Chapter 9: Inviting the Cui Family to Dinner
Chapter 9: Inviting the Cui Family to Dinner
Li Kailang also felt that dealing with people in the hospital was meaningless.
Ever since his mother fell ill, these people in the yard have not cared about him at all.
I didn't even know he had passed the driving test.
Just then, he saw Cui Yuan and Cui Gang coming back.
"Brother Cui, Xiaogang." Li Kailang shouted.
The two turned around and saw Li Kailang in the kitchen, busy cooking.
"Xiao Li (Brother Li)!" the two shouted.
"Come to my house for dinner later," Li Kailang invited.
"No, Xiao Li, the meal is ready at home." Cui Yuan refused.
After all, Li Kailang's family situation is not easy either.
"It's okay, just come over and eat. Remember to invite Aunt Cui along, I'm almost ready."
"I don't feel comfortable doing this." Cui Yuan said a little embarrassedly.
After some refusal, Cui Yuan finally agreed to take Cui Gang and Aunt Cui to Li Kailang's house for dinner.
"This amount of food is not enough." Li Kailang looked at the vegetables in front of him and felt a little worried.
Originally, he had only prepared enough food for one person, but now he suddenly had to entertain three people from the Cui family. This amount of food was obviously not enough, but with [Mastery of Cooking], cooking was not a difficult task.
Fortunately, I went to the vegetable market yesterday and bought some vegetables, so I could cook them together.
Today is a year of great harvest. The yield from farmland is very good. Everyone can eat better this year. If your family is well-off, you can invite people to dinner.
Li Kailang steamed the rice again and cut some more pork belly to make another serving.
After a busy meal, three dishes and a soup were ready.
The meat dish is pork belly fried with shredded potatoes, a seasonal vegetable, a Chinese cabbage, and finally topped off with tomato and egg soup.
This soup was specially prepared by Li Kailang. He beat five eggs just to make the soup richer and more nutritious.
After everything was done, Li Kailang was still not seen by Aunt Cui and her family, which made him feel a little strange.
"Damn it!" Li Kailang said to himself, and immediately went to Aunt Cui's house, only to see them eating corn porridge.
"Aunt Cui, what are you doing?"
I saw Aunt Cui and her family eating corn porridge.
The cornmeal porridge at this time was not made of pure corn like in later generations. Instead, it was crushed together with corn cobs and mixed in, which tasted spicy to the throat.
Aunt Cui knew Li Kailang's character. When she smelled the fragrance of food cooked in Li Kailang's house, she knew he was not joking. She also knew that Li Kailang spent a lot of money on this meal.
In order to eat less food from Li Kailang's family, Aunt Cui and his family deliberately filled their stomachs at home first, so that they could eat much less.
"Auntie, Brother Cui, Xiaogang, stop eating, come to my house and eat. I have steamed rice."
Most people nowadays are simple and honest and don't want to let others suffer losses.
If we invite the Jia family, they will have to come with empty stomachs and eat the whole meal in one go.
"Aunt Cui, stop eating and come to my house to eat. I made a lot and you can't finish it all by yourself."
Aunt Cui and her family also knew that Li Kailang had to treat them to this meal, so they finished the corn porridge in no time.
Suddenly, her stomach was at least six-tenths full. Seeing that the two children had also finished their cornmeal porridge, Aunt Cui finally felt relieved and said with satisfaction:
"Okay, okay, Auntie, let's go to Xiao Li's house to eat. I will definitely eat my fill then."
"How much can you eat like this?" Li Kailang asked with concern.
"Don't worry, there will be plenty to eat then." Aunt Cui said confidently.
The group of four returned to Li Kailang's house, and when they saw the sumptuous food on the table, they couldn't help swallowing their saliva.
The dazzling array of delicious food and the aroma of it all whet your appetite.
Li Kailang took out the steamed rice, and the pot of fragrant white rice was very tempting.
"Hey, Xiao Li, why did you steam so much rice? I don't want to live like this anymore." Aunt Cui asked in surprise when she saw a pot of white rice. "Hey, didn't Aunt invite you to my house to eat? Did I steam more rice specially? Don't blame me, just eat it quickly."
Li Kailang said this while enthusiastically serving food to everyone.
"How can you finish so much? Just use a small bowl." As she said that, Aunt Cui went to the kitchen, took out a small bowl, and scooped out some rice from the large bowl.
A bowl of rice was forcibly divided into three bowls of small rice, each being half a bowl.
"Auntie, how can this be enough?" Li Kailang saw the three small bowls of rice and worried that it would not be enough.
"You kid." Aunt Cui didn't know what to say to Li Kailang.
"Eat, eat, eat. Don't stand." Li Kailang said as he enthusiastically pulled everyone to sit down and closed the door first.
He didn't want to be disturbed while eating.
Seeing that no one was eating, Li Kailang picked up a large piece of pork belly and put it in Aunt Cui's bowl.
"Eat, don't look at me." Li Kailang said.
Although he strongly recommended it, Cui Yuan and Cui Gang did not pick up their chopsticks and waited for Aunt Cui's instructions.
"Xiao Li has said it, let's eat." Aunt Cui spoke, and the two began to eat.
The Cui family was eating. Although there was a lot of meat on the table, they were very restrained and mostly ate vegetables.
Because they had eaten porridge before, they were full after just finishing the rice. The dishes on the table were basically untouched, and there was a lot of pork belly left.
Only Li Kailang was still eating, but as he was being watched by the three people, his appetite was not very good.
He sighed inwardly and stopped eating.
Looking at the remaining dishes on the table, he said, "Auntie, please take all these dishes away."
"How can this be possible? There are so many dishes." Aunt Cui immediately retorted.
"It's okay, Auntie. I won't be home for dinner tomorrow. If I leave it here, it will go bad and I won't be able to eat it. You can take it away."
"Xiao Li, don't lie to me. There are so many dishes, how could you not come back to eat tomorrow?" Aunt Cui said with some doubt.
"Really, Auntie, I have a mission tomorrow and won't be back for dinner. You can take the meat back and eat it." Li Kailang explained.
"What mission?" Aunt Cui asked further.
"Well... I can't talk about the mission now." Li Kailang hasn't thought of what mission excuse to use.
"If you don't tell me, I can't take this dish away." Aunt Cui insisted.
"Auntie, I really do have a mission. So, you take the meat away. If I can come back in the evening, I will definitely come to your house to eat. Is that okay?" Li Kailang had to compromise.
Aunt Cui also knew that this was a way for Li Kailang to give her an excuse, so she said, "Okay, then I'll wait for you to come and eat. If you don't come, we'd rather starve than eat."
"Don't worry, Auntie. As long as I don't come back before six o'clock in the evening, you can eat without worry." Li Kailang promised.
Having said that, Li Kailang sent the Cui family out the door.
"Xiao Li, remember to come back for dinner." Aunt Cui reminded him before leaving.
"Don't worry, Auntie." Li Kailang assured.
Yan Bugui's family across the street couldn't help swallowing when they saw Cui Gang holding a large plate full of pork belly.
"I didn't expect that Xiao Li would be so generous." Yan Bugui said, staring at the plate of meat with narrowed eyes.
They didn't go to help at the beginning, and now looking at the plate of meat, they couldn't help feeling a little regretful.
Yan Bugui began to imagine how delicious the meat would be, but unfortunately it was no use saying anything now.
"What a pity that I didn't help back then, otherwise the meat would be ours." Yan Bugui said regretfully.
"Why would I be so stupid as to not help? After all, we are from the same courtyard." The third aunt also agreed.
Now they can only watch others enjoy delicious food while they can only drool.
(End of this chapter)