80s Transmigration: The Young Widow's Hustle to Riches

Chapter 372 - 369: The Young Owner of the Steamed Bun Shop

"Alright." Lin Lan sorted the *zongzi* and poured them into two large pots. She stirred the charcoal and added two shovelfuls of coal, and soon the fire in the stove was blazing.

After boiling on high heat for an hour and a half and steeping for another thirty minutes, the first batch of *zongzi* was ready.

Lin Lan scooped out the *zongzi* and said to everyone, "Ma, brothers, sisters-in-law, let’s all take a break and try the *zongzi* you wrapped with your own hands."

Tong Xinglan picked one up. "Let’s see what flavor this is."

Lin Lan glanced at the hemp string tied around them. "This batch is salted egg yolk, and the other is salted pork and chestnut."

Tong Xinglan put down the salted egg yolk one she was holding and said with a smile, "I’ll try a salted pork and chestnut one first."

Lin Lan brought the bamboo basket full of *zongzi* over to everyone, letting them pick their own.

Li Xiaofeng also grabbed a salted pork and chestnut one. After taking a bite, she couldn’t stop praising it. "This is amazing! So much better than the sweet potato ones."

Zhou Shisong laughed. "You silly goose, it’s filled with salted duck egg yolk. Of course it’s delicious!"

Li Xiaofeng sighed. "Ah, city people really know how to eat. We’ve spent our whole lives farming and raising chickens and ducks, but how did we never think to put salted duck egg in our *zongzi*?"

Zhou Shisong scoffed. "In your dreams. All our grain went to the state levy. We barely had white rice to eat, and you were thinking about using salted egg yolks for *zongzi*? Your mother would’ve chased you out with a broom!"

Zhao Xiaohui patted Li Xiaofeng. "It’s different now, Cousin-in-law. You can eat any flavor you want, and I guarantee no one will chase you out."

Lin Lan nodded. "Exactly. For this year’s Dragon Boat Festival, we’re going to eat to our hearts’ content and try every single flavor."

Tong Xinglan gestured enthusiastically. "Alright, let’s eat our fill!"

Wu Shufen shook her head with a smile. "Not me. I’m getting old. I can have one at most. Any more than that and I’ll have trouble digesting it."

Lin Lan chuckled. "It’s alright, Ma. I’ll go steep some hawthorn tea for everyone."

"There’s no need for hawthorn tea. It’s not like we’re going straight to bed after this."

Wu Shufen and the others helped Lin Lan finish wrapping that day’s batch of *zongzi*. By the time they were done, it was already past eleven, and they each left with some *zongzi* in hand.

Lin Lan put the *zongzi* in the pots, filled them with water, and loaded the stove with coal briquettes. She, Tong Xinglan, and Qiaohui then took turns tending the fire. The two large pots boiled nonstop, and it wasn’t until the next morning that all the *zongzi* from the previous night were finally cooked through.

Early the next morning, Lin Lan moved the coal stoves she had already prepared to the entrance of the pastry shop. She placed an aluminum pot on each of the five stoves and filled them with *zongzi*: ham and red bean, chestnut and salted pork, eight treasure, candied date, salted egg yolk...

The aroma of the *zongzi* immediately attracted passersby, and a steady stream of customers came to buy them.

Lin Lan and Tong Xinglan were swamped, selling several hundred *zongzi* in a single morning.

Yang Zhigang helped out by buying dozens of pounds of sweet potatoes, asking the seller to deliver them directly to the shop.

Qiaohui looked at Lin Lan in surprise. "Cousin, are you really going to make and sell sweet potato *zongzi*?"

Lin Lan nodded with a smile. "Yep! With a couple of candied dates inside, the sweet flavor is sure to be nice."

"Alright then. Shredding sweet potatoes is my forte, so I’ll handle the sweet potato *zongzi*," Qiaohui said.

Lin Yuezhen pulled up a stool, and she and Qiaohui sat down to peel the sweet potatoes. Once they were done, Tong Xinglan dumped the potatoes into the sink, washed them, and then carried them to the cutting board to begin shredding.

