Chapter 9： Grilled Fish and Pond Digging

"Snapped!"

Jiang Xuan picked up a suitable black gravel from the creek and threw it hard at a big stone. The gravel cracked with a sound. Jiang Xuan picked up a thin piece of stone, and the fracture was very sharp.

Afterwards, he untied a large fish from the rattan, used stone flakes to remove the scales and gills, and opened the intestines and guts.

"A lot of fish oil!"

The fish in autumn is very fat, and there is a lot of fish oil in the stomach.

Jiang Xuan is very happy. Most of the beasts on the mountain are lean meat with very little fat. For the tribesmen, meat and oil are a good thing, and they are more popular than lean meat.

He tore off the fish oil little by little, put it in a bamboo tube, left the swim bladder, and threw the rest aside.

Fish bladder is fish foam. After drying and boiling, fish bladder glue can be obtained, which is a highly viscous adhesive glue.

Chishao and Uncaria also found sharp stones and helped kill the fish together. After all the fish were prepared, Jiang Xuan got about a pound of fish oil and more than a dozen swim bladders of different sizes.

As for those fish offal, Jiang Xuan asked Chishao to pack them in a bamboo tube and poured them all into the pool he dug before, so as to attract more fish.

After finishing, Jiang Xuan and others rinsed all the fish and took them back to the bamboo house to roast.

In fact, they couldn't eat so many fish in one meal, because these dozen or so fish together weighed at least fifty or sixty kilograms.

But there is no way, if you don't dry all these fish, in autumn weather, at most one day and night, these fish will stink.

In the bamboo house, above the fire pond, there is a thick bamboo beam, which is not very high, and you can reach it by standing up and straightening your hand.

There are a dozen or two braided ropes hanging from the bamboo beams. The ends of these ropes are tied with nooses, which can be connected to other ropes to hang uneaten meat.

The flames of the fire pond are endless day and night. The high temperature and smoke constantly smoke and roast the meat hanging on the beam. Mosquitoes cannot approach, bacteria are difficult to breed, and the meat will become drier and drier. This method can prolong the preservation time of the meat. .

This method was not conceived by Jiang Xuan, but a habitual practice of the Lu tribe, the survival experience and wisdom of the tribe.

If it weren't for this method, raw meat wouldn't last long without salt.

"Leave two to eat later, and hang the rest."

Jiang Xuan and Gocten tied the fish one by one to the ropes hanging from the beam, and hung them high above the fire pit to be smoked by fireworks.

There were two fish, which were pierced with wooden sticks and roasted beside the fire.

For the dozen or so swim bladders, Jiang Xuan found a thin vine and hung it on the wall of the bamboo house for later use.

Jiang Xuan added some firewood to the fire pond, and the fire quickly burned extremely vigorously. The fire reflected the fish and the faces of the five people.

There was a circle of big stones by the fire pond. Jiang Xuan put the wooden sticks wearing the fish on the two opposite big stones, and it was enough to turn the fish from time to time, instead of always holding it in his hand.

Although the fish has been cleaned, it still has a faint fishy smell.

"A fishy smell..." Jiang Xuan seemed to remember something.

"Don't grill the fish first, I'll go out."

Jiang Xuan moved the fish aside, then stood up, picked up the bone and walked outside, Chi Shao hurriedly followed, fearing that Jiang Xuan would go too far and be in danger.

"Xuan, where are you going?"

"I'm going to find some spice."

"What is a spice?" Chi Shao was puzzled.

"You'll find out later."

Jiang Xuan walked into the forest to the right of the bamboo forest, and before he walked too far, he saw a plant with yellowed edges.

He walked over and tried to pull it out first, but it didn't work, so he dug out the plant together with the underground tuberous roots with a bone stalk. The thin roots of the plant broke, and a pungent smell spread out.

This is a wild ginger, which can be seen everywhere in the southern deserted mountains and forests, and there are several in the adjacent areas, but Jiang Xuan did not dig any more.

Chishao looked at the wild **** that Jiang Xuan had dug up: "This is a herbal medicine that can detoxify. What are you digging for?"

