Oat, linseed, sesame and oregano crackers

Feed your farmer with these healthy, grainy crackers:

For the crackers:
2 C plain flour
2/3 C wholemeal flour
1/2 C rolled oats
3 T linseed
3 T sesame seed
3 T fresh oregano, chopped (or 3 t dried)
4 T oil
2 t salt
cracker pepper (about 30 twists of the pepper grinder, or to your taste)
1 C hot water

For the topping:
cracked sea salt

Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

Thoroughly mix all cracker ingredients to form a stiff dough. Turn out onto a lightly floured bench, shape into a ball, then divide into eight. Roll each eighth of dough into a sort-of square, about 8 by 10 inches (20 by 25 cm), then cut into smaller squares and place on a large tray (this recipe makes about four tray-fulls). Unless you are incredibly patient, your bigger and smaller squares won't be quite square - we think the almost-square look adds to the rustic farm-fresh look. Sprinkle cracked sea salt over the top (or, for more decadent crackers, brush lightly with oil and then sprinkle with cracked sea salt). Bake 15 to 17 minutes, until golden.

Cool and store in an air-tight container. These crackers are tasty on their own, or served with your favorite goat's fresh cheese, and some chutney.

Pleasant pheasant and apple meatballs

Pheasant meatballs. Perfect partners with free-range eggs
and a good hollandaise sauce.

Pheasants are so lean and mean that even Mr Farmer says they can be tough (and everyone at Fiveacres will tell you that Mr Farmer is pretty tough himself). But there is a softer side to everyone - even Mr Farmer. Serve these tender, flavorsome pheasant meatballs on mash or fresh bread, with green beans, a poached egg, and hollandaise sauce.

If you are all out of pheasant, just use a small whole chicken.

Pheasant and Apple Meatballs

1 small onion
2 T butter
half a pheasant, roasted*
3/4 apple, cored but not peeled**
1 rasher shoulder bacon, rind removed but fat*** intact
100 g fresh bread
1/2 t salt

Put the onion through the mincer, or (if you don't have a mincer) chop finely. Melt butter in a pan and gently fry the onion until translucent but not brown.
Put the pheasant meat, apple, and bacon through the mincer. Put the bread through the mincer last, to clean it out. If you don't have a mincer, finely chop the pheasant and bacon, grate the apple, and make the fresh bread into breadcrumbs.
Mix cooked onion, pheasant meat, apple, bacon, bread and salt. Wet your hands with cold water****, and shape into walnut-sized balls.
Bake in a 300°F (150°C) oven for about 20 minutes, or until just golden brown on the outside. We like to use a Maxwell Williams Microstoven quiche dish - non-stick cookware to which superglue would not adhere.

Enjoy - on a salad, or (our favorite) with a fresh poached egg, hollandaise sauce, green beans and Mr Farmer's top-secret potato mash. If Mr Farmer won't share his mash recipe (we did ask, and he says he  won't), use toasted fresh bread.

*when roasting your pheasant, pour some cider and white wine in the bottom of the pan, and stuff the pheasant with a cored, quartered, un-peeled apple
**use the apple that was used to stuff the pheasant - usually this is only half an apple in total (we challenge you to fit more into your pheasant), so you'll need an additional quarter. We like Pacific Rose or Braeburn, but any sweet apple will do.
***some of us at Fiveacres don't usually like fat, but pheasant is so lean that it needs the fat for tenderness and flavor. Bacon fat is perfect, as it doesn't have an overpowering flavor or texture.
****this helps to keep the meatball mix from sticking to your hands. Really.

Alberto von Danswan's last laugh

After a Summer so drought-stricken that farmers all over the country swore they had never experienced anything so dry, Mother Nature unleashed rain so torrential that rivers all over the country broke their banks, flooding paddocks, breaking fences, and causing the death of hundreds of innocent Salmon. Farmers all over the country swore it had never been so wet.

