Chapter 116 The First Bowl of Hot and Sour Noodles
"Sir, what is this cement?"
How could these people understand this?
Liu Zheng laughed: "To strengthen my house and my city wall!"
Liu Zheng was quite familiar with slag cement in his previous life. In addition to traditional silicate cement, slag cement also occupies a very important position. In a narrow sense, slag cement is a finely ground mixture of gypsum, cement clinker and blast furnace slag.
The slag contains a lot of cement. The main process is to mix the liquid slag from the reduction process and steelmaking process, such as blast furnace slag and converter slag, with lime and clay added when necessary...
Of course, the specific process still needs to be slowly explored! But Liu Zheng is very confident that the lime workshop and steelmaking workshop of the Divine Workshop have become more and more sophisticated. Liu Zheng believes that as long as he tries a few more times, this cement can really be made!
Everyone heard Liu Zheng's confident words and did not doubt him.
Qingyang Suo laughed and said, "If there really is such a solid thing, Loulan will probably regret it!"
Everyone laughed.
The reason why Loulan was willing to sign a desert ownership agreement with Liu Zheng was because they felt that no one had been able to manage the desert for thousands of years. If they, the Loulan people, couldn't do it, could Liu Zheng do it? Little did they know that Liu Zheng could build post stations and inns along the road in a short period of time with cement, and even if there was sufficient funds, he could consider paving the road... and then planting trees.
But when he thought of this, Liu Zheng asked about Yinzhou's accounts during the past few months when he was away.
As soon as these words came out, Liu Dahao's face fell.
"Son, we are out of treasury silver again!"
boom!
Liu Zheng just stood up and almost fell to the ground, looking devastated: "Poor again?"
Liu Dahao said with a bitter face: "My son, you can't blame your father for this. It's really because Yintan City is too expensive! It's simply a bottomless pit!"
Liu Zheng looked at Qingyang Shuo, who also nodded.
This left Liu Zheng speechless.
He had built such a big business, but still couldn't make ends meet? Then, everyone sat down to do the math, which made Liu Zheng feel very disappointed.
Recruiting soldiers is something that Yinzhou has been doing continuously.
So far, the number of soldiers who can be taken out to fight has reached 50,000, and there are 30,000 militiamen. Although Yinzhou is a garrison system, what about the weapons and equipment these soldiers need? Even if they can make them themselves, isn't iron ore money?
Maintaining an army costs money, and this is a major part of Yinzhou’s current expenditure.
But so far, Yinzhou’s military expenditure can temporarily be equal to the income from refined salt.
Then what?
The construction of Yintan City has emptied all the profits from winemaking, perfume, and soap, and it's still not enough! Liu Zheng looked at the accounts and found that the Baiya Army had paid for five batches of refined salt, but only three batches were delivered...
In other words, Yintan City is still in a deficit state!
Liu Zheng shook his head and smiled bitterly: "Well, it seems that we can only tighten our belts for the time being. The next batch of refined salt must be transported to Loulan first, and all the silver there must be transported back..."
When everyone heard that Loulan still had nearly 10 million taels of silver, they became excited. Liu Dahao even jumped up and said, "My son is really doing well. Dad can eat meat again!"
Liu Zheng rolled his eyes and suddenly remembered something, so he quickly called Liang Erfu over.
"What's the matter, sir?"
Liu Zheng took out a handful of red stuff from his package. Everyone looked at each other in confusion and asked what it was.
"Chili peppers are the most delicious in the world!"
Liu Zheng laughed out loud.
At this time, chili peppers had not yet been introduced into the Longyan Dynasty, but Liu Zheng saw them in Loulan. For a guy like him who loved spicy food in his previous life, this thing was simply a savior!
Liu Dahao walked over with shining eyes, grabbed a handful and put it into his mouth, chewing hard: "Dad, let you try it first..."
The others looked at Liu Dahao one by one.
It was too late for Liu Zheng to stop him. Liu Dahao's face changed from excitement to confusion, then to horror, and then to a flushed face with tears streaming down his face.
"Ah ah ah ah ah ah ah!"
"Water, water, water, where is the water!"
“Give it to me now!”
Liu Zheng was laughing so hard that he couldn't even straighten his back.
Just then, one of Liang Erfu's subordinates ran in excitedly: "Master Liang, Master, the first batch of sweet potatoes in our Yinzhou test field was successful!"
"What?"
Liu Zheng and Liang Erfu looked at each other in surprise.
Everyone came to Liu Zheng's personal experimental field, where some farmers had already started digging sweet potatoes. It was May, and at a glance, the sweet potato seedlings were eye-catching. After the farmers dug up the sweet potato seedlings, they found huge sweet potatoes, one by one, no matter the size or the appearance , they were all very pleasing.
“What is the yield per mu?”
Liu Zheng asked happily.
An old farmer laughed out loud: "Sir, it weighs a full six thousand kilograms!"
"What?"
The group of people who followed Liu Zheng were all stunned.
Yield of 6,000 kg per mu? Two crops a year! What kind of magical crop is this?
Liu Zheng said with relief: "Good, good, good!"
"Sir, I just tasted it. Even if it's not cooked, it's sweet!"
a child yelled.
