After the divorce, he took care of his child and sold fried rice; his ex-wife was filled with regret

Through the thick paper bag, I felt a heavy, unusually hot temperature in my palm.

Moreover, the dark green lunchbox was surprisingly sturdy, unlike the usual soft and flimsy fast food boxes.

But he didn't have time to look closely at the time. He grabbed the bag, ran through the snow, and got into the car.

The car door closed, and the heater was turned up to the maximum.

I glanced at the time on the watch face: half an hour until the company's morning meeting.

Old Zhang placed the paper bag on the passenger seat, looked at the howling north wind outside, and sighed.

It's -15 degrees Celsius outside, and it takes at least 20 minutes to drive from Jin Street to the company.

In this freezing weather, as long as the buns are still warm when I bring them into the office, and the lard inside hasn't frozen into a white soup, then I'll consider my three hundred yuan worth of money worthwhile.

As for crispy crust and caramelized fat, don't expect that from takeout.

He stepped on the gas, and the car merged into the morning traffic.

There was some traffic congestion on the road due to snow accumulation.

By the time Lao Zhang drove his car into the underground parking garage of the high-tech industrial park, parked it, turned off the engine, and took the elevator up to the office area on the twelfth floor, a full twenty-five minutes had passed.

The heating hadn't been turned on completely yet, and the large office area felt damp and cold.

Several colleagues who usually arrive early or worked overtime all night are huddled at their workstations, each wrapped in a thick down jacket, rubbing their hands together from the cold.

Sitting next to Lao Zhang, programmer Xiao Wang was staring at his computer screen, listlessly munching on a cold bun he'd bought from the convenience store downstairs.

"Good morning, Brother Zhang. It's been so cold lately." Xiao Wang took a bite of the cold, hard dough and mumbled a greeting.

Old Zhang walked to his workstation, put down his backpack, and said, "Yeah, this awful weather."

He placed the paper bag on his desk.

Xiao Wang turned his head and saw the takeout paper bag on Lao Zhang's table, and paused for a moment.

"Brother Zhang, why are you taking out food in this freezing weather? My buns have frozen solid since I brought them up from downstairs, they're like rocks."

Old Li from the planning department walked over with a thermos of hot water, looked at the paper bag, and shook his head:

"Yeah, Lao Zhang, are you out of your mind from the cold? It's minus fifteen degrees outside, even the strongest packaging would freeze solid."

Old Zhang put the paper bag on his desk and took off his coat, hanging it on the back of his chair.

Hearing his colleague's words, Old Zhang smiled, shook his head, and sighed:

"Well, what can we do? That restaurant is so popular, the lines for dine-in are incredibly long."

"If I just wait in the store for an empty table to sit down and eat, I'll definitely miss today's morning meeting. If I'm late even once, my perfect attendance bonus and this month's performance bonus will all be gone."

Xiao Wang, munching on a cold bun, mumbled, "But we can't waste money on takeout. In this cold weather, the meat and oil inside will definitely have solidified into white lumps, and eating it will surely give us an upset stomach."

Old Zhang rubbed his hands together, looked at the paper bag on the table, and said with a wry smile, "I know that, but I was just so hungry for it."

"I figured the car would be warm the whole way, so as long as the food inside wasn't frozen solid, I could manage to swallow it. As long as it was warm, that was fine."

"How much did you pay for it?" Old Li asked casually.

"Pan-fried buns with soy milk, plus a takeout box, it'll cost almost 300 yuan," Old Zhang said truthfully.

"Are you crazy?!" Xiao Wang gasped, nearly dropping the steamed bun in his hand. "Three hundred yuan for a frozen block that's been chilled by the wind? Brother Zhang, did you kill someone and the breakfast vendor saw you?"

Old Li patted Old Zhang on the shoulder: "Old Zhang, you're usually a pretty shrewd guy, but you've really messed up today. Three hundred yuan for an ice cube, only you could pull that off."

Old Zhang shook his head helplessly and didn't explain further.

I was really hungry, so I figured I might as well eat it cold; I couldn't just throw it away.

He reached into the paper bag, ready to take out the lunchbox.

Old Zhang's hand suddenly stopped as soon as his fingers touched the dark green box.

The box was surprisingly warm to the touch.

It didn't feel as cold as I had imagined, and there were no traces of soup leaking out around the sealing buckle.

Old Zhang suspiciously took the dark green lunchbox out of the paper bag and placed it flat on his desk.

Sitting next to him, Xiao Wang leaned over and sniffed, "Brother Zhang, your takeout box looks pretty high-end."

Old Li also came over with a thermos of hot water. He looked at the green box on the table and smiled, "What's the use of being fancy? In this awful weather, a bottle of hot water will freeze into an ice pop in no time if you leave it outside."

Old Zhang didn't argue with them; he simply reached out and placed his hand on the side of the lunchbox to hold it.

The handle is very finely made; it's a four-sided snap-on design.

"Click, click."

With two crisp clicks, Old Zhang slightly tightened his fingers and pried open the sealing buckles on both sides.

Sitting at the opposite workstation, Xiao Wang was still biting into a half-cold, hard bun, glancing sideways at me with a smile on his lips, clearly anticipating the bitter look on Lao Zhang's face when he took a bite of the cold, oily dough.

Old Li also stood to the side, holding a water cup, watching with a smile.

Old Zhang took a breath, pressed his thumb against the edge of the lid, and lifted it up.

"boom--"

Suddenly, a large cloud of hot, thick, white, humid steam burst out of the box that had been tightly sealed.

White steam billowed more than half a meter high, and then a pure and strong aroma of black mountain pork, roasted black sesame seeds, and fresh scallions sizzling in hot oil suddenly exploded in the cold and dull office area!

The rich aroma of meat wafted through the air, forcefully filling the noses of the people nearby.

Holy crap!

Upon smelling the aroma, Xiao Wang loosened his grip, and the half-eaten, cold, hard meat bun fell directly onto the table.

Old Li, who had been holding the hot water cup steadily, suddenly shook it, and the hot water almost spilled onto his sleeve.

His eyes were fixed on the green box on Old Zhang's table, which was steaming hot.

The colleagues who were dozing off or staring blankly at their computers at their nearby workstations were all jolted awake by the overwhelming aroma.

"What's that smell? Who's eating something so delicious in the office this early in the morning?"

"This scallion oil flavor is amazing, where did it come from?"

Before they had even taken off their coats, the group swarmed around Old Zhang, staring at the lunchbox on his table with expressions of disbelief.

"Old Zhang, what kind of magical takeout is this? It's freezing cold, and it's still steaming hot when you bring it out?!"

Old Zhang was dumbfounded.

He looked down at the inside of the box lid.

It is dry and smooth, without a single drop of water forming a string of beads. When you touch it, you only feel a warm, dry sensation.

Let's look at the bottom of the box.

Four plump, white pan-fried buns were neatly arranged inside.

The top layer of dough remained round and fluffy, plump and full, without any of the yellowing and wrinkling marks that would appear from a regular takeout box.

The black sesame seeds and bright green scallions on top of the buns are so vibrant in color that they look as if they were just taken out of the iron pot.

Old Zhang swallowed a large mouthful of saliva.

Under the watchful eyes of seven or eight pairs of eager eyes around him, he broke open the disposable bamboo chopsticks and picked up one of the pan-fried buns.