Well, here's what my beautiful Saddle-Backs looked like the day before they left. Please note the state of the pasture they had as loveley green grass - and turned into a muddy wallow! That's Violet at the front, then, left to right Daisy (still here), Winston (also still here) and Lilly. They had a wonderful life!
You will have to turn your head to the right to see this picture of Violet and Lilly when I went to pick them up from the Nice Butcher Man. This huge amount of meat includes all the bones and feet (the bones went to a friend's dog) the feet are in the freezer awaiting slow cooking for my own doggies, together with lights (lungs) and ears. The hearts, livers, kidneys are all packed and in the freezer, alongside half a dozen huge pork joints and FIFTY packs of sausages - the best I have ever had!
Today I spent the morning cutting up the two squares of belly-pork that I cured myself in 5 days into the tastiest streaky bacon I have eaten in my life. Here's a picture of some of it in muslin, yummy!
With the foot and mouth outbreak we were concerned that we would not be able to send Winston and Daisy to slaughter, but that's all cleared up now and all I'm worried about is that we will end up having to store another Lord knows how many boxes of pig until we sell another two "halves"! So, if you know anyone who would like to buy about 45 - 50 Kgs of prime, English, extensively-farmed, peach fed, spoiled and indulged pork, get them to give me a call!! Sorry, but you won't get trotters, ears, lights, or hearts!
To Lighter things - I went to the giant strawberry on the A146, just before you get to Morrisons and asked the lady how much a punnet of strawberries weighed. They were £2 each and are about 500g. She asked me if I was going to make jam with them and when I said yes, offered me a tray (4.5Kg!) of lovely strawbs for a Fiver! With my delivery of 84 jam jars safe in the utility room, this was just what I needed. We now have 19 jars of beautiful strawberry jam!
The veggies are coming in thick and fast now. We have plenty of tomatoes of all different colours and sizes - even I like the black and cherry ones. We have runners by the hundred every day, sweetcorn is coming along and each one has two ears! Stereo! The little purple french beans are delicious, but lose their colour when they are cooked, which is disappointing.
The baby sheep are growing and not nearly so frightened of us. I think we will be parting with the Soays, tho'. They bully the babies a bit and they are too tiny to stick up for themselves.
Baby chickens are growing, as are the Christmas Turkeys! The whisper is that a free-range turkey will be costing about £50 this year! We might even break even on the food bill and the two new feeder/drinkers.
Oh, Happy Days!
You will have to turn your head to the right to see this picture of Violet and Lilly when I went to pick them up from the Nice Butcher Man. This huge amount of meat includes all the bones and feet (the bones went to a friend's dog) the feet are in the freezer awaiting slow cooking for my own doggies, together with lights (lungs) and ears. The hearts, livers, kidneys are all packed and in the freezer, alongside half a dozen huge pork joints and FIFTY packs of sausages - the best I have ever had!
Today I spent the morning cutting up the two squares of belly-pork that I cured myself in 5 days into the tastiest streaky bacon I have eaten in my life. Here's a picture of some of it in muslin, yummy!
With the foot and mouth outbreak we were concerned that we would not be able to send Winston and Daisy to slaughter, but that's all cleared up now and all I'm worried about is that we will end up having to store another Lord knows how many boxes of pig until we sell another two "halves"! So, if you know anyone who would like to buy about 45 - 50 Kgs of prime, English, extensively-farmed, peach fed, spoiled and indulged pork, get them to give me a call!! Sorry, but you won't get trotters, ears, lights, or hearts!
To Lighter things - I went to the giant strawberry on the A146, just before you get to Morrisons and asked the lady how much a punnet of strawberries weighed. They were £2 each and are about 500g. She asked me if I was going to make jam with them and when I said yes, offered me a tray (4.5Kg!) of lovely strawbs for a Fiver! With my delivery of 84 jam jars safe in the utility room, this was just what I needed. We now have 19 jars of beautiful strawberry jam!The veggies are coming in thick and fast now. We have plenty of tomatoes of all different colours and sizes - even I like the black and cherry ones. We have runners by the hundred every day, sweetcorn is coming along and each one has two ears! Stereo! The little purple french beans are delicious, but lose their colour when they are cooked, which is disappointing.
The baby sheep are growing and not nearly so frightened of us. I think we will be parting with the Soays, tho'. They bully the babies a bit and they are too tiny to stick up for themselves.
Baby chickens are growing, as are the Christmas Turkeys! The whisper is that a free-range turkey will be costing about £50 this year! We might even break even on the food bill and the two new feeder/drinkers.
Oh, Happy Days!
