Eating

What happened after was inevitable. They were scalded, of course.

Li Shouji and Xiaoyi put down their chopsticks at the same time and began to hiss and stick out their tongues. It was obvious that they had been scalded quite badly. They really should have thought better since the food was fresh out of the pot.

Jiang Danhe looked at Li Shouji in disdain. Then, his gaze was attracted by the transparent strips in the bowl.

“Hey, what’s this transparent strip? The appearance is rather interesting.”

Jiang Danhe picked up the potato noodles and studied them curiously.

Xiaoguo looked helplessly at the few seated at the table. Two were screaming from the heat, while one was observing the noodles without tasting them.

Xiaoguo and Zhuang Zhuang looked at each other helplessly, then rushed forward to help them.

Zhuang Zhuang poured water for Xiaoyi and Li Shouji while Xiaoguo explained to Jiang Danhe about how the noodles were made.

Finally, everyone quietened down.

Li Shouji and Xiaoyi were no longer eating hurriedly and Jiang Danhe had a better understanding of how everything was made. He ate the potato noodles in astonishment.

“Silence at last…”

That was what Zhuang Zhuang and Xiaoguo thought at the same time.

Then suddenly!

“Hey, the taste is so familiar!”

Li Shouji spoke again. When he first saw the dish earlier, he thought that it looked somewhat familiar. Now that he had eaten it, he found it even more familiar. But when had he ever eaten such delicious food? He shouldn’t have forgotten…

“That’s right. Very familiar!”

Xiaoyi said the exact same thing.

However, before he could recall where he had eaten it, Zhuang Zhuang mercilessly answered his doubts.

“You had this at the noodle shop before.”

“Oh… that’s right…”

Xiaoyi nodded, looking enlightened. Then he stopped thinking about it and dug into the meatballs.

Jiang Danhe took the first bite and was struck by the same sense of familiarity as Li Shouji.

Jiang Danhe frowned and took another bite. The more he ate, the more familiar he found the taste. Jiang Danhe had a better memory than Li Shouji—his mind whirled quickly and he thought of the small fishing village.

“Where did you buy this from when we were in the fishing village?”

Jiang Danhe looked up and asked Li Shouji, who was chewing on two meatballs and was going to stuff in a third one.

“…?”

Li Shouji’s memory was not very good. When he heard Jiang Danhe’s question, the dots in his mind suddenly connected and he instantly recalled.

“Yes, yes, yes! This is the taste!!”

Wasn’t this the noodles that he had eaten in the prince’s residence when they were recuperating in the fishing village? Didn’t the emperor, who was still the prince at that time, give him a lunch box and gave him an address so that he could go buy it?

“My stupid brain! I just remembered!”

Li Shouji swallowed the pork balls in his mouth and asked Xiaoguo, “Did you sell this at the intersection of Fumin Road in Yonghai County?”

He remembered the address as he often went there. Now that Jiang Danhe mentioned it, he immediately recalled the scene.

Xiaoguo had heard the road name before. She looked surprised and nodded. “That’s right.”

At the beginning, the intersection she went to was Fumin Road.

Li Shouji clapped his hands and shouted that it was fate, “Sister-in-law made the potato noodles that I bought for you previously!”

Jiang Danhe was stunned when he heard this. However, after hearing what Li Shouji said, he understood. The food that he thought was delicious was made by Xiaoguo. If this wasn’t fate, then what was?

Xiaoguo looked at Li Shouji and Jiang Danhe’s excited gazes and tried her best to piece together the whole story.

She knew that the two of them had stayed in the fishing village before. Li Shouji had bought potato noodles from her by chance and brought them back for Jiang Danhe to eat.

After thinking it through, Xiaoguo was rather emotional too. This was indeed fate.

“So I’ve tasted your cooking before.”