Mid-way through some of the worst weather Mr Farmer has seen this year, Big Suffolk proudly announced the birth of twins, Molasses and Moonshine. Two small lambs with over-sized ears, little black hooves, and big, dark brown splotches on their coats. Two small lambs who looked distinctly like a certain goat we used to know...

Roger Ram thinks someone's pulled the wool over his eyes. Big Suffolk is a bit sheepish, but she ain't sayin' nothin' about what she got up to five months ago.

Apricot-cherry-glazed manuka-smoked ham

Peter (front, center), excelling in his culinary career, with
colleagues new potatoes (back, left) and salad (back, right).

After the recent controversy surrounding the murder of De Ceased, Peter and Paul quit their jobs at the Fiveacres Stytion, and went on to pursue a culinary career (with a little help and encouragement from Mr Farmer). They were a wild success, particularly at Christmas dinner:

Mr Farmer's Apricot-Cherry-Glazed Manuka-Smoked Ham

For the manuka-smoked ham:
1 leg pork
8 t pink salt (Colorquik or Prague Powder #1)
4 L boiling water
3/4 C non-iodized salt (or 1 1/2 C kosher salt)
2 C brown sugar

Dissolve sugar, salt and pink salt in boiling water, then set aside to cool. Once the brine has cooled completely, put your pork leg(s) in. Leave to brine in the fridge 1 day per 300 g.

Remove from the brine, and cold smoke over manuka wood chips.

Or, visit your local supermarket or butcher for a pre-prepared leg of ham, bone-in.

For the apricot-cherry glaze
150 g apricot jam
2 T cherry brandy
2 T whisky
1 T wholegrain mustard

Combine all ingredients over a low heat, and stir until mixed.

For the finished ham
Cut around the shank of the ham, then gently push the skin of the ham away from the fat layer. Lightly criss-cross the skin. Spread glaze over the layer of fat, and over the skin. Bake at 175°C for 1 hour, basting every ten minutes. Drain the glaze from the ham after cooking and use as a sauce - either as it comes, or strained and thickened with a little cornflour.

Pig out on your ham warm or cold.

Turkish Delight

Tiffany, Yortu, Bob, De Sappeared and De Coy (from left to
right), in happier times.

Yortu was arrested at the boundary fence some months ago, on suspicion of child smuggling. Yortu and the two turkey chicks found in her possession - De Sappeared and De Coy - were remanded in custody, without bail.

Yortu's cellmate Tiffany was not your average jailbird. Tiffany was a young white turkey who, despite a sheltered upbringing in an affluent neighborhood, had fallen in with the wrong crowd, and been arrested for assaulting a blind cat.

Proud Dad Bob with Yortu, De Sappeared and De Coy.

The duo - Yortu, a runaway with connections to the Guinea Fowl Gang, and Tiffany, a misguided youngster from a well-to-do family - became unlikely friends. De Sappeared and De Coy took an instant liking to 'Aunty Tiff'. When Bob, a proud father once again, came to meet his two offspring for the first time, he too took an instant liking to Tiff.

The rest was history, but between misguided Aunty Tiff, mischievous Yortu, and love-stricken (and often broken-hearted) Bob, De Coy and De Sappeared grew up on the wrong side of the fence, falling fowl of the law and becoming prospects in the Guinea Fowl Gang at an early age. Things took a turn for the worse when De Sappeared was hauled down to the Stytion for a grilling over his involvement in the murder of Detective Inspector P Igg.

De Sappeared has not been seen since he entered the Sytion on that fateful Saturday. It is rumored that he gave crucial evidence against the alleged killer in exchange for immunity from prosecution, and was subsequently given a new identity and put into the Witness Protection Scheme. Although nobody knows for sure, sources say De Sappeared now lives in the farmhouse kitchen, under the alias of De Licious.

Manuka-smoked turkey

One small turkey (De Sappeared was about 4 months old and weighed 5lb)

Pluck and gut the turkey, but do not skin it - the skin helps to keep the meat moist. Gently loosen the breast meat from the skin with your hands to allow maximum connection with the brine. For added convenience, split your turkey in half.

