Happy New Year!!

Lovely evening with friends and curry (with naan)

Didn't use the pool, bit chilly!

Lovely sunny weather for apexes

Starter

Making naan

Cooking naan

Cooking curry

This is mutton madras made from one of our sheep. Came out really well.

Some nice home-brew to drink (Three Crops)

Scoffing it all

Pudding

Sanglier Stew

This was made from some of the sanglier. Also v yummy

I cut in to chunks which I tossed in flour and salt. Then fried them quite hot in some oil, when it was nice and brown but not cooked through I added the onion and cooked it a little. I then added wine to nearly cover the meat and cooked for around 3 hours. For the last 30 minutes I added some pepper, carrot and mushrooms.

Ham for boiling

1kg roast

Salt at 40g per kg

I just used normal cheese salt for this (not sure if that is different to table salt, but possibly table salt has added iodine)

Put in a ziplock bag with the salt for 5 days to cure in the fridge

Use straight away, of freeze, then boil to cook for about an hour. You can finish in the oven but I think this dries it out a bit.

I like leftovers fried with egg and chips

Saucisson and Chorizo

We haven’t succeeded with good saucisson (or other dried sausage) yet, so hoping for success this time! I have read lots and it seems likely that one potential problem has been humidity in the drying location and another is possibly the starter used. I am planning on spritzing these ones as they dry and I have put a starter from weschenfelder in them. It is hard to compete with the excellent dried sausage available here!

Saucisson
1.1 kg meat (approx 1/3 fat ground with 10mm plate)
Salami salt cure from Weschenfelder at 28g per kg of meat
0.25g or 1/8 tsp per kg Bactoferm T-SPX (also from Weschenfelder)
Salami seasoning from Weschenfelder at 15g per kg
Beef bungs (for thick saucisson shape)

Chorizo
1.1 kg meat (approx 1/3 fat ground with 10mm plate)
Salami salt cure from Weschenfelder at 28g per kg of meat
2tsp smoked hot paprika
0.25 or 1/8 tsp per kg (also from Weschenfelder)
Chorizo seasoning from Weschenfelder at 15g per kg
5g sugar (approx 1tsp)
Normal sausage casing from pig for thinner chorizo

Mix everything up and stuff in to casing (I did it with a funnel!). Hang somewhere at room temperature for 48 hours then somewhere cooler for about 3 weeks until they have lost 40% of their original weight.
I have weighed and labelled on in each batch as a sample one.
Spray with water occasionally to stop the outside drying too fast (if the outside dries too fast the middle doesn’t dry out properly)

Once they are dried to your satisfaction, eat some. Then sous vide (or put in ziploc bag) then freeze the rest.

In the end I didn't spritz them as the humidity upstairs where they dried seemed sufficient. They came out BRILLIANT. I have never made any before that come out like the real thing. I didn't make many as I wasn't convinced they would go well.

Sanglier!

Best Christmas present! Some local hunters that I chatted to in one of our fields a few weeks ago dropped of a leg of wild boar that they killed nearby. I have made it in to some roasts, some ‘chops’ (medallions maybe) and some stewing/mincing pieces. The bones are boiling for stock and some of the stewing bits are in the oven in slow cooking in red wine. We had some fried for lunch. Delicious! Very tender and tasty.

Doug said of the bread 'Did you make this! I thought it was real bread'! Must be getting better at making baguette!

Kitchen Work in La Mongie

We decided that we needed to put a dishwasher in to the La Mongie flat as people pay quite a lot for the holiday weeks in winter - and also because we want one!

Here's why we need one...

This is the before picture, you can't see very clearly how crappy that bit of the kitchen is, but I wanted  to show the buffet on the left too as the new unit is intended to reflect this.

Doug made the units and cut the tiles, I stuck them on and grouted them. Exciting to learn a new skill.

It was a lot of work as we had to do electrics plumbing and make the unit to size as well as cutting the worktop, fitting the sink and tap and dishwasher.

We will replace the top unit too with one with the same look as the bottom unit. There was a pressure to get it done as we had guests coming in for new year.

We made it in time. Phew! So now we can go skiing...

