Chapter 81 - Secret Recipe (1/2)
Right after Madam Li threw the pig head away in a panic, she suddenly felt a long thing fall on her shoulders. Her head and chest had also been hit by something soft. Immediately a horrendous stench arose, like the smell of a pig sty that hadn’t been cleaned up, and the scent assaulted her nostrils.
When she could finally clearly see what was on her, she acted as if she had stepped on a bunch of hot coals. She jumped in fright and screamed as if she was a pig at slaughter. Words just blabbered out of her mouth in an unending stream, and she felt like something had exploded near her ears as she continuously retreated.
“You need to die, need to die! I am your eldest paternal aunt, yet you dare to pelt me with such disgusting things! Do you no longer believe in the young respecting the old? If you can treat me this way, then the next time you will treat your grandmother this way!! I want the entire village to know how Madam Liu has taught her kids!!”
Madam Li lowered her head to look at her clothes that were made dirty. The acrid smell of pig feces on her body repeatedly assaulted her nose and made her stomach roll in nausea. She almost fainted at this moment.
Xiaocao smiled sweetly at her, “Eldest Aunt, how did I not show you proper respect? You said you wanted to see what was in our basket, and I was afraid that your eyes weren’t so good due to your age, so I especially ‘delivered’ the things in front of you to let you see them more clearly. Now that you see what they are, are you still going to say that Grandfather is secretly giving us money on the sly?”
Without waiting for Madam Li to reply, Xiaocao continued after increasing the volume of her voice, “Eldest Aunt! There was one thing you said correctly, our family really doesn’t have much at home! Today I brought my younger brother to the docks because I wanted to see the markets over there. I wanted to find out if I could pick up any vegetables on the ground that other people didn’t want or other food like that. Uncle Wang, who’s the butcher in town, saw that we were pitiful and gave a pig head to us. As for the pig tripe and pig intestines, Little Shitou and I picked them up from the ground to see if we can eat them after washing them clean. As long as we don’t die from eating them, does it matter if it smells a little? It’s still better than starving to death. Our family is already at this point in our lives, so why would Eldest Aunt claim that our grandfather is subsidizing us? Do you really want our whole family to die? If my whole family dies of starvation or from freezing to death, will that make you happy?”
After tasting the steamed stuffed buns that Xiaocao had sent her family earlier, Madam Mao’s opinion of Xiaocao and her whole family was quite good. At the side, she idly commented, “This is the first time that I’ve heard of an older sister-in-law forcing her younger brother-in-law’s entire family to die in the entire Dongshan Village! Madam Li, if you really want to do this, you’ll be famous all around the area! Tsk, tsk, tsk…just look, the children are so hungry that they’re willing to scavenge something so disgusting and smelly to try to eat!”The expression on Madam Li’s face changed instantly. Her son was only two years away from talking about marriage and finding a wife. If word came out that she had forced her younger brother-in-law’s family to death, who would let their daughter marry her son?
Madam Li’s mouth opened and closed a few times as if she wanted to say something. The usually gentle and easily persuadable Madam Fang glared at her as if she was her worst enemy. Madam Fang tenderly drew Little Shitou into her arms and wiped the tears in her eyes, and said, “Poor children, you guys can’t eat those things. Quickly throw them away. If there’s really nothing at home to eat, then I’ll lend you guys a few catties of grain to eat.”
Yu Hai felt a pang in his heart and a complicated look crossed his face. He lifted up his head and let the tears in his eyes slowly disappear. He glanced at Madam Li and said, “Eldest Sister-in-law, I can make an oath to the heavens that I have never asked my parents to give me money. Father also has never subsidized us on the sly! When we split our families, I had made it clear, no matter how poor we became or how difficult our lives were, even if we had to beg for food, we would never ask a single thing from the rest of the family! You have seen what is in the basket, if there’s nothing else, please go back home!!”
Madam Li had made a fuss for nothing, so she flung her handkerchief down on the ground and left the place covered from head to toe in grime. She needed to find the village idiot’s wife to settle the score for giving her bad information.
There was no such thing as a secret in a small fishing village. Before long, word that Yu Hai and his family were desperate enough to gather food that was as smelly as pig poop travelled throughout Dongshan Village.
Yu Hai’s eldest uncle, Yu Lichun, went over to the Yu Family’s main residence in a towering rage. He screamed and shouted at Old Yu in fury, “This wife is a stepmother, so does that mean you’ve also become a fake father too? Dahai is your own blood and flesh. Do you guys want Dahai’s whole family to forfeit their lives? If that’s so, then you are no longer my younger brother!!”
With a dark expression on his face, Old Yu called Madam Li over to scold her profusely. He then told his youngest daughter to bring around ten catties of millet and ten catties of sweet potato starch to his second son’s family.
Naturally, Yu Hai didn’t take any of it. He had already said that he was not going to take even one iota from the Yu Family, and they weren’t desperate without anywhere to go. Thus, in order to avoid anyone calling them hypocrites, even when Old Yu personally came over to discuss the matter, he maintained his current stance on the matter.
After Yu Xiaocao used the pig head and extremely smelly offal to frighten Madam Li into leaving, she immediately started to work on cleaning and preparing the ingredients. It was time to make more braised food.
“Uh…Xiaocao, are you sure that you can use this stuff to make food? Don’t waste your time and seasonings if it’s not going to work!” Madam Fang reminded her warmly. The rest of the members of the Yu family had long gotten used to her ability to turn trash into treasure, so they didn’t say anything.
Madam Mao had actually brought over a small portion of sweet potato starch and some wild herbs that she had dug up today and said, “Quickly stop trying to prepare those things. Listen to your auntie and throw them away, ok? In the future, if there’s nothing to eat at home, just go to my place and borrow some. Once the sweet potatoes are harvested, you can return what you ate! Who doesn’t have a difficult time now and then? Throw it away, throw it away!”As she talked, Madam Mao enthusiastically pulled the tripe from Xiaocao’s hands and turned to head out of the room to throw it away.
Xiaocao started sweating in anxiety! This was the money-making method that she had wracked her brains for. If they threw away her ingredients, then how could she sell more of her braised foods for a copper coin a portion tomorrow? She had promised people at the docks!