Chapter 220 - 146: Silent Tofu
"Savings: 2,158.82 yuan. Progress on the house fund: 21%!"
After counting the day’s earnings, Zhou Yan packed the money back into its box and recorded the final tally in his ledger.
Business this week had seen steady growth. The biggest contributor was the braised meat order from Feiyan Restaurant, with another portion coming from a slight increase in customers who weren’t textile factory workers.
Indeed, the dining frequency among the textile factory workers was starting to level off. But as word-of-mouth spread, there was an increase in diners from relatively higher-income groups, such as staff from the Suji Town Hall and local teachers.
They were easy to tell apart. On weekdays, the textile factory workers wore uniform indigo-blue work clothes. As for those not in uniform, he could generally guess their profession from their attire.
There were so few clothing styles in this era that people in the same profession generally wore similar outfits on weekdays, so you couldn’t really blame Zhou Yan for stereotyping.
Huang Chen came twice this week: once to treat a guest, and once by himself for noodles in the morning.
Zhou Weiguo had come for noodles twice.
A deputy town mayor and the head of the local armed forces department—their visits had boosted the restaurant’s profile among the town’s civil servants.
That’s how a reputation is built—slowly, bit by bit.
Zhou Yan took out some stationery. After a moment’s thought, he gripped his fountain pen and began to write, the nib scratching swiftly across the page.
He was deeply moved by Qiu Qi and Wang Yu’s story, and the words flowed effortlessly from his pen, filling four full pages.
Once the ink was dry, he gave it a quick glance before slipping it into an envelope and deftly writing the name and address on the front.
He felt a sense of pleasant release after he finished writing. ’So, sharing beautiful things with others can bring happiness to yourself as well.’
Zhou Yan took a wooden board from the cabinet and wrote on it: Braised Beef—1.4 yuan per serving (four liang).
To start, he would braise fifteen jin of beef tomorrow.
Zhou Yan had already arranged to buy beef shank from his first, second, and third uncles.
The beef shank cost one yuan per jin. One jin of raw shank yielded about six liang of braised beef. He would sell it for three and a half yuan per jin. After factoring in shrinkage and trimming losses, the gross profit margin would be around fifty percent.
Zhou Yan was quite confident about selling braised beef at three and a half yuan per jin.
Five jin of that were reserved for Huang He. He hadn’t told him in advance, but Zhou Yan was sure he wouldn’t turn it down.
Lying back down on his bed, Zhou Yan pulled up his status panel and took a look:
[Player: Zhou Yan]
[Profession: Chef]
[Wealth Value: 3,162.36]
[Professional Skills]:
Knife Skills (Advanced): 5,600/100,000
Fire Control (Intermediate): 8,488/10,000
Seasoning (Intermediate): 8,688/10,000
Oratory Skill (Advanced): 88,999/100,000 (Pushing to the next level!)
...
Quests:
[Side Quest: Master’s Obsession! Incomplete]
[Side Quest: Zhao Shulan’s Troubles! Incomplete]
His Knife Skills, Fire Control, and Seasoning were steadily improving.
There wasn’t much to say about his Knife Skills; his current level was more than sufficient for any dish his restaurant required.
His Fire Control and Seasoning had improved significantly and were now advancing toward the Advanced level.
He had done some experiments these past few days and discovered an interesting phenomenon.
When he cooked dishes for which the system had provided a complete recipe, the gains in his Seasoning and Fire Control skills were relatively small.
However, when he attempted to cook dishes on his own—like braised fish or *mianyu*, or the pork-crackling-stir-fried cabbage his master had taught him—the improvement to his Fire Control and Seasoning skills was much more significant.
Zhou Yan inferred that it might be related to his own active involvement in the process.
The system awarded experience that boosted his Knife Skills, Seasoning, and Fire Control all at once. However, for a dish he had already perfected, the experience gained from cooking it repeatedly would naturally be lower.
On the other hand, for a dish he had only ever eaten or watched someone else cook, he had to be much more careful with his Fire Control, as well as the combination and quantity of seasonings. It was a process of trial and error, of learning.
’Interesting. I could use the staff meals as an opportunity to experiment with and practice more dishes, which would raise my Professional Skills.’ Zhou Yan mused, a few new ideas already forming.
Progress comes from practice.
When running a restaurant, more isn’t always better when it comes to the number of dishes on the menu.
The compatibility between dishes, their profit margins, whether they were presentable enough for the restaurant, and whether they might cause chaos in the kitchen were all factors that needed careful consideration.
Even if the system gave him a recipe for a perfect dish, Zhou Yan wouldn’t necessarily add it to the menu if it didn’t fit with the other items.
Conversely, if he could figure out a new dish that was a good fit for the menu, or learn one from his master that could both enrich the offerings and increase revenue, he would consider adding it as long as it could achieve a [Quite Good] rating.
For example, the pork-crackling-stir-fried cabbage.
As for his two incomplete quests, his master hadn’t shown up for a Grandmaster lesson in days. The next time he saw him, he’d have to give him a proper nudge.
’Comrade Xiao Lei, you’ve gotten lazy!’
As for Zhao Shulan’s troubles, that likely wouldn’t be solved anytime soon.
If Huang Ying wanted to lose sixty jin, it was by no means an overnight task.
However, cycling seventy to eighty kilometers every day had greatly improved both her and Huang Bing’s complexions.
She had successfully gone from being a weak, fat person to an energetic, fat person.
In fact, Zhou Yan was impressed by that amount of exercise.
’Besides, what unreasonable demands could he make of a distinguished VIP who spent an average of 6.60 yuan a day?’
Lights out, eyes closed, asleep in a second.
...
"CRUNCH!"
"CRUNCH..."
「A dorm at the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute.」
Zhu Yuyu and Deng Hong stood on either side of Xia Yao, one holding a piece of puffed rice candy and the other a piece of peanut brittle, both chewing away with satisfying crunches.
"This peanut brittle is so good!" Zhu Yuyu said. "It’s a little harder than the puffed rice candy, but it smells amazing when you chew it!"
"I still prefer the puffed rice candy," Deng Hong added. "It has a faint sesame oil flavor. It’s pretty unique compared to what you get elsewhere."