The beautiful pastoral field of Jiangmen girl

Chapter 123
Seeing that Gu Qiang was so happy, Qing Shu couldn't say anything more, let him watch the arrangements.

August [-]th, Reunion Festival.In this era, there is not so much attention. It is just that the whole family gets together and eats something good. Moon cakes and the like have not yet appeared.Wealthy family means that relatives and friends get together to eat, drink and have fun, give each other gifts, visit each other, and enjoy the moon at night.Ordinary people and people in the village should work or work, it's just a rare thing to add one or two meat dishes to the dinner table.

Modern people basically don't feel much about festivals, and so does Qingshu.When my grandma was alive when I was a child, she loved festivals the most.After grandma passed away, many things happened, and her parents divorced again. Gradually, she lost interest in all festivals, and she didn't even remember her own birthday, let alone celebrate her own birthday.

Qing Shu, who had no feeling for August [-]th at first, finally became interested when she saw Xiao Juan and Xiao Yu looking forward to it, and ordered Ding Jiabao, who was in charge of purchasing, to buy twenty catties of fat meat and twenty Get as many catties of pork belly, ten catties of lean meat, pig's trotters, meat bones, pork liver, pig heart, and pig lungs, and then buy a pig's head.In short, she used a very vulgar way, that is, to improve the food, and wanted to make the whole house happy.

Today is the festival, and there are many people buying meat, so the two butcher shops in the town slaughtered one or two times more pigs than usual.What's interesting is that these two butcher shops do not occupy the two ends of the town, but are gathered together, and the two butcher shops are facing each other.On weekdays, the men in the two stalls are fine, but if the women of the two families are present, they will keep humming and staring at each other.

Ding Jiabao walked past the two butcher stalls, and also saw servants from several wealthy households in the town also buying meat. Comparing them, it is estimated that their ancient mansions are the biggest customers of the butcher stalls in the entire Kangxi Town today.He walked to the stall of Butcher Zhao, who usually buys meat, coughed, and asked loudly, "If you bring twenty catties of fat meat, twenty catties of pork belly, ten catties of lean meat, and a pig's head, how much cheaper will it be?"

Butcher Zhao put the meat chopping knife on the chopping board with a clang, and grinned, "Brother, just say what you want to be cheap."

The daughter-in-law of the Qian butcher at the opposite stall heard it and yelled: "Big brother, if you buy the meat from here, the pig's head will be given to you, which is not considered money. If there are odds and ends that look good, I will give them all to you, not counted as money." .”

Butcher Zhao didn't say a word, but Butcher Zhao's wife quit and yelled, "My surname is Qian, I don't do things like you." She immediately turned around and greeted Ding Jiabao with a smile, "Big brother, don't pay attention to that woman, we When doing business, you have to do it honestly and honestly. It’s not sincere to only offer odds and ends, so, you chop off the meat from our old Zhao’s stall, and add two catties of fat to you.”

Butcher Qian's daughter-in-law continued to shout, but Butcher Qian gave her an annoyed stare, and she became listless.

Ding Jiabao didn't care about that, and bought meat according to Qingshu's instructions.Twenty catties of fat meat cost 43 cents per catty; twenty catties of pork belly cost [-] cents per catty; ten catties of lean meat cost [-] cents per catty; Calculate forty catties, five cents per catty.Two pig heads, sixteen pig trotters, four pairs of pig livers, pig hearts, and pig lungs, free of charge.Butcher Zhao originally wanted to give Ding Jiabao two catties of fat meat as his wife promised, but Ding Jiabao didn't ask for fat meat, so he replaced it with a pig's head.Fat meat is the most valuable and the best selling. Ding Jiabao is willing to spend less money, but he doesn't want to treat others badly.

Ding Jiabao counted out one tael of silver and handed the other to Butcher Zhao.Zhao Butcher's daughter-in-law happily sorted and wrapped the meat, put them into one frame, and put the odds and ends into another frame.

