Evening.
After finishing work, Zhao Yi handed the day's catch of fish to Su Hong before hurrying over to Zhangjia Village.
"Xiao Yi's here."
Wang Kaihui greeted Zhao Yi with a cheerful smile when she saw him.
"Mom, I came to pick up Xiao Jing and check how Dad and the others are getting along," Zhao Yi nodded.
In the west room, a considerable amount of grapes had been prepared for drying.
"Dad, the windows need to be opened to ensure proper air circulation. Otherwise, moisture will linger in the room and condense into fog when the charcoal fire dies down," Zhao Yi remarked upon entering the west room and noticing the closed windows, though the temperature inside was sufficient.
As he spoke, Zhao Yi pushed the windows open.
"Xiao Yi, do you think they'll be able to sell all these raisins?" Zhang Fusheng asked uncertainly.
"It's hard to say, but currently only our two families are making them. At most, we can only produce a few dozen jin at a time. A big city can easily absorb that much—it's not like there's only one Supply and Marketing Cooperative," Zhao Yi explained with a laugh.
Processing a hundred jin at most would yield less than thirty jin after drying. Any more than that, and the room wouldn't have space. Sun-drying would take an exceptionally long time and require frequently turning the grapes, which would be troublesome and interfere with work.
A single room couldn't hold many grapes. Each layer of the wooden racks held one winnowing basket, and even when the room was full, it only amounted to about a hundred jin.
Wang Kaihui led her two daughters-in-law into the kitchen to prepare dinner.
"Mom, there's no need to trouble yourselves. I've already cooked at home. Xiao Jing and I can eat as soon as we get back. In this weather, cooked rice will spoil if left until the next day," Zhao Yi quickly advised.
His in-laws didn't have the habit of eating dinner—nor did many other households these days.
They ate once in the morning before work, again at noon, and generally skipped dinner since there was no work in the evening. If they were truly hungry, they'd boil a few potatoes to tide them over.
Zhao Yi wasn't lying. He had made too much rice at noon, and there were leftovers waiting for Zhang Jing to come home so they could finish it together. In this weather, leaving it until the next day would definitely cause it to spoil.
Although spoiled food wasn't typically thrown away these days, Zhao Yi had no desire to eat it.
This was a common habit among many elderly villagers, one that often made children sick. They believed nothing should be wasted—rotted food could still be eaten after cutting off the bad parts and washing it.
In his previous life, Zhao Yi had heard about an old woman who nearly wiped out her entire village.
She accidentally spilled rat poison into the rice jar but couldn't bear to throw the rice away, thinking washing it multiple times would make it safe.
As a result, all five family members ended up in the hospital. The old woman, having eaten little due to her poor appetite and frail health, was discharged the next day, but her husband wasn't so lucky—he had already lost vital signs by the time they reached the hospital.
Returning home, the old woman still couldn't bring herself to discard the rice. Thinking it unfit for humans, she decided to feed it to the livestock. She soaked the rice in water for a while and washed it several times before confidently giving it to the chickens.
All forty or fifty chickens died.
Coincidentally, villagers came to help with the funeral arrangements. Unwilling to waste the dead chickens, the old woman used them for the funeral feast.
The chickens died in the morning and were served at noon. By evening, ambulances were constantly arriving in the village to transport people. That day, nearly everyone in the village except the rats ended up consuming rat poison.
When Wang Kaihui heard Zhao Yi say this, there was no further persuading him. It would be a pity to let the grain at home go bad.
Zhao Yi chatted a while longer with his father-in-law and two brothers-in-law about the details before finally heading home with Zhang Jing.
"What were you talking about with my brothers and dad so mysteriously, as if you were afraid others might hear?" Zhang Jing looked at Zhao Yi curiously and asked.
"I was telling them how to set traps in the mountains. If nothing goes wrong, they can go try it out. That way, our dinner table might occasionally have an extra dish," Zhao Yi said with a laugh.
Of course, just talking about it wouldn’t teach them—they’d have to follow Zhao Yi into the mountains a couple of times to learn how to spot traces of small animal activity and figure out the best places to set traps.
Hearing this, Zhang Jing nodded. Since living with Zhao Yi, they’d had meat many times—something she never dared to imagine before. Now, they could eat fish and drink fish soup almost every evening, and occasionally even have pheasant or rabbit. She’d even gained a bit of weight.
"Brother Yi, are we really going to give the chicken to my parents?" Zhang Jing couldn’t help feeling reluctant. After all, it was a hen that would start laying eggs soon.
"What else can we do? Slaughter it and eat it ourselves?" Zhao Yi retorted.
Nowadays, killing an old hen for meat was a luxury few families could afford, unless the hen stopped laying eggs altogether for a year.
"Your eldest and second brothers are about to start their own households soon. They’ll need to raise their own livestock. Giving the hen to your parents lets them decide how to distribute it and saves us a few yuan. We’ll keep two hens, one piglet, and one assigned pig. By the end of the year, we’ll have plenty of meat. Whatever we don’t eat, we can sell for a decent profit," Zhao Yi explained cheerfully.
Nowadays, those with money wanted to raise their own pigs, but a piglet cost over twenty yuan, and no one had that kind of spare cash. Besides, grain was already scarce. The assigned pigs in the village often looked no bigger than dogs in later times. In the future, pigs weighing two to three hundred jin would be common, but now, one hundred seventy to one hundred eighty jin was the norm—and that was only considered Grade B. Grade A pigs were over two hundred jin, but few villages could raise pigs to that size unless they had side businesses like grain processing—making tofu or dried bean curd, with leftover bean dregs to feed the pigs. Or if there was a nearby distillery, they could mix in distillers' grains. With such supplemental feed, piglets grew faster; relying only on grass made them grow slowly.
These were all native breed pigs, not as fast-growing as imported ones, but their meat was exceptionally flavorful and never greasy.
If you raised your own pig, you only had to hand over half, keeping the rest for yourself. Over a year, that could earn you dozens of yuan. But with assigned pigs, it was different: a Grade A pig came with twenty jin of fat, while Grade B only had about ten. Anything below Grade B wouldn’t even be accepted.
For now, Zhao Yi was guiding Zhang Jing through these matters, gradually building up their funds. Later, if better opportunities arose, he planned to hand these tasks over to Zhang Jing’s family.
Chatting along the way, they soon returned to Wangou Village.
Once home, Zhang Jing immediately went to the storage room. Seeing the half-dried grapes Zhao Yi had prepared, she felt particularly happy—these were money, the means to a better life.
"Husband, you said they’re letting you bring the wine you brewed to try out?" Zhang Jing pointed to the jars in the corner of the kitchen and asked.
"That’s still a ways off. It won’t be drinkable for over a month. Besides, even after all that time, there’s no guarantee it’ll make money," Zhao Yi shook his head and laughed.
"Drinking it ourselves is fine too."
Zhang Jing thought for a moment before speaking.
Zhao Yi also knew that without proper packaging, there was no way to sell it at the same price as soda. Being able to sell any at all was already quite good, but they should still keep some for themselves to drink.