Food starts with Mapo Tofu

Chapter 408 The First Trial of Xiaolongbao
"I said the boss knows how to do business. At the beginning, he advertised the mapo tofu worth 15 yuan, which attracted a large number of people in a short time, and then slowly introduced new dishes." Chen Ke said admiringly, "In fact, the boss can restore the original price of mapo tofu. With this taste and weight, even if it sells for ten yuan or even 20 yuan or even [-] yuan, someone will pay for it, but he doesn't.

Instead, the price continues to be one yuan. Even if every table of guests who comes here orders a mapo tofu, the money lost on mapo tofu for a month is probably tens of thousands of yuan. Earning back from other places is much more than that.

Although we only came here for the first time, today is a weekday. If it is so full on weekdays, it means that there will be more people here during holidays or weekends.

Generally speaking, if you want to make your business bigger and bigger, you need to spend money to promote it, whether it is bidding on Baidu or finding various food bloggers to visit the store. It doesn't matter if you post a video or write an article, or find a marketing company to publish soft articles on some platforms.

Even doing outdoor advertisements such as buses, and public accounts for local life and people's livelihood to do publicity, no matter what, if it lasts for a month, the cost will not only be tens of thousands of yuan, unless you find The kind of official accounts or bloggers with little traffic and strength.

But the effect would be very mediocre. In Chengdu, where delicious food is everywhere, it is easy to be lost in the crowd, and it will not be able to make a splash. "

Just like this, Xu Chunyan listened to her boyfriend talking, with stars in her eyes constantly. She was not focusing on what Chen Ke said, but on Chen Ke himself, looking at her boyfriend. The friend looks full of confidence, she likes it more and more.

"So this is the cleverness of this boss! Even if not every guest will post to Moments, Weibo or Xiaohongshu to plant grass for others after coming, but he will definitely tell at some point A friend or family member in Chengdu has a mapo tofu shop that costs [-] yuan."

"It's amazing!" Xu Chunyan couldn't help admiring.

"That's right, I didn't think of this place before, but after I came here for dinner and some rumors I heard before, I suddenly thought that the owner of this shop is really amazing." Chen Ke was full of admiration.

"No, I mean you are very good. You can see so many things after eating here once. My boyfriend is really the best!" Xu Chunyan said and put a piece of meat in a pot for Chen Ke. Into the bowl, "This is your reward."

"No, no." Chen Ke quickly waved his hands, "It's all my nonsense, how could it be as powerful as you said!"

But even though Chen Ke said so, the expression of complacency on his face was beyond words. Obviously, his girlfriend's compliment made him very happy.

And Xu Chunyan smiled even happier seeing her boyfriend like this.

Chen Ke originally liked to see his girlfriend smile, because he thought Xu Chunyan's smile was particularly good-looking, but at this moment, he couldn't help but stare blankly, Xu Chunyan, who was smiling like a flower, hit his heart.

"It's nice to be young, look at this love affair." Feng Honghong, who had just reported to Chen Nian in the kitchen, looked at the loving couple through the glass and couldn't help but sigh.

"Mom, look, it seems that another guest has come in." As soon as Chen Nian heard what his mother said, he knew what she was going to say next, so he quickly changed the subject.

As a result, as soon as Chen Nian finished speaking, Wen Hongxia, who was outside, happened to be free to meet the guests at the door.

"No need, Xiaoxia is going." Feng Honghong was overjoyed when she saw the situation, thinking that you kid still want to drive me away?
Predict what I'm going to say next?

Prejudged, but is it useful?
"Look at them, they have a partner at a young age, and they are so loving..." Feng Honghong's lips moved while talking about Chen Nian, but if you listen closely, you can hear what Chen Nian said is actually the same as Feng Honghong He said it verbatim.

"Look at your age, you don't even have a date. You say you're not bad looking, so why don't you have a date? When I was in college, I thought you could find someone with your face. A woman, but she was still a bachelor after graduating from university..."

