Hwyaid 0 Hebogiaid 5

I have decided that we need to rethink our poultry plans.  The chicken and cockerels are doing fine. They seem happy and productive and cover their own keep through the sale of eggs. The ducks on the other hand pose a bit of a problem.

The Muscoveys have proven themselves very productive and at 

their peak this summer we had 29 of them wandering around the garden. Two clutches were hatched and they proved to be very good mothers in looking after their offspring. Seven were bartered with friends, seven found their way into the freezer, and seven await this fate when they are large enough.  They are cute ducklings, inquisitive and pretty, and as meat birds have a pleasant taste and are very lean. The Muscoveys are not the problem.

The Welsh Harlequin Ducks are the problem. We hatched seven of these from eggs this spring and at first they met expectations. They were very pretty and it was very pleasant to watch them in the garden and, later, in the woodland. They have a lovely light colouring which is particularly easy for birds of prey to see from a great height. This coupled with their small weak frame make them simply waddling prey. Over the summer we have lost 5 to hawks and buzzards.


The large goshawk in the lower wood has had his share and it has become depressing to see the remains when we check them in at night. It seems that this lack of guile and inbuilt attraction for birds of prey is one of the main reasons that this species is endangered and was nearly extinct.

It is clear that these ducks are less farm stock and more garden pets. Therefore they have had to go. The remaining two, hopefully a breeding pair, have gone to a wonderful garden owned by our neighbour. Hopefully the hawks won't follow them there.

I have decided small, pretty  birds are not for us. We need things which can fight back.  Large, ugly birds with attitude seem to fit our specifications - turkeys, I wonder.

Mushrooms

This year has seen a very heavy crop of mushrooms and fungi on the smallholding. Unfortunately this has happened before we have become anywhere near proficient in identifying mushrooms and they have been little use to us.

Each time we find one I spend about 45 minutes on the web comparing the mushroom with the specimens there. Is it red or pink ? Brown or Beige ? Large or small ? Has it got a ring on its stem ? What are the gills like ? Does it drive a volvo ? The end result of this, everytime, is that I am sure I have found a mushroom never before seen in Europe. I'll have to contact the World Mushroom Taxonomy Centre to register these new species.

Though to be truthful this doesn't happen everytime. The commonest outcome is that it looks quite like mushroom X and mushroom X is edible and safe. But it also looks quite like Mushroom Y and mushroom Y is either poisonous or probably poisonous. The more time you spend looking at the pictures, and reading the symptoms of poisoning, the more it looks like mushroom Y and the less appetizing becomes the musky aroma and meaty taste of mushroom X.

Even the puffballs prove themselves to be devious little critters. I was previously under the mistaken impression that you couldn't go wrong with these. I had thought that they were easy to identify - they look like balls and can puff - and all varieties are edible.

This is true but with a pretty hefty caveat.

The Fly Agaric mushroom (amanita muscarina) is the red and white toadstool we all know from fairy stories and the amanita mushrooms account for 90% of all mushroom poisoning fatalities. When the fly agaric is a baby it is covered with a universal veil which makes it look like a small button which could  conveniently be mistaken for a small puffball if it is not opened and checked.

Further, there are also earthballs which are not puffballs but can be poisonous, but not usually fatally. The Pigskin poison puffball is one of these. This has been handily called a puffball so as to allow confusion between an edible and a poisonous species.

It seems that a lot of the pleasure in eating mushrooms is like the fun of bungee jumping; it feels is if it might kill you , it will probably cause sweating, diarrhoea, panic attacks and fear, but if you survive you can tell people you did it. If you die then people can confirm their impression of you as stupid and feckless.

Part of me feels it should be easier than this. The information at our fingertips should now make this easy. You should be able to log on, answer a series of questions, and identify your mushroom. But I understand the problem.

I wouldn't want to be running the site that says - yes, that probably brown, or maybe pink, medium sized, small mushroom with the cream (or is it yellow?) gills, yes that one is safe to eat. Go ahead fry it up and feed it to yourself and your family. We'll pay the hospital bills and the funeral directors fees should you have go it wrong.

Like everyone else I'd run a site saying - well, maybe, you could maybe eat it but it is a little bit like that poisonous one that causes explosive diarrhoea, agonizing pain and death because there is no known antidote. Is it worth it to pad out your breakfast ? Fry another egg or nick out to the shop and buy a carton of button mushrooms.

So we will have to do it the old fashioned way. We'll go on the fungus foray next week. At the end we will be taken into a potting shed where the grand mushroom master will show us some edible mushrooms. We will swear the oath, and sign in blood, that we will never let people know which are the edible mushrooms (other than those that come in a can or a punnet).

We will then collect some edible mushrooms and eat them. We'll feel anxious, and still hungry, for 8 to 10 hours while we worry (was that more russet than brown?) before enjoying the sense of relief that we are not dead.

It will then dawn on us that many people go through their entire lives never having eaten a mushroom. We will remember that we can only think of one recipe that has mushrooms at its heart. And we will know that there is a reason for this.

