Piggyness of Pigs

if you follow my posts at all you know that i am a joel salatin devote .... he is an amazing farmer who runs Polyface Farms in the US.  He is a man committed to stewardship of this planet and a man who recognises our Creator God made it and the design of it .... for US.  including animals.  he often can be heard talking about the chickenness of the chicken or the piggyness of the pig .... eluding to the whole idea that we should respect all living animals for how God created them and what He created them for.

i reckon its a concept that once you get your head around what that means .... you will forever be changed about how you see the animals we live with.  that doesn't mean not to eat them .... it means to let them live their lives the way they were meant to be lived .... not cooped up in cement floors or row upon row of tiny cages, never seeing the light of day and living horrific and miserable lives.

anyway .... i digress.

i had the opportunity to go out and see a friend who had just gotten a couple of "weiners" .... these are piggies that have grown enough to be weened from the sow and are ready to be fattened for the dinner table.  but while they are growing they can perform a wonderful service, by beginning to till the soil, etc.  which is what our friends were going to use them for .... to reclaim an old are of their veggie patch.  it really was inspiring.  hubby still has to finish off the movable electric fence area where they will till the soil for the veggie patch reclaiming .... but even in their current quarters, you could see their piggy-ness coming through.

i saw them on their first day getting settled into their temporary digs.  they seemed a bit listless, so i suggested to my friend that pigs love mud .... why not spray them and get them wet?  so we did and oh my!  within 15 minutes they were charging about, having a blast and enjoying their piggy-ness.  gorgeous little animals.

i so enjoyed watching them dig around in the dirt.  one of my pet peeves is to see people who have pigs as pets with nose rings.  it is truly horrible to watch people put rings through pigs noses because they don't want them mucking around in the dirt.  guess what?  it is part of how God created them .... it is wrong to deny them of their innate piggyness.  what is one of the most intrinsic things that you do as a human?  imagine someone coming along and saying .... you don't get to do that anymore .... because i say so.  it's wrong .... it's just wrong!  so my heart was very happy to see these piggies with clumps of mud on their noses .... having fun .... because it is part of how they were created!  and their nose serves a huge purpose to us!  if we manage them properly then they can dig up old veggie patches (as in my friends case) and in general just be of great use to us .... and they are enjoying themselves as they do it!

seeing them in action was a real affirmation to me of how we want to use them on JustEarth.  we will probably fence in the OMG (organic market garden) area first up.  providing the appropriate mobile shelter while they dig up the earth and make it all mucky and full of good fertile "stuff" .... after that we'll put the chooks in the chook tractor over it just to spread it all out and then we'll be ready to till!  it's all about using the systems and animals the way they were made rather than making life too hard!  and at almost 51 .... i am very appreciative of that!  <g>

i will finish with another thot.  any animals we own will serve a purpose -- they are partnering with us in the work that we do.  one of the purposes that any animal we have will be to nourish our family.  so rest assured, any animal we have will have a great life .... and one bad day.

off to dream now .... about prosciutto, sausage, slabs of bacon ....... <sigh>

The World of Bamboo

a while back i promised a post on some impressions i have had of bamboo.  stunning.  amazingly diverse.  hardy.  so easy to use.  SUSTAINABLE.

we were walking around the Djanbung Gardens a month ago and i was taken aback by their ability to use bamboo in so many ways.  it made me smile when i thot back to our trip to Hong Kong 3 years ago and saw these 5-6 storey scaffolding structures made out of .... you guessed it .... bamboo!

i could wax lyrical .... but that does get boring after a while.  so i thot i would let the pictures of what you can do with bamboo speak for themselves.  please forgive the blatant child photo's .... can't help it .... they are an integral part of our lives and seem to follow us everywhere!  <g>

take a look at the bench!

these are beans growing up a bamboo
pole.  the spikey bits from the bamboo
have been left on and make great spots for the
beans to grab on to!

a shade house of course.  will be early on our agenda
to build.  and of course it's out of bamboo!

a shot under for how it is put together

and an even better shot!

bamboo, stripped down and used to create raised
bed gardens!

nothing from bamboo goes to waste ....
these are the leaves that fall off ...
used as mulch

hey mum!  that's a huge bit of
bamboo!  

you do need to choose your bamboo
carefully.  talking to the staff at djanbung they indicated
that this bamboo is useless for building big
structures because it didn't stand up to the elements
very well. however for furniture .... well jeepers!
it would be gorgeous, aye?

a stand of bamboo that they use to build with.
takes about 4 years for it to be big enuf to do much with.
guess we'll have to get planting early!

now that is pretty darn cool!

more bamboo leaves .... they were used as mulch for the
turkeys and chooks.

yeah .... she is cute and having fun .... but look at
the trellis behind her!

and of course the required curing station
to allow the bamboo to dry out and
harden.

a big picture perspective of some of the ways they have
used bamboo in the garden.  hodge podge ... a bit.
but it works and it's sustainable!

and even as fencing around some of the gardens!  

in mid march i will be heading off to the Philippines to visit the orphanage our kids come from, Rehoboth Children's Home.  they have over 2 hectares of land and have many opportunities to do sustainable ag in a small space.  there is a place very near them that does sustainable / organic permaculture.  look at how they use bamboo!  i reckon my march trip is gonna have me seeing bamboo in my dreams!

Bunya Nut .... success!!

so i had to do a follow-up on my last post ....

you see, that dear friend who brought me the first cone decided that he could get his hands on a fresher ones and dropped one off after church on sunday ... why not see if this works?  up to the challenge?  heck yeah!  <g>

 it was significantly smaller than the last one .... and if i must say .... significantly tougher!  had to get hubby to do this one .... and he had to get two chisels and wedge them in and push them apart to get the nut split.

the mammoth effort!

after that i managed to get them out of their out green protective shell to reveal the inner hard shell ....

so we cracked one raw .... wanted to make sure it was good.  and if you have been wondering about a size comparison .... check this out.  a macadamia nut unshelled and a bunya nut .... shelled. ate this ... had a bit of a fibrous texture ... but was otherwise ok.

woa!  that's a big sucker!

next step is to try the cooking again.   now that we know we have a viable nut .... let's cook it like it says.  apparently this is when the flavour really starts to set in.

the nuts, cooked.

the next photo shows the three stages of the cooking and cracking.  not an easy process i have to say .... but got it down to about 30 seconds per nut!.  the secret seems to be to get a pair of bull nose pliers and use them to wedge into the top and to pull it apart, with the pliers, along the clear fault lines on the nut .... and then to use the pliers to pull the shell back .... at least half way.  then i got a small knife and pierced it and was able to pull the nuts out whole.

cooked, slimy nuts in a pile.  the one off to the bottom right
on the blue towel has had the slime removed (impossible
to get traction to open otherwise.  and the bowl has
the successfully shelled nuts in it!

what do they taste like?  waxy texture with a chestnut / potato starch nutty flavour.  i can see how they could sit around a campfire and eat these (another way to soften the shells, drop them in the fire and wait until they pop!) .... they are certainly meaty enuf!

and a picture tells the story.  roasted about a dozen of them and made a basil, garlic, lemon, parmesean  and bunya nut pesto .... and i reckon the verdict is really good!