Villager of Daming

Chapter 1304: A Mouth of Tofu is So Frightening
"Hot big tofu, big tofu with marinade, two cents for a big piece..."

"Frozen tofu, when eating hot pot or maocai, put honeycomb in it, it tastes best after absorbing the soup..."

"Would you like some dried tofu? Hey! You want some dried tofu? How many pieces?"

The line went around and around, and around noon it arrived at a normal market, where people buy their groceries on a daily basis.

When the weather gets cold, we cover some things with cotton cloth, including the vegetables bought wholesale from the greenhouse.

Tofu sellers usually guard the entrance and exit. In winter, the freshly made tofu is covered with cotton cloth to prevent it from freezing for a while. The tofu is hot when it is just made.

Only when there is leftover that cannot be sold will it be cut into pieces and placed on a board to freeze into frozen tofu, and the price is the same as normal.

This is what is done in the north in winter. Either continue pressing and make it into dried tofu. If the dried tofu is not selling well, add salt and pickle it into salty dried tofu.

Just like dried tofu, it is called bean skin in some places, but there is actually a special type of bean skin, which is different from yuba.

You usually see bean skin when eating spicy hot pot, so the one that looks like thousand sheets is called dried tofu.

If the dried tofu is spoiled or cannot be sold, just roll it up, wrap it with a layer of dried tofu, press it, and then add some salt to smoke it to make vegetarian chicken, which can be preserved for one more day.

Some people make dried tofu shreds after smoking and add salt to them, which can also be preserved for one more day.

Zhu Yuanzhang stood in front of a tofu stall and watched. No one came to buy. The stall owner was also watching, staring eagerly. He already knew who was coming, but he didn't dare to shout or kneel down.

I was told a long time ago that if the visitor does not identify himself, you should not greet him.

The tofu seller knows people from Xiaqiu Village. Xiaqiu Village does not wholesale tofu, even though the cost is lower, because that would cause the people who originally used small mills to grind the beans to lose their skills.

People in Xiaqiu Village collect bean dregs and also provide better filter cloths.

The collected bean dregs are not so fine when ground by normal means, so Xiaqiao Village grinds them again to produce some tofu. The rest is used as feed and part is used to make fried vegetarian meatballs.

The tofu sellers would wait for people to collect the bean dregs every day. Sometimes they would ask for money, and sometimes they would exchange them for the better gypsum or brine provided by Xiaqiu Village.

Of course, you can also make tofu with vinegar, but no one does that. Glutinous rice vinegar is good, but the cost is too high.

The tofu seller saw so many people from Xiaqiu Village and looked at their standing positions. Oh my god! Is the emperor coming?
In any case, it is impossible for the minister to allow the people of Xiaqiu Village to praise him like this. What should he do with his own tofu?
"This piece weighs two pounds, right?" Zhu Yuanzhang had no idea what the other party was thinking. He looked at the size of the tofu block and his eyes turned red.

"To answer your question! It's about 1.9 jin. Some people think it's too small, so they buy it at 1.5 yuan per jin. If you add a little, it's still the same price. Sometimes you even buy it by the block."

The stall owner answered carefully, it's 1.5 cents per pound. When the tofu is pressed, it will leave grid marks, and you can cut along the marks to get the same weight.

The earlier you buy it in the morning when it is hotter, the more you can add because it contains more water. By the afternoon, some of the water will be gone and you will have less to add.

In winter, if it is left at night, it will become old tofu. It is good enough if the price is not increased at this time. Don't expect to get more.

Even if it cannot be sold, the price will never be lowered. If it is lowered today, there will be many people waiting to buy it in the evening tomorrow.

Just like the watermelon seller, when it’s night time and the watermelons can’t be kept anymore, they just throw them away.

"It's cheap, really cheap. When we were young, we couldn't afford tofu. It cost four cents per pound. It was because there were not many people growing beans!"

Zhu Wentian blinked his eyes and recalled the days when he was a cowherd. Tofu was too expensive.

The main reason was that there were few people planting beans, and the yield per mu was also low. He didn't have much money, and he got beaten for secretly roasting beans to eat.

Empress Ma naturally held Zhu Yuanzhang's hand and said, "One pound of beans can be exchanged for two pounds of tofu. One pound of beans can be exchanged for two pounds and four ounces of tofu. It's about 10% profit, and there are still bean dregs left." When the two of them said this, the tofu seller's eyes also reddened: "Thanks to your majesty, oh! Your Majesty, the beans shipped from other places are cheap, and the people make more money. It's easier for us to buy tofu every day."

"Cut some for me so we can try it." Zhu Yuanzhang suddenly wanted to eat tofu.

"This..." The tofu seller's face turned pale, it wasn't because of the cold weather.

"Cut, come on, cut a little, a little later, um! Hehehehehe..."

Zhu Wentian came over and put his hand on the stall owner's shoulder, near his neck, and asked him to cut it.

"Cut it! Choose the position at the back." Ling'er followed.

"Okay!" The stall owner took a deep breath, picked up a tofu-cutting knife, pulled up the covering cloth, cut off a little bit in the middle of the back of the tofu, and handed it over with trembling hands.

Zhu Yuanzhang didn't stretch out his hands, but stretched his neck and bit it with his mouth. He didn't stop until he had eaten it and stood still. The stall owner was already drenched in sweat.

"It's delicious! It's hot, and I feel warm inside after eating it. Let's go to the next place to have a look."

After tasting, Zhu Yuanzhang walked forward.

The person behind bought all the tofu and gave the stall owner a bar of soap. The stall owner wiped the sweat from his forehead and smiled.

Zhu Yuanzhang looked at the head of the village and said, "Oh! Who would have thought that a place that should have suffered from drought and locust plague would actually provide soybeans in large quantities?
Winter wheat is rotated to soybeans and sorghum, and corn will be planted later, right?
Corn grows well in the plains, especially, that's what the book says, right?"

Zhu Yuanzhang knew why tofu became cheaper, because the supply of soybeans increased and people started planting them after harvesting winter wheat.

Plant sorghum first, and then plant soybeans next to it after it grows a bit. The sorghum will provide shade for the soybeans, and the soybeans will provide nitrogen fertilizer for the sorghum.

Crop rotation and intercropping can increase people's land productivity. People have to work harder, use more fertilizer, and turn the soil.

If you don't plow the land, just cut the wheat stubble low and then plant directly.

The village head responded: “Once the corn grows, its grains are large and sparrows don’t like to eat it and can’t swallow it.

In mountainous areas, wild boars and other large animals will come down the mountains to damage corn fields. In plain areas, the main threat is rabbits.

Corn requires less water than sorghum and soybeans, and its roots are firm.

However, since corn roots are large, it is convenient to dig them out manually, and they can be used as firewood after being knocked off..."

According to what Hanhan said, the village head said that it is most cost-effective to plant corn after harvesting winter wheat. The proportion of corn and soybeans eaten by birds is much smaller than that of sorghum.

But mice and rabbits like to live in cornfields because cornfields are hidden and they can eat corn kernels.

"That means we need to find a special place to grow soybeans. Otherwise, where can we find cheap tofu? Can we make much money from the soybean dregs we collect?"

Zhu Yuanzhang considered the issue of people eating tofu. After switching to corn, who would grow soybeans?
"Your Majesty, there are a lot!" Ling'er replied, "After we collect them, we can use them for a lot of purposes. We can even grind them and make some tofu.

Then we make the meatballs. The taste of the okara meatballs is different from other meatballs.

After fermentation, it can be used as livestock. If there is more, it can be fermented with other things to become good fertilizer. The larger the production scale, the lower the cost. "

(End of this chapter)