After eating some of the first day's harvest, the remaining meat was divided equally between the two families.
Originally, Xiaoman said his family didn't want him.
It was Jiang Zhi's idea to get this meat. His family only had Xiaoman as a laborer, and the whole family was eating together. They had already eaten too much and couldn't take advantage of him anymore.
Jiang Zhi said, "Since Chang Gengbo has already said that he will listen to me in everything from now on, he must listen to me even when dividing the meat. We can talk about the future after we get through this difficult time."
Each situation needs to be analyzed individually. Xiaoman's grandparents are not being lazy or shirking their duties.
The two are elderly, and it is dangerous for them to walk around on these steep mountains. In addition, they have sick people and children at home who need their care.
Xu Dazhu did not suffer from bedsores because he had to be turned over every half hour.
In addition, Xiaoman is very sensible and always volunteers to do chores, which makes Jiangzhi very satisfied.
Following the rules is a good thing, but being too calculating is not. Everyone needs help sometimes.
I brought back half of the meat, about five or six small pieces, weighing only three or four pounds.
To be honest, wild foods don't taste good. Just like wild vegetables, they're just a way for modern people who are already well-fed to create something new and exciting.
If pheasant and wild boar meat were delicious, why would agronomists bother to cultivate superior breeds?
When you're hungry and have no oil or fat, and you're eating wild vegetables every day to fill your stomach, your face will turn pale and sallow, and you won't say it's delicious.
Pheasants and rabbits would never grow a body with alternating layers of fat and lean meat just to satisfy human tastes.
The meat has no fat, so it can't be braised without plenty of oil and seasonings, and stewing it makes it very dry.
This is certainly partly because Jiang Zhi once visited Sichuan, a place known for its abundance of rabbits, which explains her discerning palate.
For Xu Errui and his men, these wild game were rare meats, life-saving rations.
Jiang Zhi plans to turn this meat into smoked meat and then make jerky for emergencies.
That night, a room was burned down, so the family of three squeezed into another room.
Qiaoyun and Jiangzhi slept on the kang (a heated brick bed), while Xu Errui slept on the ground with dry grass.
Being young is great; after eating and drinking their fill, they lay down and fell asleep. Soon, the two of them were snoring, but Jiang Zhi couldn't fall asleep.
No one mentioned the village at the foot of the mountain during the day, but the two corpses were left lying exposed in the wilderness, unable to be buried in peace, and people felt uneasy about it.
"Alas! You have become wronged ghosts and wandering spirits. You must find your enemies to attack. We want to help you, but the current chaotic world does not allow it. We can only burn more paper money and ingots when we collect your bones in the future."
Jiang Zhi couldn't bear to put the two families on the mountain in danger because of the two corpses, and she also felt sorry for the wronged souls. After muttering to herself for a while, she finally fell asleep.
The next morning, after breakfast, Xiaoman came to find Xu Errui to collect the meat. Jiang Zhi repeatedly told the two of them not to go down the mountain, and even more so not to go into the fire.
Grandpa Xiaoman had also given Xiaoman these instructions, and Jiangzhi only let them go after receiving the assurance.
The two boys went out to find food, and Jiang Zhi also prepared to set off.
Although clearing land and building houses are urgent tasks, she still needs to find other edible things. Having food at home will give her peace of mind and allow her to focus on infrastructure construction.
This mountain range consists of several peaks and is commonly known by the villagers as Wufeng Mountain (Five Peaks Mountain).
Apart from the weathered rocky cliffs, the mountain is mostly loess and gravel, and the soil is barren. Therefore, the main species are drought-resistant and barren-tolerant oak trees, interspersed with some shrubs and miscellaneous trees.
Having experienced an unusually long and dry winter, it remains a desolate and barren wasteland.
There are no ginseng or lingzhi mushrooms to pick, and no wild vegetables to dig up.
However, there are mountain streams and creeks between the peaks, as well as some alluvial deposits, making the vegetation near water more diverse than the monotonous forests.
Jiang Zhi had a general understanding of this mountain from Xiao Man's grandfather, so she first found the ditch that was mostly dry, and then walked along the water's edge into the mountain.
People used to occasionally frequent this place, and there's still a small path that you can walk on.
The cliffs on both sides of the ditch were initially covered with withered grass, but gradually more green appeared on the stone walls.
Those were creeping vines clinging to the rocks, with sparse, oval, opposite leaves spread out on both sides of the vines, dry and long.
