mtl008 Chapter 156 Bamboo shoots and fish
Chapter 156 Bamboo shoots and fish
Gu Zhou looked at her as she stood up tremblingly and felt a little worried: "Give me the fish."
"No!" Shen Wu refused flatly and urged him to squat down and carry the bamboo basket.
Gu Zhou knew her temper well, so he stopped talking and squatted down to hold the backpack in place.
Shen Wu was afraid that the child would not be able to get up, so he tied a string of fat fish around his waist, tying it as close to his waist as possible. Fortunately, the bark was long enough, otherwise he would not be able to tie it.
Gu Zhou felt her help and was stunned for a moment. He quickly stood up with the fish in one hand and the hoe in the other: "No need to help me, I'm fine."
Seeing that he was fine, Shen Wu stopped supporting him and followed him home.
"Should we go to the river or go home?" Gu Zhou asked in front.
Shen Wu did not hesitate: "We have to go to the river! Let's wash the bamboo shoots and kill the fish before going home."
Although this is tiring, it is much easier than killing fish and washing bamboo shoots at home. You have to carry water to wash them at home, the fish is too fishy after being killed, and washing them in the yard may easily suffocate the children. It is better to wash them by the river.
I don't know if it was because he rested too long this time or what, but Shen Wu took breaks intermittently along the way and finally reached the river. Although he was still sweating from exhaustion, he felt it was much easier than when he was carrying the soil on his back.
Shen Wu found the old place and untied the fish from her waist. This thing hung around her body like a long skirt, which was really in the way when she walked. If she didn't want to take the fish to the river to kill it, Shen Wu would have taken it off as soon as she got home.
Gu Zhou helped her unload the backpack before he unloaded his own. He did farm work all year round and the food he carried was heavier than this. Apart from some sweating and panting, he was not very tired.
Shen Wu was so tired that she sat on the ground gasping for breath. When she was about to relax, Gu Zhou put her share into the river and fell in.
Because the water is shallow at the riverside and the bamboo shoots themselves have some weight, the bamboo shoots poured into the river cannot float. When water flows through, it will create layers of ripples due to the different surfaces of the bamboo shoots.
Shen Wu came back to his senses immediately after hearing the plop sound. He felt like he could breathe evenly and was not so tired anymore. He hurried to help Gu Zhou wash the bamboo shoots.
"We'll cook this when we have time when we get back. We can also press it into dried bamboo shoots. In winter, we can stew it with dried radish, bamboo shoots, and dried fish. Add some rice noodles and make a pot of stew. Not to mention the smell, it's so fragrant that it will definitely make you dizzy." Shen Wu squatted by the river and rubbed the bamboo shoots clean one by one with Gu Zhou.
When I threw it into the backpack, I realized that it had been carrying soil. Although I poured it out with force, I was still a little worried. I quickly pulled it out and took out the bamboo shoots inside and rinsed them in water.
Gu Zhou couldn't imagine what it tasted like after listening to what she said, but it should be delicious. Everything she cooked was delicious.
After cleaning the basket, Shen Wu washed the bamboo shoots she had rubbed at the beginning before throwing them in. She placed the basket between the two of them in the water, and because the basket couldn't be placed too far away, she squeezed some of the bamboo shoots out of the water.
Gu Zhou also washed a bamboo shoot and threw it in. He was a little confused and after hesitating for a few seconds, he finally asked, "What are rice noodles?"
"Rice noodles!" Shen Wu was washing and heard him ask this question and explained: "Rice noodles are made by soaking rice and grinding it into pulp. After squeezing out the water from the pulp, the remaining powder is steamed and squeezed out."
Shen Wu thought for a while and said: "But there is another way. Make the rice milk and then steam it into rice skin, cut it with a knife, and dry it. It can be stored for a long time."
Gu Zhou had never seen this method before, but was very interested when he heard that it could be kept for a long time. He didn't know what this thing tasted like, but it should be good if she liked it.
Because the bamboo shoots themselves are very clean, they are just stuck with some mud from the basket and are very easy to wash. Just rub them a few times and throw them into the basket in the water.
In less than ten minutes, the two of them had washed all the bamboo shoots in the two baskets.
The backpack was heavy, so they carried it and placed it in a place with lush vegetation by the river to let the water drain away first.
Shen Wu squatted at the side and began to process the fish they had brought back. The fish were not easy to process as they had caught almost all large fish. They needed to be scaled and then gutted and the black membrane inside the belly cleaned to avoid the fishy smell.
Shen Wu squatted by the river, concentrating on scraping the fish scales, while Gu Zhou quietly picked up a basket of bamboo shoots and went home.
It’s not that Shen Wu didn’t hear the noise, she was afraid that she wouldn’t have time to finish cooking. Even though she knew Gu Zhou was making some noise, she didn’t dare look back, for fear that if she was a step late, it would be dark by the time she finished cleaning up the fish.
Gu Zhou came and went very quickly. Shen Wu had just scraped five fish with a machete when he rushed back with a tiny knife in his hand.
"Did you bring the bamboo shoots back?" Shen Wu asked with certainty.
Gu Zhou nodded: "I remembered that I have a fish scale scraper at home, so I just went back to bring some bamboo shoots back."
Shen Wu saw the small knife handed to her, and silently took it in her hand to try it. She was a little worried and told the person behind her: "Don't carry it anymore, I'll do it later, be careful not to hurt your back." Just as she finished speaking, she heard footsteps behind her gradually fading away. When she turned around, she saw that the person had already walked several steps away carrying another basket of bamboo shoots.
Gu Zhou responded without stopping and walked faster and faster towards home.
Forget it... this broken kid...
Shen Wu no longer paid attention to him and began to concentrate on killing the fish.
The knife is very useful and it deserves to be called a fish scale scraper. It is simply the nemesis of fish scales. The semi-curved arc fits the fish body perfectly, and a lot of fish scales can be scraped off with one cut.
Shen Wu wiped it a few times and one side of the fish was scraped clean. In order to keep the fish body clean, she scraped and washed it at the same time, finishing one side and then the other. When Gu Zhou came back again, she had scraped out eight sides of the fish.
When Gu Zhou came again, he carried the basket with the least bamboo shoots. He cleared the bamboo shoots and put them in a basin. He brought the basket back to the river and waited to bring the fish back later.
While Shen Wu was scraping the scales off the fish, Gu Zhou took the fish she had killed and gutted it. He had killed fish before and learned how to do it, so he was quite adept at scraping the belly of a fish with a machete.
"Stop it, let me do it. Chopping with a knife is too tiring for my hands." Shen Wu scraped out another fish and threw it onto the pile of prepared fish.
"It's okay, I'm used to it," Gu Zhou said. In the past, when he went into the mountains with his father, he only used a machete to hunt down a lot of food.
Seeing that he was so persistent, Shen Wu stopped persuading him, but sped up his hands.
Shen Wu killed the last fish. He soaked half of the fish in water, pressed down with three fingers using a fish scale scraper to cut open the fish's belly, then reached in to take out the fish bubbles and other things inside and threw them into the grass by the river to use as fertilizer.
We don't have time to dig a hole today. Fish entrails decompose easily, and the weather is good, so there might be a little smell but it will disappear quickly.
When the two of them returned, Aunt He had already left. Before leaving, she asked Xiaowei to tell them that the younger brother had just woken up and should be allowed to play more so that he would not make trouble at night.
When Gu Zhou came back for the last time, his aunt was still there. She was talking to Xiaowei and his younger brother. Gu Zhou was in a hurry to go to the river, so he said hello and left the yard.