Before lunch, the sweet potato *zongzi* were ready. Lin Lan unwrapped one, revealing a golden-yellow filling interspersed with grains of white glutinous rice. She took a bite. It was looser and less sticky than a typical rice *zongzi*, with a pleasant, refreshing sweetness.

Qiaohui asked Lin Lan with a smile, "So, cousin, how does it taste?"

Lin Lan thought of the crystal *zongzi* she’d had before and laughed. "I don’t think we should have shredded them. We should have cooked the sweet potatoes first, mashed them into a puree, and then wrapped them. The result would be much more marketable."

"Should we buy more sweet potatoes and try it that way?" Qiaohui asked.

Lin Lan shook her head with a smile. "Let’s try that next year when we’re properly prepared. For now, we’ll sell these for five cents less than the candied date ones."

"Okay!" Qiaohui carried the sweet potato *zongzi* out to the back courtyard.

At noon, a well-dressed, middle-aged woman entered the shop. She introduced herself to Lin Lan as a buyer from the county hospital. She wanted to place a large order of *zongzi* as a holiday bonus for the hospital employees but needed to inspect the shop’s hygiene first.

Lin Lan was quite confident in her shop’s cleanliness. After she gave the woman a tour of the back courtyard, the woman placed an order for six hundred *zongzi*—half ham and red bean, and half salted pork and chestnut.

Suddenly faced with an order for hundreds of *zongzi*, staffing became an issue. Lin Lan thought for a moment, then went back to Lexing and hired five local women to help wrap *zongzi* at the shop for a wage of five yuan a day.

In those days, a strong man doing manual labor might only earn a few yuan a day. Wrapping *zongzi* wasn’t strenuous, and the five-yuan wage even included meals. The women were thrilled and happily went to the pastry shop to help.

Seeing they were all quick, efficient workers, Lin Lan felt hiring help was a good decision. It would save her own family from being overworked.

That afternoon, Yao Xiuyun and Xu Dong came through for her as well, securing the order for their company’s holiday *zongzi*. They had originally wanted the salted egg yolk flavor, but Lin Lan didn’t have enough cured eggs on hand, so they had to switch the order to ham and eight treasure.

Now with corporate orders from three different places, Lin Lan and her crew had to work overtime, wrapping *zongzi* as fast as they could.

Perhaps because her *zongzi* business was so hot, when Tong Xinglan and Zhigang carried the stoves out on the morning of the fourth day of the fifth lunar month, they discovered that the bun shop and the small restaurant across the street were now selling *zongzi* too.

Both were selling salted pork, candied date, and eight treasure *zongzi*, and they were even using the same setup of aluminum pots on stoves to cook them on-site.

"Cousin, look! The shops across the street are selling *zongzi* now!" Tong Xinglan yelled into the store.

The young owner of the bun shop across the street flashed her an awkward, apologetic smile.

The young owner was a frequent customer at their shop; his favorite treat was their peanut nougat.

Tong Xinglan shot him a glare, then turned indignantly to Lin Lan. "Cousin, they’re just jealous! They saw how well we were doing and decided to copy us."

Lin Lan glanced over at the young owner and smiled. "What’s there to be angry about? Let them run their business, we’ll run ours."

She figured that two new competitors, offering only two or three varieties, posed no real threat to her business.

’The way that young owner was looking at Xinglan, though... that seemed to hint at something else.’

Qiaohui looked at Lin Lan with concern. "Cousin, we can sell on Limin Road until seven. Should we move a couple of the stoves over there?"

Lin Lan considered it for a moment. "Let’s see how this morning goes. If business is slow, we’ll have Zhigang take two stoves over there when he gets back from his own stall."

’Qiaohui is much better at handling problems than Xinglan,’ she thought. ’When something comes up, Qiaohui immediately thinks of a solution, while Xinglan just gets flustered.’

’Once Xiangyang gets back, I’ll put that empty storefront on Limin Street to use. I’ll have Qiaohui manage a shop over there.’

Qiaohui nodded. "Okay. Once Zhigang is back, we’ll have someone to watch the stall here."

After the *zongzi* stall was set up, the hired women arrived. Lin Lan assigned their tasks, then rode her bike to deliver some *zongzi* to her own home. She also dropped some off for the old matriarch and for Yao Xiuyun’s family.