Author: Mahjong Jun

Shanqian Village, Xinjia.

Zhao Wenmu is washing wheat at home.

Well, just like washing rice, wash wheat.

Because, their family also has to grind flour.

After the news came that flour could be ground in Toucun, Shandong, every household in Shanqian Village was washing wheat, which became a unique scenery.

Zhao Wenmu's family is naturally no exception.

Liu Sufang, Zhao Wenjun, and Liu Xiumei were very enthusiastic about grinding flour and wished they could grind all the wheat at home into flour.

Then Zhao Wenmu was taken to work.

"Mom, you don't need to grind too much flour at one time. You can grind it again after you finish eating!"

"Wheat won't get moldy if you keep it at home, but bugs will grow on flour!"

Zhao Wenmu talked hard and finally convinced several women that their family would only grind three hundred kilograms of wheat this time.

Three hundred catties, given to the three brothers, Zhao Wenjun and Zhao Xuehai.

This is the bottom line for several women.

Zhao Wenmu could only accept it reluctantly.

Washing wheat is a time-consuming and labor-intensive job. It usually takes several minutes to wash two or two meters, let alone hundreds of kilograms of wheat.

Moreover, the rice has been threshed, shelled and screened.

The newly harvested wheat is mixed with a lot of chaff, sand, gravel, soil and other impurities.

First, you have to sift over and over again, rely on wind blowing, and pick by hand to remove visible chaff, pebbles, etc. But no matter how many times you sift, there will always be some fish that slip through the net.

Zhao Wenmu only felt dizzy and annoyed.

This is only the first step.

Afterwards, the wheat must be washed with water to remove soluble impurities such as attached soil, as well as debris, bran, etc. that can float on the water.

Keep washing and remove floating impurities again and again.

Until visible to the naked eye, the water surface is clean.

Then use a filter to filter out the water, and spread the wheat flat on a clean cloth.

There are no good materials at the moment, so I just wash the big sheets and spread the washed wheat on them.

During the washing process, you have to keep picking out the stones.

While drying, continue picking stones.

By the time the wheat is dried, the stones mixed in it will have been picked up.

It's just about the same.

Wheat cannot be dried too dry and must maintain a certain moisture content.

This can improve the toughness of the wheat hull and reduce the mechanical strength of the wheat endosperm. During grinding, the wheat hull will not be ground into small pieces and affect the flour quality.

It can also reduce the wear of the grinding mill and reduce energy consumption.

These are naturally said by the propaganda personnel of Shandongtou Village.

"Brother, don't be unhappy! You don't know that the flour sold now has talcum powder in it."

"Otherwise, why would it be so white? So, it's better to eat flour you grind yourself!"

Liu Xiumei lowered her voice and whispered to Zhao Wenmu.

"Sister-in-law, who did you hear this from?"

Zhao Wenmu smiled.

Then he laughed.

"Everyone said that. I don't know who said it first. Why are you laughing?"

Liu Xiumei was so confused by his laughter.

"Sister-in-law, this is what I taught Zhang Zhenpeng to say."

Liu Xiumei was stunned for a while, then grabbed an arm and patted him on the back several times.

Zhao Wenmu doesn’t know if there is talc in the flour sold now. Anyway, later national standards do not allow the addition of talc.

Some people also say that talc powder has the effect of ascorbic acid, which can also help extend the shelf life of flour, make flour products brittle and maintain their shape, etc. This means that talc powder is beneficial.

More people say talc causes cancer.

In any case, talcum powder must have been added to the snow-white flour. This view is still firmly believed by many people thirty years later.

Zhao Wenmu just borrowed it in advance.

The effect is still very significant.

Most of the villagers believed this statement.

So I prefer to grind my own flour.

When the villagers ate the slightly yellowed flour they ground themselves, they found it fragrant and chewy, and tasted far better than the flour they bought.

I feel much more at ease in my heart!

After loading the washed and dried wheat into the cart, Zhao Wenmu drove the mule cart and went to Shandong Toucun with Zhao Wenjun.

By the way, the mule cart has been bought by Zhao Wenmu.

I usually pull grain, firewood, etc. at home, and I can also use it to pull mushrooms after a while.

The dark-skinned old mule never imagined that his life would be so miserable.

The Zhao family treated it very well. They all had cornmeal, so there was no need to complain.

In the past two years, people sometimes couldn't eat cornmeal, okay?

"Second sister, why are you looking for Zhang Zhenpeng?"

Zhao Wenjun came along, not only to help grind flour, but also because he had something to talk to Zhang Zhenpeng.

Zhao Wenmu drove the mule cart and chatted with her while turning his head.

"Brother, I think this wheat bran is very suitable for feeding crayfish. I want to talk to him and buy bran from him."

Bran is actually the outer husk of wheat.

When flour is ground, it will be crushed and screened by the machine, turning into a pile of wheat-yellow flakes.

A bit like oatmeal, but much lighter and finely chopped.

It stands to reason that the nutritional content of bran is actually no less than that of flour. It is full of protein, starch, vitamins and minerals, and some ingredients are even higher than those of flour.

In poor times, bran naturally entered people's stomachs.

Nowadays, many people use them as feed to feed chickens, ducks and other poultry.

Well, it is indeed a good food for feeding crayfish and crabs.

And the price is cheaper.

The flour mill not only grinds flour for the villagers, but also produces flour itself.

When villagers grind flour, they will naturally take away the flour and bran, but the bran produced when the flour mill produces its own flour will most likely not have a good sales channel.

The villagers will definitely not buy it back to feed the chickens.

Just dig some wild vegetables in the mountains and feed the chickens some cornmeal. Why spend money on bran?

"Second sister, this is a good idea. It is indeed necessary to develop some special feeds. If the feed specifications are unified, crayfish will not be prone to problems!"

"Yes, that's what I think too. You can't feed them randomly. It's best to have a clear diet. What you eat in summer, what you eat in winter, and how much you eat, are all regulated."

When it comes to crayfish farming, Zhao Wenjun becomes even more excited.

It can be seen that she really likes what she is doing now.

"Well, I think you can draw out a few small fish ponds and compare them, so that you can better determine which plan is better."

"Don't worry about money. There will always be costs for experiments. These are not big things."

"good!"

When we arrived at Shandongtou Village, there were not so many people queuing up, but there were still a dozen families waiting.

After Zhang Zhenpeng came over to say hello, he went to talk about bran with Zhao Wenjun.

Zhao Wenmu had nothing to do, so he went to chat with the villagers.

Many villagers here know him. After all, last year's mushroom harvest had spread to seven villages.

"Boss Zhao, are you still harvesting mushrooms this year?"
To be continued...