Chapter 567 Leisure in the Mountains
“This is a mountain crab. It won’t grow very big to begin with. The ones you just caught are already quite big. Look around more to find more and catch more. Use oil when you get home. It’s fried, crispy and delicious.”
Zhang An opened the bag in Fatty’s hand and looked at it. There were more than a dozen black mountain crabs caught inside.
Although its size is not comparable to other crabs, it is already quite large among mountain crabs.
“It’s so big, it looks like it’s all shells and there’s no meat, is it really edible?”
The fat man looked at these little things he caught in disbelief. It was so small. He had seen so many crabs, but he had never seen one so small.
He didn't even think that this thing could be eaten. He went into the water to look for it just now, just out of curiosity, he wanted to catch some for fun, and take some back to the naughty children in the village.
After all, he has been in the village for a long time. He knows that the naughty children in the village like these things. Birds, insects, etc. can make them happy for a long time.
“It’s edible, but why can’t it be eaten? This thing is fried until crispy, and sprinkled with some chili pepper, it will make you want to eat it again.”
Zhang An is full of confidence. I promised Fatty that as a rural child, who has never eaten fried mountain crab?
However, although this thing is delicious to eat, it cannot be eaten often, because this mountain crab is used for medicine and is cold in nature, so it is not suitable to eat too much.
And in the past, there was another crucial reason: fried mountain crabs required a lot of vegetable oil.
At that time, a pound of vegetable oil would last for an average person for several days. Who would be willing to use it to fry something that was not filling enough?
"If that's the case, then I'll catch more."
Fat Man absolutely believed in Zhang An's guarantee, because he knew that Zhang An was the best guy among all the people he knew. The best eater.
"Hmm, don't catch them if they are too small. Try to get as many big ones as possible. And this thing is not only found in water, it can be found in any damp place."
The reason why mountain crabs are named "mountain" is because they can live out of the water. Some damp soil and under rocks are their ideal habitats.
Then Zhang An found a mountain spring with relatively large water, cleaned up the two prey, and then cut the meat into pieces.
He went around and folded some branches and put the divided pieces of meat on skewers.
The pickling is quite simple, except that Zhang An found some weeds nearby and brought them over to remove the smell. All that was left was to put in some seasonings, because they didn’t bring much with them when they went out this time. .
In the end, it didn't take much time for Zhang An to pick up the dry firewood that Fatty and the others had picked up and light up the small fire pit.
Then Zhang An did not rush to take the dressed meat to the fire to roast, but ran to the stream and started kneading the mud.
“Hey Zhang An, what are you doing with all this mud?”
Others saw Zhang An playing with mud and were curious about what he wanted to do.
If this mud was going to be used to make beggar's chicken, the pheasant that Zhang An brought back would have been cut into pieces by five horses.
"Hey, look what this is, I'm going to give you a different way to eat it."
Seeing everyone asking about it, Zhang An smiled slightly and took the food he had just eaten from his pocket. Take out the few eggs you picked up from the chicken coop.
Today he is going to prove that eggs are not just eaten fried, boiled or pickled, but can also be eaten burnt.
Then Zhang An wrapped the green-shelled wild eggs in his hand with the reconciled mud, just like making preserved eggs.
Because the mud was a little too thin, we could only take it to a dry place and roll it with dry mud, and then stuff all the eggs wrapped in mud into the bottom of the fire pit.
"The new way of eating you are talking about is not burning eggs, is it?"
When several people saw Zhang An stuffing the eggs under the fire pit, they realized that Zhang An was talking about burning eggs.
I have to say that this way of eating is really new to them, because they have never eaten like this before.
"Yes, you can eat it after it's cooked. Now we're going to start grilling meat. You can see for yourself whether you want grilled chicken or rabbit."
Zhang After An threw all the eggs in, he found that the dry firewood in the fire pit had lost its smoke, leaving only an open flame. The meat was ready to be skewered and barbecued.
Since there were two types of pheasant meat and hare meat, Zhang An let them choose.
"Then I want rabbit meat. I have never eaten such roasted rabbit meat before."
Zhang Zilin was the first to choose and went straight over to pick out a piece of rabbit meat.
