Since mid Nov, I’ve been making all of the bread we eat, so that means baking almost everyday.  I wondered if it would be one of those passing phases, but it has been one of the best things we’ve adopted!  We still haven’t got past the smell of fresh bread and hearing that wonderful crackle as it is cooling off.

The idea came from our friends at Well Preserved.

I watched this and that was it for me – so easy, no kneading, no fussing or fluffing and the result is what is the real seller.

My basic bread recipe is:

4 cups flour

¼ tsp heaped dried yeast

1¼ tsp heaped salt

and up to 2½ cups warm water (depending on the flour and its thirsty-ness)

Bake it at 250°C for 30 min then 10-15 min

I’ve tried it with different flours, where I normally add 1 cup to the 3 cups ordinary white flour.  With the variations, I’ve discovered:

* Spelt makes an awesome crumb and the most stretchy dough, just add the water a bit at a time after the first cup, as it uses less water than the basic recipe (too wet next morning means no folding and it is hard to transfer to the baking dish)

* Wholemeal is more thirsty, but very tasty.  Need a little more salt too.

* Semolina makes good texture and is nice strewn over the top before baking

I made one a few days ago using plain yoghurt instead of some water (¾ cup yoghurt and 1 cup water to 4 cups flour) – it was awesome!  Just adjust the water to account for the moisture of the yoghurt.

There is one other I tried, but I’ll write that at the end, because there is a bit of a story in the middle.

Butter

I thought it would be fun for the kids to see the process of making butter – it’s always better if there is something to eat at the end (biscuits, cake etc).

500mL full fat cream

and a container that screws shut or seals well.

Pour the cream in and shake.  And shake and shake and shake.  The whole family took turns and first it went like whipped cream and everyone had a taste, then it went really solid and finally all the buttermilk started to come away.

The butter is great.  Am interested to see if we stop buying butter totally too – hope so.

So, back to the bread.  I had just less than 1 cup buttermilk from the butter and the logical conclusion was to put it in the next bread.  It was a wonderful bread, with good crumb and crust, just again adjusting the amount of water.

Some other things that have worked for me:

* using a pyrex glass dish with lid for baking.  Has great seal to keep in the steam when baking the bread

* don’t oil or grease the dish at all, the baked bread loosens on its own and the glass is easier to clean

* I let it rise overnight and first thing in the morning fold the dough edges in and let it rest while the oven is heating, then bake

* I let it rise on a floured counter, no cloth covering

Now I want to try one with potato (mashed) in place of some flour and adding lots of fresh herbs to another.  There is so much you can do, once you’ve got the feel of the dough.  Oh, and incidentally, two loaves (4 cups of plain white flour) cost less than 1 dollar to make (more ‘fancy’ flours cost a little more, but you don’t use much either, ie 1 cup per 2 loaves)…  and I know exactly what went into it.

*****Has photos of a rabbit being skinned and gutted*****

Don’t look if you are squeamish!

It has been a long time coming, but here, as promised is a guide to skinning and gutting a rabbit.

A group of us went out for a night shoot.  Steve arranged access to the farm, Barry from London took my new shotgun, an 11-87 Remington Light Contour, and Nina from Germany had my Savage Shorty .22.  I was working the spotlight, with Steve driving the ute.

The three of us crowded onto the back of the ute, and after a quick briefing and safety talk, we were off.  Barry hadn’t shot for a good few years, having been resident in London for about a decade, and Nina was about to have her introduction to shooting.  A good way to start!  No gentle introduction, shooting paper targets at the range, just straight into rabbit shooting.

We had a very good night, with both of the shooters taking time to get their eye in, but getting better as the night went on.

All up we shot 16 rabbits and hares, not a bad tally, and the photo on Nina’s camera of her standing in front of them all, holding a rifle, in camouflage gear is priceless.

Obviously her Grandfather liked the picture as well, because he photoshopped a cut-out of Nina’s face onto the body of Elmer Fudd, surrounded by signs saying “Rabbit Season” .

We got home some time after midnight, packed up the guns, and off to bed we all went.

The next day, we cleaned and skinned the rabbits, and for those who are not keen, this is where it gets graphic.

