Busy day on the homestead

Thursday Dec 23rd

Having 1.5 Gallons of raw milk in the fridge, I decided to skim the cream off the top and make butter...

Churning cream to butter

Finished butter (spoon for scale)

I pulled out a load from Betty. 

1 tray of 18 farm eggs, 1 tray of lemon peel, 2 trays with 1 Liter of raw milk on each.

Egg load

I also had over 60 eggs on standby and so I prepped 3 trays (18 eggs per tray) and 1 tray of crushed egg shells which I feed back to the chickens to return the calcium to them. This load will go in first thing in the morning.

While I was waiting for the butter to finish, I figured I'd start a quick loaf of bread.

Voila, soft, chewy and delicious

My ever faithful assistant was at the ready to clean up any mess

Brad found a great deal on chicken breast and turkeys at Superstore yesterday. I threw the chicken in a crockpot with chicken broth, garlic, salt & pepper and put them in the oven for an hour and 15 min.

First load of 7 chicken breasts

Added a second load of 8 chicken breasts for a total of 15

I then split the breasts to thin them slightly (with Brad's help) and put them on 3 trays to feed to Betty along with 1 tray of the chicken broth I cooked it all in (waste not want not). 

I had time to kill while waiting on the second batch of chicken breast so I made some Lemon & Lavender body lotion. 

Once cooled

1 for my Mother

1 for Brad's Mother

1 for me

To be perfectly clear, this is not a normal day around here. It was a day when I had no need to leave the house and so I was able to get some stuff done. 

Tomorrow -- ordinary laundry day.... 

But Saturday...

Merry Christmas one and all!!

Fermenting and IBS update

Fermenting: I've no idea what I'm doing but it seems like this fermenting thing is literally just putting veggies in a jar with optional spices, salt and a nipple lid so it can self burp and leaving it to sit for 2-4 weeks. 

Someone stop me if I'm wrong. Please?!

So I ordered a kit from Amazon, below is a pic of the benefits which explains why I thought it a worthwhile investment, not that it was expensive.

I'm excited to give it a try. I bought a jar of organic kimchi about a week ago and we have actually been eating it. Sure it wasn't an enjoyable experience the first time but it actually gets better each consecutive tasting. Note: you only need to eat 1-2 Tbsp with supper. Not a handful.

Because I have moved Betty's camera out to the chicken coop, I have ordered another for Betty because if I don't see the screen (Betty is in a closed room) then I forget to put a load in and it can run 2 odd hours before I remember (not that that uses much power, but..) I try to keep on a rough schedule of putting a load in each morning and taking it out the next morning and this has been messing me up. Yup, control freak.

Not sure if I mentioned about the milk. So I've had IBS for -well, since I was just over 20 (I blame this on my red head son since it started right after his arrival).... I learned recently that raw milk helps so I got some from a neighbour willing to sell milk and butter.

Its been well over a month now, I've been having a cup of warm milk every morning instead of the Tim Horton's (Canadian coffee brand) French Vanilla Cappuccino I've been drinking every day for the last 16 years!!! 

IT IS WORKING!!! Sooooo grateful. 

That french vanilla is something like 350 calories and 32g (8 tsp) of sugar. EVERY DAY for 16 years because it was the only thing that worked.

SO... since the raw milk worked -- how about the eggs?

I haven't been able to eat egg white for 20 years because it was one of the worst foods for setting off my IBS. When I order bacon and eggs I dip my toast in the yolk -- God forbid I get a tiny bit of white on the toast in the process because I would be laid up in pain for a few days.

I tried it. Scared to death because I know how that goes.... IT WORKED! I can eat farm fresh eggs! LOLOLOLOL WTH do they do to our food in these places?! 

Honest to God, I can't even believe it! Me, eating whole eggs! That's a coup -- from the coop. :D