Chapter 172 - 172: She Should Have Done This Long Time Ago
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Forget it. She should be more diligent in making bacon and sausages to sell in the shop. It can be considered a signature item for the snack shop.
Unexpectedly, Shopkeeper Niu had all the empty vats cleaned and filled all the empty rooms on that side of the shop.
Qiao Mai looked at it and got a headache. Was he forcing her to make pickled vegetables?
Fine. She could teach them how to do it. The workers used to be busy and felt uncomfortable when they had nothing to do.
Shopkeeper Niu had also hired three more assistants. Now there were twelve people in the shop. With so many mouths to feed, how could they not sell more goods?
Qiao Mai selected three clever assistants who had arrived later and instructed them to make pickled vegetables, kimchi, preserved vegetables, spicy radish, spicy pickled cabbage, and garlic chili.
After teaching them several times and making sure they understood, Qiao Mai stopped interfering.
There were plenty of ingredients in the warehouse, so she let them use them as they pleased. From now on, she didn’t have to handle these tasks personally.
Next, it was time to buy meat. Qiao Mai brought several kitchen maids to the butcher’s shop. The shopkeeper was overjoyed to see her.
“Madam Qiao, you’re here?”
“Yes, starting today until the 25th of the twelfth month, send a pig to my house every day. The more small intestines, the better. Leave three sets of pig heads and intestines at the end of the year and keep all the pig trotters for me.”
“Yes, I’ve kept the freshest ones for you.”
Back at home, Qiao Mai taught them to make cured meat, sausages, garlic sausages, red sausages, and canned luncheon meat in three days.
She regretted not doing this earlier. She didn’t have to wait for everything.
For example, they had to wait half a month for bacon and cured sausages. Other sausages could be steamed and sold after drying for a day.
Shopkeeper Niu kept accounts recording the flow of meat daily.
As for the cabbages and radishes, Qiao Mai moved them from the space to the warehouse after using them. Shopkeeper Niu kept track of the purchase price in the autumn.
After the popcorn and crispy rice craze, Qiao’s Small Eatery had a sausage frenzy in less than three days.
When the kitchen staff delivered the red sausages, garlic sausages, and luncheon meat to the snack shop, Shopkeeper Niu knew they would sell well. Sure enough, people were meat lovers. After tasting them, the customers went crazy.
“How much for a pound of these sausages?”
“I’m sorry, we sell them by piece. One piece is five hundred coins.”
“This is daylight robbery!”
“Ah, no bargaining. Good things are expensive; it’s common sense. If you don’t want it, let someone else have it. Some people want to buy.”
Behind the counter, Shopkeeper Niu watched the arguments between the assistants and customers with a smile. He set the price and thought it was reasonable.
Although each sausage cost 500 coins and the pure profit was about 450 coins, he knew that making these delicious sausages required effort from the kitchen staff.
It involved chopping, cleaning the small intestines, seasoning, stuffing, drying, and steaming. It was indeed a labor-intensive process, but it was necessary to create delicious sausages. There was no room for shortcuts.
Qiao Mai said that for every sausage sold, the kitchen staff would receive fifty coins as a bonus for their hard work.
Therefore, this sausage earned a profit of 450 coins, which wasn’t much. If they didn’t want to buy, that was their loss.
Qiao Mai also made this decision because she saw the kitchen staff working hard, cooking for her family, and making sausages to sell. She wanted to reward them for their efforts.
The kitchen maids were overjoyed about this. They appreciated the extra income and were generous in sharing it with other household staff. Anyone who helped with the meat chopping received their fair share.
So, when the older maids were free, they would go over to help. In a day, they could make quite a few sausages.
After tasting the sausage, people couldn’t get enough of it. They thought, “500 coins for one? Damn it, even if it’s one or two silver coins, I still want to buy one to satisfy my craving and taste it again later.”
The sausage war began. It was fortunate that it was winter and the sausages could be stored. The wealthy families in the town rushed to buy them.
By mid-December, the delicious sausages had made their way to the county and the prefectural cities.
Many wealthy households in the area sent people to Tianshui Town to buy sausages. The ones who couldn’t immediately place orders and planned to pick them up later.
