So, the rumor about people in Sichuan keeping pandas at home started way back in this era.

Zhou Yan chuckled and patted her head. "If you go to Rongcheng, you’ll get to ride a panda to school every day."

"Fow weal?" Zhou Momo’s eyes lit up. She turned to Mrs. Zhao. "Mama! Let’s go to Rongcheng! I want to have a giant panda too!"

"Why would we go to Rongcheng? Here in the village, we have land to farm, space to raise chickens and pigs, and we own the land our house is on. We’ve lived here for half our lives; it’s much more comfortable than Rongcheng." Mrs. Zhao shook her head with a smile. "When we rebuild the house later, we’ll make the courtyard even bigger. We traded for that patch of land next to us from your third uncle two years ago. We’ll plant garlic shoots, chili peppers, patchouli, and green onions right in the yard. Whenever we’re cooking, we can just go out and pick some. How convenient would that be?"

"You’re right, let’s make it bigger," Comrade Zhou said with a nod, his eyes filled with affection.

Zhou Yan didn’t press the issue. ’In this era, if you can make good money at home and live comfortably, who would be willing to leave it all behind?’

He had asked Lin about it a few days ago while jogging. The state had just recently allowed the sale of private homes, but there were still many restrictions. Publicly owned housing was strictly off-limits for purchase, and all the better apartment buildings were state-run dormitories.

Zhou Yan had just paid off his external debts, but he still owed his parents over five hundred yuan. Naturally, he couldn’t afford to have any grand ideas.

He had to earn his first pot of gold from this shop at the textile factory gate.

’If I make more money in the future, what’s to stop me from building them a new house in the countryside?’

Comrade Zhou rode his bike back to work on the house, while Zhou Momo tagged along behind Zhou Yan, pestering him with questions.

"Brother, are you going to Rongcheng? Can I come with you?"

"Brother, how many giant pandas are we getting?"

"Brother, can the giant panda sleep next to me at night?"

"Brother..."

"Alright, alright, I’ll definitely buy you one when the time comes!" Zhou Yan’s head was buzzing. He gave her ten cents and sent her off to buy some candy.

"Hooray! I’m going to ride a panda to school!" The little girl skipped away with the coin, already lost in her fantasy. Her little ponytail bobbed up and down as she disappeared into the small factory store.

Finally getting some peace, Zhou Yan lay back in a chair under a tree, enjoying the breeze and staring blankly at the distant river. It was an overcast day, and the wind was starting to feel cool.

"Zhou Yan." A voice spoke up beside him.

Zhou Yan turned to see Zhao Minghui had already pulled up a small stool and sat down next to him. Zhao Minghui grabbed a handful of braised peanuts from his pocket, pressed them into Zhou Yan’s hand, then shelled one for himself and popped it in his mouth. "I saw your braised meats sold like hotcakes at lunchtime," he said with a grin. "I had no idea you had this kind of skill."

"Life’s tough. You’ve gotta be versatile." Zhou Yan sighed, shelling a braised peanut and tossing it into his mouth.

"Since you’re selling braised pig head, you need to watch out for Yang the Third and Zhu Feng. Those two are bad news. They ganged up on me before and started a price war. Whatever price I set, they’d go thirty cents cheaper. They straight-up forced me to stop selling braised pig head." Zhao Minghui lowered his voice.

Zhou Yan glanced at him and smiled. "Don’t worry. I’m always on guard, but I’ve got plenty of tricks up my sleeve too. If they dare to play dirty, I can play a whole lot dirtier."

Zhao Minghui blinked. ’Since when did Zhou Yan talk with such flair?’

"Besides, my price is already thirty cents a jin higher than theirs. That little trick they pulled on you failed before they even got a chance to try it on me," Zhou Yan said with a laugh. "If they want to cut their prices, let them. I really don’t care. I won’t follow suit."

"That’s right!" Zhao Minghui suddenly realized it too. Zhou Yan’s situation was completely different from his own.

’It’s thirty cents more expensive, yet customers are still fighting to buy it. What does that tell you?’

’It has to be delicious!’

’So much more delicious than the other three places that people are willing to buy it even if it costs thirty cents more.’

"My mom said you were giving out free samples of braised peanuts. How did that work out?" Zhou Yan asked casually, munching on a peanut.

