Sorghum is red!

Sorghum was red

One

The car passed the county seat, along the winding mountain highway to the Dongshan Pass, all the way east, past Chunrong, Shigu, then entered the gully and the longitudinal and horizontal beams connected to the JiuYuan, the surface gradually narrowed with the change of terrain, the north and south sides of the ditch along the far side, is the horizon across the river faintly visible, the green and yellow between the original surface is a flat and tortuous asphalt road, which is like a black silk belt, connecting the ridges along the way and the village, like the pearls on the necklace, the pieces of yellow outside the window, Is the ripe corn dotted with this vast autumn color, the grass on the hillside and the willow leaves on the side of the road have hung on the color of the depression, only the bushes of wild chrysanthemums bloom golden flowers to compete for the autumn scenery, the first few days or the scorching summer, with two days of autumn rain, instantly put the heat out of sight, the sky becomes deep and high, the white clouds like water simmered wings, gently waving under the blue sky, at this moment, the noise of summer cicadas has gone away, the chirping of insects between the grass has lost the noise of the past, There is some silence in the wilderness, the autumn wind flutters, a few chirps, and the signal that nature brings to people - autumn has arrived!

As soon as the car turned over the mountain beam of BaYuan, a red high beam came to the face, like a red rainbow falling in front of the car, and the long-lost, eye-catching crimson tightly attracted my eyeballs, and I couldn't help but stop and stroll to see the scenery in front of me. This is a large piece of red sorghum planted on the road, seven or eight acres large, the east side of the plot stretches along the terrain to the north of the ditch, connected to the bottom of this depression, or two pieces of sorghum land, looking around, the whole mountain depression is like a red torch reflecting half the sky, the full spike is as round and shiny as a pearl, frequently nodding in the breeze, and the spike, like a shy girl, blushing shyly bowed her head, the long leaves on the pole are green and yellow, like the ribbons that sway between the fairy's waist, Wrapped around the slim and tall beam poles, interlaced with each other, dense and lush, some are dashing and free to dance in the autumn wind, occasionally the autumn wind swept by, the pole swayed with the wind, as if opening a skylight, through the gap, you saw the vast sky, at present, the green mountains are chuchu, the blue clouds are blue, the yellow leaves are everywhere, the fiery red sorghum, like a natural autumn landscape, dyes the autumn xiaoser into a vibrant picture, and exudes the rich and charming charm of autumn.

The red sorghum has such a breathtaking beauty!

Two

Speaking of sorghum, the elderly people are not strangers, it is also called Shu Huang, Reed Millet, etc., as well as called "Wood Millet, Wuhe", most of them are named after the form of their growth, it is adaptable and strong, there are traces in the world, it is said that in our country has a history of more than 5,000 years, China's northeast, north China, northwest and other places in the sixties and seventies have been planted in a large area, but the yield is not high, about three or four hundred pounds per acre, after harvesting, it becomes sorghum rice, and it has become people's food. In the past barren years, sorghum in the countryside is a good thing that can not be lacking, it likes warmth and light, drought and flood resistance, salt and alkali, stems are thin and tall, the root system is developed, the ability to absorb fertilizer and water is very strong, it is very suitable for growing in poor soil, it does not seek the fertility of the soil, as long as it is given an inch of heaven and earth, it will not give up the hope of life, just like the children of poor families, as long as there is a mouthful of coarse tea and light rice, they can survive tenaciously, therefore, farmers usually squeeze out a piece of land in their own fields. Or plant some in the inconspicuous depression at the edge of the ditch or in the corner around Zhuangzi to ensure that when the year is not good, the whole family also has a guaranteed ration available, so it is difficult to see his shadow on the large area of land on the surface.