Nina could have gone to the sleepout and hidden during all of this, but she stayed to watch, ask questions and take photographs, and was very keen to partake in the meal.  Pretty good I thought for a townie that had never seen the whole process of dressing an animal.

The rabbit, ready to be processed

Make an incision across the back and pull the two halves towards each end of the rabbit

Pull the pelt off each leg (the feet will still have fur), but they will be chopped off when the pelt is gone.  Pull the pelt far enough to show the neck, so the head can be chopped off.

Make a shallow cut, starting from the back end of the rabbit, being careful not to nick the gut

Open up the cavity, to expose the guts

Pull it all out, cleaning out the heart & lungs etc under the rib cage and the entire intestine.  Make sure you clean all faeces thoroughly!  There are some things you don’t want turning up in your dinner.  Some people split the pelvis, but I just push a finger through from the inside, and make sure I get everything, tubes included.

This is the messiest part of the job

Wash the rabbit, clean of all fur & blood etc

Place it in the roasting dish.  This one is covered in 1 finely sliced apple (to retain moisture) and lots of chopped fresh herbs and some olive oil and green ginger wine drizzled in the bottom of the pan.  Wrapping in streaky bacon is also a good way to retain moisture and add fat.  Rabbits are incredibly lean, so it is easy to dry them out.  We stuffed an onion and some garlic inside this one.

Roasted at 100 DegC for about two hours.

All in all, a very enjoyable hunt, and a great meal with great company.

A while ago, I wrote about rabbit shooting (here).  It rapidly proved to be the most popular post of all time, so I thought it was time for a follow up.

Rabbit shooting is a popular pass time where we are.  It teaches hunting basics, as well as accuracy, respect for your prey, basic gun craft and safety.

I have friends who shoot rabbits at long range, with centre-fire rifles and a range finder, regularly taking shots in the 350-400 metre range, and I have friends who, like us, hunt rabbits purely for food.  I use a .22, although I have used a shotgun on occasion.  I prefer the .22, as there is one hole, and one bit of lead to find.  The people who hunt with large calibre rifles also hunt deer with these same rifles, and familiarity in the field enhances accuracy, and therefore your chances of bringing home the bacon, so to speak.  Of course a .308 or .30-06 doesn’t leave anything for the pot.

Savage Shorty

This is the rifle I use.  It is modified by Savage in New Zealand to be just over minimum legal length, and has a full over barrel suppressor.  I use a Bushnell Banner 3-9×40 Dusk-Dawn scope, and CCI sub-sonic ammunition.  The rifle is black milspec paint and a synthetic stock.  It is very light, very short and easy to carry.  It has limitations.  It is a very good short range rifle, good out to about 75 metres with the rounds I use, and I have it sighted in for 50 metres.  At 75 metres it shoots about an inch and a half low, after that the bullets drop rapidly, so that at 100, they have dropped 14 inches.  CCI Stinger Hypervelocity fix that though, and are about 1/4″ high at 100.  Close enough for me.  I carry two magazines, one loaded with subs, and one with hypervelocity rounds.

The Stingers (These are no longer available, and I haven’t yet tried their replacement.  Luckily I have a few.) negate the suppressor, with the crack of the sound barrier being broken very audible.  It is still quieter than a Stinger through a Ruger 10/22.

If you were going to buy one .22, I wouldn’t buy a Shorty.  It is a good addition to a gun cabinet, and suits me nicely, but if you get a standard .22, you can shoot anything through it without the mucking around that I did.  Also, the over barrel suppressor is a pain to clean properly.  Savage recommends cleaning every 500-1000 rounds, but sub-sonics are dirty, and they need cleaning every time you use them.

Subs are devastating on rabbits.  They hit and mushroom, penetrating far enough for serious damage and a good wound channel, without full penetration.

As rabbits are a declared pest in New Zealand, farmers are mostly keen to have them shot.  The key word is mostly, and you do need to ask permission.  The best way to do this is before you want to go, don’t turn up on a doorstep at 8:30 at night carrying a rifle looking to shoot rabbits.  I can almost guarantee you won’t get a good reception.  Try and get an introduction or recommendation from someone who knows the landowner.  That’s what I did, and I now have exclusive rights to shoot on a couple of properties.  Certainly enough to keep our family in meat.

