My village can't be like this

Chapter 668 Buying Rapeseed

In the yard, the honeysuckle that was planted only last year has already climbed all over the wall. Now, as the weather warms up, it is slowly blooming, ushering in the first flowering period of the year.

The newly opened honeysuckle flowers look like only some silvery-white and greenish flowers, and are still tender.

If someone who is not familiar with honeysuckle sees it, they might think it is a leaf on a vine rather than a flower.

After seeing off several waves of tourists who came to inquire about accommodation, Zhang An walked to the wall facing the sun.

I picked a silver flower that was still in bud and put it in my mouth. After chewing it a little, I found that it tasted a little bitter, but much better than when it was in the golden flower stage.

Afterwards, Zhang An went home, brought back a small basin, and picked the silver flowers from the vine.

When I picked honeysuckle last year, both the gold and silver stamens were in full bloom.

Zhang An thought he had picked the honeysuckle very well, but he learned from Zhang Yixing that the best time to use honeysuckle as medicine or for making tea is when the flowers are just beginning to bloom but have not yet blossomed.

Just like spring tea, you can pick one bud, one bud and one leaf, or even when it grows to three leaves.

But when it comes to drinking it, the best ones are those with bud tips or one bud and one leaf, and they are more expensive.

Zhang An didn’t know all this before. Instead, he thought that the flowers would be best when they bloomed. That’s why he picked them so late last year.

Fortunately, the honeysuckle grew well, which might be because Zhang An used too much space spring water to water it during that period.

So even though they missed the best time to pick the flowers, Zhang and his team identified that the dried flowers still had some medicinal properties.

Now that he knows the best time to pick honeysuckle, Zhang An naturally will not miss it.

But this time when picking the honeysuckle, he was not as anxious as before, picking them one handful at a time. After all, he was not picking them to sell, so there was no need to rush to increase efficiency.

Moreover, with nothing to do, you can pick the most tender and high-quality flowers, ensuring the best quality of the honeysuckle.

When picking the flowers, Zhang An did not pick them as he saw them. Instead, he used scissors to cut the flowers here and there.

After all, when this honeysuckle was first planted in their family, it was more for decorating the courtyard wall for viewing, and picking the flowers was just a side job.

Furthermore, the reason why I was so anxious last year was because it was the last flowering period of honeysuckle.

In contrast, this is only the first flowering period of honeysuckle this year. Even if the flowers wither after a while, they will bloom several times again later.

There is still plenty of time left for him to pick the honeysuckle, so there is no need to pluck the entire plant in this batch.

Although it is only in the silver flower stage now, Zhang An can clearly feel that there are more flowers on the vine than last year, which is probably because the vines have already taken root.

However, although there are more flowers, the quality seen with the naked eye is not as good as last year.

Zhang An himself was somewhat self-aware of this, because last year he was worried that the honeysuckle would die, so he watered it with space spring water every few days.

This year, he saw that the honeysuckle had survived and he had not watered it once from the beginning of spring until now.

This may be the treatment when a newcomer becomes an old employee. At first, he called her Sweetie, but now when he speaks to her again, he just calls her Mrs. Niu.

Half an hour later, Zhang An had just picked a small pot of silver flowers, probably only two or three pounds, when Chen Ze, who had just returned home for dinner, came back.

"Why are you picking these tender leaves for no reason? Can you eat them?"

It was obvious that Chen Ze was not familiar with honeysuckle. When he saw Zhang An picking the honeysuckle flowers with some emerald green color, he thought they were picking the tender leaves.

"This is a newly bloomed flower. It doesn't look like a leaf."

Zhang An was not too harsh on Young Master Chen. After all, he was a real city young master, and it was normal for him to know little about these things.

"So that's how it is. You picked them and dried them for tea. My old man likes them very much. When they are dried this year, please give me some."

After listening to Zhang An's explanation, Chen Ze immediately remembered the honeysuckle tea he drank here at the beginning of the year.

Although it tastes a bit bitter when you first drink it, it will slowly turn sweet on the tip of your tongue, making it more acceptable than bitter tea.

Especially older people like the old man of the Chen family, they like things with this flavor.

