The whaling ship successfully retrieved a few soldiers who had gone to the island to investigate. They also brought back detailed information about Seagull Island.
Sure enough, there was a pirate lair on Seagull Island. Moreover, there was a port that wasn't considered small. The port was located about a hundred steps into the waterway. There were three small fishing boats docked in the port, and the port was large enough to dock twenty ships of various sizes. From this, one could infer the maximum number of pirates.
There weren't many houses on the island. Moreover, they were built separately and seemed to be well-hidden. Even if one occasionally entered the island, it wouldn't be easy to discover them. Even the rather large port was well-hidden on the island. The port was surrounded by dense shrubs that tightly surrounded it. There were only a few gaps that allowed one to enter and see the port in its entirety. Even if an ordinary fisherman entered the island, there wasn't much of a chance that they would discover the port. Moreover, there wasn't anything worth paying attention to on Seagull Island. Under normal circumstances, no fisherman would land on Seagull Island to further reduce the possibility of Seagull Island being exposed.
"From the investigation of the soldiers, there are estimated to be nearly two hundred pirates on Seagull Island. There are no less than twenty pirate ships. If we want to eliminate this group of pirates, I'm afraid we'll have to mobilize five to six hundred people."
Chen Long said.
Ang Lee nodded and said, "There's no rush for now. This matter must be kept strictly confidential. No one is allowed to leak a single word. Let's go and take a look elsewhere. If there's a pirate lair on Seagull Island, there's no guarantee that there won't be any on other islands. I'm really not interested in eliminating a small group of less than two hundred pirates. The scale is too small.
A small island with less than two hundred pirates. If he really wanted to destroy it, he could do so in the blink of an eye. However, Li An really didn't care about such a small group of pirates. With such a small scale, they didn't pose much of a threat. If he casually destroyed them, he would only alert the enemy. Li An planned to follow the vine to find the melon. He wanted to see if the pirates on this island had other nests, or even if they had nests in other places.
Surveillance and tracking on the sea was naturally not as convenient as on land. If one wasn't careful, they would be discovered by the bandits. However, the soldiers of the Tang Dynasty could use binoculars to increase the distance of the tracking. As long as they followed from a distance, they wouldn't be noticed by the pirates. After all, so many ships passed by the sea every day. They wouldn't dare to act only when they couldn't see any traces of ships! As long as the other ships were far enough away, the pirates wouldn't care. In fact, if they were far enough away, the Tang soldiers could use their binoculars to discover the pirate ships, and even if the pirates opened their eyes to the maximum, they wouldn't be able to discover the Tang soldiers following them. This provided ample opportunity to follow the pirates.
After returning to Tianguang Port, Ang Lee asked his soldiers to unload the two whales and then break them down at the port. The whale meat was distributed to each camp. Of course, a part of the whale meat was given to Chen Fugui and his soldiers. They had contributed a lot, so they got more whale meat.
As for the best part of the whale's body, Li An had kept it for himself. He was going to make a delicious meal out of it.
In addition, the seemingly useless fat and internal organs of the whale were directly sent to be refined into whale oil. At present, whale oil was very popular overseas. This kind of oil had excellent effects and was not expensive.
In order to track the pirates, Ang Lee chose more than a dozen fishing boats from the port. These fishing boats couldn't be too small or too big. If they were too big, they would be easily discovered by the pirates. If they were too small, they wouldn't be able to withstand the wind and waves and would easily encounter danger. A medium-sized fishing boat was the best.
The performance of each selected fishing boat was good. Ten soldiers were enough to be assigned to it, and more than ten fishermen were responsible for operating it. There were more than twenty people on each boat.
Whale meat wasn't delicious. At least, in Ang Lee's opinion, the taste of whale meat didn't satisfy Ang Lee. However, if it was prepared well, it could be made into delicious food. It was just so-so!
Because Ang Lee had issued a gag order, not many people knew that the soldiers of the Tang Dynasty had found a pirate lair on Seagull Island. As for the results of the investigation of the soldiers, even fewer people knew about it. Only Ang Lee's confidant and Chen Fugui knew about it. The other fishermen and soldiers only knew that some people were swimming to Seagull Island, but they didn't know what they were doing there.
