Next, there will be disasters for several years in a row, so it is the right thing to save enough vegetables now.
In Jiang Hexi's family, Sister-in-law Du, Granny Du and Grandma Jiang, as well as two maids, are all hard-working people and all like to dry vegetables.
Everyone goes to the fields to pick vegetables every day, goes home, fills the water, and puts them on bamboo mats to dry in the sun.
At this time of year, the mountains are full of food.
Among them, bamboo shoots, etc., are the targets for drying vegetables.
During the off-farm time, everyone would go into the mountains together and dig up mountain bamboo shoots. After carrying a large basket of bamboo shoots, they would go home and peel the bamboo shoots, so that they could dry out a lot of dried bamboo shoots every day.
In addition to dried bamboo shoots, the potatoes that everyone planted years ago also grew at this time.
Dig the potatoes out, cook them over some firewood, then take them out and dry them in the sun.
In winter, whether you use dried bamboo shoots or dried potatoes to stew soup, it is a rare delicacy.
In fact, in addition to dried vegetables, Jiang Hexi also pickled a lot of pickles.
Among them, pickled beans and pickled bamboo shoots are must-haves.
She specially found a kiln owner and bought a lot of rough porcelain vats, and marinated a room full of sour bamboo shoots.
Use sour bamboo shoots to cook duck or stew soup, which is a rare delicacy.
As the days passed, the village seemed to have calmed down again.
In the nearby town, the market was opened again.
The hard-working farmers experienced hardships in this land one after another, and survived the passing of winter and the coming of spring.
The invasion of Liao people at the beginning of spring seemed like a dream.
If it weren't for the Liao people's chess pieces hanging in Yuzhou, everything would be like a dream.
Since the Liao people did not come out to harass them, people just pretended that the incident had never happened. After getting new food, they would go to the town market and exchange some supplies with others.
The days passed like this day after day.
Qingming is a time for ancestor worship. In Jiang Hexi's family, in addition to offering sacrifices to his grandfather, they also have to offer sacrifices to Jiang Changsheng.
Whenever the four siblings think about Jiang Changsheng, they always feel a sense of heartbreak spreading in their hearts.
Jiang Hexi specially took her younger brothers and sisters to the fields to collect Qingming grass in order to steam Qingming cakes in a steamer for sacrifice.
Hearing that they were going to pick Qingming grass, the second brother Jiang took the third brother Jiang to rummage in the fields.
The Qingming vegetables in this season are at their most tender, so if you pick them into sharp ends and put them in a vegetable basket, you will have a full basket in no time.
Grandma Jiang loves to eat thorn sprouts the most. When the second brother Jiang and the third brother Jiang went out, she chased them out. Jiang Hexi was actually quite greedy for wild vegetables.
Her favorite thing is to pick dandelions and soak them in water to remove the bitterness, and then mix them with chili oil. Oh dear, just thinking about the taste makes people swallow.
When I think of my deceased relatives, I feel a little sour and painful in my heart, but because of the wild vegetables, I feel better again.
Third Brother Jiang said, "Sister, I know where there are dandelions. There is a big one. Let's go and pick them."
"OK."
After the younger brothers became literate, they now know how to identify medicinal materials, and they are even more familiar with these wild vegetables.
When Jiang Sandi led him through an open space, the ground was really covered with dandelions.
The three siblings hurriedly picked up their hoes and started digging.
Grandma Jiang said, "There are thorny buds in the forest ahead. Let's go and pick some."
Since it was nearby land and there was no danger, the siblings responded and left Grandma Jiang alone.
Grandma Jiang could only reach the thorny buds at the bottom. Later, Brother Jiang and others came over and helped pick the thorny buds from the top of the tree.
After picking the thorn buds, everyone was about to go back when Jiang Sandi exclaimed and jumped up.
"Quick, wild duck, there are wild ducks over there."
After saying this, he rushed forward like a bouncing rabbit.
Brother Jiang was also dissatisfied with his reaction. He rushed towards the open space in front of him and caught a wild duck amidst the wild duck's "quacking" sound.
In the grass on the side, a group of wild ducks were frightened and flapped their wings and flew forward.
"Ah, there are so many wild ducks!"
Jiang Hexi was about to walk over to see the duck when she felt something under her feet. She looked down and found an oval duck egg under her feet.
"Oh, wild duck eggs."
Then everyone started to stir up in the grass underground again.
Spring is always full of surprises. In the grass underground, not only did everyone pick up wild duck eggs, but they also picked up horn fungi.
Sheep fungus is a good thing, and the soup is especially delicious.
Grandma Jiang said, "There is a small stream in the forest ahead. Let's go and have a look."
Wild ducks have a habit of running to places with water, and you might even find some wild duck eggs there.
The grandfather and grandson walked a few steps toward the jungle in front of them and saw a small stream.
The creek is extremely clear, and you can see small fish and shrimp swimming in it.
The creek was very shallow. The second brother Jiang and the third brother Jiang liked to play in the water. They immediately took off their shoes, ran directly into the creek, and started swimming in the water.
They lifted up the stones and could always catch a crab under each stone.
