Greedy Mouth
At that time, the village chief sent someone to the upstream village to inquire. The villagers were busy fishing, so the individual promptly returned to report. The village chief then immediately instructed each household to take out their fishing nets and string them together, thus creating a large net.
Previously, they had already fished upstream a bit and had caught several buckets of fish. Someone mentioned seeing numerous fish hiding in the water grass in front of the school, which prompted them to relocate to that spot.
Surprisingly, Zhou Erlang and several villagers walked forward with the nets, while people on both sides of the bank used bamboo poles to beat the water grass. In no time, several large fish darted straight towards the fishing net.
Upon seeing this, Manbao became extremely excited, drooling and imagining stewed fish, fried fish, stewed fish, fried fish…
Perhaps Manbao's thoughts were too intense. Even though she didn't say them out loud, Keke still heard them.
She also watched the fish jumping around outside and said, "Host, why don't you also include the fish?" In the future, there are several species of fish that are endangered or already extinct.
Manbao was reluctant to fish in the river near their home because the fish were not easy to catch. In Manbao's memory, they could only occasionally have a fish meal in the autumn, and that was only after San Ge had squatted by the river all day to catch them.
How could such a rare fish be obtained for Keke?
Keke felt that the host couldn't distinguish between what was important and what was not. However, at this moment, the child's mind was solely focused on food. It knew it was difficult to reason with her, so it said, "Then include the smaller fish." Additionally, fish can be cooked in various ways, such as deep-frying, water-boiling, fish slices, fish balls, and more.
Manbao's eyes lit up, and she asked eagerly, "How do you do it?"
"If the host can include species of fish that are already extinct or endangered, I am willing to provide a friendly search for these cooking methods."
In any case, it still had the right to conduct this search.
Manbao immediately moved closer, gazing intently at the fishing net.
Zhou Erlang and the others cheered a few times, then they all exerted force to pull up the fishing net. Inside, large and small fish were crowded together, and people on the bank immediately helped to pull them up. With a splash, the fishing net was pulled onto the bank, and all the fish jumped out.
The children couldn't help but cheer at the sight of so many fish. Manbao and Baishanbao also saw many fish for the first time and were excited to approach them.
Keke called out to her several times in her mind, but Manbao didn't notice.
Helpless, Keke could only wait for her to calm down a bit before saying, "Host, do you see the slightly pointed fish on your left?" Include it. My search system has not found any records of it, so it should be an extinct species.
Manbao rushed over and tried to grab the fish, but it was not very big and was jumping around. She didn't catch it in one go.
Many children were also trying to catch the fish, so her actions didn't stand out.
Keke made some cover-ups for her, and after her hand touched the fish again, it was subtly concealed.
Once a living creature entered the system, it was considered alive. The fish would go directly into the water to survive.
Dadao and the others brought all the wooden barrels from their homes. Along with all the children, they held the fish and put them into the barrels, which only had a small amount of water.
All the children were eyeing the big fish, while Keke mainly chose the small fish. Since they were caught in one net, there were fish of all sizes, covering almost all fish species.
Keke found that a lot of fish information was missing from its data.
The data representing joy constantly guided Manbao to include the fish.
Although Manbao listened to Keke and caught the small fish, she couldn't resist catching the big fish as well. She deliberately placed them in their family's wooden barrel, thinking, "These are ours."
Keke watched, not wanting to shatter her fantasy.
With so many fish, of course, they couldn't just belong to whoever put them in the wooden barrel. The items had to be taken to the village collectively and then distributed according to the labor contribution of each family.
The Zhou family had a significant advantage in this regard.
Apart from Zhou Sirlang and Zhou Wulang, who had gone to the county town and were not present, the six brothers of the Zhou family had all gone down to the river, with Zhou Erlang and Zhou Sanlang being the main participants.
When the fish were distributed, the Zhou family took back three barrels of large fish and one barrel of small fish.
The villagers also understood the importance of not depleting the fish population. Therefore, when they caught fish, they would select some that were not large enough but still lively and release them back into the river. However, there were always some small fish that were not lively enough, and these were distributed.
Although the small fish were not as tasty, they were still meaty, right?
So, each family was unwilling to waste anything, and the Zhou family also took a barrel back. Baishanbao also received a lot because he promptly called Daji over. As a result, he obtained a large portion of big fish and a small portion of small fish.
Manbao and he squatted in front of the wooden barrel, discussing the ways to cook the fish. "I want to eat boiled fish slices, fish balls, and fried fish."
All of these were mentioned by Keke, but she had never tried them.
Coincidentally, Baishanbao had never tried them either, and he asked curiously, "How do you do that?"
Manbao recited the information provided by Keke and said, drooling, "It must be very delicious."
Baishanbao also drooled and nodded, so the two children looked at each other and immediately went back to their respective homes. They decided to have their families cook the fish using the methods they had discussed.
The Zhou family kept the large fish in a water tank and also placed some in the wooden barrel.
Old Zhou walked around with his hands behind his back and said to Zhou Dalang, "Tomorrow, you, Erlang, and Sanlang should take some goods to the county town to sell and see if you can make some sales."
Zhou Dalang agreed.
Old Zhou then pointed to the barrel of small fish and said, "Pick some, cook the live ones, and give the dead ones to the chickens."
Most of the Zhou family's dishes were boiled because Old Zhou only knew this method of cooking to make food edible.
Manbao went straight to the kitchen, raised her little head, and with bright eyes, said to Xiaozhen, "Sister-in-law, the small fish should be deep-fried, and the big fish can be sliced and boiled, and can also be made into fish balls."
Xiaozhen didn't even listen to the other two methods. When she heard the first one, she shook her head, "Deep-fried?" "Why is there so much oil?"
She said, "Boiling is the best." "The big fish already has oil on it, and it's delicious without adding any extra oil."
Evidently, she was unwilling to follow Manbao's suggestions.
But Manbao really wanted to eat fried fish, and she pestered her, "I want it fried, I want it fried!"
"Alright, alright, fried it is." But how do you fry it? "How much oil do you need?" Xiaozhen had never heard of this cooking method, so she didn't know how much oil was needed.
She went to get the oil can, which contained the household's oil.
It was all made from pig fat. They used to use mutton fat and chicken fat, but after they went to earn money for Laoding's soup last year, they found that there was also a lot of pig fat, so they gradually switched to pig fat.
The key was that pig fat was cheap.