tall and rhubarb

On the night of August [-]th, Gao Chang’s family began to collect sugarcane, cleaned and squeezed the juice, and filtered it, trying to produce sugar on the night of August [-]th. As expected, Bai Bao kept his promise and sent ten brothers to help. A group of men were busy all night. Just harvested all the sugar cane in the whole field, cleaned the head and tail, squeezed out the sugar cane juice, filtered out the impurities with gauze, and set aside to boil the sugar the next night.

August [-]th is the Mid-Autumn Festival. At two or three o'clock in the afternoon, the north wind blew outside, the sun hid in the clouds, and the sky was a bit dark. Gao Chang asked Uncle Ashan and Zheng Guofeng to help set up five Big pots, these pots were borrowed from various villages by Baibao, and when they returned, they had to bring a few pieces of brown sugar with them.

The adults and children in the village all got up early to help out, and those who couldn't help just watched the fun.In order to avoid sticking to the pot, a small spoonful of rapeseed oil was added to each pot of sugar water. Firewood was burning under the pot, and a person was placed next to each pot to keep stirring with a wooden spoon. After a few moments, the taste of sugar came out. Yes, the children in the yard are so sweet that they hail.

"You boy, is it possible to burn it like this? It's five pots once it comes up, don't waste things." Old Ninth Uncle looked around for a while, but still felt uncertain, and the people in their place didn't grow anything Over sugar cane and sugar, no experience, no understanding.

"What are you afraid of, as long as it doesn't burn, the brown sugar will come out sooner or later." Gao Chang is quite confident, and the people watching the pot are stirring so diligently, and it's likely that the brown sugar will not be burnt.

"Gao Chang, give me two spoonfuls of syrup when it's ready. I'll fry some peanuts and make some peanut candy later." Chen Yuzhen said.

"It goes without saying that Uncle Guofeng is watching the pot for me. If you don't tell me, I have to give you some brown sugar. You can ask Uncle Guofeng to scoop it up for you in a while. It's okay to scoop up the whole pot. Your peanut candy I'll have half of it." Speaking of it, Gao Chang hasn't eaten these snacks for a long time, so he really misses it.

"Daughter-in-law of Guofeng, let me tell you, while you're free, order glutinous rice flour with ginger juice, and when the syrup is ready, make some ginger candy." At this time, the fifth uncle from Xiwei also came over with a cane It's hot, the old man has bad legs and feet, he has to pass a bamboo ladder when he goes in and out of the yard, and he always has to pin his crutches to his belt, and he crawls over the ladder. I think there is something, saying that at this age, one more day to live means one more day to watch the excitement, and I don’t want to stay in the house and wait to die.

"Didn't the master in Baohua Temple still grow wheat? There must be flour. When I send the dolls to class later, I will bring some rice to exchange flour with them. Let's fry some twists and put them on the twists when the syrup is out of the pot." One shower, tsk tsk..." Liu, the fire leader under Bai Bao, was also present.

"Hey, this candy has just been boiled, so you are all thinking about it." Several pots were watched, and a group of half-grown dolls helped to light the fire. Gao Chang had nothing to do, so he had to sit by and accompany a few Young and old gossip.

"If you are so stingy, can you still eat your candy for nothing? I'll ask them to bring the cloth over in a while." Fifth Uncle snorted.

"That's a good relationship. A piece of cloth is exchanged for three catties of brown sugar. If you want to buy it, fifth uncle, I will give you five catties."

"Your knives are very sharp, what's three catties of sugar enough for?" Da Liu thought it was too expensive.

"I said Da Liu, it's brown sugar, not flour. Three catties of sugar is enough for a family to eat for a year or so, and you can't eat brown sugar as a meal, right? Eating too much is not good for your health, especially like Like you, your blood pressure and blood lipids are probably quite high, so you can’t eat it like this.” Gao Chang grabbed a handful of peanuts from Chen Yuzhen, and they tasted like grass when they were raw.

