The village chief, who had already lined up by the door, stretched his head and glanced into the grain store. The grain inside was piled up half a wall high. How could there be no grain
At this time, the boy from the grain shop took the door panel and was about to close the shop door. The village chief was in a hurry, and was about to argue with the shopkeeper when Yu Hai came over, shook his hand lightly, and whispered, "Village chief, it's useless to argue with the shopkeeper. You saw it too, you just came here Personally, what did you tell him, the shopkeeper said that there is no food. The shopkeeper has no control over what the above means."
The shopkeeper of the grain store faintly heard the conversation between the two, and slightly nodded at Yu Hai. He felt that this person had a kind face, and after thinking about it for a while, he realized that this was not Yu Hai from Dongshan Village? The Yu family in Dongshan Village is very much trusted and respected by the future head of the Zhou family, and all the respectable servants of the Zhou family know this.
Although the shopkeeper didn't know why the future owner would treat a farmer differently, but as a servant of the Zhou family, he could figure out the meaning of the above and do what he liked, so that he could win the favor of the master. The servant who just came to inform him to close the door, and the price of food will rise by 50% tomorrow, is a celebrity around the eldest son of the big house. Although the eldest son is in charge of the Zhou family's grain shop, the third son of the second room is, after all, a reserve candidate for the head of the family. Which is more important, the shopkeeper of the grain shop has his own weight in mind.
The shopkeeper of the grain shop walked over with a smile on his face, and said to Yu Hai, "This is Brother Yu Hai, right?"
After seeing Yu Hai nodded, he said again: "Please take a step to speak!"
At this time, the door of Zhou's Grain Store was closed, and although the people queuing up in front of the door had been arguing for a while, they gradually dispersed. Only a dozen or so households from Dongshan Village who came to buy grain remained, looking at the village chief helplessly, waiting for him to speak.
The shopkeeper of the grain shop called Yu Hai aside, smiled and said, "Brother Yu Hai is here to buy grain?"
Nonsense, queuing in front of the grain store, isn't it buying grain, is it buying meat? Yu Hai nodded slightly, and said: "Yes, the village has been plagued by locusts, and the crops have failed. I want to store more food to see if I can survive the famine."
The shopkeeper of the grain shop thought for a while, and then said, "Brother Yu Hai, how much grain are you going to buy? You have also seen that our eldest son ordered the price to be raised after closing the door. However, if Brother Yu Hai buys it, it will be sold at today's price. It's time to make friends!"
Anyway, the Eldest Young Master doesn't know how much of the stored food in the store has been sold, so he gave Yu Hai a favor today so that he can make plans in the future. The manager of the grain shop is capable, but he lacks opportunities. If he can show his face in front of the future Patriarch from Yu Hai, with his ability, he will definitely not only be in charge of a small grain shop in the future.
Yu Hai showed embarrassment when he heard this, and slowly shook his head and said, "There are more than 30 households in our village, all of whom are waiting for food to save their lives! They are all from the same village, and I can't do anything to patronize myself and care about other people's lives." Come on!"
The manager of the grain shop hesitated for a moment, then gave Yu Hai a thumbs-up, and said, "Brother Yu Hai is indeed a kind and righteous person. I wonder how much grain your village needs? Within a thousand catties, I can still be the master!"
Yu Hai was overjoyed, and said eagerly: "Really? That's great! I'll go ask the village chief first, how much food is needed!"
Yu Hai ran over, pulled the village chief aside, and whispered to him about the shopkeeper's promise to give Dongshan Village a thousand catties of grain in private. This time, most of the people who came to buy grain with them were families who had no food in their hands and had not taken it back. There were only thirteen households.
Coarse grains usually cost five Wen a catty, but now the price at the Zhou Family Grain Shop is five times the usual price, which is twenty-five Wen a catty. These dozen or so families had a small surplus selling sea sausages and sea oysters, so although they felt distressed, none of them could afford to buy food. When they heard that the price of the grain store was going to increase, they all wanted to buy more grain and go home. But people only give them a thousand catties of grain to share, so what should I do
In the end, the village head made the decision, counting according to the head of the family. If the family has many members, it will share more; if it has few members, it will share less. On average, each household can buy at least seventy to eighty catties of grain. If you want to buy it again at this price, it's gone! tomorrow? Food prices should go up again!
More than a thousand catties of grain were loaded into the horse-drawn cart and donkey cart brought by Dongshan Village. Yu Hai bought a hundred catties of fine grain for a symbolic amount, and spent nearly five taels of silver. Yu Hai secretly sighed in his heart that the grain store is really a profitable business. When he came to purchase two days ago, he only bought about one or two hundred catties of fine grains, which cost five times more money for nothing!
When I got home, the whole family was busy too. Adults and children work together to pickle the caught locusts. The weather is hot and the locusts cannot be left for a long time.
With the help of Liu Shi and her aunt, Yu Xiaocao made grasshopper sauce. Locusts, commonly known as grasshoppers, have delicious meat, as delicious as shrimp, and are rich in protein and various amino acids. Eating them is very good for the human body.
In her previous life, she tried to make grasshopper sauce according to the method introduced on the Internet. It tasted very good and went well with rice. She asked her mother and eldest aunt to drown the caught locusts in water, wash them, and then took the wings away. The wings cannot be chopped, which will affect the taste.
