After many escape attempts over the past week, we decided to move our 6 sows.
The past few mornings have been made a little busier due to finding the odd pig raking around the farm, looking in the poly tunnel and going in the sheds! They haven't caused any damage but it is rather unsettling to think of the devastation they could have caused.
Despite having food, water and plenty of straw and hay to sleep/chomp on they seem to have decided that the grass is greener. We thought it might be nice to set up the new paddock down by the little beck that supposedly drains our top field so when they piggies get hot and bothered they can get in the cool wet sludge and roll around to cool off and protect themselves from sunburn.
All these considerate thoughts were contradicted when we went down to check them after the first night in the new place to find that 2 of them had returned to the old paddock crossing electric fence, over the beck and under the old pig netting and barb wire in the process. We moved them back only to find the next morning the 2 had become 4!
We have pushed them all back in the paddock once again and hope the wanderlust dies down sometime soon...
Friday 23 May 2008
Monday 19 May 2008
The shopping channel
South charlton pre school, where the boys used to go. Were having a fund raising cookery gadget demo, and I was only to glad to attend.
After quite a productive planting day I rushed to school to pick up the boys. Dashed home made wheat and gluten free chocolate chip cookies and a quickie tea of pasta. Through the boys in the bath and chucked on some clean jeans.
Left the boys in front of a dvd with the baby sitter. (We don't do television normally)
Well with a little make up and some smelly I looked and more to the point, smelt better than usual.
On getting into the landrover I noticed fat tummy was with me and no amount of persuasion would ensure it stayed at home. Then hag hands thought they should also be invited, well if hag hands were going gardeners nails were coming too.
So off we set, fat tummy, hag hands, gardeners nails and me, looking absolutely fabulous darling.
The cookery demo was rather more like the shopping channel, but with no remote.
Some fantastic gadgets that the demonstrator simply couldn't live without, but you would need a kitchen the size of the local swimming pool to display them all to your friends, then cupboards space similar to the tower of London to condemn them to when they go out of favour.
But I have to say, all in all a very enjoyable night out. Thank you little acorns pre school committee.
After quite a productive planting day I rushed to school to pick up the boys. Dashed home made wheat and gluten free chocolate chip cookies and a quickie tea of pasta. Through the boys in the bath and chucked on some clean jeans.
Left the boys in front of a dvd with the baby sitter. (We don't do television normally)
Well with a little make up and some smelly I looked and more to the point, smelt better than usual.
On getting into the landrover I noticed fat tummy was with me and no amount of persuasion would ensure it stayed at home. Then hag hands thought they should also be invited, well if hag hands were going gardeners nails were coming too.
So off we set, fat tummy, hag hands, gardeners nails and me, looking absolutely fabulous darling.
The cookery demo was rather more like the shopping channel, but with no remote.
Some fantastic gadgets that the demonstrator simply couldn't live without, but you would need a kitchen the size of the local swimming pool to display them all to your friends, then cupboards space similar to the tower of London to condemn them to when they go out of favour.
But I have to say, all in all a very enjoyable night out. Thank you little acorns pre school committee.
Monday 12 May 2008
Sunday steaks
Had another great hot and dry day yesterday. Managed to drive upto the farm steading area for the first time since back in September!Spent some time arguing with B over bedding plant locations around the shed and summerhouse/kitchen, B's love of people means she would be quite happy having our own 'personal garden' right next to the commercial side of the business leaving me nowhere to hide on open days. I disagreed on locations and took to the summerhouse roof with hammer and nails to make some noise, B took to the firepit and made us a lovely steak and salad lunch. Obviously I agreed she was correct about the locations and got stuck in to the steak.(served on makeshift tin foil plates)
Sunday 11 May 2008
Taking shape
We have had some back breaking days on the farm this week, but really feel we have turned the corner. Lots of jobs to be ticked off the to do list.
