Liu Yu made a round trip in a flurry of activity, renting out the shop in just half a day.
The landlord kept his word, having everything useful in the shop removed that very day. He only left a few sets of tables, chairs, and benches, along with a wooden bed in the back room, saying they were too troublesome to take and leaving them for Liu Yu to use.
The next day, Liu Yu placed a cardboard sign outside his stall. In striking characters, it read: “Starting today, the breakfast stall will relocate to Dongping Street. All new and old customers are welcome to visit!”
An old customer craned his neck hard to look at the cardboard sign.
“Whoa! Your efficiency is really impressive. Yesterday everyone was still egging you on to rent a shop, and just one day later you’ve already rented one?”
Someone laughed and teased, “This kid’s luck is unstoppable. How hard is it to rent a shop in town right now? It’s just that Old Li happened to tip him off; otherwise, someone else would have snatched it up privately before the news even got out.”
“Cough, cough!”
Seeing everyone chattering and discussing animatedly, Liu Yu immediately cleared his throat and said, “Uncles and aunts, I’ll be moving to Dongping Street tomorrow. Everyone is welcome to come show your support! For the first three days of the new shop’s opening, buy six spring rolls and get two free, buy five fried dough sticks and get one free, while supplies last.”
Hearing that opening a new shop meant there were bargains to be had, the crowd instantly boiled with excitement. Seeing this, Liu Yu lowered his head and secretly curved his lips into a smile.
Liu Wenyu and his younger brother didn’t have school today because it was the weekend. They ate breakfast at Liu Yu’s place in the morning, followed him into town, cleaned the place thoroughly, and got all the necessary items ready in the shop.
When Liu Yu packed up his stall and hurried over, he saw that the interior had taken on a completely fresh look. Overjoyed, his arms and back no longer ached; his heart was entirely filled with the thought that he finally wouldn’t have to lug a handcart back and forth anymore.
It was custom in their village that when moving into a new home, one should invite relatives and friends over for a big feast. Even when Liu Yu had originally moved into those two modest mud houses with limited conditions, he had still managed to treat people to a meal.
What’s more, the back kitchen of this shop was fully equipped, with a huge stack of firewood piled up. Not treating people to a good meal would really be inexcusable.
It was just that several months had flashed by since he came here. After twists and turns up to the present, the only ones who could accompany him for meals and share laughs and bickers with him were still just the two brothers right in front of him.
Thinking of this, amid his joy, Liu Yu felt a hint of loss.
Liu Wenyu was right to scold him; he really was hopeless. How long had it been, and he was already starting to miss Brother Zhou a little bit?
If Brother Zhou were here, he wouldn’t be stuck all day without anyone to chat with whenever Liu Wenyu and his brother went to school.
I wonder what kind of situation Brother Zhou was in right now. There still hadn’t been any letter from him—was he trapped by something?
“Brother? What are you thinking about? You’re so spaced out.” Liu Wensheng poked his upper body out from behind and stared right at him.
Liu Yu snapped back to reality and said, “Nothing much. Just thinking about what hearty dishes we should make for lunch.”
“Brother, I’m not picky at all. Whatever you make, I love eating. Of course, if it’s big chunks of fatty meat, that would be even better.” With that, as if savoring the flavor in his mind, he drew in a heavy breath to catch the saliva overflowing at the corners of his mouth.
“Pfft!”
Liu Yu was amused by his act.
Liu Wenyu felt that this younger brother of his was truly disgraceful, so he slapped him right on the forehead and shot him a glare.
Liu Yu instantly pursed his lips and stopped smiling, slipping out the door with a gloating expression.
The butcher shop was right next door. Liu Yu arrived rather late, and now the counter only had pork backbone and some spare ribs left.
Fortunately, people nowadays lacked oil and fat in their diets, and everyone loved eating fatty pork; otherwise, even the spare ribs would be gone.
Spare ribs were sixty-five cents a catty. Liu Yu asked for a catty and a half. While checking out, he gave it some thought and asked how much the large bone sections cost.
The butcher replied, “Big bones are seven cents a catty.”
