FLOWER POT KITCHEN: OUR GLORIOUS PIGS WEEK 26 AND OH MY! ARE WE REALLY GOING TO EAT THEM ? OH I REALLY NOT LIKING THE COUNTDOWN UNTIL THEY GO !!!

10 Jan 2013

OUR GLORIOUS PIGS WEEK 26 AND OH MY! ARE WE REALLY GOING TO EAT THEM ? OH I REALLY NOT LIKING THE COUNTDOWN UNTIL THEY GO !!!

Ginger

Our pigs are so social and love talking to us

Lemon

Up grade, new extension for the pigs as the rain has not let up

I want what you got ! So true...

Love Lemon's ethos, why stand and rootle when one can sit and achieve the same result !

So happy with our gorgeous pigs, great personality, and sense of humour, a pleasure to look after and great characters to watch and play with. We have a couple of chairs under the tree by their run and we sit and watch them rootling, playing and every so often they come over and have a chat with us.

Time is ticking on and we are now on a 10 week count down! Today we ordered the ear tags, We are very lucky to have meet a really supportive pig experienced couple who set up our ark and have been really supportive all the way through with helpful experience tips. They are going to tag the pigs on the day they leave as they are collecting them from our home and transporting them to the end destination.

Over the next month we are going to have to start looking at booking our local farm shop to do the butchery and what cuts of meat, mince and sausages we are going to want! We have emotional mixed feelings about this, but something Hugh Fernerly Whittingstall said helps, if we eat meat we are responsible for the welfare of the animals and the legal minimum standard of welfare is not acceptable by our standard and that is the main standard of care for most standard lines of supermarket meats. As we do love eating meat and want to be a bit more guilt free, we feel that by raising our own pigs we have given our meat the very best love and attention and a great fun positive life. Will use every bit of them, including the oink!

We won't pretend this is something as first time pig raisers, animal lovers and pet owners, that we are comfortable with, we are putting a face to our food, and we will see how this goes, We know that the next stage will be the hardest part as it is our first time but what does not help this experience and journey is that the pigs are so clever with great personalities and such fun to spend time with...

No comments:

LIFE MY PASSION

Welcome to my daily life of cooking, one winters day many years ago my family and I were all inspired by a back to back rainy day of River Cottage this got us to stop talking about and start actually doing, suddenly three weeks later eight vegetable beds were dug, greenhouse erected and our first vegetables were propagating, this was the start to raising and growing our own food, our fabulous son Oscar changed our path in life which lead us to sell our small thriving restaurant of 10 yrs and to start our new life (Terrifying!) a life of the self sufficient in touch with nature and seasons, taking a step back and looking forward to a slower change of pace and making the most of every moment.

My passion for cooking was stronger than ever and having time at home with Oscar I found I had a new direction and I was no longer striving for perfection, I was suddenly very passionate for the enjoyment of the other side of food, something I had not realised, being the Chef/Cook and every other duty of your own small restaurant made me see that I never actually took time to cook what I wanted!

So there I was muddy boots and hands digging deep in more than one sense and I found myself transported back in time to where everyone grew some of their own food, it is a wonderful world with a real sense of achievement and loss, Slugs Snails and Caterpillars! But thats another story! Childhood memories of summers when I lived with my grand parents reminded me of so much that I had learnt about the make do and mend generation that I had forgotten.

Now as a family we love our free wild food days where we gather what nature has provided, have gone from being mini mini garden urban small holders, who did raised pigs at home because we could not wait to find land and supporting ourselves from our garden to now owning a very small farm that allows us to grow more vegetables for the whole of our family and neighbours, raise our own gorgeous Gloucestershire Old Spot pigs, (Sausages!) and pets! Dorset Down sheep, chickens for eggs and pet goats! Suddenly having large quantities of produce started to wake up the Cook in me!

The Cook was awake that part of me that wants to cook for the masses and I found myself setting up Flowerpot Kitchen, a Farmers Market Stall, I wanted to use our honest raised meats and make old fashioned pork pies, rabbit pies and game pies from the local game keeper along with old fashioned techniques and the best hot water crust pastry. This in turn grew to a small cottage industry from home weekly supplying three farm shops and a deli along with also attending three farmers markets A few years later there came a time when my son Oscar's health changed and it was an easy decision to stop.

I still hold the occasional pop up 40 seater restaurant or gourmet lunch which we do for local charities for the love of sharing food and to remind that Cook in me why I love our go slower self sufficient life!

So here I am sitting amoung the vegetables watching the chickens loving that every season nature teaches me something new and that nature is in charge! She has taught me to just go with it and grow. Give it a try from a tray of salad on your windowsill to a few tomato plants it all counts.