In that difficult era, sorghum was considered part of the staple food, and the golden wheat noodles could only be eaten during the New Year's Festival, and most of them were wrapped in corn sorghum and potatoes. Because the seeds of sorghum are called "sorghum rice" after shelling, they can be boiled into porridge, and the ground noodles are steamed into nest heads or rolls of noodles with other flour, but their color has always been black and red, Lu Yao described it in "Ordinary World": "The steamed buns in the middle school canteen are divided into three grades, the first grade is white steamed buns, the second-class yellow steamed buns, and the lowest grade is black steamed buns made of sorghum." It can be seen that the status of sorghum in grain, but no matter how it changes, the natural bitter taste of sorghum is difficult to change, why is this so? In 2019, when I was stationed in the village of Beizhuang village in Ningxian County, I invited the scientific and technological experts of the Municipal Bureau of Agriculture to Jiudan Township for scientific and technological training, and I raised this question to the teacher, who explained: The grain of sorghum contains tannins and anthocyanins, tannins are secondary metabolites, anthocyanins are colored substances, the red of sorghum is derived from this, these two elements are born with bitter taste, poor taste, in addition, the protein in sorghum is mainly alcohol-soluble protein, and the human digestive system is very accurate to dissolve this, if continuously consumed, It will make people's stomach and intestines dry, and it is difficult to defecate, so the sorghum noodles must be mixed with other flour to eat, and after listening to the teacher's explanation, I suddenly realized. In this way, I understood the reason why sorghum could not be used as a staple food.

Three

I remember when I was a child I went to school with my parents in Xiangle, winter and summer vacation back to my hometown to visit my grandparents, usually most of the food at home is corn flour and sorghum noodle nest head, drinking sorghum batter, compared with the sweet taste of corn noodles, the taste of sorghum noodles is bitter, swallowing is also very poor, grandpa let me eat less, said to eat more stomach dry stomach is difficult to defecate, and let grandma in sorghum noodles and corn noodles to participate in some wheat noodles for me to eat another steamed bun to eat, even aunt and uncle are difficult to eat. Grandma's tea and rice is famous in the village, especially to roll thin noodles is the most skilled, when the knowledge of young people went to the mountains to the countryside, there is a Zhiqingdian in our village, there are about 6 or 7 men and women, Zhiqingdian is in the new countryside less than a hundred meters away from home, because Grandma's rice is done well, often sent by the captain to cook for Zhiqing, Grandma always leads me when she goes, so that I can rub a little, but he never eats Zhiqing's rice. Grandma is skillful, always changing the pattern of coarse grains as fine, sometimes mixing some bean noodles or black noodles in the high beam noodles, making a high beam churn, Grandma first beat the black noodles in the basin into a paste and poured into the pot, while burning the fire while stirring, and then adding the high beam noodles to the pot, stirring in one direction with the rod stick, until the batter can be hung on the pole stick, cover the pot lid, the small fire is stuffy for ten minutes, the churn is cooked, and then tan on the board, after it is cooled, it is beaten into small squares, put in the dish, pour the vinegar-adjusted garlic water, and eat it is full of spicy.

Sometimes Grandma will be the black side of the high beam noodles into dumpling noodles, every time at this time, Grandma will use the golden oil and lard to pour some oil on the spicy seeds, and then cut some green onions, and after the dumpling noodles are pressed out of the pot, he uses the big white bowl to fill more than half a bowl, put salt vinegar and a little oil to splash spicy seeds, sprinkle with green onions, hold the bowl with his left hand, the dry right hand holds the chopsticks in the bowl to provoke left and right, the chopstick head and the bottom of the bowl touch gently make a sound, like a beautiful music in the air, Grandma bowed her head, the white hair on her cheeks hung down, With the movement of the right hand in the gentle swing, the wrinkled face is full of kindness, I sat next to grandma, he looked up at me, smiled and squinted the oily sorghum in front of me and said, eat, see the baby hungry ..., for many years, back to my hometown, every time I put up the rice bowl, I think of my grandmother, this picture of Wei Mei appeared in front of my eyes, although it is a rough and bitter sorghum noodle, but I think that grandma's bowl of sorghum is the most delicious and happy taste in the world, Although he was somewhat distant and sad.

