"Zhou Yan, you got it up and running so quickly? How's business?" Zhou Jie put down the rag he was holding and greeted him with a smile.
"Yes, really fast!" Zhou Hai looked at him expectantly as well.
Zhou Liangliang, the owner of the stall beside was cracking sunflower seeds, pursed his lips, and muttered under his breath, "Tch, selling a dozen or twenty bowls at most. He said he'll learn, but I never see anyone."
"Business is alright. Yesterday, the first day, I sold seventy bowls. Today I estimate I can sell a hundred." Zhou Yan said with a smile.
"What?! A hundred bowls!"
"Business is so good!"
Zhou Jie and Zhou Hai were both shocked.
They had been selling soup pot for two years, slowly building up their customer base. Recently, with the weather cooling down, sometimes selling a hundred bowls was considered good business.
Zhou Yan had just started selling soup pot, and on his first day alone, he sold seventy bowls! And today he was going to sell a hundred?!
*Crash...*
Zhou Liangliang dropped the sunflower seeds in his hand, staring wide-eyed at Zhou Yan, his eyes filled with shock and disbelief.
A hundred bowls!
How much does it cost? How much profit do they make?
They're all from the same village, all surnamed Zhou, so why does their soup pot sell so well?
Their cattle are all slaughtered at the same slaughterhouse!
It doesn't make sense.
So frustrating!
"Great! Zhou Yan, your cooking skills are amazing! You can sell a hundred bowls of soup pot right outside the textile factory." Zhou Jie was happy and gratified: "Now your restaurant business will be even more prosperous, and you won't have to worry about restaurant business going badly anymore."
"I knew Zhou Yan could do it; he's been clever since he was a child." Zhou Hai said with a hearty laugh, his face beaming with pride.
"I'm selling the soup for sixty cents a bowl." Zhou Yan said with a slight smile, feeling the genuine happiness emanating from his two cousins.
"How much?"
"Sixty cents a bowl!"
Zhou Jie and Zhou Hai stopped laughing, their expressions turning to shock and disbelief.
Their soup stall sold soup for forty cents a bowl, which was already the highest price in all of Suji, and they relied on the taste and reputation to maintain their sales.
They had gradually increased the price from thirty cents and thirty-five cents.
Zhou Yan was selling bowls of soup for sixty cents each right from the start? And he could sell a hundred bowls a day?
When did making money in Suji become so easy?
Didn't the female workers at the textile factory dislike eating soup pot?
Both of them were a little bewildered.
"Are you kidding?" Zhou Jie looked at Zhou Yan and asked.
Zhou Hai also scratched his head.
"I'm not kidding." Zhou Yan said with a smile.
"Okay, I believe you." Zhou Jie immediately nodded, grabbing Zhou Yan's arm and saying, "That's amazing!"
Zhou Liangliang had just grabbed a handful of sunflower seeds, but now they tasted bitter and numb, not delicious at all.
Selling it for sixty cents!
What's the difference between this and robbery?
He could still make a profit selling it for thirty cents.
If Zhou Erwa sells it for sixty cents, how much money would he make selling a hundred bowls a day?
If he was to set up a stall at the entrance of the textile factory, let alone selling it for sixty cents, even selling it for fifty or forty cents would still be a lot of money!
Calculating this in his head, Zhou Liangliang's hands were trembling, and the sunflower seeds he had just grabbed fell all over the floor.
"Parkinson's disease? Can't even hold onto the sunflower seeds." Zhou Yan glanced at him, knowing exactly what this guy was thinking.
His business selling cross-legged beef at the entrance of the textile factory was booming. The fact that he was selling a bowl for sixty cents would soon spread, and such a clearly profitable business couldn't be kept a secret.
In a few days, there will definitely be a bunch of people from Zhou Village selling soup pots outside the textile factory.
Setting up a stall is just a matter of moving to a different location; there's hardly any cost involved, and these vendors are all very shrewd.
Zhou Yan isn't afraid of direct competition. The taste and quality of his cross-legged beef are his competitive advantage, and the improved reputation of his restaurant these past few days is also a bonus.
In later years, there were cross-legged beef restaurants all over Jiazhou, and the most successful ones were never the cheapest, but those that excelled in both taste and marketing.
