Grilled duck breast

 

One of our friends who helps at a local shoot gave us a couple of ducks earlier this month. So we had the breasts grilled with an apple sauce and roast potatoes. Very pleasant.

Potato soup

 

The potato crop is ready for harvesting and it is much better than we feared. We had been worried that the long period of dry weather would result is a low yield. It turns out that the lack of rain has not affected the crop. Anyway, this potato soup was one of our first meals from the new crop.

Historic tractor parade

 

Every year the Bowes Show hosts a parade of historic tractors. The show on 10th September was no exception.

The Bowes Show

 

We made our annual trip to the Bowes Agricultural Show on 10th September. As usual, I had pies, flans, jams and so on for the competitions. I was very hopeful that my game pie would be a winner this year. Sadly, it wasn't but my fruit liqueurs and lemon curd all came away with certificates.

Carrs Billington had a stand. They quadbike they had looked very tempting!

Using the new hay rake

 

Steve tested out the new hay rake on our middle field recently. I'm glad to say it worked well, turning the hay and putting it into rows. What is left to try out is the buck rake.

Sunniside Leek Show

 

I paid a visit to the Sunniside Leek Show last week in Sunniside Social Club. It reminded me that I need to check on our leek crop on our farm.

New hay making equipment

 

The new land we bought earlier this year included a 9 acre hayfield and a 6 acre field which currently has a hay crop waiting to be collected in. We have bought a flail, hay turner and hay rake so that we are not dependent on contractors to cut and collect in our hay crop. Recently the new equipment arrived and we tested it out!

Blackberry and apple jam

 

I've been making jam again today. 17 jars of apples and blackberry jam. There is a big crop of blackberries so get picking everyone. Free food waiting to be gathered.

Cost of living crisis pushes us towards greater self-sufficiency

 

The cost of poultry feed has gone up 25% this year. We are already largely self-sufficient in feed for the goats and sheep but had yet to make the leap towards feed self-sufficiency for our poultry. The rising cost of feed however has pushed us to look into alternative, home produced feeds for the chickens and ducks. And so far we have successfully experimented with apples, rowan berries, potatoes and comfrey leaves. This video was filmed in the earlier part of the experiment before we found that it was better to boil up the apples and rowan berries. We have now slashed our poultry feed bills by half.

More jam

 

I've had a bit of a jam making week. These are the most recent to come off the production line: redcurrant and raspberry jam and crab apple jelly.