Su Ying and Li Li didn't care, because they had eaten both pheasants and hares many times.
“Those, Fatty, Old Ding, hurry up and barbecue.”
Although each person has one piece, six pieces need to be baked at a time. Zhang An only has two hands, so he will definitely not be able to bake them.
So they caught Fatty and Ding Yi, so that it would be just right for each of them to grill two skewers.
"I'm here to bake together, I've never tried it before."
Zhang Zilin seemed to be very interested in these, and immediately ran over from the group of sisters and followed Zhang An and the other three grown men gathered together by the fire pit to barbecue.
Zhang An didn’t say anything. Although it would be a little hot to grill meat around the fire, it was actually not too hot because the branches Zhang An used to skewer the meat were very long and everyone was sitting quite far away.
“By the way, how do you bake this? Can you just hold it like this all the time?”
Although Zhang Zilin, like everyone else, is grilling meat with branches, she has never done it before. I had experienced this before, so I asked.
"It's okay, just hold it and bake it. I will tell you how to bake it later. Just do as I say."
Zhang An gave her a The reassuring look in his eyes was just a look at him, and Fatty and Ding Yi would also ask him to remind him later.
“Okay, but the outside of my piece of meat has begun to burn. Do I need to keep roasting it?”
Zhang Zilin looked at the piece of rabbit meat on her branch, which kept making a sizzling sound and was slightly burnt to the naked eye, and couldn't help but asked worriedly.
"It's just grilling like this. It's not time to turn it over yet. Let's grill it over an open flame. The outside will definitely be charred. As long as it's not too charred, it's fine. And a little charred is actually fine. It’s quite delicious, crispy on the outside and tender on the inside.”
Zhang An smiled and comforted Zhang Zilin, and then reminded everyone to turn over.
Then he took out a bunch of peppercorns, salt and chili peppers from his pocket and prepared to spread them.
“Why did you bring these?”
Smelling the five-flavored aroma from the chili powder in Zhang An’s hand, the fat man shrugged his nose and asked.
He really likes Zhang An’s chili powder because Wang Fang prepared it himself and it tastes particularly fragrant.
In fact, Zhang An had already taken out the salt and peppercorns to marinate the meat just now, but they didn't look at it. They just thought it was the wild herbs Zhang An picked from the stream to marinate the meat.
"What's this? I always take it with me when I go into the mountains. It doesn't take up any space anyway."
In fact, Zhang An didn't have this habit before. I learned it there. When the old man went into the mountains, he would take out all the seasoning packets.
In his words, if you take it with you a little, sometimes you can get enough of it when you go into the mountains.
Later, Zhang An often prepared some and placed them in the space.
After roasting for more than ten minutes, the pieces of meat on everyone’s hands were already sizzling and oily, and the aroma was constantly wafting.
Even the two little guys were attracted. They didn't care about playing. They were already lying on their father's back, drooling and staring at the pieces of meat on the branches.
“Wow, it smells so good. Is it already cooked?”
Not to mention the two little guys, even Zhang Zilin was amused by the smell of meat. of.
“It still needs to be roasted for a while, because I haven’t thinned the meat, it’s still quite thick. Even though it’s cooked on the outside, it’s still raw on the inside, but you have to flip it diligently next. It’s a little bit, so you don’t have to burn the outside into char.”
Zhang An said, using a knife to cut the piece of meat on his hand, and sure enough, it was bright red and white inside.
Actually, it’s not unpalatable now, because this is what foreigners call medium rare.
It's just that since we are all Chinese, we should bake more. He really can't eat medium rare.
The most important thing is that whether it is a hare or a pheasant, they are both wild animals, and they should be thoroughly roasted to make people feel at ease.
After another ten minutes of roasting, all the firewood in the fire pit had been burned into charcoal, and the open flame was much smaller than before.
But Zhang An no longer plans to fill it with firewood. This kind of charcoal fire is most suitable for barbecue.
Then Zhang An roasted two pieces of meat with one hand, and holding a short stick in the other hand, he poked out all the muddy eggs that had been stuffed in from under the fire pit.