"It worked great! That’s actually why I came to thank you." Zhao Minghui sounded a little excited. "I gave away two or three jin in samples, and the remaining ten jin sold out completely by noon. I even had a few people pre-order for tomorrow. A lot of customers tried it and said it was delicious."

"That’s great. Once your business stabilizes, you’ll have a steady income," Zhou Yan said with a nod.

Zhao Minghui chatted with Zhou Yan for a little while longer before heading back. He was in a hurry to get home and cook another pot of braised peanuts to catch the evening rush after work.

He lived right in Suji Town, so it wasn’t far. Braising peanuts didn’t take long, and if he brought them over right after cooking, they might still be warm, which was even tastier than when they were cold.

People are always full of energy when there’s money to be made.

Zhou Yan took a short nap, played rock-paper-scissors with Zhou Momo for a bit, and then went back into the kitchen to slice the pig head meat and ears.

He had no choice. He’d learned a harsh lesson at lunchtime. He had to slice the pig head and pig ears in advance so that during the evening rush, Mrs. Zhao would only need to weigh and pack everything, maximizing their efficiency.

When workers got off their shifts in the evening, they wanted to grab their braised meat and head home for dinner. Nobody had the time to wait around for him to finish stir-frying several dishes before he got around to slicing their order.

He also chopped the chicken beforehand. That way, if a customer ordered it in the evening, all he had to do was mix the cold salad.

To get the cold-tossed chicken to go, customers had to bring their own containers. That rule was written on a sign by the door.

He had no other choice. Zhou Yan couldn’t find any usable take-out containers; he didn’t even have plastic bags.

The braised pig head and pig ears were packed in waxed paper bags, which was the common way to package braised foods back then.

In this regard, Zhou Yan wasn’t trying to be unique. As long as it worked, it was fine. He had to keep his costs under control.

"Mom, I want to hire a chopper. Do you know anyone suitable?" Zhou Yan asked as he saw Mrs. Zhao coming downstairs, having just woken from her nap.

Mrs. Zhao was much better connected than he was, so she might know the right person for the job.

"A chopper?" Mrs. Zhao rubbed her eyes, still a bit groggy from her nap. She looked at Zhou Yan, who was busy slicing pig ears. "Are you saying you can’t keep up with slicing all the braised meat?"

"Yeah. At lunchtime today, I had to slice the braised meat, stir-fry dishes, and make the cold-tossed chicken. I was about to go crazy," Zhou Yan said with a nod.

"It does sound like a lot. Let me think..." Mrs. Zhao thought hard for a moment before shaking her head. "I don’t really have anyone good in mind. If we’re talking about the best Knife Skills around, that would be your old man. During New Year’s and other holidays, he’s always the one who helps your grandma slice the braised meat. Your grandma insists on him doing it; she’s only satisfied when he’s the one cutting."

"My dad has to butcher cattle and sell the meat," Zhou Yan said, shaking his head. ’Comrade Zhou has been butchering cattle his whole life; there’s no way he’d come work as a chopper for me.’ He sighed. "Forget it. I’ll just write a ’Help Wanted’ sign and post it on the door. We’ll see if I can find someone suitable."

The drama at the factory canteen was starting to die down.

At noon, the factory director and two deputy directors had shown up at the canteen. They ate the communal pot dishes with the workers and repeatedly promised that the tainted pork incident would never happen again. Deputy Director Liu Yusheng was now personally responsible for the canteen.

The attention and resolve shown by the factory leadership helped the workers regain some of their trust in the canteen.

They had no choice. They still had to eat there.

The factory canteen was cheap, and the portions were huge. For the communal pot dishes, a serving of Twice-Cooked Pork was only forty-five cents, and a vegetable dish was ten cents. You brought your own lunchbox to steam rice. If two or three people chipped in for a meal, you could get meat and vegetables for just twenty cents per person.

The canteen’s a la carte stir-fry section was eliminated. All the chefs were now focused on making good communal pot dishes for the workers. The old system, where head chefs cooked the a la carte orders and apprentices cooked the communal dishes, was a thing of the past.

The workers’ feedback on the communal dishes after lunch was generally positive. Even though Master Xiao had left, the factory canteen still had three Third-level Chefs on staff. If they put in a serious effort, there was no way the food would be bad.

