Chapter 57 The Key to the Problem

A week later, Zheng Da renewed his hotel stay for another week.

Two weeks later, Zheng Siyuan felt that his father should seriously consider buying a house nearby—staying in a hotel every day was really inconvenient.

If Qin Huai hadn’t repeatedly emphasized to Chen Huihong that Zheng Da and Zheng Siyuan were not new pastry chefs hired by Yunzhong Cafeteria, and that the recruitment process had to continue, Chen Huihong would have already called her brother to take down the recruitment notice.

In the kitchen, Zheng Da and Zheng Siyuan were still staring in deep confusion at the freshly steamed locust flower buns. Outside the kitchen, Qin Huai had already started slacking off.

Calling it “slacking off” wasn’t entirely accurate, because Qin Huai did have something serious to attend to.

The community committee had scheduled a visit to Luo Jun for the day after tomorrow.

It was said that Dr. Qu had been away on a business trip recently. Without Dr. Qu and Chen Huihong leading the team, the community staff found it difficult to face direct interaction with Luo Jun, which caused the visit to be delayed again and again.

Other elderly residents living alone had already been visited, and even the public account articles had been written. Only Luo Jun’s visit still required some mental preparation from everyone.

“10 a.m. the day after tomorrow. Sister Hong asked me to inform you,” Ou Yang said. “Qin Huai, you’d better be prepared. Bring plenty of freshly made buns, pastries, steamed items, and herbal tea. Also buy some nice fruit. Our Uncle Luo from the community is a photographer—he’ll be taking pictures. When you hand things over, try to pose a bit so the photos come out well.”

Qin Huai nodded, not really paying close attention.

If Ou Yang hadn’t come to him today, he would have almost forgotten he still had a side task.

If the buckwheat bun phase had been like losing himself in obsession, then during this period, the locust flower bun challenge felt like cultivation going awry—on the verge of defecting from the “demonic path.”

Qin Huai glanced at Zheng Da and Zheng Siyuan in the kitchen.

Mm, those two were still in the “going astray” stage.

One locust flower bun had driven three pastry chefs to madness. One could only say an S-tier bun was truly extraordinary.

“Got it. I’ll prepare more,” Qin Huai said. “There’s something I’d like to ask you about.”

Ou Yang adopted an attentive posture.

“A few days ago, Sister Hong suddenly contacted my mom and recommended many private high schools for Luo Luo—some in Guangdong Province and some here.”

“Oh, isn’t Luo Luo registered in Guangdong? Can she study high school here?” Ou Yang’s focus immediately shifted.

“International schools. The most expensive one costs 600,000 yuan per year. As long as tuition isn’t an issue, she can definitely attend,” Qin Huai said.

Ou Yang gasped.

Qin Huai: …

You rich second-generation acting poor? Your yearly business earnings could cover Luo Luo’s high school tuition for ten years.

“How did Sister Hong know my mom was worried about Luo Luo’s high school?” Qin Huai asked. “Did you tell her?”

“I didn’t!” Ou Yang looked innocent. “I didn’t even know about it. I see Luo Luo happily eating every day, so I assumed she did well on her exams.”

“So has your aunt decided? Will Luo Luo go back home for high school or attend an international school here?”

“She’ll definitely go back,” Qin Huai said. “My mom thinks private school tuition is already too expensive, let alone international school. One year of international school tuition alone could cover Luo Luo’s cram classes until she’s exhausted.”

“And my mom used to watch too many dramas like Meteor Garden when she was young. She worries that even if our cafeteria earns decently now, if she and my dad scrape together their savings to send Luo Luo to an international school, kids like us from ordinary families would get bullied there. Luo Luo is quite strong—if she fights back and ends up beating three people and injuring them, we’d have to pay compensation.”

“But the most important reason is that studying at an international high school usually means going abroad later, which is even more expensive. You know my parents—they believe the cafeteria is something left to me by my biological parents, my own asset. The money for Luo Luo’s education should be their responsibility.”

Ou Yang caught another key point: “Summer break is almost over. Luo Luo will have to go back when school starts.”

“Not only Luo Luo. My mom will go back too. I’ve already asked Sister Hong to help post recruitment notices to hire a few more general workers.”