Liu Yu frowned. These bones had hardly any meat on them, and they were heavy with the bone weight, yet they were sold this dearly. Thinking this, he turned around and prepared to walk away.
Seeing that he was determined not to want them, the butcher hurriedly called out, “Five cents a catty, deal? But you have to buy at least five pieces. If I weren’t in a rush to close up the stall today, I couldn’t sell them this cheap!”
Hearing this, Liu Yu turned back around.
Large bones were actually a great item. Simmered with some corn and white radish, you could whip up a huge pot of sweet, savory, and nutrient-rich corn and radish bone soup. By then, people could drink it plain or use it as a base for noodles.
Liu Yu decided to test the waters tomorrow. If it proved popular, he could incorporate it into his breakfast shop menu.
Having worked all morning, Liu Yu didn’t want to exert himself further. For lunch, he simply made braised pork ribs, stewed a pot of big bone soup, and stir-fried some napa cabbage on the side. It didn’t take much effort and tasted fantastic, making it the most suitable choice.
At the dining table, Liu Wensheng was gnawing on a spare rib with an expression of supreme bliss.
“You know,” he said while sucking on his sauce-covered fingers, “why are these spare ribs so delicious? The flavor is simply out of this world!”
Liu Yu teased, “Who was it that clearly insisted big fatty meat was the best just a moment ago?”
Liu Wensheng chuckled foolishly: “I was wrong. Spare ribs are the best part of the pig.”
Liu Wenyu took a slow, composed sip of the bone soup without raising his head, giving Liu Yu a perfunctory thumbs-up gesture.
Liu Yu: “…”
He vowed never to play with this cheeky guy ever again!
In just over a month, it would be the Chinese New Year, and the weather was growing increasingly cold. After another snow shower yesterday afternoon, Liu Yu prepared the next day’s breakfast and headed home with the two brothers.
The snow showed no sign of stopping even into the night. Liu Yu guessed that the roads in the village early tomorrow morning would probably be very difficult to walk on.
Sure enough, when he pushed open his door early in the morning, the outside world was pristine white, as if he were living in an ice-and-snow wonderland.
No matter how heavy the snow fell, he still had to go to town. He had promised his customers yesterday, and losing credibility on the very first day the new shop opened wouldn’t look good.
He changed into rubber boots, wrapped his head tightly with a scarf, took two puffs of warm breath into his palms, and plunged light-footed into the freezing snowscape.
At this hour in town, every household had voluntarily mobilized manpower to shovel snow energetically in front of their doorways and street entrances.
There was no help for it—if the accumulated snow wasn’t cleared, it would soon reach knee-height. Not only would it be inconvenient for walking, but it would also affect their storefront businesses.
Liu Yu borrowed an iron shovel from a nearby household and cleared a path right outside his own door.
He originally wanted to go to the street corner to help out, but seeing that he ran the shop all by himself and was still a minor, the neighbors chased him right back inside.
Before long, the shop welcomed its first customer.
“Give me six spring rolls and five fried dough sticks. There’s an extra bonus item with this, right?”
“Yes, please wait a moment!” Liu Yu smiled and nodded.
Taking advantage of the time while Liu Yu was frying the pastries, the customer vigorously shook the snow off his rubber boots and walked straight into the shop to look around.
“Your shop is so bright and spacious. With so many tables and chairs set up, does this mean dine-in is available?”
Liu Yu replied, “Dine-in is available. The shop has also prepared big bone soup, only three cents a bowl. Would you like to try some?”
“Alright, give me a bowl to taste.” The customer pulled out three cents from his pocket and handed it to Liu Yu.
“Little boss, I’ll dine in too. Give me two bowls of big bone soup just like his.”
More and more people arrived in a steady stream. At first, everyone was drawn in by the promotional freebies, but in the end, they all stayed to order bowls of the soup.
The bone soup sold out quickly, and those who wanted seconds couldn’t get any more.
“This soup is brewed so fresh. My teeth were chattering from the cold when I left home, but now a bowl of this has my whole body feeling warm.”