Rabbit is a much underestimated meat.  It was the first game meat my wife tried, and remains a favourite.  It is amazing how much meat there is on a fat rabbit.  Done with a bit of thought, feeding four adults is easy on one animal.  The best advice if you want to eat your rabbits is to get skilled enough with your rifle to take head shots regularly.  This is so you don’t destroy any meat, or have a guest bite on a bullet!

I have been tossing up about posting photos and descriptions of skinning and gutting a rabbit.  I think I will, and will take photos next time I go out.

A Blue Moon is when two Full Moons occur in a calendar month.  As there are 12 months, and 13 lunar cycles every year, a Blue Moon must occur once a year.

This year, we have an unusual situation, as the first Full Moon of the year was on January the 1st.  This means we also get a Full Moon on the 30th, so the first Blue Moon of the year.

Then, February is so short that it doesn’t get a Full Moon of it’s own at all, the third Full Moon of the year falls on March the 1st.  Then, on March 30th, we get the fourth Full Moon, and second Blue Moon of 2010!

So, the odds of something happening, that only normally happens “Once in a Blue Moon” have just doubled.

There has been a lot of vitriolic debate regarding the accuracy of the science surrounding climate change and the inaccurate label of  “Global Warming”.

There seems to be a fairly general agreement that the climate is changing, with a few notable people disagreeing, but the causes of it are at the centre of the debate.  Both sides, proponents of the theory that climate change is at least accelerated by man, and climate change “deniers”, accusing each other of lies, fabrication, distortion of facts, selective reporting, and junk science.

Neither side comes out looking particularly good, and rather than investigate the phenomenon, warfare seems to be the order of the day.  This overflows to the general public, who seem to take sides on political grounds – right wing equals denier, left wing equals radical environmentalist.

This is most evident in the US, where politics are actually talked about this way, even though their alleged left is more right wing than some other countries right!

Ill informed debate takes place along the lines of anecdotes about personal experience that “disproves” a huge amount of investigation by either side.  Both halves of the debate refuse to listen to the other, and dismiss out of hand any argument, reasoned or not.

Unfortunately, even serious journalism has sunk to the depths of name calling and partisanship.

So what to do?  Who to believe?  Where to turn for informed accurate comment?

Quite frankly, I don’t care.

What we need to do is stop the debate degenerating further into the politics of the schoolyard, and look at some serious issues that the debate has highlighted.

We pollute at a phenomenal rate.  Does this cause the planet to get warmer and melt ice caps?  I don’t know.  Do I want my kids to grow up in a world that is so contaminated that they don’t get to see natural wonder and beauty?  NO!

Simple.  Take the debate and turn it.  Do we all agree that we pollute, and over fish, and our land practices need work?   Obviously we do.  Do we achieve “World Best Practice” in the way we conduct ourselves with regard to the environment?  Patently we do not.

We pander to big business whose sole reason for existence is maximum profit in the shortest possible time.  At it’s worst, business is indistinguishable from crime.  The harm that it does to people and the planet with some practices would have an individual arrested if it were an individual act.  The fact that these acts are perpetrated out of sight by a corporation should not excuse the behaviour.

Forget the climate change debate, we need to hold responsible the major polluters of the planet.  That’s the big corporations who pollute and destroy on a grand scale, the shareholders only after a good return at any expense, the lawmakers who allow and condone it, and the customers.  Yep, you and I.

Boycott those that don’t take their responsibilities seriously.  Tell them both that you are boycotting, and why.  If enough of us do this, it will make a difference.  Individuals do have power, we just can’t see it. Get involved in a group, volunteer, buy local and organic, support farmers markets.  Protest.

We all have a responsibility to our future generations to leave the planet in a better state than we found it.    We don’t need more hot air surrounding the issue, we need action.  Now

Best known as “The Chimpanzee Lady”, Jane Goodall has written a thoughtful, intelligent and articulate book about the problems that we face with our food system.  This is a well researched tome that describes accurately  the problems currently faced in food production, and where we are headed if we don’t change direction.

Jane is a well known vegetarian activist, and I expected a preachy style regarding harvesting and eating of meat.  It didn’t happen.  She quietly points out that most of us eat far too much meat, and suggests we make a choice to reduce that amount.  That is a statement that is hard to refute, given the state of our health in Western nations and the impact food has on our health.