Jiang Zhi casually called it by its name: sweet potato vine, also known as ground centipede or ground gold.
It is also known as ground loquat in herbal names.
This plant is the most common creeping plant in the southwestern region of China.
It grows in sparse forests, ditches, and open grasslands. It is evergreen and flowers from April to June, and bears fruit from June to September.
The ripe fruit, half-buried in the soil, resembles loquats. It is brownish-red and dark red, with a sweet and tempting aroma. When broken open, it is full of seeds, making it a favorite snack for children in the mountains.
Every summer during the hottest time, Jiang Zhi would go to the mountains to pick sweet potatoes and fruits.
Besides being a snack or fruit, sweet potato vines are also a target for housewives to cut firewood in the mountains during winter.
Cut the main vine with a knife, pull it in the opposite direction, and you'll have a vine net. Tie it into small bundles, dry them, and they'll burn very well.
It is said that the environment shapes the people, and in the hearts of Chinese people, every plant has a different purpose.
Non-poisonous items are food ingredients, poisonous items are medicinal herbs, and old, non-poisonous items that cannot be eaten are wood.
But this often overlooked sweet potato vine has many uses: it can be eaten, burned, and used as medicine. It's no exaggeration to say that it's a treasure from head to toe.
Sweet potato vines can treat coughs and asthma caused by lung heat, edema, rheumatism, and injuries from falls and blows.
If you boil 3 ounces of ripe fruit in water and drink the decoction, it can treat simple indigestion in children.
Washing the affected area with water boiled with fresh vine leaves can treat scabies and urticaria, while taking the decoction orally can expel roundworms.
But now… Jiang Zhi held a sweet potato vine in her hand, looking regretfully at the white sap oozing from the broken end.
The timing is wrong; it's only good for burning as firewood.
Because the sweet potato vines are to be collected for medicinal use, they need to be washed and dried between September and October for later use.
Sweet potato vines were useless, but Jiang Zhi quickly discovered a plant that made her ecstatic.
In the sandy soil beside the ditch, there were piles of withered grass and branches washed down by last year's flash flood.
She parted the weeds that weren't completely rotten, hoping to find hibernating frogs and crabs, but what she saw instead was a bunch of newly sprouted reddish-brown buds.
Image from the internet
For people in Southwest China, this stuff is practically an addictive drug.
Jiang Zhi immediately put down her basket, not even bothering to use her hoe, and took out her sickle to lie down on the ground and begin to carefully dig around her.
Just by looking at the thick, fleshy buds, she could already predict the thickness and length of the rootstock below. It must be at the Tyrannosaurus Rex level. In the past, it would have taken several dikes to find such a thing.
As the layers of sand and soil peeled away, the roots inside were exposed, and a row of white, plump houttuynia cordata roots looked like chopsticks stuck straight into the ground.
Jiang Zhi quickly dug downwards, wanting to see just how long and deep it was, afraid of breaking this priceless treasure.
This is a true treasure; it's both food and medicine, so its medicinal effects are self-evident.
It is a good product for clearing heat and detoxifying, treating upper respiratory tract infections, and also has anti-radiation properties. It is a favorite among food lovers.
She felt that, at times, the reverent harvesting actions of digging for termite mushrooms, houttuynia cordata, and ginseng were essentially the same.
I wonder if people who live by the sea feel the same way when they go beachcombing.
The first batch of houttuynia cordata in spring is like the first cup of milk tea in autumn—not for eating, but for showing off on social media.
Perhaps he would walk past his neighbors with the basket in his hand, and amidst their envious and jealous inquiries, he would casually reply: "I dug them up by the ditch, and I've already finished them all!"
Then they walked away without even sharing a single one.
There's a lot of houttuynia cordata here.
You won't believe it until you dig, and what you find is astonishing. They're everywhere, in the cracks of the rocks and in the grass. It looks like they'll sprout their first leaves in five or six days at most.
If you count the time, they should have sprouted long ago if it weren't for the long winter.
It's just that this place is sheltered from the wind, and it's also damp, plus it's covered with weeds to keep warm, so it grows better than other places. The longest roots are as long as a meter.
Jiang Zhi put a large handful of houttuynia cordata she had dug up into her basket and didn't touch the rest of the vegetables. She was worried that it would be a waste to dig up too much at once and not be able to finish it all, so she decided to save it for later.
Moreover, digging up houttuynia cordata was just a small part of her trip into the mountains; she also needed to find some other plants that could be used as staple foods for everyone.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com