Datang Nongsheng

Chapter 6 Xiaohe Collection

The large water tank in Sun Xiangfu's house became a rice field eel tank, and even the empty rice tank was temporarily used to hold loach. The scale fish that are easy to feed can weigh more than ten catties.

Sun Dali insisted on not throwing away the internal organs of the fish, so after a large pot of fish had been scaled and gills removed, Sun Xiangfu and him used a big bamboo basket to clean the fish intestines and fish bubbles by the river.

These fish offals are indeed edible, but because the entrance of the fish cage is not big, it is impossible to catch large scale fish, and the internal organs of these scale fish, which are no bigger than chopsticks, cannot be cleaned in a short time. Something happened, so by the time they finished their busy work, the fish soup was already boiling in the iron pot at Sun Dali's house.

"Second brother, little sister, get up and eat."

Perhaps Sun Xiangfu's words were too unfamiliar, and the two little guys who just woke up couldn't believe it. The last time they ate when they woke up, it should be when they were in their hometown in the north.

The fish soup was cooked by Sun Dali's old mother because he had a big iron pot at home, half of the ten catties of white meat fish was boiled, and the rest was marinated with some salt left over before Sun Xiangfu touched it. eat a meal.

No one in the village has a dedicated vegetable plot, and naturally there is no condiment of onion, ginger and garlic, so Sun Xiangfu picked some young chrysanthemum chrysanthemum leaves by the river and added them to the fish soup, which can somewhat remove the fishy smell. As for the taste? !For those who have not had a full meal for a long time, it is delicious to leave out the salt.

My family pays attention to honesty when eating. Each person has a big pottery bowl, and there are three or five palm-sized crucian carp or other fish in the bowl, and there are also a lot of white river shrimp and dried shrimps. After cooking a big pot full, after Sun Dali's fish offal was washed, the six of them gathered around the stove and began to eat, the faint fishy smell mixed with the salty taste made them enjoy eating.

"Even the meat of the fish is so fishy. I guess the fish offal is too fishy to swallow. Erli will find some reed leaves to wrap after eating. I'll take it to the village chief's house and forget it."

Sun Xiangfu was the only picky eater present, and he still had the mood to talk while eating. As for the others, they were all gagged by the food now. When Sun Xiangfu called his name, Sun Erli just responded with a hmm, After a large pot of fish soup was drunk by several people, Sun Xiangfu could talk to everyone properly.

"Brother Dali, you are going to take Erli to make a fish cage at home today. According to the method I taught you yesterday, you can make it a little bigger, so that you can catch big fish. Please ask Auntie to take our two little guys. , wash and dry the locusts caught last night, then dig some earthworms and feed them to the loaches and eels in my tank.”

Sun Dali's old mother, Li Cuihua, also ate roasted locusts last night, so she naturally knew that this food was counted as rations when it was crucial, so she promised Sun Xiangfu to rest assured.

"Why, you want to give these fish offal to Hu Cai? His family is not short of food."

Sun Dali, who reacted a little slower, seemed to be worried about these miscellaneous things, and then Sun Xiangfu explained, "Hu is the village head, and he is in charge of some public objects in the village. I have something to ask him, give him some favors Only in this way can things be handled more smoothly, remember our goal and let the whole village live a good life, if we want to achieve this goal, we must use our brains and be flexible."

After a while, Sun Xiangfu brought a fish wrapped in reed leaves that looked like a big rice dumpling into Hu Cai's fence yard, and Sun Dali also listened to Sun Xiangfu's words, and took a hatchet to the back mountain bamboo forest to cut it. bamboo.

The whole village lived in shack-style houses, and only the house of the head of the village, Hu Cai's house, was built of wooden boards, with bamboo fences erected at the front and back, which can be regarded as surrounding a yard.

"Happiness is coming, sit down and talk."

Hu Cai's family is also short of food, but it's no problem to drink a few bowls of porridge a day, and he knows a few words, so he can go to the village chief every now and then to cry about being poor, begging for some farm tools and so on. rare.

The villages in Guanzhong are not all as poor as this village. The old villages that have lived here for generations can basically solve the problem of food and clothing by themselves, and then there are those fiefdoms of noble families, where the tenants have no worries about food and clothing. Only this kind of newly moved village It's a little bit harder, but as long as we get through this year, and there is a one-year tax holiday next year, as long as there are no major natural disasters, life is still very promising.

"Village Chief Hu, I brought you some fish offal, and put it in millet to cook porridge, which can be regarded as meat."

