Chapter 502 - 496_1
However, this time Lin Yue also needed to prepare local products as gifts for Princess Yongle and Lady Roujia to take with her, which did indeed require her own careful consideration. After all, considering the status of Princess Yongle and Lady Roujia, she had to prepare only the finest items, and they had to align with their preferences and tastes. This required Lin Yue to put in quite an effort.
Yet Lin Yue was quite willing to personally prepare the gifts for Princess Yongle and Lady Roujia. Not to mention that there had been a friendship between them, Princess Yongle and Lady Roujia had taken good care of her when she was in Capital City and even after returning to Xin’an City, it was under their protection that the Magistrate Ceng Lu had been so cautious as not to trouble her, although Jiang Ziqi was a factor in this, the role played by Princess Yongle and Lady Roujia was not insignificant. Otherwise, despite her previous good relations with the Jiang Family, Ceng Lu wouldn’t have been so considerate.
For Princess Yongle and Lady Roujia, the gifts didn’t need to be numerous, but they absolutely had to be exquisite. Not to mention that Lin Yue personally made the Fragrant Soap based on the standards of the batch previously sent overseas, even the various prepared foods were made by Lin Yue and Wang Dachuan together, which naturally tasted much better than those from the workshops. The finished embroidered products, needless to say, were embroidered by Lin Yue herself, although they had been completed earlier by Lin Yue, who then had Zhang Qiusheng mount them according to the designs she had drawn. There were also some ingeniously carved trinkets that Lin Yue had recently come up with and had Lin Qiusheng carve out.
Just preparing gifts for Princess Yongle and Lady Roujia had taken Lin Yue seven or eight days to get everything ready. She had the Jiang Family send them along with the goods to Princess Yongle and Lady Roujia. Having spent so much effort on these gifts, Lin Yue could imagine the happy expressions on Princess Yongle’s and Lady Roujia’s faces upon receiving them.
With autumn past and winter coming, the crops in the fields had long been harvested. Lin Yue, having finally found some free time, began to ponder over culinary delights again. Considering the scarcity of vegetables in winter, she had someone build a greenhouse. This was no particular innovation; big households all did this. However, Lin Yue’s greenhouse was improved by her own guidance, making it more scientific and economical than those of other big households, ultimately yielding better vegetables, including a new variety that others didn’t have: "mushrooms".
Speaking of mushrooms, the Haishi family’s contribution was the greatest. At the time, Lin Yue, struck by inspiration, had shared the method of mushroom cultivation from her memory, instructing Haishi’s daughter-in-law to command the servants to give it a try, without expecting it to succeed—after all, theory and practical application differed significantly. It was only her craving that made her hope for a success.