It just meant that from now on, if they wanted a la carte stir-fry or something a little better, they’d have to go to Zhou Yan Restaurant.

Zhou Yan was quite pleased when he heard the news from the workers.

He hadn’t bankrupted the factory canteen, but he had managed to shut down their a la carte section.

The main culprit, Wang Defa, was already behind bars. Rumor had it his alliance with Sun Meili had collapsed. They were now in a dog-eat-dog phase, slinging mud at each other. They didn’t even need much interrogation; their confessions were more thorough than anything the security department could have dug up.

The amount involved was over fifty thousand yuan. In this day and age, that was enough to guarantee they’d be locked up for life.

How many "ten-thousand-yuan households" were there in the entire country?

The audacity was staggering!

Zhou Yan thought of the other Zhou. When their memories had merged, he was Zhou Yan, but he was also that Zhou. Perhaps there had been no difference between them for a long time.

He quite liked this era.

And he liked the people here, this family, even more.

That evening, business at the restaurant was even better.

News that the braised pig head at Zhou Yan Restaurant was unbelievably delicious had already spread by the afternoon.

One worker had gotten some braised pig head to-go, planning to have it with a drink at home. But his colleagues in the workshop caught the scent, and there was no hiding it. The whole portion was devoured during their break.

The worker was left holding a handful of jiao and fen coins, on the verge of tears. Those women were absolute bandits!

Once they had a taste, word of mouth spread like wildfire.

What’s more, some of the factory’s older employees recognized a familiar taste. The flavor was remarkably similar to that of Zhang’s Braised Shop, which used to have a stall at the Stone Bridge Head years ago.

"Boss, who taught you to make this braised meat? This is the flavor of Zhang’s Braised Shop from the old bridge head!" an older worker exclaimed, holding his lunchbox with a look of excitement.

"My mother-in-law was the one who ran Zhang’s Braised Shop back in the day. Zhou Yan learned how to make this from his grandmother," Mrs. Zhao replied with a smile.

"No wonder! It’s perfect, he’s captured the very essence of it." The old worker handed over his lunchbox. "Give me half a jin of the pig head meat, and a serving of the cold-tossed chicken, too."

"Zhang’s! They were so famous back in the day!"

"My old man still talks about it. He says the best braised food in all of Jiazhou was from Zhang’s. It’s a shame they closed up shop."

The old worker’s words stirred up memories for many people. Their elders would always mention it whenever they bought braised food, which had turned Zhang’s Braised Shop into the gold standard for the younger generation.

The workers, who had come specifically for the braised food, began ordering with even more conviction.

"I’ll take half a jin of braised pig head meat, too!"

"I’ll have a pig’s ear!"

"Ma’am, here’s my container. I’d like a serving of the cold-tossed chicken to go!"

Customers getting takeout crowded the restaurant entrance, while many of those dining in also rushed to order, some already holding bottles of liquor they’d just bought from the small store.

Braised pig head was the perfect snack to have with a drink. Enjoying a little something with colleagues after a long day of work—it was just perfect.

Just like that, the rest of the pig head meat sold out quickly.

Zhou Yan looked at the few scraps of pig ear and head meat left in the small bamboo tray. It wasn’t enough for another full portion, so he told Zhao Hong to mark all the braised dishes as sold out on the menu board.

He packed up the little that was left for Comrade Zhou to take home.

Reinforcing the house and replacing the roof tiles must have been a big job; he still hadn’t shown up yet.

"So sorry, it was our first day, so we didn’t prepare enough. We’ll definitely make more tomorrow, so please come back then!" Mrs. Zhao gave her routine apology to the customers who missed out, promising to be better prepared next time.

"Is the braised meat all sold out?" Wang Hongliang asked as he stopped at the entrance, pushing his bicycle.

He had heard this afternoon that Zhou Yan Restaurant was selling braised meat, and that it tasted nearly identical to the old Zhang’s Braised Shop. This had really piqued his curiosity. He’d done a lap through the canteen after his shift, which made him a little late.

"Director, I’m so sorry, but we’ve already sold out for today," Mrs. Zhao said with a smile. "Please come a little earlier tomorrow."

"Will do." Wang Hongliang nodded, looking slightly disappointed.

Even the factory director couldn’t get any if he was late!

The workers felt a sense of satisfaction at that.