Seeing that Sun Xiangfu had brought something for himself, Hu Cai then looked at him. In his memory, Sun Xiangfu was a relatively dull person, especially after his parents died, with a pair of younger siblings, the family often couldn't open the pot. It's just that after yesterday's incident, he has changed his view of Sun Xiangfu, and it's a remarkable achievement to be able to deceive the officers and soldiers into half a pot of rice porridge.

"Xiao Wu, pour a bowl of water for Brother Xiangfu."

Hu Cai took the offal from Sun Xiangfu, shouted into the house, and asked him to sit on the bamboo horse in front of the house.

"Mr. Hu, I remember that there are several wheelbarrows in our village, can I borrow them?"

If it was normal, Hu would say, 'Of course not, it is the public property of the village, if it is damaged, how can I explain to the village chief. '

But today!After accepting some benefits from Sun Xiangfu, Hu Cai nodded and said, "Occasionally you can borrow them, but you can't take them back for your own use. These things are the public property distributed by the imperial court when we moved here. They are all available and must not be damaged. , what, you want to pull something?"

"No, did you catch some fish and want to go to the market to exchange some money." Sun Xiangfu expected Hu to say this early in the morning, and said honestly.

"You know how to catch fish? You want to go to the market to sell it? It seems that you caught a lot! No wonder some fish was sent to my house, but we northerners are not good at water. Didn't we have a few children a while ago, so hungry Go down the river to catch fish, if you drown, you have to be careful."

Hu Cai said so, rolled his eyes, but thought, "Since you have caught so many fish, why didn't you mention a few fish, but sent some miscellaneous fish to fool me." '

"Hey, I know, I will be careful. I have another thing to tell you. Everyone knew that bamboo worms can be eaten yesterday. Today, there are still many people who will go to the back hillside to chop bamboo. You have to tell me Don't chop them up, the insects are gone, it's not a big deal, the bamboo is cut down, it will be troublesome for the village to use bamboo materials in the future, the family really has no food, catch the locusts and roast them to make them more full, Dali's mother will come to the village in the afternoon Where can I grind the dried locusts in the stone mill, then you will ask everyone to learn how to turn locusts into food."

Hu Cai is also able to accept the taste of roasted locusts, and the reason why the whole village is so peaceful this morning is because everyone knows that locusts are edible, so they don't worry about starving to death. I think everyone will spontaneously go to the field today Go to the ground to catch locusts.

Hearing that locusts can be ground into powder and made into food, Hu Cai frowned. He didn't know what he was thinking. Sun Xiangfu asked him about many things in the village until the sun rose in the morning, and a burst of heat hit him. Sun Xiangfu just left and went home, and it was through this conversation that Sun Xiangfu learned many things that the original Sun Xiangfu in this world didn't usually care about.

The village now has 46 households with a population of 157, including 14 strong men aged 40 to 58, and the rest are old, weak, women and children.

There are a total of [-] mu of Yongye farmland, which is divided according to the original [-] households and one village. However, in the past year or so, four households have disappeared, and the court has not taken back those fields.In addition, there are one bamboo mountain, two timber mountains, ten official oxen, ten plows, and ten wheelbarrows each.

Every ten miles in the Tang Dynasty set up a mile, and there was one person who managed all the villages and villages under his jurisdiction, urged farming, collected taxes, and was directly responsible to the county government. personnel.

And in each li, most of them will set up a small market, so Wuliji and Shiliji are everywhere in Datang. Most of the markets sell relatively simple commodities, such as iron and wood utensils and other agricultural tools, salt, and fish. Food and other necessities of life for the common people, as well as crops and handmade products produced by farmers in each village, and then nothing else.

No way, the goods in Datang are so scarce. There may be tea shops in market towns, but there are absolutely no restaurants, because alcohol is a controlled commodity, and no one will take a business license for liquor business to open a shop in a small market.

The reason why Sun Xiangfu asked Hu Cai about the market was because he was basically unable to reach the county town dozens of miles away. With the ancient roads, it would take two days to walk a few dozen miles away by foot alone, not to mention the need to carry Heavy goods, so his fish can only be sold in the nearest market at first, and this market is called Xiaoheji.

The Xiaohe is a tributary of the Weishui River, and it is also the name of the river that flows through the village where Sun Xiangfu lives. Although it is not wide, it has been flowing for an unknown number of years, nourishing hundreds of villages along the river. , After knowing where he was more clearly, Sun Xiangfu pushed a wheelbarrow borrowed from Hu Cai and went home.

(End of this chapter)