Tribal people use many herbs, and wild ginger, which is common in the mountains, is also one of them.

"I heard from people in the tribe that this herb can not only detoxify, but also remove the fishy smell and make the grilled meat more fragrant. I want to see if it can be used to grill fish."

Jiang Xuan pushed the matter to the people of the deer tribe without blushing and beating hearts.

"Really? Why haven't I heard of it?"

Chi Shao was skeptical, but she didn't ask any further questions. It wasn't her character to ask the truth.

"You'll know when you go back and try."

Jiang Xuan walked back with Gu Si and wild ginger, Chi Shao thought about it, there is no harm anyway, just try it.

Jiang Xuan returned to the bamboo house, put down the bones, washed the wild **** by the stream, broke off the stems and leaves on it, and cut the wild **** into several pieces with sharp stone chips.

After returning to the bamboo house, Jiang Xuan divided the wild **** into two halves, stuffed them into the stomachs of two grilled fish, and sewed the fish stomachs together with thin vines to prevent the wild **** slices from falling out.

Jiang Xuan placed another big stone on the edge of the fire, and placed two fish on it. Then, he pulled the red-hot charcoal fire from the center of the fire, and grilled the fish directly over the charcoal fire.

Fish grilled on an open fire will burn, but the charcoal fire is relatively mild, and the grilled fish is not easy to burn.

Time passed bit by bit, and under the charcoal fire, the grilled fish gradually exuded the aroma of meat, and at the same time there was a faint smell of wild ginger.

The surface of the fish was gradually browned, and the fragrance permeated the whole bamboo house.

"You can eat it!"

Jiang Xuan placed the two grilled fish on a clean stone plate, then used chopsticks to pick up a piece of fish meat from the back of the grilled fish, blew it, and put it into his mouth.

When building the bamboo house, he used bamboo to sharpen several pairs of chopsticks. Unfortunately, apart from himself and Chishao, Uncaria and others prefer to eat directly with their hands.

The fish is roasted for a long time, and the roasting is relatively dry. The rich meat flavor is also accompanied by the fragrance of wild ginger.

This original ecological freshwater fish has excellent taste and taste. Even if only two slices of wild **** are placed, it tastes delicious.

"It tastes good, let's try it."

Jiang Xuan continued to eat while greeting.

Chi Shao also picked up a pair of chopsticks. She was not used to using chopsticks, but Jiang Xuan liked it, so she tried her best to get used to it, so that Jiang Xuan would not be alone.

Chishao clumsily took a piece of fish with chopsticks and held it with her hands, for fear of falling.

After she put the fish in her mouth, she chewed it a few times and nodded with satisfaction, her eyes narrowed slightly because of her smile, like a crescent moon.

"With that herb added, it is indeed much better roasted than before."

Chishao fully affirmed Jiang Xuan's method of stuffing wild **** into the fish's stomach and grilling the fish.

"Hot, hot, hot..."

Uncaria, Shi Loach, and Nan Xing directly tore the fish meat with their hands.

"delicious!"

"Xuan, your grilled fish is amazing!"

"I still want to eat."

The three of them quickly ate a big fish. The big fish didn't have any small fish bones, and Jiang Xuan was roasted dry. Therefore, although they ate fast, no one was caught by the fish bones.

After eating the two big fish, the five of them were still not satisfied, and then skewered the fish oil on small wooden sticks, grilled them on a charcoal fire, and then ate them.

The taste of fish oil is actually not very good, but no one cares, as long as it can be eaten.

After eating the fish, Jiang Xuan thought to himself, it would be great if he could boil a pot of fish soup, and he would be bored if he always eats grilled things.

However, you need a pot to make soup. If you don't have a pot, you need at least a crock pot.

"Crock pot..."

Jiang Xuan muttered in a low voice, his eyes lit up: "Why don't you burn some pottery?"

Chi Shao, who was beside him, heard his words and said in surprise: "Xuan, do you still make pottery? How much did you learn in the tribe?"

Chi Shao always has an unreal feeling that her own younger brother is so powerful, why didn't she find out before?

