Samurai Comes to Visit

It's breeding time at Sweet Garden Farm so the girls have a suitor, NC Promiseland SAI Samurai. Sam arrived on October 20. As of this past Wednesday, November 4, he had bred all three does. I was actually ready to return him to his home this morning and saw him mounting Tigger! So, he'll be staying a few more days to make sure that Tigger doesn't come back into heat. I do want to be sure of this pairing for Tigger as I plan to keep two of her doelings if she has two. Sam is related to several national champion milkers, and Tigger is my best milker, so I'm hoping the combination will be good. Tigger has the capacity, but not the form. Sam should bring capacity and form. Click on his picture in the sidebar to go to the website for his herd, Tiny Town Goats.

For those of you who are new to goats and their ways, Sam is actually completely white. During rut the bucks pee on themselves, especially their front legs and faces. This scent is supposedly very attractive to the does. Really! He does smell though, so I'll be happy to get rid of him, although he is an extremely well behaved boy, and no problem at all other than the odor. :) He was a bottle-fed baby, just like my three girls.

I hope to have kids the last of March and first of April. I will certainly have some available for sale, as I plan to keep only two doelings, but should have a total of five to seven kids.

Today's Menu:

Breakfast: Bacon, Simple Fried Eggs, Gogurt with Blackberries
Main Meal: Grilled Chicken Thighs with Homemade Seasoned Salt, Cheesy Kohlrabi, and Cole Slaw
Evening Snack: Cheeses and Salami, Grapes, Wine, and Dark Chocolate

Ingredients in today's menu from Sweet Garden Farm: Eggs, Gogurt, Kohlrabi, and Cabbage

Seasoned Salt
3 T Coarse Sea Salt
1 T Paprika
1 T Celery Salt
2 t Garlic Powder
1 t Raw Sugar
1 t Onion Powder
1/2 t Cayenne
1/2 t Tumeric

Mix all ingredients and then pour into small shaker bottle. Shake on pork chops or chicken thighs before baking or grilling. YUM!

Link to Kohlrabi Recipe: http://recipes.epicurean.com/recipe/11783/summer-kohlrabi.html
I added about 1.5 cups of shredded cheddar cheese to make it "Cheesy Kohlrabi."

Kid Update

Here are WillYum and Woobie (Tigger's two sons) at home. Looks like they have lots of forage to choose from and lots of room to run. Also looks like they are totally spoiled; goats do hate rain...

BlueBell (Tigger's daughter) and her bunk mate Moon Lily are shown on the right. BlueBell is to be bred this Fall for a Spring delivery. Yes, that's standard to breed a young doe to kid for her first time when she is one year old.

Breeding season has begun for me. Yesterday my chosen Buck arrived and is now in the yard with Tigger, Una, and PJ. So far he's shown considerable interest in PJ, but none for the other two. He'll be here until he's bred all three which might only take a couple of days, or might take a couple of weeks.

Today's Menu:

Breakfast: Goat Cheese Quiche, Uncured Kielbasa, Gogurt with Blueberries

Main Meal: Grilled Chicken with Homemade Seasoned Salt, Creamed Swiss Chard, and Pickled Beets

Evening Snack: Salami, Cheese, Grapes, Wine and Dark Chocolate

A Tale of Mice

I have officially killed thirty-six mice in the barn since it was built. I've been keeping track by putting marks on the wall.

When I realized that I was going to have mice out there, and that I really couldn't ask my husband to bait the traps and dispose of them for me, I decided that I better learn to do it myself. So, I bait the traps, and when I catch one, I dump the body in the field (outside of the barnyard) and reset the trap. I do wear gloves!

There's really no way to keep them out of the barn, there are so very many ways they can get in. But, I sure don't want them setting up house in there.

I've devised a strategy that seems to work pretty well. I use to put traps all around the milk room, but the mice would steal the bait and not get caught. So now I set up kind of an ambush. I put five to six traps in a circle. In order to eat the bait off of one trap, they have to stand on another. Sometimes one mouse will get caught by several traps. That's fine. I do want to be sure that they are dead. And they are, thirty-six so far...