"What? Someone actually asked about the soldiers' purpose on Seagull Island? Who dared to leak the information? "
Ang Lee said angrily.
Chen Long hurriedly said, "Assistant Minister Li, when we sent the soldiers to swim to the island, the fishermen on the boat saw them. Maybe they were just curious! They just asked casually. Chen Fugui also said that these people had been with him for many years, so there shouldn't be any problem. "
"But now they have come ashore. If they tell others about what they saw, some people might discover something."
Ang Lee said worriedly. If he had known this would happen, he would have trapped all the fishermen on the boat and not let them go ashore. Tianguang Port was only a small port with a small population, but there were still thousands of people here. God knew if there were any pirate spies here. If they knew something, it would be terrible. There were still several soldiers who didn't tell others about what they found, and Chen Fugui didn't have the guts to do that.
"How about this? Let those soldiers spread the news that they didn't find anything on the island. There are poisonous insects everywhere, and there are no herbs to be found."
Ang Lee said. After a pause, he added, "In addition, starting from tomorrow, the soldiers responsible for tracking the pirates will start to act. Before the action, let those fishermen tell their families that they will go out for a few days and come back after a few days. When they come back at night, they should not go ashore. No one is allowed to go ashore in case the news is leaked."
After arranging everything, Li An still felt that something was not right and there seemed to be some flaws. However, it didn't matter. It was not a big deal to have some flaws. Even if the pirates escaped, so what? Li An was just on a whim to catch pirates. Even if he couldn't catch a single pirate, no one would blame Li An. At least on the surface, Li An's task in Tianguang Port was to plan the future super port for the Tang Empire. Eliminating pirates was such a trivial thing that Li An shouldn't do at all. Li An only did it because he was bored out of his mind.
After arranging everything, Li An personally went to the kitchen to instruct a few of his subordinates. He asked them to make a delicious dish using the whale's lips. This dish was created by Li An himself, so he had to try it himself to know how it tasted.
This delicious dish of whale lips needed a lot of ingredients. First of all, it needed more than one kilogram of whale lips. Whale lips were big enough, so it was easy to get one kilogram of meat from them, and there was still a lot left. The ingredients were 200 grams of bamboo shoots, 200 grams of shiitake mushrooms, 200 grams of lard, 200 grams of soy sauce, a little white sugar, chopped green onions and other seasonings.
The process of making this delicious dish was a bit complicated. For example, the shark lips had to be washed first, put in a casserole pot, and added with boiling water. After rolling it over the fire, it was taken away from the fire and stewed with a lid for two hours.
After that, the fish lips were placed in a basin of boiling water, and the broken bones were removed. After that, the fish lips were placed in a basin of boiling water and steamed for half an hour until the fish lips were soft and had no smell or smell. After that, the fish lips were placed in a basin of boiling water, and added with cooking wine, chopped green onions, sliced ginger, a little lard, cooked meat, drumsticks, and steamed for ten minutes. After that, the chicken, meat, scallion, and ginger were removed, and sliced into large blades. Then, they were placed together with winter bamboo shoots, shiitake mushrooms, and water chestnuts. After that, the clean pot was placed on the fire, and the lard and chicken oil were added. When the oil was hot, the fish lips were put into the pot together with the side dishes. Soy sauce, sugar, monosodium glutamate, cooking wine, and salt were added with a spoon. Then, more than one kilogram of fresh soup was added, and the juices were heated. When the juices were cooked until the red juices were thick, it was hooked with the secret ingredients that Ang Lee had researched. Then, it was taken out of the pot and placed on a plate. With this, the dish was considered complete.
It took a lot of effort to really make a dish of whale lips. Without more than three hours, it was definitely not enough. And all delicacies required a long time to prepare and make. Making delicacies was a very tedious process. It was impossible to save time. The food that was made in saving time was always unsatisfactory in terms of appetite.
