Chapter 37 Roasted Pine Nuts, Sugar-Roasted Chestnuts, Cat Head Stamps...
The sky was a bit overcast after we got home, so Lai carried the chestnuts and pine cones back to the living room in several trips. Sure enough, it started to drizzle that night.
The next day at dawn, shortly after breakfast, George and Lamb arrived pushing a stroller.
During this trip up the mountain, the four of them harvested two bags of peeled chestnuts, three bags of pine cones, more than half a bag of pine nuts, and some miscellaneous wild fruits and vegetables.
Since two people went to the Lai family's house, Lai got a whole bag of chestnuts, and Lamb and George split the remaining bag equally.
Songtalai, Lamb, and George each received a bag. The pine nuts were divided into four portions, one portion for each of the four.
There weren't many wild fruits and vegetables, so they were all left for Lai and Neil.
Actually, this way of dividing things up puts Ray at a slight disadvantage. But he doesn't mind, and Neil doesn't have any problems either.
Lamb and George felt a little bad and wanted to give Neil another portion of the pine cones, but Neil firmly refused.
He felt that he was too young to do much work, and that his three older brothers did most of the heavy work, so he had already been given a lot.
"Brother, we'll be going now."
Lamb greeted Rye and then pushed his things away, with George following closely behind.
"Goodbye, Leigo!"
"Okay, go back and get some rest."
After seeing the two off, Ray and Neil tidied up the things piled up in the living room.
The whole bag of chestnuts probably weighed a hundred pounds, more than enough for two people. Lai immediately thought of a common street food in autumn – roasted chestnuts.
I've spent over a gold coin on the Little Delraston Beast, and haven't earned anything yet. This can't go on.
Setting up a stall selling roasted chestnuts in town seems like a good idea. But Lei still needs to carefully consider how to implement it.
He first moved the chestnuts into the storage room to avoid them getting in the way. Then he cleaned up the wild fruits and vegetables for easy consumption.
The pine cones couldn't just be left there, so he took out the bag containing them and started peeling them with Neil in the living room.
The pine cones were tough on the outside and difficult to break open by hand. Lai first used a knife to split them open with a wooden board, and then continued to peel out the pine nuts inside.
Pine cones and pine nuts have a strong pine aroma. People who like pine nuts especially enjoy this flavor, while those who don't generally avoid it.
Fresh pine nuts can be eaten raw, but they are unopened and difficult to eat. Therefore, they are usually roasted and opened before consumption.
Pine nuts fell into the basin one by one with a clinking sound. In Lai Yi's eyes, what was in the basin was not just pine nuts, but also shiny silver coins!
The bag of pine cones was quickly harvested.
These pine cones are still green, and burning them directly will produce a lot of smoke. They can't be used for cooking, but they can be used to smoke cured meat.
Lai put them in a basket, and they could use them directly after buying meat in a few days.
Ten pounds of pine cones can yield one pound of pine nuts. Lai's bag of pine cones, plus the pine nuts he received, barely filled a small bag, weighing about 30 pounds.
Harvesting is difficult and yields are low, so it's normal for pine nuts to be expensive on the market. Lai needs to find out more about the price of these nuts before deciding on a selling price.
"Brother, how can the two of us possibly finish all these chestnuts and pine nuts?"
Neil sighed softly, a bittersweet expression on his face.
"Let's eat some and sell the rest."
"That's what Lei suggested," Rye proposed.
"good!"
Neil immediately agreed.
The sun was shining brightly outside.
The soil in the yard was still a bit damp in the morning, but after a morning of sunshine, it had dried out. It seems the rain last night was light and didn't thoroughly soak the land.
Lai set up the iron pot outside the yard and placed a large basin full of water next to it.
He heated the iron pot, poured in some pine nuts, and began to stir-fry them continuously.
Just like roasting sunflower seeds, roasting pine nuts also requires controlling the heat, otherwise they will easily burn.
When pine nuts are freshly shelled, the outer shell is somewhat whitish. After stir-frying for a few minutes, the whitish color begins to fade, turning into a light brown.
Continue stirring, and the color gradually deepens. By this time, the pine nuts are very hot. Lai seizes the opportunity and scoops them all into the basin of water. As soon as the hot pine nuts come into contact with the cold water, they start to crackle and pop open.
Remove all the pine nuts floating on top. Wash the pine nuts that have sunk to the bottom and put them back into the pot to stir-fry. Stir-fry for a few more minutes after all the moisture has evaporated, and the first batch of pine nuts is ready.
Lai started frying a second batch of pine nuts.
Having learned from the previous experience, I poured out more this time, still using the same method as the first batch.
Lai fried four batches of pine nuts in a row, finally finishing frying all of them.
However, there is still a problem. That is, if chestnuts are directly fried in a pan, they will not cook through due to uneven heating. Modern methods solve this problem by frying chestnuts with quartz sand.
But since they couldn't find any quartz sand for the time being, Lai planned to go to the river today to collect some round stones to use as a substitute.
Extinguish the firewood, clean the iron pot, sweep up the pine nuts that had been thrown out, and put them into the fire pit.
After finishing all that, Lai was finally able to taste the pine nuts.
These pine nuts, roasted in an iron wok, have a slightly blackened outer shell, but they taste exceptionally fragrant and are so delicious that you can't stop eating them once you start.
"Neil, you should try some too. Take the top one, be careful it's hot."
"Um."
Neil grabbed a small handful, his fingernails gripping the opening of the pine nuts, and with a little force, he broke them open.
Rub off the thin inner skin, pop the milky white pine nut into your mouth, chew it up and down, and your mouth will be filled with the aroma of pine nuts.
