Lu Sheng’s face was flushed red. “Dad, I steamed a pot of buns, but… something doesn’t seem right.”
His father had gone out early that morning, and his mother had broken her leg some time ago and was bedridden recovering. The family had run out of dry rations, so he thought he’d make a batch of steamed buns. He had watched his mother make them countless times and assumed it was easy. Yet somehow, with the same flour and the same water, what came out was definitely not the same buns.
Lu Yan and Old Lu followed him into the kitchen. The moment they lifted the lid, they saw a pot full of unleavened buns.
Lu Yan: “…”
The buns were dense, hard as rocks. Toss one onto the chopping board and it would actually bounce.
“Didn’t you let the dough rise?” Lu Yan asked.
Lu Sheng looked blank. “Let what rise?”
Lu Yan: “…”
Of course dough had to rise before making steamed buns. But in ancient times there was no baking yeast; people used old fermented starter dough instead. Lu Yan found the old starter in the kitchen and mixed up a basin of dough to ferment.
At the same time, she heated some water for a bath. Soon the water was ready. She mixed the boiling water with cool well water, and Old Lu carried the tub into an unused side room for her. Lu Yan took a thorough bath and emerged wearing one of Madam Xu’s old outfits.
Now that she was clean, Lu Yan looked delicate and pretty. Unfortunately, years of malnutrition had left her thin and scrawny. She was about the same height as Lu Sheng, with yellowish hair and an air of poverty clinging to her from head to toe.
This was also Lu Yan’s first time using old starter dough, and she had no idea how long it should ferment. After a little over half an hour, she checked on it. It was nowhere near ready. Fortunately, they had returned home early, and it was still morning. There was plenty of time before lunch.
She looked around, wondering what to make for the midday meal.
There were two blocks of tofu in the kitchen. Thinking of the small river they had passed on the way home, Lu Yan couldn’t help but want to take a look.
This whole family consisted of the old, the weak, the sick, and the injured. They needed something nutritious.
Leaving the kitchen, she called to Lu Sheng, who was feeding the chickens.
“Do we have a fishing rod or a fish spear?”
Lu Sheng scratched his head. “I don’t know. Try looking in the backyard.”
So Lu Yan headed to the back courtyard.
Only then did she learn that Old Lu was a carpenter. The yard was piled with all kinds of wooden and bamboo items he had made. When he heard she wanted fishing gear, he rummaged around for a while. Before long, Lu Yan left happily carrying a basket and a fish spear.
Lu Sheng stared in surprise.
“Dad, what’s she doing?”
Old Lu replied, “She saw the Cui River on the way back and said she’s going to catch fish.”
Lu Sheng: “…”
The fish in the Cui River were wild and slippery. If she actually managed to catch one, he’d be impressed.
By then, Lu Yan had already arrived at the river.
A few children were already there, wading barefoot in the water. Whenever they spotted a fish, they would plunge their hands in with great enthusiasm, only to come up empty every time.
One boy finally caught a large black fish, but it was so strong that it flicked its tail and leaped right out of his hands, splashing back into the water and swimming away.
The boy got a face full of water. He wiped his face and climbed ashore in defeat.
“I’m done. I don’t have the skill for this.”
After watching for a while, Lu Yan also took off her shoes, rolled up her trousers, and stepped into the water. The other children all stopped to watch her.
She pulled out a piece of steamed bun she had brought and crumbled it into the water. Several large black fish swam over to eat it.
Holding the spear high, she remained perfectly still for a long moment. Then she seized her chance and thrust downward with all her strength.
When she lifted the spear, a huge black fish weighing seven or eight jin was skewered on it.
The other fish fled in panic.
The big fish thrashed desperately, but Lu Yan quickly flung it into her basket.
Grinning from ear to ear, she carried the basket home while the children stared after her in stunned silence.
Less than half an hour later, she returned carrying the big fish.
Both Lu Sheng and Old Lu were dumbfounded. They hadn’t expected her to actually catch one.
Lu Yan skillfully gutted the fish and chopped off its enormous head.
Before Madam Xu broke her leg, the Lu family had cooked proper meals regularly, so they still had oil, salt, soy sauce, vinegar, scallions, ginger, and garlic.
Lu Yan marinated the fish head with scallions, ginger, and garlic, then turned to the fish meat.
There were many ways to cook fish, but if she wanted it to last, fish balls were the best option—they could be eaten for days.
Black fish had very few small bones, so she quickly scraped out a large basin of fish meat, leaving only the skeleton behind.
Once the fish head was marinated, she fried it on both sides in the wok. A delicious aroma soon drifted out of the kitchen.
