So I bought the jars and vegetables anyway. It's an investment for pickled vegetables of the future. I'll have to leave the jars in a cool place outside of storage. Do I have such a place? No. But that's a problem for future me.
Current me has the problem of being very close to broke. Broke and with no ingredients for bahn mi. Broke with no bahn mi, and crepes the locals don't want to buy.
I need money. So I am falling back on the tried and true option to turn very little money into medium amounts of money. It's cheap, fast, and has the two addicting ingredients that almost all humans love: butter and salt. That's right. Popcorn.
I get back to the cart, toss my shopping into storage, and set up the popping cage for popcorn. I always keep stocked up on popcorn whenever I'm in a reality that has it cheap. Because as often as I tell myself I will be more fiscally responsible, I end up falling back to popcorn more often than not.
This time I will raise the prices just a bit more than average. Popcorn will be a novelty here. At least I think so. I can't remember an episode ever showing the snack.
After looking at the prices in the market, the Naruto Ryo is worth about 10 cents USD. That means I was selling the breakfast sausages for about a dollar a piece. And the crepes would have been two dollars. No wonder I'm broke. “Next time check the local economy first idiot.”
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I priced the popcorn at 20 Ryo for a small 1.5 cup bag, and a 9 cup bag for 100 Ryo. Then because everyone chooses the middle size, I set out a single giant 30 cup paper bag for 380 Ryo. I use a few stones to hold down the empty sample bags. Then I painted a sign by tracing over the system translation of English to the local writing. It took a few minutes, but I had a very smart looking sign that explained the sizes and pricing.
The popcorn pot was now hot enough, so I added the oil and let it coat the drum. I have
a wonderful antique popcorn maker. Well, simi antique, I bought it from P.T. Barnum himself. However, it was the Hugh Jackman musical version from a few years ago. It looks old but has modern wiring.
Period piece realities have such odd quirks. I was in Ben-Hur (1959) 's ancient Rome and a centurion walked by with a gold wristwatch. I tried to point it out to him but he got confused and wondered what I was talking about. Then it vanished. The soldier thought I was trying something funny and I had to give him some free fried dough balls with garum ( fish sauce) to stop him from being upset. Still, what a day, I was able to buy 5 large jars of garum. I poured them into a modern pitcher. These alternate realities can Random modern wristwatch but also an ancient condiment who's exact recipe has been lost to time. Well, lost for everyone else. I have 3 gallons, and a system that can create ingredient lists.
