Lettuce shrinks quickly when stir-fried, so if you buy it at the market, two heads might not be enough for a dish.
But now the two huge, plump heads quickly picked by Mother Wang are crisp when snapped, and the leaves are vibrantly green. When stir-fried, they have the effect of three or four market-bought heads.
"You did great, Wang Yangyang!"
As a mother, she can't help but smile brightly as she puts the plate of lettuce on the table: "Give me some of those seeds next time, so I can plant some on the balcony."
Wang Yangyang was just bringing over rice and was genuinely puzzled: "But those seeds are the same as the batch we planted last time! You said my planting was no good then."
So for the second planting, it was her mom who did it, not expecting much to grow, but just not wanting to waste the seeds.
After all, the lettuce from the first planting was sparse, with only a few leaves on each head. It took seven or eight heads to make a plate, which was quite embarrassing.
