Reborn in 1977

Chapter 494: Waiting to Eat

This year's Spring Festival didn't have a thirtieth day of the twelfth lunar month.

The twenty-ninth day of the twelfth lunar month was New Year's Eve.

If there's no snow on New Year's Eve, it always feels like something's missing.

Fortunately, there was a light snowfall last night, covering the ground with a layer of white. Although it didn't have the atmosphere of heavy snow, it was still pleasing to the eye.

Chen Fan, as always, got up early, did his usual morning exercise and washing up, and then went downstairs to the kitchen to cook.

Originally, Liu Dan and the others wanted to come over and cook New Year's Eve dinner for him, but he refused.

On New Year's Eve, even the landlords had to give their laborers a day off. How could he let those girls come over to work today?

That would be too inappropriate.

Besides, he would have to give out red envelopes.

So he decided to do it himself and be self-sufficient.

First, he made a pot of breakfast, not for himself, of course, but to feed the animals.

Mainly the two dogs and a flock of chickens. The horses and sheep could eat grass on their own. The peregrine falcon and myna bird could find their own insects to eat in the spring and summer. In the dead of winter, they only needed a little shredded meat. The three pandas had bamboo. The raccoon cat, Baliang, was also used to going out to find its own food, eating everything clean before returning.

Only the dogs and chickens needed to be fed.

What about the pigs?

Ahem, yesterday, taking advantage of the last day the food station was open, Captain Yang found two people to carry one over to hand in for the task.

It must be said that Yang Ju and the others really did their best. The weight of both pigs exceeded 150 jin. The smaller one was also 152. When they were pulled over to hand in for the task, Master Zhu was there to greet them and directly designated them as special grade products. The price of the live pig was set at 6 mao, and it sold for a total of 91 yuan, which was roughly equivalent to the year-end bonus of a strong laborer in Lujiawan last year.

Compared to this year's income, this amount of money was a bit shamefully low. Fortunately, there were also 50 jin of meat coupons, which could be kept for buying fresh pork in the future. Yes, they were valid for one year.

What about the other, bigger one?

Of course, it was slaughtered and eaten fresh.

Chen Fan ate breakfast, changed into a pair of plastic rain boots, took off his cotton-padded jacket, put on a smock, and slowly walked to the back of the house with a bundle of knives.

In the woods behind the house, a path more than two meters wide had been cleared, paved with gravel, so even though there was a layer of white snow, it wasn't very slippery.

Walking down the path, after a few steps, you could see a large, deep pit, like a dried-up pond.

But now there was still a layer of shallow water in this pond.

That was where the village used to get soil to build earthen-walled houses. Since the family breeding business became profitable, the villagers no longer looked up to earthen-walled houses, and the pottery factory was also placed near the commune, so there was no need to get soil here, and this deep pit was abandoned.

Next to the deep pit, a new livestock shed was built.

The livestock shed was built along the north-south axis, with a solid wall separating the middle, one side facing east and the other facing west.

The east side was the stable and sheep pen. In fact, they weren't separated. The two horses and two sheep lived together.

The other side was the pigsty.

At the edge of the livestock shed was a large manure pit. Every few days, someone from the team would come to pull the manure away, so there was no smell here.

In addition, a small shed was built on the side, specifically for cooking pig feed.

But now it was used by Chen Fan to boil water.

In the pig feed shed, there was a chopping board that Chen Fan had prepared in advance, as well as a huge kidney basin.

Not the one he used to take baths in. That one was put in the storage room, and it would be a small souvenir in the future.

This one was made by him himself, focusing on large quantity and deep water.

As the saying goes, you have to eat well before you leave, but Chen Fan didn't plan to cook pig feed. He planned to send the big fat pig on its way now. Why give it anything to eat? It would be even harder to clean up after it ate. So he had stopped feeding it since yesterday, and its stomach should be almost empty by now.

Some places pay attention to not killing on New Year's Eve, but in Yunhu, from the Winter Solstice to New Year's Eve, you can kill New Year's pigs during this time.

Only pigs killed during this time are called "New Year's pigs."

However, it only lasts until the afternoon of New Year's Eve. After the sun goes down, you must stop, and then you don't use a knife on the first day of the new year, and you don't resume normal until the second day.

Putting the knife on the table, he first fetched water from the large water tank in the corner into the large iron pot and started a fire to boil the water.

Then, he picked up two wooden buckets and went uphill to the faucet behind the house to fetch two buckets of water.

While carrying the water back, Chen Fan thought that he should find someone to connect another section of water pipe over there someday, so he wouldn't have to come up to fetch water to boil it.

Oh, right, he also had to buy two sets of electric water pumps, so that he could have running water all day long in the future, and he wouldn't have to wait specifically for the water delivery time to get water.

Thinking about the things he wanted to do next year, he filled the water tank in two trips and fetched two more buckets of water and placed them aside.

