The next day, the Yanzhou Prefecture issued three official documents concerning Yingtian to the counties under its jurisdiction. One is to reiterate the edict issued by the DPRK and China at the beginning of the year on the resettlement of tenants; The other is that the displaced people and tenants who have poured into Yanzhou over the years can first register with the county government where they are located, and then grant land according to their households, as well as specific data and laws on the distribution of land and property.

The last question is about the categories of goods prohibited by the imperial decrees of the DPRK and China in previous years, such as the prohibition of selling salt and refining salt without permission; Iron and weapons shall not be smuggled to the people outside the Guan. As well as salt, tea, silk and other goods out of the country, the amount of tax that should be collected by the inspection office, etc. Of course, the entry of war horses, mules, donkeys, raw hides and animal tendons, etc., is taxed very low, almost tax-free.

The official document of the state government was issued, but seven or eight days passed, and it did not cause any movement. Zhang Yue sent people to the counties to ask questions, but the results were similar in the counties, either using excuses to prevaricate or lying and prevaricating. Only Jincheng County Ling Bian Conghan and Yan'an County Ling Qin Mingshan replied that they could discuss it with local big households!

Zhang Yue couldn't believe this result, but after thinking about it carefully, he understood that the ruling model in these years was from top to bottom, and the foundation seemed to be at the top of the center, but in fact, it was the local big and powerful, they ruled many tenant farmers, and the government only maintained a limit.

If you really want to release the population and exempt the tax according to the emperor's edict, you can only hit some of the big households, but Zhang Yue doesn't think so, he wants to fight all, and now that these two counties have agreed to start, it may be a breakthrough.

Three days later, Zhang Yue found Feng Qianhou and led his own troops to Jincheng County, intending to personally preside over the affairs of the first division of fields. The county magistrate Bian Conghan and the chief bookkeeper Yao Guangchun are not bad, they have already communicated with the local big households and reached a consensus, but only a dozen households agreed with the data submitted to Zhang Yue, and the remaining 40 or so households did not express their position.

As a result, it is meaningless to divide or not, Zhang Yue has no interest, and his kind words appeased the border county order and Yao's master book, and he returned to the state very unhappy. Subsequently, Yan'an County reported that more than a dozen families had released tenants and land properties, and sent people to send a household registration register for archiving.

Zhang Yue felt a deep sense of frustration, and for the time being, he stopped talking about the matter, and turned his attention to the affairs of the border defense of the northern part of the country and the crackdown on private businessmen. At the same time, thinking of his own industries in various places, he sent Han Sheng back to Tokyo first, received the grange given to him by Hou Zhang last year, and went south to Tangzhou and Yuezhou after dealing with this matter, and rectified the industries in these three places clearly and re-planned.

Xuan Chongwen had already gone north to strike Jiao County, where he was in charge of the defense of Saimen Town and Luzi Pass, while Zong Jingcheng set up cards to collect taxes on the border of Yeon and Gyeongse, and occasionally inspected the Gyeongju border. Li Chuyun stayed in the barracks to train soldiers, while Zhang Yue himself was full of ambition, but he had nothing to do.

In this idleness, Zhang Yue remembered the apple saplings and cotton he had planted, and ran to see that the saplings and cotton were growing well. The cotton harvest was made this year, but I didn't know how long it would take for the apples to come, so I decided to try some fruit wine and high-grade liquor first.

As soon as he thought of it, Zhang Yue first cleaned up the Gao family's courtyard in the west of the city, and sent his own soldiers to transport food and firewood, but the problem came again, the pot for cooking in these years is not called a pot, but a kettle! The bottom is semi-circular, and the walls are cylindrical, so thick that it takes a long time to boil the water.

"Alas! The dignified state official didn't ask about political affairs, but he came to do this side way...... "Feng Qianhou no longer accompanied him around, and walked away."

"It's a university question, you just wait!"

Zhang Yue was not discouraged, found the Wang Ji blacksmith shop in the city, personally drew and designed a new iron pot, and personally supervised and instructed, it took five days to finally cast molten iron with a pottery mold, and successfully made the first Zhang's iron pot.