Polytunnel sheeted, tomatoes planted amongst other things. Really gearing up to have you all over for the open day on the 15th of June. The summer house, which will be our commercial kitchen, is coming on with only the roof to go on before we can get inside with the shiny stainlees steel stuff. If any of you would like to camp on the Saturday night before the open day please let us know numbers. Facilities are very limited, but that could add to the fun!
Every meal this week has been cooked and eaten out side, great, very limited washing up and tidying up. I think it has also improved our diet. No sticky puddings and loads of salad and raw veggies along with the meat dishes. In fact we have eaten so much meat this week we are both craving a veggie curry for supper. Hot and tasty, a great way of using up the left over vegetables. Like cauli, fennel, red onions, carrots, leeks and potatoes.
The school pick up has held some scary moments these last few weeks, with me appearing “fresh” from the veggie garden. But Tuesday was the funniest day by far. I am normally running late. But Tuesday I appeared at school, much to the heads amusement , on time. Well what I thought was on time, I had forgotten the children were signed up to the schools gardening club 3 till 4 on Tuesday. ( you would have thought they got their fill of gardening.)
“ Oh great mummy, you can help. “ shouted Billy before I could make my escape. “ She’s organic” announced George my youngest, to the rest of the group of 4 to 9 year olds . Who all nodded their heads, staring at me, with rather a knowing look.
“Your 5” I wanted to shout , “you shouldn’t care if “I’m organic”“, but “have you brought me a present! “
Actually we all had rather a nice time gardening together in their raised beds. It will be lovely for all the children to grow and use their own produce.
Perhaps it is the right time for even our round faced babes to understand about organics and even a little about self sufficiency . Look out school I may need to do a take on compost toilets!
Polytunnel sheeted, tomatoes planted amongst other things. Really gearing up to have you all over for the open day on the 15th of June. The summer house, which will be our commercial kitchen, is coming on with only the roof to go on before we can get inside with the shiny stainlees steel stuff. If any of you would like to camp on the Saturday night before the open day please let us know numbers. Facilities are very limited, but that could add to the fun!
Every meal this week has been cooked and eaten out side, great, very limited washing up and tidying up. I think it has also improved our diet. No sticky puddings and loads of salad and raw veggies along with the meat dishes. In fact we have eaten so much meat this week we are both craving a veggie curry for supper. Hot and tasty, a great way of using up the left over vegetables. Like cauli, fennel, red onions, carrots, leeks and potatoes.
The school pick up has held some scary moments these last few weeks, with me appearing “fresh” from the veggie garden. But Tuesday was the funniest day by far. I am normally running late. But Tuesday I appeared at school, much to the heads amusement , on time. Well what I thought was on time, I had forgotten the children were signed up to the schools gardening club 3 till 4 on Tuesday. ( you would have thought they got their fill of gardening.)
“ Oh great mummy, you can help. “ shouted Billy before I could make my escape. “ She’s organic” announced George my youngest, to the rest of the group of 4 to 9 year olds . Who all nodded their heads, staring at me, with rather a knowing look.
“Your 5” I wanted to shout , “you shouldn’t care if “I’m organic”“, but “have you brought me a present! “
Actually we all had rather a nice time gardening together in their raised beds. It will be lovely for all the children to grow and use their own produce.
Perhaps it is the right time for even our round faced babes to understand about organics and even a little about self sufficiency . Look out school I may need to do a take on compost toilets!
The hot Bank holiday Monday
Well what an absolutely fantastic start to the week. We spent a very wet Sunday indeed, planting and tidying on the farm. We were so wet we ate our lunch outside, with a roaring hot wood fire to dry us off a little. It wasn’t worth getting dry to go in for lunch just to get wet when we went back out. “ The show must go on “ and we were starting to get our knickers in a twist about sowing dates and harvest intervals.Monday morning arrived, as it does, and what a day! Clear blue skies and hot, hot, hot. We had arranged to go out for the bank holiday Monday, with the kids. I have to admit half of me was just itching to get back to planting, but luckily guilty mummy syndrome was far stronger. I truly believe that all working mums suffer from the disease.