He came to see Zhou Jie and Zhou Hai today, planning to teach them how to make cross-legged beef.
They're a family, and he just want them to have a better life.
[Ding! Side quest triggered: Inheritance of Cross-legged Beef. Cross-legged Beef, a traditional intangible cultural heritage dish, urgently needs to be properly recognized! Recruit an apprentice to be the inheritor of Cross-legged Beef, teach them the authentic method of making it, and promote and preserve this culinary tradition.]
[Task Reward: Unknown. Accept: Yes/No.]
Zhou Yan's eyelids twitched as he saw the quest that suddenly popped up.
This was quite unexpected.
Does this system even have side quests related to culinary inheritance?
But there's no reason to refuse a quest that's practically handed to him.
He decisively chose to accept.
"Brother Jie, Brother Haizi, I've made some improvements to this soup pot recipe. The workers at the textile factory all said it was delicious, which is why I can sell it at this price." Zhou Yan called the two aside and lowered his voice slightly, "Do you two want to learn from me? As long as you do as I teach you, your business will definitely be even better than it is now, and you'll earn more."
"That won't do. Your restaurant business has only just started to pick up, and you still owe a lot of money. As your older brothers, we can't steal your business." Zhou Jie immediately shook his head, his attitude firm. "I know you're sincere towards me and Brother Haizi, but we want you to do even better."
"That's right, we're also making money now. None of the other stalls in this row have better business than us." Zhou Hai also said, patting his chest.
Zhou Yan felt a lump in his throat and didn't know what to say for a moment.
What can you exchange for genuine sincerity?
At least money can't buy it.
"Brother Jie, Brother Haizi, listen to me." Zhou Yan said, looking at the two with a serious expression: "I understand your intentions and thoughts, but I'm thinking about the long term."
"You both can't possibly be selling food from a stall here for the rest of your lives, can you? You're exposed to the sun and rain everyday, and you can't even set up your stall when the weather is bad. After deducting the off-season, you won't make much money at all, and your wives will suffer along with you."
"I'm opening a restaurant, not just selling soup pot. I'm selling noodles now, and later I'll sell stir-fried dishes and braised dishes – that's my main business."
"If you learn my soup pot recipe and hone your skills, you can open a shop in the town, or even in the city, and then you can earn more money and live a better life."
"Are you worried about me that you both stealing my business? That's impossible. My customers are mainly textile factory workers; they wouldn't travel this far to eat the same soup pot."
"We're like brothers, don't be so formal. Otherwise, I'll go to Grandma's tomorrow for dinner and complain about you two."
Zhou Jie and Zhou Hai fell silent after hearing this, one scratching his head, the other stroking his chin.
"Brother Jie, what do you say?" Zhou Yan looked at Zhou Jie and asked.
"Okay, since you've put it that way, what more can we brothers say?" Zhou Jie nodded. "You name a time, and I'll come and learn from you first. Once I've learned, I'll teach Brother Haizi."
"We're off tomorrow, so come to the restaurant to find me next Monday morning." Zhou Yan said.
"Alright." Zhou Jie smiled and said, "Then Brother Haizi and I will become your apprentices."
"Zhou Yan is a proper chef." Zhou Hai chuckled.
"No problem." Zhou Yan nodded. "Then I'll head back now. A group of art students from Sichuan Fine Arts Institute are coming to the restaurant to eat today, and I need to go back and prepare the ingredients."
"Art students?"
"A whole group of them?"
Zhou Jie and Zhou Hai looked surprised and quickly said, "Then you'd better go quickly, don't waste any time."
"See you later." Zhou Yan got on his bicycle and left.
Zhou Liangliang watched his retreating figure, his eyes darting around. He turned and woke his wife, who was dozing behind the stove, and whispered, "You watch the stall alone tonight, I'm going to take care of something."
"How can I manage it alone? What are you going to do?" His wife, still half-asleep, complained.
"We only sell a dozen bowls tonight, you could manage it with your eyes closed. I'm going to do something big, we might get rich." Zhou Liangliang lowered his voice.
"Get rich?" His wife looked at him suspiciously, "Are you going to rob a bank?"
"Rob a bank? Nonsense! Go back to sleep, you unlucky woman!" Zhou Liangliang pulled the apron over her face and pushed his bicycle towards the textile factory.
...