Baozi Xishi's Struggle

Chapter 275 Hawthorn Osmanthus Cake and Candied Haws

Yu Cheng said this, smacking his lips as if he was still unsatisfied.

Shen Yu thought of the copper pot full of hawthorn fruits, and nodded with a smile: "Mom is right, you only think about eating."

"If you want to eat it, wait until tomorrow when I'm free. I'll make some and it'll be just right for you to eat when you get back from school."

Yucheng and Dundun were so happy that they smiled happily and kept thanking their elder sister. At Li's urging, they returned to their room.

After Yucheng and the others left, Li sighed, "If Mr. Yang can really reconcile with his father, it will be a blessing for Yucheng and Dundun."

Everyone thought it was a good thing and after some discussion, they went back to their rooms to rest.

Early the next morning, Shen Yu washed the hawthorn fruits and hung them up to dry by the well.

Uncle Yang gave a lot of hawthorn fruits, filling up a whole soup pot.

Shen Yu planned to keep a portion of it, cut it into slices, and dry it. He would then put two slices into the broth to remove the fishy smell and increase the flavor. With the rest, he would make some hawthorn and osmanthus cake and candied haws.

After working in the store for a while, Shen Yu returned to the backyard when he saw that there were fewer customers eating breakfast.

Take the drained hawthorn fruits to the kitchen, remove the cores with chopsticks, pick out a plate of large round ones, and keep them for making candied haws.

The rest was sliced, spread out on a bamboo plate, and left in the sun to continue drying.

The other part is chopped into pieces to make hawthorn cake, which will cook faster.

Shen Yu tasted a small piece when it was being chopped up, and it was so sour that his face wrinkled into a bitter gourd.

I stopped what I was doing and thought that if I added some pears, it would be more moisturized and not so sour.

She waved to Yutao who was in the shop and asked her to go to the fruit stall on the street to buy some autumn pears, oranges and apples.

This is the season when autumn pears and citrus fruits are on the market. They are cheap and delicious.

Yutao also likes to eat hawthorn cake. She was wondering how the hawthorn cake was cooked. When she saw Shen Yu calling her, she came over immediately.

He wrote down the fruits that Shen Yu wanted, took a purse and a bamboo basket, went through the small door of the shop, and went to buy the fruits.

Not long after, before Shen Yu had finished cutting the hawthorn fruits, Yutao came back carrying two large bamboo baskets.

Shen Yu took a look and found that Yutao not only bought the fruits he wanted, but also bought half a basket of hawthorn fruits.

Shen Yu looked at the half-full basket of hawthorn berries and felt a headache: "Why buy hawthorn berries again?"

Yutao blinked her big eyes, looking puzzled: "Mom heard that you were going to make mountain peach and osmanthus cake and candied haws again, and was afraid that the hawthorns sent by Uncle Yang would not be enough, so she stuffed a bamboo basket in my hand and asked me to buy some more."

Shen Yu smiled helplessly: "This is too much. I didn't explain it clearly. Candied haws can be made with more than just hawthorn. Many fruits can be used to make it."

Yutao was surprised and asked, "Sister asked me to buy these fruits. Didn't she want me to eat them directly? Can she also use them to make candied haws?"

Shen Yu smiled and said, "Yes, a lot of fruits can be used, such as citrus, apples, walnuts, and yams. All of them are fine."

Yutao said excitedly: "My mother and the others are in the shop right now, so they don't need me. Is there anything I can do to help make the candied haws? I'll help."

Shen Yu smiled and said, "Okay, then help me wash these fruits and I'll cut them."

Yutao agreed, took a basin, put the fruits in it and went to wash.

Shen Yu cut the fruit pieces needed to make hawthorn cake, then took two autumn pears, peeled, cored and chopped them up. Then he took the soup pot, poured all the chopped fruit pieces into it, and added cold water.

Light up the small stove, put the soup pot on it, and simmer over low heat.

While hawthorn cake was cooking on the stove, Shen Yu began to process the fruits that Yutao had washed.

After peeling the citrus, remove the pith and separate it into segments.

Peel the autumn pears and apples, and cut them into pieces the same size as the hawthorn berries.

Peel the yam and cut it into pieces, blanch it in hot water and then rinse it with cold water.

Try to peel the walnuts into complete kernels.

After all these are done, you can string them together.

Take a handful of bamboo skewers for making fried skewers, and string the cut fruit pieces, walnuts, and selected hawthorn berries into strings one by one.

After Shen Yu had strung several strings, he finally thought of preparing a tool to insert the candied haws.

She stood up and walked around the kitchen but couldn't find a suitable one. She thought, I can't just make a straw basket out of straw like the ones selling candied haws on the street?

Don't say you don't know how. Where can you find straw at this moment?

Zhou Dalang, who was making pancakes nearby, asked Shen Yu what he was looking for and gave him some advice: "There is a small bamboo basket in the kitchen. Put something inside to hold it down, and stick bamboo sticks on the outside, and the candied haws will stand upright."

Shen Yu thought about it and decided that this was indeed a good idea, so he took the bamboo basket that he had put aside because it was too small.

Put a large cabbage in the basket to press it down, pick up a bamboo stick, and insert it through the gap outside the basket. It is indeed stable and convenient, and you can insert many sticks by turning it in a circle.

After washing the fruits and helping to string the fruits onto the skewers, Yutao saw that there was nothing else she could do, so she went to the shop to help.

Shen Yu was watching over the stove, stirring the autumn pears and hawthorns in the pot with a spoon, pressing them as he stirred, trying to press the fruits into a paste.

When it seems that it is almost cooked, the soup in the pot starts to become thick and there are no whole fruit pieces left, add an appropriate amount of granulated sugar.

Keep stirring with a spoon until the fruit puree has been cooked into a thick paste. Pour the cooked fruit puree into an oiled square plate, scrape the surface with a spatula, and set it aside to wait for it to solidify.

After making the hawthorn cake, Shen Yu cleaned the soup pot, filled a small bowl with half a bowl of cold water, and poured some roasted white sesame seeds into it on a flat tray.

After completing these preparations, put the small wok used for cooking on the stove, and start to boil the sugar water in a ratio of two to one between sugar and water. First boil it over high heat, then simmer over low heat until the sugar water is thick and slightly changes color.

Shen Yu took a bamboo stick, dipped it in some sugar water, put it in the cold water prepared nearby, took it out, pinched the sugar stuck on it, and found that it had become hard and brittle, which meant that the sugar water was ready.

Quickly move the small iron pot to the pot rack next to it, tilt the pot to make it steady, pick up the skewered fruit, and quickly roll it in the sugar water.

Some fruit bunches are directly inserted back into the bamboo basket, while others are rolled in white sesame seeds and then dipped in some white sesame seeds before being inserted back.

I was a little hesitant at the first few, but it got easier and easier as I followed along. When the syrup got cold, I put it back on the stove to heat it up again.

Just do this while heating, and in less than an incense stick of time, twenty or thirty strings of fancy candied haws are ready.

Shen Yu felt that the kitchen was too hot, and because there was steam from the pancake maker next door, he was worried that the sugar shell would melt easily if he put it here.

He carefully placed the bamboo basket on a large tray, carried the tray to Yucheng's room, and placed it on the desk to dry.