sjar Chapter 115 The Difficult Quilt and Salted Duck Eggs
Chapter 115 The Difficult Quilt and Salted Duck Eggs
Li Ke asked curiously: "Sister-in-law, what else is there?"
Originally, Lin Wan wanted to change her mind and stop making salted duck eggs. After all, after they gave away ten kilograms of salt, the remaining salt could last for a year if eaten sparingly.
And she didn't know whether the war would really not last as long as she expected.
But the child paid attention to whether the duck laid eggs every day and learned to count, so that he could collect all the duck eggs as soon as possible and ask her to fulfill her promise to make salted duck eggs for him if he collected thirty duck eggs.
She still felt that she should fulfill her promise, but she also had to consider the salt usage at home.
So she tried to discuss with Li Ke: "Aunt Xiulan sent us some fluffy cotton. Let's sew the quilt first and then make salted duck eggs. But I may have to apologize to you. We can't make so many salted duck eggs. Making salted duck eggs consumes too much salt. How about we make ten to try?"
Li Ke knew that the adults were worried about buying salt, and that they were looking for saltwort before, so he said sensibly:
"It's okay, sister-in-law, we won't make it anymore. Salt is too hard to buy now."
Lin Wan touched Li Ke's head and said, "Xiao Ke, you are so good, but you still have to do what your sister-in-law promised you. Just do ten, okay?"
"We don't need ten. There are five of us, you, me, my brother, Xiao Jing, and Doctor Zhong. We can each make one. Let's make five."
Li Ke counted carefully on his fingers.
Seeing that Li Ke was so well-behaved and sensible, Lin Wan smiled and replied:
"Okay, listen to our Xiaoke and make five to try. Xiaoke, go get five duck eggs, wash them, and dry them."
Li Ke responded happily and went to the kitchen to wash the duck eggs.
Lin Wanze went back to her room and took out the two pieces of cloth that she had asked Chen Lian to sew.
She spread a cool mat on the floor of the main room and prepared to sew a quilt on it.
She wasn't sure if the next method she would use to make the quilt would be successful.
She tried to sew a quilt by learning from the method of making down quilts.
Because what she wanted to solve was the problem of preventing the cotton from running around in a large quilt, so she thought of fixing it grid by grid, and that would solve the problem.
She did it like a math problem. She first calculated that the square would be roughly divided into small grids of 30 centimeters in length and width based on the assumed length of 2.1 meters and width of 1.8 meters. Then she calculated that there were 42 small grids, and each grid would be filled with about 1.9 jin of cotton.
In order to ensure that the amount of cotton filling in each grid does not vary too much, she has borrowed a scale from Aunt Li.
First weigh the cotton in the first row of six boxes and pile them next to each other.
After completing these preliminary preparations, Lin Wan picked up the needle and thread and began to sew.
She first sewed the three sides of the first grid, then filled the grid with the weighed cotton, and then sealed the last side, thus completing the sewing of the first grid.
She examined the result carefully, and although the stitches were a little rough, she had sewed them very closely, which did a good job of securing the cotton.
This method should work, so she continued to sew the second grid using this method.
I guess she is really not good at needlework, her movements are a bit clumsy and her speed is not fast.
She had just finished sewing the second one when Li Ke came back with the washed duck eggs.
After Li Ke put the duck eggs away, he ran back to the main room and saw his sister-in-law sewing with full concentration, with beads of sweat on her forehead.
"Sister-in-law, your method is great. It really fixes the cotton well."
She watched her sister-in-law sew the third grid and made a suggestion:
"Let me help you. I'll sew the last edge of each grid, and then you'll have time to weigh the cotton."
"Okay, our Xiaoke is so smart. He found a way to save time so quickly." Lin Wan responded with a smile.
After that, the two of them divided the work and cooperated with each other, and their efficiency was indeed greatly improved.
With the tacit cooperation of the two, the grids were completed one after another.
"Sister-in-law, at this rate, we can finish sewing this quilt very quickly."
"It will probably take a whole day at most. Let's prepare for a protracted battle."
Lin Wan recalled that one summer vacation during college in modern times, she bought a down duvet cover and wanted to dismantle the down duvet at home and refurbish it.
When she took apart the old duvet and saw the down floating everywhere, she immediately wanted to back out.
In the spirit of not wasting anything, she thought of using a kettle to wet the down to solve the problem of the down floating everywhere.
And to ensure that the filling weight of each cell is consistent, she also controls the humidity as much as possible.
