop thinking about things, stop slacking off on his phone, and hurry back to make some snacks.

Qin Huai couldn't handle such an important task as gathering enough pastries for the tea party by himself; Zhao Cheng'an also had to contribute, since there were only two pastry chefs at the tea party.

Zhao Cheng'an: QAQ
After Qin Huai's diligent practice, he felt it was time to test the waters with a formal tea party where everyone was present.

It's okay if you don't succeed the first time. This side quest is obviously not a time-limited quest. As long as Gong Liang and Chen Gong haven't left Shanshi, there is a time limit to complete the quest.

Moreover, as long as Luo Jun's list is correct, and the pastries Gong Liang wants to eat are indeed among these 12 pastries, given Qin Huai's current B+ to A grade level of production, the probability of a mishap is extremely low.

Qin Huai understood Gong Liang well; more than the taste, Gong Liang cared about the emotion. Gong Liang was the kind of cunning spirit who, as long as the emotion was there, even if the taste was lacking, could complete the task on the spot with just the right amount of passion.

Boss Gong is actually a man of strong emotions.

Of all these spirits, Shi Dadan has the highest standards when it comes to taste. His standards are so high that even if he wanted to go easy on the task to finish quickly, his mind couldn't determine if it was a success.

This can be seen from the side quests in the Four Joys Scroll.

Qin Huai set August 27th as the important date.

For He Cheng, it was a day that felt like the sky had fallen.

He Cheng returned to Guangdong Province on the 27th.

That noon, at the airport, He Cheng, who had gained a little weight in just a few days, wanted nothing more than to hug Qin Huai's leg and wail loudly, as if only in this way could he express his deep reluctance to part with his dear cousin.

Although Qin Luo was a little annoyed with He Cheng because of the summer tutoring, and even felt a bit gloating on the way to the airport, she was also a little sad when it came time to part ways. She sniffed as if moved by the scene, wanting to say a few heartwarming words to her cousin to show that there wasn't much sibling affection between them.

Just as He Cheng's tears were about to fall like raindrops, Qin Huai instructed him: "Go back and study hard, take the exams seriously when school starts, and let your parents see the results of this summer's tutoring."

"Come visit again during the National Day holiday if you have time."

"I originally planned to put the raw dough for fermented rice buns, four-happiness glutinous rice balls, rice cakes, three-ingredient buns, five-ingredient buns, and four-happiness dumplings in your suitcase and check them in on the plane. Anyway, it's only a few hours on the way and they won't spoil."

“But the suitcase you brought is a bit small and can’t fit everything. I’m afraid you won’t recognize the new suitcase and will take the wrong one if I ask you to check in another one. I’m also worried about leaving you alone after you land, with no one to look after you. So I’ve sent all those embryos back to you.”

"I also sent 50 jin of 'Fanpo cakes', 40 jin of mung bean cakes, 50 jin of crab shell pastries, and 30 jin of coconut milk cakes."

"When you go back to eat, be careful and remember to share one-third with your maternal grandparents. Don't forget to send some to your paternal grandparents' house as well. I know you have many relatives waiting to share, so I sent extra."

Upon hearing Qin Huai's words, He Cheng stopped crying.

In terms of acting alone, He Cheng is actually an experiential actor; he can't act out emotions if they aren't there. Originally, He Cheng was genuinely sad, but now, after Qin Huai rattled off the names and weights of the snacks, how could He Cheng possibly feel sad? The fact that he could control the corners of his mouth from turning up was already the limit of his acting skills.

He Cheng didn't know how to act, so he could only say, "Well... brother, I'll go through security first."

"Okay." Qin Huai nodded with a smile. "Be careful, and message me when you land."

"Okay bro."

Watching He Cheng walk towards the security checkpoint, Qin Huai turned to look at Qin Luo and noticed that Qin Luo's expression had changed from reluctance to her familiar displeasure. Qin Huai smiled and patted Qin Luo's shoulder: "Alright, are you still angry about He Cheng reporting you during tutoring?"

“Didn’t my Luo Luo report it back too? It’s worth it. I asked Zheng Siyuan, and he said that you two ate about the same amount of snacks during the summer vacation. Didn’t you two have a lot of fun at the amusement park together a couple of days ago? Don’t be angry.”

"When you were little, you dragged He Cheng into kindergarten and asked him to prove that your brother really had a game system. He Cheng didn't know anything, but as soon as you asked, he loudly proved it to you."

“When his aunt and uncle asked him, he insisted that I really do have a game system, and that what Luo Luo said must be true.”

"I'm not angry," Qin Luo pouted. "I lost 3 jin of Fanpo cakes!"

“Last night when He Cheng was packing his luggage, I noticed that you didn’t pack any snacks in his suitcase. I thought you weren’t planning to give him any snacks, and since he wouldn’t be able to eat them after he got back, I gave him all the 3 jin of sesame cakes I had yesterday, and I ate two myself.”

"If I had known he weighed 50 pounds, I wouldn't have given it to him!"

"He should give me the 3 jin he ate yesterday; he brought 6 jin on the plane today alone!"

Qin Huai: ...No wonder He Cheng was carrying such a big and heavy bag. Qin Huai thought that He Cheng's bag contained his summer homework. He thought to himself, how could this kid be so honest, putting such a heavy thing as summer homework in his bag instead of his suitcase.

Feelings are like snacks you eat on a plane.

"It's okay, Luo Luo, we'll eat when we get back. Eat as much as you want. I'll make it for you tomorrow. I can't make it today because I have to go to Luo Jun's house to make snacks for the tea party. If you really want something to eat, go to Ouyang's milk tea shop for a drink."

"And get him some hand-beaten lemon tea while you're at it."

"Your brother Yang has been incredibly busy lately; he works even longer hours a day than I do," said Qin Huai, the culprit.

"Okay." Qin Luo sniffed sadly.

(End of this chapter)