279 Dried
Li Hehua sat at the entrance of the stove, watching the fire in the stove and letting the fire burn until the water in the pot boiled. She also stretched her neck to see the situation above.
On the other side, Xue Yifu, who was under the shed, also stopped what he was doing and looked over.
Xue Sifu and Liu Guixia each held a pair of chopsticks. They became even more nervous and alert as time passed. As soon as their Jiang Yue spoke, they would quickly use their chopsticks to scoop out the cooked rice noodles.
Jiang Yue poured the rice dough into the wooden ladle, and several lines of rice dough flowed out of the small holes at the bottom of the wooden ladle.
Jiang Yue moved the wooden ladle to make the rice dough fall into the boiling water more evenly.
It didn’t take long for it to be cooked in the pot. Jiang Yue quickly said, “You can fish it out now.”
“Alright.” As Liu Guixia and Xue Sifu responded, they reached out and used their chopsticks to scoop out the rice from the pot and put it into the cold water.
The rice noodles in the cold water were white, one by one, and they were very beautiful.
Liu Guixia and the others were very happy.
Jiang Yue had only missed a small scoop, and that was it. Instead, she put down the ladle in her hand and said, “When the rice in this basin has completely cooled down, you can hang it on the bamboo pole and dry it. It could also be cooked like this, but at that time, my mother was reluctant to eat it, and I couldn’t finish it in one meal by myself. My mother dried it like this, and after a few days, she cooked it for me again, and the taste was not much different.”
“This can be dried?” Liu Guixia, Xue Sifu, and the others couldn’t believe it. This was the first time they had heard of such a thing.
“Yes, it can be dried.” Jiang Yue said. “You don’t have to sun it so long. You can group it up into small rolls and hang it on the bamboo pole. You can also sun it on something else. It’s easy to store. When you want to eat it, just soak a roll in cold water or warm water and then cook it. You can also cook it directly, but it’ll take a while.”
“That’s great. I don’t have to pull it on the spot like the noodles in town. I don’t need to be afraid of others learning it.” Xue Sifu said happily. The main technique won’t be easily replicated. This was important for a business to keep growing.
Yu Hongyan smiled and said, “So the rice noodles aren’t pulled like normal noodles… Interesting…”
“That’s right, it’ll become a strip once it’s cooked. It’s also because Jiang Yue’s mother is good at studying food that she thought of this. If it were anyone else, who would have thought of this? Otherwise, other people would have sold this long ago. There wouldn’t be noodles like this in town that I can guarantee.”
“Yes, yes.” Liu Guixia and Li Hehua both agreed.
“As for how to make the rice noodles,” Jiang Yue said again, “It should be similar to the cooking method of normal noodles, such as mutton noodles and beef noodles. The rice noodles can be eaten with mutton and beef too. If you want people to know that it’s not noodles, you can directly call it lamb rice noodles or beef rice noodles. This can be fried too. For example, it can be called fried rice noodles. What my mother made for me at that time was actually very simple. She just cooked it and mixed it with vegetable soup.”
After a pause, Jiang Yue continued, “For example, we can ask Yifu to make a few more wooden scoops. The holes at the bottom can be made smaller or bigger. This way, the rice noodles will have a different type of thickness. When we sell them, some people might like to eat the thick ones, while others like the thin ones. This should make them easier to sell.”