86 Lemon Duck Claw
The stewed meat business had a very high saturation limit. Whether it was the initial 40 catties or the later 200 catties, as long as it was sold, it would be sold out. Therefore, even if there were more sellers, she would still make money.
Later on, there were a few more stores in the county that had signs that were exactly the same as Jian Qingqing’s stewed meat sore. They started to surround her, selling the same kind of stewed meat.
For a moment, the people in the county were overjoyed. Jian Qingqing’s stewed meat was originally delicious. They had to snatch the meat from her store. If they were too late, there would be no more. Now that there were a few more stores, there was no need to snatch it.
Everyone had grain after the summer harvest, so the price of grain had dropped. It was almost the same price as before. The price of meat had also dropped. Jian Qingqing had also lowered the price of stewed meat.
Everyone had money. The price of stewed meat had dropped, and more people came to buy it.
The taste of the dishes in this era was still very bland. In the families, there was generally no use of spices in cooking. All the flavors were the original flavor of the dishes. At most, they would add a little salt. It was very bland, that was why they never got tired of Jian Qingqing’s thick-flavored stewed meat.
In summer, it was the season for fruits to ripen. Plums, peaches, and pears were all over the mountain. Jian Qingqing used them to make a pot of canned fruit. The taste was not bad. It was ice-cold and sweet. Children loved to eat it.
She took the canned food with her to set up a stall. It was unexpectedly popular. Many servants from large families would buy it back for their young misses and young masters to eat. They were afraid that she would not make it clean, and the fruit inside was not good fruit either, when the young masters and young ladies got sick from eating, there were still people who wanted to buy the recipe back so they could do it themselves.
Jian Qingqing did not hide it either. It was 20 taels per serving. These people had money, so they simply gave her the money and took the recipe back. She made a small amount of money from these.
In the past few months, she had earned quite a lot of money, but she did not spend much. There were more than 100 taels. In this era, it could be considered a huge amount of money.
If she did not spend the money, it would be dead money. There was no use in saving it, and it could not generate money. She still had to spend it. Therefore, Jian Qingqing bought a large courtyard in the county town. It was the kind with a shop in the front. After buying a house, she did not set up a stall. Instead, she sold it in her own shop. She named it the ‘Jian’s Food Shop’ and hired people to look after the shop for her. She also hired people to cook the stewed meat in the backyard, so she did not have to work so hard to transport it from the village to the county town.
This was how the rich people operated. She no longer needed to be exposed to the wind and the sun. In the past few months, they had been traveling back and forth between the village and the county town under the bright sun. Even though they had taken great care to protect themselves from the sun, their faces became as black as stewed eggs, while the skin that was covered by the clothes was white and tender. Their skin tones were at two extremes.
In the autumn, the crops matured again, and a new round of harvesting began. The year after the harvest was considered to be a good one.
One day, a group of children came looking for Jian Qingqing with a pile of citron. Jian Qingqing looked at the ugly pile of citron, and only then did she remember what she had told the group of children previously. At that time, she had asked them to remember the location, she did not expect them to pick them for her.
Under their expectant gazes, Jian Qingqing gave each of them a handful of candy.
The citron was ugly, and the flesh was not very good. Jian Qingqing tasted it. It was very sour, but it also had the fragrance of lemon and orange. She used it to make lemon chicken feet and duck claws. It tasted very good, she added this dish to Jian’s Food Shop.
The food shop also made stewed chicken roasted duck, so she would use the claws to make lemon claws.