I didn't know until recently that basil is not a precious and distant species.

I used to eat it when I was in my hometown. I can see it in every small vegetable garden, and its fragrance permeates every dining table. This is very common.

We ate a basil, a nine-story pagoda with purple stems.

In my hometown, it is called "bone drill".

This is probably a misinformation about the word "gold does not change" in Chaoshan, but I don't know which words it is.

But at home, we never worry about its name and how to write it. We bought it, planted it, ate it, and never thought about writing it.

In spring, someone sells its seedlings in the vegetable market in the town.

The seedlings are delicate, the stems are purple, and they branch from bottom to top, with small leaves on them, soil on the roots and small piles on the ground.

After some bargaining, people brought it back from the market, tied it with a straw and hung it on the handlebars of men's bicycles.

Or put it in the housewife's basket and squeeze it with red and white pork belly, white and tender tofu, green pepper seedlings and furry cucumber seedlings. Such pictures often make people feel that spring is really a particularly good season.

As a condiment, as usual, "bone drill" only occupies a small piece in the corner of the vegetable garden, which is almost the same as leek and fennel. It is a small line planted by hand after planting other vegetables.

In spring and summer, vegetables grow very fast, and this small row soon grows sturdily. The purple stems changed from delicate to stout, the leaves stretched up vigorously, and they stood in the garden full of energy. From bottom to top, layers of branches are flourishing, delicate and lovely, and the name of the nine-story building is really vivid.

When it grows into a vigorous clump, you can eat it.

When the food in the big iron pot is almost cooked, put down the spatula, rush into the hot summer day, bend down and pinch out a nine-story building in the vegetable garden. Pinch is the top of each layer of "tower", even the stems and leaves are pinched off, and soon a handful will be held in your hand. On the way back to the kitchen from the vegetable garden, you can't help smelling and smelling.

Rinse with water, roughly chop it up, sprinkle it into the pot, and turn it over several times with a spatula. Aroma is excited by hot air and wafts everywhere. It is a fresh and warm spicy fragrance, much like a vibrant summer.

At this time, if a neighbor passes by, he can't help but sniff a few times and say loudly: This family has put bone drills in cooking, which is really fragrant. If the housewife hears this, she will have a conversation. If a passing neighbor doesn't have that kind of bone drill at home, she should be politely asked to pinch it back. A few polite words from passers-by will really pinch it back, and the aroma is really attractive. What's more, no matter what dishes are fried at noon, it is ok to sprinkle a bone drill.

Stir-fried meat, braised chicken and potato chips ... what an ordinary and plain dish. Sprinkle this on the pot before it turns into another dish with a strange smell. The food is still the same, but it seems to have sublimated.

We can use it to make anything.

Soon after kneading, it grows new and tastes versatile, so in summer, the dining table in the countryside exudes this rich aroma from morning till night.

Sweet potato porridge is also found in the cold salad in the morning, which is finely chopped to add some flavor to the refreshing side dishes.

Eat more noodles at home at night, and it is delicious in a steaming noodle bowl. Even the soup will be drunk twice.

This is one of my colorful memories of summer.

In autumn, every household uses Chili sauce. Peppers are bought on the street and grown by themselves. Put a big red basket in the peach pocket, wash it in the pond first, carefully wash it with well water by the well, and then put it in a bamboo basket to dry the water vapor.

At this time, I went to the vegetable garden and pulled out several nine-story towers. I removed the roots and soil, picked the yellow leaves, washed them carefully and dried them.

Put the nine-story tower and pepper into a machine to make a paste, then add a lot of salt and stir it in. The taste is really impressive and spicy. Eat rice with fresh spicy sauce, and you can have nothing.

In autumn, tender ears are plucked from the spire of the nine-story tower, and then flowers will bloom. Purple flowers are layered, a bit like ears of wheat and green bristlegrass. When the flower withers, it is just a dry ear, which is not beautiful at all and contains small seeds. Before the nine-story tower withered, we uprooted it, knocked the soil, uprooted it and dried it.

When stewing poultry or pork belly in winter, my mother always tells me to remember to put a bone drill.

The bone drill at this time, oh, no, the nine-story tower, is more like a mysterious spice. A dry dark brown plant gradually released a strange fragrance in the thick broth.

At the dinner table on winter nights, when the family sits around and scoops out the bones and muscles from the soup, they always eat leaves and suck the soup on them. It's ten times uglier than eating a sauce skeleton, but it tastes very pleasing. The moment of satisfaction is like a small ceremony to resist the long winter night.

A warm magic ceremony.

Last May, I bought six nine-story pagodas in Taobao and planted them on the balcony. They are green stems. In August, the nine-story pagoda with white flowers is in full bloom, which makes me feel that the nine-story pagoda with purple flowers is not as fragrant as my hometown.

Of course, maybe it's just because I grew up.