Chapter 230 4. Wild Burdock Has Fine Uses

"Grass? Don't be ridiculous. Straw ropes can't be used to make tinder." Yamauchi Yoshiharu thought Xiao Pingtai was joking when he heard it. Grass burns so fast that even a one-meter-long straw rope can't burn for half an hour. This time is not enough.

Yamauchi Chief Accountant also shook his head beside him. The price of grass is indeed so low that it is free. A straw rope is worth three coins at most. Compared with a tinder of forty or fifty coins, the price is really different. It's not even in the same weight class.

"Of course it's grass, but not ordinary grass. I have my own way to make this straw rope better than his hemp rope!"

Xiao Pingtai knew that grass was not resistant to burning at all. It burned up in a few seconds. If it wasn't for the fact that it was not suitable for the battlefield at all, even if it was half as resistant to burning as hemp rope, it would have replaced hemp rope long ago with its price. The whole world would definitely use straw ropes instead of hemp ropes.

But what Xiao Pingtai used was not ordinary grass. He used grass with added materials. He added a very special thing that could not be found anywhere else in the country.

"Your Highness, do you know about mountain burdock?" Xiao Pingtai said the three words of mountain burdock slowly, one by one.

"Yes, during the spring famine, many people would pick its young shoots and cook them back to eat. Like many wild vegetables in the mountains, it is a bit bitter but edible." Yamanouchi Yoshiharu certainly had never lived a poor life, and he certainly did not fall to the point of eating wild vegetables to survive.

In the old society, even if the year was good, many people were reluctant to eat wild vegetables even if there was a little grain stored at home at the turn of spring and summer. They often went up the mountain or into the forest to dig and pick wild vegetables for consumption, both because these wild vegetables can be eaten to reduce food consumption, and because of the promotion and support of the lords.

In the Edo period, there was even a book called "Forty Good Herbs for Famine and Disaster Preparedness", which introduced in detail various wild vegetables that can be eaten as food. It was widely promoted by the lords and daimyo to let the people know. The life of ordinary people was not easy, and eating wild vegetables was just a common thing.

So it was not strange for Yamanouchi Yoshiharu to know about mountain burdock. If he was asked carefully, he might be able to name a dozen plants that can be collected in the wild. The adjective "not eating worldly things" would not appear on such a daimyo who had worked hard and developed his family business.

"Your Highness, do you know what mountain burdock looks like?" Kobayata asked casually, fearing that he had only heard of it, after all, Yamanouchi Yoshiharu himself did not need to eat wild vegetables.

Yamanouchi Yoshiharu thought about it, looked at his younger brother again, and Yamanouchi shook his head directly. He was also from a high-ranking military family. Although he was not the young master who inherited the family business, he was also the son of a spare tire, and he had never lacked food and clothing.

"It seems to be a plant with broad leaves, tall and strong stems, a thorn ball on the top, and a body covered with fluff." Yamanouchi Yoshiharu thought about it seriously and said the shape in his memory.

"Your Highness is well-informed and well-read." Xiao Pingtai knew that Yamanouchi Yoshiharu must have seen the mountain burdock. Although the description was very superficial, it was not wrong.

Yamanouchi Yoshiharu blushed and shook his hand, signaling Xiao Pingtai to stop exaggerating and get down to business.

(The following is from Baidu)

The mountain burdock is a perennial herb, 0.7-1.5 meters high. The rhizome is thick. The stem is erect, solitary, and sturdy, with a base diameter of up to 2 cm, branched or unbranched in the upper part, and all the stems are sturdy, with stripes, grayish white, and densely pubescent or hairless in the lower part.

The base leaves and lower stem leaves have long petioles, which are up to 34 cm long and have narrow wings. The leaves are cordate, ovate, broadly ovate, ovate-triangular or halberd-shaped, undivided, 10-26 cm long and 12-20 cm wide. The base is cordate or halberd-shaped or truncate, with triangular or oblique triangular coarse serrations on the margins, but usually half-cleft or deeply lobed. The leaves gradually become smaller upwards, ovate, elliptic, lanceolate or oblong-lanceolate, with serrations or thorns on the margins, with short petioles or no petioles.

All leaves are different colors on both sides, green, rough, with multicellular hairs on the upper side, and grayish white on the lower side, with dense and thick hairs. The head inflorescence is large and drooping, growing at the top of the branch or the plant only contains one head inflorescence and grows solitary at the top of the stem. The involucre is spherical, 3-6 cm in diameter, covered with dense and fluffy spider silk hairs or depilated to sparse hairs. The involucral bracts are multi-layered, usually 13-15 layers, gradually elongated towards the inner layer, sometimes turning purple-red, the outer and middle layers are lanceolate, 0.7-2.3 cm long, 3-4 mm wide; the inner layer is velvety-lanceolate, 2.3-2.5 cm long, 1.5-2 mm wide.

All bracts are long and gradually pointed, the middle and outer layers are flat or bent downward, and the outer surface of the upper inner layer is densely short and rough. The florets are all bisexual, tubular, the corolla is purple-red, 2.5 cm long, the tubule is 9 mm long, the eaves is 1.4 cm long, the corolla lobes are unequal in size, triangular, up to 3 mm long. Achenes are oblong, light brown, 7 mm long, about 2 mm wide, truncated at the top, with a fruit margin, finely serrated on the edge of the fruit margin, and attached to the side. The pappus is brown, multi-layered, unequal in length, gradually elongated towards the inner layer, 1.5-2 cm long, connected into a ring at the base, and falls off as a whole; the pappus is setose and rough.

The flowering and fruiting period is from June to October. It grows on the edge of the forest on the hillside, under the forest or on the meadow, at an altitude of 550-2200 meters.

(End of excerpt)

Xiao Pingtai summarizes for everyone. First of all, due to the characteristics of the plant itself, its growth areas are mainly concentrated in a very small number of mountainous areas in China, Inner and Outer Mongolia, North Korea and Japan.

Secondly, it is not resistant to high temperatures or severe cold, so it does not grow in Kyushu and Shikoku even though there are high mountains in hot weather, and it does not grow in Oshu and Ushu in cold weather. The remaining areas where it can grow are mainly concentrated in Shinano, Kai, Hida and Echigo in the central part of Japan, and other places can only stare blankly. Now the most important growing area in Japan is the Nabekurayama area in Iiyama City, Nagano Prefecture, which is a local specialty.

Secondly, which part of the mountain burdock can be used? This comes from a Japanese program that Xiao Pingtai once watched that introduced the specialties along the Central Shinkansen. When introducing the Iiyama area, in addition to introducing the very famous Nozawa Onsen in the area, a local specialty, Udon noodles, was also introduced.

The Udon noodles here are chewy and very chewy and refreshing. After several investigations, its production process was made public. In the production process of Udon noodles, fine fluff scraped from the back of the branches and leaves of the mountain burdock is added. This fluff is collected and sorted, rinsed and pounded, and then added to the Udon, making the Udon taste very chewy and delicious.

Is Kobayata the only person who can remember eating noodles? He quickly became interested in this matter, and after a while of Wikipedia, he was able to confirm something.

From the end of the Warring States Period to the Edo Period, the Shinano Iiyama region invented the matchlock with added burdock fluff, which became one of the most important local products and was sold to various countries. Unfortunately, it was born at the wrong time. After the establishment of the Tokugawa Shogunate, it soon imposed strict restrictions on military equipment and took a severe attitude of suppressing the increase of military equipment by various feudal domains throughout the country.

So the burdock matchlock was a failure!