Ding Jiabao thanked him, took the pole, picked up two boxes full of things, and left.

Qian Butcher's daughter-in-law was so jealous that she sold so much meat at once, she was so angry that she hid in the shop and refused to come out.

Ding Jiabao carried the burden, walked back to the house in a hurry, entered through the back door, and sent the meat to the kitchen.

Xu Sanniang threw a cloth towel to him, "Wipe off your sweat, take a breath, and help me divide the meat. Miss will go to Zhuangzi later, just in time to bring the meat there."

Ding Jiabao wiped the sweat from his forehead indiscriminately, "How to divide?"

Xu Sanniang looked at the meat she bought, and asked Ding Jiabao to cut off about five catties of fat and put it in the kitchen. The pork belly and lean meat were all moved into the kitchen. The pig's trotters and heart were all kept, one pig's head was kept, and half of the pig's bone was kept. , keep two pig livers, and give the rest to Zhuangzi.

After the distribution was completed, Xu Sanniang asked the little girl to start the stove, and she was about to cut half of the pork belly to make braised pork.Later, Miss and raw meat will be taken to Zhuangzi together.The seasoning on the Zhuangzi is not complete, and the two women in charge of cooking can't cook braised pork.She makes it here, takes it with her, puts it on the drawer to steam at lunch, and eats it when it is hot.

The kitchen is busy, and Qing Shu is not idle either.When they came to Kangxi Town, they had received four gifts, which was equivalent to having contacts with four families.When they were in the capital, there were quite a few boxes of Fushunzhai snacks from Luo Mansion and General Hu's Mansion. The cakes and snacks that were not easy to preserve were eaten before leaving Beijing, and the biscuits that were good to preserve were basically untouched, which was just right for gift giving.

Dim sum from the capital must be very popular in this small town as a gift.Bai Xianfu's mansion, Bai Qingfeng's Baifu, Shiji's owner's Shijia, and Qingshu each prepared four boxes of biscuits.On Feng Yaren's side, Qing Shu prepared two boxes of biscuits.

I want to ask Qingshu why the etiquette of Baixianfu is not thickened, but equal to that of Baifu and Shijia?The reason is very simple, Qing Shu is reminding Bai Xianfu that you don't take care of my Gufu people and let my Gufu people be bullied, I still remember it!If you want me to treat you favorably, you have to do things that allow me to treat you favorably.

Only four boxes or two boxes of biscuits are sent, which is an extremely thin gift in the capital, no, it should not even have the word "li" on it.But in Kangxi Town, the value immediately changed.Besides, August [-]th is just a small festival. Everyone expresses small things to each other. The critical time is during the Spring Festival.

The gift from the ancient mansion had just been taken out by the butler, but before it was delivered to the place, the gift from the other prefecture had arrived.

Bai Xianfu's wife, Mrs. Lin, sent a butler to deliver a basket of apples, a basket of pears, a basket of oranges, and a basket of crispy dates.

Bai Qingfeng's wife sent a butler to deliver a basket of apples, oranges, melon seeds, and this year's new peanuts.

The wife of the proprietor of Shiji Inn sent a basket of oranges and hazelnuts.

I heard people say that one of these oranges and hazelnuts is produced in the south and the other in the north. In short, Huizhou does not have any. Every year, passing merchants bring some over and sell them to local wealthy households.Therefore, oranges have become a must-have for gift-giving among rich households in Kangxi Town.As for hazelnuts, even merchants seldom bring them with them, so there is no way to become a must-have.

Feng Yaren also indicated that his wife brought her ten-year-old daughter with a basket in her hand.Half of the baskets are oranges and half are this year's new peanuts.It looks like it was prepared with care.Locally, the peanuts are not as expensive as fruits, but they are not cheap either. Even the skin weighs twelve cents a catty, almost catching up with the price of white flour.

(End of this chapter)