Traveling through 70's wine

Wen Qing took time to take care of the forest he contracted.

When she contracted the forest in the spring, she had to go to school and did not have much time to take care of the forest. She only found time to plant more than 30 peach trees. Most of the land was left barren. Now that it is vacation, it is a good time to tidy up the land so that she can plant fruit trees in the fall.

Captain Liu introduced two villagers in their fifties to help her look after the forest. Both of them came from families with heavy burdens and were in financial difficulties. Wen Qing paid them 20 yuan a month.

The two are responsible for planting trees and the daily management of the orchard. After the fruit trees are planted, it usually takes several years for them to start bearing fruit. During this stage, they only need to fertilize, weed, and prevent diseases and pests. There is not much to do, and they still have time to help with farming at home, so both of them are very willing to do so.

Wen Qing took the two of them up the mountain. After the Great Leap Forward, all the big trees on the mountain had been cut down. Now there were only some small trees and shrubs on the mountain. Usually, the villagers went up the mountain to collect firewood.

The three men cleared the rocks, weeds and trees on the mountain and dug a tree pit.

Wen Qing said to the two of them, "I plan to plant fruit trees in the fall. From now on, be careful not to let anyone go up the mountain and damage the fruit trees."

The two forest rangers nodded without saying anything. After signing the contract, all trees on the mountain belonged to the contractor. The Chen family, who contracted the western forest in the village, also said the same thing. The villagers would not randomly cut down trees on other people's land.

She plans to plant peach trees, apricot trees, cherry trees, as well as some apples and pears in this forest.

At night, Wen Qing entered the space and pruned the fruit trees. The pruned branches were directly planted in the fields. A few months were enough for them to grow into saplings, which could be transplanted to the mountains in autumn.

Of course, she will buy some high-quality saplings for grafting when she has the chance in the future.

After the expansion of the winery, some equipment needed to be added. Wen Qing once again found the school-run factory and paid for the equipment, provided the drawings, and ordered processing.

Wen Qing was already very skilled in processing these equipment. It only took him a week to make the distiller, stainless steel tanks, temperature controller, and cooler. He then pulled the items back to the front yard and placed them there until the winery was repaired before installing them.

One day, Wang Jianguo said to her, "Sister Wen, there are ten vats of light-fragrance liquor that have already undergone secondary fermentation. I checked and the temperature of the vats has dropped to 25 degrees. The fermentation should be almost finished. I want to start distilling the liquor tomorrow."

In the evening, Wen Qing put the food in the front yard, ready for use tomorrow.

The two started working early the next morning.

Wen Qing first placed a layer of clean and pre-steamed rice husks on the grate of the steamer. When the steam started to rise, the two of them sprinkled the mash into the steamer and began to distill the wine. A ground jar could hold about 500 kilograms of mash, which could be steamed all at once.

The second batch of wine has a smaller amount of wine than the first batch. The head and tail of the wine are cut off and placed aside, and the body of the wine is put into the jar for aging. It does not take long to distill the second batch of wine. Ten jars of wine can be distilled in two days.

In the evening, after dinner, Wang Jianguo came to the winery, and the two of them started to soak the grain in one go. After soaking it all night, they could proceed to the next step the next day.

Wen Qing said: "Fragrant liquor is usually brewed from a single grain. We use hulled sorghum. We need to slightly break the sorghum before steaming it. Some wineries steam the whole sorghum directly. Both methods are acceptable."

He also said: "To moisten the grain, use hot water above 80 degrees. Moisten the sorghum for 12 hours. Be sure to stir it frequently and try to mix it as evenly as possible."

The two men talked as they worked, stirring the sorghum constantly with shovels.

The two men kept crushing grain, boiling water, moistening grain, and piling it up. They were busy until midnight. Both were sweating profusely and exhausted, but they only moistened 12 kilograms of sorghum.

The next day at noon, Wen Qing came to the winery and checked the grain that had been piled up last night and found that it had been moistened.

She took out the clean rice husks from the space and put them into the steamer to steam them first.

