After the Double Ninth Festival, Merchant Guo and Madam Li had nearly cleared their remaining stock and began packing for their departure.

Shen Shaoguang gave them a large box of flower cakes, saying, “These can tide you over if you miss any roadside inns during your journey.”

Looking at the box of beautiful assorted flower cakes, Madam Li smiled, “I couldn’t bear to eat these on the road. I’ll take them home to let everyone see and taste these capital delicacies. We don’t have such things in the countryside.” After all, having lived in Chang’an for so many years, she had been eager to leave before, but now that it was time to go, she began to appreciate its merits.

“It’s not far. You can always come back to visit whenever you want,” Shen Shaoguang still carried traces of the future’s global village mentality.

Madam Li took it as mere consolation and held her hand rather reluctantly, “The key is that we’ll never have such a good neighbor as Young Miss again.”

Shen Shaoguang smiled, “But you’ll have your daughters and daughters-in-law attending to you. Living happily together as a family is wonderful.”

Hearing this, Madam Li nodded with a smile, “Isn’t that exactly what we’re looking forward to?”

…

After seeing off the former tenants, Shen Shaoguang arranged for masons and carpenters to begin renovating the new shop. Before this, she had already negotiated with the old shop’s landlord about breaking through the wall and renewed the lease for another two years.

With the shop’s current stable and substantial income, even with rent payments and renovation costs, finances weren’t a concern.

The renovation didn’t require careful material conservation or cost-cutting measures. With the old shop as a foundation and the two spaces connected, they needed consistency rather than new styles or patterns, making this renovation relatively straightforward.

Snow-white painted walls with wooden shelves holding potted plants and small trinkets bought from the Western Market – clay figurines of foreigners and foreign horses, woven bird decorations, horn instruments, and such. Later they would hang a few paintings, which would be enough for the atmosphere.

Matching natural wood dining tables, and with enough space, the new shop wouldn’t need a wall-facing counter like the old one – they’d keep the old shop’s setup unchanged — some people might prefer that style for solitary drinking.

The floor was covered with barbarian rugs – the old shop had used bamboo mats, but they proved impractical, with bamboo strips quickly coming loose and potentially hurting customers’ feet. The mats were also hard to clean, so Shen Shaoguang had already covered the main areas with barbarian rugs. This time, she simply standardized everything.

These barbarian rugs, probably woven from a mixture of camel hair, cow hair, and sheep wool, showed varying shades of brown mixed with white in thick braided patterns, somewhat similar to the felt of later generations, though much coarser.

Despite being foreign items, they weren’t very expensive, nowhere near the famous Xuancheng red-lined carpets or even Chang’an’s local velvet floor coverings. But they were quite suitable for a small tavern, especially since they matched the overall color scheme well.

The kitchen was naturally expanded, with masons building thin walls and carpenters making wooden doors, leaving a service window to the main hall while keeping the outward-facing windows fixed.

What delighted Shen Shaoguang most was that the new shop’s backyard had its small well, eliminating the need to fetch water from outside, and allowing them to make various “iced” snacks in summer.

As for the backyard house renovation, it was even simpler. The previous tenant, Madam Li, had been quite particular – the floor was already tiled, and the owner had provided beds and cabinets. Shen Shaoguang only needed to paint the walls, repair broken tiles, and provide suitable curtains and bedding before moving in.

Shen Shaoguang and A Yuan would use the large bedroom and hall, while the smaller side room with access to the courtyard would be perfect for Yu San.

When moving out, the Abbess led Jing Qing, Jing Ci, and others to see them off at the temple gate. Shen Shaoguang respectfully bowed to the Abbess again. When she had first left the palace without a place to stay, Abbess Yuan Jue had not only taken her in despite their poverty but had treated her with extra kindness – something Shen Shaoguang would always remember.

Abbess Yuan Jue gave her a benevolent smile.

Shen Shaoguang smiled, “When Abbess finishes writing the pastry scripture, please allow me to study it.”

Abbess Yuan Jue and Jing Qing both laughed, only Jing Ci seemed unhappy. She had been calculating when to persuade the Abbess to drive this poor girl away, but now that she had left on her own, Jing Ci felt dissatisfied. It was like a man who wanted to break up with his girlfriend but felt humiliated when she initiated the breakup first.

After moving in, there was another round of cleaning, organizing, and arranging, with two trips to the Western Market for additional items. It took several more days, and the weather had turned cold before everything finally settled down.

After closing the shop front for the day, Shen Shaoguang finished washing up and read a few pages in her room. Then, wearing loose shoes, she came out and pointed at the cured meat, ham, and various game meats hanging under the eaves in the courtyard, asking Yu San, who had just finished washing up: “Why isn’t this meat red and firm yet?”

Yu San went inside to get a bamboo skewer, poked the meat, and said, “Young Miss should stop checking so often. It makes it seem like there’s no change at all.”

This isn’t… how is this my fault?

Shen Shaoguang suddenly recalled the legendary “Quantum Zeno Effect” – “If we continuously observe an unstable particle, it will not decay.” Because “in quantum mechanics, so-called ‘observation’ will produce classical mechanical physical quantities. High-frequency observation will slow down system transitions.”