Then I weighed the weight according to the grid, and asked my mother to help me stuff the down into the quilt cover one grid at a time.
She worked on it for a whole day and was so tired that her back and waist ached.
Because the down was wet, her hands kept getting white and wrinkled, and the wrinkles couldn't be removed.
Finally, she placed an order for a hand mask online that day, and she vowed never to refurbish her own duvet again.
I didn't expect that I would travel back to this ancient time and experience a similar experience again.
Alas~ Lin Wan sighed deeply and continued to sew the quilt.
With the cooperation of the two, the sewing progress was greatly accelerated.
Near noon, Li Chongle came back with a basket of green grass and a lot of wild grapes.
He went out early in the morning with Li Chongwu and his wife to cut grass.
They had almost finished cutting all the grass nearby, so today Li Chongwu took them to a farther place.
Unexpectedly, they found wild grapes there, so they picked a lot and brought them back.
After returning, he first fed today's grass to the goats, and then dried the remaining grass, and stored winter fodder for the goats as usual.
Seeing that her elder sister-in-law and younger sister were busy, she did not disturb them. She put down the backpack and took the initiative to cook lunch.
After dinner, Lin Wan took Li Ke to continue sewing quilts, while Li Chongle went to take care of the vegetable garden.
They finally finished sewing the quilt before the sun set.
Lin Wan looked at the brand new quilt. If you didn't look closely at the stitching, it was pretty good. Overall, she was satisfied.
She held her aching waist and thought again that she would never do such a thing again.
Li Ke, who was full of energy, took Lin Wan's arm and said:
"Sister-in-law, let's quickly tidy up the quilt and prepare to make salted duck eggs."
She has been thinking about it for about a month.
In order to make the duck lay eggs every day, she caught earthworms, snails, grasshoppers and picked wild vegetables for it.
Although she was only making five salted duck eggs, she was full of anticipation.
"Let me rest for another quarter of an hour. Sister-in-law is too tired."
Lin Wan feels that doing things that one is not very good at makes people feel even more tired.
Seeing that his sister-in-law was indeed very tired, Li Ke kindly asked her to sit down and rest, while he took the initiative to take on the task of packing up the remaining things.
While she was busy, she asked, "Sister-in-law, can I help with the preparations for making salted duck eggs?"
Lin Wan thought for a moment and said, "You can first clean the jar containing the duck eggs and dry it for later use. Also, boil some water and let it cool for later use."
After cleaning up, Li Ke immediately ran to the kitchen to prepare.
When everything was ready, she ran back and said, "Sister-in-law, everything is ready. Let's start making salted duck eggs."
Lin Wan stood up and responded with a smile: "Okay, let's get started now."
Alas, there is no strong liquor at home.
There seemed to be no strong liquor in this era. What she saw here were mainly yellow wine and rice wine, most of which had an alcohol content of less than ten degrees, and almost none exceeded twenty degrees.
She remembered asking her mother why she had to soak the duck eggs in strong liquor first. She seemed to have said that it could kill bacteria and disinfect, and at the same time help the duck eggs to produce oil.
As for sterilization, it would be great if she could find a way to sterilize duck eggs.
Lin Wan thought of using vinegar to sterilize duck eggs.
She took out the fruit vinegar she made with Rhus chinensis last time, poured it into a large bowl, and then soaked the duck eggs in the vinegar.
After soaking for a quarter of an hour, she took out the duck eggs and wiped them dry with a clean cloth.
Then, Lin Wan began to prepare the salt water.
Try to reduce the amount of water used to a minimum, just enough to cover the eggs in the jar, and avoid wasting salt with too much water.
She used five washed duck eggs to experiment with the minimum amount of water, and then added about three ounces of salt to boiled water and stirred it to melt.
The amount of salt used is actually too little, and it can only be compensated by extending the marinating time.
Lin Wan gently placed the five processed duck eggs into the jar, then poured in salt water, making sure the salt water covered the duck eggs, and then sealed it.
Li Ke, who was watching the whole process, saw that the sister-in-law had finished cooking, so he asked, "Sister-in-law, how long do we have to wait before we can eat?"
"Usually half a month, but if we reduce the amount of salt, it will take about a month." Lin Wan replied.
At this time, Li Chongle ran in from outside holding a sweet potato leaf, "Sister-in-law, look, this vegetable leaf has grown. You said before that this vegetable leaf can be eaten when it grows up. Let's eat this tonight."