The Fiery Era: Starting from Longxugou

After leaving his house, Zhao Shi'an put a basket in his spatial storage in the yard. Once outside, he looked up at the crescent moon in the sky and noticed that the moon was very bright in this era.

After determining their direction by the moonlight, they headed straight for Dongxiao City.

Longxugou is not far from Dongxiao City, only a few hundred meters away, about the same distance as the nearby public toilet. This is why he ran away in the middle of the night; when his parents asked, he said he went to the toilet.

Upon arriving in Dongxiao City, the streets were bustling with people, and some early arrivals had already started setting up stalls.

The private butcher stall was crowded with purchasing staff from various restaurants.

Meat ration coupons were not yet issued, and private and state-owned meat shops coexisted. Most residents in the vicinity preferred to buy meat at the state-owned vegetable market, mainly because the prices at state-owned meat shops were much cheaper.

Cheap means in high demand; if you want to buy good meat, you have to queue up early.

The state-run vegetable market opens at seven o'clock in the morning. If you want to buy good meat, you have to arrive at least an hour early to queue up. If you arrive late, you won't be able to buy even minced meat.

The same applies to privately owned butcher shops. Despite their high prices, they are usually sold out by dawn, even the lean meat and offal, which are the hardest to sell.

The same thing happened when my family sold the first batch of chives! It just goes to show that fortunes change!

Yesterday, he asked to buy meat, and his mother was worried about disturbing his rest, which was also for this reason!

Glancing at the bustling scene at the butcher shop, Zhao Shi'an, carrying a basket, searched for chicks. Soon he found several vendors with their stalls clustered together, and could hear the chicks chirping through the willow baskets. Hearing the sound, he walked over and saw a middle-aged man squatting on the ground smoking a pipe. He asked, "..."

"Uncle, how much are the chicks?"

"Newly hatched chicks are 1000 each, male or female not included! Adult chicks are 1500 for males and 2000 for females!"

"A bit expensive, can you make it cheaper? I want a lot! Besides chicken, what else do you have?"

Upon hearing the price, Zhao Shi'an tried to bargain. The large chicken the stall owner was talking about was a chick that had hatched about ten days ago. These chicks had a high survival rate, and their sex could already be roughly distinguished, making them the most sought-after.

These chicks can be compared to puppies that are just a month old. Anyone who has raised a dog knows that puppies that are a month old are very easy to raise once they are brought home.

Newly hatched chicks can be seen as puppies that are only a few days old. Their survival rate is low, so the price is naturally cheaper. As for raising them to ten days old before selling them as adult chicks, it's not that the stall owners don't want to, but they themselves cannot guarantee the survival rate, so they sell them as early as possible.

"Even if you want them all, it's still the same price! We also have ducklings, 1500 each, male and female are the same. Male adult ducklings are 2000, and females are 2500! The geese are still hatching!"

Hearing that it was a teenager's voice, the stall owner didn't pay much attention, assuming that he was just there to inquire about the market.

"Uncle, can I take a look first? If I like it, I'll buy it!"

After hearing this, Zhao Shi'an did not insist on bargaining anymore. In this era, hatching chicks mostly relied on the mother hen to brood, and a hen could hatch at most sixteen or seventeen eggs.

In the cold north, hens usually start brooding around the second day of the second lunar month. It takes about 21 days to hatch the chicks, and they hatch around the twenty-third day of the second lunar month. This is also when chicks are most expensive. Today is April 10th, the eighth day of the third lunar month. Although the price has dropped since the peak, it hasn't dropped much.

As for using heated brick beds to hatch chicks in large numbers, it seems that the technology is not yet available, but it might be worth trying if there is an opportunity!

"Fine! You see!"

As the stall owner spoke, he lifted the straw curtain. Zhao Shi'an leaned closer to take a look and found that there weren't many seedlings in the basket, but there were about ten chicks and ducklings each. After a mental probe, he discovered that their bellies and bottoms were covered with tender skin.

After watching for a while, Zhao Shi'an looked up and said:

"Uncle, give me ten chicks and eight ducklings!"

"You really want to buy them? These chicks and ducklings have just hatched! Why don't you buy some adult chicks and ducklings? You can raise them right away. These are more likely to die!"

