Chapter 85 - Smoked Meat

After Xiao Sheng threw a few stones down to confirm that the wild boar was no longer a threat, he jumped into the pit from the ground and let Yu Bing throw down one end of the rope. Then, he tied the wild boar with the rope.

He tried his best to hold it up in the trap while the three people on the ground pulled the rope with all their might. The four of them quickly carried the wild boar up. Xiao Sheng took a few steps back and used the momentum to climb up to the ground.

Everyone quickly carried the wild boar back to the wooden house and prepared to kill the pig!

The wild boar’s blood filled more than half the basin. After they spinkled some salt, they waited at the side for it to solidify.

Although Xiao Sheng didn’t have any experience killing pigs, everyone would watch when the village slaughtered pigs and distributed pork at the end of every year. Fortunately, he hadn’t watched for nothing all these years.

Xiao Sheng first used the iron pot to scald the skin and remove the fur. After he cut the pig in half, Yu Bing immediately went forward and smeared the pork with high-quality white wine before letting Xiao Sheng continue.

Jiang Chun and Yu Bing took advantage of this period to kill the chicken, rabbit, and those big grass carp.

Xiao Sheng was in charge of cutting the meat. Although the meat was cut a little crookedly, he had successfully completed the task of cutting the meat!

It was time for Yu Bing to show off.

Xiao Lin was in charge of grinding the peppercorns, sienna, fennel, cloves, anise, and pepper into granular and powdery forms.

Yu Bing poured the spices that Xiao Lin had ground into the large iron pot and then added salt to stir-fry them. Then, she wrapped the sliced pork, chicken, and rabbit in salt and spices one by one while they were hot. The pieces of meat were placed in various containers that could hold things in an orderly manner.

The fish was a little more troublesome. After removing the fish scales, she cut the fish from the back. However, the abdomen was still connected. Unlike meat, which couldn’t be washed with water, fish had to be washed with clear water. She drained the blood, removed internal organs and the black membrane in the abdomen, then dried the water with a cloth. Then, she smeared salt and spices that had been stirr-fried and cooled before storing them in the container.

This was considered the first step. The next step would be to marinate the meat in the vat for six days, but she would have to flip it once during the process.

It was already afternoon when everyone was done. After leaving the mountain, they returned to their respective homes.

At this moment, the Yu family had already received a letter from Yu Bing. In the letter, Yu Bing first explained why she didn’t have anything to send home. It was because farm work was too intense and her body couldn’t take it anymore. Therefore, she didn’t have the strength to pick fruits and do other things when she rested. She also said that she had gone to the hospital when she was sick and spent a lot of money. She hoped that her family could send some more money over. Otherwise, she was afraid that she wouldn’t be able to last until the day her family asked her to return to the city.

Yu Bing described herself as miserably as possible in the letter and even expressed her longing for her family. Then, she instructed her family to think of a way to send her some nutritional supplements so that she could survive until the day she returned. She also specifically dripped two drops of water on the letter to imitate the traces of tears.

Seeing this, Yu Pan felt a lingering fear in her heart. She touched the nonexistent sweat on her forehead and was glad that she was smart enough to trick Yu Bing into taking her place so that she didn’t have to suffer. She didn’t care that if this letter was true, her sickly biological sister was suffering now!

Yu Wu was looking at the new comic book on the sofa absent-mindedly and didn’t notice what Yu Pan was reading.

Mr. Yu and Mrs. Yu listened carefully, but when they realized that their youngest daughter was asking for subsidies instead of sending them food, they immediately became impatient.

Mrs. Yu snorted. “Other people think of ways to subsidize the family, but she wants to collect more money from the family!”

As for the mention of finding connections to transfer her back, the Yu family automatically ignored it.

After all, they had used this excuse to coax her into going to the village back then. They didn’t really intend to do this. Moreover, they had to fork out money if they wanted to use connections. Their son needed money to find a job and get married. Mr. Yu and Mrs. Yu were worried that the remaining money wasn’t enough to do these things!

Yu Pan nodded in agreement when she heard Mrs. Yu’s words. “That’s right. No matter how much she lacks food, she’s just a single person. There are four people in our family, so four people will be going hungry.”

Yu Pan spoke with conviction, but she once again ignored the fact that the four people in the family were healthy. Moreover, three of them had jobs that weren’t physical. No matter how much of a pinch they were in, they wouldn’t go hungry. Ever since Yu Bing was gone, the number of times they ate meat every month had increased.