"It's not difficult to say this sugarcane, because the villagers in our village have a lot of sugarcane in their fields, no matter whether they have a sugar house or a sugar mill, they all know the local method of sugar making nine times out of ten......

Zhang Dahu first briefly introduced the situation of local sugar production, and then turned to Gu Zheng to introduce the simple steps of sugar production: "Every year from late autumn to the end of the second year' is the best season for cane sugar making. ”

Gu Zheng and his entourage have come to Zhang's soil sugar liao outside the room, Gu Zheng came to the scene in person only to find that the original Zhang Dahu mouth of the small sugar liao, just covers an area of six or seven acres, the whole sugar liao is built a little simple——— the sugar liao is made of large fir wood, penny as the beam, covered with felt pieces woven from straw, roughly divided into the main liao, the cow liao, and the three major parts.

The main liao is the place where the sugar is boiled, about 50 meters long and 30 meters wide, roughly divided into two parts before and after: the front liao is called "the winch hall", the area is spacious, it is in the shape of eight trigrams, and the stone roller of grinding cane to extract juice is placed in the middle; The rectangular shape of the house is called the "sugar field", and there is a boiler for boiling juice, as well as various tools for filtering and forming sugar.

In addition to the main building, there is also a cane stripping yard and a fuel storage yard around the storehouse.

After Gu Zheng carefully looked at the large piece of sugar liao, he couldn't help but ask: "Brother Big Tiger, your sugar liao also occupies seven or eight acres of land, isn't it very 'wasteful' to use these land to build the sugar liao?" ”

"You don't understand this," Zhang Dahu 'touched' his head and laughed twice, and introduced in an expert tone: "After the cane crushing season, our family's sugar liao will be completely demolished, and then the land will be ploughed and leveled, and all kinds of crops will still be planted on it, and the land will not be wasted in vain!" ”

Gu Zheng was relieved when he heard this: "I see." ”

In order to save time and refine the white sugar as soon as possible, Gu Zheng said to Zhang Dahu bluntly: "The steps before boiling the juice in my method are about the same as the steps you said first, we can directly take the squeezed cane juice to try to refine the white sugar, which can save a lot of effort!" ”

Zhang Dahu quickly brought a bucket of sugarcane juice to Gu Zheng, Gu Zheng asked them to pour the sugarcane juice into the cow ear pot to boil, and on the other hand, he took out the tools prepared in advance, and when the sugarcane juice boiled to a certain concentration, he quickly poured them into the tile slip (funnel-shaped pottery), and then poured yellow mud from it, intending to use the adsorption characteristics of the yellow mud and the decolorization to make white sugar.

This yellow mud refining method is also called the drip method, because the steps are simple and there is no technical 'sex' problem, Gu Zheng successfully refined the white sugar in the first experiment, so that Gu Feng and others saw it and exclaimed: "It's amazing!" Pouring the yellow mud into the boiled sugarcane juice will not only not stir up the sugarcane juice, but also remove the miscellaneous "color" in the sugarcane juice...... If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I wouldn't have believed it! ”

Gu Zheng didn't expect that he would succeed at one time, and he couldn't help urging Zhang Dahu again and again while being overjoyed: "Brother Big Tiger, since it is done, then you can quickly bring a few more buckets of sugarcane juice over, let's refine more white sugar while the iron is hot, and see if we can refine more 'refined' pure white sugar!" ”

Zhang Dahu would not be stingy, and immediately carried several buckets of sugarcane juice to Houliao in one go, and Gu Zheng and the others refined it again according to the previous method...... With the experience of the previous time, the white sugar refined this time is obviously much purer than the last time, and several people made persistent efforts and quickly refined enough white sugar, and sent it back to the Cen family to solve the urgent need!

With the white sugar into the 'medicine', Mrs. Tai's condition quickly improved, and she was gradually able to get out of bed and walk around...... and Mrs. Tai, who had a lot of "spirits", learned from Gu Zheng that Mu Savil would not save him when he saw death and refused to sell sugar, and she suddenly felt very angry: "I have long known that the Hui people have always been very stingy and hold grudges, but I didn't expect that Mu Savville would be so hard-hearted, knowing that your father bought white sugar to enter the 'medicine' to heal me, he was still indifferent and did not save me!" ”

Gu Zheng is also very unkind to Mousavier: "Yes, if Mousavier is willing to sell sugar to his father, his father doesn't have to go to the capital in person......