Feng Honghong kept talking, Chen Nian also kept mumbling, obviously Feng Honghong said this more than once.

As for the other people in the kitchen, they were doing their work with serious faces, but in fact they were all holding back their laughter and pretending not to hear.

"Mom is not urging you, even if you have a girlfriend now, right? At least there is someone who can develop. No matter when you get married, it will definitely depend on your respective arrangements for the future.

But you still need to have a partner. If this continues, my mother will get older and older. When the time comes, I will have trouble with my legs and feet, even if I want to help you take care of the children, I can’t help you. While I am still young, if you have children, I can still help you. Help you bring a belt. "

In this way, after Chen Nian followed Feng Honghong and said this long paragraph verbatim, Chen Nian solemnly assured his mother: "Mom, I will definitely work hard."

"Hey, that's the same sentence again. I think you work hard on everything, but you don't work hard at all on this matter. Anyway, Mom doesn't care about you since you were young, as long as you want to make your own decisions. Let you make your own decisions, but on this matter, Mom has to push you a little bit."

After finishing speaking, Feng Honghong also knew that it was useless for her to continue talking like this. Anyway, it was enough to remind her son from time to time, so that he could take a little care.

Chen Nian sighed in his heart.

It's not that he doesn't want to, but it's mainly because he's afraid. After all, it's the first time he has someone he likes, and Chen Nian doesn't want to make it too embarrassing, and as a bystander, he can see very clearly that many things happen to others. Can give some advice.

But it's different when it happens to me, and Chen Nian doesn't know whether the other party's attitude towards him is that kind of good friend, good buddy, or something else.

So if possible, Chen Nian still wants to wait for the other party to speak first.

Of course, if Chen Nian can be 100% sure that the other party also has the same intentions, it's okay to speak up on his own initiative.

He sighed and continued cooking.

Just like that, when Chen Ke and Xu Chunyan finished eating and checked out and left, Chen Nian was still watching the young couple with his eyes.

I thought to myself, because of the two of you, I was rushed again today.

However, because He Hai is not here today, the noodles with scallion oil are not sold, so there are still slightly fewer customers eating today than in the past, and because today is a working day, after about nine o'clock, the customers in the store will be gone. Gradually less up.

Therefore, Chen Nian thought otherwise he would leave work early.

At around [-]:[-], when customers came to the store again, Chen Nian directly said that there was no food today.

And told everyone to pack up and get off work first, and go back early today.

Sometimes Chen Nian feels that there is still a big gap between the catering industry and some industries that people often mention. At least it is possible for other industries to get off work at six or seven o'clock, and working again is considered overtime.

But in the catering industry, six or seven o'clock is the peak time for guests to come, so there is no such thing as nine to five.

As for 996, it is impossible, especially in smaller restaurants.

Even Chen Nian, who once condemned the 996 system, has no choice but to pay more wages for the employees in the store as compensation within the limit of his ability.

Everyone was also full of surprises when they heard that they could get off work at 09:30. For migrant workers, being able to get off work half an hour earlier means that they have an extra half hour of free time on this day.

Even if you just lie on the bed and do nothing, it's blood money.

Just after everyone went back, Chen Nian took out a lot of signs from the cabinet. These are all signs used in his shop to hang menus on the wall.

The name of the dish on each sign is written by Chen Nian himself.

And this time I plan to add small noodles to it.

The various ingredients used to make the small noodle toppings have also been told to Brother Liu, and they will be delivered together tomorrow morning.

Over the past period of time, he has researched various toppings such as pork ribs, beef, peas, fried sauce, shredded pork with sauerkraut, etc., and wrote these on the sign one by one, and then added vegetarian noodles.

After all, some people order a bowl of vegetarian noodles if they don’t eat meat.

Then I wrote prices ranging from ten yuan to 15 yuan on it. Of course, these are the prices of two taels.

