We live in the best place...

Come on! This actually got here yesterday. Rural Vermont rocks. Thank goodness for old school love and attention—and our local postal service. Thanks Alex. Love you too! 

Passion Flower Blooms in January

Making Sausage

Experimenting with sausage. Finally know we need to use pork and beef fat vs. lamb or ewe (or ram, etc...). Spicy, garlic and sweet breakfast.

January 8—Chilly!

This past Wednesday, I was blessed by the company of many wonderful women sharing time and food. It was lovely. Thank you all for traveling out in the super cold. Later in the night, it got to be -34 with windchill—bitter as we tarped and warmed the tracker and dealt with hassles brought on by black ice and such. By 6:30 the next morning two lambs were born. It was -20—rough for the animals. One didn't make it, but the other did. Her name is "Chilly" and she lives in the house. We bring her to her mom every 1-3 hours for feeding. We're a bit ragged, but she's healthy and well. We'll lamb for the next couple of weeks. Hopefully these will be born during daylight and on warmer days. Next year, we'll return to lambing in April or May.

Lamb "Fries"

As practice, we do our best to recycle, drive less, conserve energy—and generally keep in mind good manners, good care, respect and resourceful perspectives. Regarding our friends, family, pets/livestock, and plant world (indoor and out), we try to treat all with honor and gratitude. In respect to food (both lamb, poultry and vegetable), we make the very best of each "harvest" by storing, cooking, canning, preparing and consuming the most we can. To that end, near-rotting or soft veggies suddenly end up in the stew pot, bone broths are common—and our interest in how to use all parts and pieces of lamb, chicken and duck is high. Two years ago, we focused on basic cuts and recipes. Last year, we focused on the good use of offals. This year we discovered that Testicles are extremely good to eat. Unlike scallops, bigger is not necessarily best. Duck testicles, (tiny, like kumquats) are apparently more tender and delicately flavored than those of lamb (roughly the size of an avocado). Their texture is very similar to that of a scallop.

There are many recipes on line (surprisingly enough!), but we simply pan-fried ours with a bit of butter, garlic and olive oil. My friend enjoyed them with additional spices and veggies (pictured here). The trimming and prepping is important—check chef's pics on line.