Brine

4 L hot water

1 C non-iodized salt

1.5 C brown sugar

4 t Colourquik (Prague Powder #1)

Dissolve dry ingredients in the water, and allow to cool. Use a non-reactive container - plastic works well. Once the brine has cooled, add the turkey, and leave in the fridge. De Sappeared was brined for 5 to 6 hours (roughly one hour per pound of turkey), but Mr Farmer thinks he will brine De Coy for longer.

Remove from the brine - there is no need to rinse. We rinsed one half of De Sappeared, and did not rinse the other. The un-rinsed half is more flavorsome. Leave the brined turkey in a plastic bag in the fridge overnight.

In the morning, prepare your smoker with manuka wood chips, and hang your turkey in the smoker for a good 6 hours. Once smoked, put the turkey in a roasting pan with a little water in the bottom (just under a centimeter - enough to stop the meat from drying out), and roast uncovered for two hours on a low heat, about 150°C.

Smoked turkey is similar to smoked chicken - if you can stop yourself from eating it straight off the bone, it goes well in sandwiches, salads, quiches and pizzas.

For the record, sources are correct - De Sappeared really is De Licious.

Peter and Paul's slow-cooked pulled pork and black beans

Peter and Paul explore the Stytion.

Two zealous young recruits arrived at Fiveacres today, to replace the last member of the Stytion, sadly gunned down by a crazed gunman during a high-speed chase in the paddock. Peter and Paul, fresh out of police academy, hope to bring law, order, and tender, lean pork to the community of Fiveacres.




Slow-cooked pulled pork and black beans

2lb chunk of pork shoulder (or other marbled meat)
24 oz tomatoes
2 cloves garlic, sliced

Something to aspire to...

6 cloves garlic, minced
1/3 C leek, finely sliced (or green onions, if you have them)
1/3 C brown onion, finely chopped
4 t red wine vinegar
1/2 t dried oregano
1/2 C fresh cilantro
1/4 t chili powder
2 T cumin
2 T brown sugar
1/4 t cayenne pepper
1 t salt

1 can black beans**

Combine all ingredients except the black beans in a large pot, cover, and cook slowly for approximately 6 hours in a 210°F (100°C) oven, or a slow-cooker, until the meat is able to be pulled apart. For an authentic feeling (or, if it is the middle of Winter and your kitchen is too cold to venture into), cook at a very slow simmer on top of your firebox.

When the kitchen is too cold...

After about 6 hours, the meat should be ready to be pulled apart with a fork (this should require very little effort - if not, you need to cook your pork a little longer). Once you've pulled the pork apart, add the can of black beans. If you're using black beans in a sauce (Peter and Paul love La Costeña), you can add the sauce and beans. Otherwise, drain your beans first and add them. Cover, and cook slowly for another couple of hours.

Serve in a tortilla with cotija cheese***, rice, salad, pico de gallo, and plenty of cilantro.

**If you're from New Zealand, you're unlikely to be able to get these, so just leave them out (or substitute with kidney beans, if you must). Avoid at all costs impostor black beans such as Delmaine black beans in chilli sauce - you might as well throw in a can of baked beans.

*** If you're from New Zealand, you're also unlikely to get cotija. Engage in the services of a friendly goat and make some, or use a different type of cheese.

Pork, sage, apple and cheddar meatballs (in loving memory of Detective Inspector P Igg)

Detective Inspector P. Igg down at the
Stytion, in happier days.

FIVEACRES Stytion today mourned the passing of Detective Inspector P. Igg, shot and fatally stabbed in an altercation with Mr Farmer. Farmer, returning from his paper round, was seen entering the Sytion with a .22 calibre rifle. Paramedics arrived on the scene but were unable to revive Igg: "He was bleeding like a stuck pig."
At the funeral, held today, mourners were wallowing in misery. Igg's colleague Constable S. Wine said in her euology, "[Igg] could be a bit pig-headed at times, and he liked to hog the limelight and boar you with his work stories, but his heart was in the right place, and he was focused on bringing home the bacon. He was our best interrogator; he really gave the suspects a grilling."
Farmer, who does not like to mince words, was unavailable for comment. Investigators could not confirm a motive, although sources suggest the pair's relationship sowered after Igg told Farmer a porky. A memorial pignic will be held this Sunday.

