When radishes are in abundance, a documentary of farm women's handmade work, part one: drying radish strips and making honey radishes

Text. Photography / Lin Ming-hua

Every year around the Lunar New Year, daikon radish - caitou - reaches its peak season, and farming households everywhere are busy making all kinds of dried and pickled vegetables, and Xizhou is no exception. Following Aunt Liu Shumei through the process of making dried radish, I listen as she recounts the earlier era, when farming was not yet mechanized and farm women, besides looking after the children, preparing three meals and handling the housework, also had to go out into the fields to help.

Back then, despite being busy, farming families still held to the spirit of diligence and thrift, turning vegetables and fruits in peak season into dried or pickled goods, and trying to use the fastest methods to make and preserve food within their limited time. So the way caipu was made in the past differs from today's practice: a large amount of salt would be added directly, and it would be processed by sun-drying.

However, relying on sun-drying alone takes a long time, and drying it too long gives a poor texture and a rather salty taste. In today's method of making farmhouse caipu, the salt is reduced, and dehydration and stone-pressing are used to force out the excess water. Then, depending on how the caipu is releasing water, one decides whether to dry it in the shade or in the sun. This relies on experience accumulated year after year, and every household makes its pickles a little differently, each with its own special tricks.