Chapter 95: Morning Market, Braised Food, and Lobster Cages (Part 2)
Jiangyou had made a killing yesterday and was well aware of Tukes's craftsmanship. She didn't waste time bargaining and only made one request: "Three gold coins is fine, but I need these lobster traps this afternoon. How quickly can you get them?"
"Very quickly." The dwarf shook his beard and held out his palm to her. "Everything will be easy once the money is in place. Full payment. I need to buy materials and ask the brothers for help."
"Okay!" Jiangyou took out his photo crystal, recorded the transaction, counted out three gold coins, and placed them in Tukes's palm. "Deliver on time, and we'll have lobster tonight!"
The dwarf craftsman smacked his lips, as if recalling the delicious food he had last night, and then he ran off in a hurry, shouting to the dwarves not far away as he ran: "Brothers, it's time to work! Get to work!"
A large group of dwarves ran away.
Jiangyou couldn't help but chuckle. Regardless of nationality, if interests didn't align, they'd easily gouge each other; but if they did, things would be easier. Now, the dwarves couldn't get enough of her soy sauce and food, and they all rushed to help, unfazed by the thought that they'd take the money and not do the job.
Twenty lobster pots, each only fifteen silver coins after the discount, calculated that the dwarf craftsman had already given them a 25% discount, making it a very good deal. And these lobster pots only need to be handed over to the beavers, and they will be able to catch a steady supply of magic lobsters, without even any effort from the craftsman.
After the carnival is over, Jiangyou will stay here for a few more days to discuss business with the witches, and then he plans to set off back to the workshop.
There would be no waterway between Beaver Lake and the workshop, and transporting the crayfish all the way back to the workshop would cost a fortune, which was definitely not cost-effective. Jiang You didn't plan to continue the lobster business at the workshop, but he could sell the lobster traps to the witches and make some money.
The Witch Forest, on the other hand, has the perfect location and time. The witches can maintain a long-term partnership with the beavers, solving the ecological problem of the devil crayfish infestation in the upstream beaver lake while also developing a new food industry. Most importantly, to make delicious crayfish, they must continuously purchase soy sauce from Jiangyou—a lifelong business!
Since you can’t earn some money yourself, it’s better to give it to your partners for mutual benefit.
- Of course, how to make partners clearly feel that this is a matter of 'mutual benefit' rather than their own ability to make money is another skill in dealing with people.
As for what else the workshop might sell besides soy sauce...Jiangyou had a plan in mind. Uncle Duoluolang's meat was high-quality and inexpensive, and even the scraps were handled cleanly, free of insects and flies. Jiangyou figured she could make a killing while the locals still didn't realize the value of chicken, duck, and pig offal.
However, considering that people here don't really eat these things, and the morning customers are all weird "discipline-minded" people, Jiangyou decided to try selling them for a morning. Even if things go wrong, it's only a loss of a few nickels. The marinade can be reused, so it would be great to marinate giant bird legs or crayfish in the evening.
Weird customers are everywhere, and making money from them isn't always easy. Jiangyou didn't plan to invest too much in this unknown customer base. If the soy sauce could sell, then sell it. If it didn't, it wouldn't cost too much. He could still sell it to the carnival guests that night, so it wouldn't lose money either way.
The stewed food in the pot was cooked to the perfect temperature. Jiangyou stirred it with a long spoon to allow the stewed food to be soaked more evenly. Then he turned off the stove, covered the pot, and let the marinade slowly seep into it.
Suddenly, there was a commotion in the crowd not far away. The vendors all looked out and whispered to their neighbors, "Here they come! Here they come! The customers are coming!"
Jiang You also poked his head out from behind the snack kiosk and saw a group of women in plain dresses with serious faces, wearing small straw hats on their heads and carrying large straw bags or small baskets in their hands, walking towards them in groups of three or five.
Each of their baskets was filled with many short, shiny white sticks of maltose - this was a crystallization phenomenon formed by the maltose being constantly stirred, pulled, and mixed with air - it was obvious that the witches' maltose had made an indelible contribution to the existence of this morning market.
According to Jiangyou, maltose is normally made from sprouted wheat and glutinous rice. This is because sprouted wheat (barley or wheat) contains amylase, which can break down starch and form maltose.
However, due to the special magical properties of glutinous rice and its sky-high price, the witches naturally wouldn't choose it as their starch source. Instead, they used millet, which they cultivated themselves. Jiang You also recognized this rice; it was the millet used in his previous life to make rice wine and yellow rice cakes, and it was one of the five grains passed down from their ancestors.
Millet also has a high starch content and was one of the raw materials used by our ancestors to make maltose in ancient times.
Millet can be grown in temperate zones and has strong adaptability. It is drought-resistant, salt-alkali-resistant, and has low soil requirements. The witches planted a lot of it in the mountains and forests specifically for making sugar.
However, the production process of maltose is complicated. It starts with soaking the wheat, going through a series of steps such as germination and growth of the wheat to the appropriate state, steaming and gelatinizing the starch source, mixing in malt, saccharification and fermentation, filtering the juice, boiling the sugar and pulling the sugar, etc., which takes four to fifteen days.
The most time-consuming and fluctuating part is naturally the germination of wheat. When the temperature is suitable, it will be fast, but when the temperature is not suitable, you can only wait.
Magic is certainly useful, but when it comes to plant growth, its effect is not as great as people imagine.
Even if the temperature and humidity can be controlled with magic, the plants will still die if the grower makes a wrong move.
Greenhouse products are always inferior to plants that are directly planted in a suitable natural environment and raised naturally. Any slight change that is imperceptible to humans will cause the former to suddenly die.
The witches have now mastered the technology of making malt sugar, but it is still time-consuming and labor-intensive. It is only because they produce the raw materials themselves and have no transportation costs that they can bring the price down to a level acceptable to the normal middle class.
——Although it is repeatedly jumping around the upper limit, why can't it be considered within the "acceptable range"?
Judging by the candy in their baskets, these "disciplined" people seemed quite wealthy... well, at least they were before they bought the candy. But the fact that they could spare so much money for candy showed that no matter how austere these "disciplined" people were, they still had certain tastes in food.
Jiang You rubbed her jaw and decided on the price of the braised food. As the woman at the front of the line approached her stall, she lifted the lid of the pot and said with a smile, "Braised food! Delicious braised food! Five nickels per portion, with ten meat dishes of your choice!"
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