"We still have some from last year. If you want, you can take some back later."

I'm afraid the newly picked ones this year will not be suitable. It will take a lot of time to fully dry the newly picked honeysuckle.

Moreover, at the current rate, only a little can be picked at a time. Even after drying, there will not be much left, so how can we give them away?

However, there are still a lot of fruits that were dried last year. Although they were not picked at the best time, the quality is still acceptable.

The old man of the Chen family only drinks a little on weekdays, which is fine.

"By the way, why are you so free today? Don't you have to supervise?"

Zhang An looked at Young Master Chen who was reaching out to help pick the flowers, and couldn't help but look at him in surprise.

In the past, Chen Ze had always been very leisurely, and he often had time to come and chat with him to pass the time.

But since the construction of his hotel started, he was rarely seen here because he had to go to the site to supervise the work.

"No need to go. It's basically finished now. There are only some finishing touches left. Li Hongbin will be there to watch over it."

Building such a big hotel has taken Chen Ze too much time and energy from the initial planning to now.

Now that a rough outline has been completed, he feels quite a sense of accomplishment.

"Huh? That looks pretty fast. Such a big building was built in just half a year."

Hearing Chen Ze's words, Zhang An turned his head and looked downstream of the bridge.

Sure enough, the six-story building has been topped out and many of the scaffolding on the outside has been removed.

Looking at Hongyan Town, this is definitely the tallest and largest building.

"Since it's almost finished, when do you plan to start decorating? Do you hope to open it during the National Day this year?"

To be honest, even though he had seen the renderings, Zhang An was still looking forward to seeing what Chen Ze's hotel would look like.

"I have already found the people in charge of the renovation. They can come in after Li Hongbin finishes. However, this is a big project. It may be difficult to finish it in a short time. But it should be possible to finish it by the end of the year."

Chen Ze silently calculated the time. It was only early May now. He felt that it might be a bit rushed to open the business in October.

But if we rush to finish this year, there won’t be any surprises. After all, there are still six or seven months left until the end of the year.

Moreover, he specially found the construction team in charge of the decoration from the provincial capital. The scale is quite good, just to finish it as soon as possible. "That's a pity. Look at the number of tourists who came here in the past two days. It's so terrifying. It's a pity that the accommodation conditions in the village can't accommodate so many people. Many people can't find a place to stay in the village and can only go to the town. During the National Day holiday, the flow of people is no less than now. If your hotel opens, we won't have to spit out the meat in our mouths."

Although today is only the first day of the holiday, some tourists from nearby areas have already arrived early since last night.

But Changqing Village is, after all, just a small mountain village. Even though its development momentum has been good in the past two years, its size is still so-so. As of this morning, all the homestays in the village were rented out.

Zhang An could only sigh that his village was not blessed enough to enjoy such overwhelming wealth.

Especially this morning, he felt really bad seeing those people coming to ask for accommodation and running to the town in groups.

Although he himself has never thought about getting involved in this field, don't forget that he is a very stubborn person and can't bear to see the good things go to other people.

"There's nothing we can do about it. There's no point in being anxious. We can only take it slow."

Chen Ze felt the same way. Seeing the number of people overflowing, he felt as uncomfortable as Zhang An.

He chose Changqing Village because he saw its potential.

Facts show that his vision was not wrong. It was just a short holiday, but the influx of people was more than he had expected. If he had waited until the summer vacation in a while, what would have happened?

At night, Zhang Laosan ran to Zhang An's house.

"Zhang An, didn't you say before that you wanted to buy a few hundred kilograms of rapeseed? My rapeseed has been dried. If you want it, come and weigh it tomorrow."

A few days ago, Zhang An just mentioned that he wanted to buy a few hundred kilograms of rapeseed to make oil, and Zhang Laosan took it to heart.

Just now, their family had just brought the rapeseed from the fields home and had just dried it when he ran over to talk to Zhang An.

"It's so fast. I thought it would take a few days."

Zhang Laosan's family planted all rapeseed this year. Zhang An thought the harvest date would be later, but he never expected that it had already been harvested in the past few days and had been dried.

