jdhmnovel Chapter 54 Dyeing and Tasting
Chapter 54 Dyeing and Tasting
Gu Zhou took the knife from Shen Wu's hand and started cutting according to her instructions.
Over there, there was the sound of cutting vegetables, and over here Shen Wu started to rinse clothes on the spot with cold water.
Rinsing with cold water is to clean off the floating color on the surface, and then putting it back into the dyeing machine to boil and dye for a while so that the fuel can be fixed better.
She washed them casually, took them out one by one, wrung them out, and threw them back into the pot. The water in the pot was boiling, so she put all the clothes in and stirred them with a stick, then covered them with a lid and started dyeing.
Shen Wu put another piece of firewood in it, turned around and took out the floating color water and poured it into the vegetable garden. Natural dyes do not have any chemical additives, and the water is warm, so it is no problem to pour water into the vegetable garden.
At first, Gu Zhou's cuts were a little crooked, but after cutting half of the bamboo shoots, he was able to cut them into even and beautiful shreds.
When Shen Wu came back and saw him finishing the cutting, she praised him, "You cut very well, much better than my first time cutting things." She put down the wooden basin and asked Gu Zhou to rub the bamboo shoots into a bowl and then put it in the water.
Gu Zhou put the bamboo shoots into the water as she said: "Is it okay if the water is not boiling yet?"
Shen Wu waved his hand without caring: "It's okay, sometimes I'm lazy and just blanch it in cold water." Seeing him stirring the bamboo shoots, he said: "Cover the lid, wait for the steam to come out, then open the lid and wait for a minute or two, don't worry about it now."
After Gu Zhou stopped working, he wanted to help her with some work again.
Shen Wu didn't understand. How could he be so helpful after fooling the kid? It was good to have someone around to help, but she felt uncomfortable when she was idle. She had been working alone in the kitchen since she learned how to cook, and she felt uncomfortable when this person came.
"Um... I don't need your help here. How about you go and have a rest?" Shen Wu asked tentatively.
She wasn't the kind of person who chased people away! She wasn't the kind of person who was ruthless and would drive partners away after they had done the work. That's it, I suddenly felt a little uncomfortable.
Gu Zhou shook his head: "It's okay. Didn't you say you wanted to make dumplings later? I'll come and help you."
"I...uh..." Shen Wu didn't know what to say, so she decided to just shut up.
"What... is wrong with you?" Gu Zhou was puzzled. He turned around and looked at Shen Wu from staring at the pot.
"Ah...well...the water is boiling, hehe!" Shen Wu just happened to see steam coming out of the pot where the bamboo shoots were blanched, and he quickly reminded Gu Zhou.
Gu Zhou turned around, lifted the lid of the pot and stirred the bamboo shoots a few times: "Shall we take them out now?"
Shen Wu quickly filled a large basin with cold water and handed it to him: "Leave it in there. It will become crispier after being washed with cold water."
Gu Zhou had a hard time picking up the bamboo shoots with chopsticks. Because they were cut so thin and small, the pieces fell back easily when he picked them up.
Shen Wu handed him a spoon: "Use this. After you scoop it up, you can use chopsticks to press it to drain out the water, and then put it in the basin. When I have time, I can make a bamboo colander, which will be much more convenient for scooping things in the future."
Gu Zhou took it and followed her method. As expected, he was able to scoop up a lot at a time. Half of the pot of bamboo shoots was quickly scooped out, and the remaining few were also carefully picked out by Gu Zhou.
Shen Wu asked him to stir it and then drain the water so that she could teach him how to make the stuffing later. She went to another pot and turned the cooking cloth.
This was the last time to boil dye. Shen Wu turned the fire to the lowest, then took out the clothes and put them in the basin. She used a wooden spoon to scoop out the water used for boiling dye in the pot. It was too tiring to do this again and again. She missed the water scoop at her grandmother's house when she was a child. It was light and easy to use. It seems that she should pay attention to whether there are gourds or other things here. If there are seeds, it would be fine. She can buy some and plant them to make scoops.
She scrubbed the big pot several times before adding some water and boiling it over low heat. The water can be used to steam buns or to disinfect the pot at high temperature.
Gu Zhou had already drained the water and was waiting on the side. Seeing that she was about to rinse the clothes, he hurried forward and wanted to take over: "Let me do it, you do something else first."
Shen Wu thought for a second: "Help me carry this out, let's rinse it together quickly, and then put it on the clothesline and it will dry quickly."
The two of them carried the large basin to the yard, one on each side. Because the water was not squeezed dry when they took it out, Shen Wu didn't let him touch it first. He poured a lot of cold water into it and stirred it with a stick before telling him to start.
"We use one basin. There's no need to rub them. Just rinse them clean in water. Then put them aside and rinse them again." After saying that, Shen Wu rolled up his sleeves and squatted down to start working.
Gu Zhou followed suit. The water temperature was okay, but the temperature at the folds of the clothes was still a little high. Shen Wu asked him to be careful and quickly processed a set of clothes himself.
It’s not that she was wasting water. This... water can be kept and put in the basin to wash hands.
After the second rinse, the water color had changed from light black to a clearer color. Seeing that he had finished, Shen Wu stood up and asked him to help wring it dry. Two people could do it much faster than one person.
"You go left and I'll go right. Come on, one, two, three!" After Shen Wu said that, the two of them wrung his clothes until no water could drip out.
After putting all three pieces of clothing in the basin, the two began to put the clothes together. Gu Zhou followed Shen Wu's example and shook the wet clothes before putting them on. Although she didn't know what the use was, she felt that what she did must be effective.
After finishing the clothes, Shen Wu asked Gu Zhou to wash his hands and asked someone to go to the stove to teach him how to fry the stuffing.
She didn't know when she started teaching Gu Zhou with the idea of teaching her younger brother how to survive. It didn't matter anyway. In her opinion, Gu Zhou was just a little younger than her modern brother, but he was no less intelligent than her brother was back then.
Shen Wu raised the fire that was used to blanch the onions, letting the water vapor at the bottom of the pot dry up, and then suddenly remembered that he had forgotten to peel the onions.
When Gu Zhou learned that they needed onions, the two of them hurriedly peeled an onion, washed it and cut it into shreds.
"What just happened doesn't count, let's try again!"
Shen Wu put the lard into the pot, because the pot had been heated for a long time, he put the green onions in as soon as the oil was in the pot, and after a few stir-fryings until the green onions changed color, he quickly put in the bamboo shoots. The bamboo shoots could not be poured in, but had to be picked up, mainly because he was afraid that there would be water residue at the bottom and putting them directly into the pot would affect the finished dish.
Stir-fry it slightly, add the previously squeezed oil residue and some pepper powder, stir it a few more times, stir everything evenly, add some light soy sauce and a little salt, stir it evenly and it is ready to serve.
Shen Wu picked up some vegetables and put them into the bowl, then took a new pair of chopsticks and asked Gu Zhou to taste it: "How about you try it?" After handing the food over, she put a bowl of water into the pot to wash the pot, and then she would use this pot to cook rice porridge.
Gu Zhou took the bowl, picked up a piece of food with chopsticks, and his eyes suddenly lit up: "Delicious, very delicious"
"As long as it tastes good." Shen Wu asked him to finish everything in the bowl, then helped to wash the pot, made the noodles himself and explained to him why he did so.
Although Gu Zhou had long been amazed by her cooking skills, today's shredded bamboo shoots seemed to be even more delicious than before. He finished all the bamboo shoots in the bowl in a few bites and even felt unsatisfied after finishing. He was very happy looking at the full pot of shredded bamboo shoots next to him, and bent down to start washing the pot.