I Got Rich in Period Fiction-Chapter 160 Fried Potato Sticks

Although the family compound of the base looked beautiful with its red bricks and tiles, they still had to cook with firewood.

The electricity supply was insufficient, and there were no gas stoves.

Next to the stove was a bellows; only when it was pulled did the firewood in the stove burn vigorously.

Nowadays, they were burning cornstalks, and every household also had a coal stove, receiving a monthly allotment of coal briquettes—of course, this cost money.

Because of the hot weather, Qiao Qingyu had placed her coal stove in the courtyard, right next to a stone platform specially built by He Xiuyu.

Qiao Qingyu brushed aside the coal that covered the stove’s embers and set an iron pot with two handles on top of the stove.

There wasn’t much oil in the house, but she poured what there was into the pot.

Soon, an unusual fragrance wafted through He Xiuyu’s courtyard—one that He Xuerong had never smelled before, and Xiao Hu had certainly never encountered either.

Qiao Qingyu was frying French fries.

In that era, fast food and the like had not yet entered China.

For the ordinary citizens of China, there were only so few ways to cook potatoes.

Stir-fried potato shreds, potato slices, or stewed potato chunks.

Even if the potatoes were cut into sticks, they were still meant to be stewed.

In the following decade, people would create numerous variations with potatoes, but for the time being, even the most common potato pancake or shredded potato cake was rarely made by anyone.

As far as Qiao Qingyu was concerned, she didn’t know about other places, but at least she was aware that in the entire Harvest Commune, the above-mentioned were the usual potato dishes.

However, people in the north liked to grind potatoes into flour, then mix it with some wheat flour to wrap and eat as vegetable dumplings.

Frying French fries releases a unique fragrance that can fully capture the charming aroma inherent to potatoes.

To say that the scent wafted for thousands of miles was an exaggeration, but at the very least, the children of the base’s family compound, who had never experienced such an aroma before, now smelled it drifting out from He Xiuyu’s house into the outdoors.

Dashun and Daji, along with Yu Jing’s little girl, were playing on the road outside.

Having just finished a fight with Xiao Hu, whose parents had shown up, the children didn’t dare to follow suit; however, Dashun felt he had won, and the victor naturally wanted to strut triumphantly in front of the loser.

So, since the place where they played was not far from He Xiuyu’s house, the enticing aroma naturally led these children, without any prior agreement, to sniff the air in unison, searching for the source of the fragrance.

Children, inherently, have a natural craving for food.

At this moment, they still didn’t know how to control their desires.

So, following the aroma, they all stood at Qiao Qingyu’s front gate.

Qiao Qingyu had deliberately left her gate wide open, and the spot where she was frying the French fries wasn’t far from the gate.

The tempting scent at that moment was like a little hand tugging at the children’s stomachs.

Dashun, Daji, and Yu Jing’s little girl couldn’t help but swallow their saliva.

They didn’t dare to enter the courtyard, so they stood outside, sticking their heads in and looking for the source of the aroma. Then they saw "Aunt Qiao," the woman sitting next to the coal stove. In front of her was a bowl of golden yellow stick-shaped items, from which the fragrance was emanating.

Dashun couldn’t stop swallowing his saliva uncontrollably; Daji and Wei Xiao did the same.

Every child who has had such an experience knows that when faced with delicious food, saliva isn’t something they can control.

At this moment, that’s exactly how they were.

Qiao Qingyu glanced at the three children peeking around, her lips curling slightly as she pretended not to see them and finished frying the rest of the potato strips. She then took the iron pot off the stove to start making tomato sauce. freewebnσvel.cѳm

The tomato sauce was meant to be dipped with the potato strips.

Using ingredients at hand made it all too easy, and the tomato sauce was simple to prepare.

Blanch the tomatoes in boiling water, score them with a cross, peel and chop them finely, pour a bit of hot oil in the pan, add the tomato pieces in, and after simmering for a few minutes, the tomato sauce was ready.

Qiao Qingyu served the tomato sauce in a dish.

She moved the small elmwood dining table from her bedroom and set it under the south side of the grape trellis, only a dozen steps away from the doorway. At this point, Xiao Hu and Rongrong could no longer restrain themselves and would have already snatched some if not for Qiao Qingyu’s usual strictness in certain matters.

Qiao Qingyu directed Xiao Hu to fetch some stools, and he quickly ran to the shed on the east side, grabbing two stools and racing back.

Xiao Hu and Rongrong took their seats beside the small dining table while Qiao Qingyu portioned out some of the potato strips onto a plate and brought over the tomato sauce.

By now, the two children had stopped looking at Qiao Qingyu; their four eyes fixed intently on the golden, tempting fried potato strips on the table.

They had never seen such a thing before, whether in the commissary or even on other families’ dining tables.

He Xuerong came from a family with better living conditions and had eaten many things that ordinary children couldn’t access, but she had never seen such food.

Her bright eyes locked onto it, and a suspect trace of drool formed at the corner of her mouth.

Qiao Qingyu hurriedly pulled out a handkerchief to wipe it away, and seeing Xiao Hu constantly swallowing with a "glug glug," she glanced at the three other children standing at the door, unwilling to leave. Qiao Qingyu picked up a potato strip and dipped it in the tomato sauce.

Qiao Qingyu was absolutely not putting on an act.

This thing was naturally fragrant.

Not to mention its fragrance now, it would also be delicious decades later.

Elderly folks, children, and young people all liked it.

"Xiao Hu, Rongrong, this is called fried potato strips, eat it with the tomato sauce and it tastes amazing. We must be hungry, so let’s eat quickly," she said.

As soon as the word ’eat’ finished, two little hands reached into the plate; each grabbed a potato strip, imitated Qiao Qingyu by dipping it in the tomato sauce, and then took a bite. Both kids paused simultaneously at first, then involuntarily squinted their eyes and continued stuffing their mouths non-stop...

Even He Xuerong gorged herself like she hadn’t eaten in days.

That’s the reason why people in later generations enjoyed watching mukbangs, witnessing someone else eating evokes a desire to eat oneself, all the more so in the early 1980s.

Dashun and Daji, along with Wei Xiao, watched enviously as Xiao Hu and Rongrong devoured the potato strips, dipping bites into the sauce on the plate.

They stood at the doorway, not far from the grape trellis.

Dashun felt if only his arms were a little longer, he could almost reach those delicious-looking golden strips on the table.

The three kids kept swallowing saliva, the more they looked, the more they craved, the more they looked, the more uncomfortable they felt. They gripped the door threshold so tightly that they left indentations in the door frame.

They looked again at Qiao Qingyu, but she didn’t look back at them at all, acting as though those three standing by the door did not exist.

Dashun wondered if they were at someone else’s house, would their mom allow him, his brother, and Xiao Xiao into the yard for a few bites?

Wuu, Aunt Qiao is so mean!