Chapter 748: Don't use your amateurism to question someone else's professionalism

Li Long said to Ha Ha Li Mu:

"Let's slaughter one first and boil it. The water in the pot is already boiling, and I think you're quite good at boiling meat. Later, after the sheep is slaughtered, you go boil it first, and you decide what seasonings to put in. Just let them slaughter and skin the sheep."

"Okay." Since he had come, Ha Ha Li Mu listened to Li Long's instructions.

"Start." Li Long said to Yushanjiang and the others, "Slaughter one first to eat, and slaughter and skin the rest directly, then open the belly; you are responsible for these two things, and Old Man Luo and the others will handle cleaning the internal organs and such."

"Sure." Yushanjiang smiled, then said to Talihaer and the others:

"Young men, start! Do your own work..." He meant for the five of them to slaughter their own.

Talihaer had already nimbly jumped over the wall into the pen, without even needing to open the gate. Only after entering the pen did he ask:

"Li Long, can I slaughter these sheep as I please?"

"Slaughter as you please, they are all quite fat anyway." Li Long waved his hand. Those ewes with lambs had already been separated into another single pen—he figured some people selling sheep didn't even know the ewes they were selling were pregnant, while others simply didn't care, selling them in groups, pregnant or not.

In the pen, Talihaer moved very lightly and quickly, grabbing a sheep's leg in one go, nimbly flipping the sheep over, then using the rope he carried to tie three of the sheep's hooves, leaving one front hoof free, then carrying it horizontally and handing it to Bieke, who was waiting outside the wall.

Bieke took the sheep, held it, and placed it on the snow. By the time he went back to wait to receive another, Talihaer had already flipped another sheep and was preparing to tie it.

Amantai also jumped into the sheep pen, with movements similar to Talihaer's.

Li Long said to Old Man Luo:

"Old Man Luo, we don't need to be too fast, collect as much sheep blood as you can. We can't keep up with their movements in handling internal organs, and we don't need to be too fast, just work slowly, collect as much as we can today."

Then he said the same thing to Sister-in-law Liang Wenyu and the others.

Liang Wenyu and the others naturally had no objections, but Yang Laoliu, who was piling up corn stalks the sheep had gnawed on outside the horse stable to prepare to start a fire, was a bit unconvinced, saying while holding firewood:

"Can it be that fast? They have to slaughter, skin, and open the belly, we just have to pull out the internal organs and wash the stomachs and intestines, can they be faster than us?"

"Haha, Uncle Yang, you'll see later. When it comes to slaughtering sheep, they are professionals."

Li Long didn't explain much. There was a saying often used to slap faces in later generations: "Don't use your amateur hobby to question someone else's professionalism." Compared to the matter of Yang Laoliu and these people handling internal organs, Yushanjiang and the others were truly professional at slaughtering sheep.

Li Long also joined the action. It was already the end of the year, and even during the day, the outdoor temperature was below minus twenty degrees. For convenience, Ha Ha Li Mu and the others had already taken off their coats.

So Li Long followed Yang Laoliu and the others, intending to light a few fires outside the pen, even if it only increased the temperature by a few degrees, it would at least make slaughtering the sheep more comfortable.

Li Long thought that if they were to raise fat sheep like this every year, they could build a shed next to the horse stable in his spare time next summer, and it would be better to slaughter sheep in the shed in winter, at least it wouldn't be so cold.

It seems he was still negligent.

Four fires were lit around the place where the sheep were slaughtered, using corn stalks gnawed on by cattle and sheep, which were more durable than grass stalks, and in the middle, they added some rotten wood and tree branches that Old Man Luo had picked up when he was cutting grass in the summer. The fire was very vigorous and lasting, not like wheat straw or reeds that would disappear as soon as they were burned, which was quite good.

When the snowmelt floods came at the turn of spring and summer, they would carry some driftwood from upstream, which no one cared for, and Old Man Luo would pick some up and store them when he was free.

Older people like to collect everything they think is useful; anyway, the courtyard is big, and there is a place to put them.

After the fire was lit, Yang Laoliu had already hurriedly gone to collect blood. At this time, Talihaer and Yushanjiang had already slaughtered two sheep and flipped them onto the ground.

Old Man Luo and Yang Laoliu took basins to collect blood, stirring while collecting.

"Hey, this blood is really good!" Yang Laoliu said involuntarily.

This year the New Year was late, and those raising pigs at home hadn't started slaughtering the New Year pigs yet. Those who participated in slaughtering pigs last year knew that when slaughtering pigs, some people would make mistakes, not stabbing in the right place, and the blood wouldn't spray out, finally pouring all into the cavity.