When the water was boiling, Chen Fan lit a pot of tobacco and walked to the pigpen.

Inside the pigpen, the big fat pig was lying on the ground, its face full of despair. When it saw someone coming, it immediately turned over and stood up and ran over, grunting and squealing.

Chen Fan took a puff of smoke, looked at the spotted pig in the pigpen, and exhaled a puff of smoke, "You're about to hit the road, so don't squeal for food anymore. It'll be even more uncomfortable if you eat before you go."

Unfortunately, he was speaking human language, and the spotted pig didn't understand, and was still grunting and squealing.

Chen Fan smacked his lips and thought silently in his heart, I wonder when white pigs will be promoted here?

As early as the 1960s, China had already introduced white pigs, but it was still in the stage of cultivating and promoting them at the same time. There was no start, and there were not enough piglets for large-scale promotion, so the pigs currently raised in China are still mainly native pigs.

The biggest feature of native pigs is "black." In some areas, the pigs are all black. The very old allegorical saying, "A crow falls on a pig—you can't see that you're black," refers to native pigs.

In addition, there are also black and white spotted pigs, such as the Two-end Black used to make Jinhua ham, and some other pig breeds with variegated colors.

But there are no all-white ones.

As long as it is an all-white pig, it must be an imported pig breed.

However, after so many years of cultivation, the large-scale promotion period of white pigs should come soon. … The second senior brother in the 1986 Journey to the West is a big white pig, so the promotion had been completed at that time, and native pigs were rare, otherwise they wouldn't have found a white pig to be the prototype of the second senior brother, they should have found an all-black one.

Thinking of this, Chen Fan secretly planned again that he should put the construction of the original seed base on the agenda within one or two years at the latest, otherwise it would be difficult to find many original seeds later.

In addition to pigs, the original species of local chickens, ducks, geese, cattle, sheep, and even soft-shelled turtles and other meats must be preserved.

In addition, after the hybrid rice was trial-planted this year, the planting scale will definitely be expanded next year, and the original rice seeds will become very rare at that time.

Although the yield of original rice seeds is far inferior to that of hybrid rice, the taste is very different. There is also one thing, I don't know if it's true, that is, the original rice is more suitable for the physique of the local people.

He remembered that there was an old grandma in his grandfather's village. Even when everyone else went to plant hybrid rice, she still insisted on leaving a piece of land in her own rice field to plant original rice. She rarely got sick in her life. When others asked her, she said that it was related to the rice she ate. She had only eaten rice from old seeds in her life, and she felt very energetic even if she didn't eat meat, eggs, or milk.

Unfortunately, this matter originated solely from her, without any scientific evidence to confirm it.

Anyway, regardless of whether it's an isolated case or not, even if it's just for the rice to taste better, Chen Fan wanted to keep some old grain seeds and find a piece of land to plant them for himself.

While thinking and smoking, he finished a pot of tobacco in no time. He turned around and walked to the pig shed, first placing the tobacco pipe, then opening the knife sheath, picking up a chain with an iron hook fixed on the wooden bar, with a large wooden basin underneath to catch the blood.

Then he returned to the front of the pigpen, moved the wooden fence and walked in.

The big fat pig stood in place, staring blankly at him.

Chen Fan brushed back the hair that had fallen to his forehead, slowly walked over, and suddenly punched the pig's head.

Without a word, the big fat pig lay motionless on the ground.

After waiting a few seconds, it stopped breathing.

Chen Fan bent down and grabbed the pig's hind neck, his five fingers like five iron hooks, almost digging into the pig's skin. Then, he exerted force and lifted the pig, weighing more than 160 kilograms, with one hand and dragged it out.

Back in the pig shed, he was like a master with decades of experience, easily hanging the pig upside down on the iron hook. He picked up a slender pig-slaughtering knife from the table, first shaved a tuft of hair, and then stabbed from the throat into the heart, the blood gushing down.

After the blood stopped flowing, the hot water was also ready. He scooped the hot water into the kidney basin and took the pig down to soak it in the water.

Next, step by step, without any help, he completed the process of scalding and scraping hair by himself.

Then he hung the pig up again, placed a new wooden basin underneath, picked up a bull-eared knife, and cut straight down the belly, the pig's innards immediately falling into the basin.

After taking the pig down and placing it on the table, in less than half an hour, the big fat pig became a pile of neat fresh meat.

After finishing, he filled another pot of tobacco and smoked, preparing to rest for a while before going to the front to get the bamboo basket and carry the pork back.

As a result, before he finished smoking the pot of tobacco, he heard the barking of two dogs from the front.

Someone? Or an acquaintance?

Chen Fan couldn't help but raise his eyebrows slightly, wondering who it was that would come over today?

It shouldn't be Huang Ying and the others, otherwise the dogs wouldn't be so excited.

