Rabbit Stalemate

2015-12-03 - Stalemate

I have never thought that my first biology lesson in year four would haunt me 60 years later. Anyhow my rabbit operation is very simple. I breed for the pot only and have three does and one buck that I mate once every two months. Every doe breeds twice a year which gives me 6 – 8 rabbits after sales and replacements for the pot every 8 weeks. I replace the older does every so often with a good specimen out of a litter and replace the buck with a new purchase as frequently as required to introduce new genes. When a friend of mine said that she has a New Zealand White buck and we should swap bucks as our breeding animals were not related, I thought it a great way to introduce fresh genes into both our operations. She was kind enough to bring her young man around and took my old buck away. I had a doe to breed and, as I normally do, I placed the buck with the doe for 25 days. When I moved the buck to his own cage I was certain that some days later I would have a litter. Last week it was time to slaughter and I butchered all the young ones except a very good looking young doe that I kept for breeding. The following day the buck’s 25 days of pleasure was up and I removed him from the doe. I noticed that even though still young, he did not put on much weight during the 25 days. At first I thought he must have over worked himself and I was now hoping for large litters, but to my dismay on closer inspection found my buck to be a doe. Inspecting the real doe, of course she was not pregnant but very nice and plump. I now have four empty does and no buck – what a farming fiasco!  My teacher in year four told me that if you want to breed farm animals you should have boys and girls – only now do I understand what he was saying.  I am now desperately searching for a virile buck – four lovely young ladies waiting!

Coratella

2015-11-27 - Coratella

Coratella is the Italian name for all the organs in the thoracic (chest cavity) and the dish includes the heart, lungs, liver, spleen and kidneys of either a young lamb, chicken or rabbit. We were fortunate to obtain a suckling Boerbok lamb from a farmer close to Dunedin and I went to the farm and slaughtered it myself, hence had access to all the organs normally discarded and seldom eaten in New Zealand. Coratella is also the name of the resulting dish.

Clean the organs making sure that all the blood is washed off, then cut it into cubes about 2 cm square. Dice two onions and two cloves of garlic and fry in some butter and olive oil until well soft. Ad all the organs, except the liver, and fry well over medium to high heat. While frying, ad a chopped red chili, two bay leaves, salt and pepper. When the meat is almost done ad the liver and turn the heat to high. Ad a handful of chopped parsley and fry for three to four minutes until livers are done, but still pink on the inside. Ad one glass of dry white wine and let it evaporate. Serve immediately with polenta.

Do not forget the good home made dry red wine!

ENJOY!!

Rare Coturnix coturnix

9

Every so often one finds a unique bird in your flock. At present I am breeding four different breeds of Coturnix coturnix, one which is a White breed that was originally developed by the A & M Texas University as a dual purpose bird. The Americans claim their Jumbo Browns to be 450 – 500 g in body mass, but trying to locate such birds or breeders of these large birds appears to be very difficult – I do not know why the Americans want to hide these. Anyway, unlike our friends from abroad, I am not trying to breed the Coturnix coturnix bigger and bigger (if I wanted to breed big birds, I would have started with ostriches), but have put my mind on breeding two of my breeds to be about 280 – 300 g for the females and 220 – 250 for the males – a milestone I have already reached in New Zealand after two and a half years of intensive selection. Hence, I am presently selecting against too big birds in these breeds and made my primary selection criteria egg production, feed conversion, fecundity and body conformation. This is a good size eating bird, which is still an effective producer of both meat and eggs. But back to my unique bird – the A & M Texans are white, but almost always have a black or brown spot somewhere on the body. It is a breed I have had little experience with, but breeding more than 1200 Whites over the past two years, I have bred only three ALL WHITES with no other coloring at all. The first two did not make it on my selection criteria and color not being important to me, they only made it as far as the stock pot. This third all white I have will definitely make it to the breeding pens as he is a magnificent specimen and weighed in at 230 g on 33 days of age. This is my UNIQUE BIRD! (I presume there are other breeders in New Zealand with strains of the pure whites)

