Hispanico (Cows milk Manchego), Harvesting Onion and Garlic

Time to try something different in the cheese making area. Came across this recipe on NECMSC. It looked pretty simple and having tried Manchego a few times in the past it went on our list of things to try. The process turned out to be very straight forward. We haven't been using the heavy duty cheese press of late but with a block of cheese this size it came in handy especially as the pressing process involved different pressures at various timings. Gauging the pressures was a bit of a guess. 5KG is easy as that is the exact weight of the metal door stop. But 10 KG was a shot in the dark i.e. the screws turned down a bit and 30 KG was the screws turned down a lot. In hindsight maybe making a couple of smaller ones might have been a better idea so that tasting them at different ages would be easier but sometimes it's just nice to have a big wheel for aesthetics.

There was a bit of stirring involved but as luck would have it a handy book and the art of reading and stirring work well. Stirring, coffee, Christmas cake and reading is a touch more difficult but can be achieved.

Some of the alliums were ready in particular the one called French Shallot which looks like a bunching onion. It keeps really well. We used the last one only two weeks ago. They are also exceedingly strong flavoured. Definitely eye watering material. This years crop did not contain the larger sized bulbs that came last year. Our assumption is that weather conditions were a little different and not ideal. It could also have been that the compost used was not up to scratch but we don't think so. Sometimes nature has a little mystery. Still the quantity was good enough and there will be plenty to use as seed stock this coming July.

 

 

The last of the garlic was pulled as well. Again the quality was not present. The odd good corm but nowhere near as good as last year. It just didn't bulb up. Normally we would have finished harvesting in November so this is more than a month late. Still there will be enough across all the varieties to keep us going. Especially now that we have started freezing some of the crop to prevent it shooting before the next years crop is ready.

 

 

We finished the day by sitting in and around a friends swimming pool having a drink and chatting about the world, books and every thing else. Something we plan to do more of in 2014.

An Early Start

Very hard to get out of bed at 5.30 when the temperature outside is 6.5 C, our coldest morning yet. But there is too much to do, don't want to get behind on the things they must happen. No smelling of roses this month at least not yet. July should be the laziest month but it's not. A lot of things happen in July as these blogs will explain.

Cup of milky latte and then drive down the road to let the neighbours cows and calves into another strip of fresh grass and set up two more strips for later in the week. The bull gave me a dirty look. I'd been warned about him and growled back. But typical male, the fresh grass was more attractive than bothering me.

Cows and calves feeding on a new strip

Just as well that electric wire separates us.

Back within an hour to make and eat breakfast, toasted sour-dough toast with Avocado, melted Havarti and a smear of Dijon mustard for one of us and toasted sour-dough bread, Avocado and Kim Chi for the other.

Filled six barrels with compost and planted the Artichoke seedlings.

 

Artichoke Farm

 

 

Harvested the Horseradish, emptied the barrel (keeping the soil in bags for future compost making), refilled with fresh compost and planted Horseradish seedlings.

 

Horseradish in need of work

 

 

Harvested Turmeric, kept old soil and refilled pot ready for replanting. Lot of time washing Horseradish and Turmeric. Plugged into the MP3 player listening to some of Greening of Gavin podcasts on cheese. Handy, always something to learn from someone else. All these little bits on food or gardening get filed away mentally (I hope they stay there).Then morning tea two scones with butter over second latte. A good and productive start to the day.

 

Turmeric washed and in drying racks ready for use

 

 

Collected another 20 or so fallen limes. wrapped most of them in a sheet of newspaper and stored in a box in the Cave. Tried this technique (passed on by a friend) last year to good effect.

 

Then the main task of the day i.e. Planting Shallots, French Onions and Potato Onions. Chopped up the Woolly Pod Vetch green manure crop with hedge trimmers. Forked it over roughly, and chopped vigorously with a spade. Added a generous layer of fresh compost and forked that in - bed ready. All that raised a healthy sweat, no need to go to the gym. Laying out all the bulbs to see how they will fit trying to provide as much space as possible for each plant. Nothing worse than not providing enough space and finding everything constrained when it is only half grown. Everything buried and task complete.

 

Green Manure Crop

Chopping Complete

Forked and spaded

Fresh compost

Shallots

 

 

Headed across the river to the regular job to put out more silage. They only needed one bale and we are now into the high quality bales having worked our way through the poorer quality woody stuff. The girls will enjoy this good silage. They can smell it at a distance. If you are carrying good quality silage they will crowd around the tractor straight away pulling at the bale before the wrapping is taken off. The feeding bins are surrounded with a sea of mud making the task all that much more difficult and dangerous. Again the job only took an hour all up and so back home.

 

Silage in the mud

 

 

Ahead of schedule for the day. Spent the last hour or two of daylight weeding. The Asparagus bed all clean and tidy and also the Pineapples which were at risk of disappearing under chickweed, tidied up around the peas and Daikon Radish. A good day.

Pineapple Bed

Asparagus Bed

 

 

Now off to cook dinner. Started with some more Roquefort on Daikon Radish slices today. Another nibble to keep us going is steamed Red Cabbage wrapped around a small slice of Avocado and a sliver of tinned Mackerel. Main course was roasted Sweet Potato (again as it was so nice last night), Couscous, lightly fried Mushroom quarters in Olive oil and Fish Sauce. Mussels in fried Onion, Garlic, Ginger and Turmeric. Finish off with Yoghurt and ported prunes. The photographs are of the leftovers.

 

Mussels

Sweet Potato

Mushrooms

Couscous

 

 

Not every day is this busy or productive but this intensity of activity is not untypical. There is always so much to achieve in the garden and especially so when the routine is interrupted with wet weather.