Lin Yuan coughed dryly, "Um, that, not letting him, not letting him eat?"
"No, no, too lenient." Lao Fan’s head shook like a rattle-drum.
Xia Zheng was also taken aback, tapping his chopsticks against the table discontentedly and said, "Hey, stinky old bugger, stop playing the pity card here! You were just wolfing down those potatoes a moment ago, and you seemed pretty delighted!"
"Wuuu, stinky girl, did you see that? He’s bullying me again! I, I can’t live anymore!" Lao Fan started wailing loudly again, his shoulders heaving as he lay on the table; it was a sight so pitiful it could break one’s heart.
After receiving a fierce glare from Lin Yuan, Xia Zheng too felt wronged, pouting and turning away, he guzzled down two large bowls of soup in defiance.
Lin Yuan felt overwhelmed by Lao Fan’s crying, finding him more and more childlike, and she couldn’t help but notice traces of Xiao Linshuang in him. This wouldn’t do—if she left these two kids together, who knew what trouble they could stir up?
"How about this, let’s punish him by forbidding him from eating the new dishes I’m developing, how about that?"
Both voices chimed in simultaneously, Xia Zheng was no longer angry, and Lao Fan stopped crying, both fixing their gleaming eyes eagerly on Lin Yuan.
Lin Yuan held her forehead, these two foodies!
Speaking of new dishes, it wasn’t exactly new—it just wasn’t available here yet.
Lin Yuan nodded, sharing her thoughts, "Yes, new dishes. Winter is quickly approaching, and I’ve heard from the staff that guests feel the meals cool too quickly, losing the deliciousness they had before. So, I was thinking of introducing a new dish that not only ensures the food stays hot until the very last bite but also enables the guests to chat while eating, making for a great atmosphere."
"What dish is that?" Lao Fan, whose mind was filled with thoughts of delicious food, couldn’t care less about anything else. Seeing that Lin Yuan was beating around the bush without revealing the main attraction brought him some urgency.
Lin Yuan smiled, "This is called hot pot."
As she spoke, she pulled out a piece of blueprint from her sleeve. She had considered opening a hot pot restaurant long before, originally planning to acquire a new location specifically for it. However, after taking over the Fuman Building from Xia Zheng, she started to treat it as her own and didn’t hesitate to introduce new ideas.
Xia Zheng and Lin Yuan shared the same thoughts regarding the business model for the hot pot. He leaned in, carefully examining the blueprint Lin Yuan had drawn, which featured a small charcoal stove with an open-top pot placed on it.
"This is the hot pot you mentioned?" Xia Zheng puzzled, "How do we eat this?"
Lao Fan was also disappointed, "How can one eat with just a pot?"
Lin Yuan laughed, pointing at the blueprint and explaining one by one, "To be precise, this should be called a ’dip pot.’ You add water to the pot, and once the water boils, you put in various kinds of vegetables and meat. After everything inside is cooked, you can pick it up with your chopsticks and dip it into the sauce to eat."
She also pointed to the charcoal stove, "Because there’s a charcoal stove under the pot, the water stays boiling throughout the meal, so the guests won’t complain about the food cooling down."
Xia Zheng, however, frowned, "This pot, is it one per person, or one per table?"
If it were one per person, that would be too extravagant; if it were one per table, it wouldn’t be clean or sanitary for everyone at the table to be sticking their chopsticks into the pot, especially for the wealthy families who are particular about dining hygiene—It would be considered dirty.
Although he didn’t express it explicitly, Lin Yuan understood his concern from his question and laughed, "Actually, one per person is possible, but that would be too cost-prohibitive; we would need to make hundreds of these small charcoal stoves and pots. So, I’m thinking of one per table. As for your concerns about hygiene, I have thought of a solution—we can provide each guest with two pairs of chopsticks, right?"
Those who are particular will use serving chopsticks and individual chopsticks, while those who do not care about such manners won’t use the two pairs provided anyway. Lin Yuan’s approach was simply a precaution, as chopsticks were plentiful and much less expensive than having a small hot pot for each person.
Xia Zheng heard the rationale and immediately agreed.
Lao Fan, however, didn’t care about cleanliness at all. He was used to being lazy, and after listening to all this talk about the hot pot without a mention of what would go into it, he was getting anxious.
"Hey, you brat, you just said we put vegetables and meat in this pot? But it’s already winter; where would we find so many fresh vegetables? And the meat, would it really be delicious after boiling it like that in water?"
Lin Yuan suppressed a laugh and replied, "Don’t worry about the vegetables; there are plenty available in winter. There are cabbages, carrots, winter melon, bean sprouts, potatoes... all of these can be cooked in the pot."
At the mention of potatoes, Lao Fan indeed felt nauseous again, but fortunately, he had already emptied his stomach earlier, so he only retched dryly this time.
"What about the meat?" The vegetables Lin Yuan had just listed were all familiar to Xia Zheng and Lao Fan, except for bean sprouts, which had not been sold in Fuman Building; the rest were quite common.
When it came to meat, Lin Yuan became somewhat concerned, "As for the meat, it’s best to have lamb, sliced into almost transparent thin slices. However, sheep are not especially common among farmers and are rarely raised in large numbers, I..."