Chapter 28: Chapter 28 That matter_1
Chapter 28: Chapter 28 That matter_1
Lin Yue was originally cleaning the kitchen when she noticed the wooden basin in the corner and remembered that the soybeans she had soaked were still there, forgotten and uncooked. Upon opening the wooden lid, however, she discovered that the beans had already sprouted. Due to the lack of water changes and the rotting beans, a foul odor was emanating from the basin. Lin Yue felt no remorse for wasting so many beans; instead, she was overjoyed.
“Oh, I’m such an idiot, how could I not think of something so simple and delicious.” Lin Yue knocked hard on her own head, expressing her annoyance, just as Zhao Erhu came in and was startled, thinking Lin Yue was upset about something serious.
“Niuniu, what are you doing, why are you hitting yourself like that?” Zhao Erhu said, tenderly rubbing Lin Yue’s forehead, naturally seeing the spoiled soybeans in the wooden basin. Seeing Lin Yue staring blankly at the basin without speaking, he thought Lin Yue was upset about the spoiled beans.
“It’s just some beans, if they’re spoiled, throw them away, they’re not worth much. There’s plenty to eat at home, don’t trouble yourself over such a small thing,” Zhao Erhu said, preparing to dispose of the beans in the basin.
Lin Yue didn’t stop him; her mind was filled with all the different ways to make bean products. That’s how people are—sometimes the easiest things are the ones we fail to think of, or perhaps we limit ourselves. This sprouting beans incident broadened her thinking; as soon as her mind made the connection, she came up with many good ideas. After all, her knowledge from crossing over gave her an advantage of over two thousand years of culture and insight compared to the ancients. Even if she couldn’t shine dazzlingly and lead a fabulous life like the women in the novels she crossed over from, she could still use her knowledge to make her life more comfortable.
From that day on, Lin Yue started to experiment with soybeans, made a large wooden frame to grow a good amount of bean sprouts, and thought about making tofu. Without a stone mill at home, she inquired around the village and found that aside from Zhao Er Gou’s family, only the village chief had one.
Lin Yue would never go to Zhao Er Gou’s household; she couldn’t afford to provoke Li Guihua, his shrewish wife. Even Zhao Er Gou himself had a bad reputation in the village for being lazy and indulging in unsavory relations with a certain widow. Everyone kept quiet about it in front of Li Guihua to avoid trouble, but behind her back, everyone knew the score.
It was just that the village chief’s house was a bit too far; walking from Lin Yue’s house would take about twenty minutes, and carrying items there and back was really inconvenient. However, this didn’t dampen Lin Yue’s enthusiasm for making bean products, and she wished she could try making everything she could think of that was possible with the resources at hand.
Lin Yue didn’t know the village chief, but it so happened that Zhang Chunhua was going to mill cornmeal, so they agreed to go together.
The village chief, Zhao Youfu, was a skinny old man in his fifties, with a bright gleam in his face, clearly a cunning and calculating person. Lin Yue had heard that the villagers considered the chief fair and that he had quite a bit of prestige in the village. When Lin Yue and Zhang Chunhua arrived, they happened to find the chief sitting in the courtyard enjoying the sun, holding a long smoking pipe and puffing away contentedly. He acknowledged Lin Yue and Zhang Chunhua with a nod, exuding the air of a village chief, and simply said, “You’re here,” before leaving the entertaining to his wife.
“Oh, you must be Erhuzi’s wife, aren’t you? Quite the beauty, Erhuzi is indeed a lucky man.” The village chief’s wife, Liu Damei, was straightforward with a bit of a fiery temper. Seeing Lin Yue dressed neatly, she took a liking to her and didn’t hesitate to praise her openly.