Lu Sheng could smell it and found himself unable to focus on his books.
Ever since his mother had broken her leg, he hadn’t eaten a decent meal.
Even Old Lu was stunned.
He had thought the girl’s claim that she could cook was just an excuse to persuade him to buy her. Who knew she actually had real skills?
When the fish head turned golden on both sides, Lu Yan poured half a pot of water into the wok and began simmering it.
The dough had been fermenting for nearly two hours and was finally ready. She placed a steaming rack over the pot and started steaming the buns.
About fifteen minutes later, she lifted the lid.
Plump, steaming buns had emerged.
She removed them, then added the sliced tofu into the now milky-white fish soup and seasoned it with salt.
The soup bubbled merrily, and its rich, fresh aroma filled the entire courtyard.
By the time Lu Yan carried out a large basin of fish head tofu soup, Lu Sheng and Old Lu were already sitting at the table, watching eagerly.
Fish Head Tofu Soup.
Lu Yan gathered the failed, rock-hard buns Lu Sheng had made and put them into a basket.
“Break these up and feed them to the donkey,” she said.
Lu Sheng looked shocked.
“We can’t eat these?”
Lu Yan froze for a moment.
For many years in her previous life, she had been a food blogger who lived comfortably and abundantly. Her first instinct with inedible food was always to feed it to pets. Sometimes the pets even ate better than people.
But she wasn’t in modern times anymore.
She was no longer the former Lu Yan.
She needed to slowly adjust her mindset.
After some thought, she decided how to salvage the ruined buns.
She ladled most of the fish head and tofu into a large basin, leaving half a pot of milky soup behind. Then she tore the hard buns into thumb-sized pieces and dropped them into the soup, planning to save them the way one made soaked flatbread.
The hard pieces simmered in the boiling broth, gradually absorbing the soup and becoming soft.
Lu Sheng took a bowl and filled it with fish soup, scooping in plenty of tofu and fish. He also prepared a small dish of pickled vegetables and grabbed a bun, intending to take the food to his mother.
But Lu Yan took the tray from him.
She hadn’t met Madam Xu yet and thought this would be a good opportunity.
When she entered, Madam Xu was sitting on the heated brick bed with a small table set up before her, making it convenient to arrange the meal.
As Lu Yan handed over the food, she studied the woman.
She realized she had made a mistake in her assumptions about this world.
Madam Xu was far younger than she had imagined.
Old Lu was the same.
Because they were the heroine’s foster parents, she had automatically pictured them as elderly.
But the heroine, Lu Yan herself, and Lu Sheng were only twelve or thirteen years old.
Madam Xu and Old Lu had only just passed thirty.
The realization made Lu Yan gasp inwardly.
That meant that, unless something unexpected happened, they wouldn’t die early at all.
They still had many years ahead of them.
Madam Xu had only broken her leg; her hands and arms still worked fine, so she could feed herself.
She took a bite of the soft bun and then spooned some of the delicious fish soup into her mouth.
Immediately, her eyes turned red.
Lu Yan panicked.
“Why are you crying, Mother?”
Madam Xu had already heard how her husband had bought Lu Yan for only one tael of silver and everything the girl had gone through.
Now, hearing her call her “Mother,” her heart felt unbearably sour and complicated, and tears welled up again.
Unable to speak, she simply patted Lu Yan’s hand.
“Good child. Don’t stay here with me. Go eat.”
Lu Yan didn’t refuse.
She nodded briskly.
“Then enjoy your meal, Mother. I’ll come back later to clear the dishes.”
When she returned to the main room, both Old Lu and Lu Sheng were still sitting at the table, waiting for her.
Lu Yan smiled and quickly sat down.
“Alright, let’s eat.”
Holding a bun almost as large as his face, Lu Sheng took a bite and marveled inwardly.
He had clearly seen that the dough pieces had been only fist-sized when they went into the steamer. Yet the finished buns were huge.
So this was the effect of letting dough rise?
Then he took a sip of fish soup and nearly swallowed his tongue.
The milky broth was incredibly fresh and sweet, with not a trace of fishiness.
The soft tofu had soaked up all the soup, and one bite made the flavorful juices burst in his mouth.
Lu Sheng had always thought he wasn’t particularly interested in food.
Now he realized it was simply because he had never eaten anything this delicious.
Since he was the only scholar in the family, Lu Yan and Old Lu gave him the entire fish head, telling him to nourish his brain.
Unable to refuse, he happily accepted.
A growing teenage boy could eat an astonishing amount.
Though Lu Sheng was frail, he was still in the middle of adolescence. By the end of the meal, the three of them had polished off the entire pot of fish head tofu soup and every last piece of soaked bun.