A foreign city, dear you

"What else do you want to talk about?" Cao Xueqin asked.

"I'm still worried that one day you might waver and agree to work with Wang Daqun again."

"No, every failure is a lesson for me. I am now very careful in choosing my partners. Isn't Xiao Maobing a lesson for me?"

"That's right. The character of a partner is the most important. Forget about someone like Wang Daqun. Never mind that he has no responsibility for his family and he is not tough with his friends. You paid for his drunkenness and gave him cash, a total of 5,000 yuan, and he has never mentioned it to this day."

"He must have forgotten."

"Really? Are you still making excuses for him? Since you said he forgot, why didn't you ask him for it?"

"Oh, forget it. He is also a man who wants to save face. It is bound to be embarrassing to mention his miserable state."

"You are just kindhearted, that's why he asked you to lend him money later, and today he wants you to invest. Who knows what he is thinking?"

"Anyway, I won't pay for it, and I'm not interested in smart locks."

"That's good, otherwise I'd be worried. He said that the smart lock has a huge market, but it's not your area of ​​expertise. As the saying goes, every trade has its own barriers. We can only make money within our capabilities. Outside of our capabilities, no matter how profitable it is, it belongs to others. We shouldn't be envious."

What Ye Lian said includes her purely theoretical insights as well as her personal experiences.

"Yeah, my wife's analysis is very correct. I think so too." Cao Xueqin imitated the tone of a sketch actor.

Ye Lian laughed again and said, "It seems that although Wang Daqun is still as good at playing the game as before, his condition is not as good as before."

"I haven't fully recovered from my illness yet."

"Why doesn't he go to see a doctor? People like him who always stay up late sometimes don't even realize when something is wrong with their body." In Ye Lian's impression, Wang Daqun seems to be able to stay up late.

"He's very confident about his body."

"How is it?" Ye Lian said with a triumphant attitude: "You told me not to think so badly of Wang Daqun, but he still brought a woman with him, right?"

"Okay, you win." Cao Xueqin admitted defeat readily.

"So is the woman he brought today his girlfriend or wife?"

Cao Xueqian shook his head: "I don't know. I don't want to ask him. I don't care if she is a girlfriend or a wife."

Ye Lian smiled. Cao Xueqin was not very interested in and cared about many things about Wang Daqun.

"What are you laughing at? Do you have anything else to talk about? If not, I'm going to bed." Cao Xueqin yawned again.

"Okay, okay, go to bed."

……

Cao Xueqin went to sleep.

Ye Lian was no longer angry with Cao Xueqin for not washing the dishes at noon.

Cao Xueqin doesn't like doing housework, but compared with men like Wang Daqun, he is simply a perfect man.

Moreover, Ye Lian felt that Cao Xueqin should have room for improvement when it comes to doing housework. Just take it slow and see if there will ever be a day when the improvement is successful.

*************************

The dining table became a makeshift workbench with a thin layer of flour on it.

There was a thin iron plate on the table, with a large dough on it and a thin layer of flour on the edge of the plate.

Although the weather was cold, Cao Xueqin didn't feel it. He only wore an autumn shirt and a thin vest.

Cao Xueqin this morning looked like a pastry chef. Compared with the Cao Xueqin who always made excuses to do housework, he seemed to have been reborn.

Cao Xueqin has been unemployed at home for almost three months.

Before we knew it, 2016 has gone and will never come back.

It’s 2017 and it’s already the end of February.

This year, Ye Lian will be 42 years old, Cao Xueqin will be 41 years old, and Cao Lanshan will be 17 years old.

During these two or three months, although Cao Xueqin did not work to earn money, he learned a pastry-making skill that would be useful in life.

Here's the thing:

One day at the end of last year, Ye Lian accidentally discovered that the mother of her next-door neighbor, Lawyer Xu, could make dumplings, buns, wontons and other pasta. Ye Lian was interested and wanted to learn how to make these pastries from the old lady.

The old man was also very enthusiastic and would call Ye Lian over to watch whenever he was making noodles.

Ye Lian watched it once or twice and felt that she had learned it, so she tried to do it herself.

If you make it yourself, you have to knead the dough.

Kneading dough is a strenuous job, so Ye Lian pretended to be very weak (fortunately she was weak herself), and said in front of Cao Xueqin, "You see, I am not strong enough, I can't knead it well, and it doesn't turn out to be smooth or chewy."

Cao Xueqian said, "What's the difficulty?" So he took over the job of kneading the dough with sympathy.

After kneading the dough, Ye Lian started to cook.