Mrs. Tai pondered for a moment after hearing this, and then said to Gu Zheng: "Bend, help grandmother to the study," after speaking, she put her hand on Gu Zheng's arm, and instructed the maid Zisu: "Help me lay paper and grind, I want to write a letter to the master." ”

Mrs. Tai suddenly said that she wanted to write a letter for no reason, which made Gu Zheng puzzled: "Grandmother, you are not in good health yet, you have to rest well!" Why is the letter so anxious? Can't you wait until you're well enough to write? ”

"No, I have to have your father deliver the letter to him before he returns to Tongzhou," Mrs. Tai slowly explained while being helped by Gu Zheng to sit on the Taishi chair in front of the long desk in the study: "I want to write to your father and ask him to tell the emperor the truth about Moussavier's refusal to sell sugar, so that the emperor knows that even if we are nobles, it is very difficult to use sugar, and we have to see back people's faces, which is quite inconvenient and even delays the ...... of the disease."

Gu Zheng thought that Mrs. Tai wanted to ask the emperor to punish Musavil, and couldn't help but be a little worried: "Does grandmother want to ask the emperor to punish Musavil?" Wouldn't that be bad? What if the Emperor thinks that Mousaver is doing the right thing and blames us? ”

Mrs. Tai first put a pen in the inkstone pond to dip it in ink, and then pretended to be displeased and scolded Gu Zheng: "Could it be that in your heart, grandmother is a stingy person who holds grudges and likes to sue?" ”

Gu Zheng blushed a little embarrassedly: "Then grandmother wants to ......?" ”

"Our Tongzhou is already rich in sugarcane, and now you have mastered the method of refining white sugar by mistake," Mrs. Tai said and paused, her face was solemn, and she proudly said her plan: "Since you have such a ability, and Tongzhou has unique conditions, then we can open a sugar bureau belonging to our Cen family, and we don't have to ask for sugar from the Hui people in a low voice!" ”

Regarding the refining of white sugar, Gu Zheng only said that he had happened to read a similar and vague method in miscellaneous books, and later because he was in a hurry to cure Mrs. Tai's illness, he accidentally tested this method successfully...... Therefore, Mrs. Tai only regarded this as Gu Zheng's blessing and ability, and did not delve into where Gu Zheng saw the method of refining white sugar.

However, the proud look on Mrs. Tai's face still made Gu Zheng very embarrassed, and she diverted the topic with some weakness and confirmed in disbelief: "Open a sugar bureau that belongs to our Cen family?" ”

"That's right, the reason why I am in a hurry to write to your father is to ask him to ask the emperor and ask the emperor for permission to open a sugar bureau in Tongzhou, and give full authority to our Cen family to take care of it," Mrs. Tai said and looked at Gu Zheng with burning eyes, and there was a hint of honor in her tone: "Wanwan, grandmother plans to put the opened sugar bureau under your name, I believe that you will take care of the newly established sugar bureau, and our sugar bureau in Tongzhou will definitely not be worse than the sugar bureau in Luzhou that is managed by Musavil!" ”

Gu Zheng had only been thinking about refining white sugar to cure Mrs. Tai's illness before, and he hadn't thought about anything else at all, but now as soon as Mrs. Tai mentioned it, Gu Zheng suddenly opened his mouth, and realized that if he could really ask the imperial court to allow the Cen family to open a sugar bureau, then this was really a good way to get rich!

Previously, Gu Zheng had learned from Master Cen that although the so-called sugar bureau was nominally set up by the imperial court, it was actually equivalent to a shop opened by the Hui people who had mastered the technology of refining white sugar. The returnees only need to pay tribute and taxes on time, and the money they earn belongs to them.

And they have a complete autonomy to sell sugar, which is actually similar to the imperial court delegating the right to operate official salt——— the imperial court does not allow individuals to sell 'private' salt for profit, but as long as you pay the salt tax according to the regulations, then you have the right to sell salt, and the income except for the salt tax is also owned by the individual, and the court will not bother anymore.

Jewels of the Maison:

Chapter 172: Sugar Healing: