Chapter 48 It’s All a Technical Problem

At 4 p.m. in the afternoon, the locust flower steamed buns came out of the steamer.

[Locust Flower Steamed Bun — C Grade]

Looking at the clearly failed batch of locust flower buns, Qin Huai knew that he must have made mistakes in many steps.

“Bro, bro, they’re done, right? Can we eat them? Why did these buns take so long to make? The previous batch of locust honey buns already sold out.” Qin Luo rushed to the steamer at the first moment.

Qin Huai nodded, indicating they could be eaten, and reminded her, “Blow on them a few more times and let them cool down.”

Wearing gloves, Qin Luo took out a locust flower bun from the steamer. Perhaps because she had eaten fermented rice buns in the past two days, she subconsciously squeezed the bun. Finding that this locust flower bun had far less elasticity than the fermented rice buns, she felt a bit disappointed and tore it open.

Qin Luo blew on the bun several times, tried to take a bite but failed due to the heat. She blew on it for another half minute, shook it a little, felt it was fine, and took a bite.

“Bro, your buns aren’t any different from the previous ones. They’re not very sweet either,” Qin Luo mumbled. “And they’re a bit hard. Did you not let the dough rise properly?”

Qin Huai felt that the buns and steamed breads Qin Luo had eaten over the years were not in vain—she immediately hit the point.

If the dough had been properly proofed, would this bun be C grade?

“Anything else?” Qin Huai broke off a small piece of the bun from Qin Luo’s hand and took a bite.

Very average.

Only slightly better than Qin Congwen’s craftsmanship.

“Anything else?” Qin Luo chewed a bit more and asked, “Isn’t this just an ordinary bun?”

Her implication was that there wasn’t much problem that could be tasted in a plain bun.

Qin Huai silently continued eating.

“Ordinary” was the biggest problem of this locust flower bun.

Turning an S-grade locust flower bun into an ordinary one—wasn’t that a serious issue?

“It’s still a fermentation problem,” Qin Huai muttered. “What’s so good about fermenting with honey?”

Last night, Qin Huai had studied honey fermentation. Using honey to leaven dough has a long history, but the reason it hasn’t been widely passed down is because honey was originally a substitute for yeast—it was only used when yeast wasn’t available.

Honey-based fermentation is difficult. It requires strict control of the ratio between honey and flour. Too much honey will cause the dough to fail. One must also consider season and temperature. It’s a high-difficulty, low-efficiency method from the past, and there’s a reason it hasn’t been widely preserved.

For this failure, Qin Huai even felt there were no objective external factors—it was entirely due to insufficient technical skill.

He even began to suspect that the signature of Qin Ji Pastry Shop was fermented rice buns, not the long-lost honey-leavened dough. Perhaps honey fermentation required such high skill that a generation of inheritors in Qin Ji Pastry Shop failed to meet the standard, causing it to be lost over time.

Qin Huai felt like scratching his head.

What should he do? He kind of wanted to ask for help online.

He wanted to ask netizens whether there were any descendants of Jiang Chengde or Qin Ji Pastry Shop who might kindly teach him some tricks for honey fermentation, or share techniques that could help him overcome the technical bottleneck.

Qin Huai felt he was becoming depraved—he was starting to think about taking shortcuts.

As expected, skills must be honed through practice.

Qin Huai swallowed the bun in his mouth and began practicing more.

Meanwhile, Grandma Ding walked into her home with the lightest steps she had taken in days, carrying a large bag of buns.

“Grandma!” her youngest granddaughter, who loved maple syrup with goat milk, ran over. “Eat buns!”

The little girl was only a little over two years old. She could only eat buns by holding them in her mouth, and her speech was still unclear. She was the main one who would cry loudly if there were no buns at home.

“Grandma bought buns that Miaomiao likes today. I’ll break one for you later!” Grandma Ding smiled as she took out a locust honey bun, then reached toward her grandson, who was sitting on the carpet happily watching cartoons. “Tutu, have a bun. Your favorite.”

Seeing that both his younger siblings had buns, the second granddaughter couldn’t stand it and protested loudly, “Grandma! Grandma! What about me?!”

“Tingting has some too—your favorite milk buckwheat bun. I went right when the buns just came out of the steamer. After paying, I hurried back immediately. It must taste great.”

Only then did Tingting happily run over and take her bun.

Seeing that everyone had buns, the eldest granddaughter and eldest grandson didn’t want to lose out and also ran over to ask for theirs. Grandma Ding was very experienced with this—she broke each bun into half for each child to nibble.

Now it was Elder Mr. Qiu, Grandma Ding’s husband, who felt surprised.

“Did Xiao Qin really make so many different flavors today?” Mr. Qiu picked from the remaining buns.

Grandma Ding smiled mysteriously, continuing to break buns carefully, making sure each piece was small to avoid her youngest granddaughter choking.

“You think the two bottles of locust honey I brought yesterday were for nothing? Xiao Qin is smart. I guessed that he must have forgotten about it in the first two days. When I peeked into the kitchen earlier, the jar of locust honey wasn’t even displayed.”

“As soon as I brought it yesterday, Xiao Qin made sure to prepare all the flavors our little ones like today. He knows what he’s doing. The conversations we have during afternoon tea, chatting casually—he listens and remembers everything,” Grandma Ding said, full of praise for Qin Huai.

“Speaking of tea, did you know the cafeteria is giving out cold herbal tea today? I heard you get one free with purchases over 25. You bought so many buns and didn’t bring back a cup?” Mr. Qiu’s thoughts jumped quickly.

“What cold tea? I told you to take the kids downstairs to play—were you being lazy and didn’t go out?” Grandma Ding’s gaze instantly turned sharp. “That tea is so bad it’s already spread to the neighborhood across the street. Old Xu said the tea was brewed by Luo Luo—he saw it himself when having breakfast this morning.”

“Luo Luo is a cute kid, but her skills are far behind his brother. Though I heard the hand-shaken lemon tea she makes is pretty good—the neighborhood committee folks are already drinking it. If you want some, go buy it yourself. In this heat, you expect me to run errands just for a drink?”

With that, Grandma Ding had already finished breaking the bun.

She gently coaxed her youngest granddaughter Miaomiao, telling her to open her mouth as she fed her a small piece of bun.

Miaomiao, with her teeth not fully grown, half-gnawed and half-held it in her mouth. After a while, she suddenly burst into loud crying.

“Not bun! Not bun!” Miaomiao’s cries echoed throughout the living room.

Grandma Ding panicked and took a bite herself, confirming, “It is maple syrup and goat milk flavor—it’s this taste!”

“No, no!” Miaomiao continued crying at the top of her lungs. “Want the previous one, the previous one!”

At that moment, the second granddaughter, who had already finished half a bun, chimed in, “Grandma, the buns from the day before yesterday were better.”

“The ones from the day before yesterday,” the youngest grandson echoed.

Within minutes, all the children started clamoring for the fermented rice buns from two days ago—including the eldest grandson who liked mung bean cakes and the eldest granddaughter who liked jujube cakes.

Grandma Ding: completely numb. All that effort was wasted. The locust honey was given for free. The world might as well be destroyed.

Mr. Qiu, whose hearing was somewhat poor but quite tolerant of the children’s noise, continued eating his bun and said, “I also think the fermented rice buns from two days ago were better.”

“Shut up!”