Chapter 755: If You're Not Eager to Eat, There's Something Wrong with Your Head

As the sounds of the double-kickers rang out one after another, the men, young and old, who had finished working in the fields in the village, all brought their own large bowls or small basins and walked toward Wang An's house.

That's how it was in this era; with so many people, everyone had to bring their own bowls. Everyone had a limited number of bowls at home. As for chopsticks, it didn't matter; bringing them was fine, and not bringing them was also fine.

Anyway, if the host didn't have enough chopsticks, using two tree branches as chopsticks was the same; no one would care about such things.

Everyone who came walked incredibly fast, fearing they would be left behind. It was clear that everyone had been prepared for a long time, just waiting for the sound of the firecrackers to come over and eat.

However, this is understandable. After all, every household didn't have much grain. With such a rare opportunity to have a full meal, who wouldn't be eager? As the saying goes, if you're not eager to eat, there's something wrong with your head!

Of course, this saying isn't very accurate, because even people with something wrong with their heads know they are hungry, and they are also very eager to eat.

For example, Comrade Niu Dazhuang.

Just as Wang An reached the gate after digging the dirt, he saw Niu Dazhuang sprinting over. He was running so fast, really moving.

And under Niu Dazhuang's influence, the people who were already walking briskly toward Wang An's house moved even faster than before.

Watching the crowd gradually gathering, Wang An suddenly had the feeling of "a single arrow pierces the clouds, and thousands of troops come to meet."

As the crowd gathered, Wang An greeted everyone while roughly counting. Not counting the women cooking, there were over 40 men! And this didn't even include the Wang family members. If you added Great Uncle Wang Dashu and Second Uncle Wang Daliang, along with their four sons, it would be around 50 people!

To be honest, this number of people was truly a bit too many.

It was just building a brick house; where would you need so many people!

Fortunately, Wang Dazhu and Liu Guilan had experience in this area. When they were kneading and proofing the dough yesterday, they used a full 90 jin of cornmeal mixed with 10 jin of white flour.

Normally, one jin of flour can make about 1.4 to 1.5 jin of buns. Therefore, Wang An's family made over 140 jin of buns just this morning.

From this, it can be seen that building a house is absolutely a bone-breaking matter for ordinary commoners.

Of course, this is only the case for Wang An's family; other families aren't like this.

Because in this era, when building a house, it can be said that over 99% of families build ordinary earthen houses.

And for building an earthen house, you only need to find a dozen or so people to build the earthen walls; seven or eight people are even enough.

To be honest, with this many people building a house, just the food alone could eat a person into poverty.

After everyone had entered the courtyard and sat down, Wang An stood at the gate and waited for a while. Five minutes later, seeing that no one else was coming, Wang An shouted into the courtyard, "No one else is coming, let's eat."

Hearing Wang An's shout, the group of helpers stood up one after another and crowded toward the stove.

The women guarding the stove lifted the lid of the large pot, and the full pot of stewed vegetables was enough to demonstrate the formidable strength of Wang An's family.

A mixture of one-quarter black bear meat and three-quarters tofu and dried cabbage made people drool just looking at it.

As the aroma of the meat permeated the air, everyone's stomachs began to growl.

However, in this era when all of China was suffering from famine, this situation was extremely normal, so there was no such thing as anyone laughing at anyone else.

Actually, by comparison, people in the Northeast region in this era could still be considered quite fortunate.

Although there wasn't enough grain to eat, the wild vegetables, mushrooms, and dried fruits in the mountains truly saved many people's lives.

Looking at the meat and vegetables in the pot, the group of people began to discuss with smiles.

"The Old Wang family is really generous; there's really a lot of meat in this dish."

"Yeah, there's a lot of meat and plenty of tofu too. I haven't eaten tofu since before the New Year."

"I'm just craving meat. My family hasn't seen any meat since the New Year."

"That's like saying no one else craves meat." Looking at the pile of heads surrounding the stove, Li Guilan asked Wang Dazhu in a low voice:

"Head of the house, have you counted how many people came? Will 300 buns be enough?"

This kind of thing must be figured out; otherwise, if the buns aren't enough to eat, that would be shitty.

Of course, it wouldn't be that shitty, but the group of women comrades would have to figure out how to make something else to eat.

There's no way around it; in the countryside, there's a custom that those doing physical labor eat first. To put it plainly, it's actually the men who eat first.

At this time, Wang An, who was nearby, said with a smile:

"I counted. Not counting the people from our own extended family, 41 people came in total."

The three words "extended family" here refer generally to Wang Dazhu's brothers and Wang An's uncles and cousins.

Hearing Wang An say this, Wang Dazhu and his wife muttered and calculated for a long time, finally concluding that these buns were enough to eat.

With peace of mind, Liu Guilan walked to the stove and shouted to the crowd:

"Everyone gets 4 buns first. If it's not enough, come and take more."

That's what Liu Guilan said, but in fact, everyone knew that each person would only get 4. One bun is over half a jin, so four buns are definitely over 2 jin. Although many people couldn't eat their fill, this was how it was passed out.

Fortunately, there were plenty of vegetables today, and they were quite substantial. Even if they couldn't eat their fill, it wouldn't be too far off.

And the reason Liu Guilan had to do this was actually because there was no other choice.

Even though Wang Dazhu and his wife had prepared in advance, they truly hadn't expected so many people to come.

If everyone ate as much as they wanted, then these nearly 150 jin of buns would absolutely, definitely not be enough.

Because in this era, for an adult to eat two and a half to 3 jin of buns can be said to be an easy and pleasant matter.

Hearing Liu Guilan's words, many people in the crowd showed very disappointed expressions. It was clear that these people had come with the intention of having a big meal.

However, the food at Wang An's house was already substantial enough, and they were providing three meals a day, which was quite generous, so the crowd didn't say anything.

Just like that, each person ate their 4 half-jin buns along with a full large bowl of meat and vegetables, eating with slurping sounds.

Soon, sighs of satisfaction came from the group of men.

"Ah, this meat is so fragrant. When will we be able to eat meat every day?"

"Yeah, haven't had meat in so long. It's really satisfying."

"In all these years of helping out, the Old Wang family's dish has the most meat."

"That's for sure, it's even better than what my family ate before the New Year."

After the group of men had all started eating, the group of women comrades and the few children began to use their chopsticks.

However, immediately after, the sound of Wang Xiaomei and Wang Xiaoli picking meat for Goushenzi could be heard.

"Brother Goushenzi, here, eat some meat."

"Brother Goushenzi, look how thin you are. You can have all this meat."

Someone who didn't know would think these two sisters were so sensible. Only those who knew understood that these two sisters didn't eat fat meat at all!

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 756 =====