The lonely foodie

After the chicken is cooked through, increase the oven temperature by 10 degrees and bake until the skin is crispy.

Seeing that there was a piece of tender tofu in the refrigerator, Mobai asked Ivan to blanch the tofu in a hot pot to remove the beany smell, then iced the well water in the garden, added minced green onion, chicken essence, and salt, mixed well, and drizzled with sesame oil. Made a dish of tofu with shallots.

The rain has stopped, and the early autumn wind has brought coolness. There are stone tables and chairs in the garden just beside the well. The two of them put the roast chicken and side dishes up. The artistic conception of returning to the countryside.

When Wang Yiming came to beg for food, he was naturally polite.

After taking a bite of the grilled chicken, Wang Yiming slapped the table and stood up, "The glutinous rice wine brewed last year is just right with this chicken." Then he went to the wine cellar to get the wine.

When I came back from the wine cellar, I picked a few bunches of grapes from the roadside. The purple-black rose fragrance, the particles are small, full and even, and the grape fragrance is strong.

Wang Yiming doesn’t have many friends, and Pan Wine Cellar sells wine in a Buddhist style. If someone buys it, he sells it. If no one buys it, he drinks it by himself. Anyway, he doesn’t make money from it. Today, I met Qu Mobai and... Qu Mobai’s dishes. I was in a particularly good mood, and I had long forgotten the unhappiness when I saw guests.

The three of them chatted while drinking, and the topic turned to the cousin.

Wang Yiming is not shy, saying that his mother's family has a genetic disease, and his cousin is actually not very old, but she has been ill for many years and her health has deteriorated, so she looks old.

"Is it a bone disease?" Mo Bai asked.

Wang Yiming nodded, "The autoimmune system disease is reflected in the bones and joints, and the heart will also be affected. If you take too much medicine, your kidneys are not very good, and you are afraid of cold."

"There is a lot of humidity in the mountains, so you can usually use moxibustion to regulate the bladder, small intestine, Shenshu, Sanjiaoshu, and Pishu. If you take western medicine for a long time, you can add moxibustion to Ganshu."

Wang Yiming was a little surprised. My cousin had been seeking medical advice for many years, but the moxibustion methods Mo Bai said were similar to those taught by a well-known old Chinese doctor in China.

"Mr. Mo Bai is in the catering business, and he has such a research on traditional Chinese medicine?"

Mobai took a sip of the glutinous rice wine. The aroma of the wine was lingering and mellow. It was a perfect match with the charred and soft roast chicken. Health is naturally better."

After speaking, he joked, "You didn't delay writing a book by making wine."

Wang Yiming was a little ashamed. He made wine to escape from writing. "Miss Li" was written darkly and depressingly. When he wrote that Miss Li killed her husband, he felt that he was also killed. The feeling of suffocation is still vivid in his memory. new.

After this book, he no longer wanted to write. In his early 30s, he yearned for no reason for the rural life where the sun rises and the sun sets. He found this deserted village and brought his cousin who was in poor health to live Lived a semi-retired life.

The guests and host enjoyed the simple meal of meat and vegetables, Mo Bai did not have the slightest aura of a businessman, chatting with him about food and life, in the breeze and white jade, the dark clouds that had hovered over Wang Yiming's heart for a long time dissipated a lot.

Heping Hot Pot ordered two altars of peach bayberry fresh wine, and Wang Yiming sent someone to pack it into a 500ml bottle. When it was ready, he would call a courier to pick it up.

Ivan was driving, and after Mo Bai got into the co-pilot, Wang Yiming stopped him again, "I don't need WeChat, just leave a phone number so I can contact you in the future."

After the car left, Wang Yiming stared blankly at his phone for a long time. He rarely took the initiative to leave someone's contact information. The last time he took the initiative to leave a phone number was... a teacher who liked to teach philosophy in his junior year. He left someone's phone number, but he always Did not dare to contact.

I heard that the teacher is not married yet, but the philosophy class he teaches has become popular, and students often spread it on TikTok. Wang Yiming downloaded another TikTok for this, and liked it when he saw the video about the teacher .

Ivan was going to return the car, and Mo Bai got off at the gate of the Normal University and strolled back.

There were a few people around the intersection of the snack street. When I went up to see it, an old lady was selling some fish in a basin.

"Authentic Minghu mandarin fish." The old lady was selling her fish to the onlookers. "My old man caught it by himself in the morning. Our family can't finish it, and this fish can't be kept. Let's sell some."

"How much is a catty?" someone asked.

"Sixty." The old lady replied.

"Hey, it's not cheap. The mandarin fish in the vegetable market are only 42 cents."

"This can't be compared. The ones in the vegetable market are all farmed fish, and the meat quality is worse than mine."

Mo Bai looked at the fish in the basin. There are three types of mandarin fish, carp and grass carp. They are slender, which means that the fish has an unstable food source for a long time, and they exercise enough in the process of looking for food. It is indeed only wild fish that have this kind of behavior. body type.

Squat down and open the mouth of the fish to have a look. The meat in the mouth does not turn black, it is fresh pink. The cleaner the water, the more beautiful the color of the fish, and the meat is pinkish white.

In addition, the scales of wild fish are long and strong, and the meat is firm and delicious, but these are known only when the fish is killed and eaten.

Mo Bai picked the ferocious-looking mandarin fish and asked the old lady to ask for a scale. There was a small grass carp in the basin that had already rolled its eyes. Mo Bai remembered the cat that often came to the store to eat, so he asked the old lady Madam, "Can you sell me this small one at a lower price?"