"We are not tall, and being fat is hereditary, and it has nothing to do with what we eat." Da Liu quibbles, he hates people who say that he is fat because he eats a lot, and ask him to go on a diet.

"Da Liu, you've come out to cheat people again, haven't you? I've heard that when your father was young, his height was 1.7 meters five, less than one hundred and two. What do you call heredity? I think it's more like a mutation. Go back quickly, the boss asked me to come out and ask you to cook." Over there, Luo Sen brought the two brothers into the yard, and when he came, he demolished Liu's platform.

"I'm inherited from generation to generation, what do you know? Aren't there a few big sisters cooking in our yard, why are you asking me to go back and cook?" Da Liu made up his mind to wait for the brown sugar to come out of the pot, so what do you say now? I don't want to go either.

"It's August [-]th today, don't you need extra meals? Those big sisters may not be able to handle it, and you have to go back to be the commander-in-chief. Hurry up, don't wait for the boss to come out to invite you in person."

"Tsk, I've been teaching for more than half a year, and I haven't left anything behind. I've taught you everything, why can't I become a teacher..." Da Liu glanced at the big pots reluctantly, and muttered. I guess this guy has to come back to report after cooking.

"How's the candy going? Our boss said, let's order a hundred catties first." Luo Sen said that he wanted to buy candy.

"If it burns, do you want it too?" Gao Chang asked with a smile as he leaned on the Eight Immortals table next to him, chewing peanuts.

"Yes, the boss said, if you are willing to sell, we will make a round." Rosen replied loudly.

"Baoyuan? Gao Chang, you can't promise him. If you want me to give you the bag, I'll let them carry the cloth over here." Uncle Wu is also a generous man. The old man is full of children and grandchildren, and everyone is filial. So much cloth.

"Why do you want to outsource it? When the brown sugar is boiled, the people who want to pack our yard will do it." Chen Yuzhen also booed.

"Hey, Baoyuan, it's a good idea. Our family worked so hard to grow sugar cane and boil brown sugar, but in the end it was wrapped round. The boss let you all be the ones, so I became a wage earner?" Gao Chang made a decision: " According to the head, each person is limited to purchase one catty, and no one is allowed to speculate."

"That's fine, our brothers from Shangkan want a hundred catties first." The total number of people under Bai Bao's hands is now more than one hundred, and one hundred catties is not too much.

"Cash on hand, no credit." Gao Chang was very proud of his own business, and it was easy to do business, and no one wanted to bargain for what he said.

"The sugar didn't come out yet, so the tail went up to the sky first." Old Ninth Uncle said with a smile beside him.

"We have the capital to be proud." Gao Chang hecked a few times, and at the same time urged Chen Yuzhen to make more peanut candies, planning to send them to the monks in Baohua Temple later. The child Suobo is not very gregarious, and he is studying in Baohua Temple In class, it is impossible for Gao Chang to take care of him all the time, and it is all up to the monks in the temple to take care of him.

In the early years, Gao Chang did not agree with the behavior of students' parents giving gifts to teachers. He felt that it was very conducive to evil spirits. After he became a parent himself, he finally understood a little bit. In fact, most of the parents' reasons for giving gifts are still very simple. I just hope that the teacher can give more attention to his own children when he can't take care of them.

But this group of monks in Baohua Temple is really good, and the children in several nearby villages have also been taught very well. Not only did they learn to write and count in the temple, but they also read scriptures with the monks for an hour every day. Master also explained some simple and easy-to-understand principles for them.People in various villages said that since the children went to school in Baohua Temple, they became more sensible, and the parents naturally respected this group of monks even more.

Because of the festival, the dinners in each yard were very rich that night. After eating, there were still a lot of dishes left on the table. After the villagers sent their children to Baohua Temple, they sat around the table again. .Drinking the freshly opened rice wine and smelling the increasingly strong aroma of brown sugar, except for a few unlucky guys who got short lottery tickets and went out to stand guard, no one else had to work tonight.

