Chapter 283: Pork Party In The Courtyard
In the evening, in the Xiang Family Courtyard.
Dinner time had arrived, but the Class Eight Grade One crowd was still tirelessly helping Xiao Chuan organize information. After all, one can’t bite the hand that feeds them. In the afternoon, they had tasted the bread that Xiao Chuan and others had successfully baked for the first time, and tonight they could eat pork.
Since they had all agreed to help Xiao Chuan, they couldn’t just eat the Xiang Family’s food for free!
Moreover, they were very interested in the content of these documents and information.
Watching their excited looks, Xiao Chuan seemed to see those 21st Century university freshmen who were like newborn calves unafraid of tigers.
The difference was that the drive of 21st Century university students came from their longing for university life and the sense of liberation from finally escaping the college entrance exam, while the motivation of these kids in front of her, who were still one or two years away from adulthood, came from the gluttony of being able to eat more delicious food.
……Compared this way, modern youth seemed even more innocent than those fragile university students from the 21st Century?
Xiao Chuan muttered in her heart.
——
Even after Mr. and Mrs. Xiang Weiguo got off work and returned home, the courtyard still maintained that lively and somewhat noisy atmosphere.
Yue Xiang Group’s takeaway business income had been rising steadily these past two days, so Xiang Weiguo was busy but happy. Therefore, this meal of pork he had finally gotten from the Agriculture Bureau was to reward his eldest daughter who had done the preparation work in advance and his youngest daughter who had worked hard on the live stream.
Of course, Xiao Chuan had told him at noon that the Class Eight Grade One crowd would probably eat at home tonight, so he naturally didn’t forget to bring portions for his daughter’s classmates.
The Agriculture Bureau staff negotiating the experimental field cooperation project with Yue Xiang Group heard that the little girl who provided A Bite of China was treating friends to a meal and immediately enthusiastically took over Xiang Weiguo’s ingredient wholesale work.
In the end, the ingredients Xiang Weiguo brought home were so many that they even required a medium-sized container to hold them.
When Xiao Chuan saw the container being transported behind Xiang Weiguo’s car using levitation equipment in the courtyard, she even wondered if it was new ingredients issued by Yue Xiang Group.
As a result, when she opened the container and saw the mountain-like pork inside and the bamboo shoots that had almost caused a scramble in the residential area last night, Xiao Chuan’s speechless ellipses in her heart could fill an A4 paper.
“Xiao Chuan, these bamboo shoots are all brought to you by the Agriculture Bureau. They kept a portion for reference samples, and these given to you are for you to try making some dishes with the current ingredients and seasonings.”
Xiang Weiguo directed Da Xing to move the ingredients from the container into the kitchen while explaining the situation to Xiao Chuan.
“Of course, they have some requests for giving us so many bamboo shoots. They hope to get video records of your entire process of handling the bamboo shoots.”
Video records?
Xiao Chuan blinked, wasn’t that just shooting some video for archiving?
She glanced at the bamboo shoots in the container. Not bad, some even still had some soil on them, and they looked quite large. The Agriculture Bureau had really invested this time.
“Alright then, later I can have Xiao Chu and Da Xing help record it. By the way, you don’t mind if I have Yating and the others help out?”
Xiao Chuan turned to look at Ouyang Yating and the other two who were with the other classmates. The Class Eight Grade One crowd naturally saw the bamboo shoots in the container too, and one by one their eyes widened like light bulbs.
If it weren’t for their surviving reason telling them not to lose face in front of their classmate’s elders, a few more impulsive ones would have even gone up to gnaw on the bamboo shoots raw to taste them.
“Of course no problem. The Agriculture Bureau also said that having more young people participate like this is a good thing.”
Xiang Weiguo agreed with a hearty laugh.
“Speaking of which, they sent me a new cooperation draft. You can discuss it with your classmates.”
With that, Xiang Weiguo opened his personal terminal, popped up a document on the light screen, and directly sent it to Xiao Chuan’s terminal.
Cooperation draft? From the Agriculture Bureau? Is this kind of thing suitable for high school students to look at?
Xiao Chuan looked doubtfully at Xiang Weiguo’s back.
——
As A Bite of China said, bamboo shoots have a simple texture, so cooking them doesn’t require much effort.
Moreover, with pork available, Xiao Chuan unhesitatingly had Xiao Chu and Ouyang Yating and others help her stir-fry several portions of stir-fried bamboo shoots with pork.
Smelling the savory aroma of pork and bamboo shoots, Xiao Chuan swallowed more and more saliva, quietly asking Xiao Chu to scoop her two extra spoonfuls of white rice.
