Just another Day on the Farm

A Walk-about..

Posted on May 3, 2013 by Just another day on the farm

First off, I am thrilled to say that my goose lady, let me know that the goslings have hatched, now to see if the sex’s I want are there, that will take a few days to be sure of..

So as we are speaking of babies, here is a new snap shot of one of the wee buns, gotta tell a funny story, you see these kits were born on the same day as niece #2 and so she asked if I was going to keep a baby, and I said, I can’t hon, I just got three new female (all unrelated) and I don’t like to keep more then that.. but that she could pick the names for the buns, so we will see what she comes up with when they get bigger.

So excited, these are all those wonderful elder babies that are coming up.. there must be at least 50 of them at a min..

The nettle patch is coming right along, I have three different spots that grow my nettles in them, but two are further behind as they are in the downhill slope of the garden, its cooler, wetter down there and everything takes a little longer to get going but this patch is up in the front area and there is enough for nettle tea daily and by next week, I will be able to start my first big nine tray load of spring nettles for drying.. I like the spring nettles for tea, where I find the larger older nettles are better for herbs in soups, stews or as greens.

the burdock is coming out and growing well, I have 20 plants that I am working with at the moment, kinda hoping that I have more then that come up in a few other spots, as I will grow these ones for late summer, fall root harvest, but hope to find some in places they should not be popping up, so that I can have some for spring harvesting of roots.

Speaking of things that will be ready for a tiny harvest by next week, o ya baby, just a tiny fresh rhubarb crisp will be on the menu! Coming right along now!

Sleepy pigs, I would tell them to get busy but given that is clear that they will need to be moved again today, I think they have earned a warm nap..

the Barley is up and doing very well, growing like mad, I am tracking it carefully, I want to know how long from planting to milk seed cropping for fodder.. Can’t decide if I should have seeded it a bit thicker or if this is good, we will see..

Speaking of thing that are coming right along, while almost all my fruit tree’s are just budding out, and same with most of my fruiting canes, they are just getting leaves.. not so with my red currents.. they are bursting out!

One more interesting thing, so you know those huge hay bales that I got that will be used for compost.. well most of them are looking nice and dry but one of them decided to send up these little lovelies..

Posted in gardens | Tagged Burdock, Garden, mushrooms, Mushrooms in straw, New rabbit kits, Victory gardening | 8 Comments

Garden Friday..April/May 1st

Posted on May 2, 2013 by Just another day on the farm

Well, its that time of year again, ideally I will do better this year at keeping up on my garden updates.

This week, we add in a pear tree(on sale) 33.90, a new current (black) bush 9.99, a new blackberry (thornless) bush 9.99 and one more lovely green gooseberry bush 9.99

Garden outputs this week: 64 dollars

Planted this week-,Friday to Friday

48 new baby strawberry plants-MG
64 square feet in barley-MG
ten foot row of dill seed-MG
ten foot row of spinach-MG
Pea’s and beets- 8 foot rows in raised bed

Currently prepping and working on different garden beds and everything that is coming back from next year..

Harvest this week..

Danelion- Greens -3 bunches 1.99 = 5.97
Nettles-4 cups (will make these equal to basil herb) 7.50
horseradish root- 1 cup worth =3.00
Garlic greens/bulbs- one bunch (count them as green onions) .99

total harvested to date.. 17.46

Extra’s..

Pig plow update: Cleared 202 square feet this week

compost used from the farm – Three wheelbarrels- equal to 12 large bags at the store.. 2.99 per bag- Savings on compost -40.88 (including tax)

Pulling dried matter out of the garden to be used as bedding in the barn- 5 dollars worth of straw.

Posted in Garden harvest, gardens | Tagged Garden harvest totals, Garden report 2013, Gardening is saving money, Victory gardening | 12 Comments

Headcheese

Posted on May 1, 2013 by Just another day on the farm

I remember headcheese at a child and on the farm, I never minded that it was fred that was in the pot, or that it was made up of bits an spice, it was the texture of the jell that drove me nuts, I can still remember my grandfather cut big thick cut of it, explain to me (not that you need to use this part of the hog) but that it was healthy for me, that the gell would help me grow big and stong and it was needed for my bones..

In my house, you didn’t really get to say no when something was served to you, but wow, could staight headcheese gag me..

So my mother would slice it as thin as she could, layer it on fresh thick bread and then put 3 to 5 time as much fresh crunch lettuce or greens on top of it with hot mustard and I thought it perfect that way..

I have tried headcheese in the stores and it just does nothing for me, so when I had the chance to make up a batch, I cooked of the bones, and the meat, but I will own up to a mistake, well two in truth, one I should have remembered that you needed to take the broth and strain it and chop up the meat into itty bits, and second, I should not have poured in into the loaf pans hot and into the fridge, because all the heavy settled, where what you want it to cool the broth till its getting thick, stir and then pour and the bits are to be thoughout the gell.

