After lunch, Old Man Chen saw some of the village children digging up a few wild vegetables. He sighed and said, "After the wild vegetables, we'll eat tree bark; after the tree bark, we'll eat clay. There's no way to survive!"
Kaolin, also known as "Guanyin clay", "white clay", or "white clay", is rich in minerals such as silicon, zinc, magnesium, and aluminum. It is a white or grayish-white powder with strong adhesiveness and is an important raw material for manufacturing ceramics.
There is a folk tale about the origin of the name Guanyintu. During a great famine, starving victims went to a temple to pray to Guanyin, hoping that the Bodhisattva would protect them.
To the astonishment of the disaster victims, when they went to worship Guanyin again the next day, they found piles of white soil behind the statue, which looked very similar to flour. They thought that the Bodhisattva had manifested and brought them food, so they quickly knelt down and worshipped the Bodhisattva, naming the soil "Guanyin Soil".
However, Guanyin clay is not easily absorbed by the human body. Eating too much of it often causes bloating. Although it can temporarily relieve hunger, it expands and hardens when it comes into contact with water. Many starving disaster victims died from bloating after drinking water following excessive consumption of Guanyin clay.
Chen Kai said firmly, "No, Dad, we will definitely get better."
Suddenly, Chen Kai looked at the bare mountains outside and his eyes lit up. How could he have forgotten about bracken root powder? Bracken root powder is actually made from the roots of bracken.
Use a wooden mallet to continuously pound the cleaned bracken roots to extract the starch from the bracken root fibers, leaving only the fibers, which can then be filtered to remove the starch.
Afterward, filter the mixture several times with gauze to remove the residue, and then let the bracken root starch slowly settle in the water. After settling overnight, you can see the starch at the bottom. However, the starch is still very cloudy at this point, so it needs to be washed several times and settled a few more times to obtain snow-white bracken root powder. After drying, the bracken root powder is ready.
Chen Kai suppressed his excitement and decided to wait until everyone had finished lunch before discussing it, since no one would dig up the bracken roots on the mountain anyway.
After lunch, just as Chen Kai was about to bring up the matter, he was notified to gather at the village square. The village chief had something to announce. Chen Kai thought to himself that Bai Yu must have persuaded the village chief.
When they arrived at the square, the village chief was indeed talking about this matter.
Although the villagers didn't quite understand what was being said, they felt it wouldn't affect them much, so they just did as instructed.
Chen Kai stepped forward to explain to everyone that, in layman's terms, it was similar to the last sports meet—both were designed to attract people to spend money.
As for how to attract people, they have their own methods, and the villagers just need to cooperate.
Then, Chen Kai started making empty promises again.
Everyone made money at the last sports meet, so when they heard about this kind of thing, they were all excited and asked him how to cooperate.
Chen Kai told everyone that this project was quite large and would take a long time. The most important thing now was still land reclamation. However, land reclamation needed to be planned, and everyone should just follow the plan. It wouldn't affect anyone. At most, everyone's land had to be concentrated in one place, not scattered in different areas.
Previously, the land in Anping Village was scattered here and there, and even in a large, contiguous plot of land, there were other people's several acres of land in between.
This time, they are going to solve all these problems at once.
After everyone had left, Chen Kai explained the details of Anping Village's future plans to the village chief.
The village chief and Bai Yu were so surprised they couldn't close their mouths. Although there were some things they didn't quite understand, they knew it was meant to attract tourists, and that was enough for them.
The village chief was most concerned about the waterwheel that Bai Yu had mentioned to him, which could irrigate the farmland, so he asked, "Chen Kai, what did you tell Bai Yu about that could be made?"
Chen Kai explained, "Uncle Village Chief, this matter can't be rushed. We need to find some carpenters to develop it slowly. There's only one carpenter in the village, his second brother, and he can't handle it either. This matter needs to be done gradually."
The village chief thought Chen Kai's words made sense, so he said, "Chen Kai, if you encounter any problems while researching the waterwheel, just let me know, and I will go to other villages to find carpenters to help."
Chen Kai replied, "Okay! We'll talk about it later."
After returning home, Chen Kai mentioned the matter of making flour from bracken roots, and the Chen family members were so excited that they immediately packed their things to go to the mountain to dig up bracken roots.
Seeing this, Chen Kai quickly stopped them. Digging up bracken roots didn't require much effort, so it was better to leave some people to clear the land.
So Old Man Chen decided to let the children go up the mountain to dig for bracken roots, while the adults continued to clear the land.
Chen Kai didn't want to discourage them; the starch yield from bracken roots was very low, so it was best not to waste too much manpower.
Actually, the starch yield of bracken roots is highest in winter, but they can't wait that long now.
In the evening, after the Chen family finished their work and returned home, they went to the river to wash the bracken roots.
Bracken roots are incredibly difficult to clean. You have to wash them ten or eight times to get them clean, and you also have to rub the mud off by hand, otherwise it will affect the taste.
More than half a month has passed, and the Chen family's development of bracken root has finally reached the stage of producing starch.
After repeated processes of washing, filtering, and settling, the settled powder can finally be collected today.
Bracken root powder can be made into many delicacies, the most common being bracken root noodles and bracken root rice cakes.
This batch of cleaned bracken roots weighs about 100 jin (50 kg), but only a small amount of starch is produced.
Looking at the dark brown, damp fern root powder, Chen Kai sighed helplessly. The yield was just too low!
However, Old Man Chen and the others were very happy, because the bracken root could really be made into powder, and it looked pretty good.
Old Man Chen asked his eldest daughter-in-law to find a container and steam a piece of fern root. After steaming, following Chen Kai's instructions, his eldest daughter-in-law cut the fern root powder into pieces, then cooked it in a pot with seasonings and some greens.
After it was cooked, Old Man Chen and the other older generation tasted it first.
Old Chen took a bite, smacked his lips, and said, "The texture is pretty good, almost like noodles, delicious!"
Chen Kai smiled and said, "After being made into bracken root powder, it can be dried and stored for a long time."
Uncle Zhou said happily, "Good, good, good!"
Others who tried it also praised it.
Zhou's eyes lit up when she looked at the bracken root noodles. It was a food similar to noodles, and it tasted good. It should be worth a lot of money. Her family could make a fortune again.
Seeing his mother like this, Chen Kai knew what she was thinking, but he didn't say anything or discourage her. The yield of bracken root powder was so low, it wasn't easy to make money from it.
The remaining bracken root powder was dried and saved for later consumption.
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