Chapter 227: Colored Pastry
Translator: Xiong Guoqi Editor: DesTheSloth
While the stone mill was rotating at a uniform velocity with a sound of "Zhiya Zhiya", the fragrance of the glutinous rice flour slightly spread out. Nevertheless, it was far from enough. Yuan Zhou rolled it for another 4 circles and then grounded the glutinous rice into the thin flour.
"How fragrant the glutinous rice is!" Since Yuan Zhou was wearing the face mask, his voice sounded a little hollow.
The fragrance of the glutinous rice had been fully grounded by the stone mill out of the flour while Yuan Zhou rolled the stone mill in a way that could contain all the fragrance in the flour.
As a matter of fact, the pastry was very simple to make. It was merely making the flour into paste and then steaming it until it was well-cooked, or making the flour into wet starch and then steaming it. The problem was that this method was a little difficult and an ordinary novice wasn’t able to master it.
Another way was that people could make the flour into a dough, cut it into small pieces, and then cook it by steaming or boiling. They could also roast them in the modern oven. All these were the methods that could be used as civilization progressed.
The pastry actually had a very long history and various varieties. It could be traced back as early as the Northern and Southern Dynasties. The popularity of the pastry could then be seen.
There were particular pastries in the 12 solar terms of the ancient Chinese calendar. Divided by categories, there were birthday pastries or cake for the birthday party of the aged; the honey cake or pastries for the daughters that were to be married; the haircut pastries and the celebration pastries for one-month-old infants and one-year-old kids; the flat pastries for the children’s entrance to a school; the Dingsheng pastry for setting the roof beams in place and the housewarming party. It had so many varieties that one could hardly list all of them.
What Yuan Zhou was cooking today was the colored pastry, of five colors in particular. They were dark reddish purple, bright orange, dark green, snowy white and rose. The flavors were naturally different from each other.
There was a certain particular sequence to make the pastry in each color. Yuan Zhou selected to make the pure white pastry to start with, therefore he had to make the stuffing of it beforehand.
While Yuan Zhou was busy cooking in the kitchen, Shen Min, likewise, didn’t idle at all. Out of the side street was a bus stop board, where she stood and waited for the bus to the university town.
During the time, Shen Min took out an old used Nokia and began to make a call.
Currently, young people basically used the iPhones while fans of China-made goods used Xiaomi or Huawei phones. Only Shen Min was still using the old and used Nokia, which was so hard that it could be used to smash walnuts.
For this reason, she was even teased by her roommates.
"Min Min, are you using the Nokia to defend yourself?" The girl who was asking said curiously.
"You are wrong. Even if Min Min wants to defend herself, she should use the newly-marketed Nokia phone, which is pentagon shaped." Another girl at the side followed.
"Pentagon? What exactly is the phone like?" The girl who first asked became astounded. Including Shen Min, all of them looked at this cla.s.smate with curiosity.
"It’s a kind of irregular pentagon with a pointed right angle. With the quality of Nokia, the phone can definitely be used to poke a person to death." The cla.s.smate climbed onto the bed neatly and then explained.
"Incredible! It seems that we should truly buy such a phone to defend ourselves. If there was a thief, we could poke him dead if smas.h.i.+ng doesn’t work." The girl who first asked about it said after awakening from her daze.
The phone was so peculiar that Shen Min would recall the matter every time she took her Nokia phone out. Luckily, the phone got through in a little while.
"What’s up, Min Min?" From the other end of the phone pa.s.sed a clear female voice. It sounded like that the girl was also young.
"Xiao Jia, have you found a job?" Shen Min first asked her tentatively.
"That’s not easy. I don’t have a university degree and basically can’t find a job with two days off per week. What’s wrong?" The girl called Xiao Jia said straightforwardly. Despite saying that, she didn’t seem to be frustrated.
"I just got one. It’s a part-time job." Shen Min wasn’t an optimistic person, therefore she didn’t tell her friend directly that she wanted her to come to work.
"Terrific! Congratulations. I will bring your favorite dried tofu to you the next time when we meet." Xiao Jia was very happy.