Merry Christmas

A Merry Christmas to us all; God bless us, every one!

Crochet Beanie Pattern

6mm hook and suitable weight wool for that.
Adjust how many increase rows if you use a smaller or larger hook and wool

R1: 10 dc magic ring (in the ring ch 3, 9 dc, sl st to the start chain)  [10]
R2: ch 2, 2 dc in each st, join with sl st to the 1st dc [20]
R3: ch 2, *2 dc in the first st, 1 dc in the next st repeat from * to end, join with sl st [30]
R4: ch 2, *2 dc in the first st, 1 dc in next 2 sts, repeat from* to end, sl st to join [40]
R5: ch 2, * 2 dc in the first st, 1 dc in each of the next 3 sts, repeat from * to end, sl st to join [50]
R6: ch 2, * 2 dc in the first st, 1 dc in each of the next 9 sts, repeat from* to end sts, sl st to join [55]
R7: ch 2, 1 dc in each st around, sl st to join [55]
R8-R13: repeat R7 [55] (or more or less depending on required length. Add post stitch ribbing for 4 rows is a nice finish too)
R14: Finish with your preferred edging eg sl st or crab stitch , finish off and weave in ends [55]

Bacon

Mostly made belly bacon, but some back too

There was 6.5 kg of belly

50g of salt cure per kg

10g of sugar per kg

Bit of pepper

Bit of ground nutmeg

Maybe this is pancetta not bacon

3.3 kg of belly (this one skin on)

50g of cure per kg

10g of sugar oer kg

2 cloves of garlic 

tsp pepper

tsp ground nutmeg

Salted in bag stacked up pile of 4 pieces.

Put in fridge for 10 days (14 for the thicker back bacon)

Heroically sliced it all before freezing, as when frozen unsliced we don't eat it so often because it is a hassle to thaw the whole giant lump then slice it then refreeze some.

I hung up some of the Pancetta to dry for a couple of weeks as well

Yum

Cream Cheese Icing

60g butter (room temperature)
120g cream cheese (room temperature)
250g icing sugar

Whisk butter and cream cheese together until very creamy and soft
Add sugar and keep whisking until you reach a soft spreadable consistency

Huge Storm

There has been some scary storms here recently. Of course you expect it in the winter, but they have been on a different scale to anything we have seen before. Lots and lots of rain, but also crazy scary wind. We have had a lot of trees over as well as damage to the car and to the roof.
Compared to some people we have got of fairly lightly. A friend had a giant hole in their roof, other friends had a tree fall on part of the house and several friends (and the neighbours) have been without power and phone for days. Thank goodness for 5G broadband!

This tree is over the drive. It is HUGE, those roots are taller than me.

Doug had to hack a way through

Somehow the wind blew this light out of the car

Many many trees down over our track

And up the top of the land on fences

Some slates blew off the roof and this one landed several 100m from the house. Just as well no-one was wandering around at the time!

Walnut tree over

The shed in the garden blew away and quite a few more trees over. One is the mirabelle which is a shame

You can't really see the damage on the roof, the zinc along the top has come off too.

Christmas Dinner with Friends

Poppy NOT in the front seat

Shhh don't tell anyone! I'm not meant to be on the front seat...

Making Black Pudding and Liver Pâte

TBH I wouldn't bother making black pudding except I don't want to waste the blood. I do like black pudding, but it is quite an effort and those I make just haven't been as moist and tasty as you can buy.
This lot came out best yet, though I still think they could be more tasty.

This is Liz's lovely kitchen. Lot more space than in ours.
Lots of chopping going on. We made several batches. We cooked them in a bain mairie which I think is why they came out better than before. It is difficult to get a consistent temperature in a pan and overshooting spoils the texture.

Stuffing skins

Checking the seasoning

Ready to cook

We made a lot! We did a Portuguese recipe, a Spanish one and British black pudding

Fried ready for testing

We made some liver pâte that came out very well too. I have had problems in the past with the texture being dry, but this one was nice and moist. I did add quite a lot of fat as well as cooking relatively slowly in the oven. I have all the recipes written down somewhere which I need to find and record!

Lunch was pasta with veal, cream and lemon