dtnovels Chapter 81 The Preserved Fruit Shop Opens
Chapter 81 The Preserved Fruit Shop Opens
Song Jiaojiao called out to the village chief, who was sitting in a recliner, "Uncle Wang."
The village chief opened his eyes and saw that it was Song Jiaojiao. He didn't get up and said, "Jiaojiao is here. Come in. The gate isn't closed. Come and sit here."
The village chief pointed to the stone bench next to him and said that he and Song Jiaojiao had become quite familiar with each other, so there was no need to pay much attention to formalities.
"What brings you here today?" the village chief said as he watched Song Jiaojiao sit down.
Seeing a teapot on the stone table, Song Jiaojiao went into the kitchen, took out a bowl, poured herself a glass of water, and drank it before replying, "Uncle Wang, please don't tease me. You know I don't come here unless I need something. Today, I took my family's helper to the mountain to pick a lot of apricots and came up with a new recipe. I'd like you to help me inform the villagers."
Song Jiaojiao drank another bowl of water before continuing, "Inform the villagers that I'm buying apricots here. It's one coin for two catties. I only accept soft, ripe apricots, not green ones. Also, I need a worker to help with the work tomorrow. It's still 20 coins a day. This time, I need women."
Before Song Jiaojiao could finish speaking, the village chief sprang up from his recliner. His face beaming with delight, he said, "You've invented another new dish! But what's an apricot?"
Seeing the village chief taking off like a catapult, Song Jiaojiao was genuinely worried about his aching back. "Apricots are also called yellow fruits. I think these fruits are only available for the next few days. They'll be gone after that or after a rain, which is why I came to ask you for help."
"Alright, I'll have Fugui inform them later. I'll tell your aunt about the search when she gets back. Are we selling the food to Sifanglou again this time?" The village chief, remembering that the last batch of giant turtles had been sold to Sifanglou, asked. After a month of catching giant turtles, the number in the village had noticeably decreased; many people had to travel far to find any. Plus, other villages knew about it, making them even harder to find now. Luckily, Song Jiaojiao had a new job, giving the villagers another source of income. This year was definitely going to be a good one.
"That's not necessarily true. The food I made this time doesn't really go well with Sifanglou. I'll have to ask around to find out." Song Jiaojiao still wanted to sell it to the owner of Huichuntang this time, since the apricot preserves were more like a dessert.
"I was just asking casually, and you seem to have a good idea," the village chief said with a smile as he slowly lay down.
After explaining the situation, Song Jiaojiao didn't stay any longer. She needed to arrange for someone to buy sugar the next day. Nowadays, sugar comes in two types: brown sugar and yellow sugar. Yellow sugar is more expensive, but it's still necessary to use sugar.
Whether making candied fruit or jam, sugar is needed; one pound of sugar is required for ten pounds of fruit. Adding the cost of harvesting the fruit manually, and the fact that fruit that is too soft cannot be processed, the cost is estimated to be around 100 coins per pound.
And how exactly should jam be stored?
After thinking all the way home, Song Jiaojiao came up with a method for making jam: using bamboo tubes or earthenware jars, sterilizing the bamboo tubes with boiling water, pouring in the jam, sealing the opening with oil paper, and then sealing it with mud. This would effectively isolate the air, but she estimated that it would not last more than half a month.
Another method is to buy a well-sealed earthenware jar and store it using the same method as bamboo tubes. Earthenware jars are much better at sealing than bamboo tubes. Both methods require placing the jar in a low-temperature environment.
Without further ado, Song Jiaojiao had Meng An and Xu Da cut down a lot of bamboo. They made bamboo tubes overnight, boiled them in hot water for ten minutes to kill the bacteria, and then placed them upside down in a winnowing basket to air dry naturally.
The next day, Song Jiaojiao asked Xu Da to buy two hundred catties of brown sugar, ten feet of oil paper, and ten ten-catty earthenware jars. Song Jiaojiao gave him 100 taels of silver and told him to go and come back as soon as possible.
After breakfast, the village aunties all arrived. Song Jiaojiao led the newcomers to the candied fruit shop. This was the first time the shop had been used since it was renovated. The stove and iron pot had been prepared and seasoned. Since knives were used a lot here, the shop had the most knives and cutting boards, and these things could not be exposed to oil.
Song Jiaojiao first instructed them to wash the apricots. The bright orange apricots were poured into a large wooden basin. As she washed them, Song Jiaojiao said, "Auntie, while we're washing these apricots, we're also picking out the ones that are too soft and putting them in a separate bucket. Apricots like these, which leave a fingerprint when pressed, are too soft and mushy, so they need to be put separately." Song Jiaojiao picked out a ripe apricot from the basin to demonstrate for everyone. "And these that are only a little soft don't need to be taken out separately; they can just be put on the hard side." Song Jiaojiao then picked out a slightly soft apricot to show everyone.
Song Jiaojiao walked to the other side, picked up a cleaver and cutting board to prepare to cut apricots. "After washing and draining the apricots, we cut them in half, remove the pits and put them in a separate bucket. The chopped fruit flesh is placed in a clean bucket. All the apricots must be washed at least twice. We are making food, so cleanliness and hygiene must be done properly."
"Finally, marinate the chopped fruit with sugar overnight. The next day, boil it over a fire for two minutes and then turn off the heat. The cooked apricots need to soak in the broth overnight. The next day, take them out and dry them for two days."
The aunties listened attentively to what Song Jiaojiao was saying. When they heard that sugar was to be used, they couldn't help but gasp. Sugar was so expensive! Brown sugar cost 300 wen per jin, and yellow sugar was 20 wen more expensive. They only knew that sugar was needed, but they didn't know what kind of sugar it was.
"Today, the aunties' main task is to wash, sort, drain, and chop these apricots. We won't be using sugar until the afternoon, so time is tight and the task is heavy. We'll leave the rest to the aunties. If you have any questions, feel free to ask me."
After explaining the precautions, Song Jiaojiao told everyone to get busy. There were several large water vats in the yard, and last night Song Jiaojiao had her family fill them with water overnight. She estimated that they should last until today.
Seeing that the aunties were alright, Song Jiaojiao opened the door of the dried fruit shop, just in case the villagers selling fruit couldn't find the place later. There weren't many people in the sweet potato shop next door, and there weren't many sweet potatoes left recently. Song Jiaojiao dismissed some people, leaving only Aunt Li and Aunt Lin, who were close to Song Jiaojiao.
Among the aunties who came today, several had previously helped out at the sweet potato farm. From afar, Song Jiaojiao saw villagers carrying baskets and quickly called them over.
Each workshop has its own separate door, and there are also small doors connecting them in the courtyard, but these doors are generally not opened.
Song Jiaojiao lived some distance from the village, and there were no other houses nearby. Later, Song Jiaojiao repaired tiled houses and workshops, which further discouraged everyone from wanting to move there. After all, others lived in tiled houses while they still lived in mud houses, so there would be some comparison.
When the man saw Song Jiaojiao waving at him, he knew that the yellow fruit was collected here, so he quickly took a few steps and carried the fruit over on his back.
Song Jiaojiao had prepared the scale well in advance. After checking that the fruit had been picked according to the requirements, she put it on the scale.