Pork, sage, apple and cheddar meatballs

250g pork mince
3 T breadcrumbs
1/2 medium onion, finely chopped
3 T aged, bandaged goat cheddar*, finely grated
sprig of sage, finely chopped (about 4 leaves)
1 small apple, peeled and finely grated
1/2 t salt

Mix all ingredients together, and shape into four large-ish balls (their size helps retain moisture). Bake in a 150°C oven for 40 minutes. Serve warm.

* Don't be put off. The cheddar just enhances the flavor, it doesn't hog the limelight.

Aged goat cheddar and tomato tart

Aged bandaged goat cheddar, pictured here with lavosh
and two chutneys. The tart itself looked lovely, but got
eaten before anybody could think about taking a photo.

This tart is the perfect accompaniment to any Summer-evening barbecue - we used our second ever aged bandaged goat cheddar, and adapted this recipe to suit the sweeter, tangier flavor of goat cheddar. With thanks to Helen, who produced the milk that made the cheddar, and Mr Farmer, for being on the taste-test panel.

Flaky Cheddar Pastry:

200 g white flour
50 g butter
50 g lard*
25 g aged goat cheddar**, finely grated
1/8 t cayenne pepper
1 t salt
dash freshly cracked black pepper
2 T water

Rub butter and lard into flour, cayenne and salt. Stir in cracked pepper, then mix in water. Leave to rest at room temperature for 15 minutes. Roll out, press into a shallow 26-cm (10 inch) pie tin - the trick is to make the sides extend only a little above the base, as the filling doesn't add much height, and the sides do overcook easily. Cover with baking paper (or tinfoil, if you're out of baking paper), fill with beans (or other small, weighty, oven-proof objects), and bake in a preheated 190°C (370°F) oven for 10 minutes. Remove the baking paper and beans, and bake for a further five minutes. Remove from the oven and leave to cool.

Filling:

6 medium-sized tomatoes, halved
salt, pepper and oil
1 egg
1 t dijon mustard
20 g aged goat cheddar**, finely grated
pinch of thyme

While your pastry is resting, put a little oil, salt and pepper in a baking dish, and place the halved tomatoes cut-side down on top of the oil. Bake for 10 minutes at 190°C (your oven should be conveniently preheated to this temperature at this stage). Remove from the oven and leave to cool - the tomatoes should be soft but not shapeless at this point. In the meantime, beat the egg, and mix with the dijon mustard, thyme and finely-grated goat cheddar. You'll end up with a rather thick mixture - don't panic; it is meant to turn out like this.

Once your pastry and tomatoes have cooled, remove the tomato skins (and cores), and slice the tomatoes in half again. Spread the egg mixture over the cooked pastry shell, then place the tomatoes on top. Cook in a 190°C oven for 20 minutes. You can serve the tart warm, but it really is nicest cold.

*you can use butter (or margarine) in place of lard, but lard makes a wonderful, light pastry.
 **actually, any old cheddar will suffice, but don't tell Helen.

Thanksgiving: a turkey-inspired recipe for scandal

Mo' and 'Col, having a very happy Thanksgiving with
their adopted mother.

Although Thanksgiving is not widely celebrated in New Zealand, the gossipy bantams celebrated Thanksgiving this year with turkey. They couldn't celebrate with Yortu, because she had conveniently disappeared a few days beforehand, and they wouldn't celebrate with Bob, because he tends to be a little socially inappropriate. Instead, the gossipy bantams celebrated the birth of a new scandal when one of the girls - Sarah Git - discovered that the eggs she had been sitting on had hatched into two fluffy, bright-eyed turkey chicks named Mo Lasses and E. Col I (need we say anything about how naughty he is?).

