Prodigal Son of the Ming Dynasty

  Chapter 1504 It smells so good

  After listening to the play until now, it's midnight, and I'm really hungry.

  The county magistrate Zhu Wenjing heard that His Majesty wanted something to eat, and hurriedly said: "I will order someone to cook some food, for fear that it will not suit Your Majesty's taste."

  Emperor Hongzhi shook his head: "Didn't I say, I want to eat this dried fish."

   "There's no need to bother the cook. It's midnight. I think I've already fallen asleep. How about..." Emperor Hongzhi glanced at Zhu Wenjing: "Does the Qing family know how to cook?"

  Zhu Wenjing hurriedly shook her head: "The gentleman is far away from the kitchen, why...how did this happen?"

  Emperor Hongzhi said indifferently: "Wen Yansheng, the former prefect of Ningbo, is proficient in this way. In my opinion, he is also a gentleman."

  Zhu Wenjing: "..."

  Emperor Hongzhi said: "Where is the cook, Jifan..." He cheered up, as if he had developed a strong interest in trivial matters.

  Zhu Wenjing was startled, dumbfounded for a moment, but now she had to bite the bullet and lead Emperor Hongzhi to the kitchen.

  Emperor Hongzhi said: "Wen Qing's family can cook, and I want to try it too. Come, light a fire for me."

  Fang Jifan only held the dried fish aside and remained silent.

  Zhu Wenjing was astonished, and hurriedly said: "Your Majesty, Your Majesty...Your Majesty's body is so rich, how can...you can do such a thing."

  Cooking, in the eyes of scholar-bureaucrats in this era, is considered a low-class activity. Zhu Wenjing is obviously in a hurry. He thinks that His Majesty is self-defeating. Could it be that he deliberately expressed his dissatisfaction with the hospitality?

He is just a small county magistrate, located in a remote place, and that's how people are. For many people, the emperor has been sanctified. Like a clay statue under it, it only enjoys fireworks and has no humanity.

   Just like Ye Gong loves dragons, when the dragon really appeared in front of him, Zhu Wenjing felt astonished, alas, the emperor still eats supper in the middle of the night.

  Emperor Hongzhi frowned, and looked at Zhu Wenjing strangely: "I am the body of a thousand pieces of gold, wouldn't my stomach be hungry? Shouldn't I eat something when I'm hungry? Eat, don't cook, what's the point?"

  Zhu Wenjing was stunned.

  Seeing Emperor Hongzhi instructing Xiao Jing to make a fire, he rolled up his sleeves himself, looking eager to try.

  Zhu Wenjing suddenly stretched her neck, as if she had made a lot of determination, and said solemnly: "Your Majesty, I... I can do it for you."

  Emperor Hongzhi said: "You know how to cook?"

   Zhu Wenjing said sullenly, "Yes."

  Emperor Hongzhi smiled and said: "So, Qing is deceiving the emperor?"

   "This..." Zhu Wenjing smiled wryly: "Even if you know how to cook, you must not show it to others, otherwise you will inevitably be laughed at. I will die."

  Fang Jifan can be considered convinced of this person.

Zhu Wenjing seemed to want to show that she could do the work for her, so she started to get busy all of a sudden, and said, "Your Majesty, it is inconvenient at night, and it is not suitable to eat too much. You might as well cook a porridge and send it with dried fish. Serve the rice first." , this porridge needs to be boiled slowly, but...I'm afraid I can't wait now, so I have to cook it with high heat. This dried fish..."

He took the dried fish from Fang Jifan, rolled up his sleeves, took a kitchen knife, chopped the onion and garlic, chopped it, and cleaned the dried fish. Fang Jifan asked him to put more peppers .

He took the peppers again familiarly, chopped the peppers with excellent knife skills, soaked the peppers in oil first, and heated the oil pan on the other side. Come on, stir-fry back and forth, while saying: "This kind of dish needs to be stir-fried with high heat. If the heat is not enough, the taste will not be enough. Please go and turn the windbag.

As a result, the wind blew directly under the stove, and the fire burst up, and the red oil mixed with chili peppers in the pot boiled and splashed. Zhu Wenjing raised the pot with his hand, and flames burst into the pot. Taking advantage of the fire, his hands flew like flying , After a while, he covered the oil pan again, and the hot oil in the pan was crackling and boiling. He let out a sigh of relief: "Okay, you can put out the fire."

After that, he opened the pot again, put in the onion and garlic, mixed with a little vinegar, and said: "When frying this dried fish, you must not add too much salt, and you must be careful." Throw in some salt.

  Then put the fried golden fish on the pan.

  At this time... the aroma of the dried fish began to overflow.

  Emperor Hongzhi has been standing silently watching, actually a little confused.

  Obviously this Zhu Wenjing said that he can't cook, but just looking at his skills, I'm afraid he is still a 'wizard'.

At this time, Zhu Wenjing said: "Your Majesty, it is not suitable to eat this spicy dried fish now. One is that the porridge is not yet cooked, and the other is that other dishes are best eaten while it is hot, but dried fish does not need to be eaten while it is hot." , When it is cold, eat porridge, it will be more delicious. I implore your majesty to move to the living room to rest for a while, there is a lot of oily smoke here, wait for half an hour before you can eat."

