Chapter 461 - 17: Sugar Production (Part 2)
Moreover, the stirring speed cannot be slow this time. If it's slow, the syrup won't crystallize into granulated sugar before cooling, making the finishing work extremely labor-intensive.
The iron spoon moved the viscous syrup, creating a reddish-brown vortex within the spinning clay pot.
The original aroma of sucrose mixed with the heat of the uncool syrup wafted onto Chen Zhou's face, making him experience the sweetness of brown sugar without tasting it.
After fiddling for a while, Chen Zhou finally saw some small granulated crystals in the pot, which instantly revived his spirits, and he wielded the iron spoon with greater force.
As the granulated crystals increased, the resistance in stirring the syrup also grew larger.
Knowing it was time, Chen Zhou stopped stirring and poured the syrup from the clay pot onto the large wooden boards that were prepared in advance.
These wooden boards were recently cut with a trans-temporal cutter, with extraordinary smooth surfaces, and had been dried.
After the syrup was poured onto the boards, it naturally cooled and solidified into chunks of brown sugar, which, when tapped, would break into coarser granulated brown sugar.
Aside from the original aroma of sugarcane and its reddish-brown color, its taste was not much different from white sugar.
If overcooked, the syrup wouldn't granulate when stirred, it could simply be allowed to solidify into hard candy.
This hard candy wouldn't affect the taste; it can be eaten directly in the mouth, or crushed into granulated sugar for cooking purposes. Once it becomes sugar, it doesn't matter how it's used.
...
Chen Zhou's familiarity with the sugar manufacturing process benefited greatly from the modern developed network.
Through various channels, he always managed to learn bits and pieces of the manufacturing procedure, and these procedures, once slightly extrapolated, formed the complete method of sugar manufacturing.
Perhaps the indigenous people would spend a lifetime researching how to turn sugarcane into sugar without understanding it.
But for Chen Zhou, who came from modern times, this entire process was very simple, so much so that he succeeded on his first attempt.
...
Of course, although the sugar-making did not fail, Chen Zhou, witnessing the entire manufacturing process, was still able to identify many shortcomings.
Besides the indigenous people's lack of skilled techniques causing waste by not extracting all the juice when pressing sugarcane, the sugar content yield from sugarcane was also a serious flaw.
Chen Zhou didn't know what the sugar yield from modern sugarcane was like.
He only knew the wild sugarcane planted on the island could produce about 2 pounds of brown sugar from 75 pounds of sugarcane.
No matter how you view it, this ratio is somewhat astonishing—astonishingly low.
He had calculated before; the mature sugarcane available for use on the mountain stream sides covered an area of about 3 acres, with a total weight of sugarcane around 21,000 pounds.
This means that a little over a year of sugarcane planting produced only 560 pounds, at most no more than 600 pounds of brown sugar.
If placed in modern times, unless hinged on the premise of pure wild sugarcane, these 600 pounds of sugar couldn't even recover the cost of fertilizer and labor.
Even in the 17th century, Chen Zhou estimated that this "sugarcane field" sugar yield was far inferior to the professional sugarcane garden managed by European farmers.
And the primary reason for such a low sugar yield lies in the sugarcane variety—
Wild sugarcane grows slowly, with thick outer shells, slender cores, high fiber content, and low sugar content, making it unsuitable as a raw material for sugar production.
Yet, presently, the island has only this type of plant suitable for sugar making.
Besides sugarcane, the only other material for sugar making that Chen Zhou can think of is malt, which can be turned into malt syrup.
However, Chen Zhou doesn't know how to make malt syrup, nor is he willing to consume precious grain crops to satisfy his palate.
Hence, even if he is dissatisfied with the sugar yield from sugarcane, he can only continue to use sugarcane for sugar production.
After all, currently, there are only ten people on the island. The annual production of 600 pounds of brown sugar is insignificant in modern times; here, it is considered an astronomical figure.
...
Successfully completing the first sugar making, and confirming that his ideas and manufacturing processes were correct, Chen Zhou immediately handed over the excessively labor-intensive task of stirring syrup to the indigenous people.
He had long heard that there are three hardships in ancient professions—"sailing a ship, forging iron, grinding tofu."
