Chapter 24 Got the Honey (Please Read)
In the woods, Gao Mingcheng sensed that there was no swarm of bees chasing him, so he gradually slowed down.
He strolled through the woods, looking left and right, searching for his next target.
Every time he finds his target, a group of bees will lose their homes. The anger will ignite the colony, but in the end they can only retreat unwillingly.
If there were communication between bee colonies, these bees would definitely complain about the shameless humans coming to steal their honey when they met each other.
Gao Mingcheng's evil reputation will spread throughout the bee colonies in the mountains.
On this day, the bee colony suffered heavy losses!
It was almost noon when Gao Mingcheng carried a bucket full of beehives and walked towards Xinai's house.
My grandmother was cooking in the kitchen, and the air was filled with the pungent aroma of chili peppers.
"Grandma, are there any clean cans at home?" Gao Mingcheng asked.
Eating canned food is a luxury for country people. When the canned food is finished, the cans are not thrown away but kept for further use.
It can be used to store rice wine, oil, salt, dried chili peppers, etc.
"Yes, there are several empty bottles in the room where I sleep. Wait, I'll get them for you." The thin grandmother scooped out the stir-fried peppers from the big iron pot with swift movements, and then poured half a bucket of water into the pot, which made a sizzling sound.
She walked into her room, and soon she took out several empty bottles, all of which were bottles of canned yellow peaches and canned lychees.
Grandma Xi has a daughter who married and moved to the next village, but every year during the Dragon Boat Festival and Mid-Autumn Festival, she would come back and give Grandma Xi some money and gifts.
Every time I come back, I will buy two cans of food.
As time went by, there were a lot of useless empty cans and bottles left in my grandmother's house.
Gao Mingcheng was happy when he saw these empty bottles.
Honey is easily attacked by insects and ants. If it is not stored in a sealed container, the insects will crawl into the honey and ruin the good stuff.
"Grandma, you cook and I'll wash these bottles." Gao Mingcheng put all the empty bottles into a basin, first washed off the dust on their surface, then opened the lid, cleaned the bottles inside, and then placed them upside down on a clean stone slab.
After the water in the bottle is drained, you can use it to store honey.
Taking advantage of this opportunity, Gao Mingcheng began to clean the beehive he brought back.
The honey was hidden in the beehive. He didn't have a honey shaker at the moment, so he could only rely on primitive methods to get the honey.
First, cut the honeycomb a few times with a knife and let the honey flow out.
Then take a piece of clean gauze, wrap the honeycomb, and squeeze it hard to squeeze out the honey remaining in the honeycomb.
The reason for wrapping it with gauze is to prevent the debris from falling into the honey.
But even so, there are still some debris at the bottom of the bucket.
This is also inevitable. Even if you use a honey shaker, there will be some debris left, but it only takes a while for the debris to sink to the bottom of the bucket.
Just after finishing these things, Gao Zhuang came back carrying a rabbit.
Seeing the rabbit in his hand, Gao Mingcheng raised his eyebrows. He didn't expect that Gao Zhuang was not so lucky in catching fish, but had good luck in catching rabbits.
"Grandma, Brother Mingcheng! Look, I caught another rabbit!" As soon as Gao Zhuang came back, he picked up the rabbit and showed off proudly.
I caught one yesterday and two more this morning. With this one, I now have a total of four rabbits at home!
Gao Zhuang had been craving for meat for a long time, and said to his grandmother, "Grandma, kill two rabbits later, and we will have a good meal of rabbit meat tonight!"
He was afraid that one rabbit would not be enough for him, but since he had four rabbits, he felt he was well off enough to afford to eat two rabbits at one meal.
"Okay." Grandma Xi smiled and nodded, without any objection. She urged Gao Zhuang to wash his hands and prepare for lunch.
The lunch was simple, just a plate of stir-fried peppers and a bowl of loofah soup. This made Gao Zhuang even more excited about the rabbit meat in the evening.
The summer is hot, and noon is the hottest time. The sun is scorching and the heat is steaming. At this time, even the most hardworking people in the village will stay at home to rest for an hour or two before going out to work.
Gao Mingcheng and Gao Zhuang also stayed at home, but did not take a nap.
The water in the cans that had been cleaned before had been drained. Gao Mingcheng sat under the eaves, holding an iron spoon, and began to scoop the honey from the bucket into the bottles.
Gao Zhuang sat on a low stool made of a tree stump, watching Gao Mingcheng work eagerly. He was not very greedy, after all, Gao Mingcheng had given him some honeycombs to eat yesterday.
Gao Mingcheng's hands were steady, and the mouth of the can was not small, so not a drop of honey was wasted. All of it was put into the bottles. When all eight bottles were filled, there was still one bottle left in the wooden barrel.
There are some residual residues in the remaining honey, which is not suitable for selling, but there is no problem for family consumption.
"Bring me a clean bowl."
As soon as Gao Mingcheng gave an order, Gao Zhuang jumped up immediately, ran to the kitchen, got out a bowl, and placed the bowl on the flat ground.
Gao Mingcheng first used a spoon to scoop the honey at the bottom of the barrel into the bowl. In the end, the remaining honey could not be scooped out and it all stuck to the barrel.
Upon seeing this, Gao Zhuang immediately reached out his hand and scratched the inner wall of the barrel with his fingers, bringing out some sticky honey. He put his hand in his mouth and smacked it happily.
Gao Mingcheng didn't care and ate some of it. He washed the rest with water and poured it into the trough in the pigpen in the backyard, as a sweet drink for the pigs at home.
"I'll take this bowl of honey to my home. You take a rest first, and we'll go to the mountains together later." Gao Mingcheng said as he picked up the bowl full of honey.
There was a full bowl of honey, and the broken honeycomb residue had already settled to the bottom of the bowl.
Gao Zhuang's house is not far behind his house. If his family members speak loudly, they can be heard here.
I went out, turned a corner, and followed a corridor to the back door of his house.
Gao Mingcheng's family also raises pigs, a total of two, which mainly eat pig grass. His sister is the main force in collecting pig grass. Of course, his brothers will occasionally help collect pig grass.
Entering from the back door, there is a very simple small courtyard with some pig feed piled in the corner and a large iron pot for cooking pig feed next to it.
The big iron pot was empty, but still warm.
"Fourth brother, are these spicy dried radishes and pickles enough to last us a week?" Gao Shufang's voice came from a room. Gao Mingcheng looked in the direction of the voice and through the open window saw Gao Mingli and Gao Shufang in the room. Gao Mingli was packing up and stuffing clean clothes into an old canvas bag.
He lowered his head to work, answering his sister's words, "It's definitely not enough. The weather is too hot now, and I can't keep more if I take more, so Dad gave me an extra dollar and asked me to buy some vegetarian dishes to go with it."
Gao Mingli had a stack of money next to him, all small-denomination bills. He counted them carefully again and found that there were a total of eighteen yuan.
The tuition fee was seventeen yuan, and the extra one yuan was given by Gao Yuanjian to buy groceries.
(End of this chapter)
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