Zhou Xiaoyun’s Happy Life

Chapter 142 Ordinary Happiness

 In autumn, Zhao Yuzhen was busy drying sweet potatoes at home.

Our family has a bumper harvest of sweet potatoes this year, and we can’t finish them all. Later, I simply put some water in a big iron pot and boiled a pot full of sweet potatoes. Adults and children could eat as much as they could, and any leftovers were fed to the pigs.

 Sweet potatoes are sweet and delicious after being boiled, but no matter how delicious they are, they cannot stand up to being eaten like this every day. Later, except for Zhou Xiaoyun who could eat two pieces of Dabao, Xiaobao and Erya, he refused to eat any more.

Zhou Xiaoyun loves to light a fire at home in winter. The glowing flames make his face turn red and his whole body feel warm, which makes him feel very comfortable. The best thing is to throw a few smaller sweet potatoes into the bottom of the pot and stew them in the ashes. After about ten minutes, use a fire fork to take out the cooked sweet potatoes one by one.

After peeling off the dark sweet potato skin, the sweet and warm flesh is revealed. It’s so delicious to take a bite!

Dabao was impatient to wait for the sweet potatoes to cool down a bit before eating them. He would often move them from his left hand to his right hand, shouting to scald them while eating, and he would almost finish them when they were no longer scalded.

Xiaobao was only allowed to eat sweet potatoes by Zhou Xiaoyun, so he ate no less than Dabao.

Erya was the most squeamish and insisted on letting Zhou Xiaoyun peel the skin and feed it to her.

 What else can Zhou Xiaoyun do? Hello!

These two girls are not young at all. They will be seven years old soon after the new year and will be in the first grade next year. However, this little girl still thinks of herself as a child!

It seems that it’s time to train her well. Zhou Xiaoyun thought that after feeding the one in his hand, he would stop feeding her.

The determined Zhou Xiaoyun was often captured by the coquettish Erya the next day.

Who makes Erya the youngest child in the family? He is three years younger than Xiaobao! Who in the family doesn't pamper her and let her go?

Zhao Yuzhen saw that she couldn’t finish the sweet potatoes at home, so she made some dried sweet potatoes before winter. This job is very simple. Use a knife to cut the sweet potatoes into long strips one by one, and then put them on a dustpan or sieve to dry for a few days until the water in the sweet potatoes dries. Then you can put them in your pocket.

　In winter, put a handful of dried sweet potatoes in the corn porridge, and the porridge will become sweet and delicious, not to mention the soft and delicious dried sweet potatoes.

Chao Yuzhen also made a vat of soybeans this year. The vat of soybeans was really made in a big water vat!

Pour the cooked soybeans and the soup into the large dark water tank, which is about half the height of a person. Then add **** and salt and cover it with a lid for a while. This is the so-called "browning".

 In fact, it means waiting for the beans to become moldy and the soup will be thick and smelly, but it cannot be too long otherwise it will become too moldy to be eaten. Knowing the right balance is a big question, and the soy beans taste really delicious. Especially if you put some winter melon in it, it will taste better.

Coupled with a lot of pickled dried radish and fried potherb, the side dishes on the dinner table are extremely rich.

Whenever the weather gets cold, the pancakes at home are replaced by steamed buns. Steaming them once is enough to last four or five days. Zhao Yuzhen thought it was too troublesome to borrow a cage, so she simply went and bought one herself.

　　What you have is still someone else's, and it is your own that you can use for peace of mind.

Steamed steamed buns originally taste very ordinary, but when they are paired with home-made soy beans, they are completely different. Zhou Xiaoyun can eat two steamed buns.

 Let’s have a bowl of fragrant cabbage stew, meat stew and vermicelli. The children enjoyed it and the adults were happy to see it.

Dabao muttered while eating: "Will grandma come back to live during the Chinese New Year this year? I miss grandma..."

Zhou Guoqiang was very moved and looked at his eldest son, thinking what a filial treasure he was!

Before Zhou Guoqiang could finish thinking about it, Dabao said again: "I miss the scallion pancakes made by grandma."

 Emotions are always thinking about grandma’s good craftsmanship!

This little bastard, Zhou Guoqiang glared at Dabao fiercely: "You only care about eating, why don't you care about grandma!"

Seeing Zhou Guoqiang’s anger, Dabao defended himself innocently: “I was thinking about grandma, and by the way I remembered the scallion pancakes that grandma made.”

 Finally, he was smart enough to say all the words.

Zhou Guoqiang snorted, not wanting to look at Dabao for fear that he would be tempted to beat him.

Zhao Yuzhen suggested: "The children are on vacation, and the child's third aunt is also on vacation. She must have time to cook and other things. Let's just bring the child's grandma back to celebrate the New Year!"

Dabao, Xiaobao and Zhou Xiaoyun cheered and agreed together! I don't know whether he missed his grandma or her scallion pancakes. Regardless of him, the fact that the children were eagerly looking forward to her coming home made Zhou Guoqiang feel very comfortable.

He nodded: "Tomorrow, my eldest brother and I will pick her up. You can tidy up the house again and give my mother the new bedding that was just made this year."

Zhao Yuzhen went to clean up after eating, and Zhou Xiaoyun immediately followed to help sweep the floor and pick up things.

Dabao and Xiaobao crowded over to help, and the small room was filled with laughter and laughter.

Zhou Xiaoyun thought to himself, this is the happy life I want!

It doesn’t have to be rich, as long as you are not poor and can live happily together as a family. What's more important is caring for each other. Isn't the most important thing in life just family ties?

As for love, let’s wait until we are twenty-five years old to talk about it! hehe!

Zhou Guoqiang and Zhou Guofu went to the city to pick up their grandma together. Zhao Yuzhen was a little busy alone in the market. Fortunately, several children were able to help.

Dabao pushed the tricycle steadily. Dabao, who was almost as tall as an adult, seemed to look more and more like Zhou Guoqiang as he grew taller.

Zhao Yuzhen felt very happy when she saw her son getting taller and taller. Time passed so fast, and Dabao was already so big in a blink of an eye. It seems that Dabao's newborn appearance appears before his eyes!

Zhao Yuzhen was thinking about something when she was reminded by Xiaobao: "Mom, we're here."

 Zhao Yuzhen quickly packed up her things and set up the stall. There were a lot of people coming to buy meat at the end of the year. People have a lot of money and can only buy dozens or dozens of kilograms of meat. Zhao Yuzhen is very busy. Fortunately, Zhou Xiaoyun was by his side to neatly collect the money, calculate the accounts, and change the money. The cash box was almost full by noon.

The hundreds of kilograms of pork brought today were all sold out, and Zhao Yuzhen was all smiles.

Nowadays, there are more restaurants in various villages in the township, and many of them are old customers of the Zhou family. When Zhou Guoqiang got a call, he was busy delivering goods everywhere, not to mention that the owner of the pork stall came to wholesale pork, which was hundreds of kilograms.

Of course, many jealous followers have emerged. Now that life has improved, more and more people are buying meat. It is no longer like the situation in the past when guests came to the house and they were willing to buy two kilograms of meat. The Zhou family's business is so prosperous that many people are jealous.

 For a time, many pork stalls popped up in the market.

However, Zhou Guoqiang’s business prices are fair and he is well-known in the market, so the slight impact on his business can be ignored.

But this also reminded Zhou Guoqiang that he has been exploring the market recently, specializing in restaurants, pubs and other places that consume a lot of meat. Think about it, if we could do more of this kind of business, wouldn't it be much more cost-effective than the one-pound takeout from the market?

 (End of this chapter)