Tree Range Chickens and Winter Wheat

The whole "slow food" movement is getting

a lot of attention these days. Eating local is a win

win for farmers and consumers. Bo and I are a little of both. We have a small vegetable garden and have had Bantam chickens for almost two years: the fresh eggs are the best and, though they aren't the best "meat" birds, they are pretty good slow cooked in a soup or stew. This summer they all decided to roost in the weeping cherry by the back door. Bo has been waiting for the leaves to fall to get a picture of them...our Tree Range chickens. We went to a dinner party at Jay and Orsia Young's this summer and the whole meal was food from local farms. They are members of the One Straw Farm CSA which is where the vegetables were grown. Bo and I have been having some all local dinners and started going to the Bel Air farmers market. We found lots of great produce; the pea shoots were a lovely addition to our salads all through October. But what do you do when the summer bounty is over? How do you eat local then? I bought two big boxes of sweet potatoes to store in the basement and I bought a crate of green tomatoes. I made green tomato pickle and also froze a bunch of sliced green tomatoes, coated and ready for frying. I perfected the fried green tomato recipe this fall. The secret....cracker meal mixed with brown sugar and pepper. Dip the slice in egg then coat in the cracker meal mixture. Refrigerate for 30 min. then fry in equal parts bacon grease and canola oil. If using frozen ones don't thaw them, just fry them straight from the freezer. I have made many batches of wild blackberry sauce and applesauce. I canned tomatoes and pears.

Basically I have or know where to buy everything I would need for a local dinner except flour. I haven't found any local grains and so I did a little research and decided to grow some winter wheat. I cleared a 30'X30' patch in the front field and traded one of the turkeys for Uncle Jock's roto tiller for a day; and he and Matt and I tilled it. The blue birds had a "field day". Bo got a picture!

Then Matt and I planted two kinds of heritage wheat: Red lamas and Crimean. It took about two weeks before the tell tale greening began.

And then last night something got in, leaving no tracks, and nibbled a lot of shoots! I had put some deer netting around to keep our chickens from going in a scratching around in the dirt but it wasn't rabbit proof....they are my primary suspects.

We still have beets in the ground, the greens are thriving in the cool weather, I guess they should be harvested soon. I pickled some and made several batches of Borscht... Russian style which I froze. They have been really great because they don't have to be picked at any particular stage. We have been eating them all summer and looks like we'll have them all winter too.

Turkeys

Bo and I bought 15 turkey chicks in July. It was an impulse internet buy deliverd in early July. They were out of all the cool hertitage and wild turkeys so I settled for the generic white ones. They were pretty cute. The lady at the post office told Bo she couldn't resist and had opened the box to pet them. It also added to our cool Aunt and Uncleness. We built a good prototype movable pen out of 1 inch PVC pipe, left over goat fence wire, deer netting and zip ties. It is not the prettiest pen but has worked really well. I always thought turkeys were notoriously dumb; I had heard that if left outside in the rain they would stare up into the sky and drown....not true! They are incredibly curious and while not really affectionate, they will come to the side of the pen when I walk up and eat clover or japanese beetles from my hand; the banty hens still run whenever I go near them and I have had some of them for a couple of years!

Now the turkeys are huge. We lost a few along the way but have raised nine to maturity. They are only three months old but together eat 100 lbs of feed a week and each weigh over twenty pounds! The toms have blueish purple heads with weird noodle nose appendages that retract! They also have this strange black burr-like thing on their chests. The jennys are smaller and their heads are less freakish.

We "harvested" four in the last two weeks. Those of you with delicate sensibilities should stop reading now. It certainly is not a pleasant or easy job; but it is a part of farm life. I don't know which is the harder part chopping off their head or holding them until they stop moving. But I alway think of the movie The Gods Must Be Crazy when the bushman kills the deer. He whispers in its ear and thanks it for providing him with food. It is something Bo and I do . Since we don't have the room in the freezer for more than one or two whole turkeys I skin the bird and breast it. I also debone the thighs and save the giant drum sticks. I eviscerate it, saving the liver and heart, I have a great pate recipe, and throw the wings and carcass is the stockpot with celery,carrots, onion, and parsnips. I freeze the meat and have found that brining the tom breasts makes them tenderer.

Here is the Apple tart we had with our turkey dinner Saturday night.