"If it was last year, I would have to wait a week or so. The main reason is that this year we had good rain and plenty of sunshine, especially since it has been sunny these days, so it's a little earlier. I estimate that we can harvest an extra hundred kilograms, and I will sell it all to you."

This year's crop is rapeseed, and Zhang Laosan has already prepared for a poor harvest.

But I didn't expect that when I finally collected and dried them, there were hundreds of pounds more rapeseed than I expected.

Originally, he could only sell about 200 kilograms at most to Zhang An, but now he could easily sell 100 kilograms more.

Although the extra hundred kilograms would not sell for much money, he felt that Zhang An would definitely be happier than before.

"Is the harvest so good this year? Of course I will go get it tomorrow."

When Zhang An heard that he could buy 300 kilograms of rapeseed from Zhang Laosan's house, he was immediately very happy.

The rapeseed their family needs every year is about 60 to 70 kilograms.

After all, their family usually eats a mixture of rapeseed oil and lard, so they don’t need too much.

But to produce those 60 to 70 kilograms of rapeseed oil, at least 300 kilograms of rapeseed are needed.

Originally, Zhang Laosan had promised him about 200 kilograms, but he still had to find other people to collect another 100 kilograms.

Now that Zhang Laosan can take out 300 kilograms, he doesn't need to look for anyone else, which can save a lot of trouble.

The next morning, it was just after six o'clock. Zhang An had just got up and, taking advantage of the fact that there were not many people on the road to the village, he saddled Dahei and went to Zhang Laosan's house.

If he waits until seven or eight o'clock, most of the tourists staying in the village's homestays will definitely be up, and the road will be full of people, so it will not be very convenient for him to walk on the road with Dahei.

In fact, it is not a good idea to go to someone else's house so early in the morning.

Because it is just daybreak, many people have just gotten up, and some people are still sleeping at home, so it is most appropriate to visit them later.

However, based on his understanding of Zhang Laosan and his wife, they might have gotten up a long time ago.

Because when the kiwis were just planted two years ago, the two people in this family got up before dawn to work in the orchard. They were extremely hardworking.

It is also because of this that, although they have acquired such a large orchard, they take better care of it than other families, thanks to the couple's hard work from dawn to dusk.

Therefore, there would definitely be no inconvenience for Zhang An to visit at this time.

When they arrived at Zhang Laosan's house, just as Zhang An had expected, the couple had been together for a long time.

At this moment, Zhang Laosan was groping for a sickle in the yard, preparing to go outside to cut some grass to feed the cows.

"Third brother, I'm coming over to carry the rapeseed."

As soon as Zhang An entered the yard, he greeted Zhang Laosan.

"Then come with me and put it in the main room."

Zhang Laosan put down the sickle in his hand and walked into the house with Zhang An.

As soon as he entered the main room, Zhang An saw the pile of rapeseed under their big wooden ladder.

"Anzi, come and see how the rapeseed is drying."

Zhang Laosan took the iron weight from their home, grabbed a handful of rapeseed, put it on the ground, and used the weight to plow it for Zhang An to see.

This is the method used by the villagers to identify whether the rapeseed at home has been dried.

If it is dried, you won't see much moisture when you plow it with a weight. If it is not dried, it will be thinner when you plow it with a weight.

Zhang Laosan first showed the rapeseed to Zhang An, mainly to explain that his rapeseed had been dried and was not weighed unfairly, and other families basically did the same.

"This rapeseed is well dried. How many suns have they been exposed to in total?"

Zhang An only took two glances and knew that the rapeseed at Zhang Laosan's house was dried very dry, and must have been dried for more than one day.

"In fact, we only dried it for one day after we got it back, but when we were in the field, we dried it for most of the day while beating it, so we did this."

Zhang Laosan smiled and said, then he carried out a large bag from under the ladder.

Seeing this, Zhang An quickly took out the nylon bag he had brought with him and poured the rapeseed that Zhang Laosan had picked up into his own pocket.

When dumping the rapeseeds, Zhang An could feel that the rapeseeds were very clean, with very little residual rapeseed husks and dirt.

Anyone with a discerning eye can see that this must have been blown by the wind, and more than once, so it is so clean.

(End of this chapter)