Take the farm down to earth

Chapter 31
When I came to the world of Red Chamber, Lin Daiyu and Xue Baochai were of course the first choice to marry a wife. Unfortunately, sister Lin is still too young. If I guess correctly, she is still around 10 or 11 years old at this time.

How can it be possible to wait for 5 or 6 years by yourself.

Jia Yingchun is actually not bad, but Xue Baochai is even better, and Shi Zhongkui is undoubtedly the king of the sea at this time.

Looking at Xue Pan, he secretly thought that this guy condoned his servants to beat people to death, and then he was sentenced to death by Jia Yucun to get rid of the crime. It can be said that he directly made his sister miserable.

In ancient times, a girl whose father died early was not easy to marry, and with such a real brother, except for those who coveted the Xue family's millions of wealth, it was basically impossible to marry a good family.

Before the Jia family lost power and suffered serious losses, no one in the Jia family thought that Jia Baoyu would marry Xue Baochai.

On the contrary, Mrs. Wang grew up with Jia Baoyu, and she should have a vague understanding in her heart that other powerful families look down on Jia Baoyu, who is deviant and deviant. Otherwise, why don't there even be a serious person to propose marriage?

Similarly, Mother Jia really loves Lin Daiyu, but it must be nonsense to say that Mother Jia did not pay attention to the money of the Lin family, and the dowry of Lin Daiyu's mother Jia Min back then.

It's just that the old lady never imagined that the Jia family would lose so quickly.

To some extent, both Lin Daiyu and Xue Baochai are just tools used by Jia's mother to maintain Jia's family.

But Xue Baochai often persuaded Jia Baoyu to study before she married, which shows that she knew very well that the protection of her ancestors' past merits would not last long.

That is to say, Xue Baochai would rather marry a young Jinshi than Jia Baoyu, who doesn't like reading and has been in the rouge all the year round, if he has a choice.

So Shi Zhongkui didn't think he had no chance to marry Sister Lin or Xue Baochai.

Xue Baochai is actually easier, because as long as Xue Pan agrees, Aunt Xue has no right to object.

Among the three obediences and four virtues, it is not empty talk to obey the father at home, obey the husband when married, and obey the son when the husband dies.

After Xue Pan's father died, he had absolute authority to decide Xue Baochai's marriage.

Thinking of this, Shi Zhongkui's attitude towards Jia Lian and Xue Pan is of course better.

However, he knew better in his heart that money was indispensable.

Can't help but think of saffron again, but the problem is how to get the saffron rhizome.

After thinking for a moment, he nodded to Shun'er, put his hand into his sleeve as a cover, and took out the few taels of silver remaining from the space.

"According to brother Xue's suggestion, go and buy some wine, meat and some spices. Tonight, the three brothers and I will drink and eat barbecue."

Shun'er just wanted to go forward to take the money, when Xue Pan heard that Shi Zhongkui wanted to drink and eat barbecue, he yelled outside.

Let the servants of your own family ride home to fetch good wine and meat, as well as a stove for barbecue, charcoal fire and other things.

Then when he thought of spices, he looked at Shi Zhongkui suspiciously, "What spices do you want, brother?"

Shi Zhongkui laughed, and took the opportunity to talk nonsense, "I mentioned spices in the restaurant before because I have a good friend who lives in Wannian County, Chang'an, and his family has some business contacts with Hu merchants from the Western Regions all the year round.

After the younger brother got the first case in the county examination and the government examination, the virtuous brother came to ask for advice, and even thanked him with a recipe and the sales of spices from the Western Regions, asking for his study experience over the years.

But the younger brother was worried that if the virtuous younger brother failed the imperial examination, he didn't dare to accept the market, so he only accepted the recipe first, and heard that it tastes very good when used for barbecue.

Just take it out tonight and try it with the three brothers to see if it is really what the classmate said. "

Jia Lian, Feng Ziying, and Xue Pan thought about it for a while, and felt that it was right for Shi Zhongkui to only accept the recipes. If the other party failed the exam and the spice business was gone, it would be fine. Everyone knows.

But Shi Zhongkui was not worried at all.

Pretending to be nonchalant, he mentioned cumin, Chinese prickly ash, cardamom, star anise, and dogwood.

After hearing this, the three of them thought he was really stupid.

But for Shi Zhongkui, except for cumin, he added everything else at will.

Besides, cumin, Chinese prickly ash, cardamom, star anise, and dogwood are too common, experienced people can know these five spices just by smelling them.

Five-spice powder with different spice ratios must have been added to the dishes of the restaurant before.

His purpose is just to express that he has a way to obtain the spices from the Western Regions and make plans for the future.

The reason why saffron is expensive is not only the high cost of transportation, but also because only three styles are available for one flower.

A kilogram of dried flowers needs 6, or even more than 10,000 flowers.

Coupled with the short flowering period, the flowers must be harvested when they are about to open, and they must be dried on the same day, so the price is of course expensive.

But for me who owns a space farm, once a day blooms, it must be ten catties of flowers each time, and there is no need for manual collection, and it can be collected and dried with a single thought.

And the flowers grown will definitely not be worse than those from the Western Regions.

However, this thing was a specialty of Greece and Iran in this era, and it was not grown from seeds, but from roots.

Fortunately, the Yuan Dynasty expedition not only brought back saffron, but also brought back the rhizome as a seed.

Xue Pan said at the wine table that he had seen a wealthy family planting potted plants in Nanjing.

Shi Zhongkui couldn't help thinking of getting him drunk and making clichés.
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Jia Lian and Feng Ziying looked at each other, and couldn't help but regret not getting to know Shi Zhongkui earlier.

In addition to Xiangxiang Road, the two also thought that if they could be like the scholar Shi Zhongkui made nonsense about.

Studying with Shi Zhongkui earlier, relying on his level of being the top of the case, it is impossible to say that he can also be a scholar.

But after a while, the two of them sighed in their hearts, as long as they read Jinshu, even Jinshi who are Juren and idle at home can be invited to be teachers.

As for Xiangxiang Road, the two of them are not stupid, they haven't seen anything, so there is no way that Shi Zhongkui really believes what Shi Zhongkui says.

Not long after, the servants of Xue's family brought back all the wine, meat, spices and barbecue tools, along with Aunt Xue's advice to him not to be drunk.

The charcoal fire and other preparations, of course, were prepared by the servants. After Xue Pan and the three had eaten the barbecue that Shi Zhongkui personally cooked, a little bit of chili was added instead of the spice of cornel.

Immediately, it became hot and non-stop drinking.

Fortunately, cornel itself is an ancient spicy seasoning, so the three of them had no doubts.

In addition, he drank a lot in the restaurant before, and Shi Zhongkui poured him down before he knew it.

Seeing the three drunks being helped into the guest room by his servants, Shi Zhongkui smiled inwardly.

Taking the opportunity to learn from Xue Pan what the family name of the saffron planter in Jinling is.

By the way, I also found out that this family has a shop in the capital, and there seems to be a farm outside the city that specializes in growing flowers as the source of rouge raw materials.

Shi Zhongkui's eyes lit up when he heard about the farm.

At noon the next day, Xue Pan, who got up after a night of hangover at Shi Zhongkui's house, casually ate breakfast, and asked about the preserved fruit as expected.

Shi Zhongkui didn't intend to sell, but he gave 10 catties each of preserved peaches, dried persimmons, dried dates and raisins.

Sometimes the things you give away are far more expensive than the things you buy.

Sure enough, Shi Zhongkui, who was sitting at home holding a book and drinking tea, waited for almost two hours before he heard a knock on the door.

(End of this chapter)