The blood in the cavity couldn't be wasted either, and had to be scooped out, but that blood was almost solidified, which wasn't very good.

The same principle applied to slaughtering sheep; if not slaughtered well, the blood would flow back.

Yushanjiang and the others parted the hair on the sheep's neck, took a small knife, and made a cut and stab on the neck. The blood sprayed out directly, the sheep's untied front hooves kicked hard, but the body was pressed down by the slaughterer and didn't move, and the blood sprayed out with the movement of the front hooves, all flowing blood.

It looked quite vigorous.

The blood in the two blood basins was poured together. Old Man Luo and Yang Laoliu handled the blood matter, while Yushanjiang and Talihaer had already nimbly started skinning.

Starting from the legs, to the cross-opening on the chest. The small knife should have been sharpened yesterday, it was very sharp, one cut went down along the skin, the sheepskin was cut open like a thin line, Li Long had sharp eyes and could see a thick layer of fat under the skin.

Old Man Luo and Yang Laoliu ran to collect blood again. Five people slaughtered sheep, they had to collect four times, and there was one time Li Long saw it was too late, so he ran to take a basin to collect it himself.

Then he saw that when they were skinning, the movements were incredibly nimble, as if there were no extra movements at all. The small knife passed by, and the fat on the skin and meat easily separated.

This kind of flowing movement gave people a feeling of "I can do it too," as if it were too easy.

Just after looking a few times, the skin of one sheep was skinned halfway, and then they changed to the other side.

"Next year, plant a few stakes here, the kind that can hang the sheep up." Ha Ha Li Mu said to Li Long while skinning the sheep, "That way, skinning will be more convenient."

"Good, we'll do that next year." Li Long followed the advice.

When Yang Laoliu and the others were busy, they would look at Ha Ha Li Mu and the others skinning from time to time, and then they saw that in just over ten minutes, the sheepskin was almost skinned, and Ha Ha Li Mu, who was fast, was already preparing to open the belly!

He didn't quite believe it, so he leaned over to look, wanting to see if these young men would sacrifice quality for speed, such as leaving skin meat fat on the skin, or even breaking a hole or something.

Not at all!

The skin was clean, and the layer of thick fat outside the whole sheep's carcass, with blood-red meat skin, looked very beautiful.

Sure enough, as Li Long said, these people were truly professional.

Yang Laoliu watched them skin, but Yushanjiang and the others didn't pay attention, they could turn back and smile occasionally, just as a greeting.

These herdsmen who came out of the mountains were still relatively shy at this time, and also very simple, not yet knowing how to deal with strangers.

"They are really professional." Yang Laoliu sighed when he came back to handle the offal, "That skin was skinned really cleanly."

"Not just skinning, wait and see them trim the meat later." Li Long smiled, "If they want to trim the meat cleanly, then the bones might not even be gnawed by dogs."

"Really or fake?" Yang Laoliu asked, "No way, right?"

"Really, but let's not try it, we eat meat and gnaw bones, so there still has to be some meat left on the bones. If they get serious, they won't even leave much tendon on the trimmed bones!"

This time, everyone was truly impressed.

Ha Ha Li Mu's movements were the fastest, because they had to boil meat, so he placed a basin by his side, and the internal organs were directly pulled into the basin.

The skinned sheepskin was spread on the snow, and at this time there were no flies or anything to harass them, so Ha Ha Li Mu simply started to dismantle the bones on the sheepskin.

To boil meat to eat, the bones couldn't be too big, and there couldn't be too much meat left on them. He dismantled the bones while trimming the meat, sighing while doing so:

"This sheep is really fat! Look at the oil on this! Oh my, when we gnaw the meat later, that full mouth... it must be fragrant!"

Although Li Long felt he might not be able to eat it later, Ha Ha Li Mu and the others didn't feel there was anything difficult to eat about it at all.

When eating meat at this time, you have to pick the fat ones to eat!

Half an hour later, Ha Ha Li Mu carried a large basin to boil the meat, and Liang Wenyu and the others had already started working, the stomachs and intestines of several sheep needed to be cleaned.

A pile of trimmed meat was on the sheepskin, which would be cut and stir-fried in winter after freezing. The warm water had been mixed, they were working in pairs, Old Man Luo and the others also joined in, and Li Long was still there holding a basin preparing to collect blood, because the young men were already preparing to slaughter the second sheep.

The dismantled sheep heads and sheep hooves were all thrown into a basket, and when Lu Lu Dasao and the others returned, they would pick some to take back to handle.