"The eggs have been cooked? The mud outside has been burned into black charcoal. Can the eggs still be eaten?"
The fat man saw that the ones he picked out were all burned one by one. Heitan's stuff asked hesitantly.
“Don’t worry, it’s definitely edible. Even though the mud has been burned into carbon, the eggs inside are still white and tender when opened.”
Zhang An is very confident about this. , the beggar's chicken has not been burnt, let alone the egg still has a layer of eggshell.
“Okay, okay, no need to bake it anymore, it’s already cooked, everyone can eat it, but be careful not to burn it.”
When you see that the pieces of meat you are holding are no longer sizzling and oily, but have become slightly dry, this means that they are cooked.
When Zhang An said this, the first person who couldn't help it was the fat man. This guy took two fingers and tore off a small piece of his meat, and couldn't wait to put it into his mouth. inside.
“Hiss, it’s so hot, so hot, but it’s so delicious, even better than the ones I bought on the street.”
This guy is a foodie, and he opened his mouth while eating. He exhaled through his big mouth and blew on his fingers.
But even though he kept shouting, his mouth never stopped.
Zhang An handed one string to Su Ying, stuck the other string on the ground, and then walked towards the upper reaches of the stream.
When he came back just now, he seemed to have found some wild taro not far ahead.
Wild taro is not like the taro grown at home. Even if it is cooked and eaten, it is still numb. Zhang An naturally does not like it, but is attracted by its wide leaves.
This thing is similar to a lotus leaf. I just pick some and wash them with water and put them on the barbecue for everyone.
Not long after, Zhang An came back with a thick pile of wild taro leaves, about a dozen of them.
"Come on, come on, it's more convenient to use this as a cushion."
After Zhang An rinsed the picked leaves with water, he distributed them to everyone.
"This is good, this is good. With this, you don't have to worry about the oil dripping everywhere when you tear the meat."
After the fat man took a leaf, he immediately threaded it on the branch The piece of meat was pulled out, and the others followed suit.
Zhang An didn't stop at this time, but walked aside and peeled off the peat one by one from the eggs he had just cooked.
The eggshell inside is no longer as green as the one he brought back just now, but has been burned into black charcoal like the mud outside. This may be because Zhang An was slightly wrapped in mud just now. The wrap is a little thinner.
But even so, when Zhang An cracked the eggshell open, the eggs inside were white and tender, almost as good as cooked ones.
It’s just that the steaming eggs at this moment, although I haven’t eaten them yet, smell really delicious, much more fragrant than boiled white eggs.
"Come on, come on, let's all try the roasted eggs."
There were seven eggs in total. After Zhang An peeled them off, he wrapped them in taro leaves and brought them to everyone.
"You have to try it. I have never eaten cooked eggs before."
The fat man is always the first, but this time he did not directly grab the steaming eggs with his hands. It is wrapped in taro leaves.
After all, his hands are not the legendary ruthless iron hands. They have learned a lesson when they tore the flesh just now.
"Don't worry, it's bland and tasteless. Break the egg in half and I'll sprinkle some chili powder on you."
Zhang An asked the fat man to break the egg and take it out He was sprinkled with paprika.
This is actually a crooked way of eating. Although it is not serious in the eyes of many adults, it tastes very good. Zhang An liked to eat like this when he was a child.
"Woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo. Sprinkled with chili powder, it immediately felt like a dark dish, but after taking a bite, I no longer doubted it.
Seven eggs, just the right amount, one for each person. The two little guys are too young, so one of them is enough for the two brothers.
“Zhang An, give it to you, I can’t eat any more.”
At this time, Su Ying handed the half piece of meat left in her hand to Zhang An.
After giving birth to little Siqi, her appetite returned to its original state. She ate breakfast again in the morning, but now she couldn't eat much.
Although everyone only has half a piece of meat, this half piece is not small, weighing half a catty.
Su Ying was able to eat most of it because she fed Xiao Siqi together.
On the other side, Li Li also had a lot left over, and she gave them all to Ding Yi.
Of the three women, only Zhang Zilin ate with gusto and looked like she was almost finished.
(End of this chapter)