There were too few manpower, and it was extremely difficult for three people to complete the task of cooking sugar. Liang Chuan simply called all the family members over.
Ye Xiaochai swapped with Zhaodi to drive the cattle, which was a relatively easy job. Then Yi Niang went to feed the sugarcane. Li Erhua lifted the sugarcane juice into the moso bamboo tube and poured it into the house. Shen Yuzhen was responsible for burning the firewood. The firepower required for boiling sugar was continuous. Liang Chuan He and Zhaodi were waiting by the pot with a large spoon each.
The design method of the chain pot is to save firewood and increase the firepower. The top pot is not burned directly. If the firepower in the lower stove is sufficient, the heat will also be transferred to the upper iron pot. The principle is the same as steaming steamed buns. The steamer underneath is still half-cooked, and the top one is often cooked first!
The flames in the stove kept licking the bottom of the pot, and under the action of the heat, a large pot of sugar water began to slowly stir.
The sugar juice squeezed out by Shiji is only sifted through a filter made by Li Erhua himself. The mesh of the filter is as small as a fishnet. Large pieces of cane wax and cane shavings can usually be filtered out, and the impurities contained in the sugarcane juice can be filtered out. If there is too much, the freshly squeezed cane juice can still be like clear water. After too much, it starts to become turbid, the color becomes dark and thick, and there is a hint of thickness when it surges in the iron pot.
The first step in cooking sugar is to skim off these impurities.
Liang Chuan put a lot of charcoal in the stove. The flammable calorific value of charcoal was also very high. It was a bit wasteful to use it to cook sugar, but Liang Chuan didn't have time to wait for a large piece of wood to be completely burned.
The first pot of cane sugar is opened to ensure success. In the future, charcoal will not be used to boil sugar. There is more dry firewood in the yard than can be burned in several years. This pot of cane sugar will not be used up until the hundreds of acres of sugarcane fields are boiled. Otherwise, the fire in the stove will not be cut off.
The small pieces of wood were combined with the charcoal, and the heat in the stove was overwhelming. The fire burned on Shen Yuzhen's face, and sweat began to fall down. Shen Yuzhen turned out to have a pretty face, and her fingers were not touched by a trace of spring water. Now he is holding a fire blower in his hand, his cheeks are rounded, and he is blowing air into the stove with all his strength. He is breathing like a blue but trying his best to make the fire burn brighter! After blowing it for many times, the beauty's face turned into black coal!
No one had ever taught Liang Chuan the art of cooking sugar, and he had never taken the initiative to learn it. He relied on what he saw from the fine historical materials and some anecdotes. As for the legendary cooking art that involves more than a dozen techniques, He doesn't know how to make sweets at all. Now he's rushing to put them on the shelves. If he can't do it, he has to do it. He signed a contract with Zheng Ruoying and bet on the young lady's youth. If he can't do it, he will be very sorry for her. .
Seeing that Huo Hou was almost in place, Liang Chuan asked Shen Yuzhen to get some duck eggs and some pieces of fine gauze. These are tools that will be used later, so prepare them now.
The turbid sugarcane juice began to boil in the largest iron pot. The color changed from the original turbid yellow to a thicker yellow. The huge bubbles on the sugarcane juice kept rising from the bottom of the pot. There was a popping sound, and then suddenly Exploded, the sound was slightly dull. There was a thick layer of foam floating on a large iron pot, which was thicker and thicker than the foam for ordering tea!
The whole family went into battle. Li Chu only had one hand and was guarding outside. Although it was winter, the others were already sweating profusely after being busy. Fortunately, this is the middle of winter, and sugarcane, a crop gifted by God, only matures in this season. If it were summer, I can't imagine how high the temperature would be in this sugar boiling room. .
Seeing that the sugar water in the first pot was almost boiling, Liang Chuan said to Brother Zhao, "Brother Zhao, let's keep stirring the sugar water in this pot now. When the bubbles start to bubble, use a spoon to stir the sugar water in this pot." Wait for the impurities to be skimmed off, and then pour the cane juice into another pot."
