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Coq au Vin

Leicester is for the pot. We hadn’t planned to eat any more of our livestock quite this soon but he is suffering rather and it is surely the kindest (and tastiest!) thing to do.

The problem started a couple of days ago when I noticed that he was having trouble standing. Luckily, Miguel the farmer was working on his sweet potato crop in our field (no chemicals mean plenty of weeds!), so we asked him to come and have a look.

He said that basically, Leicester was too fat and his legs won’t hold his weight – it’s a fairly common problem, apparently.

Once again, I am confused about things. Everything I have read about keeping poultry says that you can feed them freely as they don’t overeat.

Since we have started keeping animals my maternal instincts have really come to the fore and I am paranoid that they might be hungry. But now I am feeling guilty as my over indulgence seems to have done for Leicester.

Miguel said that the hens were looking rather plump too…..

I guess it’s to do with being different breeds but our original three laying hens, Pam, Edna and Elizabeth, never seem to put on weight, even though their feeder is constantly topped up. Although when I say ‘layers’ that was their original purpose but to be honest they have become more like pets. The eggs they lay are huge but infrequent and, incidentally, are available - in limited quantities - at Union Jacs, the British food shop in Tornada.

As for Leicester, CG is planning his signature dish of Coq Au Vin for the weekend, yum, yum!

So now we have to hope that the eggs under the on-loan broody hen hatch and at least one of them is a cockerel.

This farming business is so strange, rather like playing God. We decide who lives, who dies and who is born.

By the way, while we are on the subject of chickens I should tell you that the nesting boxes CG is making are still under construction, they look great, but are not yet finished. Hmmmm, maybe next week……..

Last night we had a lovely impromptu supper with our neighbours, once again a shining example of Portuguese hospitality. I only popped in to ask if I could pinch a few of their gorgeous lemons and we ended up staying for dinner!

We really felt we should contribute something and so, in a rash moment, I suggested we try the cheese I made a couple of weeks ago.

Now, I know that two weeks is not long to mature, we were originally planning to wait for about three months, but over the last couple of days I have got cold feet and have been worried about leaving it too long.

The thing is that although the recipe I followed described the cheese as a ‘Cheddar type cheese’ it doesn’t actually include the full ‘Cheddaring Process’ which is what keeps a cheese in good condition for such a long time. So when on our DVD of ‘Victorian Farm’ I heard them say that without Cheddaring the cheese properly it used to go off after about three or four weeks it made me think that we should sample our cheese as soon as possible.

So we did.

It was too soon………..

It’s a shame really but I think it will continue to mature if we wait a bit longer, even though it has been cut, the recipe doesn’t say how long to leave it so we will keep testing its progress. One thing that we all agreed on was that it would be improved if a little more salt was added. The texture was fine, if a little dry, and the smell and colour were great, but it was very mild in flavour to say the least.

The whole thing has always been an experiment so I guess we learn from this and try again.

The Boy King will love going back to the dairy farm to see the cows.

Next Tuesday sees the start of the school summer holidays, which means that from now until mid-September anything I do will take me ten times as long. Every five minutes or so I am dragged away for a noisy game of Dinosaurs, I make a very good Velociraptor, apparently.

It is also the Boy King’s fifth birthday on Wednesday so I am currently busy making little party bags with Dinosaur pictures on them and designing a giant Dinosaur cake.

He’ll love it!

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