" Sir , how do you eat this sweet potato?"
Qingyang Shuo was becoming more and more shocked by Liu Zheng.
Liu Zheng smiled and said, "You can eat whatever you want. You can cook it, bake it, steam it, or grind it into powder..."
Speaking of grinding flour, Liu Zheng had an idea. He had another way to make money in his mind! But... he laughed out loud as he thought about it, and couldn't stop. Should he really enter the catering industry? Of course, Liu Zheng was thinking about satisfying his craving first.
"Hurry, hurry, pick some big sweet potatoes and follow me!"
Just do it.
Liu Zheng called Liang Erfu, Zheng Yueru, and even Hu Xier to join the team of selecting sweet potatoes. Liu Zheng specifically instructed that they should select sweet potatoes with smooth surface, no insect pests, no green heads, and of moderate size.
"What are you going to do again!"
Hu Xier's hands were covered in mud, but she didn't care and looked at Liu Zheng curiously.
Liu Zheng first cleaned all the sweet potatoes and removed the ends. Then he used an old farmer's grinding wheel to crush the sweet potatoes, adding water while crushing, and then filtered it with gauze, and put the filtrate into a small pool for sedimentation.
When the pool is completely clear, drain the water, take out the oil powder on the surface, take out the starch on the bottom layer and hang it into powder balls, and put it on the drying field to expose it to the sun. When half of the water in the powder ball evaporates, cut the powder ball into several pieces and expose it to the sun. The drying field is set up in a sunny place away from the wind to prevent dust pollution.
"What on earth is this?"
Hu Xier looked confused.
Zheng Yueru also looked surprised.
Liu Zheng smiled and said, "This is a delicious dish, don't drool when the time comes!"
Hu Xier looked unconvinced and said with a snort, "It's just this white stuff? How can it be delicious!"
But everyone had nothing to do and wanted to see what Liu Zheng was going to do.
After the sun exposure, Liu Zheng began to make paste. He mixed starch and alum with cold water, put them in a basin, put the basin in the pot and boiled it, stirring constantly. It was ready when it reached 90% maturity.
The most important step is to leak the thread.
Before you make noodles, you can try to see if the dough is suitable. If the noodles are not too thick, too thin, or broken, they are suitable. If they are rolled too fast and broken, it means that the batter is too thin. You should add dry starch and knead it to make the dough tough. If it is difficult to make noodles or the speed is too slow, and the thickness is uneven, it means that the batter is too dry. You should add some wet starch. It is better to mix the noodles once before making noodles. The temperature of the dough should be more than 30 degrees. Prepare two pots, two cold water tanks, and a colander.
When leaking vermicelli, stir the paste evenly and add warm water while stirring. The water temperature should be 50 degrees. When the starch ball leaves your hand, grab a ball (handle) and let a little drop naturally. If it keeps dropping, it is leaking. When leaking vermicelli, prepare a pot of boiling water. When the water in the pot boils, let the vermicelli slip. When the vermicelli sinks to the bottom of the pot and then floats to the surface, it can be taken out of the pot, cooled by a cold water tank, and then tied into bundles by hand and threaded onto a wooden stick. It is cooled by another cold water tank and kept swinging until the vermicelli is loose. Then put it indoors and take it out to dry outdoors after it is completely cooled.
The last step is to dry the silk.
"Wow! So beautiful!"
Hu Xier's eyes lit up and she wanted to touch it with her hand, but Liu Zheng hit her back: "Don't move!"
that's all.
Every day Hu Xier would come over to see if the sweet potato vermicelli was dried well.
Three days later, Liu Zheng touched his fans and smiled: "Call everyone over here, today I will treat you to the first bowl of hot and sour noodles of the Dragon Flame Dynasty!"
Soon, Qingyang Shuo came, Liu Dahao came, Zheng Yueru came, Jiang Xuan came, Qin Changfeng came... Everyone who was in Yintan City came.
Liu Zheng had already prepared all the ingredients based on his memory. Chili peppers, of course, vinegar, coriander, peanuts brought back from Loulan, local peppercorns, star anise...
After a big pot was boiled, Liu Zheng put a handful of sweet potato vermicelli into the pot.
Everyone was amazed as they saw the sweet potato vermicelli gradually soften in the boiling water without breaking, just like noodles, yet crystal clear.
In a short while, more than a dozen bowls of hot and sour noodles were ready.
"You, you go first..."
Liu Dahao, who almost lost his sense of taste due to the spicy pepper, never dared to be the first to try it again.
Qingyang Shuo smiled faintly, picked up a bowl, picked up a vermicelli with chopsticks and put it into his mouth.
The others looked nervous.
Qingyang Shuo pursed his lips and tasted it carefully. He felt several flavors mixed together in his mouth, but they were distinct and each had its own impact. His eyes lit up: "Young Master, what you said is true. This is what delicious food in the world should be like!"
"What?"
Liu Dahao picked up a bowl.
Everyone laughed and started eating.
When they first took a bite, there was still a spicy taste. Hu Xier even spit a few times, but the more they ate, the more they felt that the taste was wonderful.
Liu Zheng couldn't help but look confident: "What do you think? Can it be sold for money?"
"ah?"