He has experienced two of these tasks himself. Sailing was indeed not light; forging iron depletes stamina quickly as well. Comparing today with stirring syrup, he found handcrafting brown sugar could entirely be listed as the fourth hardship.
Stir syrup for a day, even an iron man likely couldn't endure it.
As the "Leader" of the island, Chen Zhou wouldn't wish to laboriously make the important materials for chocolates for the indigenous people.
His goal is to enjoy life, not to be tormented by it.
"Damn it, before catching the indigenous people, I did the hard work myself. After catching the indigenous people, I'm still doing the hard work. Wasn't catching the indigenous people a waste then?"
...
Since arriving on the island, the indigenous people have helped Chen Zhou in sharing many laborious tasks.
Yet among the many heavy-duty tasks, syrup stirring stood out, becoming work that no indigenous person ever wanted to do.
Never mind stirring syrup all day long—no one can do such a task nonstop.
Even consistently doing it for two or three hours can exhaust one to the point where both arms ache unbearably, unable to lift them.
A reminder: they were not stirring a small pot of syrup but a large kettle, and it could not stop during the production process.
Once the syrup turned thick, stirring it was no different from stirring cement, having worked only a few days, the indigenous people had bent several iron spoons.
...
The person in charge of managing this task, Saturday, quickly observed the indigenous people's low morale.
He noted that within the indigenous community, small factions had formed, with the force led by zebra being the most powerful among them, especially zebra himself.
This guy leveraged his proficiency in Chinese, built rapport with "Celestial God," himself, and Sunday, and began avoiding work, frequently ordering others to do his tasks for him.
He, however, opted for lighter tasks, allowing him to finish early and sneakily prepare some good food while others were away, giving himself special treatment.
Saturday realized that zebra's behavior was a textbook example of "corruption" or "abuse of power for personal gain."
In private lessons from Chen Zhou, these circumstances often signaled that a force would decline from prosperity, a dangerous sign.
...
Saturday intended to immediately report this serious matter to Chen Zhou.
But upon stepping out of the door, he suddenly remembered what "Celestial God" once reminded him—
One person couldn't always be relied upon for trivial matters on the island; he and Sunday must grow swiftly to handle things independently, to the extent of managing these affairs autonomously; they must have their own opinions to become a competent "right arm."
In the future, there might be many people on the island, dozens, hundreds.
Even to unimaginable figures, exceeding the astronomical sum of the population of all the tribes in the Archipelago.
By then, the matters needing his attention would not only increase but also involve more interests, growing tenfold, hundredfold in complexity, he couldn't then depend on others for help.
According to "Celestial God," every outstanding manager begins managing a few people, gradually accumulating experience to later oversee more people.
Today's issue occurred among only seven indigenous people, would it be too disappointing to seek "Celestial God" for help?
...
Reflecting deeply, Saturday finally decided to handle the matter on his own first.
If he absolutely couldn't devise an appropriate solution, he would then report to "Celestial God" for a decision.
Upon careful analysis, Saturday felt zebra's actions hadn't reached the degree of destabilizing the entire force, hence he shouldn't implement harsh punishment towards zebra.
Indeed, zebra was the first to stand out and actively join them; he conducted affairs perceptively every day, and maintained fairly good relations with the indigenous people.
Tasks assigned to him were completed with diligence and excellence.
If severe punishment were enforced for this minor issue, not only would it fail to satisfy the indigenous people who were ordered, it might actually instill fear into them, making them think their leader is fickle, impacting their loyalty.
Furthermore, thinking further, Saturday reckoned the primary reason indigenous people disliked the heavy syrup stirring task lay in the equal rewards for everyone, yet syrup stirring demanded greater physical exertion, resulting in sore arms, discomfort, excessive detriments.
Such labor-intensive tasks are evidently disliked.
Especially when the others undertake relatively lighter duties while one is immersed in syrup stirring.
This contrast inevitably caused a sense of imbalance for the syrup-stirring indigenous.
To resolve this issue, it would be best to increase the benefits for the syrup-stirring indigenous, making his rewards worth his labor; with internal balance and enthusiasm for work, the problem would naturally be resolved.