Chapter 21: Developing New Flavors

  The couple didn't have much time to be curious, and before they went to sleep at night, the girl appeared in their bedroom with her son. Then the girl praised her brother for a long time, talked about his great ambitions, and future goals he would strive for. She also expressed again how happy and proud she was that she could become the sister of a future general.

  "Dad, you don't know, just now my brother was so great. He taught me many new words from several lessons in the fourth grade. I'm not as smart as my brother, and it took him teaching me several times before I learned them. Then I turned around and tested my brother on these new words, and he didn't get a single one wrong." Qiu Ye was trying her best to praise her brother in front of their parents, also fearing that her brother would regret it after sleeping on it and losing his enthusiasm, so she wanted to take advantage of the situation and put pressure on him so he wouldn't be able to regret it.

  "Oh, those words your brother can recognize himself?" Mr. Qiu knew his son was a live donkey, led by the nose but still wouldn't budge. When his son was young, he didn't study well, and he tried to tutor him, but it had no effect. The content of the tutoring at night would be forgotten by the next morning, which made him so angry that he beat him severely, but still, there was no effect. In the end, he couldn't do anything about it, thinking that when the child grew up, if he didn't behave, he would just have to join the army.

  "Oh……, of course, brother didn't know some words at first because he didn't want to learn. But brother is great, he used a dictionary and looked up all the unfamiliar words, labeling them with pinyin. Only then did he teach me." Qiu Ye felt a bit resentful towards her dad in her heart, why did he have to mention this now? Didn't he see that her brother's face was already looking down? She had just managed to help her brother regain his enthusiasm for learning and discover his own strengths, tasting the sweetness of victory. It wasn't easy! If her dad's words were going to crush him again, then she would have been wasting her time tonight.

  In the evening, she asked her brother to teach her new characters first. When her brother read them wrong, she had to find a reason for him to check the dictionary again and find the correct pronunciation. She pretended to be silly, letting her brother teach her several times more. Only when she saw that her brother had memorized them did she say that she had learned them too. Then she listened to her brother's dictation of new characters, and the effect was excellent. Qiu Feng's intelligence was verified again, with not a single mistake in listening and writing, which made Qiu Ye admire him even more.

  Qiu Ye thought to herself, it's not easy for her either. She had to teach her brother, motivate him to study, ensure his academic achievements were excellent, and make him think he was smart, that as long as he wanted to learn something, he could master it. Only then could she let her brother be confident on the path of learning, following her every day.

  "Ah, my son is so smart and talented! Alright, be a good role model for your sister. If you improve your grades in the final exams this time, Dad will reward you with a handgun, how about that?" Mr. Qiu also praised his son along with the girl, and timely threw out a bait to entice his son to study harder.

  Qiu Feng initially blamed his sister for speaking too quickly, he had just thought that studying all night was too tiring and it would be better to just become a small soldier. But before he could even regret it, his sister had already boasted about it to their parents. How could he now say that he didn't want to be a general but instead wanted to be a small soldier? Wouldn't that make his parents laugh at him? Later, when his sister praised him in front of their parents, he felt embarrassed, but seeing the admiring gaze of his sister, the loving gaze of his mother, and the relieved gaze of his father, his heart was filled with determination again. He thought to himself, "I should still become a general, not just for my little sister, but also so that my parents can be proud and it will sound good when they tell others."

  At this time, he heard his father say that he would buy him the gun he had been longing for, and he became even more excited. Although his sister said today that she would buy him a handgun after earning money, he didn't believe it in his heart. How much money could those few marbles of his sister's sell for? He would have to wait until the year of the monkey and the month of the horse. Now that his father said he would buy it for him, it was different.

  "Dad, are you serious? Are you really going to buy me a gun?" Qiu Feng stared at his dad with wide eyes, knowing that this was a treatment he didn't even get during the New Year.

  "Of course it's true, but let's make a deal first. There are over 50 people in your class, and if you can rank within the top 40 at the end of the semester, I'll buy you a gun. If not, then there's nothing." Qiu Dad thought that perhaps timely rewards were also quite effective as he looked at his excited son.

  "Alright, Dad, you can rest assured. With my intelligence and talent, what I didn't want to learn before, now that I've learned it, they'll have to step aside. Haha." Qiu Feng said boastfully, followed by a silly grin, as if he had already gotten his hands on the gun.

  Then when his sister asked if he was going to continue studying tomorrow, he nodded vigorously without hesitation.

