"Brother Zihou, can you tell us about the situation of the Liao army's annual grass valley shooting?" Zhao Yan suddenly asked after a moment of silence.

When Zhang Zai heard this, he said with a deep pain: "Caogu Valley has always been the tradition of the Liao army. Every autumn harvest, the Liao army would go south. The reason they did this was not just to rob property, but also to train troops. Moreover, when Caogu Valley, the Liao army generally had a team of hundreds of people scattered, raging in our Song Dynasty like locusts. Ordinary small villages could not resist the attacks of these Liao army. Even if they encountered large villages, they would sometimes be defeated by several Liao army 100 teams. Every year, the people on the border of our Song Dynasty were killed or injured, and the lost property was even more uncalculable."

When Zhao Yan and Su Shi heard this, their faces also showed a deep pain, and they hated the Liao Kingdom even more. However, they also knew that no matter how much they hated them, they would not have much impact on the Liao Kingdom. Unless they had the strength to destroy the Liao Kingdom in one fell swoop, this situation would not be changed in a short period of time.

"It's a pity that the court is unwilling to allocate money and grain, and Jiaohe County's annual tax revenue is limited. Otherwise, if I have money in my hands, I can train the village warriors into strong soldiers. Even if I can't defeat the Liao army, there is still no problem to maintain peace in Jiaohe!" At this time, Zhang Zai suddenly sighed. He wanted to build the village warriors into a truly battleable strong army, but unfortunately, he had no money and no food in his hands, so he was powerless.

"Brother Zihou, although I am not a wealthy family like Brother Gonglin, in order to support Jiaohe County, Su is willing to donate a thousand guan to support Brother Zihou in training!" When Su Shi heard this, he immediately spoke. Although one thousand guan is just a drop in the bucket for training, it is also his intention, and this thousand guan is already the limit that Su Shi can take out.

"This..." Zhang Zai didn't know whether to accept Su Shi's kindness, but at this moment, Zhao Yan suddenly smiled and said, "Brother Zizhan is very kind. You are willing to donate to Brother Zihou, you are also willing to train troops, so Brother Zihou, don't refuse!"

After hearing Zhao Yan's persuasion, Zhang Zai had to thank Su Shi. At this time, Zhao Yan smiled and said, "Since Brother Zizhan has invested in donating Brother Zihou, I can't be stingy. It just so happened that the royal palace had a lot of investment last year, so I donated 10,000 yuan. In addition, it is better to teach people how to fish than to give people fish. I will give Brother Zhang Zai another idea to make money. As for whether you can seize this opportunity, it depends on your talent!"

Originally, Zhao Yan wanted to donate more, but he came up with an idea to increase Jiaohe County's fiscal revenue. If Zhang Zai could seize this opportunity, it would definitely be much better than him donating 100,000 yuan.

When Zhang Zai heard that Zhao Yan was willing to invest tens of thousands of yuan, the expression on his face was still very calm. Although 10,000 yuan seemed to be a lot, it could even improve the military skills of the local tyrants. If you want to maintain a strong army, you have to invest a lot of money and food every year, so Zhao Yan's donation can only support one year at most. However, when he heard Zhao Yan finally say that he would give him a wealthy idea, Zhang Zai was also a little moved. He asked anxiously: "Prince, please tell me, I wonder what kind of plan to make money?"

Zhang Zai has always been not very concerned about money. Even after becoming an official, he still lives frugality. He sent all the money he saved to his hometown in Shaanxi to support the students in Guanzhong. When he died, his family had no money to be buried. In the end, his students raised funds, which allowed Zhang Zai to be buried smoothly. However, in order to strengthen the military power of Jiaohe County, he discovered that money was so important for the first time that he wanted to learn from those merchants to do business. Unfortunately, there was no business to do in Jiaohe County. At most, he collected taxes from passers-by merchants, and his annual income was very limited.

"Hehe, when I was wandering on the street with Brother Zizhan, I found that the tofu in Jiaohe County is very famous. We also tasted it and found that Jiaohe tofu is indeed very delicious. My idea for making a fortune is on this tofu. If Jiaohe tofu can be sold to other places, wouldn't it be possible for Jiaohe to have more wealth?" Zhao Yan said with a proud smile at this time.

When Zhang Zai heard that Zhao Yan wanted to make money by selling tofu in Jiaohe County, he was amused and said: "The prince was thinking too simple. Although the tofu in Jiaohe County is very famous, tofu is not durable. Even if it is transported by fast horses, it can only be sold in Yingzhou at most. If it is farther away, the tofu will deteriorate. It is precisely for this reason that most of the tofu in Jiaohe County is only sold locally and it is impossible to transport it to other places."

"Haha, what I want is to make the tofu moldy, otherwise it will not be delicious!" Zhao Yan said with a laugh at this time. There was a joke on the Internet in later generations that it would never lose money by selling tofu. If there is too much water, it can be sold as tofu brain. If there is less water, it can be sold as dry tofu. If there is too much water, it can be sold as stinky tofu. If there is too much smell, it can be used as fermented tofu. If there is too much water, it can be used as stinky tofu. If there is too much rotten, it can be used as fermented tofu, etc. Of course, these above are just jokes, but Zhao Yan thought of a way to make money from it, that is fermented tofu.