Moreover, on New Year's Eve, even the closest relatives wouldn't easily visit, as every household is busy preparing for the New Year's Eve dinner. Who would run around causing trouble for others?

That's right, visiting someone else's house today is just causing trouble.

He took a deep breath, finished the last bit of tobacco, then knocked the pipe clean and walked up with his hands behind his back.

He had only walked a short distance when he saw a window on the second floor being pushed open, and Jiang Lili stretched out half of her body, waving to him excitedly, "Xiao Fan, Xiao Fan."

Chen Fan's face suddenly lit up with a smile, and he looked up and smiled, "Why are you here?"

The next second, Jiang Tiantian came out from around the corner, waving and shouting to him, "I'm here too."

Chen Fan quickened his pace and walked up, looking at the beautiful woman in front of him, smiling from ear to ear, "You didn't sneak out, did you?"

Jiang Tiantian stared at him intently, smiling and said, "No, Mom and Dad asked us to come."

After a pause, she looked back at the empty window on the second floor, where no one was there, and then turned back, giggling and saying, "Mom and Dad saw that Lili looked unhappy, so they asked her to come and spend the New Year with you, and then they were worried that she would be unsafe traveling alone, so they asked me to come with her."

Chen Fan nodded in realization, "So that's how it is."

Then he asked, "What about Uncle and Aunt?"

Jiang Tiantian smiled and said, "They have to go to the factory today to celebrate the Spring Festival with the employees who are sticking to their posts, and they won't be home until evening. We'll have the reunion dinner with you and catch the afternoon bus back, just in time to have New Year's Eve dinner with them."

Chen Fan couldn't help but chuckle, "Then you're celebrating the customs of both the North and the South."

Unlike the northern regions, where New Year's Eve dinner is eaten in the evening, the reunion dinner in the Yunhu area is usually held at noon, because noon is the "Great Reunion," and even the children who have moved out will come back to have dinner and reunite with their elders.

Since the parents on both the man's and woman's sides are present, they will eat two reunion dinners during the day, usually at the man's house at noon or in the morning, and at the woman's house in the afternoon or evening.

When it gets dark at night and the northern regions start eating New Year's Eve dinner, they go back to their own small homes and gather together to listen to the radio or loudspeaker to stay up all night, or simply sit around playing mahjong and chatting, until about 11 o'clock in the evening, when they start preparing their own small family's "New Year's Eve dinner."

Those who are more elaborate will prepare a table of dishes, and those who are simpler will just cook a pot of dumplings. After eating, it will be past midnight, and then they will go to bed.

As for Jiang Heng having to eat with the employees at the unit, that is not a necessary regulation, but a kind of benefit in the factory.

At this time, the state stipulates that the Spring Festival only has a 3-day holiday, which are the first, second, and third days of the Lunar New Year, so New Year's Eve is not a holiday.

Moreover, very few people even ask for leave to go home to prepare New Year's Eve dinner, after all, asking for leave is not in line with "talking about contribution," even if it's just pretending, you have to pretend once.

Since the employees "talk about contribution," then the leaders must also talk about benefits, setting up reunion dinners in the cafeteria and distributing some welfare goods is also a matter of course.

Of course, this also depends on the strength of the unit. Wealthy units will do it on a large scale, and those without money can only offer verbal comfort and send a bag of welfare goods, wishing all comrades a happy Spring Festival.

After Jiang Tiantian finished speaking, she looked at Chen Fan's clothes and couldn't help but be a little curious, "What are you doing?"

At this time, Jiang Lili also ran over with an excited face, standing in front of Chen Fan and almost didn't stop, quickly grabbing her sister's arm to stand firm, her small face flushed, but she just grinned and smiled, unable to speak.

Chen Fan couldn't help but chuckle as he looked at her.

After a pause of two seconds, he said, "You're lucky, I just slaughtered a New Year pig, and now I'm going to get the bamboo basket and carry it back. I'll make you New Year pig dishes later."

The two sisters were both surprised when they heard this.

Jiang Tiantian stared at him intently, "You alone? Slaughtered a New Year pig?"

Jiang Lili looked at the clothes on his body, and then looked behind him, "Is it there? I'll help you carry it."

Chen Fan gestured forward and walked, explaining with a smile, "The educated youth compound in front. After the New Year, there will be educated youth coming over, so I asked Captain Yang to help build a livestock shed in the back. All the animals in the original educated youth compound have been transferred over. I was too lazy to run around, so I just slaughtered the New Year pig there."

Jiang Lili nodded, "Yeah, I heard you say that."

She rubbed her small hands and smiled, "Then we're in luck."

Jiang Tiantian looked at her dotingly, then looked at Chen Fan, and smiled, "You made last year's reunion dinner, and you slaughtered the New Year pig today, why don't we take care of the reunion dinner?"

Chen Fan raised his eyebrows slightly and laughed heartily, "Okay, then I'll wait to eat."