The soap-making workshop is about to generate good profits.
The Peanut processing workshop is also about to bring in good profits. Among the newly purchased serfs, several cooks have been assigned to research delicious Peanut. They have already developed Peanut butter, Peanut brittle, salt and pepper Peanut, and fried Peanut, and have handed them over to the Thorn Caravan for sale in small batches.
The response was excellent; many nobles who tasted the delicious Peanut expressed their intention to buy them in large quantities next time.
The Peanut production in Flower Town is insufficient, as is the number of workers. Lucas, the head of the Peanut processing workshop and a chef, has commissioned the Thorn Caravan to purchase shelled Peanut from North Valley City.
"Well done." Liszt offered only a verbal compliment before leaving. The entire Peanut processing workshop was his idea; these people were merely executors, lacking any creativity.
He preferred to use gold, silver, and Copper Coin to encourage creativity, discovery, and to establish role models, rather than to encourage hard work—because serfs were supposed to work hard anyway.
The last stop was a brewery.
Frank Distillery makes fruit wine, Bordin makes rice wine, and Huntla makes beer. They're all rushing to brew their own wines as soon as possible to earn income for the workshop. Unfortunately, no one in the workshop knows how to brew spirits, and no one knows how to brew wine either.
Ordinary wine is no different from fruit wine.
However, craft winemaking requires a high level of skill and meticulous grape selection. The techniques differ for dry, semi-dry, sweet, and semi-sweet wines.
Only Tulip Castle on Coral Island possessed the technology to make sweet wine; New Moon Wine, sweet and refreshing, was renowned throughout the Grand Duchy.
The Lachi Manor cellar red wine that Liszt drank at the Long-Yam Castle was a masterpiece among dry wines.
These techniques are all closely guarded secrets, exclusively mastered by the highest nobility.
The same applies to baijiu (Chinese liquor).
As a distilled spirit, baijiu has a more complex brewing process and was monopolized by the nobility. Baijiu, such as Juniper Wine, is not always available for purchase.
Therefore, the breweries in Flower Town can only produce some simple fermented wines.
After inspecting the workshop, Liszt began to ponder, "If I remember correctly, distilled spirits are just one step above fermented spirits, with distillation... It seems that the difference in vaporization temperatures between alcohol and water is used to purify the alcohol, and repeated distillation yields high-proof spirits."
Because he disliked drinking, he did little research on alcohol.
I've read a lot of novels before, and most of them mention distilled spirits. They seem pretty simple, so I have a vague impression of them.
"Perhaps I could have the distillery research distillation techniques, and maybe they could even produce baijiu (Chinese liquor) to increase the local specialty of Flower Town."
Rice wine is an alcoholic beverage made from fermented grains.
Baijiu (Chinese liquor) is essentially a grain-based brew.
Liszt wondered if further distillation of the rice wine would produce white spirits.
So he summoned the three brewers. "I'm giving you a task. Remember, this task is top secret. Anyone who leaks it will have their entire family whipped to death!"
The three brewers tensed up and immediately replied, "We swear to keep the mission a secret, even to the death!"
"Very good, I've obtained a recipe. It's said that baijiu is obtained by distilling rice wine. You heat the rice wine to turn it into steam, then introduce the steam elsewhere to cool it into water, thus removing the water from the rice wine. What's left is baijiu... Experiment with it a few more times and try to brew the baijiu of Flower Town!"
The three winemakers listened, completely bewildered.
However, he readily replied, "Please rest assured, my lord, we will brew the liquor as soon as possible."
The task was assigned.
Liszt felt another specialty of Flower Town beckoning him, and he even had a name in mind at that moment. "Let's call it Flower Brew. Hmm, it'll come in different grades. The low-alcohol Flower Brew will be called five-year aged, while the high-alcohol one can be called ten-year aged, twenty-year aged, or even a hundred-year aged, or five-hundred-year aged..."
Suddenly it occurred to me that the Sapphire Grand Duchy has only been established for a little over 150 years. Before that, the island was probably inhabited only by monkeys.
"Forget about 500-year-old wine, let's make one that's the same age as the nation. Say it's the year the country was founded, a winemaker came to Coral Island and personally brewed a vat of wine... There's only one vat, but you can make a vat every year, like the 1982 Lafite, which we've been drinking for years and still haven't finished it."
When he thought about alcohol sales, many classic cases immediately came to mind.
However, risks were also identified. "In a highly profitable industry like liquor, it's difficult to guarantee success without strong backing; we have to cooperate with Tulip Castle."
By associating with Tulip Castle, business becomes much easier. As an earl granted by the Grand Duke, Leewilliam Tulip is undoubtedly one of the high-ranking figures in the Sapphire Grand Duchy.
Moreover, he also served as the Grand Duke's groom, and had close contact with the Grand Duke every year.
If he wanted to establish a powerful presence, he would definitely have to share the profits with Tulip Castle, Liszt didn't mind—the more he integrated into this world, the clearer he became about the importance of noble connections.
Levis's, Lvera's, and even Lytton, no matter how much they scheme against each other, are still family. They are people who can help in times of crisis.
The Viscount of Little Papa Island was killed, but the Viscount of Great Pappa Island, who has since split off from the family, is still working tirelessly to investigate and urge the Grand Duke to find the murderer.
Liszt certainly hoped that the Tulip Family could grow strong and become a towering tree that could shelter people from the wind and rain.
The Li Dragon Horse walked steadily, with almost no undulations.
Liszt could think well on horseback, his thoughts jumping around. He thought about the distribution of benefits, and then jumped to another idea. "Speaking of monkeys, maybe I can promote monkey wine?" Whether monkey wine exists or not is not important, what matters is the hype.
Nobles have a penchant for extravagance.
Extravagance includes not only wearing gold and silver, jewels and fine horses, but also art and the pursuit of rare and exotic items. Monkey wine is clearly a rare and exotic item.
"However, truly established noble families are few and far between; most are nouveau riche whose wealth doesn't last more than three or four generations. Even the Tulip Family only rose to prominence in recent generations. It's hard to say they'd have much interest in something like monkey wine; they probably prefer gems and gold coins."
In any case, it's good to create some hype before selling fruit wine.
Liszt then inspected several other shops and workshops.
Currently, in Flower Town, the commercial area only has three shops: a bakery, a general store, and a barbershop. The workshop area only has a blacksmith shop, a leatherworker shop, a locksmith shop, a tailor shop, a cooper's shop, and a newly built brewery, soap-making workshop, and Peanut processing workshop.
Many of the completed wooden houses are empty.
If it weren't for the fact that many serfs were still paving roads, building houses, and planting grass, Flower Town would look like a ghost village.
Four hundred and seventy-six serfs joined and were assigned to various villages to farm, but they made little progress. The more than one hundred craftsmen on whom high hopes were placed were mostly workers who did not have the ability to independently support shops and workshops, and could only follow along to farm for the time being, which was a waste of their skills.
"For the time being, the commercial area can only be used as a trading market to accommodate the occasional caravan," he said, looking at the empty buildings with deep emotion. "We must first vigorously develop the workshop area, making it a production and processing center, before we can drive the development of the commercial area."
He pointed to the commercial area.
He wanted to gesture how to build this place and how to build this place, but when he turned around, he saw that the only people following behind him were Thomas, the valet, and a few Retainer Knight.
They are all vulgar people.
His ambition to achieve great things was suddenly suppressed.
"When a leader visits, even if he's not surrounded by grassroots cadres and ordinary people, he should at least have two secretaries accompanying him, carrying notebooks to record what he says..."