When Wang Zhi was busy preparing ingredients for the "Ding Shi" banquet, Jiang Xuehui in the Tang Dynasty also began to be busy, seeing that the door of the space was closed, she stood up, walked to the door and pushed the door open, and saw that the little maid Bingli was concentrating on guarding outside, and asked, "Is my father back?" ”

(Note: The titles of the Tang Dynasty are very different from those of modern times, and in order to make it easier for you to read, some titles are still used in modern times.) ）

Hearing the voice, the little maid immediately replied: "The master has returned, look at the time, it's almost time for dinner, it is estimated that the master will soon send someone to find the young lady to have dinner together." ”

"Go and call Dreams, Purple Tears, and Sakura Snow." Jiang Xuehui commanded.

The other three little maids were guarding the entrance of the courtyard and the window, not too far apart, and soon stood in front of Jiang Xuehui together, looking at the low eyebrows of several little girls in front of her who were a few years younger than her, Jiang Xuehui sighed again in her heart, and then ordered them: "Those cloth bags in my room, each person takes one bag and goes to the front hall together." ”

A thirteen or fourteen-year-old girl, although she is not a rough maid, it is not difficult to pick up a twenty-pound spice bag.

No matter what the Jiang family says, it can be regarded as a big family in Xuzhou, and Jiang Yunhe is the second-in-command of the Ministry of Industry of Zhengsipin, so the Jiang family's house is naturally very large, and when they get out of their own small courtyard, the four masters and servants walk for a while before they arrive at the front hall of the house for dinner.

When they arrived, there were already a lot of people sitting in the front hall, first of all, a middle-aged man who was sitting in the main seat dressed like Detective Di Renjie, but he was not as fat as Di Renjie, with a slender figure, and he was a very handsome middle-aged guy, this is Jiang Xuehui's father Jiang Yunhe, on the left side of the main seat, there is a long case, and there is a middle-aged woman sitting behind, this is Jiang Yunhe's main house Xu Qin, and Jiang Xuehui's mother-in-law, born in the Xu family of Xuzhou.

And on the right side of the main seat, it is also a big case, but there are two people sitting behind, a fat man and a woman with a face full of lead powder like a white ghost, the fat man is Jiang Xuehui's eldest brother, Jiang Ye, the eldest son of the Jiang family, next to him is his wife Li Qinglu, who was born in the Li family in Longxi, is Li Shimin's family, but it may be because it is too far away from Li Shimin's branch, after Li Yuan became the emperor, his father sealed a marquis without a fief, and she herself didn't even become a lord, and she had the name of a royal family member on her head, Basically, it's not much use.

And below them, in the second position on the right, sat alone a fifteen or sixteen-year-old man, dressed as a scribe, full of spirit, this is Jiang Xuehui's younger brother Jiang Xuan, who is also from his wife Xu Qin, the second son, who has been engaged to the daughter of a Hou Ye's family, but has not yet married.

And opposite Jiang Xuan, that is, the second position on the left, is empty, and that is Jiang Xuehui's position.

In ancient times, it was important to pay attention to the order of the young and the old, and this rule was reflected in all aspects of ancient people's lives, such as court meetings, sacrifices, and banquets...... From the ranking of these formal occasions, you can see the status of a person. The Tang Dynasty was based on the left, and Jiang Xuehui's position was in the second place on the left, indicating that she had a very high status in this family, except for the head of the family who sat first, the wife who was the first on the left, and the eldest son who was the first on the right, she had the highest status, even higher than other concubines and concubines of the head of the family.

As soon as she arrived at the main hall and saw Li Qinglu's white face, Jiang Xuehui went straight to her: "Sister-in-law, how many times have I told you, lead powder is poisonous, and you even wiped it on your face, is it because you have a long life?" ”

"But they all apply lead powder, and if I don't, I'll be laughed at." Li Qinglu whispered that they might be some of her female friends.

"If you put lead powder on your face, your face will start to turn yellow before you are twenty-five, and after you are thirty, you will become a yellow-faced woman, if you can live until then!" Jiang Xuehui warned.

