Chapter 21: Barbecue

  With fire, Lin Bei thought it was much better, but then he found that the difficulties had just begun.

  With fire, it's natural to roast something to eat. Lin Bei didn't have any stored meat, so he used a branch to pick up a piece of dried meat and put it on the fire to roast. For ten days, everything he ate was cold, so you can imagine how much he craved hot food. However, this time, things took a turn for the worse.

  Watching those knights roast wild game on TV, they're always golden brown and look oily, but in reality, it's all fake. Either that or the knight is a part-time chef god. Anyway, Lin Bei roasted some dried meat for a while, and although the meat was hot, it was also smoked to a dark black color, looking completely unappetizing. Lin Bei furrowed his brow and took the hot meat back to the spring to rinse it off, then put it in his mouth, feeling wet and tasteless.

  Lin Beiguo went to the small river and caught a crayfish. The wild crayfish in the small river were still numerous, and the one Lin Beiguo caught was quite large, about two palms big. He carefully removed some of the shell and used a thin branch to skewer it, then put it on the big fire to roast. When he heard the sizzling sound, Lin Beiguo started to feel good, but before long, the branch was burned off, and the crayfish fell into the fire heap with a "plop" sound. The flames seemed to grow stronger, but in Lin Beiguo's heart, ten thousand horses were galloping wildly.

  Later on, thinking carefully, roasting things doesn't seem very reliable, and you still have to burn things, such as burning sweet potatoes.

  The taro that Lin Bei brought back from outside has sprouted, but it doesn't prevent Lin Bei from digging out one or two to eat. If they taste good, Lin Bei might focus on cultivating these plants in the future. So Lin Bei dug one out, removed the tender shoots, and threw it into the fire pit. Then he carefully arranged the taro to a good position with branches, and added some kindling on top. Hmm, after an hour or two, the taro should be cooked through. As for whether it will be overcooked, Lin Bei can't be sure. If that's still not edible, Lin Bei might have to resort to making beggar's chicken.

  I think every modern person can say the method of making Beggar's Chicken, which is to remove the internal organs of the chicken and wrap it in mud, then throw it into a fire pit to roast. No seasonings are needed, just wait until the mud is dry and the feathers will fall off naturally, saving the trouble of plucking. It is said that this method was created by a beggar in ancient times and has been passed down to modern times, which means there must be something good about it. Even if Lin Bei fails once, he should be able to succeed after several attempts. There are many wild chickens and birds in the forest.

  Thinking of this, Lin Bei temporarily didn't have to worry about his own food, and it was also thanks to the fact that Lin Bei himself was a snake. If he were a lion or something, his appetite would be huge. Lin Bei felt that for now, he could go without eating for a meal, and two or three kilograms of food was enough. As for wanting to eat more? Sorry, Lin Bei was still in the stage of struggling to fill his stomach.

  While roasting the yam, Lin Bei ran to the yam field again and brought back two trees from both sides of the yam field. One was the wild peach tree that Lin Bei had seen first, which he had used a lot of effort to transplant because he had pulled it out alive. The other tree was a soapberry tree.

  Lin Bei had been wandering in the forest for over ten days, and originally thought that there would be apple trees, pear trees, apricot trees, and so on. In the end, he couldn't find any, so he brought these two trees back. As for wild peaches, don't even mention it. This soapberry tree is only a little over two meters tall, because of its slow growth rate, so it's already twenty or thirty years old. Lin Bei brought it back because there are actually many soapberry trees in this forest, with a large area of them on the other side. The largest soapberry tree has at least five hundred years of age, and these small ones are all its descendants. Lin Bei chose one that looked good to bring back, although the surroundings of Longtan are also full of trees, but bringing back wild ones is definitely different. Watching the little tree grow slowly, Lin Bei would feel a sense of accomplishment, and he also had to find something to do, so as not to be too lonely.