The first time was to make dumplings, and I found that making dumplings was just like everything else. It looked easy but was actually hard to do. No matter how many times I tried, it never turned out well.

Ye Lian started to act coquettishly with Cao Xueqin again, saying, "You see, it's so difficult. I can't do it well, I can't do it like the real thing, and I keep talking."

Cao Xueqin then asked how it was done?

Ye Lian couldn't do it with her hands, so she told Cao Xueqin what she saw with her mouth, and made rough gestures with her hands.

Cao Xueqin understood and said, let me try.

As a result, Cao Xueqin tried his best and made better dumplings than Ye Lian. The dumplings he made were plump and big, with nice and symmetrical edges, and not easy to crack. They were arranged in rows and columns, looking exactly like the dumplings in a dumpling restaurant.

Ye Lian was so happy that she seemed to have discovered a new world. It turned out that Cao Xueqin not only had a good brain, but also had a pair of such skillful hands. It was a pity that she had not made good use of them for so many years. However, it was not too late to make good use of them now. From now on, she would no longer have to go to a restaurant to eat dumplings. She could eat them however she wanted at home.

Ever since I made dumplings for the first time and tasted their deliciousness, my family has made them from time to time. Later, we became more and more adept at making wontons, buns, steamed buns, and flower rolls, etc.

Cao Xueqin's dough kneading skills are getting better and better. Whether it is dumplings or other things, he is becoming more and more adept at making them. He even bought a meat grinder to make it easier to make meat fillings, and a thin iron plate to make it easier to knead the dough. In short, he is going further and further on the road of making pasta.

As for Ye Lian, every time noodles were made, she became the assistant and did whatever Cao Xueqin told her to do.

She was very happy to do this. It must be much easier without having to carry the banner.

She was very happy and proud to see the flour getting wet, soft, balled, and then into small pieces in Cao Xueqin's hands, and then into dumplings or wontons. At such moments, watching Cao Xueqin busy, she felt like she had picked up a treasure.

But among all the common pastries, there is one that Cao Xueqin just can’t make, and that is the baozi.

When Cao Xueqin made buns, he couldn't make those beautiful folds, and he couldn't close the mouth. The buns he made had no folds, and the mouth was not tight, just bare and open, like a round mouth without lips.

Coincidentally, Cao Xueqin didn’t know how to make buns, but Ye Lian learned how to make them.

So every time he made buns, Cao Xueqin would do all the preparations and then invite Ye Lian, the bun "master", to make them.

Like today, they are going to make steamed buns. Ye Lian is the majestic "steamed bun master" in charge, and Cao Xueqin is the "odd job" serving Ye Lian.

*

Today, Ye Lian wanted to make more buns, store them in the refrigerator, and heat them up for breakfast.

Since learning how to make pastries, the breakfast styles at home have become richer, and we try to ensure that Cao Lanshan’s breakfasts are different over a long period of time.

The meat filling is ready, it’s a pot of sauerkraut meat filling, enough to make a lot of buns.

Cao Xueqin had also kneaded the dough, then kneaded it into long strips, cut it into small pieces, flattened the small pieces of dough, and slowly pinched them into round and wide shapes to make a bun skin, which he gave to Ye Lian.

Then, every time Ye Lian finished wrapping a bun, Cao Xueqin would take it and place it on the steamer next to him.

Ye Lian’s buns are generally good, but it depends on her performance. Sometimes they are barely enough, and sometimes they are particularly beautiful.

Just now, Ye Lian had just made a steamed bun and thought it was very good, so she praised herself as "perfect" and asked Cao Xueqian: "Do you know what perfect means?"

Cao Xueqian snorted, took the bun from Ye Lian, and said, "Are you testing me?"

Ye Lian picked up another bun wrapper and smiled: "It doesn't matter whether you take the test or not, just tell me whether you know it or not."

"What's there to not know? It's perfect. After all, I'm a college student, okay?" Cao Xueqin said contemptuously, placing the bun on the outer circle of the steamer.

Ye Lian suddenly realized something, and then said, "Fortunately, he is not a high school student."

Cao Xueqian chuckled: "High school student, high school student, will you marry me? Isn't marrying a college student your bottom line?"

"How do you know my bottom line? I have no bottom line. I just marry anyone and that's mission accomplished." Ye Lian said nonsense.

Cao Xueqian said with a look of regret: "Then I am at a big disadvantage. You should have told me earlier that college is so hard. If I had known, I wouldn't have needed to go to college."

Haha, what the hell is this?

The couple kept laughing while they were busy.