Chapter 266 Satisfaction
Chapter 266 Satisfaction
Li Xiaozhou took a big bite of rice with the steamed egg, "Dad, this egg is delicious. I will steam it again in the future."
Li Xiaotao nodded hurriedly, "I think it's delicious too. It's so delicious that it makes my eyebrows drop."
"We like it too. Auntie San's steamed eggs are not fishy at all, and the big abalone is better than the general's hat."
"Yes, everyone knows how to eat." Li Changle took a half piece of shrimp meat and dipped it in vinegar. He took a bite of shrimp meat and a sip of old wine, and felt that this day was really beautiful.
It would be even more beautiful if a few big beads could be opened out.
At the end of the meal, the tender and smooth steamed egg with sea urchin won the support of several children. The steamed abalone with fresh and plump garlic was so tender that even the soup was poured into the children's bowls to mix with rice.
After the children had eaten and drunk their fill, they went outside to play. Mr. and Mrs. Li took their two older granddaughters and carried two baskets of mantis shrimps back to the old house to peel them.
Li Changle pulled a chair outside to enjoy the cool air, and Li Xiaohai ran over.
"Dad, Li Daxiao is looking for you." The little guy said and went to play hide-and-seek.
We didn’t collect many mantis shrimps and prawns today, and they didn’t have school tomorrow, so the adults ignored them and let them play wildly outside.
Li Changle was stunned. "Who did you say is here?"
"Uncle Le!"
Li Changle turned his head and saw a short man coming towards him with a flashlight, looking at him stiffly. Then he remembered that it was his nephew Li Daxiao, not the one he thought.
Li Daxiao is the son of his next-door brother Li Changzhi. He is over 40 and still hasn't found a wife. It's not because he is lazy. First, he is a little short, and second, his mother gave birth to many sons very closely.
She gave birth to twin sons in the first month of the year, and triplets, also sons, at the end of the year. In total, she gave birth to five children in one year. Together with Li Daxiao and his sister, there were seven children in the family.
In those years, having children was an honorable thing. Changzhi's wife gave birth to triplets, and the government provided food and money to help raise them. For this reason, the village even made up a jingle: "The people of Changzhi are happy when they have children."
I was quite happy when I gave birth to my son, but raising him became a headache. Only three of the five babies made it to adulthood.
Several children of similar ages wanted to get married when they grew up. When the matchmaker brought them to his family, the girls were unwilling to do so, fearing that they would become like their mother-in-law and have five children a year.
When the couple passed away, three of their four sons were still single.
One is Li Daxiao, who has two twin brothers. The other two married into the mountains a few years ago, leaving him single. Later, he picked up a child.
"Ah Xiao is here. What are you doing standing outside? Come inside and sit down!" said Brother Li, who came over with a pair of mantis shrimps.
"Hey hey!" Li Daxiao followed him in.
Li Changle pulled a bamboo chair for him and asked, "Have you eaten?"
"I've eaten." After sitting down, Li Daxiao asked nervously, "Uncle Le, I heard that your family has ordered a large ship. Have you found enough people?"
Li Changle handed him a cigarette and said, "The ship will not be picked up until March next year, and we haven't started looking for people yet."
"I don't smoke." Li Daxiao looked at him eagerly, "Uncle Le, I can do everything from washing clothes to cooking and mending nets. When you bring the boat back, can I help you?"
"Ah Xiao, the big ships go to the open sea. You have never worked on a ship, you won't be able to withstand it if you go there." Li Changle was worried about his small body. If he got on the ship, he would probably be blown into the sea.
"Uncle Le, I asked, and they said you'll get used to it after a while of vomiting." Li Daxiao blushed, "I'm not afraid of hard work, I'm fine with less pay.
I want to save some money to renovate my house. If there is another strong typhoon, my old house will probably collapse."
"Even if we hire you, the ship won't be back until March next year. By then, I'm afraid there will be several typhoons."
Li Changle took a look at his clothes, which were worn out but clean. After thinking for a while, he said, "Ah Xiao, can you chop dried fish?"
Li Daxiao nodded quickly, "Yes, of course I would. I used to work with my brother and sister-in-law to make sea bream and eel in our family."
"Come to my house tomorrow to help me with the work for a while. If possible, you can dry the goods and sell them to me in the future, but the quality must meet my requirements."
Li Daxiao looked bitter, "Dalin's house collapsed during the typhoon last year, and I lent him all the more than 100 yuan I saved to repair the house."
Then she looked at him nervously, "Uncle Le, can I come and help you split the fish and dry the fish heads? I can do any job."
Li Changle glanced at Brother Li and nodded, "Okay! Come and try working for a day tomorrow. If you're okay, I'll pay you two dollars a day, and I'll give you a meal at noon. You can eat whatever we eat."
"Thank you Uncle Le, thank you Uncle Ping!" Li Daxiao thanked them gratefully and kept assuring them, "I will work hard and will not be lazy."
After seeing Li Daxiao off, Brother Li said, "Ah Xiao is quite capable at work, but he is small, so the laborers in the village are unwilling to work with him. Come and see how he chops the dried fish tomorrow. If not, I will teach him."
"Okay, you can do whatever you want." Just as Li Changle was about to use the shell to pry the pearl out, Chen Yongwei arrived.
