Wild Duck with Blueberry Peach sauce; Cabbage; Caesar Salad

Tonight's dinner was duck (black duck to be specific) with a blueberry peach sauce along with sauteed red and white cabbage and a caesar salad. (and a framboise lambic!)

Trollie had dinner of a bit of duck, some salmon, little bit of turkey, baked squash, cottage cheese and egg with vitamins of salmon oil and vit B.

 The black duck was a bit too gamey for the other person eating the dinner but I guess my palate really is different. I believe it is because I haven't eaten meat from the grocery store in over 25 years.  But even though he thought the meat was gamey he said the sauce was good. The cabbage and salad were good side dishes. The recipes are below:

Duck:
- thinly sliced duck breasts (I had a black duck but mallard or other duck would probably be better if you don't like gamier meat) - would work with chicken or other bird too
- blueberry peach butter (I made this butter which is basically just blueberries and peaches cooked down into a thick "butter") - any kind of fruit butter or jelly would work
- mead (I have home made mead but any kind of wine would work here as well)
- garlic (fresh and minced)

Get a cast iron pan hot and place the duck slices in pan and sear on each side, (don't worry about cooking all the way through it will continue to cook after you take out of pan and you don't want to over cook).
Deglaze pan with mead/wine adding the butter and garlic and let reduce until thicker sauce consistency
Pour over duck slices.

Cabbage:
- sliced/shredded cabbage (I had a little bit of red and white cabbage so I used what I had, I personally think the red works best)
- butter or bacon fat

Saute cabbage in the butter or bacon fat.

Salad:
- romaine lettuce
- 1 egg coddled, preferably farm raised (boiled for just under 1 min so it is still soft)
- anchovies
- shredded parmesan (preferably fresh and not from a jar that has added fillers)
- garlic (fresh minced)
- lemon juice (fresh if possible)
- olive oil

I don't really measure anymore because this is a staple dish of mine but I would say combine the egg, about 1/3 of a cup of cheese, a couple cloves of garlic, 1/4 cup lemon juice and 1/8 of a cup olive oil with a couple minced anchovies in a bowl...adjust to taste. Pour over broken up romaine lettuce and add croutons if you like (I make them sometimes but often go without), some more parmesan and anchovies on top.

The dangers of free ranging and raising your own animals

This post is kind of an unhappy one. Hopefully I will get some time to spend with my featherheads this weekend and it will cheer me and bring back that happiness I feel when contemplating how much I have really accomplished on the homestead...besides, who needs tv when you can watch chicken football?  However, this past week has made the dangers of other people in association with my homestead become abundantly apparent.

I live on an acre of land with several pens and two barns. Behind and on the sides are 12 acres of farm fields and behind that are 70 acres of woods.  I rent the house and if I owned the place I would probably put up a permanent 6 foot wooden fence in the front by the road.  However, since I don't I have pens set up with chicken wire and netting on the green posts. 

My chickens free range and have a large shed as a coop that I closed in and has a door.  The barn holds two coops in the back and the front area is for the rabbits and it has a screened door on the front.  In one coop are Big Tom and the other turkeys that stay here and it is open to a big pen that is netted over. The other coop is super secure and set up for babies. I raised 4 turkeys in there and until recently had the 3 girls and one boy turkeys I raised. 

The muscovies decided that they wanted to free range after the hurricane which is fine because that is what I wanted them to do for their health and bug control.  They wouldn't use the chicken coop like I tried to train them to but they liked one tree to chill under at night.

All was working well until last week.  First the muscovies decided to hang out in the street and people drive way too fast. Lancelot, my black and white breeder drake, and one of the girls were killed. So, the muscovies are all locked in the chicken coop now and the poor chickens have been kicked out for the moment because the muscovies are too smart for the front pens.... the chickens have a favorite roosting place but I worry about them in the cold weather.  I am very sad I can't continue to free range the muscovies and I obviously have to figure out something else for the pens, bigger and tighter.

That was all sad but it got even worse.  One day last week someone stopped by the house, drove into the driveway honking and told my brother he wanted to buy the two drakes that were up in the front pen. My brother said they weren't for sale and the guy was not happy.  I was gone over the weekend and my brother fed everyone but he doesn't spend much time with the animals, they are all mine... so he fed and watered and made sure everyone was alive and healthy but he doesn't know them well enough to know who belongs where.  He was able to feed most everyone without opening the gates.  Since I was away, there was times when no one was here. 

When I got back and had a chance to check on everyone individually, we realized that my tom from the secure pen was missing and the straw bale that was in front of it was still there but was a little loose.  No feathers anywhere, no possible way for the turkey to get out of the coop or the barn. Someone came onto the property while we were gone and opened two separate doors and took my tom that I had planned for the holiday dinner plus soups and broths and such. 

It has all made me very sad in a time that should be filled more with joy and hope for the future.

Apple, Squash and Sage themed Dinner/Breakfast

I like to figure out what I have on hand and make a dinner revolved around that. It is similar to how I decorate, I find one or two things I really like and the theme of the room is based on that, for instance, my living room is grey with dark blue trim and light sage accents because I have a beautiful wool tapestry of a viking scene given to me and I found some great fabric with wolves on it with the sage green that matches nicely. So, that became the theme to pull the room together.

My food choices are based on what I have, what is in my garden or freezer, local and in season and preferably primal meaning real food and mostly low carb.
Tonights dinner revolves around apples, squash and sage because I have a lot of all of those and they taste great together.  I have some apples left from my last big picking at the local orchard - they have "2nds bins" where the apples are not quite perfect but most are still good enough for cooking, canning and sauce and butter.  I have sage still growing in the garden and I have picked squash from two local farms and have a good amount on hand.  The squash I get are a couple different kinds, the long neck, hubbard and banana mostly and they are all big so any time I decide to use them there is usually a couple meals or soup or canning/freezing of some type.  So, I had to figure out how to combine it all into a meal.

I had some rope sausage from the local butcher in the freezer and pork always goes well with apple and squash. So, here is the meal I came up with - simple, quite tasty and healthy.
Friday Primal Dinner:
Sausage, Roasted Apples and Squash/Apple Soup

Sausage:
local country sausage
fresh sage from garden


- cut into pieces and sauteed in cast iron pan with chopped up sage

Roasted Apples:
local apples
balsamic vinegar
fresh sage from garden


- cut apples into slices with skin on
- place in baking pan at 350F drizzled with balsamic vinegar and sage
- roast until tender

Roasted Banana Squash and Carmelized Apple Soup
banana squash roasted and pureed (you can use any kind of winter squash that you prefer, the banana is a bit softer and sweeter than hubbard or long neck or the standard butternut)
local apples cooked down and carmelized into butter (I had just made a batch of apple butter)
home made beef stock
garlic, onion, tumeric, sage, cayenne (whatever spices you want)

- combine all and let simmer to combine flavors

For Saturday breakfast I decided to use some left overs and came up with this combination:


Saturday Primal Breakfast: Bacon Pieces, Sauteed Apple and Fried Egg

I had a package of bacon ends so I cut the meaty parts off into bits and saved the fat for another use.
I cut some apples into small bits and sauteed in the bacon fat.
I then fried the egg and placed on top of the bacon and apples in a bowl.

The combination was really tasty.

I shared this on:

http://www.theprairiehomestead.com/2012/12/homestead-barn-hop-91.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ThePrairieHomestead+%28The+Prairie+Homestead%29