Chapter 58 Picking Camellia (please recommend and collect)
Author: Han Ming
Chapter 58 Picking Camellia (please recommend and collect)
After the transplanting of the small seedlings in the rice field is completed, it is not yet time to harvest the rapeseed in the field, and it should take about twenty days.
At this time, it is also the best time to pick tea leaves in the mountains. Spring tea is the best tea leaves to be picked in the year.
Taking advantage of this free time, many people in the village went up to the mountains to pick their own tea leaves.
In the morning, the second aunt and the third aunt made an appointment to come to Zhang An's house.
"Sister-in-law, you can pinch the tea leaves in Baogudi. I went to see them yesterday and there were too many. If I don't pinch them, I'll be old in a few days."
It turned out that the second aunt and the third aunt came to the house to ask their mother to go up the mountain to pick tea leaves.
Wang Fang thought for a while, and found that this period of time was the best time to make tea, and it was also a good time to have some free time.
So today, when the second aunt and the third aunt called out, Wang Fang also prepared bamboo baskets and bags for holding tea, and brought enough tea to drink on the mountain. The third aunt talked and laughed and went up the mountain to pick tea.
The tea in Changqing Village is grown by the family in their own land, not in a centralized tea mountain, so they are picked by themselves every year.
But there are many villages nearby, and their villages are planted with tea mountains. They are terraced fields on the mountains without water, and they are filled with large tracts of tea leaves.
Especially in the villages of ethnic minorities.
Whenever they go to pick tea, the mountains are lively.
There are also many Miao and Buyi families in Changqing Village, and they are used to living together with Han people.
However, there are still many Miao villages in the mountains, all of which are home to Miao people.
Every spring, their village organizes all the women in the village to go to the mountains to pick tea. In some places, for the sake of publicity, only the young girls and women in the village go to pick tea.
In a more prosperous and grand place, the tea-picking girls will be dressed in their own ethnic costumes, which looks really good.
And when working in the mountains, don't be surprised when you hear singing. It means someone has a scratchy throat or wants to sing.
But when there were many people on the mountain, one person sang it, and some people would pick it up and sing it, and then it evolved into a folk song.
Because this is a traditional custom in their tribe...
When picking tea, there will be a lot of people on the mountain, so whenever someone speaks, there will be a group of people to answer.
This is still organized by the people themselves, and there are also those villages that specially organize tea picking and change of clothes. Such singing sessions will be even more grand, and the sound can be heard far away on the mountains.
This evolved into the practice of singing folk songs for several days every year when picking tea in the mountains.
This is also an intangible heritage culture.
Today, Zhang Jianguo was asked to do some work by people in the village early in the morning. Wang Fang went up to the mountain to pick tea leaves, so Zhang An had to cook.
At noon, Zhang An prepared lunch and ate it alone.
I found a square aluminum lunch box at home and filled it with a full lunch box.
I went to my second uncle's and third uncle's houses and asked if I needed help delivering food up the mountain to my two aunts.
Soon, Zhang An went up the mountain with three aluminum lunch boxes filled with food.
Dahu and Erhu followed Wang Fang up the mountain early in the morning, while Xiaohu was the only one guarding Zhang An at home.
Now Zhang An went out, and it followed behind Zhang An.
Walking up the mountain road from the small river ditch behind the village, when you entered the mountain, you occasionally heard a burst of singing.
Just by listening to the voice, you can tell that the master of this song is still far away.
When Zhang An walked to the Baogu field, his mother and two aunts, although they were in their own fields, were picking fresh tea leaves and chatting about home affairs.
"Mom, second aunt, third aunt, come to dinner."
The second aunt and the third aunt were still talking in the fields, and Zhang An came to deliver food.
The three sisters found a hayfield to sit down to eat. They didn't expect that Zhang An would come to deliver the meal. They originally planned to go home for dinner at one or two o'clock in the afternoon.
Now Zhang An is here to deliver the food, and you can continue working after eating.
"Why did Xiao An think of delivering food? We are planning to go home and eat together."
