Blissful Days After Widowhood

“That dream is actually very simple. In the dream, an old man taught me to cook porridge and soup. When I woke up, I felt like there was something in my head.” 

After buying all kinds of things, she asked, “What do you want to eat, mother? Let me show you my cooking skills.”

Gu Yin was best at cooking porridge and soup, and was also good with other dim sum dishes.

Seeing her calm demeanor, Mrs. Wang’s heart dropped halfway.

She looked at the thing in her hand, gritted her teeth, closed her eyes, and ruthlessly, shoved it into Gu Yin’s hand, “Do whatever you want, you can use them!”

Seeing Mrs. Wang’s appearance as if she was dying, Gu Yin smiled and nodded in response, turned around and entered the kitchen room.

Mrs. Wang bought a lot of ingredients, most of which was a large bag of flour, a small bag of rice, a small piece of pork the size of a palm, two small fish, a small basket of eggs, green onions and ginger.

Gu Yin decided to make fish ravioli.

She took out a large pot and kneaded the dough, made it into a smooth dough, put the large pot aside and covered it with a dry cloth to make noodles, and then first sliced ​​off the large pieces of fish with fewer fish bones and chopped them. She made fish meat sauce, fried the remaining fish bones and fish heads on low heat for a while and added water to make soup.

Then, she added the minced fish meat, pork belly, eggs, chopped green onion, minced ginger, a little rice wine and other seasonings that were also minced into meat fillings, stirred them in one direction for a while, and the filling was ready.

At that time, the noodles were almost done. Gu Yin kneaded a large dough sheet, folded the dough in half like origami a few times, cut out a square shape of wonton skin with a kitchen knife, and then put the prepared filling on the wonton skin. With a swipe of it, it was a small “yuanbao” when you pinch it.

On Mrs. Wang’s side, she said she was going to pack up. In fact, she put her luggage in the main room, as she couldn’t help but worry, so she peeked at the crack of the window.

Xiao Wu’an saw his mother’s strange behavior, and squatted with her to look in.

The two people, one big and one small, met head-to-head and saw that Gu Yin’s movements were as skillful and swift as running clouds and flowing water. Mrs. Wang finally calmed down, while Xiao Wu’an sniffed the fish soup and looked at Gu Yin with glowing eyes. 

“Mother, sister-in-law is amazing, she looks so good,” Xiao Wu’an whispered while drooling.

Mrs. Wang laughed, “How old are you? You know what’s good-looking and what’s not good-looking?”

Naturally, Xiao Wu’an didn’t look at Gu Yin with the eyes of a man who admired a woman, but smiled shyly, “I just think that my sister-in-law is so serious when she cooks, it seems like she would shine!”

Gu Yin’s expression was focused and serious, and she exuded a kind of confidence, which made it really seem as if her personality changed.

“You brag before you eat!” Mrs Wang laughed and scolded in a low voice.

Of course, Gu Yin knew that Wang Shu was looking at her, but she didn’t point it out. She just snickered slightly while doing her own work.

The wrapped wontons were put into the boiling fish soup for a while, and they floated up in a whirl after a while.

“Mother, come and have a taste,” Gu Yin scooped the wontons with the soup into a large bowl with a fence, sprinkled with a small rub of green chopped onions, and the aroma was immediately overflowing.

Mrs. Wang hurriedly pulled Xiao Wu’an back, pretending to be still far from the kitchen and shouting, “Come here!”

The hot wontons were brought to the hands. The thin wontons were translucent, revealing the looming fillings, white fish soup and green chopped onions. Just looking at them made people’s appetite greatly increase.

Watching the whole process, Mrs. Wang knowingly asked, “What is this?”

“It’s a fish ravioli,” Gu Yin also answered cooperatively.

“Fish meat can be very fishy if it is not cooked well.” Mrs. Wang didn’t want to pick on the thorns, but the general people’s handling of fish was not right, so everyone prefered pork. Mrs. Wang was also trying to save money, so she bought two less valuable fish after buying pork.

When they were talking, Xiao Wu’an had already eaten it, and before she could taste it, he exhaled the heat and said it was delicious!

“Little bunny looks like he has never seen the world before, eat slowly!” Mrs Wang gave him a funny look, and then started eating.

Mrs. Wang had eaten a lot of good things when she was young, but when she ate a wonton, she also widened her eyes in surprise – it was not that the young son was ignorant, but that wonton was really delicious!

The wonton that was as thin as cicada wings melted in her mouth, the fillings were salty, fragrant and tender. Not to mention the fish soup, it was so fresh that people couldn’t wait to swallow their tongues!

It was even better than the ones made by Bai An of the well known restaurant that her parents took her to when she was a child!

They buried their heads and ate hard, and the two bowls of wontons were destroyed in less than a quarter of an hour, and even the fish soup in the bowls was drunk.

Gu Yin looked at their appearance and suddenly remembered what her grandfather had said to her in her previous life.

Her grandpa said, “Girl, you are the most talented in our family. I don’t have to teach the recipes to you. You can make similar things according to them. Although since your father was a child, he was detained. He learned it in the kitchen, but his talent was far inferior to yours. Until he passed away, he was not as good as you. But grandpa has to say, you are too crafty in cooking. I hope you can make a real difference one day. People feel happy when food comes.”

Gu Yin grew up in a culinary home, and she really started to learn cooking after her parents passed away. Knowing that she would inherit her grandfather’s craft in the future, she spent the winter and summer vacations in the kitchen every year as if she had to complete a task. After graduation, she practiced in the kitchen day and night for several years.

Cooking was not difficult in her opinion. As long as she memorized the recipe, wrote down the characteristics of each ingredient, the required cooking time and the amount of seasoning, and followed the instructions, the effect would not be much worse.

As for the “happy food” that her grandpa mentioned, she always thought that it only existed in novels and TV series.

But at that time, seeing Mrs. Wang and Xiao Wu’an’s eyes, Gu Yin only felt a softness in her heart, and suddenly seemed to understand a little bit.