The old lady loaded the big fish first, and took advantage of the opportunity to pick up the small grass carp and packed them together. She waved her hand proudly, "I'll send you off."

Grass carp is worthless, this little fish is still half dead, so he is happy to be a favor.

Mandarin fish is a freshwater fish comparable to grouper. In "The Fisherman" written by Zhang Zhihe, a poet of the Tang Dynasty, there is a poem that praises mandarin fish with peach blossoms and flowing water with egrets flying in front of Xisai Mountain.

The meat of mandarin fish is tender and garlic clove meat with few spines. It is suitable for steaming, boiling soup, braised in soy sauce, and sweet and sour.

After the slaughter and cleaning, Mobai will cut a large knife on the back of the fish and marinate it with a little salt and ginger.The rest will be processed when Ivan returns.

The small grass carp is much simpler. Remove the scales and viscera, throw it into the rice cooker, add water and boil for 10 minutes, pick up the big spines, put it in a porcelain bowl for feeding cats, put it on the stove, and feed it when it cools up.

Just after finishing all these, Yuantong Express called and asked Mo Bai to pick up the express.

Mobai has already learned how to shop online, and the weather is getting cooler, so he bought two thick clothes for himself and Ivan online.I used Ivan's card, but the money was Mobai's money, and he also bought clothes for himself, so Ivan was naturally very willing.

While Mo Bai was picking up the courier, Ivan came back and saw a small bowl of fish soup left on the stove, thinking it was for himself.

He took a sip of the fish soup, frowned, took a small spoonful of salt from the salt jar, and added it, criticizing, "It's getting more and more outrageous, the stew doesn't even put salt."

After finishing the bowl of neither salty nor light fish soup with meat, the more Ivan thought about it, the more strange it became. No matter how you think about it, this soup doesn't look like it was made by Mobai.

Could it be... there are thieves.

Shopkeeper of Yida, you are talking about the snail girl, the thief is not such a high-quality person, sneaking into your house and stealing nothing, but also stewing a bowl of fish for you?

Look at the porcelain bowl again, it looks familiar no matter how you look at it, I will go, I will go, I will go, Ivan clutched his small/chest.

"Where's the fish soup for cats?" Mo Bai looked at the empty porcelain bowl with a puzzled expression.

"I...hey, I fed it." Fortunately, the cat can't talk, otherwise it would definitely jump out and say-I didn't eat it at all.

"The cat has come here already?" It was a little raccoon cat who usually fell in love with them and came here to eat.

"Well, I've been here before, I just left." Lying is much easier the second time around.

Mo Bai put the porcelain bowl under the stove, took out mandarin fish and fried it.

The fish is deep-fried in a large oil pan until the skin is crispy, and the fish meat is white and tender. It is delicious when eaten with salt and pepper.

The fish was good fish, fried just right, but Ivan didn't eat much.

"Don't you like to eat?" Mo Bai asked, "Last time you explained that the fish in the lake is good, and today I met some specially bought."

"I love to eat." It's just that I ate the cat's fish just now, and I can't eat it now.

Mo Bai smiled at him, "Eat more if you like it."

Ivan rubbed his stomach, and picked up another piece of meat under Mobai's earnest gaze, but the mandarin fish meat was plump, and it was garlic clove meat, and it was a big piece once he picked it up.

meow~

A gray big-headed blue cat smelled the fish, stood at the door and let out a cry, walked in carelessly, and jumped onto the table without admitting it, smelling the fish in Ivan's bowl.

Mo Bai stood up, went to the kitchen to fetch the porcelain bowl for feeding the cat, took a few pieces of fish belly meat, and put them on the ground beside the table legs. The cat knew that it was for himself, and jumped to the side of the bowl, He ate voraciously and snored happily.

Mo Bai has never seen a blue cat before, seeing this cat has a big face and round head, and the fur is not gray or blue, I just think it is very funny.

He flicked the non-existent long gown, squatted down and looked at it carefully.

"There is a phone number on this cat's collar." Mo Bai pointed to the collar and said to Ivan.

"Huh?" Ivan also squatted down. The collar was a sky blue leather collar with a string of owner's phone numbers engraved on it.

"Someone's pet cat must have escaped." Ivan leaned over and took the phone from the table, and dialed the number on the collar.

The phone rang four times but no one answered it, and when he was about to hang up, someone picked it up again.

"Hello." A man's voice came from over there, his voice was a little low, and his age and emotion could not be heard.

"Did your cat get lost?" Ivan asked.

After pondering for a while, "You made a mistake."

Ivan checked the phone number again, and one word was correct.

"A blue cat with your phone number written on the collar, does it belong to your family?"

"No." The other side said these two words coldly, and hung up the phone.

Ivan hung up the phone and checked the number on the collar again, it was this number.

"What's the matter?" The cat jumped to lie on Mo Bai's lap after eating the fish, and Mo Bai got a small comb out of nowhere like a magic trick, and carried it to the corridor to comb its hair.

"The man said that the cat is not his, oh, where did you get the little comb?"

"Why?" Mo Bai raised his eyebrows, his eyes were full of smiles, "You don't know him?"

Qu Mobai...I will destroy you.Of course, I only dare to growl in my heart.

After returning from Heping Hot Pot, Zhang Yan seemed to be suffering from lovesickness. From time to time, she took out her mobile phone to see if there was any new news. Watch for a long time.

Nearly 30 years old, I never thought that love at first sight would happen to me. There is a saying that is true, love at first sight is not love, but face!

Sighing, she threw the phone aside, and just as she threw it away, there was a sudden buzz on WeChat, and Zhang Yan rushed over to grab the phone again.