The taste however is wonderful, the texture is perfect, the flavour is light and clean and fresh with pork and pepper.. hmmm. Not the head cheese of my childhood by any means but the health value in having simmered bones till meat fell off and the broth is so thick with it sets into a perfect jello all on its own..

Posted in Life moves on daily | Tagged Family stories, headcheese, homemade headcheese from my childhood, odd bits head cheese pork | 1 Comment

Sally is a new momma.. A nest full of kits!

Posted on May 1, 2013 by Just another day on the farm

Sally had her kits yesterday, which just happens to be neice #2 8th birthday! Happy Birthday HP, wish we lived closer and could have come for that yummy strawberry shortcake your momma made you!

Sally is a purebred but given that the dad blue is a 3rd gen farmgal crossed buck, her kits are a mix for sure 🙂 As sally is a solid, I could have been knocked over to see that she produced a broken white with trim.. (somewhere back in her background, someone slipped something in for a trait they wanted and then bred the color back in!

The truth is I got her for her body type and coat type/color, so I don’t much care if she can throw color as long as she is a good breeder, and mom.

So far I have barely peeked in the nest, I pulled back the hair, snapped this photo, tried my best to a head count (I think six or so?) and then got out of her box, in a couple days I will be able to go back in and check more, I can peek in the box but as long as the kits are in their puddle and covered in hair, I will let momma be.

Posted in Critters | Tagged New rabbit kits, Rabbits, Raising rabbits for meat, Raising rabbits for pelts | Leave a comment

Live Below the line-June 1st to 5th Challange..

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Just another day on the farm

I don’t know if anyone is interested in donating or not but I will be taking the live below the line 5 day challange on the first week of june.. even if you don’t want to help in that way, I do hope you will read along on it, I will be blogging both on the site and on my own blog about the daily challanges.

https://www.livebelowtheline.com/me/farmgal

I am giving myself the month of may off to get ready for the challange, I only heard about it today and I have a very hard physical month in regards to planting/gardening and farm work for the month of may. We garden over a acre and half in between the main garden and the food forest gardens and I can’t imagine trying to put in those kind of day on such a limited fair..

I will still be working hard in the first week of june. I am adding to the challange in my own way..

Almost all of the food that will be eaten will in fact come from the farm itself, this will make my own personal challange quite a bit different from what I have been reading in regards to others, and I will have to work the numbers carefully to figure out the costs per day.

Because I am planning on as much 0 mile diet as possable, I will be limited in what will be done in regards to a typical N.A. Diet but I will take the time to do my best to show how the choice’s I am going to be making with provided a well rounded healthy diet over those days.

My nettles are up and will be going well in four weeks time

Posted in Life moves on daily | Tagged Live Below the Line Challange | 5 Comments

Creamed Pork Spleen on Toast-Recipe

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Just another day on the farm

Well, I have to admit that finding recipes for pigs spleen on the net or in my books is like finding hens teeth. I tapped my old cookbooks, nothing, I tapped my elders, nothing (they didn’t eat it) I dug though all my new cookbooks and even in my newest pig book, which has everything you can imagine in it, no spleen.

So then I hit the net to find out if its safe to eat, yup for sure and I could find one recipe from a blogger that everyone seems to have reposted, but its just clean, roll it with bacon and sage leaves, might be tasty but I want my first spleen to be about the spleen itself, not bacon and herbs, both of which I figure would be the big taste in that recipe.

So after reading for a bit, what I have got is this.. the closest taste is liver but different..

Ok fine, forget the books and just go the kitchen and get it done.. I took it out, cleaned it and gave it the good look over, I have fine grade thin and long.. I can see why rolling it and then slicing would be pretty.. but not what I was after..

Decided to fall back on my english roots on my one grandma’s side and when in doubt, fry with onions, cream it and serve on toast..

I took all the white fat and vein off the back and washed it well in cold water, it had been soaking in cold salted water.

then I sliced it into small bite size stripes, I put some pork fat into the cast iron pan, a whole sliced onion and the meat at med heat (the pan was hot and the onion half done before I added the spleen stripes, I allowed them to get well brown on the first side, and to sweat to the point of lighter pink on the other side before flipping them over, then I finished cooking then, salt and pepper to taste and at the very last second, I added two heaping tablespoons of rich yogurt, (cream or sour cream or cream cheese would all work as well) and served it up over a slice of older harder bread (think trencher style), this would also work over noodles or mashed.

Now, this is the first time in my life that I have eaten spleen that I know of, however I read on the line that its often ground up into the hamburger that we buy at the stores, and that most of us have eaten it without knowing it.