  The couple had long seen that the old girl was deceiving their eldest son. Looking at the old girl's small mouth, she only said what her son liked to hear, and deceived him so much that he didn't know east, south, west or north. However, when they heard that their son had such a great ambition and saw him start to study hard, as parents, no matter what the reason was, they were all happy and delighted to see it happen, so they didn't expose her, but just smiled and watched this pair of children.

  The next morning, Qiu Ye continued her meatball business. After her mother brought her here at a little past 10 o'clock and pushed a board of tofu, she hurried away. Today's meatballs sold even better than yesterday afternoon, with several female students coming specifically to buy them, and a little girl even made some suggestions.

  "Little sister, don't you have something that's not spicy?" one of the female students asked, looking at the red seasoning in Qiu Ye's hand.

  Qiu Ye looked at her face full of small pimples and sincerely said, "Sorry, big sister. I'm just starting out selling this, and I didn't know what flavor everyone would like, so I made a spicy one. You just reminded me that when I get home, I'll tell my mom to make another seasoning that's not spicy. If you want to eat it, come back tomorrow, okay? To thank you for reminding me, the new flavor will definitely be free for you to try."

  The pimple girl was a bit embarrassed by what Qiu Ye said, but when she heard that it was because her mother wanted to come up with another flavor, she got excited and said: "Really? Is it coming out tomorrow? Then I'll definitely come again tomorrow, at least to support my little sister."

  After sending away this small group of female students, Qiu Ye also started thinking about what flavor was good for the whole thing.

  She definitely can't spend money to buy seasonings and the like, her mother won't let her, and she doesn't have enough money herself. She thought about it for a long time, but could only use the materials she had on hand, so she decided to make some savory meatballs. The big sauce at home was just right, but the flavor was a bit depressing.

  Qiu Ye thought about it and decided to make a simple egg sauce, brushing it on the meatballs to sell. She wasn't very confident in her idea.

  Oh dear, I don't want to think about it anymore. Let's go home and try it when no one is around, if it doesn't taste good then we can think of another way.

  This afternoon, Qiu Ye was busy for a while and made 108 dumplings in total. After giving some away and gifting some, she surprisingly earned 1 yuan and 50 cents, which is another record high in sales volume.

  After going home at noon, Dad cooked for them and quickly ate a mouthful before going to pick up Mom. However, when it was time for Dad to go to work, he still came back himself. According to Dad, Mom's tofu hadn't sold out yet and she had to sell some more before coming back.

  Qiu Ye couldn't understand how it was possible that not even a single piece of tofu had been sold. She couldn't think of an explanation, so she decided to wait for her mother to come back and ask her carefully.

  In the afternoon, Qiu Ye took advantage of no one being at home and fetched an egg from an iron bucket in the warehouse. This was one of the few eggs that her mother had hidden away for a long time and hadn't been willing to eat. Qiu Ye also scooped out a large bowl of sauce from the jar on the cool platform, then took out the peanut bag at home and decided to make some seasoning with it too, as those were almost sold out after one sale.

  Anyway, sneaking to use mom's eggs will get scolded, might as well do it all at once and get scolded together.

  She first stir-fried the peanuts with a little oil until they were fragrant, then let them cool. After that, she pounded and rolled them into small crumbs. Next, she fried the sauce in the remaining oil in the pot, starting by diluting the thick sauce from the bowl with cold water, pouring it into the pot to bring to a boil, then beating an egg in a bowl and pouring it into the boiling sauce. She stirred vigorously in one direction, and just before serving, she added some of the cooled peanuts to the egg sauce and mixed well. The egg sauce was then ladled out and filled a small basin that Qiu Ye had prepared.

  The big sauce is very salty, otherwise it should grow hair. Qiu Ye diluted the sauce with water when frying, so a bowl of big sauce, plus an egg and a handful of peanuts, finally became a small basin after frying.

  Qiu Ye picked up a chopstick and tasted a bit, the flavor was not bad, it's just still a bit salty, she has to remember to brush less sauce next time.

  Qiu's mom had eaten all the oil in this small bowl, looking at the empty oil bowl, she thought it was better to think of a way to buy some oil back before her mother came back, otherwise, it might not be just a scolding tonight, and the punishment might be upgraded to a beating.

  Everyone, after finishing this chapter, if you think the book is good, please give a recommendation and collect it. Thank you all for your support here!