Baozi Xishi's Struggle

Chapter 105 What's the difficulty in making small reunion flower cakes

When the middle-aged man saw the waiter leave, he smiled apologetically at Shen Yu and said gently, "Miss, you want to buy a small reunion cake."

Shen Yu nodded and said, "The young man just now said that there are new reunion cakes coming out of the oven today, so let me wait a moment."

The middle-aged man smiled and said, "The new patterns of the small reunion cakes are still in the oven and will be ready in a while. If you want to see the carved patterns, please sit for a while. The ready-made small reunion cakes are the ones on the plate. I wonder what kind of pattern you want to order? Do you want it now or in a few days?

Shen Yu thought for a moment, then pointed at the cakes on the plate and said, "Pack two of each of these types of puff pastry with different fillings, then wait for the carved ones to come out of the oven, then pick three and put them in a box."

The middle-aged man agreed and put the three plates of cakes back into the food box and put the food box into the cupboard. After doing this, he called a waiter and asked him to go to the back to see if the small reunion cakes were baked. If they were baked, he should bring them out as there were guests who wanted to see them.

The waiter agreed and went. While Shen Yu was waiting, he went to the counter to take a closer look. It turned out that the names of various cakes and pastries were written on the red papers, such as osmanthus cake, Ruyi cake, chestnut cake, lotus cake, rose cake, and one-mouth cake. There were so many kinds that it was dazzling.

I had just finished guessing and looking around the pastry cabinet when the guy came out from the back with a wooden tray carrying a plate of pastries.

When the two waiting ladies saw the cakes come out of the oven, they gathered around, and Shen Yu also walked closer.

The middle-aged man called Uncle Jiang placed the cakes and pastries on the tray one by one in the small white porcelain plates on the counter according to the patterns. It turned out that these small porcelain plates were for customers to hold and look at the carved patterns.

Shen Yu secretly praised in his heart: "The big stores are more particular. The cake shop on East Street doesn't have these. The finished cakes are just placed there in trays, which looks much rougher than this.

Looking closely at the carved cake, Shen Yu felt a little disappointed. She thought she would see something very exquisite like the Cantonese mooncakes of later generations.

The result was similar to the Five Blessings Flower Cake I saw at Yuelai Restaurant. One could only make out the general pattern. Even so, the two ladies were still full of praise, and kept saying that the carved jade rabbit looked better this year.

Because it was a trial, there were many styles of carvings, including flowers of the four seasons, four-character auspicious phrases, and two larger reunion cakes, one with a jade rabbit pounding medicine, and the other with an osmanthus tree and the Guanghan Palace.

There were four or five of each type of small reunion cakes with carved patterns, probably for display as samples. The ones with the largest number were those with flowers of the four seasons. According to what was written on the flower paper, there were flowers from all twelve months. Shen Yu thought they were all the same, so he just randomly pointed to three patterns.

The middle-aged man followed Shen Yu's request and took out six cakes from the small cabinet next to him. He put nine small reunion cakes in a wooden box, wrapped them up and handed them over. He smiled and said, "Miss, please pay 400 coins for your small reunion cakes."

Shen Yu took out his purse, paid the money, and walked out of the store calmly with a calm face as the waiter politely saw him off.

Shen Yu carried the box of small reunion cakes and walked for a while before he put down the stand.

He pinched his deflated purse with heartache, secretly thanking his luck that he had been prepared and had brought enough money.

She felt that after she bought the cake, there was a little person in her heart who kept laughing at her, "You fool, anything you make will look better than this."

He sighed helplessly, hailed a mule cart, and went home.

When she got home, she put the box of small reunion cakes that she had bought with a huge sum of money on the small table. After opening it, she looked from left to right and felt that it was not worth the price.

Li and Yutao were kneading dough. When they saw Shen Yu come back and go into the house and not come out, they were worried that something had happened to her, so they shook the flour off their hands and went into the house to check.

Unexpectedly, when I entered the room, I saw Shen Yu looking at a box of cakes from left to right without saying a word.

Li asked nervously, "Yuzhi, what happened to you? You didn't say a word after you came back. Did you run into that scoundrel from the Qian family outside?"

Li became afraid when she thought of Qian Yinhu, fearing that Shen Yu would run into him outside.

After hearing what Li said, Shen Yu knew that Li was worried about her, so she smiled and said, "No, no, don't worry, mother. I took the car back and forth and didn't meet anyone."

Li finally breathed a sigh of relief and scolded, "You silly girl, why did you come back and sit here without saying a word, scaring your mother?"

Shen Yu raised the box of cakes in his hand and said with a smile: "Mom, I was thinking, these cakes are so expensive even though they are made like this, can we also make some reunion cakes to sell?"

Li finally had the heart to look at the box of cakes. She took a breath as if she had a toothache and said, "Yuzhi, you also bought a box of small reunion cakes. How much did that cost? I heard from Madam Lin that a box like this cost six hundred coins."

Shen Yu felt a pain in her heart when she paid, but as she sat in the car along the way, she felt that the box of cakes was worth it.

At this moment, she smiled and pulled Li to sit down and said, "Mother, this box of small reunion cakes cost four hundred silver coins, but I spent four hundred silver coins now, and I will earn many more four hundred silver coins from this box of cakes in the future."

Li was confused by what Shen Yu said. She asked in confusion, "You went to the bakery to see this small reunion cake. Didn't you want to see how it looked and imitate it to make a thank-you gift for the two yamen runners and the head of the criminal police's family? Do you want to charge money for the thank-you gift? That's not okay."

Li's head shook like a rattle.

Shen Yu covered her mouth and smiled, "What are you thinking, mother? What I mean is, since these small reunion cakes will be used as gifts between relatives and friends during the Mid-Autumn Festival in August, if we can also make them, we can take orders for small reunion cakes. Isn't it a way to make some money before the Mid-Autumn Festival?"

Shen Yu pointed at the small reunion cakes in the box and said confidently, "Mom, look, small reunion cakes are nothing more than some stuffed pastries. Even the ones with carvings are not delicate enough. You can only see the general appearance."

"A box of nine cakes costs four hundred coins. If I could make cakes that look better and taste better, and price them similarly, which one would people order?"

Li said as a matter of course: "If the prices are similar, of course I would choose the better looking and tastier one. This way the gift will be more prestigious."

After that, he shook his head and said, "It's a good idea, but we have to be able to do it. We don't know how to do it, so we can only think about it in vain."

Shen Yu smiled and said, "Mom, you forgot that when I was in the restaurant, I had to make five-blessing flower cakes every day. At that time, the price was low in the town. A piece of five-blessing flower cake was smaller than this one, and a box was priced at one hundred coins. Making small reunion flower cakes is nothing more than making good fillings and looking good on the outside. The rest is the same as making five-blessing flower cakes. What's so difficult about it?"