Everyday Life in Song Dynasty Streets

Completed: The Little Food Shop of Bianjing Coming soon: After Our Family Is Seized, We Farm Our Way Back to the Top. See the bottom for details. Yun Tao transmigrates to the prosperous Great Song Dynasty, but finds herself out in the countryside. With only a young girl by her side, Yun Tao sells off her farmland and heads to Bianjing to seek help from her uncle. Unfortunately, her uncle's family has just been sent away to serve as officials, so Yun Tao and her little sister settle at the Guanyin Nunnery on the outskirts of the capital. Before she arrives: The nunnery is small and poor. We may not be able to support two young ladies. After she arrives: Miss Yun Tao, don't go! We can talk this out! With her excellent cooking, Yun Tao manages to establish herself at the nunnery. Before long, its vegetarian dishes become well-known, and many wealthy families in the capital come to try them. Even the ramshackle nunnery's incense offerings begin to flourish. From a little nunnery on the outskirts to Sweetwater Lane in the inner city, Yun Tao uses her cooking to build herself a comfortable life. Crispy duck with rouge sauce, fish with pickled cabbage in golden broth, braised fish head with crab roe, old duck soup with dried bamboo shoots, chicken braised with five-finger peach root... Later, Yun Tao takes a liking to Wei Sanlang of Jiming Village at the foot of the mountain. He's tall and strong, and a hard worker, so she simply marries him into her family. The bustling city of Bianjing in the Great Song Dynasty is full of colorful characters: smooth-talking market women, a chubby little novice sneaking snacks, a woman who slaughters pigs at the market, and musicians plucking their pipa in the theaters... (Half farming, half running a business. Set in an alternate version of the Great Song Dynasty. Some ingredients that didn't exist at the time may appear, so please don't worry about historical accuracy.) Coming Soon: After Our Family Is Seized, We Farm Our Way Back to the Top Su He, the eldest daughter of the fourth branch of the Bai family, comes from humble origins. Her father is a farmer, and she only marries into a powerful family after saving Old Master Bai by chance. Among her sisters-in-law, she's the least noticeable. Her greatest joy is eating, drinking, and living life as she pleases. But less than two years after she marries into the Bai family, the struggle over the heir to the throne brings disaster upon them. Her father-in-law and eldest brother-in-law are killed, and the whole family is thrown into prison. She hasn't enjoyed the good life for long before she goes from a highborn lady to a prisoner. Su He is stunned. Wait, what happened to the promised riches and carefree life? Fortunately, even though their property is confiscated, the family is released after spending some time in prison. The pampered young masters and ladies are dumbstruck: together, they can't scrape together a single coin. Old Madam Bai has no choice but to lead the family back to their hometown in Sishui. They still have ten-odd acres of ancestral land that escaped confiscation, so the family settles in Sishui County... The eldest sister-in-law, now a widow, takes up embroidery. The second sister-in-law, a former military officer, picks up a pig-killing knife. The third sister-in-law takes charge of the family kitchen. Su He, once the least noticeable one, becomes the family's backbone in farming. Ever since the Bai family moves to Taohua Village, things have gotten lively. One day a Bai family's concubine-born son wants to split off from the family; the next, one of their wives beats her husband; the day after that, a concubine wants to remarry... The commotion is endless, but with Old Madam Bai at the helm, the family steadily prospers. They move from a thatched hut by a graveyard into a big house, and through business and the civil service examinations, they manage to rise again. Theme: Hard work creates a better life