Four

The sorghum straw is a good material for hand-weaving, and in the winter leisure season, the women in the village wear the broken sorghum to wear a lid curtain or pot lid curtain, and the dense and well-groomed ears are used to tie into a broom, which can be bought in addition to their own use. My cousin, who is a master of broom tying, every autumn harvest sorghum, he will be straight, the spikes are dense sorghum seeds and collected, in the winter leisure time into more than a hundred sweeping brooms, and then take the time, dawn up, bicycle all the way, the broom to more than eighty miles away from Maling Dongjiatan, the oil work of the aunt and uncle (cousin's aunt and uncle) always want to deal with these brooms in various units, with this income, the cousin every year to solve the fertilizer needed for sowing and the cost of children's schooling Now that he mentions the past, my cousin has always been grateful to my aunt and uncle.

It is said that when Zhang Yimou was filming the movie "Red Sorghum", he could not find satisfactory sorghum land everywhere, and finally he invested 40,000 yuan to plant more than 2,000 acres of red sorghum near the author Mo Yan's hometown, Gaomi in Weifang City, Shandong Province, and waited until the growth was mature to successfully complete the shooting. The red sorghum that those ancestors relied on for survival has now been replaced by other cash crops, and many people have never eaten sorghum noodles or sorghum rice, especially after the 90s and 00s, and the taste of sorghum is even stranger. Nowadays, people's lives have stepped into the era of moderate prosperity, the level of consumption has risen several levels, under the impetus of new science and technology, the production of grain crops such as rice and wheat, which is a staple food, has increased significantly, all kinds of paid zero are full of eyes, and the era of hunger has long gone, and other uses of sorghum, such as raising livestock, weaving, etc., have been widely used in the past, but today, compared with various food crops, it is embarrassingly left aside.

Five

In recent years, the planting area of sorghum has rebounded, people plant it because of the need for winemaking, its market price is higher than wheat, and the wet particles that have just been milled out are bought by grain merchants on the spot. It is said that in the twelve kinds of chinese aromatic liquor, in addition to rice aroma, special incense, soy fragrant wine is rice as the main raw material, strong aroma, clear fragrance, sauce aroma, wind fragrance, sesame incense, tulip, old white dry incense and other series of wine, are based on sorghum as the main raw material, Maotai, Wuliangye, Fenjiu, Jian Nanchun, Xifeng, Langjiu, Dongjiu, Luzhou Laojiao, Shuanggou Daqu and other world-famous wines, are brewed with red sorghum as the original family, the reason why sorghum is suitable for winemaking, it is precisely because of the magical tannin elements, Tannins in the fermentation process of sprinkling on harmful microorganisms have an inhibitory effect, while the production of clove acid and other aromatic substances, but also endowed with the unique fragrance of white sprinkler, which is irreplaceable by other substances, it can be said that the fate of sorghum is also born for liquor, countless fine wines, the achievement of sorghum fragrance and unique reputation, but also make sorghum become the soul of fine wine.

Today, when we taste all kinds of delicious dishes and enjoy the modern and happy life, who will forget the past of red sorghum from that difficult era? Although the memory it has left us is so heavy and sour, it has nurtured us, saved us, accompanied our ancestors all the way, never abandoned, from the sky to today. In August, the plateau is pale, walking between heaven and earth, golden, harvest in sight, the fiery red sorghum, dotted between the layers of terraces and the greenery, the flames, like the ancient gods calling. The fading figure, along with the time of the father's generation, will slowly fade away in the wash of the years, and will also be gradually deleted by the scientific and technological progress of spring planting, summer harvest, autumn harvest and winter, and then fade away, as well as the popular good times in the village and the smell of cooking smoke in the hometown...

Author, Shang Guangyuan

(September 20, 2021 at Khao San)