"Didn't you go to the theater with your Ah Chan?" "Ah Chan didn't go either. She had dinner at my house and helped grandma dry the cuttlefish. Then I sent her here."
"Has Uncle Kun seen the dry goods I sent to the restaurant?"
"He saw that he was very satisfied with our dry goods and asked us to send 80 catties of cuttlefish, 50 catties of eel, 50 catties of yellow croaker, 50 catties of mackerel and bighead carp, and 30 catties of mantis shrimp and large shrimp.
Uncle Kun also said that the restaurant uses these things all year round, so he asked you to stock up, and they will be delivered about once every two weeks."
"Ah!" Mrs. Li, who came in with a bamboo basket, started to calculate excitedly, "We deliver once every two weeks, plus Lucheng delivers four times a month, so there is not enough fish at home!"
Mrs. Li's eyes curved like beans. "If there's not enough to sell, just collect more and dry it in the sun. Now that we're close to the beach, it's very convenient to kill and wash."
Zhou Ruonan took over and said, "I'll help you when I get home from school. Dad asked someone to grind the empty land several times with a stone mill today.
The ground has been leveled, the bamboo has been cut, and tomorrow we will start setting up the scaffolding and placing the mesh."
"Ah Xiao came home just now..." Li Changle told a few people about asking Ah Xiao to do some work, "With one more person working at home, you can relax a little."
Brother Li also said that Xiao was not a bad person and if he did a good job, he could be invited to come home to help.
"Brother, money from the dried goods." Chen Yongwei took out a stack of bills from his bag and handed it to Li Changle. "There are 120 kilograms of jellyfish heads, and the total amount including the dried goods is 155."
"Awei, is Uncle Kun satisfied with the price?"
Li Changle knows the quality of his own dried food. No matter the hygiene or the freshness of the fish, it can be said that those fishmongers in town cannot compare with him.
This is because most vendors selling dried goods buy the leftover seafood from fishermen and then dry them in the sun, while his shop buys fresh goods as soon as they get off the boat, so there is absolutely no room for complaint regarding hygiene and quality.
Chen Yongwei said cheerfully: "Uncle Kun didn't say anything, he just told you to remember to deliver the goods."
"Got it." Li Changle handed the money from selling dried goods to Sister Li, "It's been rainy since the beginning of spring. Sister-in-law, please go to the dock and bring back more seafood when you have time."
Mrs. Li smiled and said, "We are a family and we are being polite to each other."
"As a family, we should be polite to each other." Li Changle arranged with a smile, "Cuttlefish, small yellow croaker, bighead carp, shrimp, mantis shrimp and jellyfish, take as many as you can.
We will hire a few more people to help us from tomorrow. We will work hard to stock up enough dry goods for the spring of next year in the second half of the year. "
"Let's go and take a look before the tide recedes," said Mrs. Li. "We really need to collect more small yellow croaker and bighead carp. We only have 50 to 60 kilograms of bighead carp at home now, and not even a kilogram of dried yellow croaker."
"Okay, try to collect as much as possible tomorrow. We won't sell the ones we catch, but save them all for drying. When killing the yellow croaker, wash the fish glue and keep it separately for drying." Li Changle looked at the others and said, "Work hard and try to make our dried goods famous and sell them all over the prefecture."
Zhou Ruonan looked at him with sparkling eyes and felt that A Le was even more handsome than when he was looking for a partner with her!
Li Changle felt her gaze, reached his hand under the table and squeezed her hand.
Brother Li reached out and slapped him, and he was so scared that he quickly retracted his hand, "Brother, what's wrong?"
"Nothing, I just think you're shouting too loud a slogan. Have you ever thought about how much dried goods you have to dry in a day if you want to sell them all over the state?"
Chen Yongwei raised both hands in agreement, "Brother, this is easy. We can also open a seafood purchasing point, and then we can just hire more people to help!"
Li Changle looked at them with a smile, "Awei is right, we should take a long-term view."
Brother Li put the peeled shrimp into the dustpan and said, "It's fine if you say so. You are the boss in business, so we will do whatever you say."
"The boss has said so, do whatever you think is best." Brother Li Er suddenly remembered something, "I forgot to open the shell."
"I remember it." Li Changle ran over and brought the bucket to the table, then handed the salamander to Brother Li.
Brother Li hung the snail meat on the hook of the scale, looked at the snail that was bigger than his head, and said, "Ah Le, is there a pearl inside this thing?"
"I haven't heard of it. You'll know once you take the meat out."
Li Changle picked up a mother-of-pearl oyster the size of a soup bowl and tore off some seaweed attached to the shell, revealing two asymmetrical shell layers.
"A Le, you're lucky, you open it." Brother Li handed him the oyster knife.
"I'll do it if I want." Li Changle took the knife with a proud look on his face, picked up the largest mother-of-pearl, inserted the knife into the opening, pried it a few times, and then stopped.
He raised his head and looked at the heads that were all approaching him, "Comrades, the time to witness a miracle has come!"
Brother Li couldn't help but pat him on the shoulder. "What are you yelling for, little brat? Why don't you just pry it open quickly!"
Zhou Ruonan also glared at him in reproach, "That's right, you just want to keep us in suspense." He was like a three-year-old child, feeling uncomfortable if he didn't act weird for a day.
(End of this chapter)