Seeing that Zhao Shi'an really wanted to buy, and so much at once, the stall owner couldn't help but remind him.

"Uncle, it's alright! We have a kang (heated brick bed) at home, we'll buy it and put it on the kang to keep warm!"

As he spoke, Zhao Shi'an took out 22,000 yuan and handed it over.

"Alright, you choose for yourself!"

The stall owner took the money, looked closely at the moon, then took out a match, lit it, and checked it again. Only after confirming that everything was correct did he feel relieved.

Zhao Shi'an thanked him and quickly selected the chicks and ducklings after a moment of mental exploration.

After selecting the chicks and ducklings, he didn't linger and went straight home, stopping by a public restroom along the way.

On the way, when no one was around, he put the basket into his space, fed each chick and duckling with spring water, and built two mud-brick huts in his space, put the chicks and ducklings inside, and crushed corn and soybeans and scattered them in the huts as feed.

After doing all this, Zhao Shi'an returned to the courtyard, put the basket back in its original place, and then went inside to sleep.

At noon after school, Zhao Shi'an had just reached the goldfish pond when his younger siblings excitedly welcomed him home.

After delivering meat to her aunt and Uncle Tian's family, Liu Guiying called her eldest son to eat!

"Boss, have some more! There's more in the pot if you're not full!"

As Liu Guiying spoke, she pushed a bowl of stir-fried shredded potatoes and meat in front of her eldest son.

"Mom, that's enough! Save what's in the pot for everyone! Eat, eat!"

After serving his younger brother and sister a piece of meat, Zhao Shi'an also picked up a piece of meat and started eating.

He frowned after chewing the meat twice in his mouth.

Pork rendered in oil should be crispy and fragrant, and should taste delicious, but he tasted bitterness in it.

He thought it was his imagination, but seeing his younger siblings fighting over food like little pigs, he carefully took another bite and found that it was still bitter.

"Boss, what's wrong? Is it not to your liking? This time, I didn't dare to render too much fat in the stir-fry, for fear it would taste bitter."

Seeing her boss's reaction, Liu Guiying quickly explained.

"Mom, it's nothing! I just suddenly thought of what to write for my new article. Tomorrow's Sunday, I'll try it out at home!"

Zhao Shi'an casually offered an explanation, and his mother's words reminded him of the source of the bitterness.

If the fat is rendered too heavily, the remaining pork cracklings often turn black and taste bitter.

The pork cracklings in the bowl were golden and crispy, and they were very crunchy. The side dishes were potatoes, scallions, ginger, and garlic. The reason why the dishes tasted bitter was simply because of the salt in the house.

Thinking of this, he remembered when the teacher came to visit his home, the scrambled eggs his family made were rather bitter. At the time, he thought that was just how his mother's cooking was!

Most families in this era mainly used steaming and boiling methods, and rarely stir-fried dishes except during festivals.

In this era where even stir-frying is a rare skill, most people have no culinary expertise. Stir-frying is simply waiting for the pan to heat up, adding some oil, pouring in the vegetables, stirring it around, adding water, and stewing it. They probably aren't even as skilled as him!

As a child raised by his grandmother, he has a lot to say on this matter.

Most northerners are not picky about food, and even now that we live in a time of extreme material abundance, they mainly eat noodles.

I may not be picky, but I can't stand bitter salt. It's not so bitter that I can't eat it, and it's not harmful to my health, but it will still affect my appetite!

Now that we've identified the problem, let's solve it ourselves. The bitterness of coarse salt is mainly due to the presence of magnesium ions. Removing most of them will eliminate the bitterness.

Although the supply and marketing cooperative had good salt, it was expensive!

Buying it directly will get you criticized by your family for being wasteful, but if you refine the coarse salt yourself, they'll say, "My son is capable!"

When he skipped a grade, Teacher Hu gave him an extra problem on refining coarse salt. This was a good opportunity to put theory into practice and refine a batch of coarse salt, enough for his family to eat for several months.

Then, use the experimental results to write a popular science article on crude salt purification. In this way, you can not only eat good salt, but also earn money through the article, which is a win-win situation!