Tea? (Part 1)

[wafflycat]

Disaster!

Due to being a tad migrainey today, I didn't water the tomato plants. Damn things wilted & fell over. So I had to hack through the now considerable undergrowth to salvage what I could. The remnants should grow. I salvaged the green tomatoes.

Every cloud has a silver lining.

As well as over a kilo of green tomatoes, I had already picked a great weight of diNizza squashes. So I have mixed these with apples, raisins, onions, sugar, vinegar and assorted spices and I now have a batch of Glutney starting to cook on the hob.

 

[wafflycat]

Betty is 90

Long live tea!

 

[tdr1nka]

I'd imagine the tea would be cold by now!

 

[TheDoctor]

I misread WCs post as 'Long-life Tea' and thought it sounded horrible.

In celebration of the new Waffleychooks, I'm having Coq au Vin tonight
And my grape juice seems to have fermented again...

 

[wafflycat]

The Glutney Chutney is made and bottled! Ye gods, making chutney takes *hours* And then you have to leave it for a couple of months before trying it to see if it tastes ok... Talk about rural bliss.. today I've seen to chickens, made chutney (from home grown squashes & tomatoes as the main ingredients) and made bread as well as 'normal' meals. And the normal meals contained produce from mine & the neighbour's veg patches! I shall sleep well tonight I think.

 

[wafflycat]

Morning!

*puts kettle on*

*sits back & reads newspaper*

 

[wafflycat]

Hurrah!

Nolo has laid her first egg since arriving at Wafflycat's Retirement Home For Ex-Battery Hens.

Reminds me of when Anode & Cathode arrived. Their first few eggs you can tell are ones 'in them' from their previous eggsistance due to the quality of the shell i.e. not brilliant. Once they get settled, get fresh air & TLC and have had plenty of Wafflycat's Patent Hen Food in them, the eggs are soooo much better. Noticeably so.

 

[Apeman]

glutney maker

Morning WC, you live the good life by all accounts but why dont you let the tomatoes ripen before making glutney? When do you ever get out on your bike?

 

[wafflycat]

The tomato plants fell over, so I had to do some radical pruning. Using up the green tomatoes that fell was a way of not wasting them. Bike time limited still due to ongoing leg problems. So might as well use the time productively!

 

[Arch]

Hurrah!

Nolo has laid her first egg since arriving at Wafflycat's Retirement Home For Ex-Battery Hens.

Reminds me of when Anode & Cathode arrived. Their first few eggs you can tell are ones 'in them' from their previous eggsistance due to the quality of the shell i.e. not brilliant. Once they get settled, get fresh air & TLC and have had plenty of Wafflycat's Patent Hen Food in them, the eggs are soooo much better. Noticeably so.

Now, hang on. In the sake of fairness, I think you ought to post photos of the new girls' eggs, like you did with the first girls.

I still remember the Tesco/Wafflycat poached egg comparison....

Quick Tea? anyone? I have to go off in a mo to set up for an outreach group I'm teaching this afternoon - I'm not entirely sure which room, and have no idea how many, isn't organisation great?

 

[wafflycat]

I should do. I'll wait to see if Campag lays today.

 

[wafflycat]

Campag has laid. Just collected the egg. Paper-thin shell. Poor girl. I had to crack the egg as soon as I brought it in it was so fragile. Even thinner than Nolo's shell this morning. Just shows how depleted of calcium they become under the pressure of being in a battery existance. Never mind, I'll correct that soon enough! Fresh air, less stress, TLC, a better diet with extra calcium and in a matter of weeks they should be fully fit.

 

[Arch]

Funny thing - I get eggs normally from a free range outfit in Seaton Ross - the lady who runs it is a friend of a friend, and sells the non-supermarket quality ones (usually too big, or have ridged shells, or odd shapes (no not square, just long and thin normally)) at the roadside (1.50 a dozen for extra large, and they ARE large!). They recently cleared their old hens and got new ones, so there were some weeks when I had to buy free range from Sainsburys - the Woodland ones - their shells were much thicker than the Seaton Ross ones - so thick that I could do my normal thing of pricking them to boil them, to avoid cracking. Yet all free range hens (I know, I've seen the Seaton Ross ones...) I suppose the feed might be different...

Well the outriach group turned out to be mostly mature students (I thought it was going to be kids), which was great, because they tend to take part much more. Mind you, I'd rehearsed my presentation as for 14 year olds, so I had to quickly think a bit more adult!

Need Tea....

 

[wafflycat]

Hmmm... whilst big eggs are a normal occurance as a hen ages, ones where they are mis-shapen or have shell 'defects' are not normal. They can be and often are, a sign that all is not well with a bird, poor diet, stress, unwell... If a free-range bird is producing such eggs I'd be wondering what is going on - or not, as the case may be. I'd be wary of them in terms of bird welfare. And commercial free-range quite often isn't true free-range: the trade has all sorts of tricks to give the birds the space to qualify as free-range 'on paper' whilst in reality, the tricks of the trade mean the birds don't free-range at all but stay in a shed that has a few small pop-holes open. Of the shop-bought eggs, the highest welfare standards are the Soil Association ones.

The outreach session sounds interesting.

 

[Arch]

I have seen the chucks out and about in their field - it's next to the field my friend has her sheep in.

As a matter of fact, I have a colleague who trained as a vet who maintains that chickens don't want to be free range, because they are naturally jungle birds and get stressed in open air. He will only buy barn eggs. I can't quite bring myself to believe him but he is very insistent on the matter. The ones I've seen have trees and little shelters to sit under if they want....

Yeah, the outreach was good - they dutifully laughed at all the right points on my presentation, offered opinions and listened to explanations, and gasped suitably when I showed them the Aurochs' horn core as the example of what it was man domesticated into the cow....