Chapter 154 Charcoal Burning

The smoked chicken has a strong flavor and the texture is not like fresh chicken. The red meat is stringy and the more you chew it, the more delicious it becomes.

The vegetables cooked in chicken soup float on the surface of the soup pot. When they are picked up, they are covered with a layer of yellow chicken oil. They have a crisp texture and are refreshing with the aroma of chicken.

The cooked Pueraria root is not as sweet and crispy as the raw one. After stewing, the wild Pueraria root becomes powdery and glutinous, which is like eating yam or the pink lotus root from Hubei Province.

There was a lot of kudzu root cooked in the pot, which was delicious and filling. The two of us each had a small bowl of rice, and after eating a pot of kudzu root and chicken, our stomachs were full.

The dog was drooling all over the floor.

Zhao Yeqing mixed the unfinished soup with rice, took out the chicken cooked for them from the pot, chopped it into pieces with a knife, and distributed it evenly before putting it into their bowls.

The fragrance lingered in the room and floated out through the gaps in the windows.

Mu Xi was cleaning up the dishes when he saw the red figure flash past outside the yard again in the moonlight.

After telling Zhao Yeqing, she stopped petting the dog.

"Could this fox be relying on our house?"

But the chicken coop was well sealed, and the two were not worried about the safety of the chickens.

Early in the morning, Mu Xi went to feed the animals at home and found that there were no fox footprints around the chicken coop.

Its footprints are almost all concentrated around the kitchen.

The two of them were careful before going to bed and closed the kitchen doors and windows tightly.

The footprints were obviously the most messy under the kitchen windowsill. It was estimated that the person wandered here for a long time and left only because he couldn't get in.

Zhao Yeqing got up to wash up, spit out the foam in his mouth and said, "It must be because my cooking smells so good that the fox took the bait."

Mu Xi nodded in agreement.

After the two of them had breakfast, Mu Xi scooped out the water containing the kudzu root powder. The kudzu root powder at the bottom was very thick and snow-white without a trace of other colors.

Zhao Yeqing took out the largest piece of gauze in the house, nailed a cross with bamboo strips, and hung the rope on the beam, suspending the cross vertically.

The four corners of the gauze were tied to the four corners of the cross.

It was fixed on the water tank filled with kudzu powder.

Mu Xi scooped out the moist Pueraria powder with a large ladle and placed it in a hanging gauze to drain the water.

After taking care of things at home, Zhao Yeqing took Xiaohong out, and the two of them took their tools and set out to the woods to chop firewood.

We went to the pine forest and found a pine tree to make a kiln of pine charcoal.

If there hadn't been a landslide, it would have been more appropriate to use the cycad wood in that forest.

When chopping firewood before, Mu Xi had cut down several pine trees in advance, sawed them into small pieces and placed them here. Now he just needed to cut them into small pieces and let Xiaohong drag them home.

When they reached the gentle slope near their home, Mu Xi unloaded the firewood and prepared to dig a brick kiln, while Zhao Yeqing took Xiaohong home first.

When Xiaohong got home, she was obviously very unhappy and resisted Zhao Yeqing's move to put her back in the stable.

His eyes seemed to be condemning her for agreeing to take it out to play yesterday, but she didn't expect that he would come back after just a short while.

She couldn't drag her baby in no matter how hard she tried, so she finally gave up and took Xiaohong back to the gentle slope.

Mu Xi had already dug a hole on the gentle slope. When he saw her coming back with the horse, he guessed what was going on.

"Let it play nearby by itself for now."

Zhao Yeqing nodded and took a hoe to help dig the hole.

The two men dug a hole half a person's height in the earth slope in front of them, and then opened two small holes on both sides of the hole. The small holes were about the size of an open palm.

Mu Xi picked up a shovel and dug a hole right above the hole.

The two small holes below are air inlets, and the small hole above is a smoke exhaust port.

After the hole was dug, Mu Xi piled all the firewood in it.

The firewood had been dried when the weather was good, but now it has naturally become wet after the snow.

However, for making charcoal, wet wood is better than dry wood.

If dry firewood is not properly controlled, it will easily burn into ash before it becomes charcoal. The advantage is that it burns very quickly and a small kiln can be burned in more than a day.

Wet wood has a higher tolerance rate and a higher charcoal yield, which means you need to control the fire to keep burning and ensure it does not go out.

It’s just time-consuming, and it takes three or four days to cook.

Zhao Yeqing handed the dry pine needles and pine cones he had picked up to Mu Xi to start a fire.

Wet firewood is difficult to ignite, so a circle of dry firewood has to be added outside. When the dry firewood starts to burn, the two men will blow air to fan it, and when the flames gradually ignite the wet firewood, they will cover the entrance of the cave with a large stone slab that Mu Xi had selected in advance.

The stone slabs were covered with wet mud mixed with water.

Thick smoke drifted out from the cracks, and the two men used the smoke to find and patch up the leaks. Except for the hole at the top, they blocked any place below where smoke was coming out with mud.

The initial success is achieved only when there is no more smoke coming out of the big hole.

In the following period of time.

Every day, Mu Xi would either prepare wood for making bathtubs at home or watch the fire in the charcoal kiln.

When you see more smoke, quickly block the air inlet at the bottom. When the smoke gradually becomes smaller, block the hole at the top.

At this stage the wood will slowly carbonize in the hole.

Three days later, the temperature of the charcoal kiln had gradually dropped, and it was time to open the kiln.

The mud on top was dug up and the heavy stone slabs were moved away, and the firewood that was originally piled full inside had disappeared.

Only a pile of black charcoal was left at the bottom of the cave.

Mu Xi took one and broke it with his hands. The charcoal was well carbonized and the color was pure black. When two pieces of charcoal were knocked together, a crisp metallic sound was made.

Zhao Yeqing took out the large bamboo basket that had been prepared in advance, and the two of them put all the charcoal in the cave into it.

It weighs about thirty kilograms.

This was the first time for the two to make charcoal. The charcoal kiln was not big and the amount burned was not much. They didn't know how long it would last if it was only used to supply the chicken coop and sheep pen.

I have to find time to fire another kiln.

The charcoal was taken home and placed in the original owner's house, which happened to be filled with food and dry goods, and the charcoal could help dehumidify and prevent moisture.

During these three days, not only the charcoal was burned, but the kudzu root powder was also dried and filtered.

There was a large lump of Pueraria powder in the gauze, which became the size of a basketball after drying.

Mu Xi took a clean and dry basin and Zhao Yeqing took out the large lump of Pueraria powder.

The knot was very hard, so she took a clean kitchen knife and used it to shave off the kudzu root powder bit by bit like cutting potato chips.

After the shaved powder is removed, it needs to be ground into fine powder. Mu Xi washed the stone pestle clean, placed it by the fire to dry, put the coarse powder of Pueraria root that was shaved into the stone pestle, and ground it with the rough inner wall of the stone pestle.

Wait until all lumps are broken up, then sift the flour until it is fine.

He took a big jar and put all the kudzu root powder in it. Zhao Yeqing filled out two bowls and then put the lid on it.

The kudzu root powder in the bowl is first diluted with cold water, then poured with hot water, and quickly stirred with a spoon a few times, and the kudzu root powder in the bowl turns into a translucent pink color.

The fresh fragrance made her impatient.