## Chapter 13: Paper-Shell Walnuts
Seeing the expression on little Guaibao’s face, Old Man Shen couldn’t help asking out of curiosity, “Guaibao, how does this pastry taste?”
Little Guaibao handed the bitten piece of biscuit to Old Man Shen and said, “Grandpa, have some! It’s so delicious! Guaibao has never eaten such delicious pastries before!”
Old Man Shen did not take the biscuit handed to him. Smiling, he handed it back to Guaibao’s lips and said, “Guaibao is such a filial girl!”
“But you eat first, Guaibao. Grandpa will eat later. There are still plenty inside the iron box!”
Hearing this, Wang Juhua, who had long been drooling and unable to hold back, said anxiously, “Dad, we’re all starving to death. Hurry up and share some for us to eat too!”
“What’s the rush? Wait a minute!” Mrs. Shen glared at Wang Juhua before turning her gaze to the iron wok, reaching in to take out the food items one by one.
The food in the iron wok this time wasn’t rice like the previous two times, but rather some foods none of them had ever seen before.
They had never laid eyes on the pastry little Guaibao had just eaten, and it was even stored in a precious iron box!
Watching Mrs. Shen take inventory of the food in the wok, the eyes of the Shen family members naturally landed on the various foods she pulled out.
The very first thing Mrs. Shen took out was the children’s alphabet biscuits stored in the iron box that little Guaibao had just eaten.
The Shen family didn’t recognize biscuits. Seeing that they looked like pastries, they assumed it was a type of pastry they had never seen before.
The second item taken out from the iron wok was purple sweet potato bread. The Shen family hadn’t seen that either; their eyes were filled with curiosity while their throats kept swallowing saliva.
The third item pulled out was an unopened bag of pure oatmeal flakes. Mrs. Shen looked at it for a moment, and not knowing what it was, temporarily set it aside.
The fourth was paper-shell walnuts…
After taking out and looking over everything in the iron wok, the Shen family only recognized the walnuts, peanuts, almonds, and chestnuts inside.
Old Man Shen and Mrs. Shen managed to suppress their excitement and quietly planned how these foods should be eaten.
However, seeing these unfamiliar edibles, little Guaibao’s brothers couldn’t help talking among themselves in excited, hushed tones.
“Goodness! What kind of pastry was that just now? It looks so delicious!”
“I just saw that pastry Grandma was holding looked so soft. It feels like if you squeezed it just a little bit, it would sink right in!”
“Those peanut shells are all peeled off, they’re all peanut kernels! I’ve never seen such huge peanut kernels in my life!”
“And look at the walnuts, they don’t have shells either, just walnut kernels, and they’re even wrapped in a layer of golden sugary glaze!”
“That layer of sugary glaze is so pretty, just like the legendary glazed glass!”
“When my Dad used to go to the county town and buy candied haws for us to eat, they also had a layer of sugary glaze wrapped around them, but they didn’t look nearly as delicious as the glaze on these walnuts!”
…
After Mrs. Shen took all these things out of the iron wok one by one, she immediately put all the food back into the bamboo baskets the Shen family members carried on their backs, leaving only the walnuts, peanuts, and chestnuts behind.
Over the past few days while traveling, they had casually woven a few bamboo baskets to hold things.
Earlier, it was because they had carried the two bags of rice directly in their hands that they were targeted by refugees driven mad by hunger.
So Old Man Shen and Mrs. Shen learned from that lesson and had Shen Qiang and Shen Gui use wood-chopping knives to cut down two bamboo stalks, making a few bamboo baskets to distribute the two bags of rice across them.
That way, even if someone came to steal their rice, it would be impossible to steal it all.
After packing everything away, Mrs. Shen took out the remaining walnuts, peanuts, and chestnuts to divide them up evenly.
Everyone in the Shen family, except for little Guaibao, received five paper-shell walnuts, twenty peanuts, and twenty chestnuts.
As for little Guaibao, Old Man Shen and Mrs. Shen let her eat whatever she wanted until she was full.
However, little Guaibao was only three years old, and after eating just five paper-shell walnuts, five peanuts, and three chestnuts, she was already full.
As for the rest of the Shen family, apart from the adult men who only managed a six-tenths-full stomach, the others all reached about nine-tenths full after eating the food distributed by Mrs. Shen.
…
Little Guaibao was the first person to finish eating. Once full, she gratefully said to the voice in her mind, “Wok Brother, thank you for the food you gave Guaibao!”
“When Guaibao grows up, I will definitely repay you!”
As she finished speaking, little Guaibao suddenly raised her little hand and covered her mouth.
Because she suddenly remembered that the voice in her mind had just told her he wasn’t Wok Brother.
Little Guaibao couldn’t help asking the voice in her mind once more, “You… won’t let Guaibao call you Wok Brother, so what should Guaibao call you from now on?”