When Wang An arrived home, Comrade Liu Guilan was tinkering with the dumpling filling. Seeing Wang An return, Liu Guilan hurriedly called out to him
"Xiao An, the filling is chopped. Hurry up and mix it."
Wang An gave an affirmative response and walked into the kitchen.
Ever since the time Wang An had shown off his dumpling-wrapping skills, whenever the family ate dumplings and Wang An happened to be home, the task of mixing the filling basically fell to him.
There was no helping it; even though Wang An had taught the method of mixing the filling to Liu Guilan and Mu Xueqing, the filling they produced using the same method was simply not as delicious as Wang An's. It would be strange if it were.
It had to be said that this was a rather perplexing matter.
Wang An took the basin of minced meat and added Sichuan pepper powder, soy-based broth, MSG, salt, and the chopped green onions and cilantro that Liu Guilan had already prepared.
He then used chopsticks to stir the mixture in the basin very rapidly in a clockwise direction.
When stirring dumpling filling, one must remember not to switch between clockwise and counter-clockwise motions; otherwise, the filling would be loose once cooked.
Therefore, it had to be consistently clockwise, or consistently counter-clockwise.
Once he noticed that all the minced meat in the basin had formed a convex mound, the filling was considered well-mixed.
It was best to let the meat sit for a while after mixing so that the flavors of the seasonings could fully marinate into the meat; only filling prepared this way would produce the most delicious dumplings.
After mixing the filling, Wang An called over Wang Yi, and the three of them—including Wang Dazhu—used brooms to sweep the courtyard.
When they spent New Year's in the old courtyard last year, the space wasn't that large. Spending New Year's in the new courtyard this year made sweeping an absolutely grueling task.
Mainly, the Wang family's courtyard was simply too large. The open area of the front yard alone—the space from the east wing to the west wing, and from the main house to the deer shed, pigpen, and sheepfold—covered over three mu, which was a full 2,000 square meters.
One could imagine how massive the workload was to sweep over 2,000 square meters by hand with brooms.
Fortunately, the courtyard was relatively clean, so the three generations simply gave it a basic sweep.
Even so, the three of them were busy until nearly 6 PM before they finished sweeping the yard.
During this time, Shen Wei and Zhao Cuiyun had also arrived from their homes and fed all of the Wang family's livestock.
Once everything was finished, the extended Wang family, along with Shen Wei and her daughter and Zhao Cuiyun and her daughter, all gathered in the living room of Wang Dazhu's house, eating snacks and watching television.
The only pity was that this year's Spring Festival Gala had not yet started; what was playing on TV was the "National Literary and Art Workers' Spring Festival Greeting," which was actually a recorded program.
Of course, even so, everyone watched with great interest.
After watching TV for a while, Liu Guilan moved the kneading board, rolling pin, flour basin, and dumpling filling onto the large coffee table in the living room. After everyone washed their hands, they slowly wrapped the dumplings for the night's meal while continuing to watch TV.
One had to admit that Liu Guilan was quite sharp; to be able to watch TV, she had come up with such a brilliant idea.
During last year's New Year, Wang An had placed 16 one-cent coins in the dumplings. This year, Wang An had prepared 30 coins.
Furthermore, Wang An planned that for future New Year's celebrations, he would put 30 coins in the evening dumplings.
Mainly, because it was "New Year's Eve" (Nian San Shi—literally "Year Thirty"), putting 30 coins on the night of the 30th matched the number 30 and ensured that "every bite bit into money," which was absolutely perfect.
When Wang An boiled the 30 coins in boiling water and placed them on the kneading board, not only were Shen Wei and Zhao Cuiyun stunned, but even Liu Guilan and Wang Dazhu, who had experienced Wang An's divine operations before, were a bit bewildered seeing these 30 coins.
Wang Dazhu poked at the pile of coins and said with a face full of astonishment
"What are you trying to do here? You're actually going to wrap this much money into the dumplings?"
Liu Guilan also said, sounding speechless
"Last year's number wasn't exactly modest enough. And now you've come up with this many this year? Putting this much money in the dumplings isn't even enough to prop up a tooth."
Mu Xueqing added with a wry smile
"Exactly. If someone accidentally bites a coin, how uncomfortable would that be?"
Wang An remained unmoved, saying with a beaming smile
"Isn't more money better? If you eat money this year, you'll be able to carry strings of money to spend next year. I'm telling you, listen to me and you can't go wrong."
Pausing for a moment, Wang An added cheekily
"Do you know why our family's life has been so good this year? It's because we put so much money in the dumplings before last year's New Year. Let me ask you, did everyone in the family eat money last year? Think about it, doesn't that make sense?"
Although Wang An's line of reasoning was pure, unadulterated sophistry, who wouldn't want a bit of good luck during the New Year? Who wouldn't want to "bite into money" with every mouthful?
Liu Guilan, who was already quite invested in these mystical matters, thought about it and felt it made a lot of sense. She then pretended to be helpless and said to Wang An
"You're the only one who can talk like that; you always have an explanation for everything."
Turning around, Liu Guilan cautioned the two young ladies, Wang Xiaomei and Wang Xiaoli, as well as Xiao Lai-jie and Gou Shengzi
"The four of you be careful before eating the dumplings; don't swallow the money and get it stuck in your throats."
Liu Guilan was still somewhat worried about this point, but Gou Shengzi was already 9 years old after the New Year, and even the youngest, Xiao Lai-jie, was already 6, so it shouldn't be a big problem.
Moreover, since Shen Wei's mother-in-law had passed away, Xiao Lai-jie had practically lived at the Wang house every day. Whatever Wang Xiaomei and Wang Xiaoli ate, she ate as well, so she was quite well-fed. If it weren't for the fact that there was money to be found in the dumplings, these three little girls might not have eaten a single dumpling.
There was no helping it; children with too good a life were like this—they barely ate their main meals.
And so, a full 30 one-cent coins were wrapped into the dumplings by everyone.
After finishing the dumplings, everyone continued eating snacks and watching TV. Time passed unnoticed until it was past 11 PM.
At this hour, people usually entered the land of dreams, so the four children could no longer hold out and were sleepy.
But today was New Year's, and the local custom was to stay awake until after midnight.
So, led by Wang An and Wang Yi, Wang Xiaomei, Wang Xiaoli, Xiao Lai-jie, and Gou Shengzi all ran outside to set off firecrackers.
This year's firecrackers had been bought by Wang An in Harbin, so there was a decent variety.
Besides the standard "two-step" crackers, "thunder" crackers, and strings of small firecrackers, Wang An had also bought plenty of children's toys like friction crackers, pop-its, sky-rockets, large sparklers, small sparklers, and so on.
Most importantly, the three of them had bought many ceremonial fireworks in Harbin.
Compared to the "two-step" crackers, these ceremonial fireworks were much easier to set off; one only needed to light the fuse, and it would automatically ignite the crackers inside the paper tube one by one, launching them into the sky to explode.
So many fireworks and crackers instantly energized the sleepy children. Each one of them was overjoyed and never tired of the fun.
Wang An and Wang Yi led the children in a boisterous celebration until nearly midnight. Only then did Wang An have Wang Yi light the "Great Red" string of firecrackers, which was a full 40 meters long.
As for Wang An himself, he lit several ceremonial fireworks in succession. (End of Chapter)