So, was it really because I kept checking that the meat wasn’t curing properly?

Seeing Shen Shaoguang taking it seriously, Yu San was first surprised, then began to laugh. Usually, maintaining a lifeless ghost-like appearance and speaking with occasional sarcasm, who knew his smile could be so pure and gentle?

Shen Shaoguang realized she had been teased but wasn’t angry. Instead, she smiled at Yu San: “You should smile more often, it looks so good!”

Yu San, probably embarrassed about his lapse in expression management, ignored Shen Shaoguang and went straight back to his room.

What can you do with a tsundere princess you chose yourself? Just spoil them! Shen Shaoguang pursed her lips, imitated Yu San’s drooping eyebrows and eyes expression, and continued looking at the hanging cured meats, imagining them becoming honey-glazed ham, gold-and-silver trotters, winter bamboo shoots with ham…

The technique of curing and air-drying meat had existed since ancient times – after all, Confucius had accepted ten pieces of dried cured meat as tuition. Many Tang people loved cured fish and meat – it was said the previous emperor enjoyed dried venison, but the current emperor didn’t care for it much, so the palace made less of it, and Shen Shaoguang hadn’t been able to learn any techniques there.

Fortunately, Yu San’s former master was from the south, and thankfully was a food enthusiast, so although Yu San wasn’t very skilled in curing pork legs, he was good at curing game meat.

While Shen Shaoguang’s practical skills weren’t great, her theoretical knowledge was solid. She had once done a special feature on ham curing and had personally visited ham masters in the Jiangzhe region for interviews.

Curing ham was a meticulous process. The leg selection was crucial – the whole pig should be around eighty jin, neither too small nor too large, with the rear leg weighing between seven to eight jin.

When cutting the leg, care was needed to maintain the proper shape – truly following the principle of “won’t eat if not cut properly,” which was why there was a “reshaping” step in the process.

During curing, there were multiple rounds of salting, with specific requirements for the type of salt used and particular techniques for massaging the pork leg.

After several rounds of salting, taking about a month, came washing, and drying, followed by fermentation, stacking, and many other steps. Not only were there many procedures, but each step was particular. Starting the curing in the autumn or winter of one year, it wouldn’t be ready until the summer of the next year, and connoisseurs preferred two-year or three-year hams.

She had once read Eight Banner nobleman and essayist Tang Lusun’s mention of adding a dog leg when curing ham to enhance the flavor. Shen Shaoguang had asked the master she interviewed about this – such slightly mystical yet folksy details would make the article much more interesting than just describing procedures.

Whether this procedure had been lost or not, that proper young ham master in his sterile work clothes, looking like a surgeon, firmly shook his head at Shen Shaoguang. She was disappointed she couldn’t add some “dog leg” flavor to her article.

Shen Shaoguang hadn’t always been so fond of ham. She was from the north, and her family didn’t have these cured goods.

In her childhood, southern relatives once gave her father what was claimed to be genuine or perhaps not-so-genuine Jinhua ham. That leg was stewed until it was greasy and overly salty, with a strange taste – Shen Shaoguang took one bite and never touched it again. Later she learned it might have been because her mother hadn’t properly treated the meat surface or dripping oil.

She properly experienced various ham dishes after starting work. All sorts of dishes with ham as main or supplementary ingredients nearly made her tongue fall off from their deliciousness.

Compared to fresh meat, ham had a unique mature, fermented flavor, just like how mature men compared to young handsome boys – those eyes that had seen a thousand sails, those knowing smiles, even the wrinkles carried the curves of time’s polishing. In comparison, young men seemed too hasty and direct, lacking that bit of “soul.”

In her previous life, there were several “uncles” in domestic and foreign entertainment circles that Shen Shaoguang admired. Looking at the crescent moon in the sky, she wistfully thought that they would never know they had a devoted fan in another time and space.

After crossing over, Shen Shaoguang had seen several handsome men, such as the current emperor, who was quite good-looking and had the added bonus of status – calling him dragon-like and phoenix-like might be flattery, but wasn’t far off; several princes were also very handsome.

The Li family was originally from the Longxi gentry, the kind with priority in mate selection, and after gaining the throne, their imperial harem was filled with beauties. Generation after generation of beautiful genes accumulated – it would have been hard to be ugly.

Speaking of gentry looks, Shen Shaoguang couldn’t help but think of the poker-faced Assistant Magistrate Lin from the same ward, surely also a product of generations of superior genes. Those features truly had a poetic and picturesque quality, and his bearing was excellent – beautiful without being effeminate, dignified without being fierce, possessing both a scholar’s elegance and an official’s authority. Tsk tsk… if only he weren’t so expressionless!

Assistant Magistrate Lin’s friend was quite handsome too, with romantic features, especially his captivating eyes, but seeing him made Shen Shaoguang think of the line “Ten years of Yangzhou dreams, only to gain a reputation for being fickle in the pleasure quarters.”

Looking at the rows of curing meat, Shen Shaoguang took stock of all the handsome men she knew and sighed deeply – when the meat was properly cured, she would first steam some with yellow wine and sugar to eat.