My Apprenticeship to Uncle Jiu: I Was a Warlord in the Republic of China

Chapter 183 Discussing the Making of Pumpkin Wine

After Old Wu left, Jiang Li arranged for people to transport half of the newly purchased weapons and equipment to various companies.

As for the remaining half, they would naturally be kept to equip the new army.

Speaking of the new army, Jiang Li is imitating Li Yunlong's approach in Bright Sword, delegating the power to recruit soldiers to lower levels and allowing them to recruit new soldiers on their own.

But they were also afraid that those company commanders would be too arrogant and refuse to obey orders, so every once in a while, they would consciously call back their newly recruited soldiers in the name of unified training.

He kept the number of soldiers under his command within a reasonable range, and his training ground in Tengteng County was expanded again and again.

Now the training of grassroots officers and ordinary soldiers has become a routine, which is obviously more formal and more organized than before.

Currently, there are 900 people training in the training ground. The training will be completed in another month, and we can expand the territory again by then.

He also specially selected a company and reorganized it into an artillery company to train them specifically in the use of grenade launchers.

He has already made a plan. After they are trained, it would be a good choice to either directly send them out to fight or disperse them to various companies to give them stronger firepower.

However, for several days, he stayed at home with Ren Tingting and did not run around.

That morning, Old Wu found Jiang Li to report, "Master, the construction materials you mentioned are almost ready. When do you think we should start construction?"

Jiang Li looked at Old Wu with some hesitation, but Ren Tingting said, "Brother Li, go and take care of the business first. I also need to practice the Hehuan Jue, so I may not have time to accompany you."

When Jiang Li heard this, he knew that Ren Tingting said this on purpose. After all, which pregnant woman doesn't want her husband to be with her?

Although his current situation seems to be pretty good, he knows how the situation will develop in the future. If he is not careful, he may face a catastrophic disaster.

This forced him to expand his strength as quickly as possible in order to cope with the situation that was about to happen.

So when he heard the way Ren Tingting gave him, he took it and didn't argue with her. Ren Tingting felt a little disappointed when she saw this, but she didn't show it on her face and still faced it with a smile.

After gathering his men, Jiang Li set off for Tengteng Town. Since there were five more three-wheeled motorcycles, they spent less time on the road and arrived in Tengteng County in just over two hours.

As soon as they arrived at the place, Jiang Li and the construction master observed everywhere and constantly improved the construction drawings. Finally, at night, they finally determined the specific specifications and dimensions of the building.

He gave orders to have someone give the construction workers some money and start work the next day. If there were not enough materials, he would notify the mayor to purchase them.

He had only one requirement, which was to restore the building on the drawing with guaranteed quality and quantity.

In the evening, he consulted Jiang Daniu about the current development of Tengteng County and learned that there was no more arable land to attract people, and not many people came to settle here during this period, only two or three hundred people.

However, due to the construction of various workshops and factories, hundreds of young men and women came to work, and more vendors came to purchase goods, which did add some floating population to Tengteng County.

Tengteng County now has about 4,700 to 4,800 people, which is considered a county of fairly good size.

The next day, Jiang Li went to inspect the new house again. After some observation, he found that the basic construction had been completed, with only some minor finishing work yet to be completed.

So he waved his hand and transferred most of the people away, leaving only a small number of people to finish the work. After all, more manpower was needed in other places, and he was not in a hurry to move, so it would be no problem to move a month or two later.

For two consecutive days, he ran around, inspecting the pumpkin processing factory, the parking lot, and going to the mountains outside the county to check the survival rate of medicinal herbs. In short, he was never idle for a moment.

But that day Jiang Daniu told Jiang Li that the weather had changed in the past few days and there were some problems with drying the pumpkins, so the processing of these fresh pumpkins at the factory had slowed down.

At this rate, the batch of pumpkins in the warehouse might not be processed in time. Hearing this, Jiang Li immediately went to the warehouse to check, hoping to find some way to solve the problem.

He was in the warehouse, checking the processed dried pumpkin and various pumpkin products, such as pumpkin candy, pumpkin seeds, etc., which filled half of the warehouse.

What surprised Jiang Li the most was that he found more than 200 jars in the warehouse where grain and dry goods were stored. When he opened them and smelled them, he found that they were actually wine.

After asking, I found out that Jiang Daniu found a wine-making master from somewhere, and he could actually make wine with pumpkin.

Because Jiang Li came back some time ago and he was so busy during this period, he actually forgot about her.

So the winemaker took a few apprentices with him to make some wine with pumpkins. Now there are fifty jars and more than five hundred kilograms of pumpkin wine stored in the warehouse.

Jiang Li opened a jar and tasted it, and found that its taste was different from white wine, rice wine and yellow wine. Although it was not top-notch, it had its own flavor.

So he found the gray-haired winemaker and asked, "What's the name of this master? I just tasted this pumpkin wine, and it tastes unique."

"I wonder if you can produce this pumpkin wine in large quantities if I give you more people?"

"Mr. County Governor, you are too kind to me. My real name is Wang Shouyi. You can just call me Old Man Wang."

"As for Mr. County Governor, I'm afraid what you said is a little difficult to handle. This pumpkin wine is not like other wines. The taste of this wine is relatively light and it can't be stored for that long. It will go bad in one or two months at most. So it's easy to produce in large quantities, but it's difficult to store it!"

Jiang Li frowned when he heard this. He had also read about it in his previous life and knew the fermentation principle of wine, which was to convert sugar into alcohol through microbial metabolism.

The sugar content of pumpkin is not too high, so the alcohol content of the wine made from it will naturally not be too high, so it is reasonable that it is not resistant to storage.

But now he didn't want him to be too reasonable. What he wanted was long-term storage of wine so that he could dispose of the large amount of pumpkins in the warehouse.

If it cannot be stored for a long time, then this pumpkin wine is of no use.

But then he thought, the low alcohol content can be distilled, and then it won't be a problem to purify medical alcohol.

So he quickly said to Wang Shouyi, "Mr. Wang, if we use distillation to purify this pumpkin wine, can it be stored for a long time?"

Wang Shouyi frowned when he heard this. "This distillation method is feasible, but the pumpkin wine is made for its flavor. If it is distilled, it will destroy its flavor. By then, there will be no other flavor except the wine. I'm afraid no one will be able to accept it!"