 

Cardoon – the ultimate BYF Recipe (Cardi alla Besciamella)

2015-10-28 - Cardo alla Besciamella

We have tried many recipes, see http://www.backyardfarmer.co.nz, mainly because we have a LOT of cardoon, but also, because we do not admit defeat easily. Wasting any garden harvest is a serious offense in this household. Mrs BYF has been on a mission to find a foolproof recipe that we can both enjoy on a regular basis instead of a one off and finally, partly due to the influence of the great Marcella Hazan and her own invention, she has arrived at the recipe below :

Cardi alla Besciamella (white sauce) with Home Made Mascarpone (We buy fresh unpasteurised milk and make our own. Tatua makes a very good mascarpone and sells in all the supermarkets, but it is very pricey.)

6 or more cardoon stems. The largest ones on the plant work best. I take care not to over harvest so the plant can keep growing.

1 liter of home made chicken stock

500 ml Besciamella (white sauce, use any recipe you like)

2 small brown onions

5 strips or more of un smoked bacon (no prosciutto to be had – pre packaged rip offs do not count )

Home made mascarpone to dollop over the besciamella. (Marcella recommends grated Parmigiano but hey, in Dunedin it is cheaper to use gold dust)

Pre heat the oven to 200C

Prepare a bowl of lemon water to hold all the cardoon pieces. Using a potato peeler, strip the strings from the cardoon stems, and cut the stems in bite size pieces. Drop the pieces into the bowl of lemon water. When all have been prepared, drain the lemon water and put the cardoon in a pan, cover with water, stir in about 1 tablespoon of salt. Boil the cardoon until soft, about 40 minutes. Drain the water and set the cardoon aside. Fry the onion and bacon in a few tablespoons of olive oil until the onion is soft but not coloured. Add the cardoon and fry for about 3 minutes, then add stock, covering the cardoon. Simmer until the stock has eveporated and the pan is almost dry. Arrange the pieces in a baking pan, convex side up, and cover with besciamella. Dot generously with tablespoons of mascarpone or grated parmigiano (or both!) and bake at 200C until bubbling and golden brown on top. Serve with fresh bread as a main meal or as a side to a meat dish.

Ravioli alla Zucca (Pumpkin filled Ravioli)

2015-09-17 - Ravioli di Zucca 2 2015-09-17 - Ravioli di Zucca 32015-09-17 - Ravioli alla Zucca 5

See recipe for basic fresh pasta – https://backyardfarmer.co.nz/2015/05/05/pappardelle-al-ragu-di-quaglia-egg-pasta-with-quail-sauce

For the Pumpkin Filling

Use a small 1.5 Kg pumpkin, sliced in half, remove seeds, place the halves face side down and bake at 200 C until soft. Dry the seeds for next year’s planting and feed the peels to the rabbits. Scoop the flesh out of the peel. Mash the soft pumpkin and mix with two beaten eggs, 100 g grated parmigiano cheese, 100 g  dried breadcrumbs, 5 crumbled amaretti biscuits, salt, pepper and a pinch of nutmeg to taste.

Roll out the pasta until it passes through the number 6 setting on the pasta machine and cut circles as large as you prefer. Place some pumpkin filling on the center of a circle, brush the edges with egg and cap with another circle. Press the edges down using a fork to prevent them from leaking while cooking.

Boil enough salted water to cook the ravioli until they raise to the top and float (al dente), which should take only a few minutes. In the mean time heat 100 g butter in a large pan with a handful large of sage leaves. The butter should just begin to burn and should be brown but not black when you dump the well drained cooked ravioli in the pan. Toss and cook for another minute. Serve immediately topped with the burnt butter sauce and crisp sage leaves and generous helpings of  grated parmigiano. Do not forget the wine.

ENJOY!!

The off cut pieces are being used for maltagliata pasta, for another day, which goes very well with any ragu.