Chapter 154: The east is bright, the west is also bright
Chapter 154: The east is bright, the west is also bright
Next door to Zizhenzhai is Zichengji. The current flagship product of this store is Guoshi Wushuang Liquor. The person in charge, Zhang Xin, found that he had too much more wine than glass bottles, so he had to put it in large wine jars.
I'm waiting for more bottles to come out from Lingao. However, the winemakers don't stop for a moment, and are processing the earthenware purchased from various places every day. So much so that the price of earthenware in Guangzhou has begun to rise slowly.
When Guo Yi discovered that Zichengji's liquor inventory had exceeded 2.5 tons, he was shocked and asked Zhang Xin: There are not so many glass bottles now, what is the use of making so much wine?
"Of course we sold it." Zhang Xin's plan was very simple. Since glass bottle wine is a luxury product, he would package it in simple porcelain bottles and sell it to foreigners in Macau.
"You're just kidding," Guo Yi said, "How big is the population of Macau? How much can it afford? Besides, Europeans can also make fruit shochu. Do they like this grain shochu?"
"Shopkeeper Guo, you don't understand this." Zhang Xin chuckled, "Foreigners also have food to make liquor, but not vodka? There is also gin. Vodka is pure alcohol mixed with water. It is not difficult to make.
"Jinper berries are not a rare thing. They are found everywhere in the northern hemisphere. We just need to get some and distill them."
"But the market is too small! The population of Macau -"
"This is the secret," Zhang Xin said confidently, "Foreigners have glass, and it becomes a rarity when it is transported thousands of miles to China; our Chinese porcelain becomes a rarity when it arrives in Europe -"
"I understand." Guo Yi suddenly realized, "That's why you said you wanted to use a porcelain wine bottle!"
"The clay pots in the countryside of Guangzhou, when put in a glass bottle, become 'Guo Shi Wushuang'; when put in porcelain wine bottles, they become 'Louis XIII': mysterious porcelain from the mysterious East, containing mysterious wine... This is
What a great business gimmick.”
Porcelain was the bulk of the materials seized from the Gou family. It was estimated at the time that there were tens of thousands of pieces. It was obvious that such a large amount of porcelain could not find a market in Da Ming. The only way was to continue selling it to the original owner, Europe.
People. There were many samples of porcelain among the goods shipped to Deng Yingzhou recently. They were originally planning to send them to Macau to see if there was any demand. Zhang Xinzai accidentally came up with the idea of using porcelain vases to hold wine, and he chose a large-capacity one.
A vase of about 600-700ml is used as a packaging bottle. There are at least tens of thousands of such bottles in the inventory.
There are wine bottles and other development projects. Now there is no activated carbon in the hands of the public, so making vodka is obviously out of the question. But distilled liquor with some spices can still be made, which is the so-called sweet wine. In theory, this kind of
Wine can be made from fruits, spices, flowers, or even various plants with special aromas. Since there were so many to choose from, Zhang Xin hesitated and sent a telegram to professionals in Lingao for advice.
"What spice plants are used to make export wine?" This topic was quickly sent to Fa Shilu's desk. The plant expert was leading several students who had initially shown an interest in botany to concentrate on collecting local plants.
Make specimens.
When he heard this question, there was a look behind Fa Shilu's glasses that said, "Finally, I've waited for it."
"Well, this is simple, just use rhubarb."
"Are you kidding?" Zhang Xin thought he was crazy when he received the call back. What is rhubarb? If you take a laxative for diarrhea and use this distilled wine to drink it, it's just a prank. After a person suffers a loss once, he will suffer a second loss.
Second time?
"No kidding." Fa Shilu gave a detailed explanation in his reply:
Rhubarb is a commonly used medicine in traditional Chinese medicine. Its origin is in the northwest and southwest of China. Its use as medicine may be the medicinal experience of the people in the Western Regions, and later spread to the mainland. It has a history of being used as a medicine for at least two to three thousand years.
Ever since Zhang Qian emptied the Western Regions and opened up the Silk Road for land trade between China and Europe, rhubarb was transported by caravans to West Asia and the European continent via the Silk Road. Camel caravans transported dried rhubarb from China and crossed the mountains to Central Asia.
Bukhara, and then came to Europe through the Black Sea. Because it reached Europe through Asia Minor, it was later named Turkish rhubarb. Rhubarb was once a very important commodity in the Silk Road trade.
In the days that followed, Central Asian merchants operated this prosperous rhubarb trade route through Persia and other Middle Eastern regions. By the Ming Dynasty, two rhubarb trade routes from China had been formed: one by sea via India, and the other by sea.
Passing through the Gobi Desert, Siberia came to Moscow. Rhubarb also accounted for a large proportion of Macao's re-export trade goods operated by the Portuguese.
Rhubarb has been a favorite of Persian and Arab doctors for a long time. The rhubarb trade has flourished on the Silk Road for more than a thousand years since the Middle Ages. Rhubarb can strengthen the stomach and detoxify people who eat meat and milk as their staple food. Before they knew how to drink tea, rhubarb relied on it.