Fermented tofu appeared very early. It is said that there were records of fermented tofu during the Wei and Jin Dynasties, but this thing was not widely circulated. In the Northern Song Dynasty, only the southern Guilin area was made of fermented tofu, and it was not widely circulated. At least Zhao Yan had never seen anyone selling fermented tofu in Tokyo. In fact, it was not until the Ming Dynasty that the production method of fermented tofu spread, thus becoming a delicacy on the dining tables of ordinary Chinese people.

"Prince, what do you mean? How can you eat moldy tofu?" Su Shi was also surprised when he heard this. Although he had tasted countless delicacies, he had never heard of moldy tofu for people to eat?

"Haha, why can't you eat it? You have all eaten bean paste. That thing is made by marinating the beans after molding and salt. Tofu is made of beans, so if you add salt to marinate the tofu, it can naturally be eaten. The thing made in this way is called fermented tofu. It has a smooth and soft texture, delicious and fragrant taste, and has a different flavor than bean paste!" Zhao Yan said with a smile again. At the same time, in order to convince Su Shi and the others, he also took the bean paste as an example.

In fact, after the tofu becomes moldy, it can also be made stinky tofu. However, the smell of stinky tofu is really unacceptable. People who like it can't put it down, and people who don't like it are even disgusting. Anyway, Zhao Yan doesn't like it himself, so compared to stinky tofu, fermented tofu is more easily accepted. Of course, the fermented tofu mentioned by Zhao Yan refers to ordinary fermented tofu. It is said that there is also a kind of stinky tofu, which combines the characteristics of fermented tofu and stinky tofu, but Zhao Yan has never eaten it.

"Prince, after hearing what you said, Su really wanted to taste the flavor of this fermented tofu, but he didn't know how to make it, and how much time would it take?" Su Shi, a foodie, immediately lit up when he heard Zhao Yan's words. He had a natural curiosity about all the novel foods, and he wanted to taste them now.

In contrast, Zhang Zai was much more serious. He thought about it for a moment and asked again: "Your Majesty, you said that fermented tofu is the same as bean paste. Does that mean that this fermented tofu can be preserved for a long time like bean paste?"

"Brother Zihou guessed it well. The fermented tofu is indeed the same as bean paste. Just wait until it becomes moldy and apply salt, then pour it on the braised soup, and then put it in a pottery jar to seal it. Generally, there is no problem in keeping it for a year. And it is said that the longer the time, the stronger the fermented tofu fragrance will be!" Zhao Yan said with a smile. In addition to the delicious taste of this thing, the most important thing is that it can be stored for a long time and can be transported to other places for sale.

"That's great! The people of Jiaohe County represent the people of Jiaohe County thanked the prince!" Zhang Zai stood up and bowed to Zhao Yan. If someone proposed the method of fermented tofu, he might still be suspicious, but Zhao Yan was different. First, the other party's identity would definitely not joke with him, and second, Zhang Zai also had a intuition, that is, the fermented tofu proposed by Zhao Yan would definitely cause huge changes in Jiaohe County.

Zhao Yan also hurriedly helped Zhang Zai up and asked him to sit down with a smile. He asked someone to prepare the pen and ink. Then Zhao Yan told him orally, Zhang Zai personally recorded the method of making fermented tofu. Zhao Yan only remembered the method of making fermented tofu in later generations. The recipe for braised soup was also very simple, so he finally told Zhang Zai that the method he proposed had room for improvement, so he must not stick to this formula, and he would definitely make fermented tofu with better taste in the future.

Next, Zhao Yan and Su Shi discussed with Zhang Zai how to promote the production of fermented bean curd in Jiaohe County. Zhang Zai and Su Shi both believed that some official workshops should be opened and then made fermented bean curd for profit. In this way, all income is from the government. However, there is a disadvantage of doing this, that is, the government needs to invest a huge amount of manpower, material resources and financial resources in advance, and the promotion of fermented bean curd also requires the government to do it, which can be said to be very troublesome.

In this regard, Zhao Yan proposed a joint venture between officials and private enterprises, and the government invested in the production method, and then selected some private merchants or landlords to open workshops. The government only took commissions from them, and the rest were done by those merchants and landlords. This seemed to dilute the profits of the government, but the production of fermented tofu can be increased in the shortest time, thereby increasing the tax revenue of the government. It can be said that it saves both worries and effort.

Finally, after careful consideration, Zhang Zai decided to use Zhao Yan's method. After all, he didn't have so much spare money in his hands now, so Zhao Yan's method could increase the income of the county government faster. However, just as they finished discussing the above matter, Zhao Yan suddenly had a flash of inspiration. He suddenly felt that it was a bit insignificant to let Zhang Zai, a talented person with both civil and military positions as a small county magistrate. Maybe he could arrange a more suitable place for him. (To be continued, please search for astronomy, novels are better and faster!
Chapter completed!