Eating less meat was a decision I personally made years ago (including a stint as a vegetarian), and the health benefits are real, and very quick to show up.

Jane Looks carefully at all aspects of food production and farming, including farming, both intensive and organic, slaughtering and harvesting, fishing and genetic modification.

There is a look at fast food and obesity and the junk science that tells us it is ok to eat fast food.  The language and behaviour surrounding the fast food industry is the same as was used by the tobacco industry in defending their products.

The most fascinating part for me was the section on genetically modified organisms, and the amount that is in our food supply.  She quotes from research that is dismissed or repressed because it is rigorous, and shows problems with GM foods.  She tells of studies involving rats that die sooner than rats fed the same food that is not modified.  Monsanto and others are setting themselves up to be in control of food production, from seeds, to fertilisers to ‘pest control’.  This is a dangerous and insidious intent, and a good reason to grow your own food as much as possible.  China is a large experimenter in GM food, yet senior members of the communist party will only eat organic.

Food is an essential ingredient for us to live.

It is time we demystified what was going into our bodies, and took control away from those who seek merely to profit for so-called cheap food.  The best step that you can take in managing your own health, and the simplest, is to understand and be mindful, of what you are eating.

If you read no other book about food production, read this one.

www.naturfoto.cz

I took our eldest rabbit shooting.

He is almost four, and has been begging to come for as long as he could talk.  So, I finally bit the bullet (ha) and took him with me.

I am fortunate in that I have several places that I am allowed to shoot rabbits exclusively.  This includes a couple of places only a few minutes drive away.  I grabbed everything we would need, and off we went.

We stopped at our destination, and I, once more, went through the rules.  Safety first, last and everywhere in between.  He was aware that the hunt would be terminated if he walked in front of me for example.

Normally I hunt ‘open bolt’.  That is, a round in the breech, with the bolt half open so that it cannot fire, my rifle is also a Savage with the accu-trigger, which is difficult to fire by accident.  As I now had someone else to think about, I had nothing in the breech, with the bolt closed.  Seeing a rabbit would mean deciding whether or not to take the shot, opening the bolt, closing it over a round, pushing the safety catch off, aiming and firing.  This meant that I would only really shoot animals that were sitting still for a while, as anything else would get away before I was ready.

We saw plenty of rabbits playing too far away for a shot, and I had a chatterbox on my hands.  He soon learned the value of silence though (if only that lesson would carry over to home…), and was seeing more rabbits than he had before.

We got two, enough for a first ever hunt, and he has already seen them cleaned and skinned in the past, so this process holds no surprises for him.

Rabbits contain very little meat, mostly in the back legs and the back.  We had a meal of Rabbit legs done on the barbecue, which was very tasty.  Amazing how sweet wild meat tastes.

Rather than waste any, we salted what was left and smoked it.  It was very, very tasty.  We need our own smoker so I can cold smoke it rather than a hot smoke.  Salting and cold smoking meat is how you make bacon.  Rabbit bacon is most definitely in our short term future.

We’ve been thinking a lot about our kids education recently.  The oldest is nearly 4, and education in New Zealand begins between the ages of 5 and 6.  In the lead up to school, children can attend a Kindergarten or similar and until last year there was a mobile kindy that came twice weekly to our village.  No more.  The nearest kindy is now just over 20km away and there are long waiting lists to get a three year old in, and minimum for acceptance is 3-half days a week.

We decided to enrol him in Pre-school Correspondence School.  It has worked brilliantly.  Every month to 6 weeks we receive a satchel containing 4 library books, a puzzle, a cd of music and lots of literature for me in support of the months theme.  The beauty of this system is that I give feedback on how the latest offerings were received and what else is going on in the child’s life, and the next posting is tailored to this information.

This has then opened the discussion for home schooling, or even continuing with the correspondence schooling.  Our preference is Sudbury schooling (which I’ll discuss a bit later in the post), but there are none in New Zealand or even Australia.  For this to be an option it would entail a huge move OR starting one for ourselves….  anyone out there interested in helping us get one started?  In all seriousness, we’ve asked the Ministry of Education for the guidelines and regulations involved in setting up a school and will soon advertise for expressions of interest, in helping start a school and for potential students.