Jiang Xuehui's words were already a bit vicious, seeing the unhappy expression on his wife's face, Jiang Yunhe, who was sitting on the main seat, immediately interrupted Jiang Xuehui's words and asked, "Hui'er, why are you only here now, and your father is ready to send someone to find you." ”

"There was a bit of a delay." Explaining casually, Jiang Xuehui raised her head and looked directly at Jiang Yunhe, and asked, "Father, how much money is left in the family?" ”

If someone else asks this question, Jiang Yunhe will definitely reprimand "Why are you asking this", but Jiang Xuehui is a different matter, Jiang Yunhe clearly remembers that the last time she asked this question was when she was six years old, and that time he answered with the idea of teasing his daughter, and then the conversation between the father and daughter saved his Jiang family from a catastrophe.

Since then, he has taken a look at the maid's concubine, and later found that she will use coarse salt to refine refined salt, and also learned from her mouth an unheard of method of drying salt in seawater, but because his home is not bordered by the sea in Xuzhou, there is nowhere to perform this magic technique, so at her suggestion, he dedicated two methods in the year Li Shimin ascended the throne, and finally not only sealed the marquis, but also promoted from a seven-grade county order to the second in command of the Ministry of Industry of the fourth grade, although the corresponding level of his title is from the second grade. (Note: In the official system of the Tang Dynasty, the grades below the four grades are divided into four levels, that is, in addition to the positive congregation, they are also divided into upper and lower levels, such as the upper and lower grades of the four grades, the lower grades of the four grades, the lower grades from the four grades, and the other Ministry of Labor is under the four grades)

So since then, his attention to this concubine has risen more than one level, not only to give her sister-in-law the treatment that only allows her to live alone in a small courtyard, but also sent her four personal maids, originally according to common sense, a woman should have married at the age of sixteen, because the law in the early Tang Dynasty stipulated that men and women must have a family at the age of twenty and fifteen, but she didn't want to marry, so he went to the palace to ask for Li Shimin's grace, and issued a special decree to allow Jiang Xuehui not to follow the decree that women must start a family in fifteen.

This shows how much Jiang Yunhe loves Jiang Xuehui, and now when he heard her ask about her family, he replied without thinking about it: "There are more than 3,000 yuan in cash at home, more than 2,000 horses, more than 130 horses of silk, and more than 100 catties of gold. By the way, why is this going on, you ask? ”

"My daughter's yard is too small, and the attic is not grand enough, so I want to renovate one." Jiang Xuehui said.

"This is easy to do, I will transfer some craftsmen from the Ministry of Engineering to do it, how do you want to repair it?" As a waiter in the Ministry of Works, it is a matter of one sentence to want to transfer some craftsmen to help his daughter build an attic, and this kind of thing is not even counted as the crime of private use of public instruments, because the craftsman is not a member of the Ministry of Works, so he is not a public.

"My daughter wants to include the front and back yards into her own yard......"

Jiang Xuehui was talking about her thoughts, but before she finished speaking, Xu Qin on the side shouted: "Presumptuous......"

"On your left is the courtyard where your sisters live, on your right is where the lord's concubines live, and behind you is your eldest brother's courtyard, you have to include these places in your own courtyard, where do you let your eldest brother live?" Xu Qin was originally dissatisfied with Jiang Xuehui's status as a concubine higher than his son, but now when he heard that she wanted to occupy the eldest son's courtyard, he couldn't bear it anymore, and all the anger that had been accumulated for many years suddenly came out.

