Why is longan baking being chased after by the environmental protection bureau?

This is a true story, but to avoid causing trouble for the farmer friend, his name is withheld; nevertheless, the facts described below are one hundred percent true.

This year, longan (Dimocarpus longan) harvests across Taiwan, China were severely reduced by heavy June rains and August typhoons, with output at only about 30% of last year's or even lower. This farmer friend was the same, with a harvest of only about one quarter. But he still worked diligently and followed his routine, picking fresh longan from the trees, carrying it down the mountain, removing the twigs and fruit stems, and preparing to place it on the longan stove to dry for three days and two nights so it could be offered as dried longan.

The neighbors all laughed at him for being foolish. This year, because the volume was small, fresh longan sold at a high price; why still go through the trouble of drying longan? What is more, this longan farmer friend was extremely honest. Despite the poor harvest, he did not raise his price by even a cent, because he said the overall situation in Taiwan, China this year was not good and he feared everyone would bear too heavy a burden, so with the attitude of "just this one year, I can still absorb it," he kept everything as usual.

Unexpectedly, last night at about 8 o'clock, a neighbor next door suddenly came in a panic to report:

"Hurry, hurry, turn off all the lights, the Environmental Protection Bureau people are coming to issue a fine!"

The farmer friend urgently asked, what happened?

The neighbor said: "A car drove up in front of our grocery store and asked for directions, asking whether anyone nearby was curing longan? I asked who he was, and he said he was from the Environmental Protection Bureau, and then asked me where this address was? They are almost here, you all hurry and turn off the lights and go hide!"

Everyone did not know what they had done wrong, but immediately turned off the lights and hid in a nearby kitchen. After an unknown amount of time, they again heard the neighbor calling, and only then did everyone quietly step out.

The neighbor said that car seemed not to have seen anyone, but did go over to the longan stove to take photos. Before leaving, it stopped briefly in front of the grocery store and chatted a little with the neighbor. The neighbor told the Environmental Protection Bureau people: "People burning rice straw in Caotun make smoke bigger than this, right? You do not go catch them, but come catch this? And if no one cures longan, will you have this kind of thing to eat?"

The Environmental Protection Bureau person said: "Yeah," and then left.

The farmer friend was so frightened that he broke out in a cold sweat, but he still did not know what wrong thing he had done? Curing longan does not use a big fire, but rather uses red-hot charcoal inside the stove for slow curing. The temperature is very low, which is why it must be cured for three days and two nights without the fire going out. Such a fire simply cannot produce much smoke, and after curing, the seeds must be allowed to release water and then sun-dried again. Every step is manual labor, and one cannot earn much money from it. Even so, must he still run from the Environmental Protection Bureau?

The more the farmer friend thought about it, the angrier he became. Early in the morning he got up and called me, saying: "If I had known earlier, I would not have hidden. I would have stood there to see what the Environmental Protection Bureau was coming to arrest me for? Is curing longan also against the law? Then you might as well arrest and jail all the farmer friends in Zhongliao….." When he got to this point, he fell silent for a moment, then said, "Ah, does the Environmental Protection Bureau really have that many personnel? There are so many factories they cannot finish inspecting, yet they still have leisure to come into the inner mountains to catch us curing longan?"

The above is the whole story from beginning to end. Attached are photos of the longan curing process, so the Environmental Protection Bureau can see clearly that this is how longan is cured. Whether it is necessary to dispatch people to arrest anyone, please judge first.

The method for curing longan is to place charcoal inside the stove and cure it slowly over a low fire, so that the longan will not become scorched and bitter. The smoke is that wisp of blue heat above the stove. During curing, there is a sweet longan aroma. To discuss it seriously, it indeed can affect others, making people still smell the fragrance in their dreams on a summer night. But I have never heard of anyone suffering insomnia because of it.