Chinese rhubarb is regarded as a panacea that can cure all diseases. Therefore, rhubarb has been one of the most popular commodities in Central Asia, West Asia and even Europe for more than a thousand years. Due to the influence of the Arabs, rhubarb is widely used
Among European medicines. Depending on the dosage and method of use, it can be used as a laxative to treat constipation, an astringent to treat dysentery and diarrhea, and a medicine to treat burns, boils, and carbuncles.
Later, Europeans also cultivated edible rhubarb, which can be used in various snacks and dishes, and even eaten as fruit. However, to this day, rhubarb for medicinal purposes can only be grown in China. Rhubarb has such a high status in the minds of Europeans that
Rhubarb festivals are held in many places around the world. This medicine is so popular abroad, which is probably hard to imagine in China, the country where rhubarb originates.
"My dear, I just thought it was a laxative. I didn't expect foreigners to think of it as a treasure." Zhang Xin said to Guo Yi after reading the telegram, "Send someone to the market to buy rhubarb quickly. This thing can also be used as an export commodity.
Woolen cloth."
Guo Yi quickly sent people to the market to inquire about rhubarb, and found that rhubarb had long been exported with a special brand name. Rhubarb in China is mainly produced in Qinghai and Gansu, with Li County as the distribution center. Guangdong is exporting business to the Portuguese in Macau.
They are all monopolized by a "Quanshuihao" warehouse run by people from Li County.
Although he was disappointed to find that this way of getting rich was being robbed, making rhubarb wine was definitely not popular. Zhang Xin asked people to secretly collect a large amount of rhubarb from various drug stores and wash and dry it overnight.
Traditional Chinese herbal wines basically use the soaking method, but Zhang Xin decided to use the alcohol distillation method just like making gin. Put the chopped rhubarb on the distillation rack, let the steam of the liquor pass through the distillation rack, and finally
It is recovered through the serpentine condenser tube, and finally a liquid with a slightly yellow color and a fragrant smell is distilled. Finally, according to Xue Ziliang's suggestion, a small amount of melted white sugar was added to the wine to make the taste slightly sweet -
This time it is truly a rhubarb liqueur.
As for the rhubarb residue after distillation, Zhang Xin asked people to dry it, seal it and store it - he planned to use this as a raw material for making rhubarb tea bags - since black tea powder can make tea bags that are regarded as "fashionable" by the Chinese petty bourgeoisie.
Black tea, then rhubarb tea with the same properties can also make Europeans flock to it.
The sticker labels on the porcelain wine bottles were not very attractive, so several people at the dispatch station discussed the design and went to an ivory carving shop to order a batch of antique small ivory tags, which were strung with colorful brocade ropes and hung on the bottles. The ivory tags were
The traditional pattern and trademark is "Princess of the Tang Dynasty". This vulgar name made everyone unanimously despise Zhang Xin. Zhang Xin said:
"You want to say something elegant, such as Roselle, etc., can foreigners understand? Look at the famous wines in France, they are either Napoleon or Louis XIII, how can they be more vulgar? I haven't called it Kangxi yet,
Where is Yongzheng and Qianlong?"
"No, you can still be your Princess of the Tang Dynasty." Guo Yi said with a smile, "As long as you are not a noble person like Lan."
"Lan Guiren? This is a good idea, but foreigners can't understand China's wife hierarchy and can't tell the difference. If not, we can use it on domestic brands in the future, or we can create a series of brands."
Princess Tang Princess and Guoshi Wushuang Wine were being processed intensely, and the craftsmen hired by Shen Fan had also arrived. When Bao Hengxiang was poured, although the boss had raised wages, the craftsmen were paid meager wages on weekdays and did not have much savings. After the New Year, they had no money.
When he was worried about his future, Shen Fan's timely recruitment was nothing short of timely. He was very grateful to the new owner. Yan Maoda comforted everyone again, saying that the treatment was favorable and everyone could continue to work with peace of mind. At that moment, everyone was given two more
One hundred coins as a New Year's profit. Then he took out the jewelry album he drew and asked the craftsmen to express their opinions.
To his surprise, the craftsmen held objections to most of the modern jewelry painted by Yan Maoda - they thought that these jewelry were good-looking, but the quality was too thin and the weight was not enough to please him. Yan Maoda spent a long time trying to find the solution.
I haven't convinced them yet. It seems that each other's ideas still need some adjustment.
Although the craftsmen did not agree with Shopkeeper Yan’s design, after all, he is the boss. It is the boss’s right to do whatever he wants. Everyone just follows suit. Originally, some craftsmen were afraid that the boss would close down sooner or later after so much trouble. After seeing the samples of Zizhenzhai,
After that, the consensus among the craftsmen was: With such good secret glassware, Shopkeeper Yan can do whatever he likes with it.
Some people have also put forward some additional processing suggestions for glassware. For example, a jeweler named Zhu Shengyi suggested that the handle and rim of part of the glass cup can be inlaid with gold and silver rims, and some small floral decorations can be added to make it
It should be more gorgeous. Yan Maoda also disagrees with this suggestion - in his opinion, it is a vulgar behavior that destroys the beauty of glassware, but he still expressed his appreciation for it - creativity should be encouraged, not because it conflicts with his own opinions.
Differences kill people. Furthermore, their aesthetics should be more adaptable to this time and space than their own.