"Hiss, the weather looks like it's going to snow." Bai Bao brought along Luo Sen and Liu's men, who probably came here after they had eaten enough to wait for the brown sugar to come out of the pot.

"How many months has it been?" There were a few large pots burning in the yard, and everyone didn't feel cold, so they heard the wind blowing outside.

"We used to be northerners, and we knew it would snow if we smelled it. You just wait and see. If it doesn't snow tonight, it will snow tomorrow." Bai Bao was very sure.

"It's only snowing in August, so how cold is it in winter?"

"According to the Gregorian calendar, it's already October. It's so cold this year, and it's normal for it to snow."

After eight o'clock in the evening, the first pot of brown sugar came out, and Chen Yuzhen scooped out half of it, and made more than a dozen catties of peanut candy. Circle, most of it went.

The remaining half of the pot of syrup was placed in a wooden tank that Gao Chang had ordered with Uncle Cui in advance. After the syrup cooled down, it became a large square sugar brick, which was cut into pieces by Gao Chang with a knife. , someone on the side couldn't wait to say that they were going to buy it, and immediately took out the scale and weighed it. The three catties of this house and the three catties of the house were divided up within two strokes.

Fortunately, the next few pots were finished one after another. The pots of syrup were poured out to cool down, and new sugarcane juice was added to the pots to continue cooking. Gao Chang is naturally not stingy with those who help him.

Several old people in the village have said to make ginger candy, but it is a pity that ginger candy is a bit troublesome to make. I am afraid that it will be too late tonight. After two days, the glutinous rice and everything are ready, so let’s take it easy. Anyway, brown sugar With it, you don’t have to worry about not being able to make ginger candy.

Before the second pot of sugar came out of the pot, it was snowing heavily outside. As a southerner, Gao Chang had never seen such heavy snow in his two lifetimes.Simba and Miaozi also came back from the outside, shook the snowflakes on their fur, and leaned over to the stove. Yingzi was not in a hurry to get on the beam, and fell to the ground, walking on two short legs Legs, follow Miao Zai and them to warm up the fire.

"With the snow now, the weather should be even colder, and the masters don't know if they have enough clothes or quilts." People in the village looked at the heavy snow outside, and the first thing they thought of was the monks in Baohua Temple. It was built in the southwest, and it is also a place where the seasons are like spring, and it has never experienced cold winter at all.

"I'll ask, and bring them some sugar." Gao Chang stood up after speaking, took a piece of silk out of the house, wrapped a dozen bricks of sugar, and put the remaining peanut candy After packing together, he said to Bai Bao: "You ask people to go to the elementary school to have a look. When those people moved, I saw that they had very little luggage. If it is really not possible, I will borrow some cloth quilts from them first. You can’t just watch them freeze to death.”

"Speaking of which, the silk quilt lent to Lin Fang and his group was burned by a fire." Borrowing is fine, but it's not a problem if you always borrow and never repay.

"People are dead, why are you still talking about this?"

"There are dozens of people in a village. If you say nothing, you will be gone. Are you still thinking about that thing?"

"Ask first, if there is really no other way, I have to sell it at every stall."

The people in the yard were chattering, and they were all ready to produce things. Even if the people in the village were stingy, they would not die. In addition, they have been influenced by Buddhism during this period of time. I have always been persuaded to be kind to others, and gradually, doing good deeds seems to have become fashionable, and people themselves get spiritual satisfaction in the process of doing good deeds.

Wrapped in a padded jacket, Gao Chang left the village with Rhubarb. There was already a thin layer of snow on the ground, which creaked when stepped on.Since the tsunami, along with the sea level rise, the temperature has also dropped a lot. In the past few months, there has been no obvious recovery. It is actually predictable that it will snow so early this year.

