Flowers in full bloom

Chapter 338: Another Waste Utilization

There are too many cypress trees in the mountains. June to August is the season for picking cypress nuts, so more people went to the mountains to pick the flower buds.

In this way, the flower buds not only pulled out the branches and leaves of the cypress tree, but also pulled out its seeds. If the cypress tree also had eyes, it would probably just roll its eyes at the flower buds countless times.

However, even if she was looked down upon, Hua Lei didn't care. In order to get money, Hua Lei could be said to have "done everything possible".

This is just the beginning. Who told you that the value of using the cypress tree is so great? If you don't make good use of it, you will be sorry for your wallet.

So, the flower buds used the branches and leaves of Platycladus orientalis and cypress seeds and added lotus leaves to make lotus and cypress fragrance. I went to Yuanying Village to pick up a lot of lotus leaves, washed them all with Platycladus orientalis branches and leaves with clean water, and placed them in a cool and dry place to dry.

After drying, pick the lotus leaves according to their veins. The veins are too hard and not suitable for making incense pills, so the veins of the lotus leaves need to be removed.

Then use a stone mill to grind all the lotus leaves and cypress branches into fine powder, sieve them, mix them in a one-to-one ratio, then add honey and knead them into a dough until the powder and honey are completely blended.

Roll the incense balls into lotus seed-sized balls, then pour lotus leaf powder into a small bowl, roll the incense balls in the small bowl, and let a layer of lotus leaf powder stick to the surface of the incense balls. Put them in a cool and dry place to dry.

After the incense is made, it can be used directly or stored in a cellar. If the incense balls are properly stored, the longer they are stored, the purer the fragrance will be, just like aged wine.

Place the incense balls in the aromatherapy burner, light a candle underneath to heat it, and in a short while, the rich cypress leaf scent will slowly diffuse along with the fresh and elegant lotus leaf scent.

It has both the elegant fragrance of lotus leaves and the mountain forest scent of cypress leaves. It blends the sweet and cool fragrance, which is fresh and refined, very pleasant to the nose, and very suitable for use in the hot summer.

Soon, the natural incense began to help Hualei collect money again. Of course, before collecting money, Hualei gave a copy to each of his superiors and colleagues in the Agriculture Bureau, asking them to wear it when inspecting the cornfield.

The officials of the Ministry of Agriculture were very happy, but only Hualei herself knew that while she was being friendly and considerate, she was also using them to promote her incense pills for free, and the effect was quite good. After all, the best promotion is to make others accept and approve without making a sound, and Hualei can be said to have taken it to the extreme.

Soon, shampoo, cypress powder, and lotus cypress pills were also sold to Yongjia Prefecture and Chengyun Prefecture. A few days later, they followed Liang Xiangyi to several cities in the south of the Yangtze River. Hualei's "profitable" business was getting better and better.

During this period, Rong Jin went to various departments of the imperial court to study, which was somewhat similar to the internship life of a college student in his previous life.

However, during the rest period, he would always find various reasons to follow Hualei, under the pretext that he needed to learn by doing. Of course, Xiaoyuan was personally taken by Marquis Pei to practice horseback archery.

After Hua Lei refused several times and saw no effect at all, she just let him do it.

Soon, the corn planted in Shangjing City was about to mature. According to the tool samples provided by Hualei, the Agriculture Bureau asked the Ministry of Industry to help make a batch of threshing tools.

In early October, corn fields everywhere were ready for harvesting, and officials from the Ministry of Agriculture led a group of people to pick all the corn cobs.

Then, taking advantage of the sunny weather, they quickly dried the corn cobs and used tools to shred the corn cobs. Finally, they weighed them and found that the corn yield per mu was more than 660 kilograms. The yield of corn in Hualei Village, which was particularly good, reached 710 kilograms.

This is much higher than the yield of about 350 kilograms per mu of rice and wheat. A series of data was quickly sent to Emperor Shengwu's imperial study. After reading it, Emperor Shengwu was very pleased.

While Hua Lei was still immersed in the joy of the corn harvest but had not yet figured out how to process the corn again, Emperor Sheng Wu sent a shadow guard to Hua Lei's farm.

I bought all of Hualei's corn and luckily I still had some corn seeds left for next year, but not even a pound of the rest was left for Hualei.

When Hua Lei was about to express his dissatisfaction, the shadow guard silently and generously threw down a silver note of 50,000 taels, which blocked all of Hua Lei's bargaining. Hahaha, 50,000 taels, Hua Lei was very satisfied.

So, he happily accepted the silver note, and very attentively sent people to deliver all the corn needed by Emperor Shengwu to the long line of carriages brought by the shadow guards.

After the corn was loaded, only a large number of corn cobs and corn husks were left on the field. Hualei had others collect all the corn cobs and send them to the warehouse, preparing to continue expanding his mushroom farming plan.

This year we planted a lot of corn and had a bumper harvest, so the corn cobs filled several warehouses.

It looks like there will be a bumper harvest of mushrooms this year. But it doesn’t matter. No matter how many mushrooms there are, they can be used in the farm and in the bun shop.

Now, in addition to making chili mushroom sauce and mushroom MSG, Hualei has also produced many new mushroom derivatives, so Hualei has no need to worry about not using up the products.

There are even more corn husks this year. Last year, Hualei gave the corn husks to Aunt Zhao to make snacks, and they lasted for a long time. However, this year there are too many corn husks.

There was no way they could use up all the corn husks to make snacks. So Hualei decided to recycle the waste. In her past life, many places used corn husks to make paper, so she decided to give it a try.

Tear the corn husks into thin strips, the thinner the better, then put them into a pot and simmer over low heat, adding alkaline water filtered through wood ash during the cooking process.

Then take it out and wash it with clean water, cut it into fine powder with a knife, put it into a stone mill to grind it into slurry, mix it into a certain proportion, and then make paper with a specially customized papermaking frame. After drying, it can be used.

Before making it, Hualei went to Guijijiu's papermaking workshop to learn for a few days. She also borrowed some tools from Guijijiu and then imitated them herself. However, it is much simpler than Guijijiu's papermaking workshop.

However, in order to avoid misunderstanding, Hua Lei told Gui Jijiu clearly that her business would not affect his paper mill, so Gui Jijiu generously lent her his tools.

Hua Lei knew the general production process and had the tools from Gui Jijiu's house. She then asked the people on the farm to experiment a few more times. Half a month later, the paper made from corn husks was successfully made.

Because the technology is simple and there are no better tools, the paper produced is relatively rough and somewhat uneven.

It is unlikely to be used for writing, but it is very practical to put it in the toilet. Now in the Dasheng Dynasty, the toilets generally use relatively poor quality paper bought from outside, of course, this is also what the aristocratic families can afford.