Farm Fashion Finery

New this fall, is this lovely, stylish horn apparel.  Our model, Miss Hope, is showing us this fall’s newest release, straight from the district of Manitoba,  the goat fashion capital of Canada.  It’s made from 100% wool and comes in natural grey and beige.  It’s versatile in that it can be worn on the left or right side.  A must for every fashion conscious goat.

Yesterday’s sky

I was on my way into town when I had to pull over to capture this one! It was noon.  The sun isn’t very high in the sky this time of year.

Kefir and Butternut Peanut Soup

Homemade kefir

I have been looking for kefir or kefir starter for ages!  Ready to eat kefir is not available in the stores anywhere here. I finally found some starter!  Actually hubby found it when we were out together. I was so excited! I don’t have raw milk to make it with but if it’s as good as I’ve been reading, even made with store milk we should see the benefits.  Eventually I would like to make it with raw milk.  You can read here about the difference between kefir and yogurt.  I have some questions, though.  How is making kefir with the starter different than with grains?  The kefir was ready this morning, I gave it a stir like the directions said.  It looks really good, thick and smooth, but there’s no grains.  It tastes good, a lot like plain yogurt.  My youngest son likes yogurt but said ‘bleh’.  I gave him half a glass and he drank the whole thing.  Maybe first thing in the morning wasn’t the best time to get him to try it.   

Butternut Peanut Soup

The other new recipe I tried was Butternut Peanut Soup. Doesn’t the name sound yummy?  I have quite a few butternut squashes from my garden this year so thought I’d try this different looking soup.  I didn’t follow the recipe exactly because there were a few ingredients I didn’t have and don’t normally so I adapted it to my pantry.  The recipe posted is my adapted version.  It’s very good and filling too.  I think I’ll try it with turkey stock next time.

Marg's Sandwich Spread

I promised to share my sandwich spread recipe so here it is.  It turns out a lovely creamy-yellow colour.  Yellower than the picture. The next batch I may experiment with adding different ingredients to this base recipe.

Marg’s Sandwich Spread

2 egg yolks
½ tsp. sea salt
1 Tbsp. raw honey
1 Tbsp. lemon juice
2 Tbsp. white wine vinegar
3/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 tsp. dry mustard mixed with a little water.

Mix the first 5 ingredients in a blender. With the blender running, drizzle in olive oil very slowly. Mix the dry mustard with a little water to make a paste and add to the blender. Keep refrigerated.

Yield: approx. 1½ cups

This post is part of Tuesday Twister hosted by GNOWFGLINS.com

More winter prep

Working away

11 more like this!

Hope the goat, salt block and fresh straw

It’s been an exceptionally nice October 31st but there’s still so much to do before snow comes.  Some years we’ve had a snowstorm on this day! Today I worked on cleaning out the goats. (finally!)  I think it got overlooked last year because Oy! what a  job it was!  I thought I’d be working until sunset but it really wasn’t that bad, only a couple hours.  My back is feeling it, though ~ 12 wheelbarrows full!  But it’s looking good.  The goats are acting like their salt block is new…??  It’s always been there.  I moved it outside while I worked and they were all licking it.  They also kept sneaking out of the gate.  Too many times I was shooing them back in, I had to get my son to man the gate for me.  Such trouble-makers they are!

I’m feeling good… this is the kind of work that is very satisfying for me. There’s a couple more things I want to do but I know the goats will be able to bed down and be warm.

Fay the goat

Fay

Fay was giving me some concerns for the past 5 days or so.  I noticed she was doing a lot of mouth movements the first day.  I thought she might be chewing her cud.  The next day the movements were more exaggerated and there was a lot more licking.  She was off her food that day but she was still drinking.  The third day I tried feeding her, she’d take a bit of sweet feed, roll it around in her mouth and then shake her head.  She wouldn’t take anymore.  I am convinced something was wrong with her mouth.  If it was her throat or stomach(s) she wouldn’t be drinking, right? She was interested in food so she was obviously hungry. I tried giving her cooked oatmeal with a little molasses.  I thought she might take it because it’s soft.  She licked it a bit but didn’t want any more than that.  By yesterday I was really getting concerned!  I tried looking in her mouth a few times.  Not an easy task, I can tell you!  I couldn’t see or feel anything. I was beginning to think I might need to get my family in on this, hold her down and really get a good look inside her mouth. 

It doesn’t look like any of that is going to be necessary because she’s doing so much better today!  No licking and she’s eating again!  If you asked me what I thought it was, I would say it was probably a sliver and it worked itself out, like slivers usually do.

As a side note, I got Fay from a neighbour and never really knew how old she was.  Looking inside her mouth and seeing her teeth, I think she’s a lot older than I thought!  Or maybe time flies quicker than I think…  probably the latter.

Mostly poultry

Here’s a look at the real food that’s been cooking in my kitchen this week.  I didn’t realize we were eating so much poultry until I put this post together! Ha!

Turkey breast

Curried Turkey Over Rice

Turkey Stock

Greek Roasted Chicken and Potatoes

Fresh Tomato Soup

Marg’s Sandwich Spread

Roast turkey – I cut the legs and wings off one of our homegrown fresh turkeys, put them in the freezer for another time and roasted the rest, breast side down. Cooking it breast down makes it very moist. I removed the breast and sliced it for a meal and for sandwiches.

Curried turkey – We loved this! It’s also a good way to use bits of meat you get from different parts of the turkey. It can be made with any kind of leftover meat. The way I used to cook it called for canned cream of mushroom soup, but this time I made it with real ingredients only and it was so much better! I served it over brown basmati rice.

Turkey enchiladas – not pictured. This was a new recipe I tried and it was very good! Filling too and we hardly knew it was turkey. Which was nice since we’ve been eating so much of it lately.