"I had nothing to do at home, so I made some food and brought it over. It happened that my second uncle and third uncle had also cooked, so I asked about it and brought it over with me."
While the three of them were eating, Zhang An picked up a small bamboo basket and tied it around his waist, and picked tea leaves on the edge of the sill.
Who said you have to be a pretty girl to pick tea? Today I, Zhang An, a young man, have to be a tea picker.
Mainly because he saw that the tea leaves in the fields had grown too much this year, and it would take several days for Wang Fang to pick them alone.
The tea produced by Zhang An's family is not a good variety, just some green tea that everyone grows locally.
Wumeng Mountain has a high altitude and high terrain, but due to specific climate characteristics, there is abundant rain and clouds and mist in the mountains in spring.
This provides a high-quality growth environment for tea trees.
These farm teas are completely different from those in the tea gardens, although all kinds of famous teas are grown in the tea garden base.
But there is one thing that is why Zhang An likes his own tea the most.
That is, the tea trees grown in the village are not taken care of all year round, let alone spraying pesticides and so on.
Therefore, the tea at home is the cleanest in Zhang An's heart. In later generations, Zhang An would take some with him every time he went home.
Tea picking in rural areas is done purely by hand, and every time we pick the new buds that sprout from the tea trees, that is, the tips of the teeth.
Because of this, many tea sellers go from village to village to collect freshly picked tea leaves during this season every year.
In Changqing Village, many people took their families to the mountains to pick tea leaves and sell them to tea sellers.
Zhang An's hands and feet were nimble and he quickly picked up a basket full.
After getting it from the field and pouring it into his pocket, he continued to pick it.
Picking tea is a very patient thing, and it may take a long time to pick a basket.
So this is why tea picking in the mountains is basically done by women at home with their daughters.
By afternoon it was getting dark, reminding everyone that it was time to go home.
Zhang An's family has already filled their pockets with the addition of Zhang An.
The two aunts' houses were all half-packed. Zhang An mentioned it and found that each house weighed about ten kilograms.
According to the calculation of five yuan per pound of raw tea, it would cost fifty yuan when sold. This is a lot of income for their family. You must know that the second uncle builds walls for others, which only costs twenty yuan a day.
money.
When he got home in the evening, Zhang An opened the bag full of tea leaves, poured out all the tea leaves and spread them out, while taking out an extra ten kilograms of space tea from the space.
When Wang Fang saw it, she was a little surprised as to why there were so many. There was obviously only one bag, but so much was poured out.
They were all deceived by the reason that Zhang An pretended to be too serious.
Because when he reached into the bag containing the tea leaves, he found that the tea leaves inside were already a little warm.
When you get home, you have to pour it out and let it sit for a few hours, then put it in the pot and start frying it in the evening.
After dinner, I heated up the stove, put the big iron pot at home, and started making tea.
Raw tea needs to be fried in two to three steps. The first step is called greening, which is the most critical. The fire must be very strong.
Put the fresh tea leaves into the pot and stir-fry the tea leaves constantly in the pot so that each tea leaf comes into contact with the high-temperature bottom of the pot to achieve the greening effect, which actually removes a large amount of water from the tea leaves.
After the greening is completed, the second stage of stir-frying is started. At this time, there is no need for high heat, only low heat and slow frying.
Put the cured tea leaves in the pot, then rub and pound them in a repeated cycle.
At this time, people with good skills can make the tea leaves look beautiful.
Making tea is a very tiring task. It requires constant stirring and rubbing, and most people may not be able to do it.
Zhang An stood around and watched his mother frying tea carefully, and sometimes asked about some details.
There is no disadvantage in learning such a craft. In the future, fewer and fewer people will learn it, and no one will be willing to teach it if they want to learn it.
I have been busy for most of the night, and half of the tea leaves at home have not been roasted, so I can only continue the next day.
The fried tea leaves need to be spread out and spread out to dry, but there is no sunshine these days, so they can only be placed on the floor at home, spread out with an oilcloth and put them on top to dry in the air.
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