Li Long quickly collected a large basin of sheep blood, then changed the basin. There wasn't as much sheep blood as pig blood, but there were many of them. These young men had high enthusiasm for slaughtering sheep, and in one morning, more than twenty sheep were slaughtered.

Old Man Luo, Liang Wenyu, and the others had only cleaned the internal organs of twelve sheep. After cleaning the internal organs of these sheep, the heart, liver, lungs, and stomach had to be packed back into the stomach.

Anyway, Section Chief Hu said that these offal and meat would be weighed and sold together later, and Li Long was naturally happy.

By the way, there was also the omentum. These sheep not only had a thick layer of fat on their bodies, but there was also a lot of omentum on the intestines. Ordinary sheep didn't have much omentum, but the amount of omentum on these sheep was almost doubled or even more.

Soon, besides the smell of blood nearby, there was also the fragrance of mutton. After Ha Ha Li Mu boiled the mutton, he didn't care about it anymore and came back to slaughter sheep. When slaughtering sheep, he would occasionally put the knife near the fire to roast it, after all, after the sheep was slaughtered, the blood would cool down quickly, and they were also cold.

Li Long had seen it many times, Yushanjiang or Talihaer and the others would take the opportunity to reach their hands into the sheep cavity when opening the belly, this was to warm their hands!

After all, although the smell in the cavity that had just been opened wasn't good, the temperature was a solid thirty-plus degrees, and compared to the minus twenty-plus degrees outside, it was simply a paradise for hands!

By the time the mutton was boiled and Ha Ha Li Mu washed his hands in warm water and went to sprinkle salt, Yushanjiang and the others had already slaughtered more than twenty sheep.

This time Yang Laoliu and the others were completely convinced, and completely understood what Li Long meant by professional.

"Alright, wash your hands and eat meat." Li Long greeted everyone, "Eat and rest for a while before continuing to be busy."

!

He had already counted, there were fourteen sheep that had been cleaned and the internal organs put into the carcass, and there were twelve carcasses left, but the internal organs hadn't been processed yet.

Li Long directly packed the processed ones into sacks and put them into the idle room; anyway, the temperature inside was low, and they were frozen. This warehouse had been specially cleaned, there were no mouse holes, and he wasn't afraid of the meat being ruined by mice.

Li Long was also watching these carcasses outside, Old Man Luo would come to replace him later, and Li Jianguo, who was helping, still had to fish out some meat to take back for his father and mother to eat.

The old couple actually wanted to come help, but Li Long refused. It was freezing cold, it was fine for younger ones, but it was better for older ones not to stay here.

Even Old Man Luo and the others, who were in their fifties, Li Long would let them rest from time to time.

Entering the courtyard, one would find that the meat fragrance inside was even stronger. A thick layer of oil floated on the pot,

and the pieces of meat in the rolling meat soup looked extremely tempting.

The meat Ha Ha Li Mu put in the pot wasn't very big, about the size of a fist, and there wasn't much meat on it, but it was boiled very soft, and a poke with chopsticks would make a hole, which was very friendly to people like Old Man Luo, at least it wouldn't be difficult to gnaw.

Liang Wenyu stood in front of the pot, holding a large spoon to distribute meat to everyone, and beside her was a stack of new enamel basins that had just been washed and still had some ice chips in them, one for each person, and half a *naan*—it wasn't that he was reluctant to give a whole one, but mainly to let everyone eat meat, and it didn't matter if they ate less *naan*.

Li Long and the others did this way of eating meat from time to time in the mountains, but the people in the team rarely ate like this. Liang Wenyu was fine, but when Lu Lu Dasao and Deng Guilan took the bowls to serve meat, their faces were beaming with smiles.

Liang Wenyu said:

"When you go back in the evening, fish out some cooked meat to take back for your family to eat, there's plenty of this meat."

Even with Ha Ha Li Mu and the few of them, and Old Man Luo and the others, the bones of this one sheep couldn't be finished in one meal. After all, this sheep was slaughtered, and with the bones, it was more than thirty kilograms, the fat was very thick, and there was a thick layer of oil on the one-meter-two-diameter pot!

Everyone ate very casually, either by the stove or by the fire in the snow outside, gnawing a bite of meat, gnawing a bite of *naan*. Li Long also cut some onions by the stove, and if anyone wanted them, they could grab a handful and put them in their basin. This stuff was greasy-relieving to eat.