"Thank you. But the boss needs another attendant working during the daytime from Monday to Friday while I only work in the evening and at weekends. Every week, we can get paid by 1300 RMB and two of us can split the money up. Xiao Jia, can you accept that?" Seeing Xiao Jia so happy for her, Shen Min was relieved and then straightforwardly brought out her purpose.
"Wow, 1300 RMB per week. That’s really a good price. Are you serious? I don’t have any problems going to work," Xiao Jia said delightedly on the phone.
"Sure. The boss wants us to go there together tomorrow...." After Xiao Jia agreed, Shen Min began to explain to her smilingly. Then the two of them started to discuss how to split the salary on the phone.
Both of them appeared happy and harmonious. It seemed that the staff of Yuan Zhou was finally confirmed.
While Yuan Zhou was making the white pastry, he added some gluten-free flour inside. The gluten-free flour had broad applications and during the preparation of snacks, it also brought about great benefits. It could increase the transparency of the white pastry. Apart from that, the texture and fragrance would become more plentiful as the gluten-free flour was made from the wheat with gluten and all other things were removed; hence, it still carried some fragrance of the wheat.
The key point now, however, was to make the stuffing of the white pastry.
Dry red dates were required to be used after they were soaked in the water again. Therefore, Yuan Zhou directly looked for where the dry red dates were stored and then found them as expected.
"The color is bright while the fragrance is as strong as fresh ones. System, are these newly-dried red dates?" Yuan Zhou picked one up to identify it carefully. He even peeled the skin and then tasted it.
The system displayed, "Each red date is worth 10 RMB."
"What the f*ck. It was just a habit of being a chef to taste the food ingredient. 10 RMB for one? Even if I’m not short of money, you cannot treat me like that." Yuan Zhou looked at the red date of which he had bit a little and felt quite speechless.
The system displayed, "From the selection of fresh fruits to the preparation technique, these red dates are of the highest grade."
In case Yuan Zhou didn’t understand, the system straightforwardly turned on the mode of acting cool.
The system displayed, "The red date originates from China and has a planting history of more than 8000 years. It has been regarded as one of the five fruits (chestnut, peach, plum, apricot and date) ever since the ancient times and is the 7th dried fruit worldwide. The main characteristic is its very high content of vitamins. Due to that, it enjoys the good reputation as natural vitamin pills."
"The system selected Liulinmu Jujube, which has a cultivation history of more than 1300 years. The red date that has been selected is from the parent trees of over 1000 years."
"The red date of Liulinmu Jujube has a small stone, thick flesh, and high sugar content. It is the best choice to make date paste. The paste made out of the particular red dates is bright in color; the fragrance will linger in the air; the flesh is as smooth as oil; the sugar filament is long and bright; and the taste is extraordinarily sweet."
Wouldn’t the tree become a demon after more than 1000 years?
All the system’s introductions could be summarized by one sentence, that is, it was already a friends.h.i.+p price in charging 10 RMB for one.
However, Yuan Zhou didn’t have any grat.i.tude towards the system. Instead, he just wanted to give a slap to it when he faced with the long paragraphs of the introduction.
The primitive power could hardly be controlled anymore.
"System, I feel that the red date is so precious that it can even be sold separately." Yuan Zhou took the red date and looked over it again and again. In the end, he gulped it down completely.
"10 RMB for each. Hooo, I can’t waste it since I have paid for it." Babbled Yuan Zhou. If the date stone was edible, Yuan Zhou would have already chewed it to pieces and swallowed it up. A red date worth 10 RMB! It was definitely the middle-cla.s.s people’s life to eat such an expensive red date.
He picked an appropriate amount of red dates into a special basket. After was.h.i.+ng them clean, Yuan Zhou began to soak them in the water right away.
The soaking time wasn’t for too long. After that, he started to boil them with a medium flame without changing the water until the red dates became soft. Having scooped up them again, he started to peel the skin and remove the stone without delay.
Along with the fragrance of the dates rising upward, Yuan Zhou took out a new bamboo knife and prepared to remove the date stone.