The scandal that the bantams are so excited about is that nobody was expecting any eggs to hatch. Sarah Git did go out on a hens' night a few weeks ago, and there are parts of that she doesn't remember, but she is pretty sure she never went home with anyone. Sarah Git also doesn't recall ever laying the eggs. Bob, the only male turkey on the street, denies ever having met Sarah Git, but (as the Leghorn and Yortu will verify), he can't always be trusted to tell the truth. Although Bob and Sarah Git categorically deny being the biological parents of Mo' and 'Col, the rumours are rife amongst the bantam community - did Bob really do the dirty on Yortu again, and is that why nobody has seen Yortu for days?

If the gossipy bantams were less bird-brained, they might have remembered Mr Farmer sneaking some eggs that Yortu had abandoned underneath Sarah Git, who at that stage, was doing her very best to hatch a golf ball. The gossipy bantams, if they weren't such egg-heads, might then have realised that Sarah Git really is just a surrogate. Happily for Mo' and 'Col, Sarah Git isn't bothered about being the centre of the controversy in the coop. She and her turkey chicks have moved into the hutch (right next door to Albie, who may or may not be wondering about his involvement), and Sarah Git is raising Mo' and 'Col as if they were her own.

Mushroom, fennel and paprika-stuffed pork leg (in loving memory of Karina)

Karina was somewhat camera-shy, and by the time she was
all dressed up with stuffing, everyone had forgotten
 about photographs. This is Kim and some of her last litter of
piglets, all of whom hope to be just like Karina when
 they grow up.

1 leg pork, boned, skin on

1/2 small red onion, diced finely
1 pork, fennel and paprika sausage*, casing removed
1 rasher bacon, finely chopped
100 grams breadcrumbs

1/2 t salt

black pepper

1 egg

2 cups mushrooms, sliced

1 T butter


Combine breadcrumbs, egg, red onion, salt, pepper bacon, and sausage meat. Sauté mushrooms in butter, until just softened, and add to the breadcrumb mix. Mix thoroughly using a strong plastic spatula, chopping the mushrooms into smaller pieces as you go.

Place stuffing mixture inside pork leg, rolling the pork leg around the stuffing. Tie together with string (this is more difficult than it sounds), and place in a roasting dish with about 1cm water in the bottom of the roasting dish. Bake at 150 - 175°C (depending on how much time you have) until pork is cooked, about 2 to 3 hours, depending on the size of your leg of pork. Make sure there is always a bit of water in the bottom of your pan, to keep the pork nice and moist.

Serve with pumpkin and some nice, fresh, green vegetables, and then do your very best to get someone else to clean the roasting pan (thanks, Trusty Sidekick, for volunteering so selflessly).

*we have refined the sausage recipe again; for every 1kg pork mince, add 1t fennel seeds, 1t salt, 1t coarsely ground pepper, 2.25T paprika, 81g breadcrumbs. Thanks to Ken (wood) for providing the original  sausage flavour.

Saturday's slow-roasted shanks

Saturday, who looks just like Nicole Ritchie only smaller.

Yesterday, Saturday was born. Saturday is an Arapawa Pitt Island cross. Roger his proud, because Saturday looks just like her dad, and nothing like her mum, Arethra (the Pitt Island ewe with the scurs and the inability to spell). Saturday is Nicole Ritchie's younger half sister - the two are almost identical, but Nicole and her mum Whitney are currently residing in the neighbour's paddock, and refuse to be photographed. Nicole was born about two weeks before Saturday.

To celebrate Saturday's arrival, here is a recipe that we have called Saturday's Slow-Roasted Shanks (even though Saturday still has all her shanks, and will do so for some time)...

2 lamb shanks

1 cup celery, sliced
1 cup carrot, sliced
1 cup onion, finely chopped
6 small-ish potatoes

2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 teaspoon dried rosemary
1 large bay leaf
salt and pepper

4 tomatoes, puréed
1 cup white wine
1 cups chicken stock

Combine all ingredients in a roasting pan with lid. Cover, cook long and slow at no hotter than 150°C (302°F), for about 2 hours, or until the meat is falling off the bone.