Off we went to the little train at Heatherslaw. ( http://www.ford-and-etal.co.uk/) The boys had a terrific day with only a few “can I haves and awh!“ We took the train to Etal and had a picnic of fruit, cold cured roast beef (from the slow roast joint that I stuck in a brine cure a couple of weeks ago) cheese and cake by the river as the boys splashed around. Then we had rather a well earned ice cream and pint ( work that one out for yourselves) in the Black Bull at Etal. Taking the little steam train winding its way back to the water mill at Heatherslaw, a lovely day out with only two obligatory parental torture chambers ( child high, plastic, toy, gift shops).
Thank you Heatherslaw for a great family day out. My tip is to get there early and miss the rush, or make a whole day of it, which you easily can.
Tuesday dawned and sun again. What luck. We spent the whole day on the farm planting, sheeting the poly tunnel , fencing and this time a rather leisurely lunch in the sun. Great root veg slaw and spicy chicken wings and garlic croutons made from last weeks loaf and far too many chocolate beetroot muffins (recipe on the web site) and cowboy style coffee from the fire. Ye hah!
Have a lovely week. Please email me and let me know what you are up to.
Look at the website to check out the dates of our cookery demo/courses in June. “Plain and fancy “is the theme and we hope you will join Lucy and I at The Estate House at Chillingham for these cookery days.
Cured Beef
This is a long , but easy process. Well worth the effort and free from any nasty preservatives and colour.
One joint of slow roast beef, you can use bone and rolled shoulder of lamb or pork to make an equally nice and useful cold cut meat for picnics and sandwiches.
The brine or cure
2 litres of water
350g sea salt
150g dark brown sugar
1 bay leaf, 10 crushed juniper berries, 10 peppercorns, 1 sprig of thyme. ( use rosemary or mint if you are curing lamb) all tied up together in a muslin bag
Bring the water, salt and sugar to the boil in a large sauce pan. Then add the herbs and spices and simmer for 10 minutes. Remove from heat and leave to cool.
Place the meat in a sterilised stone ware or plastic jar and cover with the cold brine, weigh down the meat with a sterilised plate to keep it below the surface. Soak for about one week, I leave it to soak in a cold larder or you could put it in the fridge if there is space.
When you come to remove the meat rinse it under the tap and simmer it in a large pan of water for several hours. Strain it, then take the still hot meat and press it under a weight. I use a cake tin and plate with about 900g -1.8kg of weight on the top. Any liquid that can be poured off can be boiled and reduced and poured over to set , like jelly. ( you can just pour off and discard if you feel you have done quite enough )Leave to cool.
This could keep in the fridge for up to one week
Wednesday 7 May 2008
Planting at last
We finally managed to get a good chunk of seed in the ground yesterday, planting lettuce, parsley and loads more peas. The ground being perfect at the top end of the field but still a little underwater further down.
I managed to get the tractor stuck trying to rotovate more areas in burst of enthusiasm but driving straigh into a boggy hole with a fully loaded 2wd driving tractor turned out to be a silly idea. but onward and upward..
With the sheet fully trenched around the new polytunnel Beth got busy planting her nursed tomato plants, the heat in the tunnel was breathtaking...I swear I saw a bead of sweat forming on Beths brow, people who know her will know this is previously unheard of. I managed to make some doors up but we think we'll have to leave them open all day if this weather continues. Fantastic changes from being underwater in near horizontal rain on Sunday to now being sun burnt from being outside on Tuesday.
In went our apricot tree, 2 surviving bay trees and a fantastic looking cranberry bush purchased from woolworths for £2!! I'm already excited about the muffins and smoothies.
The cranberry comes in as part of B's plan to get us eating more berries, apparently its the thing we are missing in our diet. Despite my arguments relating to my love of strawberry milkshakes, raspberry flapjack etc apparently i just don't get it.
The ground is still a little too wet to get the big machinery on that will start digging our roads. We are still using a wheel barrow to bring everything into the farm steading but hope this sick torture will end soon. I had to laugh at the site of B yesterday with a stack of around 12 milk crates bouncing up and down on the barrow as she made her way across the field. Luckily stifling the chuckle before she came too close to catch me.
