The Red Era: Starting from a Truck Driver

Chapter 161 Shaoxing Rice Wine
Shaoxing is most famous for its rice wine, and the more well-known Shaoxing rice wines are Shaoxing Huadiao, Nuerhong and Zhuangyuanhong.

But it is not easy to buy Nv'erhong and Zhuangyuanhong, just like Maotai in liquor, they are well-known high-end liquors. You need corresponding liquor tickets, which are difficult for ordinary people to obtain.

There are three types of rice wine: Yuanhong wine, Jiafan wine, Shanniang wine and Xiangxue wine.

Many people who don't know much about wine can't tell the difference after hearing this classification, but it's actually very easy to distinguish. Don't worry about the name, just distinguish according to the sugar content. The total sugar content of Yuanhong wine does not exceed 15g/L. The sugar content of Jiafan wine is between 15g/L and 40g/L. The sugar content of Shanniang wine is 40g/L - 100g/L. At this sugar content, you can already taste the obvious sweetness. As for Xiangxue wine, the sugar content is directly over 100g/L.

All four types of rice wine can be used as cooking wine, but the most suitable one is Jiafan wine, because it has the most moderate sugar content. However, some people in some regions who like sweet taste use Shanniang wine as cooking wine.

But now, no matter what type of rice wine, Jiang Cheng can't buy it at the supply and marketing cooperative. Because even if the rice wine is produced in Shaoxing, it still needs a wine ticket to buy it.

Huangjiu is also made from grain and is a planned commodity. Even if it is a local specialty, planned commodities cannot be purchased without a ticket, and the price of local and foreign Huangjiu is the same.

As a result, Jiang Cheng got up early in the morning and walked around for a long time, but still couldn't buy any rice wine.

However, just because you can’t buy wine without a wine ticket at the supply and marketing cooperative doesn’t mean you can’t buy it elsewhere. The salesperson at the supply and marketing cooperative saw that Jiang Cheng was going to the winery. Shaoxing has three large wineries, so he asked if he could go to the winery to ask for favors.

If Jiang Cheng was a driver of the supply and marketing cooperative in Shaoxing, and went to the winery to buy some rice wine, maybe they would really give him some face. But Jiang Cheng was from the Changcheng Supply and Marketing Cooperative, so he might not be given this kind of face.

So even though the salesperson at the supply and marketing cooperative kindly told him the location of the winery, Jiang Cheng did not go there directly. Instead, he drove back a little further and arrived at a place in the suburbs.

When Jiang Cheng came here yesterday, he saw another well. It should also be an abandoned old well because there were no inhabited houses around it.

After arriving at the well I saw yesterday, I found that there was water in the well. Jiang Cheng planned to get two wild boars out to do something. It didn't matter if there was well water or not. The ones that were drowned would affect the taste, but they could be put directly into the well water and shot twice with a rifle to get them out.

The wild boar was the one that Jiang Cheng had lured to his side with buns in the forest and stored in his space. Now he suddenly let it out and it fell directly into the well without even having time to react.

The fall into the water was not perfect, with a huge splash. Wild boars can swim, and the wild boars that fell into the well knew to stick their heads up to the surface of the well. Jiang Cheng shot one to death, and it immediately came out of the water after being killed. It could still kick its legs for a while, but it could no longer stand up.

After killing two wild boars, we put them directly in the car and then went to the winery.

The winery that Jiang Cheng found out about was also located outside the suburbs. It might be because of the space the winery needed. It would need to dig a very large wine cellar, and it would be inconvenient to build it in the urban area.

After arriving at the winery, it turned out that if you can't get something at the place of production, it is much easier to get it at the place of production. Just like the enamel factory, even if there is an enamel factory in Changcheng, you still need a ticket to buy enamel products. But if you go to the enamel factory and have some connections, it is easy to buy a few enamel products without a ticket.

The situation at the winery was a bit similar to that at the coal mine. If you offered money to buy, they wouldn't sell it. The money had to be handed over, and there were risks in private transactions, and Jiang Cheng wanted a lot.

