The Stepmother’s Counterattack: Raising a Child in a Bygone Era
Chapter 221 - 220: Bought Everything

Chapter 221: Chapter 220: Bought Everything

After the minor stock share disturbance, the couple’s relationship not only remained unaffected but in fact, grew stronger than before.

Shen Mingzhu granted Pei Yang the title of deputy factory director to facilitate his business operations.

Although the food factory had been profitable in November, with the drop in temperature, the sales of dried tofu and spicy strips also seemed to enter a winter freeze, with sales at various stores plummeting dramatically.

Shen Mingzhu had actually been prepared for this situation well in advance.

Dried tofu and spicy strips are cold foods, and naturally, children did not favor them in the cold winter.

And this was not even the worst scenario yet.

When schools went on winter break and the customer flow to the small stores and grocery shops around them diminished, the sales of spicy strips and dried tofu would become even more dismal.

In fact, as early as November, Shen Mingzhu was considering launching a new product to make up for the wintertime decline in popularity of dried tofu and spicy strips.

In the winter, people instinctively crave high-calorie foods.

Taking into account cost input, production processes, and audience appeal, Shen Mingzhu decided to make potato chips.

Using a special slicer, potatoes were cut into paper-thin slices, deep-fried until crispy, sprinkled with various prepared spices, and then sealed into small bags.

This kind of fried potato chip was a ubiquitous street snack in later generations.

Although the process seems simple, frying crispy and tasty potato chips has many tricks.

Firstly, the selection of potatoes was crucial; they had to choose ones with smooth texture, low starch content, and that were fresh.

Secondly, the sliced potatoes needed to be soaked to remove excess starch and then frozen.

With the current temperature in Fengcheng, freezing was actually very easy; simply leaving them outside would complete the freezing step.

If it were any other season, she would have had to spend a lot of money on a high-power freezer.

Just this one step saved a considerable amount of money.

Next came the frying, and to achieve a golden crispy texture, the oil temperature control and the need for a second frying had to be precisely mastered.

The last step was packaging.

Potato chips, unlike biscuit snacks, require nitrogen gas packaging, while biscuits only need a small bag of desiccant.

The smallest nitrogen gas packaging machine would cost around seven hundred yuan.

For the food factory at that time, this expense was indeed a significant pressure for Shen Mingzhu.

Pei Yang ran around for several days and almost turned the whole of Fengcheng upside down before finally finding an old, discarded nitrogen gas packaging machine for two hundred fifty yuan.

He asked Zhou Shuhuan, who was knowledgeable about electronic machinery, to help repair it and replace some parts. The total cost came up to exactly three hundred.

With everything ready, the food factory ceased the production of dried tofu and spicy strips and started making potato chips instead.

Leveraging the sales channels they had previously established and the potato chips’ excellent taste and flavor, the product was quite successful upon launch. While it didn’t compare to larger factories, it was certainly a rising star and secured a stable footing in the potato chip industry.

It was only when she saw the sales results that Shen Mingzhu’s nerves, tense for a month, finally relaxed.

Her mind eased and warmed by the cozy heating, Shen Mingzhu couldn’t help but feel sleepy.

Shen Mingzhu opened up the folding bed she had prepared in the office for Pei Ziheng and lay down to sleep for half an hour.

When she was woken up, the sky had already turned somewhat dark.

Father and son were squatting on either side of the bed, staring at her intently.

"What time is it?"

"It’s 6 o’clock."

Pei Ziheng’s dark eyes watched her intently, filled with concern, "Mom, are you sick? You slept for so long, and even Zhao Yun and the others playing with picture cards outside didn’t wake you up."

Pei Yang immediately placed her hand on Shen Mingzhu’s forehead to feel her temperature.

Perhaps because Pei Yang had just come back from outside, her hand was slightly cool, chilling Shen Mingzhu into an alert state and instantly rousing her from her drowsiness.

"I’m fine, I just didn’t sleep well last night."

In recent times, preoccupied with preparing the production of potato chips and worried about the new product not being accepted in the market, thus not making any money, she was under immense mental stress, which had also affected her sleep.

Upon finally relaxing, she naturally slept deeply and soundly.

It was already late, and too lazy to buy groceries to cook at home, the family of three ate in the canteen.

After dinner, around seven o’clock, the sky outside was pitch-black, and the bone-chilling wind grazing their faces was sharp as knives.

Wrapped in scarves, with hands tucked in their sleeves, the family of three ambled home along the street lamps laughing and chatting.

Approaching their residential complex, they encountered an old farmer carrying a yoke selling apples.

In such cold weather, the old farmer wore a jacket patched with cloth puddings and didn’t even have socks on, his thin ankles exposed, his slender frame slightly bent under the weight of the yoke.

"Apples, anyone? Home-grown apples, crisp and sweet, just ten cents a pound."

As he walked, the old farmer offered his apples to passersby along the way.

Despite being coldly rejected time after time, the old farmer’s face still bore smiles and hope.

Shen Mingzhu felt a pang of heartache and stepped forward intending to patronize his business.

The street lights weren’t very bright at night, and from a distance, she couldn’t see clearly; it was only when she drew closer that she recognized the old farmer as the one who had sold her river fish before.

Perhaps because she was bundled up well, the old farmer didn’t recognize her, eagerly picking out a large, red apple to offer her a taste, fearful of losing her as a customer.

Pinching the apple, Shen Mingzhu recalled she had just bought similar ones at the market a few days ago, for twenty-five cents a pound.

"These apples are so good, why are they selling so cheap?"

"There’s no helping it, they just won’t sell. In past years, the traders would buy them for eighty cents, but this year they’re only offering forty cents. These good apples, I just can’t bear to sell them so cheap, so I decided to carry them out and sell them myself."

As he spoke, the old farmer’s face was always smiling, but the bitterness, sadness, and helplessness in his words made Shen Mingzhu’s nose tingle with emotion.

She was not usually so sentimental, but today there was something different.

Pei Yang, noticing the shift in her emotions, squatted down and said to the old farmer, "Weigh all of these for me."

The old farmer was both shocked and overjoyed, yet he managed to say, "Buying so much, can you finish them all?"

"We can finish them. There are about a dozen workers in the factory, and these apples of yours will be eaten up in four or five days at most."

Hearing what Pei Yang said, the old farmer hurriedly found an old urea fertilizer bag, started loading apples into it, and apologetically explained to them, "I don’t have a bigger bag, so I can only use this one for you. My wife has washed this bag several times; it is clean."

"It’s okay, just pack them," Shen Mingzhu reassured.

While chatting amiably with the old farmer, Pei Yang’s right hand subtly stroked Shen Mingzhu’s back, silently comforting her melancholy.

"Do you still have many apples at home?"

"Yes, quite a bit. There are still about thirteen or fourteen hundred pounds like these, and there are also smaller, inferior ones totaling about a thousand pounds, which will just have to be fed to the animals."

Pei Yang reassured with a smile, "Selling a little each day, by the New Year, it should just about all be sold."

"That’s the plan. I hope they will all sell. The children are waiting for this money to pay for next year’s school fees."

Pei Yang was about to ask how many children he had when Shen Mingzhu suddenly made a surprising offer, "Eighty cents a pound, right? I’ll take all the apples you have at home."

Pei Yang was so startled she nearly lost her balance.