Linping Sugarcane

Linping Sugarcane

　　Product Origin: Linping, Hangzhou

Product Characteristics: Tender, crisp texture, sweet and juicy, highly nutritious, and affordable.

Product Categories: Green-skinned and purple-skinned.

Product Composition: Its sugar content (17–18%) mainly consists of sucrose, fructose, and glucose.

Product Benefits: Sugarcane is highly nutritious and easily absorbed by the human body; it is also a well-known traditional Chinese medicine and industrial raw material. Medically, sugarcane juice is an excellent drink to quench thirst, stimulate saliva, moisten dryness, and nourish the body. It helps strengthen the spleen, relieve hiccups and vomiting, improve bowel function, and detoxify alcohol. Industrially, bagasse can be used to produce paper, fiberboard, alcohol, monosodium glutamate, yeast, xylitol, plasticizers, resins, and more.

Product Introduction: Before written records existed, wild sugarcane forests were already present in southern China. As early as the primitive society, people harvested sugarcane stalks to “suck their juice.” By the Tang Dynasty, eating sugarcane had become very common. With over a thousand years of cultivation history, sugarcane was listed as a tribute item during the Southern Song Dynasty. Linping sugarcane comes in two varieties—purple-skinned and green-skinned—with the former being the dominant type. It is generally planted around the Qingming Festival and harvested around the Start of Winter. Compared to general fruits, sugarcane is extremely easy for the human body to absorb.

Product Story: According to the "Jiankang Shilu" (Records of Jiankang), Gu Kaizhi gained fame in the painting world at the age of 20 and became a widely known artist. At that time, the newly built Waguan Temple on the outskirts of Jiankang city sought to decorate its premises. The monks approached officials in the capital for donations, but the contributions were modest. One day, the monks encountered Gu Kaizhi and asked the young painter to donate some money for the temple's Buddha statues. After thinking it over, Gu Kaizhi took the donation book, wrote boldly on it: “I pledge one million taels.” The monks were shocked, thinking he was mocking them. But Gu Kaizhi was serious: “Since I’ve pledged it, I won’t give you a single penny less.” He asked the monks to prepare a new wall in the temple, then shut himself inside for over a month and painted a large mural. It turned out to be a Buddhist painting of Bodhisattvas, but the main figure, Vimalakirti, was painted without eyes. The monks were puzzled. Gu Kaizhi explained that he would add the eyes on the day the temple opened—but visitors on the first day must donate 100,000 taels, those on the second day 50,000 taels, and on the third day, donations were voluntary. Sure enough, when the temple opened and Gu Kaizhi painted the eyes, as soon as the grand hall doors opened, the Vimalakirti statue instantly radiated divine brilliance. The audience was awestruck and full of praise. The event created a huge sensation, and soon over a million taels were donated.