After rummaging through a few, I finally gave up.
"Ouch, without a bucket, these crabs turned around and ran away."
"Sister, let's bring a bucket to catch crabs tomorrow."
"OK!"
Along the creek, everyone caught a few crucian carp and picked up seven or eight wild duck eggs, and then returned to the village with a full harvest.
Of course, they covered the duck eggs and small fish with wild vegetables.
The wild duck was thrown into Grandma Jiang's basket and covered with firewood.
"Sister, no one should know about this place. We will come to arrest you tomorrow."
"OK."
"It would be nice if we could catch a wild duck tomorrow."
There were more than twenty of them starting to fly into the sky, and the jungle beside the creek was full of wild ducks every spring.
When everyone returned to the village, they happened to pass by the entrance of the village.
Jiang Hexi looked at the jujube tree at the entrance of the village, and the next moment, she met someone's eyes.
The next moment, her expression froze.
This person is none other than Liu Ergen.
When Liu Ergen saw Jiang Hexi, his eyes were a little dodgey, and he quickly averted his eyes.
Jiang Hexi didn't think much about it at first, but after walking for a while, her footsteps froze.
The more she thought about it, the more she felt that Liu Ergen's eyes looked familiar, as if she had seen them before somewhere.
At this moment, she suddenly thought of one of the horse thieves she had seen running away on the trade road, and her face suddenly paused.
Her feeling at the time was correct. The masked horse thief who escaped was indeed an acquaintance, and no, he was actually Liu Ergen from her village.
Jiang Hexi really didn't expect that some people in his village would become horse thieves.
That's a horse thief who commits murder, robbery, and commits all kinds of evil.
After returning home, she thought for a moment and went to Grandpa Jiang Er's house to discuss matters with Grandpa Jiang Er.
When Grandpa Jiang Er found out that Liu Ergen had secretly become a horse thief and went thousands of miles away to commit crimes, he was also shocked.
Second Uncle Jiang and Third Uncle Jiang said, "It's really not a joke. Although we are the queens of guilty ministers, we are also amnesty. In addition to not being able to take the scientific examination and becoming officials, we are not allowed to leave the North. After all, we are not punished with hard labor, so why bother to go?"
Did you do things like licking blood from the edge of a knife, killing people and setting fires? No, you have to tell Li Zheng about this."
He turned around and went to find Li Zheng to discuss this matter.
After hearing this, Li Zheng was silent for a moment and said, "Since he has become a horse thief, if he cannot be beaten to death, otherwise, if he attracts the horse thief to retaliate, everyone in our village will suffer, and
Since his lair is here, he won't do anything to us! Let's take a look. The world is in chaos now. We can only take one step at a time. As for the Liu family, let's stay away."
Jiang Lizheng was helpless.
Everyone just pretended that it didn't happen.
Next, because Qingming Festival was about offering sacrifices to ancestors, Jiang Hexi and her family started making Qingming cakes.
After soaking the Qingming vegetables in water, mash them into juice, stir them with flour, wait for them to ferment, and then you can make Qingming cakes.
On the Qingming day, everyone went to worship in the afternoon.
After taking the basket and going to the grave to offer sacrifices, Brother Jiang and others felt an indescribable feeling in their hearts.
Mrs. Wang was sleeping well that day, staying at home and not going out.
She probably didn't have the courage to go to the grave to see Jiang Changsheng.
After the Qingming Festival, in order to collect supplies, Jiang Hexi took everyone from Du's family, as well as Da Ya and others, to the mountains to continue looking for food.
The land in the north is vast and there are few people. At this time, there are really all kinds of good things in the mountains.
The villagers all go out in the spring to get more food, so that they can have something to eat when they need to change money or when there is a lean period.
The same is true in Jiang Hexi's family.
Although she made a lot of money by running a business, Jiang Hexi knew that time was getting tighter and she had to lead everyone to seize the time to collect supplies.
On the nearby mountains, children and women can pick up some wild duck eggs and catch some pheasants and ducks near the mountains and streams, while the men start to catch wild boars in the mountains.
Wild boars like to go down the mountains to steal food. For villagers, catching wild boars can not only eat their meat, but also prevent their food from being eaten by wild boars. It can be said that it kills two birds with one stone.
In addition to wild boars, villagers also like to pick fungi.
In the vast jungles, fungi are springing up like bamboo shoots after a rain, and you can't pick them all up no matter how hard you pick them up.
The matsutake stew is extremely delicious. The villagers have long known the fungus and don't worry about poisoning. Most people only pick matsutake, black fungus and other fungi, so they don't worry about poisoning.
Every day, after everyone goes into the mountains, their backpacks are always full.
The mountains seem to be surprisingly rich this year.
Jiang Hexi thought of the plot in the book, but she felt like it was sunset and the last carnival.
While going into the mountains, Jiang Hexi also took people familiar to Grandpa Jiang Er and others to sell all the ginger and other things at home.
Although I dare not enter Yucheng, the medicine shops in the town are still collecting medicinal materials.
Jiang Hexi and others planted little food, so they could harvest most of it in advance without waiting for the autumn harvest, and they also got the money.