Chapter Eleven: The Tofu Shop

  Qiu Ye happily walked with her mother for a while, less than 5 minutes, and arrived at the tofu workshop where her mother currently works. This is a special tofu workshop built by the university to supply its own cafeteria, allowing employees' family members to work there. Every morning, they only need to provide four pieces of tofu to the university cafeteria, and whatever is left can be either sold or taken home for personal consumption, with no one supervising. However, making tofu is a very tiring job, and everyone earns the same amount of money, so no one wants to do this hard work. If they could swallow their pride, they would go to the tofu workshop every morning to beg for some. In the end, Qiu's mother took on this task.

  Qiu Ye knew that her mother went to work at the tofu workshop so that she could drink some soy milk every day, sometimes eat a piece of tofu, and have time to see her in the afternoon.

  This job is bitter, every morning at more than three o'clock when everyone is still sleeping, Qiu's father and mother will get up, leaving Qiu Ye and his sister at home. They go to the tofu workshop together to make tofu. At around six o'clock in the morning, Qiu's father will return home to cook for his siblings, then send lunch to Qiu's mother before going to work himself. After eating breakfast, Qiu's mother will take the tofu flowers that have been marinated and turn them into tofu. Around eight o'clock, people from the market will come to the tofu workshop to take away four blocks of tofu. The rest of the tofu will be placed outside the workshop by Qiu's mother, waiting for customers to exchange it with soybeans. By around ten o'clock in the morning, Qiu's mother will have finished dealing with the remaining tofu and cleaned up the workshop, soaking the beans needed for the next day, and that's all done.

  Qiu Ye took a deep breath outside the tofu workshop, determined to make his first bucket of gold in this tofu workshop and create some wealth for his mother, he couldn't let his mother work hard every day for nothing.

  Entering the tofu workshop, Qiu Ye saw an old-fashioned manual tofu workshop. The room was humid with a drainage ditch on the ground. The only advanced equipment was a bean grinder that the university had spent money to equip a few months ago. Everything else was traditional tools. A large stove sat on top of a large black pot, which was used to boil the soy milk. In the middle of the room stood a large water tank with a cross-shaped frame suspended above it. The four corners of the frame were tied with a square piece of coarse mesh, forming a large net bag. She knew that this was the tool for filtering out the bean dregs.

  Qiu's mother came in and let the girl finish on her own, she picked up the white coat hanging on the back of the chair and put it on, changed into rubber boots, then carried the water pipe to prepare for washing the stone mill.

  Qiu Ye watched her mother work and couldn't just stand by, so she found some tasks that were within her ability to do.

  For example, find a small basin and prepare to take out all the bean dregs hanging in the net pocket on the water tank. Hehe, this is her purpose for coming today.

  Qiu's mother saw her daughter staring blankly beside the large vat, thinking she wanted to drink soy milk, so she put down the water pipe in her hand, picked up a thermos on the wall, poured out a bowl of steaming hot soy milk, and placed it in front of her daughter.

  Qiu Ye looked at the white soy milk in front of her and came back to herself, holding the bowl and smiling sweetly at her mom: "Thanks, Mom, I've been craving this flavor."

  Qiu Ye said it was true, this is a purely handmade soy milk, and the strong smell of soy milk can be smelled from far away. When drinking, it's even more fragrant and pure. She didn't know how long she hadn't tasted this flavor.

  After she finished drinking the soy milk, she just saw her mother about to pour the dregs of the soybeans filtered from the water vat into the slop bucket, and hurriedly shouted: "Mom, don't pour."

  Qiu's mother was startled by Qiu Ye's shout and stopped her actions.

  Qiu Ye hastily ran to the front, pulling on her mother's hem and said: "Mom, I want to eat dad's fried meatballs now, can we ask dad to make some tonight? Can we? Can we?" Qiu Ye, for her own unmentionable secret, was being coy with a 35-year-old face in front of her 39-year-old mother.

  Qiu's father doesn't cook much at home, but he has a signature dish, which is fried meatballs. It's usually only during Chinese New Year or other festivals that Qiu's father will show off his skills, and this dish has always been a staple of the Qiu family's reunion dinner for many years, with a flavor that remains unchanged and is especially loved by the two children at home.

  Qiu's father made fried meatballs with bean curd residue as an important ingredient.

  Qiu's mother thought for a moment, feeling quite anxious. This month's oil on the grain coupon had all been used up, and now there was only over a catty of bean oil left at home. If they fried meatballs, it would definitely not be enough to last until the end of the month.

  "Old girl, this month our family has no oil, we won't eat today, okay? If you want to eat, wait until next month, after mom buys oil, and then let dad fry some for you, lots of them, how about that?" Mrs. Qiu coaxed the girl, this was her usual trick, delaying one month at a time, until New Year's when she would finally fulfill her promise.

  At home, how much oil is left, of course, she knows. This morning when she was flipping the kitchen, she saw it, and she knew that next month would be buying oil again. At home, they can't even fry meatballs unless they want to eat plain boiled dishes for the second half of the month.

  "No, no, I'm going to eat today. If there's no oil, let Dad make boiled dumplings instead." Qiu Ye said with a spoiled tone, but seeing her mom's changing expression, she quickly changed her words. She didn't want to get beaten by her mom on the first day of her rebirth, although her mom was all bark and no bite, but still, what if something unexpected happened?

  Qiu's mother was about to stand up when she heard the girl say that she didn't want to eat fried food anymore, but instead wanted to eat boiled food. Boiled meatballs aren't as tasty as fried ones, and looking at the pitiful girl, Qiu's mother couldn't bear to refuse her request. Making boiled meatballs wouldn't cost much anyway, so if the child wants to eat it, she'll make it for her. So she fetched a clean basin from the side, poured out some tofu dregs from the hanging net, and prepared to take them back home in the afternoon to use for making meatballs.

  Qiu Ye saw that his mom had only poured a little, and was somewhat anxious, so he shouted from the side, "Mom, give me all of those, I'll do them with dad."

  "That's enough, taking too much is also a waste if you can't finish it." Qiu Ma said, and didn't bother with the girl anymore, pouring all the leftover tofu dregs into the slop bucket and carrying it out to the door.

  Qiu Ye knew her mother was right, there was no refrigerator at home now, and the tofu dregs couldn't be kept until tomorrow no matter how much they had. But looking at those white wasted tofu dregs, her heart ached, these discarded things were all money, and they were being eaten by pigs like this.

  The tofu workshop has villagers from nearby villages coming every day to ask for tofu dregs, which they use to feed pigs. Old Lady Qiu and the others don't need this stuff, so they just give it away for free every day.

  Qiu Ye comforted herself after feeling heartbroken, thinking that it was okay since she was just testing the tofu dregs at home today and wouldn't sell them outside. She planned to bring a large basin from home tomorrow to take all the tofu dregs back.

  Qiu Ye couldn't remember that she was just an 8-year-old kid, and even though she wasn't short for her age, she still couldn't lift so many tofu dregs. So tomorrow was destined to be another painful day for her.

  Qiu's mother ignored the girl with a bitter melon face next to her, thinking that the girl had big eyes but a small belly. She continued to pack up the remaining tools.

  This afternoon, Qiu Ye was just watching beside as Qiu Ma bustled about inside. By around three o'clock in the afternoon, the tofu workshop had been cleaned up and the beans had been soaked, so Qiu Ma locked the big gate and led the girls home with a leisurely pace.

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