The two people used large spoons to carefully scrape off the impurities that looked like foam from the pot bit by bit. After the foam was removed, although the color of the whole pot of sugarcane juice became darker, it was obviously much purer.
The chain pots are lower than each other, which facilitates the transfer of the contents of the higher pot to the lower pot. With a big spoon, the sugar cane juice will be moved to the second pot.
During this transfer process, Liang Chuan gently covered the second pot with a piece of gauze, which acted as a filter. The mesh of the gauze is particularly fine, and the filtering is more careful. Although the impurities in the cane juice will be reduced a lot after ladling, the amount is still quite large. Rough laundering can only remove the impurities on the surface. After filtering through the gauze eye, many impurities can be removed.
After all the sugarcane juice in the first pot was rushed into the second pot, Liang Chuan cleaned the bottom of the pot. Sure enough, it was a special handmade iron pot. The quality was different. In addition, Liang Chuan carefully cooked the pot with lard. If the pot is properly maintained, the sugar water has been boiling at the bottom of the pot for so long without sticking at all.
A pot has been used by farmers for decades to eat. When it is worn out, a few taels of pig iron are added to make it up. Even at the beginning of the 21st century, most rural market streets still have the skill of pot tinker!
At this time, the moso bamboo is used to add sugarcane juice to the first iron pot. These processes are the same as the first iron pot.
In this way, the sugarcane juice is continuously squeezed outside the house, and the sugarcane juice is sent to the iron pot through the moso bamboo. A group of people move together, and the sugarcane juice in the pot is rushed to the second pot, so as not to burn it, let alone cook it too fast. , even if there is a problem in one link.
Fan Dianyuan and the others were also surprised. They had sent so much sugar cane, and in just a short time, most of it turned into bagasse. Was it all ground by that stone mill?
Each time the sugarcane juice in the iron pot is driven down, not only can impurities be filtered out, but the water in the sugarcane juice can also be removed during the process, making the concentration of sugar water higher and higher.
The cane juice in the first three pots can still be filtered into the fourth and fifth pots, but it can no longer be filtered. The sugar water is as yellow as mud, sticky and thick, and the gauze net can no longer filter it.
"Is this sugar? It smells so good!" Yi Niang could smell the rich aroma from a distance outside the house. In this era when sweets are scarce, even the emperor can't resist the temptation of sweets, let alone these. Poor people rarely have access to even sugar.
Even a girl like Shen Yuzhen, who had been raised in fine clothing since childhood, could not resist the temptation of sweets. Several girls couldn't help but swallow a mouthful of saliva!
"It's not yet, but it shouldn't be far from being made into sugar." Liang Chuan's production process was rough and simple, but seeing the sugar water in the pot getting thicker and thicker, he wanted to believe that he was not far away from success.
Zhaodi had taken a few sips of cane juice and was fascinated by the taste, but now he is a little disgusted when he looks at these yellow candies. The appearance of these candies is not good at all. The pot of cane juice is thick and thick, and the color The dark brown color really makes people unappetizing.
The five pots came down one after another. The sugarcane juice in the bottom iron pot was already as thick as a paste. If you don't pay attention to stirring, even a large hand-made iron pot that is said to be non-stick will become sticky. Let that red syrup go!
There were almost not enough manpower, so Liang Chuan quickly called Ye Xiaochai in. Ye Xiaochai was driving the scalpers. Liang Chuan called and turned into a chef holding a spoon.
Finally, when they saw that they were almost stirred, Liang Chuan and Xiaochai changed places, quickly scooped up the brown sugar juice from the iron pot, and put it into a wooden bucket. The brown sugar in the barrel was stirred by Shen Yuzhen who was free. At this time, the temperature of the brown sugar was extremely high. The purpose of stirring was to dissipate heat. If you are not careful, the brown sugar may burn. Liang Chuan vaguely remembers this process. It seems to be called sanding. .
