Since everyone likes to eat bayberry, Jiang Miao and the guards went to the mountains to pick bayberry in the next few days.
In addition to the two bayberry trees they found initially, they searched around and found several more bayberry trees in other places. However, the bayberries on these trees were not as sweet as those on the two trees, and they were not as big. I don’t know if it was because this side was in the shade and the other side was in the sun.
The bayberry was loaded with fruits. At first, everyone was very happy. There was no such thing in the north. Everyone was very enthusiastic when eating it and enjoyed it very much. Although eating too much would make your teeth sour, it was not impossible to overcome it.
After eating them for a few days, everyone started to be afraid of them. When they heard the word "bayberry", their mouths started to sour and their stomachs started to churn. Now, even if you put bayberries in front of their mouths, no one would eat them. The neighbors gave some away, but there were still a lot of bayberries.
Jiang Miao couldn't bear to see the bayberries go to waste. Not to mention that he spent so much time and energy to pick them, the value of the bayberries alone would not allow him to let them go. Looking at the baskets of bayberries, Jiang Miao began to think about new ways to eat them.
First, the canned bayberry. If it is cooked, the shelf life is not as long as it is now, but it should not go bad in a dozen days. When the time comes, I will ask someone to send it back to the capital so that my relatives and friends can taste it.
Jiang Miao knows how to make canned food. The technical content of this thing is not too high, but it is difficult to preserve. There were no canning bottles in ancient times. Once air entered the cans, they would easily go bad. Jiang Miao had a headache for a few days, and then he found that the sealing of the wine jars seemed to be quite good. So he boiled the bayberries in them, and put the corks in directly after boiling. This way, the cans should be preserved for a longer time. After the canned food was made, Jiang Miao sent people out of Cangzhou and found a caravan going to Liangjing in the nearby Fucheng, asking them to deliver the cans.
The remaining bayberries, which were not big and not very sweet, were soaked by Jiang Miao in the white wine he bought to make bayberry wine. He had made it himself before and drank a small cup of it every day with meals. The taste was so delicious.
In addition to bayberry, they also brought back a lot of pine mushrooms from the mountain. The pine mushrooms they picked last time were used to stir-fry meat and make soup, and the taste was very delicious. The two large baskets of pine mushrooms picked this time were made into pine mushroom sauce by Jiang Miao with diced meat and other seasonings. The sauce tasted salty and delicious, and slightly spicy. Whether it was mixed with noodles in the morning or eaten with rice at noon, it was very delicious. Pei Che liked this pine mushroom sauce the most, and Jiang Miao was surprised. He had eaten so many jars of it in the Imperial College before, so wouldn't he get tired of it
In response to Jiang Miao's question, Pei Che directly scooped a large spoonful into the bowl and mixed it with rice, showing Jiang Miao with practical actions that he never tires of eating all the mushroom sauces made by Jiang Miao. He even took the initiative to propose to go picking pine mushrooms with Jiang Miao on this day off.
Maybe his sincerity touched the heavens, but it rained heavily the day before they went to the mountain. The mountain road was a little muddy after the rain. Looking at the mud stuck on the upper of his shoes, Pei Che felt a little regretful. He should have come back when the weather was clear. Soon, he gave up this idea, because the pine mushrooms after the rain were not only plump and big, but also numerous.
A group of people looked at these pine mushrooms, and they all turned into little girls picking pine mushrooms, bending down to pick them together. The truth that there is strength in numbers was reflected at this moment. After this group of people searched the pine forest, which was originally not big, there was not even a single big one left.
After picking pine mushrooms, Pei Che still felt unsatisfied. It was rare for him to go up the mountain, so he naturally didn't want to go down the mountain so soon. Jiang Miao saw his thoughts and suggested walking a little further in. There were many of them today, and some of them brought bows and arrows. Maybe they could shoot pheasants, rabbits, etc., and then roast them directly. Anyway, Jiang Miao brought salt, and he could find other condiments on the mountain. The taste must be good.
The group walked forward, and when they passed a valley, Jiang Miao glanced at it casually and shouted, "Look, there are tea trees there."
Everyone followed his gaze, until Jiang Miao pointed with his finger, and they realized that the short bush was actually a tea tree, which they had never seen in Liangjing. Jiang Miao walked over happily, picked an old leaf and put it in his mouth to chew. It tasted slightly bitter and smelled of a strange fragrance.
"Is this a tea tree?" Pei Che approached the tree, bent down to smell it, and picked a leaf, trying to find similarities between it and the teas he remembered.
"Yes, this is the tea tree." Jiang Miao had a friend whose family owned a tea mountain. One year, the friend invited him to visit, and Jiang Miao went there excitedly. Unexpectedly, he worked as a tea picker for more than ten days, earning more than 3,000 yuan and learning the craft of making tea. It was very cost-effective. He still misses it when he thinks of it now.
"Can we pick tea now?" Pei Che asked. He seemed to be full of curiosity about the tea tree.
Jiang Miao shook his head: "Not now. Tea leaves are picked during the Qingming and Guyu periods. Now the tea leaves are old. The tea made from them is bitter and not good to drink."