Current education leaves much to be desired. How so?

• children are put into an authoritarian system (school) and are expected to function in a democratic society once they leave school

• children are segregated into age groups, if not gender as well. Where in the real world is there segregation in age groups? Doesn’t every adult deal with all types of people, all ages, all walks of life?

• education mostly focuses on teaching, not learning. If there is no motivation, the teaching will not yield learning.

• students are discouraged from asking questions where the teacher doesn’t have the answer. Discussion and debate are discouraged, unless the teacher can have the upper hand.
• a child’s individual style and speed of learning is ignored. The learning that would naturally progress is altered and forced.

What is Sudbury schooling?  Basically it is kids deciding what to learn, when to learn and who/what to learn it from.  They use self-initiated activities to learn – like you do as a baby, when learning to crawl and walk or dress yourself.  This is then ‘fun’ learning, rather than forced or coerced.  Students interact with one another and the staff freely, irrespective of age. They learn to interact as part of their community and have responsibility, for themselves, for their education, for their environment, and for each other.  Each member of the student body and staff have one vote, and an equal say in the running of the school.

I was looking up Sudbury Schools, to make sure I had my story straight, and the one that is linked is the original Sudbury Valley School, founded in 1968. This is the successful model on which many other (Sudbury) schools have been based. Most are located in the US, but there are a few in Japan & Israel and the rest in Europe (Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, & Germany). I discovered one called Open Source Learning, (Sudbury in Hawaii) – I’d never thought of it this way, but the name what it describes fits totally into our philosophy.

Interested in reading more?  Click here.

These people can say it so much more eloquently than we do.

Onwards and upwards for open source living!!

If you have been following these ramblings, you will know that I had a trip planned to hunt Red Deer with Tim Benseman.  The trip has happened, and I am back, resting my creaky knees.

Spoiler alert!  I did not shoot a thing.

It was still one of the best hunts I have ever had in my life.  The property we were hunting on belongs to Tim’s father, Simon, and has been in his hands since 1982.

Initially it was a sheep station, and I think cattle were run there at some time as well.  Now, it is an enormous lifestyle block, covered in trees and regenerating bush.  It is a beautiful, spectacular, isolated piece of paradise, bang in the middle of nowhere.  Located somewhere along the Motu road, between Opotiki and Gisborne, it is not an easy place to find.  We turned off the Motu Rd, onto a farm, and I thought we had arrived.  However, we were driving through a neighbour’s property and didn’t reach the front gate for about ten minutes.  There are Red Deer, Fallow, goats, pigs and Pitt Island sheep to hunt.

We parked, loaded rifles, and set off.

The first thing that struck me, and it was to be a recurring theme for the day, was the native bird life.  I have never seen so many Tui or Kereru (native woodpigeon) in one place.  It was fantastic to see.  Apparently you can hear Kiwi calling at night, and I am sure I saw their tracks at one point.

However, I was there after larger game, and Tim showed his skill as a guide very quickly.  To my mind, a guide should move quicker than you, but quieter, know the country like the back of his hand, have an intimate knowledge, and respect for, your prey and it’s habitat.  Tim certainly excelled in all of these.  We started hunting at 6.00am, and walked up various creeks, gullies and defiles.  There was plenty of sign, but most of it fairly old.  At one stage a large red deer, almost certainly a stag, had come out of the bush, onto the path, and followed it for about 100 metres, and then dropped back into the bush.

Tim guides from the back, and barely says a word when hunting.  This is a refreshing change from a couple of my recent hunting companions.  He guided with hand signals, and the occasional touch on the shoulder.  If I couldn’t figure out where he wanted me to go, he would lead briefly.  This happened twice in the day.

The first hunt, we were out for four hours, and didn’t see an animal at all.  Not even a goat.  We drove up to the lodge, and had a cup of coffee and a bite to eat.  After a while we decided to have a bit of a sleep, as it was midday and we had both got up at 3.30 that morning.  A few other people arrived about half an hour after we lay down, so it was back up, another coffee, and a bit of a chat before we were off again at about 3.00pm for an afternoon hunt.