Rainy Sunday
What a day we had on Sunday... the rain never stopped all day.
We had planned to spend the day planting after hearing good reports on the weather forecast but what a disaster it turned out.
Because the fields have been so wet all our veggies are late going in the ground and we were desperate to get on the land to get them going, we even had two willing helpers lined up. I don't think they'll be back anytime soon. we just had to brave the water and get on with other jobs.
I had the delightful job of making our big composting bay with the muck from the chickens and pigs we have been saving in a corner of the field. We will add some organic compost too this and use it on the pumpkins and courgettes next year. Organic rocket fuel for veggies.
Beth had to wrestle with Bandit the pony and Gracie her 2 yer old to get them into a newly erected starvation paddock. Bandit is piling on the pounds now the grass is growing and we need to pen him into a small area with a lot less grass to munch on. This is always going to be a problem with an animal that is used to grazing the welsh mountains and now finds himself living in the lush lowland pastures of Northumberland. Beth says the breed live of 'sucking stones' normally! What a luxury to be here, although it has looked a bit like the Brecon Beacons of late.
We had the guys going round pulling up all the old barb wire off the old fences and out of the ground along with pulling out any old posts and other farm rubbish that has been buried over the years by previous owners.
Lunch was an excellent fry up of bacon and sausages with fried bread that Beth had cooked on a fire that we had going to try and get dry. What a site we must have looked huddled in the corner of a waterlogged field with the rain storming down on us, but it really is moments like this that make us both truly happy. The challenge changes every day but the humour is a constant.
After lunch we set up the rotavator on the tractor ready for the dry we are expecting on Tuesday and put a load of nice dry straw into the pig arcs, although they have been stood out all day. The wet weather bringing up the worms to find.
Plans for the future now include digging a pond to help with drainage and also enable Beth to get some ducks around the place. We regularly have ducks and swans overhead and would like to increase our chances of being a must see destination for them! And then there is the highland cattle, Dorset sheep, turkeys and geese for Christmas, field shelter to put up..........
We had planned to spend the day planting after hearing good reports on the weather forecast but what a disaster it turned out.
Because the fields have been so wet all our veggies are late going in the ground and we were desperate to get on the land to get them going, we even had two willing helpers lined up. I don't think they'll be back anytime soon. we just had to brave the water and get on with other jobs.
I had the delightful job of making our big composting bay with the muck from the chickens and pigs we have been saving in a corner of the field. We will add some organic compost too this and use it on the pumpkins and courgettes next year. Organic rocket fuel for veggies.
Beth had to wrestle with Bandit the pony and Gracie her 2 yer old to get them into a newly erected starvation paddock. Bandit is piling on the pounds now the grass is growing and we need to pen him into a small area with a lot less grass to munch on. This is always going to be a problem with an animal that is used to grazing the welsh mountains and now finds himself living in the lush lowland pastures of Northumberland. Beth says the breed live of 'sucking stones' normally! What a luxury to be here, although it has looked a bit like the Brecon Beacons of late.
We had the guys going round pulling up all the old barb wire off the old fences and out of the ground along with pulling out any old posts and other farm rubbish that has been buried over the years by previous owners.
Lunch was an excellent fry up of bacon and sausages with fried bread that Beth had cooked on a fire that we had going to try and get dry. What a site we must have looked huddled in the corner of a waterlogged field with the rain storming down on us, but it really is moments like this that make us both truly happy. The challenge changes every day but the humour is a constant.
After lunch we set up the rotavator on the tractor ready for the dry we are expecting on Tuesday and put a load of nice dry straw into the pig arcs, although they have been stood out all day. The wet weather bringing up the worms to find.
Plans for the future now include digging a pond to help with drainage and also enable Beth to get some ducks around the place. We regularly have ducks and swans overhead and would like to increase our chances of being a must see destination for them! And then there is the highland cattle, Dorset sheep, turkeys and geese for Christmas, field shelter to put up..........
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