On the day her engagement was broken off, Tian Xiaoman had only 43 yuan in her pocket. She didn't return to her village. Instead, she went alone to the county town, relying on the braising recipe her grandmother had left her. She started by selling braised eggs for fifty cents each outside the vegetable market. When Ma Guixiang cheated customers with a rigged scale, Xiaoman exposed her in public. When Zhao Pangzi demanded a basin fee, she pushed her cart to another street. When Qian Youde demanded seventy percent of her profits, she flatly refused. When Qin Wan tore down her stall, Xiaoman rushed out clutching its sign, without spilling a drop of her precious old broth. From an enamel basin to Xiaoman's Kitchen, from working alone to hiring staff and opening a proper shop, she simmered the humiliation of her broken engagement into a pot of broth that never went cold. Her mother had remarried without taking her along, but later returned to help tend the fire. Xiaoman says, 'As long as the old broth keeps simmering, people can keep going.'