Carpenter Pan's master and apprentice were chewing peonies, but they really didn't know how much thought Chen Ke put into this small jar of orange wine.
Although Chen Ke is good at wine, he does not make it for himself, but for helping others.[]
The Chen family is the creditor of eleven families, six of which are in Qingshen County. In addition to Cai Chuanfu, there is also a wine merchant named Li, an orange garden owner named Zhang, a bamboo garden owner named He, and a bamboo garden owner named He.
The sauce merchant Tu was a charcoal merchant surnamed Qian. Chen Ke learned from the side that these businesses were originally in dire straits due to various problems. In the past few years, the imperial court had been at war with Xixia. In order to raise military resources, the industry and commerce in central Sichuan were intensified.
After sending "Xi Xia money", those businesses with good profits were still overwhelmed. These businesses were directly in debt and unsustainable.
In fact, it's not that these families can't repay the Chen family's debts, it's just that they have too many creditors. If one family doesn't repay that family's debt, that family has to pay off the debt. They simply don't pay back to anyone, and every day counts as one day. Although Chen Ke understands them,
But I absolutely don't like this kind of cheating.
But sometimes it is grandpa who is in debt, and this is absolutely true. As the days passed, Chen Ke used his free time to investigate the businesses of these companies, and found that in addition to poor management, the biggest problem was the products.
Take the wine merchant named Li Jian as an example.
The Song Dynasty implemented a patented wine policy. In Sichuan, this policy was divided into two levels, one was for official brewing to be sold by the government, and the other was for private brewing to be sold by the people. As the name suggests, the former was brewed exclusively by the government, and the whole process of sales was naturally enjoyed by the government.
Huge profits. The latter allows wine merchants to buy and contract. The so-called "buying" means promising to pay a certain amount of taxes to the government and obtain the right to open a shop, make wine and sell wine.
This is like the competition between state-owned enterprises and private enterprises in the same industry in later generations, and the results can be imagined. Almost all famous wines, as well as the most widely sold rice wine and liquor, are monopolized by the government. They do not provide koji to the public at all, and private brewing is not allowed.
.However, private wine merchants can only use local methods to brew fruit wine, medicinal wine and prepared wine, among which fruit wine is the main one.
Fruit wine in the Song Dynasty is a low-alcohol beverage made from various fruits and wild fruits through fermentation. Chen Ke has seen wine, pear wine, lychee wine, pomegranate wine, date wine, and yellow tangerine wine on the market.
There are many types of sugar cane wine and honey wine, but the sales volume is very poor. At first, it was difficult for Chen Ke to understand, because as far as he knew, the Song Dynasty was the only dynasty that encouraged drinking. Song people loved wine, but they preferred mellow taste.
Low-alcohol wine, that’s why rice wine has become so popular and has become the most important type of wine.
Why is the fruit wine that should be more in line with the Song people's taste, but the sales are not ideal? After tasting it personally, Chen Ke understood - these wines are turbid in color, contain many flocculent impurities, and are sour and bitter, covering up the
It lost the fruity aroma that it should have. For the people of the Song Dynasty who pursued enjoyment, they would rather spend more money on government-run rice wine and white wine than touch this cheap and inferior wine.
The reason is that compared with rice wine, whose brewing technology is very mature, the brewing process of fruit wine is still in a very primitive stage, whether it is the sediment and suspended matter in the wine, or the bitterness mixed in the wine.
People in this era have no way to deal with the smell...or if they have it, they keep it to themselves and never tell anyone about it.
People of later generations will brew some fruit wine drinks by themselves, and Chen Ke’s grandfather, an old Chinese medicine doctor, will personally brew some fruit wine and medicinal wine every year for the whole family to enjoy. Therefore, Chen Ke is no stranger to the technology of homemade fruit wine. But after all, he has never
Without doing it yourself, it is not easy to turn theoretical knowledge into fruit wine with ideal color and taste.
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In terms of brewing technology, fruit wine can be divided into two types. One is self-fermented fruit wine such as wine and plum wine. These wines do not require koji because their skins contain wild yeast and can ferment themselves. The other is
, you need to add yeast, such as most fruit wines such as apple cider, orange wine, lychee wine, etc., because they do not contain yeast themselves, and if they only rely on natural fermentation, the wine will deteriorate before it is brewed.
The yeasts that catalyze various types of wine are different, so you must obtain the koji of a certain type of wine...that is, the yeast, in order to brew the corresponding fruit wine.
It is easier to brew fruit wine with its own yeast, but the traffic conditions at this time determine that fresh food has its regional characteristics... The so-called regional characteristics mean that the prices of foreign products in the market are high and the prices of local products are low.
Therefore it is foolish and unfeasible to choose the far one over the near.
In Qingshen, citrus is the most planted, and grapes are also grown. However, this kind of fruit that cannot be preserved can only be seen within a month after it goes on the market. The locals use local methods to store citrus, which can preserve eight
For a long time, the only fruits available on the market are citrus.
