Chapter 215 Big Black Production

When the elderly and children in the family all went to work in the production team, leaving Cuihong and the other two at home.

The three sisters were not idle either. First, they poured the manure onto the ground, then covered it with a layer of soil to let it decompose. After the ground was fully thawed and the fertilizer was absorbed, they started to dig and level the ground. Basically, they would sow seeds around the time of Qingming Festival.

The two families had separate front and back yards. The Tao family's keys were left with the Zhou family. After finishing her work, Cuihong would go to collect firewood, while her two younger sisters would stay home to cook.

The three of them didn't eat at the production team's restaurant to avoid being raided at home. They usually cooked porridge in an earthenware pot or clay pot. The eldest sister would buy some staple food from the production team's canteen. The side dishes were some pickled vegetables that Xiaojiu brought over, or boiled cabbage and cold radish salad.

At this point, the radishes have lost much of their moisture. After being shredded, they appear dry and mushy, not very tasty. It's better to eat the pickled vegetables that Xiaojiu brought over!

The sisters carefully protected their home. Fortunately, with the famine raging, everyone was minding their own business and not many people were watching their home.

They ate and drank better than ordinary people, but that didn't mean they were full. Knowing that the famine would last for three years, who would dare to eat their fill?

If someone eats a rosy and radiant complexion, how could outsiders not notice?

Therefore, meticulous girls always maintain a sallow and thin figure, not daring to be too different from those around them. If they eat too much one day, they either have to do more work to burn off the excess, or they have to restrain themselves and eat less the next day.

One day, a big black dog suddenly appeared in the village. The men of the village chased it with all sorts of tools and threatened to kill it to improve their meals. The panicked black dog, with courage from who knows where, ran away for its life.

Afterwards, Xiao Jiu didn't know if it had been caught. It wasn't until she needed to boil some water to take a bath that evening that she heard a soft whimpering sound under the woodpile. When she lifted the haystack, oh my god, it was that big black dog!

Seeing it shivering, Xiao Jiu felt a surge of sympathy, but she didn't dare get too close. She tossed it two steamed buns with vegetables, which it wolfed down. Then, she used a broken bowl from home to bring it a bowl of water.

The little guy ate two pancakes and drank a big bowl of water before he seemed to regain some strength.

"You can't stay here. If someone finds you tomorrow morning, you'll still get beaten. Come on, let's go to my sister's place. They usually don't have outsiders at her house. And remember, don't make any noise, understand?"

The dog stared at her with its bright black eyes, seemingly understanding but not quite. Lured by Xiao Jiu, it followed her to the Zhou family's house in the front yard.

The older sisters were a little afraid of it, so they put it in the Zhou family's old chicken coop and locked the door, just in case it suddenly ran out.

It was dark at the time, and I couldn't see what the dog looked like. It wasn't until the next morning when Xiao Jiu came to feed it that I realized it was a big female wolfhound with a big belly and a thin body. Could it be that it was pregnant with puppies?

Xiao Jiu tried to touch its belly, but it protested and backed away. Its protective stance made Xiao Jiu realize that it was indeed pregnant, so it quickly took two eggs from the warehouse and cracked them into its food trough.

"Since you're pregnant, don't go anywhere. Stay here and take good care of yourself. Don't make a sound, or people will come looking for you."

And so, the big black dog settled down temporarily at the Zhou family's house. It was really smart; it rarely barked. When it saw the girls coming over to feed it, it would wag its tail and whimper gratefully.

Later, when Grandma found out, she came over to take a look. I don't know if she had seen it before, but she said, "Judging from the shape of this belly, she should be giving birth soon."

This year's drought is so severe that even wild vegetables are hard to find. Many families' children go out to look for them before dawn, but when they return home at noon, they only have a small half-basket left.

Later, things got to the point where they couldn't find any good wild vegetables, and they had to bring back and dry the grass that wasn't tasty. This really surprised Xiao Jiu about the current situation.

When she wasn't stupid, she not only didn't have the time to pity others, but she also took the time to wander around with these children looking for wild vegetables. She figured she could collect whatever she could, since everyone else was looking for them and she would rather stay idle than go. That would create a stark contrast.

Under the careful care of the older sisters, the first batch of chives grew strong and healthy, tender and green, and smelled wonderful.

Every household grows chives, but they are not as robust as those of the Zhou and Tao families. Many people's chives are not only sparse but also extremely thin. No one used to care about this stuff, but when famine comes, who doesn't want it?

Previously, the chives were all planted outside the house, because it was said that cutting chives was a bad omen. At the beginning of this year, my grandparents were worried that the chives would end up benefiting others, so they moved all the chives from both houses to inside the house, leaving only a little outside. That's why the chives are growing so well now.

The Tao family made chive boxes, chive pancakes, and chive steamed buns, while the Zhou family made chive dumpling soup. The two families shared their meals.

The taste of spring is simply unbeatable. The aroma of chives is so tempting that it makes your mouth water. After eating one, you want another, until you've tried every way to cook chives, and in the end, you even made chive and egg dumplings to satisfy everyone's cravings.

It was incredibly delicious, but it felt too extravagant, and the more you ate, the more you craved it. Only after you finished the entire first batch of chives did you get a chance to catch your breath.

The pumpkins, winter melons, potatoes, sweet potatoes, cabbages, and radishes that were saved for winter were consumed by the family every few days before they spoiled.

The taste is naturally not as good as when they were freshly picked, especially the winter melon and squash, which have dried out and lost their moisture, making them taste terrible.

Even if it tastes terrible, it's still food that can fill your stomach. What right do you have to complain about it?

Xiao Jiu was wise; he had hidden a lot of fresh food in the space, which he could bring out to improve the meals of both families when food was scarce.

Everyone could tell the difference between the dishes as soon as they tasted them. Cuihua immediately understood what was going on. The Tao family didn't have many opportunities to cook for themselves. When they occasionally ate one or two fresh dishes, they might think it was because they were well preserved in the cellar, and they never considered any other possibilities.

Time flew by and it was already the end of March. After this period of recuperation, Dahei not only gained some weight, but also gave birth to a litter of three black puppies, two males and one female. This kept the women very busy. Every day when they cooked, they not only had to serve Dahei a bowl of food, but also secretly crack an egg for the new mother.

Of course, it was Xiao Jiu who fed the eggs, without letting the rest of the family know. This big black dog was also loyal, even eating the eggshells and licking the trough clean, so no one noticed.

Without this nutrition, it wouldn't have been able to recover so quickly, and it even gained weight.