Bread, the secret ingredient

It has probably taken me over two years to learn how to make reasonable bread. During this time I have tried various gadgets, different recipes and varieties of yeasts and flours. During the first years I rarely made bread, certainly not edible bread, but I did manage to make doorstops, paving slabs and weapons of self defence. Later I was able to make something resembling a loaf but although this was edible it did stretch the definition of edible to its limits. We used to presume thet these loaves were good for us, certainly there was no pleasure in munching and crunching our way through them. We thought, like medicine, if it tastes this bad it must be healthy. But despite this partial success we still didn't have bread that you could eat for pleasure, certainly you would never venture to make a sandwich with it.

Then I realised the problem. I was getting too involved. I actually knew the secret but had ignored this knowledge. The only times I had bread was when it was made in the breadmaker and I was kept out of the process. By making the bread in a sealed metal box where I couldn't get at it it worked better, what was I doing wrong. Then I realised, it takes 3 hours at least to make bread. When the breadmaker is working you don't get any choice - it takes over three hours. If you try the rapid setting to try and make bread more quickly the machine starts to produce the familiar doorstops and handheld weapons.

Since then I have learnt that whatever recipe, whatever flour and whatever yeast, bread turns out fine if you complete the steps. This recipe produces a good white loaf and has good margins of error, don't be too worried about the measures and it works as well with economy lidl flour as it does with expensive branded flour.

Put about 600g of flour, about 360ml of tepid water, 1 tsp sugar, I tsp salt, a
measure of yeast and some oil (either 1tbl oil or 1oz lard) into a mixing bowl. Mix these together and then knead the dough on a floured surface.




This is the first time that time is importance. Knead for at least 7 minutes, even if you are bored or tired keep going. Listen to the radio and keep going until you have nice ball of dough.


Now put this in  bowl and cover with a cloth and wait until it doubles in size. This will take a lot longer then you think.  Go out for a walk, surf the net in another room, visit the neighbours, but do not do anything to the bread.

It will probably take one totwo hours. If you are not sure if it has doubled in size then it hasn't, go for another walk.


Now knock back the bread; this means taking that lovely risen dough and kneading it back to the way it looked a few hours ago.  Psychologically it may be hard to do this as all the rising seems to be wasted by this process, but it is vital. So knock it back and think to yourself that you are halfway there.

Shape the dough into a loaf shape and cut the top if you want to do this. Leave this covered by a cloth while it rises to double its size. Again, it is time for a walk, a time to do your homework, get the dog out and throw sticks, just do anything other than annoy the bread.

Once it has doubled again put it in a hot oven, around 200, for about 40 minutes. For a crisper crust put a plate of boiling water in the oven along with the bread as the steam helps crust development.

Take it out, try and wait for it to cool before cutting it.

Once cooled you have an edible loaf and you can even consider making sandwiches.

If this takes too long you can buy a quick loaf from the supermarket, however, it will need to be a cheap one to compare as I estimate that this loaf (including all ingredients and power) costs around 55p to make.

Overnight yogurt

We decided to keep goats to try and become self sufficient in dairy products. Although it is now autumn and their milk production had fallen they are still giving us four pints a day. In the early summer, when Boo was very productive, we were getting up to seven pints a day. 

The milk comes ready for use, all we do is chill it in the stream before bottling it as it helps stop the milk have a goaty odour.

Between the dogs, the cat, and ourselves we get through a lot of milk but there is still a surplus. Yogurt helps us use up some of the surplus. We make two litre batches each week by a method which is ludicrously simple.

Firstly collect your milk. It is said that it is best to use the milk from the morning milking as this has a higher fat content.

Then start making the yogurt. Put the milk in a saucepan and heat it up to 200F. We then keep it at this temperature for ten to fifteen minutes, stirring throughout. We have found that if we do it for less time the yogurt its not as thick. While we are doing this we heat up the oven to 100F.

Next we put the saucepan in cold water to cool the milk down. One it has cooled to 125F we take some of the cooled milk and mix it with some of last week's yogurt (about 2 tablespoons). If you are starting from scratch use a live yogurt and check that it contains  Lactobacillus bulgaricus and Streptococcus thermophilus. We then put all the milk and this mixture into a Pyrex bowl.

This bowl is wrapped in a towel and put in the oven. The oven is then switched OFF and the mixture is left overnight.

In the morning we remove it from the oven and put it in the fridge. It gets a little thicker as it cools.

This method needs no gadgets other than a thermometer and takes only about 15 minutes of work. So far it has seemed pretty foolproof giving good yogurt each time.

Multi-species scrub clearance

We have decided to clear the upper field and try and improve our hay yield next year. The goats use a lot if hay and we will need all we can harvest next year. I have started to clear the overhanging branches and to remove the scrub and gorse.

I have roped the animals into working. Once I have cut the branches the goats clear the leaves from them. The goats have quite clear preferences; oak and ash remain their favourites but they will work ion blackthorn and hawthorn. Once cleared, I trim them into firewood and put the scrap into the incinerator. During this phase Cadi helps by chasing the larger sticks.

One we have cleared this area we will need to consider feeding the field this year. We have access to tons of horse manure which we will consider using.

We still have one lamb we can't catch and get to the abattoir. The other's have made their way to the freezer and our plates. They do taste as good as I hoped they would. The fresh liver on the day they are  brought back from the abattoir is especially good.