So he wanted to try and fiddle with the koji of orange wine. Only in this way could he give full play to the local advantages, not only save Li Jian, the wine merchant, but also promote the Zhang family's orange orchard, which would kill two birds with one stone.
In fact, the principle of preparing tangerine koji is very simple. It is to collect rotten citrus with a wine aroma, take the peel and part of the pulp, add it to fresh orange juice, and then ferment it at room temperature. After the obvious wine smell is produced, it means that there are a lot of citrus.
Yeast is produced. However, it is possible to ferment suitable koji only at a certain concentration, within a certain fermentation time, and at a certain fermentation temperature.
Everything requires exploration to determine.
Fortunately, the citrus fruits in Qingshen are as cheap as dirt. You can buy a large basket for dozens of dollars, which is affordable. So since spring, he has been trying constantly, hoping to find the ideal koji. I don’t know how much time has passed.
After several failures, I finally figured out a method to observe the number of fermentation bubbles produced within a certain period of time and determine the fermentation ability of the koji.
After obtaining the appropriate koji, you can package the fresh orange juice into small portions and add the koji for fermentation. After the fermentation is completed, squeeze it hard with clean gauze, and the original liquid with a rich color and taste will flow out.
Then beat the egg white into a foam, mix it thoroughly with a small amount of the original liquid, then add it to the jar, stir thoroughly and let it sit until the wine liquid is clear and transparent. Discard the sediment to get the original wine. Select the aroma and taste of the wine.
Blending those with the best color will result in the ideal orange wine.
This process was also long, and it was not until a few days ago that Chen Ke was the first to brew orange wine that was comparable to later generations in all aspects.
When fine wine came out, the three masters and apprentices of Carpenter Pan drank it. It was like burning the harp and boiling the crane, which greatly ruined the scenery.
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In the evening, Chen Xiliang came back and saw that the doors and windows of his home were completely new. He almost thought that he had gone to the wrong door. After learning the truth, his expression was a little strange. He sat on the red camphor wood official hat chair and gently moved his left hand.
He rubbed the smooth tabletop and remained silent for a long time.
Under the afterglow, Chen Ke could clearly see the bright luster flashing in his eyes.
When Chen Chen came back, it took Chen Xiliang a long time to hold back a sentence: "Dad is incompetent..." After saying that, he got up and went out without eating dinner.
Seeing his abnormal behavior, Chen Ke couldn't help but be dumbfounded. He knew that although Chen Xiliang had a strong self-esteem, he was by no means the kind of pedantic and rigid person who was obsessed with saving face. Why did he have such a big reaction to these furniture, doors and windows today? Is it everyone?
Are there only a few days in the month, or have the negative emotions in my heart changed quantitatively and qualitatively?
The first dinner after the family was renovated was so depressed. Chen Chen couldn't eat, Chen Ke couldn't eat, and Wulang saw that his brother couldn't eat, so he couldn't eat either. Only Xiao Liulang could eat, but it was a pity to see Wulang.
With a murderous look in his eyes, he could only sit there pitifully.
"It's all my fault," Chen Ke said in frustration, holding his head, "You're too showy and ignore your father's feelings."
"Dad is not that kind of person, you are mistaken." Chen Chen shook his head and said, "He is feeling uncomfortable about other things."
"..." When he said this, Chen Ke realized that he had not seen Chen Xiliang's smiling face for several days. Thinking about it again, Chen Chen seemed to have something on his mind, but he was careless in this regard and his homework was difficult.
It was too heavy, so I never asked: "What happened?"
"Alas..." Under his questioning, Chen Ke sighed heavily and said, "The engagement between our family and the Ma family has been terminated..."
"An engagement?" Chen Ke stared wide-eyed and said, "What an engagement? Why did I never know about it?"
"You were still young at that time," Chen Chen said, "It was eight years ago. At that time, my father took the Chinese examination. People thought that he would be able to pass high school next year, so many people came to visit him." After a pause, he said, "Dad has a surname named Ma.
A classmate and friend of mine was a wealthy family in Pengshan, and was a good match for our family at that time. Later, the grandfathers of both families made the decision and got us engaged."
"Wait a minute, wait a minute." Chen Ke raised his hand and said, "Is it you or me?"
"I told you, it's us." Chen Ke glanced at him, spread his hands and said, "The Ma family has two daughters. At that time, my father had two sons, who were similar in age. Naturally, they became two parents, which made them even happier."
"What's the result?" Chen Ke wondered whether he should laugh or cry: "Both of us were dumped?"
Those comrades who say they want glass must be disappointed. I have never been a technical person, and there was no need to climb the technological tree in the Song Dynasty. The inventions and creations in this book are all that ordinary people can master in our daily lives. To put it bluntly, these inventions
The purpose is just to make life more moist.
As I have said before, this is a book that makes you comfortable and relaxed to read. Saburo is not a party member and does not have such noble sentiments as silence. He just wants to live a better life...at least for now.
We don’t have any rest on Sundays, so I’m begging for recommendation votes…