Due to the lack of heavier seasonings, the dishes Xiao Chuan made tonight were basically pork paired with various vegetables, using the aroma of pork and lard to add more flavor to the vegetables.
Of course, pork and Chinese cabbage dumplings and pork buns were essential.
The Class Eight Grade One crowd and Li Wei stood outside the kitchen, watching the four people and the kitchen AI cooperating to cook pork. Li Wei was dumbfounded.
These past few days, he had indeed seen on SNS the Third Fleet residents discussing pork-related topics, but as a modern person, he couldn’t believe that the hard-to-eat pork could become a delicacy on the dining table.
Even after later checking the Agriculture Bureau’s official website and seeing the content about castrated pigs in the Agricultural Products Increased Production Ratio Adjustment Draft, he still couldn’t imagine: just cutting off that part of the pig could make the pork tasty?
And the aroma emanating from the Xiang Family Kitchen now, different from beef or chicken, once again shattered his worldview.
——
The Class Eight Grade One crowd still chose to eat dinner in the Xiang Family Courtyard.
Fu Chengkai couldn’t help but complain: Why does it feel like since the field training, most of our class’s group meals have been in outdoor settings or on lawns?
“Why not ask why our group meal frequency is so high?”
Xiao Chuan placed the cut pork belly on the baking pan while responding to Fu Chengkai.
There was quite a bit of good pork belly in the pork Xiang Weiguo brought this time. Xiao Chuan originally thought of rendering some lard from it, but then remembered she needed to leave video material for the Agriculture Bureau, and extracting the oil in front of the lens seemed a bit embarrassing, so she simply used the outdoor roaster to roast the pork belly.
After roasting five pans of pork belly, preparing seasoning sets like pepper powder, salt, chili powder, etc., the evening dinner officially began.
While Li Wei was battling the stir-fried bamboo shoots with pork, the Class Eight Grade One crowd first reached their chopsticks toward the roasted pork belly and lettuce.
This was the legendary lettuce-wrapped roasted pork belly!
The gluttons of Class Eight Grade One followed Xiao Chuan’s example, sprinkling their favorite seasonings on the pork belly, wrapping it in lettuce, stuffing it into their mouths, and instantly the courtyard was filled with waves of praise.
At this moment, Li Wei finally picked up a piece of pork wrapped with quite a few bamboo shoot slices and sent it into his mouth holding his breath.
The next second, the Third Fleet had one more person conquered by pork.
Of course, Xiao Chuan didn’t neglect her family either. She had long had Da Xing send two pans of roasted pork belly to the home restaurant, and the lettuce was also prepared by Xiao Chu.
This thing is so fragrant; Xiang Xue and Lin Ming are probably going to eat a lot.
——
Whether stir-fried bamboo shoots with pork or roasted pork belly, both were very rice-friendly dishes, so soon after, voices requesting more rice started rising one after another in the courtyard.
While Da Xing collected everyone’s bowls to get seconds, the crowd began chatting about tonight’s dinner.
“I really didn’t expect pork to be this delicious.” Li Wei sighed sincerely. “When I first heard that the pork here was edible, I thought the Agriculture Bureau was doing some weird experiment again.”
“Don’t let those uncles and aunts at the Agriculture Bureau hear you say that.”
Xiao Chuan laughed.
“Make do with these for now. Once other seasonings are complete and castrated pig mass production starts later, we might get to eat braised pork feet, braised pork, braised pork, and other delicacies that maximize pork’s appeal.”
“Alright, alright, we know these are delicious. Stop talking about it.”
Chou Manman quickly patted Xiao Chuan’s shoulder to stop her from continuing.
“Hearing about it but not being able to eat it is too agonizing.”
“Just endure this year. When we get to second year high school and pork supply increases, we’ll make the homeroom teacher buy a whole pig with class funds, and then everyone can make ham and the things Xiao Chuan just mentioned.”
Nancy said, her eyes gleaming with golden light.
“No, no, no, just buy pre-processed ones. Butchering a pig ourselves is so tiring. Do you all really want to do it a second time?”
Xiao Chuan hurriedly stopped them.
Unexpectedly, everyone said in unison:
“Of course.”
Xiao Chuan: ……
She had forgotten that this group of kids were native Third Fleet residents, with that hot-blooded passion for agriculture in their bones, basically like those hot-blooded fragile university students from the 21st Century just stepping onto campus.
No wonder they were so excited to kill chickens and fish back then.
At the time, she even wondered if she had awakened some not-so-good fetish in these kids, worrying so much after getting home that she nearly got dark circles.
Later she learned it was just the folk custom of the Third Fleet.
Recently developed a cyst on my body, finally entering recovery period now, but sitting is still a bit uncomfortable… Everyone should really drink more water usually.