One tael less is two yuan less than the price tag, and one tael more is also two yuan more.

Generally speaking, it costs about three or two to eat the most expensive beef noodles according to your own appetite, but it costs 17 yuan.

After writing the price, Chen Nian wanted to put these signs aside and hang them up when they were completely dry tomorrow.

After it is done, it will be aged and returned to the kitchen...

Now that the small noodles are ready to be fully launched, Chen Nian plans to continue to make Xiaolongbao while the iron is hot.

In the usual sense, there are actually two types of xiaolongbao. One is the soup-filled bao made of dead noodles, which has a thin skin and big stuffing.

And after making it, the soup inside is very rich.

Many people choose to break open the skin when eating, and eat the Xiaolongbao in one bite after drinking the soup inside.

This kind of xiaolongbao is basically popular in Jiangsu and Zhejiang regions, such as the famous Hangzhou xiaolongbao, Nanjing and Shanghai soup dumplings.

Of course, especially Hangzhou Xiaolongbao can be found all over the country, but most of those signboards that say authentic Hangzhou Xiaolongbao are not from Hangzhou at all.

As far as the old versions were eaten in the imperial capital, there are old Northeast-style Hangzhou Xiaolongbao, Shaoxing Shengzhou version of Hangzhou Xiaolongbao, and various other versions.

But in fact, these noodles are the old-fashioned versions. Although the well-made noodle dumplings can be eaten with soup, they are basically not comparable to those soup dumplings in Hangzhou and Shanghai.

After all, the noodles are very water-absorbing. Even if there is soup in the steamed buns, it will slowly enter the noodles during the continuous steaming process.

But this is what people eat most of the time.

Although sometimes people who are used to eating steamed buns will say that the steamed buns are small meat buns, and those who are used to eating steamed buns will also say that they are made with dead noodles. Guantangbao is just a steamed dumpling with a different shape.

But Chen Nian felt that this kind of discussion was like eating sweet, salty, spicy, or marinated tofu brains, which was meaningless.

Regarding the practice of Xiaolongbao, I don’t know much about aging, and the understanding of related methods is basically limited to the time of kneading noodles, the general direction to do it, and the mechanism of its fermentation. .

But no matter what to do, the stuffing and dough must be prepared first.

Among these two steps, Chen Nian chose to knead the dough first. After all, there is a certain proofing process after the dough is cooked, and it is not a waste of time to make the filling by taking advantage of this time.

Since it is the first time to try it tonight, I don’t plan to do too much in the old age. I first take out about a catty of flour and put it in a basin, and then fill it with about six taels of warm water and put it aside for later use.

Then put the yeast powder and salt into the dough, and then slowly add water into it and stir. After the dough and water start to form a dough, the kneading method is used for aging.

Just keep kneading and kneading until the old age feels that the dough has begun to become chewy, knead it into a round shape, put a lid on it, and start proofing.

After estimating the time, it will take about 15 minutes to wake up. I will take advantage of this time to adjust the filling again.

The pork stuffing has been stirred, and then various seasonings are put into it.

About [-] grams of minced ginger, appropriate amount of chicken essence and monosodium glutamate, appropriate amount of salt, a little more oyster sauce, a small amount of dark soy sauce, and a little green onion for seasoning.

As for the meat stuffing, Chen Nian felt that since the steamed buns were made of lean meat, they would definitely taste bad, so he chose meat that was basically half fat or thin.

In this way, when the meat stuffing is steamed, a part of the oil will be precipitated to become the soup.

After preparing the meat stuffing, put the whole pot in the refrigerator for refrigeration, so that the seasoning can better marinate the meat stuffing.

It's like putting a group of people in a world of ice and snow, and they will naturally cuddle up to each other to keep warm.

Taking advantage of this time, Chen Nian searched the Internet for the method of wrapping buns.

Feng Honghong knows how to make steamed buns, but Chen Nian doesn't know how to make buns. However, after reading it, Chen Nian found that the method of making buns is not very difficult.

