Butchering a deer’s hind leg

 I followed a youtube by Outdoor Allie, really helpful!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=HP43Zm1-Jrg

Didn’t really fit on my chopping board, but had to make the best of it :)

The sirloin tip is in the sous vide bag. I’m making salted venison (like salted or corned beef)

Going from there left we have the bottom round - made in to 2 roasts for pot or slow roasting

Next let is the eye of round which looks like. tenderloin but isn’t. Planning on cutting in to medallions and slow frying one of them, the other I am salting to fry rounds of like ham.

Far left is the top round which I cut in to steaks to fry

At the back is the tri tip (triangular muscle off the sirloin tip). That went in to stewing chunks

Also at the back the sirloin butt which is a kind of raggedy cut which I cut up for stir fry.

The front legs I took out the flat irons and the rest was stewing chunks or mince.

Lamb ham

We were wondering the other day whether you could dry cure lamb, I looked it up on the internet and found several recipes!

Dry cured leg of mutton (or lamb)
Boned leg of mutton

The following are per kg of meat
30g salt
1tsp ground pepper
1tsp sugar
4 cloves
1tsp chopped rosemary
1 clove garlic finely chopped

Pinch of curing salt (optional depending whether you want the salt peter which will keep the meat pink or not)

Mix all the cure together
Smear all over both sides of the leg
Put the leg in to a plastic bag and seal the bag (or make sure the end is always above the rest of the bag)
Put the bag in the fridge for a week, turn every day and swish the cure around
After the week, remove leg from the bag and rince and wipe down with vinegar then dry it with paper towel or clean cloth
Roll in to a neat tube, as tightly as you can, and tie in place.
Hang somewhere well aired, humid and under 18°C until the leg loses 30 to 35% of its weight. This is probably about a month (but more or less depending on size of leg and conditions it is hanging in)

Spring potager

 It always looks it’s neatest at this time of year, then it gets horrifically overgrown with some parched bits as the weather gets too hot to do so much!

Good bye and good riddance to Boris Johnson

It’s a worry that he hasn’t yet properly resigned to the Queen, but hopefully the Tories will make sure he does.

Hoping for the best and going ahead and celebrating…

Of course there is now the worry which swivel eyed idiot the loonies will inflict on us next… but let’s enjoy this for a minute….

Time for the chicken harvest

 We haven’t done them all yet, but nine cockerels done today (I had the day off as it is am English bank holiday)

Always a bit sad, but has to be done as… well we want to eat them!

There are probably 3 or 4 cockerels still to go and then we need to sell some females as there are more than we will keep…

Homegrown Brunch

We are trying not to eat too much, or at least to do some exercise to offset it when we do!

Bacon, poached duck egg, roast squash and potato. Yum!

Chicken ‘harvest’

 I enjoy hatching and raising them, I enjoy eating them, I don’t enjoy the part that comes between so much... but it has to be done...

I have done 9 and there will be a similar number more to do in about a month - though something has been slowly picking them off so it could be a few fewer. I saw a sparrow hawk get one, so I suspect it is that.

They are not as plump in the breast as chicken you get in the shop, this is due to the breed, but they are a lot more delicious. The meat is good and the stock from the bones also.

I made pâté from the livers. Doesn’t look great, but tastes good.

Square sausage

These are toad balls (for using in toad in the hole!)

Pretty nice fried too...

Round square sausage (square sausage that looks round?)

Bramley apples!!

They are not ripe yet, but the birds had pecked a few so I decided to harvest them early. The tree doesn’t have very many apples left on it, maybe as many as 10, but it is the most it has ever had (ie more than none!).

I have made some stewed apple and bramble (the brambles just ripe have gone a bit wonky from frazzling heat then 2 days of rain, so they were just as well stewed). Not sure what I will do with it now. Crumble or pie probably...

All home grown meal

Well, not the yoghurt or the garlic, oil, salt pepper etc...

Roast lamb with moroccan inspired potato and chive fritters, garlic roast runner beans and mint yoghurt.

It is not super attractive looking, but very tasty, perhaps I should have sprinkled some chives to brighten it up.

Mini lamb leg. Perfect for 2 people with a bit of leftovers..l

I might try this as a potato salad next time. It is left over boiled potato with chives, olive oil and some tagine spice. For frying it I added an egg to stick it together but wouldn’t do this for salad obviously (althoguh it would be nice with boiled egg!)

Fried then the top grilled.

Thinning fruit and what to do with it

I have thinning out seedlings or fruit. If the plant managed to grow it is a miracle and I don’t want to stand in it’s way! However, particularly with fruit trees I force myself to do it otherwise bits snap off.

Some fruit you can still use as long as you leave it late enough - tricky balance!

The plum tree decided to grow almost all the fruit just one one branch, who knows why... so quite a lot had to come off. They made really good jam though. Phew!

One little branch had already broken

None if them are ripe yet

I took some of the more ripe ones along with green ones as I thought maybe they would have more flavour.

It came out really well, you wouldn’t know it is made from unripe fruit I don’t think.

Potato harvest

I have only dug up 1 row of the 12 as I think (hope) they will keep better in the ground - despite the voles.

I got nearly as many stones as potatoes!

Pretty good considering the voles are bound to have eaten some. Certainly more than were planted!

We had them with some wild boar from the freezer (given to us a while ago by a hunter I met in one of the fields) and other veg from the garden.

More food!

Beef and olive pizza

Healthy salad

This week’s bibimbap

Beef Thai red curry

Bacon egg and chips

Maybe the diet will start next week!

Lamb Tagine

I may have mentioned before, I have a soft spot for cooking vessels where you can have individual serving ones (like the dolsot bowl for the bibimbap). These are so cute!

Extra good, because cooking in them is so easy. You just have to remember to put it on some hours before you eat. Many days I haven’t planned that far ahead!

This is lamb with home grown veg (not the onion or garlic as those never seem to survive for us)

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.

Christmas Dinner has arrived

Grown by a friend. One for them and one for us. I am in charge of preparing them ready for roasting.
We would like to have geese one day... but not yet...

Here are the sprouts. Not the biggest, but my first sprouts so maybe the next crop will be better. The cabbage whites got at them a bit. Doug doesn't much like sprouts but I love them.

Home grown food

Never stops being exciting having meals we grew ourselves.
Obviously some parts like the pinhead oats are not homegrown - nor the onions, seasoning etc

Day 22/23 of incubation

Chicken eggs should hatch on day 21 if all has gone well.
However the temperature can affect the hatching, a little too low and they 'cook' slower and hatch a bit late, a little too high and they 'cook' a bit faster and hatch early. Much too high or low and they just won't hatch at all.
One egg started hatching late on day 22 and two more on day 23. None of the others made any attempt at it. This is clearly disappointing!

The incubator had read correctly throughout, so we are now looking in to what happened. I measured the temperature of the eggs and they were nearly 3C below what they should have been though the incubator readout was showing the temperature they should have been at. It appears from studying the internet that there may be a fault with the incubator, which can be fixed by resetting to factory settings.

Of the three that hatched two got trapped at the side of the heat pad and died. I suspect they were weaker than they should be from having grown so slowly and then had more struggle than normal to hatch. The one and only remaining one is called Chesney (after Chesney Hawkes who had a song 'The One and Only')

It is a shame as I really wanted some Orpington chickens. The person we got the eggs from has a waiting list at the moment so we will put some others on to test the fix... fingers crossed the setting reset has worked and all will be good this time.

I have also thoroughly cleaned the incubator having taken it apart. They do get clogged up with chick dust and little tiny feathers etc. It seems a bit drastic having to dismantle it to clean it, but apparently this is a good idea...