At first, he thought the pine nuts tasted strange, but after eating a small handful, he finally got used to the taste. Later, he not only stopped finding them strange, but also began to appreciate their unique pine aroma and the sweetness of the kernels.
"tasty!"
"Brother, pine nuts are so hard to pick, we must sell them for a higher price."
"must."
Neil once again revealed his fondness for small amounts of money.
The pine nuts were taken back into the house by Lai and placed on the table to cool.
It was still early, so he took Neil to the riverbank to dig up some river sand of suitable size, washed it clean, and spread it out on a wooden board to dry in the yard.
Because we're making sugar-roasted chestnuts, the chestnuts need to be thoroughly cleaned beforehand, and a small slit needs to be made in the shell with a knife to make them easier for customers to eat.
Fearing that he wouldn't be able to sell the roasted chestnuts at the beginning, Lai only prepared ten pounds of chestnuts. He planned to roast them early the next morning and transport them to town to sell at the market along with pine nuts and raw chestnuts.
After the pine nuts cooled, I kept a small bowl of about three pounds for my own consumption, and put the rest into bags to sell.
Roasted chestnuts and pine nuts are difficult to pack, and since plastic bags are unavailable, Lai decided to make some simple paper bags herself. They're unique and easy to pack.
Oiled paper is cheaper than waxed paper, but there wasn't much left at home, only enough to make a few bags. Lai had no choice but to try his luck with acquaintances to see if he could borrow some.
He went to Old Guge's house first. Old Guge often went to town to sell things, so he must have a lot of oil paper.
Although Lao Guge lives alone, he keeps his yard very clean.
A row of wooden trellises was erected on the path leading from the courtyard gate to the front gate, with many grapevines climbing on them, bearing many small bunches of deep purple grapes. It formed a beautiful and inviting scene.
Old Guge once told him that this kind of grape is called "mountain grape".
Wild grapes are visually appealing, but they have many seeds and a sour, astringent taste that makes them unsuitable for direct consumption; they can be used to make wine. Since there were too many grapes, he simply cut them off to feed his livestock.
Is Grandpa Guge home?
Lai called out a few times, and Old Gug came out waving a palm-leaf fan, looking at Lai with a smile.
"Ray is here."
"Hello Grandpa Guge, I've come to your house to borrow some oil paper. I don't know if you have any."
"Yes, yes, how much do you need?"
Rye mentally estimated that, based on a bag holding one pound of nuts, he would need to prepare at least fifty bags.
A fully opened sheet of oil paper can be folded into four bags, so fifteen sheets would be needed.
"I need about twenty. How many do you have? If you don't need them, I'll just buy them all. Or I can go to town tomorrow to sell some things and buy them back for you."
"Let me see. Come in and sit for a while, and I'll go find it for you inside."
Lai sat in the living room waiting for old Gug to return.
The decoration of Gu Ge's house is quite rustic, with old furniture in the living room.
What's interesting is a hemp tapestry hanging on his wall, woven with many small, simple diagrams and unfamiliar characters. It looks both strange and somewhat cute.
"Found it. I have a stack of used oil paper here, about thirty sheets. You can take it and use it, and you can return it whenever you want."
"Thank you, Grandpa Guge."
Lei thanked him politely.
"What are you going to sell? Why are you preparing so much oil paper?"
Old Guge asked.
“A few days ago we went up the mountain and picked a lot of chestnuts. Neal and I couldn’t finish them all, so we thought we’d take them to town to sell.”
"Not bad, not bad. That will require quite a lot of oil paper."
Old Gugge praised Lai a few more times.
“I have some dried dates here, not many, just fifty pounds. Would you like to take some more dates from me to sell together?”
When Lai heard this, he thought Old Gugge's idea was pretty good, so he bought twenty pounds of dried dates from Old Gugge at twelve copper coins a pound. He planned to settle the payment for the dates the next day after selling the goods.
After finishing his business, Lai carried the dried dates and oil paper home.
After lunch, Neil and I started folding paper bags. After folding them, we just glued them together. These bags generally won't come unglued or open as long as they don't get wet.
They did eighty in a row before they stopped.
After finishing these paper bags, Lei felt that something was missing from them.
"Neil, how about I make a stamp and print the design on the bag?"
"Okay, I'll do whatever you say, brother!"
Neil thought Ray's idea was great.
Ray let Neil design the pattern himself. After drawing for more than an hour, he finally handed Ray a very distinctive cat head that was highly recognizable.
He dug out several radishes, ruined three of them, but finally succeeded in carving a clear cat head.
Then I found some old ink at home and printed a pattern on the center of a bag, finally solving the bag problem.
The radish that was damaged was turned into filling for steamed buns by Lai that very night, and they ate it all.
The radish stamp won't last long; it can only serve as a delaying tactic.
Lai's own skills were limited, so he decided that it would be better to spend a few copper coins to have someone else carve it for him in the future.
He found a small wooden box to use as a money box, and also found a gourd ladle to hold chestnuts and pine nuts for tomorrow. He also found a basket of similar size and some canvas.
Everything was ready. We just needed to roast the chestnuts at daybreak tomorrow and then drive the mule cart to town to sell them.
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Author's Note: A family of chubby red squirrels lives on the mountain near the small village. There are many, many pine trees on this mountain, and each squirrel group has its own "territory".
On this day, four strange people came to the territory of Fatty's tribe. They didn't come to cut down trees or pick mushrooms, but to steal food from the tribe.
In human terms, how do we say it? Yes, shameless!
Forget it, Fatty decided not to bother with them.
There are plenty of pine cones here, enough for the entire squirrel colony to fill their burrows before winter arrives, with plenty to spare.
They usually eat half and throw the other half away.
Fatty didn't realize that he had oversimplified things.
(to be continued)
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