We drove to the back of the property, had a look at the portable sawmill, and were off again.  This time the sign was fresher.  More footprints, more fresh droppings, and we saw three goats from the road.

This hunt followed the same pattern, up creeks, down gullies, into hidden clearings, through narrow openings, all as silently as possible.

About three hours in, with no sightings and an hour to go, Tim suggested we head up onto the tops (ridges).  We debated it very briefly, as my knees were starting to play up. (I have given my knees a hard time in the past and now they are repaying the favour…)  It was a brief debate, as I really wanted a look from the heights.

We attained the top of a ridge after about 20 minutes walk.  It was a steep, and slippery formed track, with fresh deer prints all the way up.  We sat for a rest, and Tim glassed (binoculars) the opposite slopes.  We spied what we thought was a pig, but turned out to be a goat, and then another.  Then Tim spied a backside.  A deer with his back to us, on the slope opposite, about 600 metres away in a straight line.  Or, about 200 metres down, and 200 metres up again, all while traversing that 600 metres. The deer turned sideways, and we could see it was a spiker (one year old male deer).  Was I up for it?  Yep.  Were my knees?  They would soon learn who was boss.  So that was it, we were off.  The 200 metres down was easy and quick.  We stopped at the bottom for a muesli bar and a drink for a quick energy top up, and we were off again.

Up the hill at probably the slowest pace Tim has seen someone walk.

We stopped for a brief respite about halfway up, and looked back to where we had come from.  And saw movement.  Out with the binoculars.  Deer.  Three, no four.  Five.  Six.  Six deer playing in the sun about 450 lineal metres away.

Tim asked if I was confident with a shot at that range.  I’m not.  With the scope dialled all the way up to 9x, the deer still looked small.  I know where my rifle shoots out to 200 metres, but have no idea how much it will drop when you more than double that distance.  I have since done the math, and it is 50 inches, or 1270mm.  A little over one and a quarter metres.  Even if I was dead on target, I would have to aim a metre high to get a hit.  I would have missed.

We watched the deer play for a while, then a large stag came and chased them back into the bush.  We continued climbing.  We reached the spot where we had seen the spiker, and of course he had gone.  He was probably scared off by me breathing like a fire engine.  Tim didn’t have the decency to breathe heavily, or break a sweat.  Tim told me there was a good game trail just a little further up the hill.  Damn.  Up we went.  Sure enough, there was a dirt path, and fresh hoof prints.  This guy knows his stuff.  We followed the deer up the path, until his hoof prints veered into the bush.  By this time it was about three quarters of an hour after the hunt was supposed to have finished.

We started to head back to the car, down a steep clay path that wound it’s way into the valley where we had left the mighty Isuzu Bighorn.

About halfway down Tim called out softly, and pointed to an area of murky bush.  I stared in the direction he was pointing, and it moved!  I closed the bolt, lifted the rifle, and watched another spiker disappear into the pines…

We continued our walk back to the car, and saw nothing further.

We drove out, back to Ohiwa, where I was staying, a two hour drive.

Somewhere, on the way back, I managed to lose my mobile phone, so it was 11.30 before I could inform the family that I was out, and safe.  Not too bad, except they were expecting us out before eight.

Am I disappointed that I didn’t get any venison?  Mildly.  But it is still one of the most memorable hunts I have had.  Spectacular country, and good company.  Also, Tim has invited me back in May for three day hunt.  And the rest of the family can come and stay in the lodge.

That’s the hunting part of the weekend, I’ll tell you about the fishing later.

Labour Weekend is upon us, and unfortunatley, we have had to cancel the planned trip away.  We were going with another family with two young kids.  On waking up on Friday morning, two of ours, eldest and youngest, were sick.  Arlo has blisters in his mouth and is miserable, and Raiden has a cough that sounds like a seal barking.

Arlo was eventually diagnosed with severe thrush, after three trips to the doctor in four days, and is making a rapid recovery now that we know what it is and how to treat it.

I have a hunting trip paid for, so I am still going.  I will leave at lunch time today (Saturday), hunt all day Sunday, and return either Sunday night or Monday morning.

I am disappointed that the rest of the family isn’t coming, but it is better than infecting all and sundry.

Let’s hope that the hunting trip is fruitful, and I will post some photots on my return.