After the rice husks are steamed, they are poured into a clean tank truck. A certain amount of rice husks are added to the moistened sorghum. This is done to make the sorghum easier to steam.

Soon Wang Jianguo arrived. Seeing Wen Qing had already started working, he hurried over to help.

The two men first put a layer of sorghum in the steamer, and after the steam came up, they sprinkled the sorghum into the steamer layer by layer, covered it with a lid, and steamed it over high heat for more than 40 minutes.

Wen Qing opened the lid, took out a handful of sorghum and twisted it open. She found that there was basically no hard core inside. She asked Wang Jianguo to remove the firewood from the stove and not to open the lid in a hurry, so as to let the grain in the steamer simmer for a while.

The two of them ground the koji into fine powder. Wen Qing said, "The fineness of the koji should be determined according to the crushing of the sorghum. If the sorghum is relatively fine, the koji should be ground finer. Our sorghum is relatively coarse, so the koji does not need to be ground too fine."

She pushed the trough cart to the steamer, and together with Wang Jianguo, shoveled the steamed grain into the cart, adding some cold water while shoveling. They then pushed the cart to the drying area, poured the sorghum on the ground, turned on the fan, and turned the grain over to cool it down.

Wen Qing said to Wang Jianguo: "Fen-fragrance liquor requires low temperature and koji. The temperature of adding koji should be controlled below 25 degrees. The top temperature of fermentation in summer cannot exceed 35 degrees, otherwise it will be too sour."

Wait for the temperature to drop slowly, and add the crushed koji according to the proportion.

Wen Qing said to Wang Jianguo: "I think the yeast we mix in during summer can be thicker to prevent it from fermenting too quickly."

Wang Jianguo pondered while working and continued to accumulate experience.

Wen Qing recalled the winemaking techniques of the winery's master chefs. As she worked her way up, she found that she had indeed gained a deeper understanding of the winemaking process and was more confident in making good wine.

After another three days of busy work, Wen Qing and Wang Jianguo finally compacted and sealed ten jars of wine and waited quietly for them to ferment.

Wen Qing checks the temperature of each wine cellar every six hours and records it in a register. He creates such a file for each jar of wine to facilitate later comparison and find the best process.

The temperature in North China is relatively high in summer, and there are no cold water circulation cooling pipes installed in the backyard. She can only turn on the fan to cool down all day long, but the effect is not very good. It seems that she needs to install a set here as well.

After making the light-fragrance liquor, two pools of strong-fragrance liquor have also completed fermentation, and it is time to take out the mash for distillation.

Changxia Distillery's strong-aroma liquor is fermented using the original cellar method. Wang Jianguo learned from the experience brought back by Wen Qing and carried out the entire winemaking process meticulously.

When watching the flowers and picking the wine, he stared at it intently. The wine grew from the size of rice grains to thin threads. He caught the head of the wine three times to test the alcohol content. Only when the alcohol content dropped below 75 degrees did he hurriedly change to a large-mouthed ceramic jar to catch the body of the wine.

Looking at the beer bubbles falling into the jar like jade beads and smelling the fragrant aroma of beer, Wang Jianguo chuckled.

During this period, he studied Wen Qing's notes carefully. He only attended elementary school and could not understand many parts. It was only after asking his son, who was in junior high school, to explain them to him that he finally understood the meaning.

After making wine with Wen Qing several times, he became more and more interested in winemaking. Before making wine each time, he would think over it over in his mind, trying his best to avoid mistakes.

After making twenty jars of light-flavor liquor and ten cellars of strong-flavor liquor in a row, he was exhausted. He found Wen Qing and suggested, "Sister Wen, the winery is about to be expanded. Shouldn't we hire more people?"

Wen Qing nodded, and he continued, "I want to find an apprentice to help me."

Wen Qing patted her head. Yes, she had forgotten about it.

There are only two people in the winery now, and Liu Quan often goes out to sell. Although she also personally participates in making wine during the holidays, it is still very hard for the two of them to steam 2000 kilograms of grain at a time.

After school started, Wang Jianguo was basically the only one there, and the winery was being expanded, so more employees were definitely needed.