Turkey stock – The bones were so big, I had to cook it in my canner! It made lots of yummy broth.

For a turkey that had the legs and wings removed, it fed us for a lot of meals. I picked the last bits of meat off the bones, (another pound!) and froze it for another meal at another time. Hopefully that’s the end of it for a while!

Greek Roasted Chicken and Potatoes – I make this fairly often. It’s a family favourite. I especially like it because you can adapt it for feeding more or less people.

Fresh Tomato Soup – A soup made with chicken broth, from the leftover roast chicken. I used up the last of my tomatoes from the garden. The picture doesn’t show that there are chunks of tomato, green pepper and chicken. I also used up the last little bit of cream I bought earlier in the week even though it didn’t call for it.

Sandwich Spread – I won’t buy Miracle Whip anymore and mayonnaise isn’t zippy enough for my family so I’ve been experimenting with a sandwich spread recipe. I don’t want to call it Miracle Whip because I’m not trying to copy the taste but make my own. This one turned out pretty good. They’re eating it in their turkey sandwiches so I guess it’s okay.

This post is part of Tuesday Twister hosted by GNOWFGLINS.com

Winter preparations

Chopping wood

Snow fence

Chicken coop

It’s been a very busy week, since we got snow.  Thankfully it all melted and it bought us more time to get ready for when the ‘real’ snow comes and stays for the winter.

~There’s firewood to be split.  We have some but not enough for the winter.  It’s been cold enough for a fire in the woodstove everyday.  We are waiting on a large delivery, 7 cords more.  The logs will be 8 foot lengths so they’ll need to be cut then split.

~We got the snow fence up.  Not really necessary but so great to have.  It helps keep the snow from drifting on the driveway. 

~I cleaned out the chickens and dumped the manure on the garden.  This will be the last time they are cleaned before winter.  They will be shut in for several months once it’s cold enough, the next time they are cleaned as thoroughly will be in the spring.  I add fresh straw throughout the winter.

~I’m still working on cleaning out the goats.  I did some but it’s a big job.  I’ll get it done though!

~Other years I’d also be putting up the storm windows on the house.  We’ve been slowly replacing the windows so this year it is so nice not to be putting up those old storm windows!

Cream of Turkey Soup

I’ve got lots of rich turkey broth simmering these days, especially this year because we raised our own turkeys.  Broth made from homegrown poultry doesn’t taste like store bought or canned.  It’s hard to describe except - how broth should taste!  One thing I love is turkey soup,  and this recipe is at the top of my list of favourites. It’s simple and easy, it makes use of the wonderful broth available to me and the carrots that are still freshy harvested from the garden. It’s rich, creamy and delicious.

 

Cream of Turkey Soup

 

Cream of Turkey Soup

1 turkey carcass
4 quarts of water
1 large onion, chopped
5 carrots, chopped fine
1/4 cup uncooked brown rice
1 pint (500ml) heavy cream
3 cups diced cooked turkey
½ tsp. sage, if desired
sea salt and pepper to taste

In a large kettle, cook turkey carcass with water to make 3 quarts stock. Remove bones; reserve meat for soup. Strain the stock; set aside. In a saucepan, combine onions, carrots and rice with 1 quart of the stock. Cook for 40 minutes. Add vegetable mixture, turkey and seasonings to taste to the remaining stock. Add cream and heat slowly to serving temperature.

 

Check out the Gallery of Soups at GNOWFGLINS.com for new fresh soup inspirations.

 

Back in business

New sign

I’ve got eggs for sale again!  The chicks I got this spring are now laying very well.  I took down the old worn out sign and hung up this new one.

Eggs are $2 a dozen.  Come by call or by chance.  Please bring empty egg cartons when you come.

Processing our homegrown turkeys

Dunking

Cleaning

Chilling

This weekend we processed the rest of our turkeys. We had some wonderful friends offer to come help! I’m so grateful! With 6 of us working, the job was done in no time.

We used a galvanized garbage can as the dunk tank. I heated several large pots of water on top of my stove and when they were just about boiling and we were ready to start, we brought them out and dumped the water in the garbage can. I tied a candy thermometer to a string and tied the string to the handle of the garbage can so I could check the temperature of the water. This worked very well for us. We had to add a couple more pots of boiling water near the end but otherwise it seemed to stay hot enough.

We didn’t use the plucker for the turkeys like we did for the chickens because they were too big. When we put the turkey on the plucker, which took 2 people to do anyway, it would stop turning because it was too heavy! We found them just as easy to pluck by hand, much easier than chickens. Once we were done plucking and eviscerating (I’d like to report that I have learned to clean a gizzard!), we put the turkeys in large plastic garbage cans filled with cold water. I left them there for several hours to make sure they were chilled to the core. Then we bagged the giblets and put them inside the turkeys and bagged the turkeys. We left them inside the garage for the night to chill. The temperature was just above freezing so it was as cold as a refrigerator.

Today I shuffled things around in my deep freezer and was able to fit 5 of them in. One, I decided to keep in the fridge and cook this week. How often do we get fresh turkey? We aren’t sick of turkey from Thanksgiving yet. I have so much planned for this one bird, it will feed us for several meals. They all dressed out around 24 lbs!

If you’ve been keeping track, you will know that I started with 10 turkey poults in the spring.  I lost one early on.  We had one for Thanksgiving, one I sold to my neighbour and one we gave to the friends that helped us butcher.  Our friends didn’t want to accept but hubby and I were so grateful, we could not take ‘no’ for an answer.

I really enjoyed raising the turkeys, they are interesting birds. I don’t think we’ll have a problem eating this much meat, though I think I’ll butcher a little sooner next time so they aren’t all quite so big!  I’d like to do it again next year.