Burp~
Burp~
After Lin Zhe and Lin Xiaomeng finished the egg fried rice on their plates, they split what remained in the stainless-steel inner pot.
Stuffed and satisfied, Lin Zhe sprawled on the sofa without a shred of dignity, burping away.
Lin Xiaomeng showed a little more restraint, pacing around the room to get her digestion moving.
"Zhe, today's egg fried rice was just too delicious. I accidentally ate too much..."
Recalling how she had wolfed down her food as though she had never eaten before, Lin Xiaomeng couldn't help blushing.
Guys, can anyone relate? A sweet, well-behaved girl like me actually polished off two heaping plates of egg fried rice!
What an appetite!
"Burp~ It really was delicious."
"Xiaomeng, your cooking is amazing. I feel like-burp~-the two of us could open a little restaurant together."
"We wouldn't even need to sell anything else. Just your egg fried rice. Burp~"
"We could make our fortune and reach the pinnacle of life-burp~!"
Lin Zhe was painfully full too. Even when he and Dan Teng went to a seafood buffet costing over a thousand yuan, he hadn't stuffed himself this much.
"Ahem, my cooking is nothing special. It's mainly because the eggs from your chickens taste so good, Zhe!"
Lin Xiaomeng had a clear understanding of her own cooking skills.
She was just an ordinary home cook, nowhere near the professional chefs at hotels.
More than half the credit for the delicious egg fried rice she had made today belonged to those eggs.
"By the way, Zhe, where did you buy those chickens? Their eggs taste so good that I want to buy a few and keep them in our yard."
Lin Xiaomeng looked at Lin Zhe. Before today, raising chickens would never have crossed her mind, but after tasting these eggs, she wanted a few herself!
Lin Zhe made up a story without batting an eye. "A friend who ran a farm asked me to look after those chickens for him. He emigrated.
"Before he left, he specifically told me I could eat the eggs, but I couldn't touch his chickens.
"That guy treasures those chickens more than his wife. He definitely wouldn't sell them, so I'm afraid I can't help you."
"Oh, I see. That's such a shame..."
After hearing his explanation, Lin Xiaomeng immediately abandoned the idea of buying them.
Actually, it made sense when she thought about it. Chickens that laid such delicious eggs surely couldn't be ordinary chickens, could they?
They had to be some rare breed. If they were hers, she probably wouldn't sell them either!
Even if they were for sale, they probably wouldn't come cheap!
She had been too hasty.
As Lin Zhe lay there digesting his meal, his mind kept working, considering how to turn these delicious eggs into money.
Of the one hundred chickens he had received from checking in at the Fox Nibbling Chicken attraction, only one was a rooster. All the others were hens.
According to the detailed notes about the chickens on the check-in panel, each chicken could lay once a day, producing one egg each time.
In other words, he could get ninety-nine eggs a day. There was no way he and Lin Xiaomeng could eat them all.
He needed to find a way to make money from the remaining eggs.
Selling them directly as farm-fresh free-range eggs was one option, but...
Farm-fresh eggs were still eggs, not gold or silver.
Selling them cheaply wouldn't be worth it, while charging too much would leave him without buyers.
A tray held around thirty eggs. If he charged a hundred yuan per tray, people would think it was expensive and inevitably call him a greedy merchant.
After turning it over in his mind, Lin Zhe felt it would be better to do some basic processing before selling the eggs.
For instance, turning them into egg fried rice like they had eaten for lunch was far better than selling the eggs directly.
At the moment, even an ordinary serving of egg fried rice at the restaurants in the scenic area cost fourteen or fifteen yuan.
Charging 29.9 yuan a serving for his delicious egg fried rice wasn't unreasonable, was it?
As for why he would charge 29.9 rather than round it up to thirty yuan, that was a little trick involving consumer psychology.
Although the difference was only ten cents, one price began with a two and the other with a three, giving people a different impression.
Including the gas, oil, salt, and other seasonings, a serving of egg fried rice would cost roughly five yuan to make.
That meant he could earn twenty-five yuan from each serving sold.
Selling ten servings a day would bring in an extra 250 yuan. Over a month, that would amount to seven or eight thousand yuan, about enough to cover his parents' medical bills for the month.
"This business could work!"
The more Lin Zhe thought about it, the more he felt this venture was worth pursuing!
Anyone who tasted such delicious egg fried rice would absolutely be drawn in by its flavor and become its captive!
"Xiaomeng, I've decided. I'm going to reopen our Fortunate Inn's little dining hall."
Having made up his mind, Lin Zhe looked at Lin Xiaomeng and announced his decision.
"Reopen the dining hall?"
Lin Xiaomeng looked at him in confusion.
"Oh, I forgot. You joined us later, so you don't know about the Fortunate Inn's dining hall."
Lin Zhe explained, "Back when my parents ran the inn, Dad handled the front of house, welcoming guests and dealing with all the inn's affairs.
"Mom ran the Fortunate Appetite dining hall in the back courtyard. One handled the front, and the other handled things behind the scenes.
"The Fortunate Appetite dining hall offered breakfast, lunch, and dinner to guests staying at our Fortunate Inn.
"Of course, since the kitchen's facilities were limited, the three meals were just simple home-style dishes and staples.
"Things like steamed buns, griddle flatbreads, and handmade dumplings.
"Then there were simple meals like egg fried rice, egg noodles, and stir-fried rice vermicelli.
"After my parents were hospitalized, the inn ran into some operational problems too.
"Some employees left for other jobs, while others quit. We were badly understaffed, so I closed the dining hall."
Realization dawned on Lin Xiaomeng. "Oh, I wondered why the kitchen in the back courtyard had such a complete set of cooking equipment. So there used to be a dining hall..."
Lin Zhe nodded. "Right. Now I want to reopen our little dining hall and see whether we can get it going.
"If the trial run succeeds, I'll promote you to manager of our Fortunate Appetite dining hall!"
"Huh? Me? Manager?" Lin Xiaomeng pointed at the high bridge of her nose, disbelief written all over her face.
I'm just a fresh college graduate with absolutely no work experience!
And just like that... I'm going to be a manager?
How many years of detours would this save me!
Of course... Lin Xiaomeng also knew that she would most likely be a manager without any staff.
But a manager without staff was still a manager!
"That's right! You. From now on, you're the manager of our Fortunate Appetite dining hall."
"Xiaomeng, don't let our small team fool you. Once our business plan passes its trial run, I'll hire a few more helpers for you."
"Once we reach our first milestone, I'll hire eight or ten employees for you to manage!"
"If our dining hall becomes a huge success, you might even end up managing eighty or a hundred employees!"
"Didn't you study business management in college? Stick with me, and your chance to show what you can do will come soon."
"In the not-too-distant future, you'll be a proper, bona fide Director Lin!"
Lin Zhe wasn't merely dangling empty promises in front of Lin Xiaomeng. He genuinely wanted to get the Fortunate Appetite dining hall up and running.
"Ahem, I'll follow your lead, Zhe. Whatever you ask me to do, I'll do it."
Stirred by Lin Zhe's words, Lin Xiaomeng felt a surge of ambition.
Zhe thinks so highly of me, and he's even promoting me to manager. I absolutely can't let him down!
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