Jiang Danhe felt even more touched as he looked at Xiaoguo. He had never expected this. Back then, he had thought that the noodles were delicious. It turned out that it was the taste of his wife’s cooking…

Li Shouji glanced at him speechlessly…

Xiaoyi was also praising Xiaoguo’s culinary skills on the side. Zhuang Zhuang was overjoyed when he heard this, and he began to praise Xiaoguo for all her abilities.

“Not only does my mother cook well, she’s also very good at making clothes and shoes. My clothes and shoes were all made by my mother. Also, my uncle’s shoes and clothes were also made by her.”

Zhuang Zhuang looked proud as he recounted the things that Xiaoguo knew how to do individually. After his fingers were used up for counting, he attempted to count with his toes, but Xiaoguo stopped him.

“Hurry up and eat.”

Xiaoguo’s skin was not thick to begin with, and no matter how thick it was, she could not withstand Zhuang Zhuang’s bragging about her.

Xiaoyi looked at Xiaoguo with admiration. Not only was Zhuang Zhuang amazing, his mother was the same too…

Li Shouji quickly finished the noodles in his bowl. After eating, he asked for a second serving, and then a third…

In between eating, he still took the time to give Xiaoguo a thumbs up. He was impressed that Xiaoguo could cook so well!

At first, Jiang Danhe listened attentively to Zhuang Zhuang’s narration of Xiaoguo’s merits. However, when he heard that she made shoes and clothes, he suddenly felt a trace of jealousy in his heart. It turned out that his brother-in-law had those things, but he did not…

Jiang Danhe quietly approached Xiaoguo. Seeing that everyone else was busy eating, he leaned in and whispered in her ear, “I haven’t worn any clothes that you’ve made.”

Xiaoguo coughed and patted her chest. She looked up at the others and saw that no one had noticed anything amiss. Then, she turned to look at Jiang Danhe. Why did she detect a hint of resentment just now?

Jiang Danhe sat up straight after saying that. When Xiaoguo turned to look at him, his ears turned red uncontrollably.

Jiang Danhe really wanted to cover his ears, but by doing that, it would draw attention to himself. Therefore, he tried his best to stop his ears from turning red. However, this was something beyond his control. The only thing he could do was to stop himself from reaching for his ears.

Xiaoguo could see his red ears at a glance—it was hard to miss them. She watched as the ears of the tanned-skin man suddenly turned red, and she saw them become redder and redder.

Xiaoguo did not dare to laugh out loud. She lowered her head and used the bowl to block her smile.

Everyone finished all the potato noodles in the basin and returned to their rooms with bloated bellies.

This was especially so for Li Shouji and Xiaoyi. They were so stuffed that they could barely stand.

Jiang Danhe rubbed his stomach. He still wanted to eat more, but he felt a little shy under Xiaoguo’s gaze. In just a short while, Li Shouji had already refilled two bowls.

Jiang Danhe helped Li Shouji back into the house as the latter was groaning from having eaten too much.

Jiang Danhe really wished that the man could fall to his death. “How useless he is.”

Xiaoguo was the same as everyone else. She was so stuffed that she couldn’t lie down. When Zhuang Zhuang saw her like this, he thought of the eating exercises that Xiaoguo had taught him before.

In the past, Zhuang Zhuang did not restrain himself when eating. He would keep eating until he was very full, so Xiaoguo had taught him some exercise.

From then on, fitness exercises became digestive exercises.

“Xiao Yi, come here. I’ll teach you some exercises for digestion.”

Xiaoyi was pulled up by Zhuang Zhuang. Then, with a dazed expression, he followed Zhuang Zhuang and moved his limbs and hips.

Slowly, he started to feel better and his tummy was less bloated. Hence, Xiaoyi paid more attention as he worked on the moves with Zhuang Zhuang.

Xiaoguo watched as the two little children twisted and shook from side to side, with their buttocks swaying in front of her.

“They are so cute…”

Xiaoguo felt like her heart was melting. She really felt like biting them…