After testing, the effect is good, although it is still a little thick, and the thickness is uneven, and it is slightly smaller, but it is very close to the kind of iron pot used in the countryside in the seventies and eighties in later generations.

Two new pots were installed on the stovetop, and at the same time, the stove and the large clay pot for fermentation were also prepared, and the first step was to soak the rice, blanch the rice, and steam it under the help of two hired brewers and five men. Of course, rice is corn, and Zhang Yue doesn't know what the effect is, so he can only brew some low-alcohol wine first.

The cooked corn rice is poured into a large clay jar and then put into the koji for initial fermentation. Koji is commonly used in sake brewing in this year, that is, the conidia of koji mold are added to the soaked corn, and after fermentation, the mycelium grows on the rice grains, which is called koji.

Then you have to add rice and sour syrup, and then carry out the main fermentation, this time it will take half a month, and then you can press it, and the resulting wine is the foot of the wine, and it must be naturally clarified. Of course, after this lees is fermented again, cold spring sake can be obtained. However, it can only be drunk after boiling and sterilization, so the liquor brewed in this era is directly heated and drunk, and the degree is not high, but it is not distilled.

The first pot of soju was brewed, Zhang Yue was very dissatisfied, and asked the two stewards in charge of the distillery to continue, brewing another pot of rice wine to try, and he himself ran to find the craftsman to make the distillation utensils for distilling and extracting liquor.

This thing couldn't be made for a while, Zhang Yue went to the blacksmith shop to take a look, and by the way, he brought a few brand-new big iron pots home to replace them, and personally cooked a table of sumptuous stir-fried dishes, which made Cheng Yachan very happy.

It turns out that the dish can be fried like this! Say goodbye to the era of boiled dishes! The quality of life is instantly well-off. But let's not forget that the still has four parts, the lower part is the kettle body for heating charge, the upper part is the retort body for steam volatilization, and there is also a condensate collection part and a condensate export part.

Zhang Yue understands this structure, but what materials are used? It's a bit of a problem. In this era, the distillation technology is very low, only the Taoist priests of alchemy have this kind of tool, Zhang Yue asked someone, there is no Taoist temple near Yanzhou, it seems that he can only design it by himself.

There is an iron pot for heating the charge, and the steam can be volatilized with a ceramic, and finally there is the condenser tube for the wine, which requires the firing of a few ceramics, and the copper may not be very good.

In this way, it took another half a month, using a combination of ceramic tubes and large copper basins as a distiller, and replacing it with a better iron pot, Zhang Yue finally brewed the first pot of distilled soju, that is, liquor.

It is slightly higher than the previous rice wine, and it is about the same as the sake of this year, and it is just over 20 degrees. This is probably not the case with the two brewing masters, and something went wrong during the fermentation and steaming process.

Zhang Yue was very dissatisfied, and personally grasped each link, and finally found that the koji was not good, but this is not difficult, and it is not difficult to soak and ferment the new koji with corn. Sure enough, the wine that came out of the third pot was much higher, and it was on par with brandy.

The two stewards of the brewery were overjoyed, and Zhang Yue sternly told them not to divulge the slightest skill in soju, and signed a contract with them to take them as his slaves from then on.

One of the two is about forty years old, named Wang Qiao, and the other is in his fifties, known as Daddy Wu, whose real name is Wu Jingcai, who was originally a buddy in someone else's wine shop, he doesn't know much, and his background is not good, so he is certainly happy to become the steward of an official's family.

Zhang Yue then soaked several kinds of koji, that is, the saccharification starter of the wine mother is different, and the main ingredients of the liquor are also appropriately blended, and there are too many that can be used, such as millet, wheat, rice, beans, fruits, etc.

Seeing that the fruit wine is about to be brewed, it is possible to purchase a large number of fruits in summer and autumn and produce wine in batches. At this time, Feng Qianhou came to him, and said angrily with a black face: "You don't care if there are accidents in Gyeongju Maidaochuan, and now the tax collection checkpoint in the west of Yanzhou has also been attacked by robbers, this is the report sent back by Zong Jingcheng, you can take a look!" ”