There are indeed people in the deer tribe who can make pottery. Although it is only the most primitive and simple earthen pottery, it is also pottery and has the basic functions and characteristics of pottery.

Jiang Xuan said embarrassedly, "I've only seen them do it. As for whether it can be fired successfully, we'll have to try it."

Chi Shao nodded and said, "Then try it, Xuan, I believe in you."

This place is rich in resources. Now there is a method of fishing, plus hunting and digging for plant roots. As long as you are diligent, it is not particularly difficult to save enough food for five people for winter.

There are fewer people, more resources, and the pressure to survive is much less than in the deer tribe.

"Okay, I'll try my best!"

In order to drink the broth, Jiang Xuan decided to try making pottery.

In fact, the manufacture of pottery is not complicated. You only need to choose the appropriate clay, and after repeated beating, kneading, and kneading, it will be shaped into a vessel.

As long as you try a few times and summarize your experience, you should be able to succeed.

There is clay by the creek, which is white in color and very fine. They are good materials for making clay pots.

However, before making pottery, there is one more pressing matter, which is to dig a pond.

Since the fishing traps are effective, they will definitely catch a lot of fish in the future, so they can't be hung up and smoked, right? What a huge fire pit!

The best way is to dig a pond, raise these fish, and eat them whenever you want. You don't have to worry about keeping them, and the small fish can be raised.

Early the next morning, Jiang Xuan got up, took two half-smoked fish from the top of the fire pond, roasted them for everyone to feast on, and then began to prepare tools for digging the pond.

As the saying goes, if a worker wants to do a good job, he must first sharpen his tools.

A good tool can greatly improve the efficiency of work.

With the help of Chi Shao and others, Jiang Xuan spent a whole day making three bone scallops again. Adding the first two, they had five bone scallops, and everyone could have one.

Then, they spent another day weaving three rattan baskets of different sizes with rattan to transport the excavated soil.

On the third day, they finally started digging the pond.

Jiang Xuan chose a place in front of the bamboo forest that was relatively close to the creek and had a relatively flat terrain. After eradicating the weeds and shrubs on it, the five of them dug soil at the same time with the bone scorpion. .

Because of the backward tools, they dug a pond that was six meters long, four meters wide, and half a meter deep. It took them eight full days to complete it.

Jiang Xuan spent another day using the reconciled wet mud to paste the embankments on the four sides of the pond. com is not prone to water leakage.

After pasting the embankment, Jiang Xuan inserted a small fence made of branches at the water outlet, so that it would be difficult for the fish to escape.

After everything was done, Jiang Xuan dug a diversion canal to divert the stream water into the pond.

"Crash..."

The stream was running, filling the pond little by little.

Jiang Xuan and the five stood by the pond, watching the pond's water level rise little by little, their hearts filled with a sense of accomplishment.

"Xuan, after digging the pond, will we have more fish to eat in the future?" Nan Xing asked longingly.

Jiang Xuan smiled and said, "Yes, one day, we will have more fish than we can eat."

"Great!"

Nan Xing suddenly laughed happily, as did Uncaria and Shiloh.

Chi Shao looked at Jiang Xuan and said, "I really hope this day will come soon, so that everyone will no longer have to worry about going hungry."

Jiang Xuan nodded, he believed that as long as he worked hard, that day would come sooner or later.

After the pond is dug, the fish caught by the fishing trap will no longer be shot to death.

They used rattan baskets to fish out the fish in the pond, and then used animal skin bags to put the live fish back into the pond for stocking.

After a few days, the newly dug pond was no longer empty, and many fish were swimming in the water.

However, they soon discovered new problems.

Carnivorous fish often bite grass-eating fish. Even if the grass-eating fish is relatively large, they will be bitten all over the body and even killed.

Helpless, Jiang Xuan could only drain the water in the pond and rebuilt a pond in the middle of the pond to keep carnivorous fish and herbivorous fish separately.

Although the carnivorous fish will still bite each other, the herbivorous fish can survive anyway, just throw some aquatic plants as food for them every day.