“That’s why they always say you gotta drink meat soup in winter. The cold-dispelling and warmth-preserving effects beat drinking boiled water at home by a mile.”
“Duh, this is meat bone soup after all, such a nourishing thing. How can it compare to plain water!”
Listening to the chatter from the table closest to him while standing by the back kitchen window, Liu Yu couldn’t keep the corners of his mouth from curling upward.
Five big bones cost just over seventy cents, plus some cheap white radish, and a huge pot of soup along with seasonings came out to less than eighty cents. Selling out a pot would net him at least sixty to seventy cents in profit!
His pricing wasn’t expensive either. If people went to the butcher shop to buy bones themselves, it would cost a fair amount, and what they stewed might not even taste as good as his. His generous bowl of bone soup cost only three cents—even cheaper than a fried dough stick.
With the weather this cold, who could resist spending a small sum of money to drink a piping hot bowl of meat soup?
By a little past nine, the crowd in the shop gradually thinned out. After selling the last batch of breakfast food, Liu Yu hung a “Sold Out for Today” sign at the doorway.
Once the dine-in customers had all cleared out, Liu Yu began cleaning up the messy tables.
Sales today had been great; subtracting the cost of giveaways, what he earned was no less than usual. Of course, a large part of this success came from the customers’ newly found favorite, the big bone soup.
After finishing the cleanup, taking advantage of the early hour, he headed back to the neighboring pork butcher.
“Uncle, I want ten big bone marrow sticks!”
“Coming right up!” The butcher swiftly picked up ten bones and tossed them onto the scale. “That comes to two yuan and twenty-five cents in total.”
Liu Yu furrowed his brow. “That’s not right. I watched the scale marker tick every single time you weighed it. It’s only thirty catties total; did you calculate it wrong?”
The butcher rubbed his nose with a guilty expression. “Calculated right. Seven and a half cents a catty comes out precisely to two yuan and twenty-five cents.”
Hah, yesterday the base price was still seven cents, and just a single day later the price had gone up. Clearly, he was being treated like a rich sucker and ripped off.
Liu Yu instantly dropped his expression. “Oh, forget it then! I don’t want them.”
He bought from him simply because it was close by. Seeing that he was making a profit selling bone soup, the butcher wanted to hike up the price and squeeze him—in his dreams!
There were other butcher shops down the neighboring streets; perhaps if he bought in bulk elsewhere, the price might even turn out cheaper.
“Hey, don’t walk away! Prices went up because heavy snow makes transporting meat expensive, didn’t you know? Seven cents is fine, let’s go with seven cents!” The butcher chased after him and shouted.
Although bones were cheaper than meat, nowadays whenever families had a little spare cash, they invariably picked the fatty cuts of meat; once the fatty cuts sold out, they bought pork belly. Bones were cheap, but heavy and meatless. Ordinarily, only households that were truly destitute yet wanted a hint of savory meat flavor would pick up a bone or two.
Therefore, the bones at his shop were the hardest to sell. When he hit situations where he genuinely couldn’t clear them, he had no choice but to offload them at a break-even price of four cents.
He had been quite cheerful yesterday when he sold them at five cents a catty, but then today he noticed this little fellow had turned around and started making big bone soup. He had heard that people paid three cents a bowl, and soup brewed from five large bones yielded a hefty profit! So he had hatched wicked ideas.
Now seeing that Liu Yu wasn’t falling for his trick, he instantly regretted it. This was a major bone buyer; if he refused to buy, there was no telling whether these bones would ever sell.
“Final price, six cents,” Liu Yu said.
“Little ancestor, you’re in business yourself too; at least let me make a tiny profit!”
“If you won’t sell, then forget it. I heard customers talking this morning—nobody even wants to buy the bones at your place for five cents on regular days. How is it that when it comes to me, six cents means you aren’t making any profit?” With that, he made a show of walking away again.
The butcher hastily shouted, “Alright, alright, six cents it is! Let’s treat it as us neighbors building good karma with each other.”
Only then did Liu Yu drop the matter. Try to cheat and scam him? No way!