Having said that, it was indeed as they said, mild in flavour, like liver but not, its flavour is closest to a mild liver but without the mush to liver, much firmer that way, it does not have livers aftertaste either.

I would recommend one spleen per adult or half for children if planning a meal, or at least I would given the size i have to work with.

* For those of you that found this recipe on the net, its worth noting that this spleen came from a large black heritage pig born and raised on our farm. I can’t say what the difference between my farm pasture pork vs factory raised..

Posted in Charcuterie, odd bits | Tagged Creamed spleen on toast recipe, eating Spleen, Pigs Spleen, Spleen recipe | 1 Comment

Pork Roast with Fruit Chuntey

Posted on April 30, 2013 by Just another day on the farm

Fresh roasted pork with a fresh fruit chuntey, a mix of plum, pear, apple and onion simmered with a big of sugar, white wine vinager and some salt and pumpkin pie spice.. so yummy..

Posted in Food Production and Recipes | Tagged Pork roast with fresh plum fruit chutney | 1 Comment

Deep Fried Chitterlings- Nose to Tail Eating March

Posted on April 29, 2013 by Just another day on the farm

Ok I have to back this story up, two or maybe even three years ago, I found this amazing book, it was a product of the great depression, and the USA goverment was making work and one of the project they came up with was for the writers, they asked them and paid them to gathering information and write out the historys of food/farming/local customs all over the US, and let me tell ya, that book is one amazing read!

It was also the first time I read in detail about Chitlins, or deep fried small pig intestines, it was the in great detail on how the best Chitlins were prepared and about that they would have paid parties in the deep south, you paid 2 dollars and you had music, dance, drink and all the fresh fried chitlins you could eat thoughout the night..

Then I did a bit more research on this food and say it in a few other books and finally I decided, I have to try this.. now there are a number of ways that this can be done, and I might? be brave enough someday to boil them, serve them white and ropy (they pretty much look like the raw picture but white and with sauce) but to be honest, it does not appeal to me, and if there is one thing that I have learned about eating the odd bits, the more you can make it appealing, the greater the odds that you will like it..

So when I butchered out a gilt this weekend, I took some of the small intestine, rule two for learning about odd bits, start small and get a feel for things, without overwhelming yourself.. learn as you go.. so i only took a portion of the intestine, enough to make sausage and enough to make chitlins. This will allow me to get a understanding of how to do these projects an I will have more skill for the next one.

So the first thing to learn is that you need to clean it, and clean it well, this involves lots and lots of fresh running water, soaking in salt water, and repeating that, till its as clear as can be.

Here it is filled up, this would give you the typical size of a garlic sausage to help with visual. It also helps that full, I can see i still need to pick off a bit of that white bits..

So I heated my oil, cut my cleaned intestine into bit size bits, dregged it into well seasoned flour and into the oil it went..

Now its darn right pretty when it comes out but what about eating it.. so I have to admit that I went into it thinking, I will eat at least one.. who was I kidding, I gobbled them down like candy, O MY GOD, these are amazing! Freakin Aweome.. I know understand why they are eating all over the world, and are considered a treat.. so so good. I can’t wait to make these again and share them with some dear friends..

If you get the chance to try this from a pasture raised, healthy pig, freshly butchered, correctly prepared, and I promise, the odds are huge, that you will love these just as much!

Posted in Charcuterie | Tagged A southern cooking treat in the far north, chitlins, Deep Fried Chitlins, odd bits | 3 Comments

Fire is so awesome..

Posted on April 29, 2013 by Just another day on the farm

Posted in Life moves on daily | 5 Comments

This and That Sunday…

Posted on April 28, 2013 by Just another day on the farm

O my goodness, that a amazing day! so warm, its a outside day, I will work on the inside stuff later today, we slipped off the farm and had a breakfast date at our local sunday place, it was a bit to crowded for our taste, we ending up the busy corner insteed of our normal quiet tucked away booth, so we didn’t linger but it was still a great way to start the day..

Then we headed to the our favorite local fruit tree place and got a new pear tree

And then ended up with a new kind of gooseberry, current and blackberry for good measure..

Then we spotted 12 of these on the side of the road and ended up dropping off the plants and heading right back out to pick them to use in the horse agility course! Its the last weekend before the spring pickup in our neck of the woods so we have spent some of yesterday and today, getting anything that needs to hauled out to the end of the drive done.

We put both Brandy (horse) and Girl out on tie out, so they are my awesome redneck lawnmowers 🙂 We already got the pear tree in the ground already and will soon enough with the others.

Need to get this latest patch of garden plot finished up and planted out today, its going into new strawberry plant rows. also got one of pop-up greenhouses set up this weekend, so will be working on getting it filled up this week.. and ideally getting the second one set up as well.

And heads up, I butchered out a gilt yesterday, so the blog is about to get really heavy on pig butchering, pig recipes and all related area’s there..