When they arrived at Baohua Temple, they gave the brown sugar to the great monk. After learning that they had a lot of supplies and no shortage of clothes and quilts, Gao Chang and the others went to the seawall to have a look. Will the bay freeze over?Logically speaking, this should be considered a good thing. In winter, the mountains are covered by heavy snow. If even the bay is frozen, even if there is a war outside, they will not be affected much here.

That night, all the brown sugar in Gao Chang’s house was boiled. The next day, many people came to buy sugar from him with cloth in the wind and snow. Almost all the brown sugar was sold out without leaving home. eat by yourself.

This kind of sugar brick tastes pretty good, it is burnt, sweet and crisp, and Suobo also likes it very much. Before going to school every day, he has to ask Gao Chang for a sugar brick. Eat candy, although there is more than one candy brick per day, nothing should happen. Suobo doesn't like many things in the first place, so Gao Chang didn't get serious with him.

After dinner that evening, Suobo carried a small cloth bag on his back and said he was going to school, telling Gao Chang and the others not to send it off, and then went out of the yard with Simba.Although it has been snowing intermittently recently, the nearby villages have been cleaned up very diligently. The snow on the roads from Baohua Temple to various villages is not serious. With Simba following, the nearby villagers are also very familiar with it. Even when the weather is cold, even poisonous snakes hibernate, and the way to school is quite safe.

But this day, as soon as they left, Rhubarb dragged Gao Chang out with his back feet, and followed Suobo and the others mysteriously. There was no abnormality along the way. He took out the sugar brick from inside and handed it to Simba. With the sugar brick in his mouth, Simba watched him enter the temple, then found a quiet place, and chewed the brown sugar slowly.

Is this wolf crazy?How dare a wolf of his grandma eat so much candy!Don't die?Calculating the time, he has eaten one sugar brick a day for more than half a month, and it is a miracle that he is still alive now!Gao Chang wanted to tear this guy's head open to see if it was filled with straw, didn't it mean that animals have the instinct to seek advantages and avoid disadvantages?

However, as a big parent, Gao Chang knows that for children who make mistakes, especially when the other party does not know that their behavior is wrong, the stick policy will not work. Simba is not allowed to eat brown sugar, and his behavior is punished. If you blame, it will not only leave the impression of being domineering and petty to other family members, but also the educational effect is not obvious.

So Gao Chang didn't show his face, and he and Da Huang went home quietly. In the evening of the next day, everything was as usual. They sent them out of the village. On the way, Gao Chang hugged Suobo and opened his teeth to look: "You eat too much sugar recently, let me see if you have any rotten teeth?"

"Will eating sugar rot teeth?" Sobo asked. This question was common sense to children a few years ago, but in recent years, because all children can't eat sugar, this common sense has gradually been forgotten.

"Well, I ate too much sugar when I was a child, and my teeth were badly damaged. One day when I was eating, I chewed and chewed. I suddenly chewed on a stone and spit it out. It was white. It turned out that a piece of my tooth had fallen out. Another time, when eating rice cakes..."

"Your teeth are fine now."

"At that time, I was still young, and I hadn't changed my teeth yet. Now you have replaced several teeth. If they are rotten, don't even think about getting new ones. It will be troublesome. I can only ask Dr. Suzanne to replace the bad teeth. Pulled out."

"Pull it out?" Suobo shivered in Gao Chang's arms, and Simba on the side also trembled.

"Well, use pliers to pull out the bad teeth, and leave a gap in the future. You have to pull out as many bad teeth as you want, otherwise it will hurt badly, and if you don't make it well, there will be pus..."

In this way, Gao Chang sent the man and wolf out of the village. The first thing Suobo did when he returned home the next morning was to take out the sugar brick from his bag and return it to Gao Chang.

"Actually, as long as you brush your teeth well, it's okay to eat a little bit." Gao Chang was a little worried, whether he had scared the child too much.

"Don't eat it." Suobo shook his head resolutely. After a while, he asked Gao Chang uneasy: "If Simba eats sugar, will his teeth rot?"