Today's Menu
Breakfast: Uncured Bacon, Scrambled Farm Eggs, Gogurt with Blueberries
Main Meal: Large Salad with Garden Lettuce, Garden Tomatoes, Garden Green Peppers, Onions, and Shredded Ricotta Salata Cheese, dressed with Sweet Oil and Vinegar Dressing; Grilled Chicken Thighs with Homemade Seasoned Salt; and Pickled Garden Beets
Evening Snack: Grapes, Assorted Cheeses and Salami, Wine, Dark Chocolate

First Fall Cabbage

I made cole slaw today from our first head of fall cabbage. It's a small savoy cabbage called "Minuet." It's very tender and delicious. The fall garden is coming along nicely

I made soft goat cheese yesterday afternoon which has to sit at room temperature overnight. Then during the day today I drained it. From one gallon I got two pounds of soft goat cheese. It's in the refrigerator now. I'll move it to the freezer in the morning.

I picked several dozen tomatoes; I'll freezer those in a couple of days.

I cooked up 6 packages of zucchini and onions that went in the freezer, and cleaned and froze about two dozen sweet peppers.

A good day's work.

Today's Menu

Breakfast: Pork Link Sausage, Over-easy eggs, Gogurt with Blueberries
Main Meal: Sliced Tomatoes with Olive Oil, Red Wine Vinegar, and Ricotta Salata, Cole Slaw, and Grilled Pork Chops sprinkled with Homemade Seasoned Salt
Evening Snack: Salami with Soft Goat Cheese and Hot Pepper Jelly, Crustless French Silk Pie with Real Whipped Cream

Fall and Winter Gardening

Most of my fall garden has been planted. For the root cellar I've planted red beets, golden beets, carrots, kohlrabi, cabbage, and celeriac. In the unheated greenhouse area (it's open now but will be covered up after we start getting frosts) we have six squares. I've planted one square of swiss chard, one square of fall lettuce, and one square with some scallions and spinach. I plan on another square of spinach, and two squares of winter lettuces. Lettuce and spinach grows very, very slowly in the winter so I'll need a lot planted. I learned this last year. I've also planted a few brussels sprout plants. They are out in the open and will be fine until January or so.

The book I'm using as a guide for winter planting is called Four Season Harvest and is written by Eliot Coleman. It's been invaluable in learning about winter gardening.

Last year Eddie built a portable greenhouse that covers six of our raised beds. We put it up in November and took it down in March. We ate spinach and lettuce all winter long from the greenhouse. I'm hoping it will do even better this year. The soil is in better shape from all the great compost we've been making, and I have a little better idea of what I'm doing.

Right now we're still enjoying lots of tomatoes, some cucumbers, melons, incredibly delicious zucchini, peppers, eggplant, and carrots. We had our first fall lettuce yesterday. It was tender and delicious!

Today's Menu:

Breakfast: Uncured Pork Bacon, Over-easy Fried Farm Eggs, Gogurt with Blueberries
Main Meal: No-Noodle Lasagna, Cucumber and Tomato Salad, Fresh Melon
Evening Snack: Shrimp Cocktails, Wine, Ice Cream with Chocolate Sauce

No-Noodle Lasagna

1 lb. grassfed ground beef
1/2 onion, chopped
1 green pepper, chopped
1 eggplant, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
olive oil

Step One: Put a little olive oil in a large skillet and heat to medium. Add crumbled ground beef and all of the above ingredients. Cook and stir until beef is no longer pink and vegetables are tender. Drain if necessary.

1 28 oz. jar spaghetti sauce
Italian seasoning
salt and pepper

Step Two: Add the above ingredients to the meat and vegetable mixture in the pan. Bring to a gentle simmer and let cook until the other components of the dish are ready.

1 lb. of ricotta
2 eggs
salt and pepper
Italian seasoning

Step Three: Combine the above ingredients in a medium sized bowl.

8-12 oz. shredded mozzarella

Step Four: Assemble - Put half of the meat mixture in the bottom of a 9 x 13 pan, cover with all of the ricotta mixture and about 1/3 of the mozzarella. Then cover that with the rest of the meat mixture and all of the rest of the mozzarella.

Step Five: Bake at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes or until bubbly and a little brown on top.

Variation: You can leave out the green pepper and eggplant. If you do, cut the spaghetti sauce down to half a jar and assemble in a 8 x 8 or 9 x 9 pan.

Enjoy!