Chapter 417: Chapter 417
After the public grains were delivered, the entire June was truly wrapped up. Around June 20th, Zheng Kai had his vacation.
When he returned, he was bought over a dozen Monkey Stamps for him, claiming he had asked a classmate to help purchase them. Adding in what Zheng Long had gradually received over the past months, he currently had close to forty to fifty whole sheets. That amount was certainly enough, absolutely sufficient.
Then, he instructed Zheng Kai, "Our family has stocked enough. If your classmates can, try to hoard a few more whole sheets. Remember, whole sheets. It’s said that this edition of the stamp is quite rare and has collectable value." He had said the same to his comrades-in-arms. Whether they believed it or not was up to them.
Of course, he had already remitted the money for the stamps his comrades helped buy, paying not less, but more. The extra was naturally for the inconvenience.
Since he planned to rest this year, he decided not to engage in other businesses. Once the grains dried, he stored them at the grain station, which provided them with a booklet, called a food book, and then they could use it to take grains from the grain station on a as-needed basis, with the station charging a certain fee for processing or storage—all within an acceptable range.
These over one thousand jin of grains should be more than enough to feed their family of three for the year. If that wasn’t enough, they could always buy from the Space Mall. In any case, they had no issues with food; it was just that making money was still not easy. But it was only 1980 now, at least two years before the comprehensive reform. Even if he farmed for two more years, there wouldn’t be an issue.
Rice Flower Marinated Fish was a traditional cooking method that Zheng Kai hadn’t tasted before. It was just as well he had come back, and the fish had been pickled almost perfectly.
"Dad, is this fish really pickled from the rice field fish we have? This taste, isn’t it fantastic?"
"Every year when the rice flowers bloom, that’s when fishes grow the fastest. If you walk through the fields at that time, you’ll find fish coming out everywhere, attracted by the sounds of rice flowers falling on the water. The rice flower season typically lasts about ten days, and by the time the flowers fall and turn into plump rice ears, the large carps would have reached half a jin, marking an excellent time for consumption. Actually, we harvested these fishes quite late; they had already grown into large fish of two or three jin, far less tender than when they weighed half a jin." For original chapters go to novel·fıre·net
Even so, Zheng Kai still praised the fish for its taste.
Zheng Long laughed, "You really have a taste for it. The fish that have fed on rice flowers are actually highly nutritious, especially in protein content, which is 3 to 5 times that of ordinary fish. Rice Flower Fish have tender meat and a very fragrant flavor. Since we harvested so much at once and couldn’t finish it all at once, to be able to enjoy such delicious fish for an extended period, I decided to pickle them—thus, Rice Flower Marinated Fish was born."
"The marinated fish, prepared using Rice Flower Fish, not only retains the high-protein and tender texture of the fish, but also becomes even more flavorful and tasty after being pickled with a variety of spices and time to ferment. I only pickled about twenty this time, and the rest of the fish were given away. If you want to eat more, once others have grown theirs, I can trade some loaches for them and continue pickling. This way, we can have them until the New Year’s."
"Dad, then why didn’t you raise fish in the second season and switched to breeding loaches instead?"
"That’s because loaches have even higher nutritional value and are known as ’water ginseng.’ Eating loaches is good for the body; after drying and grinding them, they even become a medicinal material. In any case, both their medicinal and nutritional values are higher than those of Rice Flower Fish. So, I’ve thought about it, and from next year on, for the two rice seasons, we’ll do one season with Rice Flower Fish and one with loaches. Others are breeding shrimps, crabs, and such, but I think none are as effective as Rice Flower Fish and Rice Flower Loaches!"