Ji Ying thought for a moment. She couldn’t exactly say she was setting up a factory, so she smiled and explained, "It’s , Dr. Du’s grandson buys chili peppers, and he needs a lot of them. That’s why I thought of you all."
The matter of setting up the factory was still not settled, and Ji Ying’s explanation was somewhat vague.
"Ji Ying, I really can’t thank you enough," Cai Feng’s mother and the other two expressed their immense gratitude. Selling the chili peppers for three yuan each was a very good price. For people like them who farmed for a living, their entire yearly earnings depended on the little plot of land they cultivated, so opportunities to earn a cash income were not frequent.
Xu Nian’an told me that the bottles had been procured.
Ji Ying felt a wave of pressure.
"Mom, let’s continue to buy more chili peppers from the village tomorrow. To prevent any from going bad, we can dry them if necessary. It’s just as good," said Xu Nian’an, then he took out the notes and handed them to Xu Nianhua, "Little sister, you’re the most careful one. From now on, you’ll keep track of these accounts."
Xu Nian’an thought that this meticulous task should be handled by his detail-oriented little sister, which couldn’t be more fitting.
Xu Nianhua didn’t refuse. She went back to her room, took a new notebook, and recorded all the notes in it.
Additionally, she kept a separate notebook for the chili peppers Ji Ying had acquired.
"School starts tomorrow, and we still haven’t got the factory up and running. If these chili peppers go bad, whatever shall we do?" Ji Ying was worried.
"Mom, I’ll help you after I finish selling the bean sprouts," Xu Nianji volunteered.
Zhou He also said, "And me, Mom, I can help too."
"We can dry them as well," Xu Nianhua was more optimistic. A new concern suddenly struck her, "Mom, if we’re cutting the chili peppers by hand, can our hands handle it?"
Fresh chili peppers, unlike dry ones, can’t simply be processed with a bamboo barrel and a rough knife to smash them into pieces.
Manually cutting fresh chili peppers is fine for personal consumption, but if it was to be done in large quantities, the issue wasn’t just the volume, but also whether their hands would be able to withstand it?
"Mom, let’s make some dried chili sauce tomorrow, what do you think?" Xu Nianhua hadn’t considered this before, but now that she did, she instantly thought of a solution. She had previously realized that chili sauce has a short shelf life since fresh chili peppers, if not processed promptly, would spoil.
Unlike dried chili peppers, which can be kept for a long time without spoiling.
Now, they were simply skipping the first step.
"Sure," Ji Ying didn’t see any problem with that. She said, "Won’t Pei Yicheng think we’re making empty promises?"
"Why would he, as long as it’s delicious and can make money, any kind of chili sauce would do," Xu Nianhua didn’t see this as a problem.
The next day was the start of the school term.
Ji Ying got up early to make the dried chili sauce. Since there weren’t many ingredients available, she added garlic and poured hot oil directly over the chili sauce mixture, stirring continuously as the aroma wafted out.
Xu Nianhua involuntarily took a deep breath and exclaimed, "Mom, it smells so good."
"I’m not sure if it will taste as good."
Once Ji Ying had adjusted the flavor to her satisfaction, she looked at the finished product—it looked the same as usual. However, the added pressure of making more to sell made her more anxious.
"It will definitely taste good."
Xu Nianhua exaggerated a bit. Unfortunately, they would have to wait a while before they could taste it.
Today was registration day. Xu Nianhua and Xu Nian’an, the siblings, were ready early with their belongings and a change of clothes.
They had decided to stay in a rented house, which meant they could save on accommodation fees during