Farmhouse Qiaofei

Chapter 173 Eating Mooncakes During the Mid-Autumn Festival

Five days before the Mid-Autumn Festival, Bai Shao moved out of the warehouse the thick and heavy iron box she asked Hou's second uncle to make, cleaned it inside and out, and boiled the stones underneath. Wash it again, dry it out, and put it back on the bottom of the big iron box.

The family members know that there are always strange things in Bai Shao's mind, so they watch around to see what she has to do.

I saw that she first asked Bai Yunshi to help her bring out a heavy and large stove, then took an iron pot, put a certain amount of sugar in it, added a certain amount of water, and boiled it carefully for about half an hour, When the sugar and water had turned into a thick red syrup, she took the pot from the stove and set it aside to cool.

That's what syrup is for.

Then take out the alkali and water and mix them in a three-to-one ratio.

The next step is to take out a scoop of flour, scoop an appropriate amount of syrup and an appropriate amount of alkaline water to mix into a uniform dough with wooden chopsticks, and put it aside to relax. This is the mooncake skin.

The next step is to make the stuffing. This is actually very common. Wu can do it. Take some rock sugar, crushed walnuts, and some favorite things, add syrup and some flour to make it non-sticky, and add Xieyang County The purchased green and red silk is the most common mooncake stuffed with five kernels in Anyang County.

Bai Shao doesn't like five-nut stuffing, and she thinks that since she wants to sell moon cakes, she should sell more flavors, so she asks Bai Chuanbai to buy her a few catties of red beans, soak them in water overnight, and put them in when they are fully soaked. Cook it in a large pot until it becomes sticky, take it out and crush it with a spoon, then add sugar in a large pot and stir-fry until it is not sticky, then it is the red bean paste filling.

Finally, there is the critical egg yolk.

Because there were no salted duck eggs at home, Bai Shao paid for [-] duck eggs from Dachun's house, boiled them and peeled off the whites, leaving only the yellow yolks.

When the stuffing is done, the skin is almost loose, Bai Shao asked Wu, who is more accurate with his hands, to divide the medicine evenly, and then wrap the stuffing in it.

The seemingly simplest step is actually quite difficult, because to make delicious mooncakes, you must have thin skin and lots of fillings. If you add too much skin, it will affect the taste, and the difficulty of wrapping will increase virtually.

Bai Shao used to be just a theoretical emperor, but now it is the first time that Zhenger Bajing wraps moon cakes, it is not as good-looking as Bai Wei's buns, was ridiculed by his sister, and worked hard to practice a few times before he managed to wrap it out A decent ball.

Of course, it cannot be baked and eaten. Since it is a mooncake for sale, it still needs to be presented.

In this era, the method of making moon cakes was relatively simple, and the molds were very rare. Bai Shao asked Yan Shu for help to find a set of heavy abrasive tools carved from stone.

In order to prevent the failure of the mold, Bai Shao first used a brush made of pig bristles to brush a thin layer of oil on the inside, then put the spherical moon cake in, gently pressed the spherical moon cake with the palm, and finally turned the stone carving mold upside down Shake it twice gently, and a half-finished mooncake is ready.

Although there were many twists and turns in the middle, it was a success anyway.

Bai Shao lifted the first successful mooncake with her palm, showing a happy smile.

As for the last step of making mooncakes - baking, it's actually not that strenuous.

In this day and age, most people bake things in a large boiler with charcoal in the middle. Bai Shao dislikes that the fire is too hot, and it is easy to burn the mooncakes, so Uncle Hou made such a big iron box.

This big iron box, well, let’s call it an oven, it doesn’t need to light a fire directly inside, but ignites a flame underneath, because the unique properties of iron can quickly spread the temperature to the entire oven, and the inside will reach the temperature required for baking. required temperature.

Coupled with the sparse stones placed at the bottom, the mooncake can be placed relatively in the middle of the oven to receive the most even baking. The degree of coloring of the whole mooncake is unmatched by the boiler.

However, the heat is too difficult to control. At the beginning, when the fire was high, the mooncakes inside would be blackened. Later, when the fire was lowered, the mooncakes would not reach the heat, and it would be difficult to cook. Finally, Bai Chuanbai tried again and again. After destroying at least five mooncakes several times, I managed to control the temperature of the fire.