With such a big harvest from the two whales, if he only made a dish of whale lips, he would be letting himself down. He should at least make a few more delicacies. Steamed whale meat was also not bad. Although the taste of steamed whale meat might not be as good as the small fish raised in fresh water, it had a unique taste and was also quite good. The key was that he had never eaten such delicacies before. That was enough. At least when he returned to Chang 'an City, he could tell others that he had eaten whale meat. Steamed whale meat was also something he could show off.
The steps of making steamed whale meat were not complicated. It only needed six steps. First, the first step was the selection of the fish meat. Take two pounds of fresh whale meat from the whale's back and place it on the fish plate. The beauty was secondary. The key was that it was easier to control the heat when it was raw and cooked. The second step was the shaping. After cleaning the whale meat, the whale meat was laid flat with a knife. This could prevent the whale meat from being crushed after being steamed. Smear the lard on both sides of the fish and dip it in a little white wine.
The third step was to mix a small amount of meat into a little soy sauce, sesame oil, salt, ginger, and mushroom and put it into the belly of the fish. This could not only make the taste of the fish more fresh, but also make the steamed fish more plump. The fourth step was to take a large piece of old ginger and the middle section of green onions, cut them into thin filaments of uniform length, and spread them on the fish plate. After the fish was placed on the plate, some shredded green onions and ginger were sprinkled on the whale meat.
The fifth step was to pay attention to the heat, which was the key to steaming the fish. Like many steamed dishes, the fish must be put into the pot after the water in the pot boiled. After steaming for a few minutes, the fire must be turned off. Then, the fish must be steamed for a few minutes without opening the lid after the fire was turned off. After steaming the fish for a few minutes, the fish must be taken out of the pot. Then, the prepared soy sauce, vinegar, and a little oil could be sprinkled all over the fish. Thus, the delicious steamed whale meat was ready. Regardless of whether the taste was good or not, it was at least very unique.
Two dishes were definitely not enough. Li An ordered the kitchen to make eight dishes, all of which were related to whales. Moreover, this was just whale meat, yet eight dishes were made. In order to neutralize the grease, the kitchen also prepared eight vegetarian dishes, making a total of sixteen delicious dishes. With Li An's status, it was enough for him to enjoy such a sumptuous meal.
While Ang Lee was savoring the whale meal, in a private house in Tianguang Port, several corn farmers were sitting together and discussing something nervously.
"What? Someone swam to Seagull Island? What did they find?"
A dark-skinned middle-aged man asked nervously.
"It's said that they were looking for some herbs, but they didn't find anything. Then, they left. However, these people stayed on the island for four hours. God knows what they found. What if …"
Another middle-aged man said.
"Oh! This is not a trivial matter. That's a stronghold of our boss. If it's discovered, it'll be terrible. It's better to be safe than sorry. I think we should inform them tonight and ask them to evacuate from Seagull Island as soon as possible. "
The dark-skinned middle-aged man said nervously.
"No, no, no. It's midnight. If we go out to sea at this time, we'll be suspected. Let's set off tomorrow morning! That's the only way we won't attract attention. Let's tell them the news first. Whether they evacuate or not is their own business. We can't care so much. "
"Well, okay! Let's go out to sea tomorrow morning and inform them of the news as soon as possible. "
These fishermen were of course spies left by the bandits in Tianguang Port. They were fishermen, but it was too difficult to make a fortune as fishermen. If they wanted to make a fortune, they had to be pirates. Therefore, they took this step. Unfortunately, they walked on the road of no return and lived in fear every day.
This time, they were so nervous because Ang Lee had 3,000 soldiers and horses. With so many soldiers and horses suddenly appearing in Tianguang Port, they wouldn't believe that they didn't do anything. In the eyes of these pirate spies, the sudden appearance of 3,000 soldiers and horses of the Tang dynasty in Tianguang Port meant that they wanted to wipe out the pirates. It was like a thief in the modern world who heard the siren on the street and was scared to death. In fact, the police car might just be passing by and didn't discover the thief. However, the thief didn't think so. He was always suspicious and thought that he must have been discovered and that the police car was coming to arrest him.
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