That is to say, it may be a little difficult for Chen Nian, a novice, to wrap the Xiaolongbao with eighteen pleats.

After watching for a while, the noodles almost woke up and began to become fluffy.

Chen Nian first sprinkled a lot of flour on the chopping board, and then spread it evenly. At this time, take out the dough and put it on it so that it will not stick everywhere.

First, grab a lump of noodles and rub them on the chopping board into long strips with the thickness of a small rolling pin. During the rubbing process, the surface of the noodles has been coated with a layer of flour.

Afterwards, Chen Nian took them into pieces one by one.

Immediately afterwards, another layer of flour was sprinkled, and the potions were rubbed like rubbing mahjong to make them slightly rounder.

Then flatten a piece of medicine and then pick it up, press a small hole in the middle with your hands, and pinch the edge a little bit at the same time.

Finally, I picked a piece of meat stuffing and put it in.

Since the buns have not been made before, the aged dumplings are placed according to the ratio of the noodles and fillings for making dumplings, but there is a problem in this way. When the aged dumplings were made, they found that the noodles of the buns were much easier to stretch than the dumplings. It can be extended with a light pinch.

In addition, the original technique was a bit rusty, so the folds in the middle were squeezed into a pile after wrapping around.

Very ugly.

Putting it there, Chen Nian was unwilling to admit that it was Xiaolongbao from the bottom of his heart.

At most, it's just noodles stuffed with meat.

In the end, I really couldn't see it, so I picked it up and kneaded it into an object that looked like a small steamed bun.

"This time, there is less stuffing, come again!"

Chen Nian confidently picked up another dose, first flattened it according to the previous method, and then pressed the middle back into a small hole.

This time he added some meat fillings from the experience he had learned.

In the end, I picked (three beeps) a piece of stuffing that was as big as the skin and put it on top. Chen Nian tried hard to pinch the creases, but found that it couldn't close in the end!
"Is there too much stuffing?"

Chen Nian couldn't help sighing as he watched a good steamed bun being crushed into a shumai by himself.

It seems that my smooth sailing some time ago made my mentality a little anxious. Even if I make small noodles, the toppings cannot be separated from the scope of the red case.

Even the most basic experimental common sense has been forgotten.

Taking a deep breath, Chen Nian continued to study the steamed buns. Seeing that the first two had already been made into a meat-stuffed steamed bun and a siu mai, this time Chen Nian learned the lessons from the previous two.

I picked a piece of meat stuffing that was smaller than the outer dough and put it on, then began to pinch it carefully.

First pinch the pleats together, and at the end pinch the edge of all the pleats and turn it slightly!
One last pinch!
Become!

After two failures, the third aging was finally made into Xiaolongbao.

Although it doesn't look very well-proportioned this time, and the small nest in the middle is not very nice when turning around, but at least it looks like a steamed bun now.

"It doesn't look that difficult." Chen Nian felt that he could do it again.

Afterwards, Chen Nian began to pinch the steamed buns according to the previous method, his movements became more and more proficient, and his control over the amount of meat filling became more and more precise.

It took about 20 minutes, and Chen Nian finally wrapped all these steamed buns. It can be seen that the more delicate the steamed buns are, the last few Chen Nian even challenged them. Eighteen pleats were also successfully wrapped.

It can be said that the record is remarkable and fruitful.

The baskets for the steamed buns have been bought and cleaned long ago.

After taking it out, place the steamed buns evenly on top, eight in one basket, and five drawers in total.

For aging, it is not very good at making Xiaolongbao, but it is still very good at controlling the heat and aging.

Among the dishes I was cooking before, there were also dishes that needed to be steamed, and in the last dream, the dim sum at Lu Wanxing Dim Sum Shop were basically steamed.

Watching the time steam for about 13 minutes, Chen Nian lifted the lid excitedly.

one look!
Good guy!
(End of this chapter)