If you want to bake and make date cakes in batches, the tools you need are: oven, mold, timer, thermometer and egg beater.

Don’t worry about other things for the time being, but the most core oven has some problems... Even if you don’t consider the long arrival time of high-tech products, it is unrealistic to use modern ovens directly in the Song Dynasty when there was no electricity or gas.

If you just build a adobe stove, it is easy to control the temperature, the uniformity of the temperature distribution in the furnace, and the ease of placing a baking tray, etc., you need to redesign an oven.

At first, Xiao Heng's idea was to open a hole in the side wall of the oven, then insert the iron tank filled with hot carbon into it, and hang the thermometer in the center of the oven. In this way, the temperature inside the oven can be adjusted by inserting and unplugging the iron tank.

But Xiao Heng soon abandoned this idea.

This kind of oven does solve the problem of temperature control, but it is too difficult to control. The temperature of the carbon in the iron tank will gradually drop as it burns, and it also requires manual adjustment.

In addition, the temperature in the furnace will inevitably not be uniform, the carbon flue gas will affect the taste of the food, and the ash after the burning of the carbon block will also contaminate the food... In short, there are few advantages and disadvantages.

This is the simple way. Taking shortcuts means that there will inevitably be problems of this kind, so Xiao Heng tried to change his method.

So how can we make a furnace with controllable combustion speed?

Xiao Heng thought for a long time and suddenly thought of an interesting stove that he had used before - an outdoor wood stove, or a more professional firewood gasification furnace.

The name of this wood stove sounds ordinary, but it is actually the crystallization of modern scientific theory.

Specifically, it is to use the heat generated by the combustion of the upper layer to distillate the lower layer of firewood, and the combustible gases generated to ignite upwards. At the same time, the coke produced after the distillation of the firewood is used as the fuel for the next layer to continue to heat the lower layer of firewood.

The clever design allows this wood stove to use the upward airflow generated by combustion to naturally inhale, further improving the combustion efficiency.

This kind of wood stove is smoke-free and saves firewood. After burning, it is left with extremely fine wood ash. It is not easy to pick the fuel, and it is not recommended to visit the branches, hay, fallen leaves, wood chips, etc.

What Xiao Heng values ​​is the controllability of this combustion - as long as the air flow is controlled, the firepower can be simply adjusted.

After finding paper and ink to roughly draw the design drawing, Xiao Heng carefully checked the details, and found that there was no problem, he pulled Lao Ma to the back mountain to dig loess.

The loess is transported back and roughly broken, pick out the stones, and then use water to make yellow mud with moderate humidity.

Cut the straw into small pieces about two inches, sprinkle it in the yellow mud and mix well, and then make the clay.

After finishing the preparation, the next thing to do is a small-scale experiment. Xiao Heng reduced the scale of the drawings by 5 times, and tried to make a model first.

"What does this mean by your husband?" Miss Qin said strangely.

Since Xiao Heng and Ni, the master and servant, plus a girl in white, have been standing aside and watching. Now, when Xiao Heng starts to take action, he can finally help but feel curious.

"Do a small-scale experiment..." Xiao Heng replied patiently while strictly following the scale, "...Small-scale experiments can first verify whether my ideas can work. Secondly, they can also find out the problems that will arise during actual use at a relatively small cost, so as to correct the original design..."

“…”

Miss Qin and the others were silent for a while, as if they were digesting what Xiao Heng said.

Xiao Heng seemed quite relaxed while doing it, and soon a small and exquisite clay embryo model took shape...

The outer dimensions of the entire model are about 40 cm square, and there are no more or less inside and just enough to put four small bowls down.

Xiao Heng carefully stuffed the wood chips and straw into the model wood stove and lit them, then poured the thin batter that had been prepared before into a bowl and stuffed it into a mini oven, and finally covered it with a piece of wood to fill it as the oven door.

Next, Xiao Heng used another wooden board to half cover the air suction port located below, and then paid attention to the changes in the flame inside through the observation hole on the wooden board.

More than ten minutes later, a sweet jujube radiated from the small oven, which made the little girl watching the fun swallow.

"It should be baked." Xiao Heng completely covered the air inlet, and after the flames were almost extinguished, he picked up the small bowl.

Xiao Heng first took a small bowl and observed it carefully, then dug a piece with a spoon and stuffed it into his mouth and tasted it.

Xiao Heng closed his eyes and savored the date cake carefully this time. Sure enough, he no longer had the slight smoky smell of the past. When he opened his eyes, the remaining three bowls were almost gone.

"..." Looking at the three greedy girls helplessly, she couldn't help but sigh and handed the remaining date cake to Lao Ma, "Try it too and see if it's different from before."

"Okay." Lao Ma didn't dislike it. He finished eating in a few bites, and then repeatedly said it was delicious.

Xiao Heng smiled when he heard this, picked up a pen and outlined it on the sketch...

There are still some problems with the design this time, such as the board of the air inlet is not very well controlled, the furnace door is not tightly sealed, and the hot air circulation in the furnace is not well done, resulting in the pastries in the furnace being heated evenly enough, etc.

After roughly modifying the designs related to these items, Xiao Heng made another list: sorting according to what he could do, what he could not do but could customize, and what he could not make at all.

The main material of the oven uses straw as adobe reinforced ribs. This material has been used in all kinds of furnaces since ancient times.

Other materials required for ovens such as iron rods, iron combustion chambers, furnace doors and other iron products need to be customized. In addition, molds cannot be simply used in porcelain bowls. It is best to make a set of large molds similar to those used in modern ovens... These things need to be customized with blacksmiths.

Fortunately, the iron smelting industry in the Song Dynasty was very mature, and the iron price was only a few dozen cents per pound, and even with handicrafts, it would not cost much.

Then the next one is the thermometer.

Originally, Xiao Heng wanted to buy a ready-made one online, but later he wanted to buy a modern high-precision thermometer, not to mention the arrival time, it was a bit of a waste to use it on the oven! In fact, you can make one by yourself.

Xiao Heng vaguely remembers a simple thermometer that can be made using different metal expansion coefficients, such as riveting a longer copper sheet and iron sheet from both ends, stuffing one end into the other end of the fixed base to allow it to rotate freely. After being heated or caught cold, the thermometer will be bent naturally... If you have a scale at the back, you can easily know the temperature.

As for the most difficult timer, Xiao Heng really has no choice... But don't forget that he can call out the projection of his mobile phone at any time! The software that comes with the mobile phone has functions similar to countdown and stopwatch.

"call……"

Xiao Heng raised his head and looked at the various materials and precautions that had been written on a whole sheet of rice paper, and couldn't help but smile.

The circuit diagram required to make the oven is finally completed...

Then, let’s start making it.
Chapter completed!