When Wang Zongsheng heard about this, he couldn’t help but laugh and sigh. He remembered how the Wang family had tried to obtain the recipe, but she had adamantly refused to share it. If they had succeeded, their business would have undoubtedly reached new heights.
Although sausages couldn’t be sold during the hot summer months, there were still five months from November to March in the northern region when they could be sold. That was a substantial amount of time.
Wang Zongsheng decided not to fret over it too much. After all, there was no end to wealth.
However, having money and not making more of it would be foolish. He shared this matter with his wife.
She immediately sent the manager of their restaurant at Wei City to place an order for sausages at Qiao’s Small Eatery. This unique offering would add a special touch to their restaurant’s menu and boost their business.
Although they had a special relationship with the Qiao family, they couldn’t place too many orders. Shopkeeper Niu limited their purchase to twenty sausages a day, and they had to pick them up every ten days.
To make things easier for the restaurant, Madam Wang instructed them to have the sausages cut into individual servings, each priced at five hundred coins. In this way, the sausages could be sold for more than one tael each, showing how popular the dish is in Wei City.
Anyway, it’s not an outdoor activity. Everyone sits indoors, chopping meat on wooden cutting boards when they have nothing else to do.
Qiao Mai considered providing the kitchen staff with a meat grinder to ease their workload, but she decided against it.
She didn’t want to compromise the traditional handmade quality of their products. Hand-chopped meat was more flavorful than machine-ground meat.
Old Mistress Wang thought they might not enjoy sausages this year, but Qiao Mai’s decision to sell these delicacies in her store brought them unexpected joy.
They savored sausages with every meal, pairing them with white wine and relishing their flavorful life.
Even the Jingtai Restaurant’s shopkeeper asked Lui Hai to buy sausages from Qiao Mai.
Naturally, Shopkeeper Niu gave them special treatment and promised to provide ten sausages to Jingtai Restaurant daily. Anything beyond that would not be available.
Shopkeeper Tong was delighted with this arrangement. Hiring Liu Hai was a wise decision, as his connections with the Qiao family proved advantageous.
On the 22nd day of the twelfth lunar month, the families of Lu, Qin, Qian, and the Wangs all sent New Year’s gifts earlier than the Qiao family.
Qiao Mai pursed her lips, thinking about how she gave sausages, cured sausages, and fruits as gifts last year. Should she give the same this year?
She took a spin in her space but didn’t feel like there was anything particularly appetizing. So, she scrolled through her inventory once more on the platform.
She ordered six boxes of donkey-hide gelatin, lollipops, milk candies, crispy candies, spicy snacks, and pickled chicken feet.
She opted for bulk packaging and wooden crates, which she had discussed with the sellers in advance.
Each family received one box of each item with some fruits and sausages.
She allocated the gifts, delivered them to the respective households, and kept a set for herself and another for Old Master and Mistress Wang.
Old Mistress Wang asked someone to call Qiao Mai. “Girl, what’s this dark thing?”
“It’s donkey-hide gelatin slices. They’re good for your health.”
“Is it the one made from boiled donkey hide?”
“Yes, that’s right. It’s effective for people with blood deficiency, dizziness, palpitations, insomnia, and lung dryness. You can take one when you’re feeling fine.
“Thank you. Even though I’m in good health, I still need to take care of myself. I like this. What about these other items? I haven’t seen them before.
“Lollipop candy is for entertaining children. You can hold the little stick and eat it. Milk candy is made from milk, rich and creamy. Crispy candy is suitable for those with poor dental health, but it’s very sweet, so don’t eat too much. These are spicy. This one is pickled spicy chicken feet, and it’s also spicy.”
“I can handle spicy food.”
She took a cautious bite of the spicy snack, nodding in approval as she savored the flavors.
“The spicy snack is quite good. The more I chew, the more flavorful it becomes.”
After finishing it, she reached for the pickled spicy chicken feet. Qiao Mai had ordered the boneless version so the old lady didn’t have to worry about bones. “It’s so spicy! Quickly, get me a cup of room-temperature tea.”
Seeing the old lady’s enjoyment, Qiao Mai couldn’t help but smile. Even at her age, she had quite an appetite.
On the other hand, Old Master Wang was different; he ate without much reaction, focusing solely on filling his stomach..
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