But by exchanging wild boars, people can provide benefits to the entire winery, so taking a little risk won't be a big deal.

The two wild boars were exchanged for money according to the price of domestic pigs. Wild boar meat is more expensive than domestic pigs, but no tickets are required. People also need tickets to buy rice wine, and now they don’t need tickets to exchange with Jiang Cheng.

Therefore, Jiang Cheng exchanged the unkilled wild boar for wine at 45 cents per pound, so he actually got a good deal.

In the end, they gave Jiang Cheng two jars of wine, each weighing 50 jin. According to the price, the price of the winery, Jiang Cheng seemed to have suffered a little loss. Because the winery sells the rice wine to state-owned stores and local supply and marketing cooperatives at wholesale prices, which is definitely cheaper than the market price. But according to the market price, a jar of ordinary "Jiafan wine", that is, the sugar content suitable for cooking wine, costs one yuan per jin in the market.

The other jar of wine is Huadiao wine, which is a good wine, three yuan per pound.

In fact, in the 1980s and 1990s, good rice wine was always more expensive than white wine, even Moutai was not as expensive as good rice wine. Even in later times, some wines were sold for tens of thousands of yuan per bottle, especially some Moutai and Wuliangye from the 1960s and 1970s, the prices were even more outrageous.

However, some girls’ red wines that have been treasured for decades still cost hundreds of thousands of yuan per bottle in later generations.

It’s a pity that Jiang Cheng’s space is static. If he puts some girl’s red wine in there now, it may look the same when he takes it out decades later as if it was just brewed.

~~
Nanjing, Zhou family.

Zhou Lingying's second brother Zhou Xingcai has been dating Xie Xiuyun for more than a month. Although they do not work in the same unit, they live not far away.

Every day after get off work, Zhou Xingcai would go to see Xie Xiuyun. It was impossible to say that they fell in love at first sight. But when they were in a "legal" relationship, it was easy for the opposite sex to appreciate each other.

They have been together for more than a month and now the Mid-Autumn Festival has just passed. Zhou Xingcai's parents have invited Xie Yunxiu's parents to visit their home, and it would be best to set a date for the wedding.

Because they have informed in advance, employees who are working can go to the company to take leave and rest.

Zhou Lingying's parents were on holiday today, so Liu Xiaofang bought a pound of meat. She queued up at the supply and marketing cooperative early in the morning to buy it. There was no other way, because if she went too late, there might not be any good parts of meat.

In order to entertain guests, meat had to be bought, but the meat coupons were not worth it. In fact, Nanjing was the capital of Jiangsu Province, and the meat quota was higher than that of residents in surrounding cities.

In the difficult period of the 1960s, the ration was 3 liang. Now it is about 8 liang, and people who work in units can now eat a little meat in the unit cafeteria every month.

But now the Zhou family's monthly meat ration of less than three catties is still not enough. They have to save the meat coupons for the New Year, but they can't live without meat on weekdays.

The last time my son-in-law Jiang Cheng showed up, he bought more than a pound of meat at first, and then bought another pound to bring meat for his daughter. In one go, the family's monthly ration was used up.

When Zhou Xingcai was dating someone, he would sometimes invite Xie Xiuyun to his house for dinner. Plus, during the Mid-Autumn Festival, he had to buy meat.

This time I want to finalize the marriage, so I have to entertain Xie Xiuyun's family today. After the wedding is finalized, I have to prepare several tables of food, which will require a lot of meat.

Even in the countryside, very poor families may not hold a wedding banquet, but on the wedding day, the parents of both parties will always have a good meal, and the uncles and aunts will not be invited to the meal at most.

In the city, weddings now have several tables, but not too many. If they are too extravagant, they will be investigated. Generally, there are four tables, and some leaders may have six tables at home.

But even if there were four tables, the Zhou family didn't have enough meat coupons, so they had to borrow meat coupons, and then they had no meat to eat until the Chinese New Year. The meat coupons had to be returned, at least before the Chinese New Year, otherwise how could they celebrate the Chinese New Year.

(End of this chapter)