When the first successful mooncake came out, Bai Wei cheered loudly, and couldn't wait to pick up the mooncake and stuff it into his mouth, but was stopped by Bai Shao.

"Sister, this mooncake needs to be re-oiled. It tastes best when it is left for a day or two. It can still be chewed now, but after a little cooling, it will be hard enough to crack your teeth." Bai Shao said helplessly.

Seeing this, Bai Wei had no choice but to put the mooncakes back reluctantly, and together with Wu Shi, wrapped up all the prepared fillings and let Bai Chuanbai bake them.

This busy day is over.

The whole family, including Dachun Niang who was called to help, only made more than 100 mooncakes in total.

But fortunately, there are still a lot of materials at home, and the next day was busy for a long time, because the materials have been prepared, just pack it, and finally made more than 300 mooncakes, and placed them in a room to wait for the oil to be returned. .

There was only one day before the Mid-Autumn Festival, because the mooncakes made on the first day had already returned to oil and were ready to eat, so Bai Shao brought out two plates, and did not mix them with other things in the store for sale, and let Bai Yunshi carry them directly A table, placed outside Shiweitian, yelled like a peddler.

"Come here, come here, come and taste the new mooncakes from Shiweitian, come and taste them, you can taste them for free." Bai Shao yelled at the people passing by while cutting a few pieces of mooncakes into small bite-sized pieces.

In Izumo Town, food is famous for its delicious food, so people who are full immediately came to try a couple of bites.

"Yo, the taste is not bad." The man said something, and then he bought two yuan and left.

This action attracted everyone's attention, and many people gathered around one after another. They tasted all kinds of food and asked about the price. The five kernels cost ten yuan a piece, and the egg yolks were more expensive, twenty yuan a piece. This is in Izumo The price is very expensive for the town, so everyone hesitated for a while.

"Such beautiful mooncakes are usually only available in Xieyang County, but I didn't expect to find them here." At this moment, the first person who bought mooncakes just changed a set of clothes and returned to the front of Baishao's stall. Holding a piece of mooncake with egg yolk and bean paste, he said, "There is egg yolk in it, it's delicious. Think about it, guys, if this is in the Yueman Building in Xieyang County, how much would such a mooncake cost? At least one tael of silver." One, now it only costs twenty Wen, which is really cheap, come, get me a few yuan."

After finishing speaking, he handed Bai Shao a few dozen pennies neatly, bought a few more and left.

Of course, only Bai Shao knew about all this. Others only thought that the mooncakes sold out twice in a while, and their hearts began to move. Some of the families were a little richer, so they came up and bought a few pieces. Bai Shao tied the oil-paper bag, took it out and tasted it, and shouted, "It's really delicious, I have to take it home and give it to my family."

After speaking, he left in a hurry.

After doing this, everyone finally started to rush to buy mooncakes.

It took about two cups of tea time, and the two plates of mooncakes brought out by Bai Shao were sold out.

Seeing that there were still people waiting to buy from behind, she smiled lightly, and actually asked Bai Yunshi to come over and put away the table, and then told the people waiting at the door to buy mooncakes that they wanted mooncakes. While supplies last.

With such careful control of the number of sales, by the time of the Mid-Autumn Festival, Bai Shao's mooncakes have been highly praised.

Every time the moon cakes are sold, there are a lot of people waiting there to buy moon cakes.

Seeing that the mooncakes were so popular, Bai Shao was moved by the idea of ​​sending them to Fumantang to sell. He quickly hired a few neat women to make mooncakes in the backyard, and sent 200 yuan to Fujingtang the day before the Mid-Autumn Festival. go.

Zhao Hu couldn't help being overjoyed, he removed some of the mooncakes he had made in Fujingtang, added some very high-end packaging, put the egg yolk mooncakes in them, and sold them at a high price.

As for Wuren's being common, he didn't want it.

Bai Shao didn't care, and continued to sell a fixed amount of moon cakes at the gate of Shiweitian.

On the day of the Mid-Autumn Festival, Wu made eight egg yolk mooncakes and eight five-nut mooncakes, and bought two pieces of pork, one lamb leg, two fish, two roosters, ten catties of shochu, and one catty of good tea. With the addition of two horses of high-quality cloth, two shops were closed, and the family sat in a mule cart, and it was the first time that they went to Shi Mile Shop so completely.

(End of this chapter)