Pei Che pondered for a while and asked, "Is this place suitable for tea trees to grow?"
Jiang Miao didn't understand. He looked around and scratched his head. "It's OK. It's quite suitable. Cangzhou is not too cold. The locals say that spring comes quite early here."
"What would happen if I planted tea trees on all the outer mountains?" Pei Che asked, twisting the tea leaves.
Jiang Miao could hear something unusual in this seemingly casual remark. He looked at Pei Che and said, "Do you want the people of Cangzhou to make a living by growing tea?"
Jiang Miao turned his head and carefully observed the surrounding environment, and then found a few smaller tea trees not far from this one.
"Based on these few trees alone, I can't give you any advice. Maybe only this valley is suitable for tea trees to survive." Jiang Miao didn't dare to speak up and make decisions easily when it came to people's livelihood. What if he said yes and Pei Che started to take action? If the tea trees couldn't be planted, wouldn't he have made everyone work in vain
"In other words, if we can find other tea trees on this mountain, it can prove that this place is suitable for tea tree growth?"
"Maybe."
Pei Che sighed: "I have been thinking for a long time these days, but I still can't figure out how to make the people of Cangzhou rich. Cangzhou is surrounded by mountains on three sides, and there are not many good farms. Every year, grain must be purchased from other places to ensure that the people of Cangzhou have enough food and clothing. However, after the grain from other places is transported here, the price has risen a lot. The people have to go into the mountains to find mountain products and sell them for money to buy enough food."
"There are a lot of mountain products on these mountains. They should be able to sell them for a good price, right?" Take this pine mushroom for example. If it is top quality, one catty would cost at least two hundred coins. If you buy rice or flour, you can get quite a lot.
"It has always been the case that scarcity makes things valuable. If there are only one or two merchants selling them, the merchants who come to buy them will definitely flock to them. But if everyone has mountain products, but only a few people buy them, what will be the result?"
"Of course, they are trying their best to lower the price. The less the cost, the more money they can make." As a businessman, Jiang Miao answered immediately. But then he realized what was happening and asked, "Are those businessmen really trying very hard to lower the price?"
Pei Che nodded. Merchants pursue profits. How could they not be tempted by such visible profits? They bought high-quality mountain products at low prices, shipped them out, and then resold them at high prices. It was a huge profit. The people of Cangzhou did not think about resisting. One year, they set a price and decided not to sell it below this price. However, those merchants also united and hung a sign at the door of the purchase shop, which wrote the daily purchase price. If it was 20 wen per catty on the first day, it would be 18 wen on the second day, and the price would be lower and lower after that.
After seeing this sign, the people who were originally united instantly became enemies, and everyone wanted their mountain products to be purchased first. This effortlessly disintegrated the people's team, and these merchants became more arrogant than before, and the purchase price became lower and lower every year.
"Can't you just not sell it to them and find a way out yourself? If it were me, I would rather eat it myself than sell it to them." Jiang Miao said indignantly. He couldn't help but feel his chest heaving rapidly just listening to what he heard. These businessmen were simply too much.
Pei Che smiled bitterly: "How can it be easy? If ordinary people want to go out to find a way out, they may be deceived even more miserably without anyone to lead them. If they eat by themselves, there are a lot of mountain products, but they can't fill their stomachs. Even if they can survive by eating food from the mountains, their parents and children at home can't stand it."
Jiang Miao was silent for a while. Yes, mushrooms and other things cannot replace the feeling of fullness and nutritional value brought by food. But do those mountain products have to be sold to those merchants? Maybe in the past, but it is different now. He and Pei Che can recruit people to form a caravan, and then transport the mountain goods and buy the food. If the middlemen are saved from making a profit, won't the people's lives be better
He told Pei Che his idea. He thought Pei Che would agree with it. Unfortunately, Pei Che shook his head, indicating that this method was not feasible.
"Why?" Jiang Miao was very puzzled.
Pei Che said: "I have read a lot of files these days, and I found that the people in Cangzhou are simple and honest, and major and strange cases rarely happen every few years. Do you know what the most common cases are here?"
Although he didn't know why Pei Che suddenly brought this up, Jiang Miao still tried to guess, but Pei Che just shook his head. When Jiang Miao really couldn't guess, Pei Che revealed the answer: "It's a missing person case."
"Missing?!" Jiang Miao was shocked. "Is it a case of a missing girl?" His first reaction was that someone was committing a crime of trafficking in women and children.
Pei Che said, "Women usually go into the mountains in groups to collect mountain products, and they won't go deep into the mountains. So most of those who have disappeared are strong men. In these deep mountains, dangers are hidden everywhere. If you are not careful, you will end up with nothing left. If you and I recruit caravans and raise the price of mountain products, I'm sure more people will go into the mountains in the future. By then, I'm afraid that more people will be buried in these mountains."
Jiang Miao finally understood Pei Che's good intentions. Pei Che had been working diligently since he came here, and never took advantage of his position to slack off. He really wanted to improve the lives of the people in Cangzhou, not just for his own performance. Otherwise, he could have directly organized a caravan to raise the price of mountain products without considering the consequences for the people.
(End of this chapter)