  Emperor Hongzhi and Fang Jifan were dumbfounded.

  This person, after listening to these words, you can tell... he is very capable.

   is a talent.

  Emperor Hongzhi nodded, and returned to the hall with Fang Jifan. After waiting for half an hour, a plate of dried fish and hot porridge was brought up.

  Fang Jifan said first: "Your Majesty, be careful, I will try the poison first."

  So I picked up the chopsticks, took the dried fish first, and ate it with the hot porridge. I felt the spicy taste scattered on the tip of the tongue, and then the chewy dried fish neutralized the porridge water, which immediately made the mouth feel stronger.

   At this time, my stomach was a little hungry, and I suddenly felt a big appetite.

  Emperor Hongzhi also took chopsticks when he saw that Fang Jifan was eating deliciously.

The food in the palace is the same as the moderation emphasized by the literati. It is always neither salty nor bland nor spicy nor sweet. sin.

  But if the taste is just right, or not too bad, although it has no merit, it is also not a fault.

   This is the survival instinct of royal chefs.

  Thus, after Emperor Hongzhi ate the sudden spicy food, his tongue was greatly stimulated. After a while, his whole body was sweating and his face was red.

  The entire taste buds felt uncomfortable, and Emperor Hongzhi quickly ate the dried fish mixed with porridge.

  But after this feeling passed, I felt an inexplicable feeling of wanting to stop.

   "It tastes good." Emperor Hongzhi admired, and then continued to sweat and eat porridge, and it felt like eating a side stove.

  Especially the dried fish, which is full of chewiness, coupled with the spicy taste, it is very enjoyable.

  After a bowl of porridge was finished, Xiao Jing handed over the handkerchief. Emperor Hongzhi wiped his sweat, feeling a little more satisfied, and couldn't help laughing: "The Qing family said they don't know how to cook, but they are actually experts."

  Zhu Wenjing looked ashamed, extremely ashamed and indignant, and hurriedly said: "Chen...Chen...Chen is also helpless."

   "What can we do?" Emperor Hongzhi gave Zhu Wenjing a strange look.

Zhu Wenjing hesitated for a moment, and finally said: "The salary of the imperial court is really meager. With such a small amount of money and food, I still need to bear the expenses of bearers, cooks, and handymen. Although there are occasional filial piety, there is some money. I really dare not take it. On the one hand, I can’t bear to exploit the people. On the other hand, if I have some money, I will inevitably be controlled by others. But with these salaries, how can I support my ministers? The minister’s family is actually not bad. With some money and food sent by the family, it is barely enough, but I dare not use unnecessary expenses such as the cook, so... the minister has always... lit the fire by himself."

  Emperor Hongzhi was extremely surprised.

  Dignified parents and officials, actually have to rely on money sent from home to barely support themselves? Not only that, just like that...can't afford to hire a cook?

  Emperor Hongzhi couldn't help looking at Fang Jifan: "Has Jifan heard about this?"

Fang Jifan was not surprised at all, and said: "This salary was set by Emperor Taizu Gao. At that time... it was actually a bit meager, but over the past hundred years, the depreciation of silver prices, coupled with inflation, In fact... Although there are occasional measures to increase the salary, they are just a drop in the bucket. Even the current salary, compared with Emperor Taizu Gao, after inflation has been taken into account, it is actually lower than that of Emperor Taizu Gao. It's going to be tough."

  Emperor Hongzhi was dumbfounded: "Since the pot cannot be uncovered, why is no one playing?"

Fang Jifan said embarrassingly: "This...is involved with the subtle human heart. If the officials are bad officials, they have other sources of income, and they don't care about such a small amount of salary. For them, it doesn't mean much, so they just let it go. But if they are good officials... they have already determined to be good officials, and of course they don't bother to mention money and food that are against morality. They don't talk about money, they eat Bran pharynx would be fine."

  Emperor Hongzhi: "..."

  Emperor Hongzhi seemed to have spent a lot of brain cells digesting what Fang Jifan said.

  He sighed after a long time: "I never thought of that...Zhu Wenjing, your family wants to support you as an official. How much money and food do you send every month?"

"Not much." Now that he had said it, Zhu Wenjing didn't hesitate any longer, and said truthfully: "It's probably ten taels of money and food, but...if you are an official, you always need a car to go out, and you need to hire some people, yes by…"

  Emperor Hongzhi understood, and said to Fang Jifan: "Before, why didn't you tell me?"

  Fang Jifan couldn't help complaining in his heart. Didn't Your Majesty talk to me every day about how to be frugal and brag about how you save money? Dare I mention this?

  Of course, Fang Jifan couldn't speak out what was in his heart, so he said with a smile: "I will die."

"It seems that we need to discuss this matter with Liu Qing and others. Discuss it first, and then come up with a feasible method." Emperor Hongzhi picked up the teacup, sipped the tea, and then said: "This fish It's very delicious to cook. There is no such delicacy in the inner court. The clear soup in the imperial dining room is not as good as dried fish. The man named Zhao Er has a bit of conscience. I eat his dried fish, but also Don't let him suffer, wait for me to drive back to the palace, and order someone to send one hundred thousand gold."

  (end of this chapter)