After the brown sugar in the barrel is completely cooled, it becomes the ancient brown sugar that can still be eaten today. Liang Chuan is now too busy to think about the head and tail. The main reason is that there are too few manpower. After these processes, just a few of them can't handle it. Fortunately, his energy is still strong, and his hands and feet are strong enough to stir up the sugarcane juice for a day. I didn't feel tired at all, so I didn't let the cane juice in the iron pot burn.
Liang Chuan observed it for a long time, and he felt that it was not good to have too much fire in the stove. Because the fire was so fierce, the sugarcane juice in the pot boiled very fast, and it was too late to catch the water. You also had to be very quick to scoop out the water. After the fire power was reduced, Liang Chuan observed it for a long time. , to achieve the effect of slow cooking.
In this way, the charcoal has the opposite effect!
He asked Shen Yuzhen not to add more firewood to the pot, but to slowly simmer the remaining charcoal. Sure enough, the progress of the whole process slowed down, and there was no need to be so busy anymore. The cane juice in the pot is also cooked quite gently, so there is no risk of it becoming burnt.
The golden brown sugar juice is like a ribbon, with a rich sweetness, faintly disappearing in the sugar cooking room where the mist and steam are steaming. Although the brown sugar that is almost formed does not look very good, the taste is so tempting that Lian Butan is not greedy. The artist who ate it was so excited that her mouth watered.
After the sand was removed, the brown sugar was placed in a bucket. Liang Chuan looked at it and felt it was inappropriate. Firstly, the bucket was cylindrical and the heat dissipation area was not large enough. Secondly, once the bucket was cold, it became a large piece and it took a long time to dig out.
As expected, there is still a gap in Baimi! The first time I tried making sweets, the joint was still a bit weak in the end!
The best way to make cold cane sugar is to make several molds similar to tofu molds, put the sanded brown sugar in them, and then smooth them out to dissipate heat quickly, and you don’t even need to stir them manually. Moreover, the cooled brown sugar is in one plate, which is beautiful in appearance and easy to use.
At the end of the day, Fan Dianyuan and the others delivered nearly 6,000 to 7,000 kilograms of sugar cane. Except for a few sugar canes lying on the ground in Liangchuan, the rest turned into sugar residue and piled up in a yard.
Fan Dianyuan and a dozen or so sugarcane farmers transported the sugarcane in, and now they have to transport all the bagasse out and find an open space to dry the bagasse. What they were more curious about was where all the sugarcane juice went. Could Liang Chuan's family drink it all? Did they save it all? Will this thing go rancid if kept? There is something cooking in the house. It is so fragrant that every sugarcane farmer is greedy, but they can't see it.
At the end of the day, the two men and five women were so busy that they were dripping with sweat. The bodies of the women seemed to be a little overwhelmed. Zhaodi's arms were so sore that he couldn't lift them, let alone the women. It's hot in this house, so my energy drains away faster.
Thousands of kilograms of sugar cane, after being pressed and boiled through a series of processes, only about sixty kilograms of brown sugar was left. This ratio made Liang Chuan gasp. If this sugar production rate were left to future generations, no sugar factory would be able to produce it. It has to close down because the sugar production rate is less than 1%.
Liang Chuan shook his head helplessly. If the sugar production rate and loss could be controlled by another 10% or 20%, maybe the brown sugar could be increased by one or two points, which would be even more impressive.
"Third brother, did these candies fail? Why are you shaking your head?"
Yi Niang looked at these yellow-brown brown sugars, and she didn't understand what was good or bad.
Liang Chuan picked out a piece and put it in his mouth to taste it. The joy of success made Liang Chuan shed tears uncontrollably. It took a whole year of hard work and it was not easy. Damn, he finally succeeded. Got it!
When several people saw Liang Chuan crying, they knew that the candy making might fail, and they all sighed in unison.
"Why are you sighing? I am so happy!"
"Eh...I see you're crying..."
"You can dig a small piece and try it yourself to see how it tastes!"
When everyone heard this, they all picked out a piece of brown sugar and put it in their mouths. Oh my god, it tastes like honey when a child eats it. It is sweet to the heart, rich in taste, pure and delicious, this. . Is it the sweet taste?