Li Long asked his sister-in-law to serve him two pieces of sheep neck—Liang Wenyu originally wanted to serve him two large pieces of ribs. Mainly because the thick meat on the ribs had a layer of fat, which looked satisfying, but Li Long wouldn't eat that no matter what, he just wanted to eat sheep neck meat.

"What's good about the meat on that?" Liang Wenyu was a bit puzzled, but still served Li Long two pieces of neck.

Everyone had no objections to eating the fat meat of the sheep, and could eat it, and could eat several pieces!

Li Long was very impressed!

Anyway, he couldn't eat it.

Mutton soup, *naan*, very soft boiled sheep neck meat, plus a little onion, perfect.

It was just that it was freezing cold, otherwise Li Long felt he could dig a trough and get some red willow roasted meat, which would be even more perfect.

Let the imperfection be imperfection, to be honest, in this era, being able to eat large pieces of meat was already a blessing.

Two pieces of meat and half a *naan*, Li Long was very full. After eating, he took the enamel basin to wash with warm water and put it away. He went to add some firewood to the fire outside, and then carried the brick tea that had been boiled in the morning and poured tea into the basins of Yushanjiang, Ha Ha Li Mu, and the others who had also finished eating.

Brick tea scrapes oil, people in Northern Xinjiang drink this tea to clear their throats after eating *pilaf*, and it was equally applicable at this time.

"You are really amazing." Li Long said while pouring tea for them, "Don't need to slaughter so many in the afternoon, slaughter another ten or so, and leave the rest for tomorrow. I'll take you around the county seat, and then send you to the mountains."

"Changing people tomorrow." Talihaer said with some regret, "Alema and the others are coming tomorrow, they also want to come down the mountain to see."

Li Long subconsciously said: "Then come down. After the New Year, after this matter is finished, I'll take you down the mountain one by one to play, how about that? The elderly can also come down together and look around the county seat properly."

This idea immediately made Ha Ha Li Mu and the others excited.

However, after thinking about it, Ha Ha Li Mu said:

"How about spring? At least until March, right? It's too cold now, and it's cold down the mountain, the elderly don't want to leave the winter camp."

That's true, Li Long realized, he was a bit eager. Although it was colder in the mountains in winter than outside, the winter camp was still not bad. It was hard to say on the road.

Then put this matter aside for now and talk about it when it's warmer.

After resting for twenty-plus minutes, Yushanjiang stood up first to slaughter sheep.

They came to help Li Long, and now that they had eaten meat and rested, let's work.

In fact, when they came, they didn't think about how Li Long would treat them. Now one fat sheep was enough, just like when Li Long went over, they treated Li Long, so Yushanjiang, Ha Ha Li Mu, and the others felt that Li Long truly treated them as friends.

When help was needed, call a friend.

Li Long didn't talk to them about the wages for slaughtering sheep, which made them very happy.

Helping between friends doesn't require compensation.

According to Li Long, they only needed to slaughter a dozen more sheep in the afternoon. However, the sun was better at noon, and although the outdoor temperature was still very low, it was the hottest time of the day.

Yushanjiang and the others' movements accelerated a lot, and maybe they were more skilled. By six or seven in the evening, when the sun was slanting west, Li Long forced Yushanjiang and the others to wash their hands and knives, then change clothes, and then eat meat.

The fire in the stove under the meat pot hadn't been removed, and although it wasn't boiling, the meat soup was hot.

Although Yushanjiang and the others weren't willing, they still listened to Li Long.

And young people like Talihaer and Bieke really wanted to go to the county seat to see.

Therefore, they were all in a hurry when eating, and finished after gnawing a few bones.

Li Long collected some bones, intending to take them back for the little black dog in the courtyard to eat.

Today the dogs in the horse stable also had a full meal. Usually, they ate the same food as the wild boars and red deer in the pen, corn flour and oil dregs mixed, plus some leftovers, today was an extra meal.

Don't dislike that they eat poorly, rural local dogs mostly eat leftovers and pig food.

Li Long also gnawed a bone, this time he took a leg bone, the kind with bone marrow inside, and after eating, he gnawed off a kneecap, which he handed to Liang Wenyu, Li Juan would like this better.

Yushanjiang and the others were leaving, Old Man Luo, Li Jianguo, and the others still had to continue, after all, the intestines and stomachs hadn't been washed yet. Old Man Luo told Li Long and the others to leave with peace of mind, they would finish these forty-eight sheep and stack them in the warehouse.

Li Long drove Yushanjiang and the others away. At this time, the department store and the market in the county seat hadn't closed yet, just right to go shopping. (End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 749 =====