Gu Ye went to get Li-jie’s help and made hearty dishes such as braised pork belly, stewed spareribs and potatoes, stewed pork and noodles, twice-cooked pork. The grandpas in the courtyard ate to their hearts’ content and raved about them.
Gu Ye, on the other hand, was not happy with the outcome. Her cooking skill in her past life was at the level of “idiotic”. She could make some common dishes in this life, but their quality was at the level of mediocre, far from “delectable”.
She had memorized the recipe for the braised pork belly this “Practical Recipes” from her collection in her dimension. She followed it step by step to the dot but the taste was still far from what she had previously.
In her past life, those who knew about the “genius apothecary” Mr. Ye knew that in addition to money, Mr. Ye loved food even more. A plate of delectable food that she liked could be exchanged for a dose of life-saving medication. All the top-notched chef in the post-apocalyptic world all tried every trick up their sleeves in order to make dishes that could appease Mr. Ye in exchange for medicines that couldn’t even be bought with money.
In this world, first she didn’t have the means, and now she didn’t have the skills. Those in Qingshan Village had very little ask when it came to food. Anything that could fill their stomach was good enough. Nobody would go above and beyond in making delectable dishes.
Her master, the sage apothecary, noticed the disappointment and distress on Gu Ye and quietly made a mental note of it all.
This meal had more or less finished off the 5 kilograms of pork that the Gu’s had saved for themselves. Li Hao, who stayed behind for dinner with his grandfather, said this was the best meal that he had in his entire life. He even joked that if only Gu Ye was his sister, then he’d have delicious meals like this every day.
Of course, at his house, they only used salt and miso as condiments. When it came to Gu Ye, she used anise, cinnamon etc. on top of five spice, MSG, chicken extract, etc. Naturally, the taste was much better.
Gu Ming, the sister-loving fanatic, almost started a fight with him for trying to steal his sister from him!
Even though they had gone through all the pork, but Gu Xiao would still go into the mountain and hunt for small games occasionally, there was never a shortage of meat in their house.
As the weather turned colder, Gu Ye noticed that her grandfather seemed to have a lot on his mind. One day, when she was rubbing medicinal oil on his foot, Gu Xiao sighed and asked, “Xiao Ye-zi, say…. If I asked the sage apothecary for this medicinal oil, do you think he will sell me some of them?”
That reminded Gu Ye that her grandfather had mentioned in the past how he wanted to send some of these to his old superior located on the border. She patted her own chest and said, “Grandpa, there’s no need for you to ask. I’ll ask him for you!”
“No! No! You didn’t even ask your master last time when you promised to sell Young Master Ding the heart pills. That wasn’t right already. How can you go trouble the sage apothecary again now?”
His granddaughter was lucky enough to become the disciple of the sage apothecary. It was a disciple’s duty to share their master’s troubles, not the other way around. Gu Xiao didn’t want his granddaughter to annoy the sage apothecary, which was why he hadn’t brought up the medicinal oil and warm salt compress for a while.
“Grandpa, do you not think of me as your granddaughter?” Pouted Gu Ye with her eyes rounded, looking very much like a little hamster.
Seeing her face, Gu Xiao couldn’t help but chuckled, “Which ungrateful person said such a thing? If you are not my granddaughter, who’s are you?”
“It’s your granddaughter’s duty to serve her grandfather. If you truly think of me as your granddaughter, then you wouldn’t say such things! Wait here. My master has a few more bottles of these medicinal oil, let me go get them for you!” Having said that, Gu Ye placed the warm salt compress on her grandfather’s knee, turned around and exited the room.