Then use a ratio of one catty of locusts to one half of salt to marinate the locusts and let them ferment naturally. They can be eaten in about 20 days. There is also freshly fried grasshopper sauce, which uses minced meat, chopped green onion, and chili, and the grasshoppers are fried, chopped, and fried together. After they are cooked, they come out of the pan. The taste is even more fragrant than fried shrimp.
But fermented grasshopper paste, anyone can eat. If it is freshly fried grasshopper sauce, it is easy to be allergic to grasshoppers. Therefore, Yu Xiaocao cleaned seven or eight ten-jin jars and made a lot of fermented grasshopper sauce.
At noon, the family was not in the mood to cook anything else. Yu Xiaocao made cold grasshopper sauce. It is to fry the locusts, chop them up, mix them with fried crushed peanuts, add some coriander, pour over hot oil, then mix well with salt, sugar and chili oil.
I also made stir-fried grasshopper sauce, first cut the fat meat into small pieces, and cut the washed and dried grasshoppers into small pieces, then chopped them together with the meat pieces, and chopped them into a puree. Heat the pot over high heat, heat the oil to 50% heat, pour in the grasshopper puree, stir-fry until the fragrance is released, stir-fry until the water is slightly dry, fry the oil from the fat meat, fully blend with the grasshopper puree, pour in chopped green onion, Stir fry evenly, add salt and monosodium glutamate, then add chili granules, stir fry a few times and it will be out of the pan.
The fragrant smell of grasshopper sauce drifted with the wind to Zhou's house not far away. Zhou Coral couldn't hold back anymore, Sa Yazi ran over and asked, "Xiaocao, what delicious food did you cook again, it's so delicious, my saliva almost drools!!"
Yu Xiaocao told her how to make grasshopper sauce. When Zhou Shanhu heard that such a delicious smell was actually made of locusts, she couldn't hold back: "Xiaocao, wait a moment, I'll call my mother over. Tell her!"
Zhou Coral is one year older than Yu Xiaocao, and he has no talent in cooking, so he belongs to the type who can cook and eat. Let her learn to make grasshopper sauce, and it is estimated that she may not be able to make a plate of grasshopper sauce tomorrow.
After teaching Aunt Zhou how to make grasshopper sauce, Yu Xiaocao made a lot of pancakes out of miscellaneous grains. Pancake rolls with grasshopper sauce at noon.
Fortunately, the Yu family is not allergic to locusts. After the grasshoppers are fried, they are very crispy and taste very fragrant. Coupled with the unique grain aroma of pancakes, the whole family eats them with gusto. Xiao Shitou, who came back from the town, ate four big pancakes in one go, and he still couldn't get enough of it: "Fang Ping, we'll go to the foot of the West Mountain in a while and catch more locusts. From now on, we'll have grasshopper sauce all year round!"
Liu Yan'er glanced at him and said, "Dafutian, the locusts can't be kept for a few days, if they are all pickled into grasshopper sauce, there are not so many jars."
Xiao Fangping said in a childlike way: "It's okay, we can roast locusts, fry locusts, fry locusts, stew locusts... eat locusts every day!! Cousin's craftsmanship is so good, it must be delicious no matter what you do."
Everyone imagined that the table was full of locusts, and it became an insect feast, so they couldn't help shivering. Xiao Shitou smiled mysteriously and said: "You have forgotten that we have the ability to make ice. We can build an ice cellar at home to freeze all the locusts. In this way, even if the locust plague is over, when do we want to eat ants all year round?" Grasshopper sauce, take it out of the ice cellar and make it, won’t it be enough?”
"Ice cellar? That's something only rich masters can afford!" Liu Hu said to himself.
At this time, most of the ice cellars of rich people were collected from the river in winter and stored in the cellar. The manpower and material resources spent in it can be imagined. But Yu Xiaocao has mastered the ice-making skills in her hands, and even Da Futian can make ice.
In the afternoon, Yu Xiaocao was in charge of making ice, and Yu Hai led the family to vacate the cellar. By evening, the first batch of ice had been made, and this batch was made more, filling one-third of the cellar. In the afternoon, the person in charge of continuing to clean up the locusts also sent the first batch of locusts into the ice cellar.
Yu Caifeng looked at the ice in the cellar with some concern: "These ice won't melt overnight, right?"
Yu Xiaocao said confidently: "Don't worry, auntie! There is a lot of ice in storage, and the temperature of the ice cellar is low, so it won't melt too quickly. Besides, our cellar is dug deep, and the insulation measures above Well, it’s definitely no problem to change it into an ice cellar! It’s just that part of it is melted today, and it’s enough to add some ice tomorrow. The ice cellar of the rich man’s house can be stored from winter to summer, and we can’t keep it overnight. ?"
With an ice cellar, I am afraid that the locusts caught will be damaged. Under the leadership of Yu Caifeng and Liu Shi, the family gathered all the locusts they caught overnight and put them in the ice cellar for storage. The Yu family has all lived through hardships, especially in times of calamity, and they are very obsessed with food.
After struggling all night, except for a few children who didn't work the night shift the next day, everyone else ate breakfast and went back to the house to catch up on sleep. Xiao Shitou excitedly took the bag and basket and took Liu Fangping to catch the grasshopper.