Q: Would you spend 5,000 yuan to invite three or five friends to an ordinary family for a private meal?

A: 5000 yuan a meal, are you crazy?

Q: If the chef is the Shanghai girl below, do you think it is worth it?

A: Well, it's quite interesting. . .

Haha, the girl in the picture is the founder of "Xiaoyi Private Kitchen" and the most beautiful chef in Shanghai after 1980s, Shen Xiaoyi.

Today, she is a "private kitchen owner+internet celebrity" and has been reported by famous TV food programs in Shanghai, such as Intoxicating Shanghai, Popular Eating, and Going Home for Dinner. In September, she also logged into a food platform owned by a well-known domestic video media, recorded the video of "Eating Taro II", and gained 10W+ reading. Come on, let's see.

Three years ago, at home, she was a financial petty bourgeoisie girl who never got dirty and never left the kitchen. What made her experience such earth-shaking changes in three years?

Shen Xiaoyi was born in a well-off family in Shanghai. Her mother is kind and virtuous, and her father is funny and capable. Her birth brought unusual happiness to this ordinary family. A family of three lives a warm and jade-like life. My father works hard every day, and my mother cooks delicious meals at home, making the small family warm and tidy.

Shanghainese are used to raising their daughters expensively. Xiaoyi never does housework at home and never leaves the kitchen before becoming a monk. She tries to enjoy herself on her parents' knees every day, enjoying flowers in spring, swimming in the lake in summer, eating crabs in autumn and plums in winter. Life is like running water. Twenty years have passed, and the women in Shenyang have grown up. Xiaoyi has also become a graceful, bright-eyed, intelligent and clever housewife and lane girl.

After graduating from college, Xiaoyi stepped into the most enviable hot industry in Shanghai-securities industry, and became a financial petty bourgeoisie girl (which was once her nickname in Weibo). Since then, a smart and beautiful working girl has appeared in the financial circle. I imagined Xiaoyi standing in front of the bank building on the Bund in plain cheongsam, vaguely feeling that she was back in the era of the Republic of China, when there were wars, beautiful women and heroes.

In the past few years, Xiaoyi has done very well in the company, getting a raise or promotion every year; However, under the appearance of her good girl, a heart gradually began to yearn for a bigger and more wonderful world.

But how did she start cooking private cuisine? Please calm down and listen to me slowly.

In the first 20 years of her life, Xiaoyi's life was smooth sailing, with loving parents, considerate boyfriend, smooth work and many friends. Except for some minor faults of girls, her life can be described as enviable.

However, things are unpredictable. Maybe God is jealous of Xiao Yi's luck and determined to give her some hardships in life. At the end of 20 12, on the fourth day after Mr. Xiaoyi received the certificate, his mother died suddenly in her sleep without leaving a word.

Xiao Yihe's father was stunned by this sudden blow, especially when the father and daughter were about to get married, but at this time they lost their beloved wife who had accompanied and taken care of themselves for decades. No matter how strong he is, he still can't face this cruel fact, and he doesn't want to go home, because no one will cook the home-cooked food he has eaten for decades after returning home. Since then, he often eats and lives in the unit on the grounds of overtime, and the whole person is getting haggard.

Xiaoyi saw it in her eyes and felt pain in her heart. She regretted that her mother didn't learn any cooking when she was alive. She doesn't know anything. How can she take care of her father? Sad, Xiaoyi slowly began to face the reality, because she was busy with her mother's funeral and her own marriage. Under such double pressure, Xiaoyi resigned from his high-paying job in a securities company and returned to his family.

After returning home, Xiaoyi first faced the problem of cooking. A girl who has never been in the kitchen now has to take care of her father, not her mother and her new husband. What will Xiao Yi do?

I have always thought that Shanghai women have a natural self-confidence and courage, as well as a stubborn and tasteful life. Xiaoyi is no exception. She started from scratch, holding an iPad in one hand, cooking in the other, and reading the menu. In half a year, her cooking improved by leaps and bounds. Mr. Xiaoyi, who often socializes outside and has eaten all the famous restaurants in Shanghai, has also become her die-hard fan. She is still in the circle of friends with Amway Xiaoyi's dishes, turning her home into a gathering place for friends. At most, 17 guests come to her house. At that time, Xiao Yi's rookie skills were still not skilled, and he was busy until the evening 1 1.

I also forgot to mention that Shanghai women also have a natural business mind and marketing ability. Because of her delicious, studious and hospitable, Xiaoyi's private kitchen is becoming more and more famous in the circle of friends. 20 14, a year after Xiao Yi began to learn to cook, he was interviewed by a TV station. On the night of the program broadcast, Xiaoyi received more than 30 phone calls, some praised her, and some paid to come to her house for private cuisine.

Next, she really started taking orders at home! OMG, there should be applause here! It takes courage as well as cooking for a girl to entertain a large table of strangers at home. For the first time, Mr. Xiaoyi has been hiding in the back room for fear of an accident. Fortunately, the first single hit was a hit, and Xiaoyi private cuisine was born.