  The wild walnut tree is a bit withered, but the soapberry tree grows well. It's fond of light and there's plenty of water here, so it didn't take long to adapt after transplanting. After a few years, when the soapberry tree grows bigger, we can use its fruit to wash things. Who knows, maybe we'll even be able to give some away as gifts when interacting with others. In ancient times, some poor people couldn't even afford soapberry powder, and they had to wash their hair with rice water - how pitiful!

  After indulging in such aimless fantasies for a while, Lin Bei saw that the fire had died down and hastily added a few more sticks of firewood, after which he caught the scent of yam.

  Roasted things are especially fragrant, just like roasted bread. Lin Bei has a colleague whose child loves to stand outside the bakery, but this kid doesn't like eating bread at all.

  The yam wasn't bread, but it still smelled good. However, at this time, it was not yet fully cooked. Lin Bei patiently waited for another half hour before using a branch to pull out the roasted yam with its surface charred.

  He rolled the taro on the ground, one was to remove the sticky skin, and the other was to cool down a bit. When it was almost done, Lin Bei carefully used clean branches to peel off the taro's skin, releasing a tempting fragrance into the air. As he smelled this familiar scent, Lin Bei felt like crying. He had been persistent in doing all these things, wasn't it just to smell this familiar aroma?

  The first time baking, Lin Bei was not very familiar with it. A kilogram of yam, except for the burnt part, still had about half a kilogram left, with white and powdery yam flesh. Lin Bei savored it for nearly half an hour. His feeling was that it tasted slightly sweet, with just the right amount of starch. Two words: delicious.

  "From today on, we'll be roasting things to eat. We should plant more taro and if we can get sweet potatoes and potatoes in the future, we should also plant those. Then we can hunt wild chickens too, and larger birds can also be used as food. Spring has finally arrived at Linbei."

  Lin Bei is a man of action, and he added a few more large logs to the fire. He climbed up the 'Flying Dragon Wall', where there were many wild chickens behind it. With just a casual touch on the bushes, the wild chickens would fly out. Lin Bei directly used his tail to knock down the wild chickens. In less than a minute, Lin Bei had killed three wild chickens, each weighing seven or eight catties, and they were all very fat.

  Lin Bei wouldn't be defeated even if he had to split open his belly. Without a knife, he'd use stones or sharp wooden sticks to cut open the wild chicken's stomach, remove all its internal organs, wash it clean, roll it around in the sweet potato field for several rounds until it became a big lump, then throw it into the fire pit and add some firewood on top. As for whether it would work out in the end, Lin Bei wasn't worried; he had plenty of materials to practice with.

  Two little birds chirped again, Lin Bei quickly climbed up the big locust tree, and found that the crab meat had been eaten by them. Lin Bei sighed, and had to catch shrimp or lobster again.

  "You two little ancestors, you're having a comfortable life, with a place to live and people serving you food and drink. When you grow up, who knows what you'll be like? Will you even recognize me as your 'mother'?"

  Lin Beibei was searching for a hole when ripples suddenly appeared on the surface of the distant river. Lin Beibei wasn't too concerned, as there were many small insects on the water's surface that could easily cause ripples. But to his surprise, this ripple was heading straight towards him. Lin Beibei immediately became alert and took a closer look, only to burst out laughing - at the bottom of the water was a large tortoise, slowly flipping its four legs and swimming leisurely.

  Actually, there are fish like shrimp and crab, Lin Bei knew that there must be turtles here, but Lin Bei had never explored the small river before, now it's good, the turtle came to the door by itself.

  Kill him? Lin Bei now leans on the beggar chicken for everything, and after thinking about it, he hasn't heard of a dish called "beggar turtle", so he gave up in the end. After all, they are neighbors, who makes sense to move their hands to their neighbors.

  After feeding the two little guys, Lin Bei took out the called flower chicken and found that they were all charred. This was because the mud was not sealed tightly, and when thrown into the fire, it scattered.

  "No wonder others want to wrap lotus leaves, next time I'll just wrap taro leaves."