Wentang

Chapter 307
Yue Shan has never seen sun-dried salt, and he didn't pay attention to the details when he read it in the book.He just vaguely remembers that it only takes three to five days to produce coarse salt when the weather is right, but it is not clear how many days it will take for each link.

Moreover, China is such a big country, and the climate conditions in each place are different, so we cannot generalize it.

Therefore, the first salt drying is more of an experimental nature, mainly to find out the rules of each link, and it is not important as to how much salt can be produced.

When Yue Shan came to Yantian, Deng Jian was instructing the workers to put the seawater from the evaporation pond into the crystallization pond.Yue Shan went over to take a look, and the water line in the pool had dropped by more than a third compared to yesterday.

He didn't know what this water level meant, so he could only observe and summarize slowly.However, there is no trace of salt at the bottom of the water, which shows that it has not yet reached the level of crystallization.

For the first time, only water from two evaporation ponds was released, and the next eight released two groups every other hour.Then compare and summarize to see which group of time collocation is more reasonable.

Moreover, these two evaporation pools should not be left idle. Immediately after the water is released, the openings are blocked, and water is refilled for evaporation.

Yue Shan didn't stay here too long. After looking at them and found that there was no problem with their work step by step, he returned to the house.

He has to plan carefully how to maximize the benefits of kelp.

……

In the early morning of the second day, that is, the third day of drying the salt, a piece of news ignited everyone's enthusiasm in an instant: the salt field has grown salt.

Regardless of whether it is an official, a craftsman or a worker, they all left their work and ran to the salt field.When Yue Shan arrived, the inner and outer circles were already crowded with people.

"Clear water is coming, get out of the way."

"Damn it, tell me, didn't you see Qingshuihou coming? Get out of the way."

Seeing him coming, the crowd automatically made way for a passage, and then looked at him like a god.

Yue Shan nodded to express his gratitude to everyone, and then went over the crowd to Yantian.Sure enough, there was a layer of white matter at the bottom of the crystallization pool, no doubt it was salt.

Excitedly, he reached out and touched it. It wasn't very thick, about a few millimeters, but it could already be pinched.He pinched a little bit and tasted it in his mouth. It was salty and a bit bitter, but not very bitter.

It succeeded, it really succeeded, Yue Shan was very excited.

Don't look at him with a confident look, but he is actually very nervous.What if he doesn't know about other secret techniques for drying salt in Yantian?

Now it seems that I think too much. There is no secret skill in drying salt in Yantian.

"Yuehou, look quickly, salt, salt, a pool full of salt. We have succeeded, we have succeeded." Deng Jian shouted when he saw him.

"Haha... Okay, it's all thanks to Mr. Deng." Yue Shan laughed happily.

"Haha... Where is it? It was Yue Hou who commanded it well. Without you, I would never have imagined that salt could be produced in this way." Deng Jian said excitedly.

"Let's not give in to me, no one can get away with this credit." Yue Shan said.

"Then I would like to thank Yue Hou first, without you, how could I have achieved such great achievements." Deng Jian said sincerely.

"It's all for the country." Yue Shan replied modestly, and then changed the subject: "When did you start producing salt?"

"The salt that came out in the middle of the night and the fourth watch yesterday was only a thin layer, but it was already so thick when I got up this morning." Deng Jian calmed down and replied.

"Okay, from now on, you lead people to observe the crystallization pond all the time, and when there is no salt, let the rest go." Yue Shan said.

"Could it be that the remaining water is the reason why the boiled salt cannot be eaten?" Deng Jian asked thoughtfully.

"Smart, that's right. The rest of the water is full of toxins, and it will kill you if you eat it." Yue Shan looked at him in surprise, he didn't expect him to think of this level.

Boiled sea salt has existed since ancient times, but the boiled salt is inedible and poisonous.Sun-dried salt also utilizes the principle of evaporation, but the dried salt is edible, and the secret lies in the remaining water.

The water after crystallization is also called mother liquor, which is a very important industrial raw material in later generations, but it is highly toxic to the human body.

Boiling seawater for salt is to boil seawater dry directly. Boiling salt with fire evaporates too violently, and the salt and other impurities crystallize together, and the result is that both the good and the bad are left together.

The evaporation process of sun-dried salt is relatively gentle, and the salt with a higher concentration is preferentially crystallized, and most of the impurities will remain in the seawater.Drain the rest of the water at the right moment and you'll get kosher salt that's edible.

"So that's the case, Jian is very grateful for Xie Yuehou's teaching." Deng Jian bowed.

"En." Yue Shan was not humble this time, and accepted his salute, because it was indeed teaching him the principles of salt making.

After he finished his salute, Yue Shan continued, "Are the ash and activated carbon ready?"

"It's ready, the crystallization is complete and you can purify it for secondary crystallization." Deng Jian nodded first, hesitated for a while and then asked: "Coarse salt is already edible, why waste time purifying it?"

Yue Shan sighed, and said solemnly: "Coarse salt is also poisonous, and taking it for a long time will shorten a person's lifespan. Every life in my Tang Dynasty is precious, and no life can be lost in vain. It's just one more thing. The program can prolong the lives of countless people, which one do you think is more cost-effective."

Deng Jian said sincerely, "Yue Houzhai has a kind heart, and Jian feels ashamed."

But what Deng Jian really admired in his heart was not Yue Shan's kindness, but his foresight.In his view, Yueshan purifies refined salt to prolong people's lifespan, and only when they live longer can they create more value.

All in all, his ideas are more utilitarian.Not only him, most people have the same utilitarian ideas.

The role of plant ash has been mentioned before, so I won’t repeat it here, let’s talk about activated carbon.Everyone knows it can be used for filtration, but few people know how activated carbon is made.

There are many methods, some complex and some simple.Yueshan happened to know one of the easiest ways to make activated carbon, which he heard from his school chemistry teacher.

Activated carbon can be obtained by rinsing charcoal with high-speed flowing water vapor.How about it? It's very simple, right?

It's just that the quality of such activated carbon is average, and its adsorption capacity is far inferior to activated carbon produced by other methods.But in the Tang Dynasty, it was good to have some use, who cares whether the quality is good or not.

Plant ash and activated carbon have also been prepared long ago, just waiting for coarse salt.

It didn't make people wait too long, and the crystallization stopped just after Mao Shi, that is, in the early five o'clock in the afternoon.

At Yue Shan's order, the workers drained the water from the crystallization pond and gathered the salt on the ground with a scraper.Seeing the piles of salt, everyone couldn't help cheering again.

After that, it is dissolved and added with plant ash, clarified and filtered, and secondary crystallization, which will not be described here.In short, it took about five days, and Yue Shan obtained nearly fifty stones of pure table salt.

That same night, brother Zhao Jingze appeared in the camp here and sent specific information about the river pirates in Yanci County.

Just when Yue Shan was thinking about where to start, Tian Xuechen came here and brought a piece of news that Yue Shan couldn't believe: the officials and gentry in Yanci County wanted to invite Qing Shuihou to dinner.

(End of this chapter)