After reading this, you must be thinking, Xiaoyi is really lucky. She became an online celebrity overnight and succeeded in starting a business once. Is that really the case?

The fact is, before cooking private cuisine, she opened a Taobao shop, sold clothes and made takeout. She once drove more than 20 kilometers to send two pigeons, and once stayed up late to cook more than 1000 wonton.

The start of entrepreneurship is naturally not so smooth. Family and friends are xiaoyi's strongest backing. Her father and husband love her and let her do what she likes without worrying about material life. In-laws spoil her, be her private kitchen mouse and encourage her to keep trying; Friends are her biggest push team, and Akiba, the founder of Akiba PPT, also speaks for her braised beef tendon.

In such a life experience, the former financial petty bourgeoisie put down her reserve, rolled up her sleeves and made great efforts in the small world of kitchen.

Xiaoyi once wrote an article entitled "Talk about your experience | Don't force yourself, your world will always be black and white". One sentence particularly touched me: "The harder you work, the luckier you are. Serious people change themselves, and persistent people change their destiny. " She is really such a serious, hardworking and persistent person.

Xiaoyi is now a "three-legged woman, private kitchen+micro shop+self-media". Her daily work is:

If you want to eat Xiaoyi private cuisine now, you need to book it three months in advance. The point is that you may not be able to book it!

Micro-store is a channel to bring stable cash flow to Xiaoyi, and the workload can be controlled within an acceptable range. The official WeChat account started operation in April this year, and now it has accumulated more than 1.5 million fans, so Xiaoyi "will spend at least 5 hours to 10 hours to write articles every two or three days, not including the time for taking photos and retouching pictures".

Even with such efforts, the fans of the official WeChat account did not naturally accumulate at first. At first, Xiao Yi didn't find a feeling about the operation of the official WeChat account. Until May of this year, she joined the first knowledge-based IP training camp of teacher Akiba. In the activities of the Shanghai team, she invited everyone to make a "consultation" for her official WeChat account, and made clear the operating objectives and methods of the official WeChat account. After continuous efforts and interaction with other partners, she finally achieved the goal of over 10,000 fans on the official WeChat account.

Xiaoyi's daily life is often written in her WeChat articles. I rummaged through her WeChat articles and found that she seldom wrote about her hard work, and her articles would be accompanied by her photos. Whether it's a selfie or someone else's photo, she is always beautiful.

However, in our interview, she told me how much work it takes to make a private kitchen for eight people:

Shopping (3 hours): Get up at 5 am. After simple washing, I can't even eat breakfast Go to the vegetable market by bike and make sure to buy the freshest and best ingredients in the morning. Because the ingredients need to be purchased according to the final menu of the guests, it is often necessary to go to several vegetable markets and buy a cake for breakfast on the way. Because it is a private kitchen, all the procedures are completed by Xiaoyi himself, and the procurement needs to be checked by himself to ensure that every dish is full of sincerity.

Preparation of ingredients (5-6 hours): I have been preparing ingredients all morning, and all kinds of ingredients have been washed and cut. Cold dishes and snacks need to be prepared first to ensure that guests can serve the table soon after arrival.

Table preparation (1 hour): with the cooperation of the assistant, set the table, clean up the room and prepare for the arrival of guests.

Cooking (1-2 hours): guests usually arrive around 6 pm, so cooking needs to start before the guests arrive, and ensure that the dishes can be continuously served during the meal.

Cleaning (2 hours): Guests usually leave around 9 o'clock. Xiaoyi and her assistant also need to clean the table and wash the dishes, and then do a thorough cleaning of the room the next day.

After the completion of this series of processes, it is often 1 1 p.m. After a simple rest and washing, you can lie down and rest at 12.

When I was chatting with Xiao Yi here that day, I calculated that Xiao Yi needed to work continuously 18 hours every time he cooked a private kitchen. This kind of labor intensity was really unprecedented in securities companies before. She said that every time I finish private cooking, it's like cooking a table of New Year's Eve, and I have to rest the next day.

Writing here, I suddenly remembered the phrase "one porridge and one meal" in Zhu Xi's family instructions. It is difficult to keep thinking about material resources. "Being able to cook in good faith is just like meditation every day. Cooking, chopping wood and carrying water are meditation and a kind of spirit.

To tell you the truth, I really admire Xiaoyi. Not everyone can have such perseverance and execution and repeat such a simple thing with high quality. Not every girl has the courage to put down her figure, throw away the aura of the financial and securities industry and join the small and beautiful world of private cuisine.

At the end of the visit, I asked Xiaoyi what her future plans were. Xiaoyi's answer is "Xiaoyi". She said, "Just keep this state, make more friends and control the workload within a certain range. I am afraid that if I am too busy, I will feel tired and don't love. "

Ok, the article is written here, and the answer is revealed. 5000 yuan a meal of expensive private cuisine, purple sauce. This is made by a girl with her heart, hands and heart. Do you think it's worth it? I think it's worth it anyway.