In other news, after some trouble with the big bad wolf, the last of the three little pigs moved to the freezer last weekend. Karina and Petra, aged just 17 weeks, moved into the three little pigs' house shortly afterwards. Karina plans to grow up and have children with one of Kim's offspring (due later this year), while Petra has plans for a more more culinary career. Kim and Cliff have been toying with the idea of finding a new home, and are thinking about moving out after Kim has her next litter of piglets.

Helen is still pregnant, moody, hormonal, and due to kid this Thursday (despite an early mix-up with dates which had us expecting the kid two weeks ago). She's been spending time with the cows next door, and hasn't been keen to come back home for anyone. The cows next door have accepted Helen as a senior member of the herd, and will follow her all the way to the fence when she gets dragged back home. Back in our paddocks, Roger and Albie are both excited about the prospect of fathering Helen's kids, but that is another story...

This little piggy... (or, pork, red wine and mushroom pie)

These are not the three little pigs. Inglis (front, centre) is
just dreaming about pie. The three little pigs refused to
appear on camera, and the pies disappeared too quickly to
be photographed.

In response to the dismal, wet, cold Winter weather, the three little pigs have been in the kitchen, making a rather tasty pork, red wine and mushroom pie. Here is their recipe:

700 g pork, cut into cubes
seasoned flour

15 ml oil

half a clove of garlic, finely chopped*
1 brown onion, diced
1 stalk celery, diced
1 small carrot, diced

300 ml beef stock
3/4 c red wine
pinch thyme**
2 bay leaves

20 g flour
200 g button mushrooms, quartered***

1/4 t red wine vinegar

Coat the cubes of pork with the seasoned flour, shaking off any excess flour. Heat the oil in a large pan over a medium heat, add the pork, and brown (about five minutes).

Add the garlic, onion, celery and carrot to the pork, and cook five minutes or so, with the lid on, until the vegetables are soft. Reduce the heat to a low heat.

Add the beef stock, red wine, thyme and bay leaves. Simmer very very gently for two and a half (maybe even three) hours - with the lid on for the first hour and a half, then with the lid off for the remaining time. Now is a good time to start making your pastry (or to get your pastry out of the freezer, or to whip off to the supermarket).

Add the mushrooms, and simmer very very very gently for a further half an hour. By this time, the meat should be starting to fall apart. If not, keep simmering very very very very gently. Once the mushrooms are in, start rolling out your pastry, putting it into pie tin(s) and baking the empty pie shells in the oven until only just cooked.

Sprinkle the flour over, combine, and mix until the sauce becomes smooth and thick. Season, add vinegar, and spoon into your pie shell(s). Put the lids on your pie shells, glaze if you can be bothered, and bake at 180°C for about 15 minutes, until the pastry is cooked.

Pastry****

225 g flour
100 g butter*****
1/2 t salt
1/4 c water

Rub butter into flour and salt. Add water a little at a time, until a stiff dough forms. Leave to rest 20 - 30 minutes in the fridge, then roll out into your desired shape. Pastry makers with time constraints can skip the resting part, but do be aware that your pastry will not behave nearly as nicely as it should without a good rest before rolling.


In other news, the Ride-on Mower has found a full-time position elsewhere (no grass for her here, no more work until Spring), Helen and Albie are still very much in love, and we are now saving for a donkey to replace the Ride-on Mower, much to Mr Farmer's distress.

*you could use more garlic, but Mr Farmer's stomach and garlic don't get on, so I didn't.

**or try rosemary, if you're adventurous. That is what the three little pigs will try next time.

***field mushrooms would also be excellent, but it's not the right time of year for them here.

****this is short-crust pastry. If you have time on your hands, or a supermarket nearby, this pie would be excellent with flaky puff pastry.

*****or use 50 g lard, 50 g butter - apparently lard makes an excellent pastry, but we don't often have it in the fridge. Margarine works wonderfully, too.