Slow Food Pig & Lamb Roast

All the hard work paid off and we had a great day yesterday at the Westmeath Slow Food Convivium Pig & Lamb Roast. Hilltown turned out to be a fantastic venue, many thanks to Fionnula for allowing us to be there.

We supplied the organic lamb, and so it was up early to be at Flood's Butchers in Oldcastle for 7:30 to collect both the lamb and Morag's pig ready for TJ Crowe to start roasting.

The lamb ready to go onto the spit, having been hung for 2 weeks.

The lamb on the spit.

And some time later, cooked to perfection and ready to be carved.

TJ Crowe and his assistant preparing the pig

On the spit ready to roast

Spit roast pork with lots of delicious crackling

The scent of pork & lamb is in the air and the crowd are getting hungry!

The meat was served in delicious baps made specially by Louis Peppard of Lilliput Loaf Co.

Following the meal Una gave a talk on The Slow Food Movement, it's intentions and ideals, and Terra Madre which is the world network of food communities.

She then introduced the 2 speakers for the event.

First up was Morag Newman who gave a very interesting and passionate talk on Rare Breed Pig keeping especially the Mangalitza from Hungary, and keeping pigs on a smallholding.

Next up was Christopher who gave a talk on conversion to organic sheep farming and an insight into what's involved in producing a lamb.

Eating their roast pork and lamb, and enjoying the talks.

Paddy Keogh from Wines Direct very kindly supplied some very enjoyable Prosecco

Not much was left at the end of the day!

Autumn Fruit

All around us the year is winding up and reminding us to lay down stores for the winter.

In the orchard the last of the fruit ripens.

Medlars

Asian Pears

Quince

For the first time the Sweet Chestnuts we planted some years ago on the drive have fruit.

In the hedge rows the elderberries are ripening

and the blackberries

the rosehips

and the sloes. Must buy some gin!

So much to preserve, so little time.

Westmeath Slow Food Convivium

We are members of the Westmeath Slow Food Convivium and are supplying the lamb for the above roast!

It should be an interesting afternoon, with TJ Crowe spit roasting one of our lambs and a rare breed pig from Morag Newman. It will be an opportunity to find out more about Slow Food and meet some like-minded people.

You will also be able to enjoy two talks, one from Morag on Rare Breed Pig Keeping and the other from Christopher on Sheep Farming and what is involved in producing lamb!

If you are interested please pre-book tickets for yourself and friends in advance (as spaces are limited) by contacting one of the numbers above.

See you there and fingers crossed for a sunny day!

Haylage made at last!

We have been waiting since the beginning of August for a 5 day weather window to cut our meadow and make haylage. To decide on when to cut we use a combination of crossed fingers, the Countryfile Weather Forecast on Sunday, Met Eireann's Weatherdial and finally The Irish Weather Network which has a recording station in Killucan about 15 miles away, and is a great website for local weather.

Monday 30th August turned out to be a bright hot breezy day. Ideal weather !

We tedded it out twice,

and then rowed it up on Wednesday evening.

Smidgen and Iota can be seen checking that the rows are straight!

The haylage was baled on Thursday afternoon.......

......and immediately wrapped.

The bales need to be brought in straight away or else the crows perch on them and puncture the wrap.

All safely stacked in the yard ready for winter, and most importantly, saved without rain.

It will be used to feed the cattle, the sheep and the horses.

We have had 3 inches of rain since this photo was taken!

Pickled Shallots

We lifted the shallots from the garden ten days ago and left them to dry in a shed.

Then we peeled them, and put them in brine for 24 hours.

Rinsed and sorted by size, they are now ready for putting into jars.

The spiced vinegar had been cooled and left with chillies, cinnamon, all spice, mustard seed and bay leaves to infuse.

The vinegar is poured over the shallots, and now we have to wait for a while before we can taste the fruits of our labour!

We haven't had much success with shallots for the last few years due to the wet weather, so it is all the more satisfying to have managed a good harvest this year.

The Orchard & Apple Pressing

We planted the orchard in 1993 (the trees were a wedding present). At the time there were very few Irish varieties available, and we spent quite some time looking and eventually found 3.

About a year after we planted we saw an advert from the Irish Seed Savers Association, looking for 1/2 acre sites on which to plant Irish varieties. Oh well!

We orginally planted Irish Peach, Ecklinville Seedling and Ard Cairn Russet which are Irish varieties, and then any trees we have lost over the years have been replaced with Irish apple varieties from the Seed Savers, namely: Sheeps Snout, Uncle John’s Cooker, Yellow Pitcher.

We also planted James Grieve, Bramley, Lord Derby and Worcester Pearmain. So that we now have about 16 apple trees.

The rest of the orchard is made up of pears, plums, greengage, damsons, 2 medlars, 2 quinces and 1 cherry which does fruit but we never get them because the birds always beat us to them!

We were taken a bit by surprise on Saturday as the first of the apples were ready about 3 weeks ahead of last year, and so we had to get set up for pressing our Worcester Pearmain and James Grieve. Four trees in all. Apologies to Ella who wanted to come and see the process, but we will be doing it again!

From blossom in May ............

..........to fruit ripe for picking in late August.

Onto the quad bike, which carries the crates to where we are set up.

And with unparalleled concentration, the apples go into the crusher...........

.....which chops and macerates them into small pieces ready for pressing.

We have a small screw press which takes about 1/2 a crate of crushed apples at a time, and depending on the variety produces 2 to 3 litres of juice per pressing.

We then bottle up the juice, and freeze it. Nothing added! And the juice keeps perfectly for up to a year.

Our afternoons work yielded up about 35 litres of delicious juice from 4 trees. Much better than letting them go to waste.

The first of the plums!

In the orchard the fruit is starting to ripen. The first fruit is always this small delicious purple plum.

The variety is 'Early Rivers' and it is great to eat straight from the tree, or stewed, or made into crumble; it also makes good jam.

As it is the first to ripen we eat lots and lots as it is at least another two weeks before any of the other varieties are ready to pick.