“I won’t talk to you anymore—I need to go make buns,” Qin Huai said, standing up and heading back to the kitchen.

Ou Yang, still immersed in the sadness of losing his meal buddy to school, sighed for a while before deciding to order two cups of freshly made lemon tea.

Soon he wouldn’t be able to drink them anymore—sigh.

In the kitchen, Zheng Siyuan and Zheng Da had already started another round of locust flower bun making.

After washing his hands, Qin Huai returned to the workstation and scooped out two spoonfuls of honey from the jar. Looking at the nearly empty jar, he felt it was time to contact Granny Ding and ask her to have her relatives supply more honey.

This locust flower honey was truly excellent.

Qin Huai diluted the honey with warm water.

During this period, the three of them had studied everything they possibly could—even the principles of honey fermentation had been thoroughly analyzed by Qin Huai and Zheng Siyuan.

Honey itself does not ferment easily, as it lacks certain chemical components required by yeast. However, it is fascinating that honey contains microorganisms that can grow and reproduce under suitable conditions, enabling fermentation.

More interestingly, these microorganisms consume starch in the dough to grow, which in turn inhibits the dough’s fermentation. As a result, fermenting dough with honey is extremely difficult. It requires strict control of temperature, humidity, and the amount of honey used.

If the temperature is too low, the dough won’t ferment. Too high, and it over-ferments. If the fermentation time is too short, the dough becomes dry and hard; if too long, it might give an unexpected “surprise.”

In a sense, honey fermentation is even harder than achieving an impossible client request like “vibrant black” or “radiant white.”

However, under such strict conditions, combined with specific ingredients and techniques, honey fermentation can produce exceptionally delicious pastries.

Locust flower buns were one such example.

Over the two weeks of doubt and frustration, Zheng Da had not failed to question the feasibility of honey fermentation. He experimented with different doughs—plain flour, corn flour, and sorghum flour for making the locust flower buns—but all of them tasted significantly worse than Qin Huai’s recipe.

This only reinforced Zheng Da and Zheng Siyuan’s belief that Qin Huai’s recipe was indeed a family secret.

If their buns didn’t turn out well, it wasn’t a problem with the bun itself—it was their own problem.

As Qin Huai stirred the honey water, his thoughts drifted.

Honey fermentation really is a difficult and temperamental “lady.”

Nothing works, everything is picky—and even if nothing goes wrong, that’s somehow a problem too.

Where on earth is the issue?

Looking at the honey, Qin Huai suddenly thought: could it be that Granny Ding’s locust flower honey is too good?

If dough requires a mix of fine flour and buckwheat flour, then maybe honey also needs to be a mix of inferior and high-quality honey.

He couldn’t help but laugh at his own idea.

What kind of problems could honey possibly have…

Wait.

Why couldn’t honey have a problem?

Granny Ding’s relative’s family specialized in selling honey. Their products were commercially processed and had passed quality inspections.

These honeys are typically heated to around 60°C to melt before processing.

Qin Huai froze.

Right—why hadn’t he thought of that?

The honey was processed!

If he wanted to fully replicate the locust flower bun process, he needed to recreate the original ingredients as closely as possible. In Jiang Chengde’s era, how could processed honey have been available?

The locust flower honey Jiang Chengde used must have been naturally matured and purely natural.

It likely wasn’t as visually refined and wouldn’t have been filtered so cleanly.

Qin Huai quickly took out his phone.

“Hello, Granny Ding, it’s Xiao Qin—the one from Yunzhong Cafeteria.”

“Yes, yes, the Xiao Qin from before. I specially saved your number in case I needed to buy locust flower honey again.”

“Yes, I do want to buy locust flower honey. I wanted to ask if you can get pure, unprocessed wild locust flower honey—doesn’t have to be wild, but it must be natural and unprocessed.”

“Could you help ask your relatives? Thank you so much—I really appreciate it, and it’s a bit urgent.”

“You’ll give me an answer tonight? If available, could I get it the day after tomorrow? That would be great—thank you so much!”

“You couldn’t get the fermented rice buns this morning? You want some for tonight at home? No problem—come in two hours, and the fermented rice buns will be ready.”

“No trouble at all—it’s me who should be thanking you!”