In the face of Xu Qin's questioning, Jiang Xuehui did not show weakness and said: "Since the eldest brother has already started a family, he should move out to live, as for the sisters and aunts, isn't the Qian Shizhong next door going back to his hometown to live in Tiannian and preparing to sell the house, we can buy it, and the sisters and aunts will move there to live." ”

"It's easy to say......" Xu Qin sneered: "The house in Chang'an City is so expensive, you have to buy two sets at once, where does the money come from?" ”

"I'm out." Jiang Xuehui said very magnificently, and then shouted to the four little maids behind her: "Bingli, Dream, Purple Tears, Yingxue, open the bag you brought." ”

After the bag was opened, Jiang Xuehui should say, "Are these enough?" ”。 This should have been a very imposing scene, but because the bag was tied with a dead knot, the four little maids were busy for a while before opening it, and the original brewing atmosphere had long since disappeared, when Jiang Xuehui shouted, "Are these enough?" If it's not enough", I didn't hear the expected exclamation and smacking of my tongue, only Jiang Yunhe's question: "What are these?" ”

Because it was a little far away, and the mouth of the bag was relatively small, Jiang Yunhe, who was sitting in the main seat, did not see the contents of the bag clearly.

"Pepper, cardamom, cinnamon and cumin are all good spices, the same is more than a dozen catties, if it is not enough, there are still there."

As soon as Jiang Xuehui's words came out, everyone in the hall was shocked, and Jiang Yunhe, who was sitting on the main seat, immediately got up, walked to his pocket in a few steps, looked at it carefully, dipped his fingers in some to taste the taste, and exclaimed: "Sure enough, it's pepper, and it's been ground into such a delicate powder." ”

-- The ancients could not understand the existence of pepper, because the processing level at that time was very backward, and it was very time-consuming and laborious to grind wheat into modern white flour, let alone grind pepper into pepper flour.

"Where did you get so much spice?" Jiang Yunhe hurriedly asked, all the spices in his storehouse didn't add up to as much as they were here now.

"Huh." Jiang Xuehui smiled and said nothing.

Jiang Yunhe is not a stupid person, seeing his daughter like this, he immediately understood, and did not ask, but instructed a servant behind him: "Butler, take out some of the spices in it and make it into a dipping dish, and put the rest in the warehouse." ”

"Yes, sir." In response, the housekeeper immediately went to make arrangements.

The so-called dipping dish is a small dish with dipping sauce, and there are various dipping sauces, but the dipping sauce here is very simple, that is, take out a little pepper and cumin from the four seasonings brought by Jiang Xuehui and put them in a small plate, and then send them to everyone who is qualified to sit and eat.

The food of the Tang Dynasty was simple, except for the staple food, it was soup and stew, as well as barbecue and the like.

Because the Jiang family is from the south, the staple food is naturally rice, and the side dishes are only a large bowl of chicken soup, a plate of shallots mixed with tofu, a plate of stir-fried wild vegetables, a plate of salted radishes, and a plate of sashimi.

That's right, this is the common diet of the Tang Dynasty aristocracy, and it sounds no different from the recipes of ordinary people, in fact, the only difference is that the common people generally do not eat sashimi, because it is difficult to process fish into fillets, and the Jiang family's chicken soup is mainly chicken, not soup.

The taste of the dish is very light, Jiang Xuehui usually uses fried wild vegetables and salted radish to accompany the rice, as for the broth, it is light and tasteless, but this time there was more pepper and cumin, she poured it directly into the soup, and the taste suddenly rose a few notches.

Because of the extra pepper and cumin, everyone ate very happily at this meal, and after eating, Jiang Yunhe called Jiang Xuehui to his study and asked straight to the point: "What do you think?" ”

"I'm going to be in the spice business?" Jiang Xuehui said truthfully, because in this era, it is impossible for her to come forward as a woman to do business, and even what she wants to do can't get around Jiang Yunhe, since sooner or later he will know about it, it is better to say it straight to the point now.

"Where do your spices come from?" Jiang Yunhe asked, since his daughter proposed to do a spice business, there must be a channel to get a large amount of spices.

"I can't say this for the time being, father, you just need to know that I can get the entire Chang'an City people to eat spices that can't be eaten in more than a dozen lifetimes."

Hearing this, Jiang Yunhe lowered his head and muttered for a while before he said: "For my father, I will send a craftsman to listen to you tomorrow, and I will inform him how much money you need to go to the housekeeper to withdraw it." Well, you can go back. ”

"Yes."

Jiang Xuehui left the study, looking at Jiang Yunhe's attitude, she knew that her matter must have been done.