I'm back...

Well, after 4 months of utter silence...I'm back. This winter has been particularly long and cold, so I am glad its finally coming to an end. This afternoon we filled up the raised bed I built back in December with soil and compost. I started a compost pile several months ago, which has been cooking for the past several months (despite the cold) and generated lots of good, rich compost for our beds. I also built two more 4x6 foot beds for a grand total of 3. I've got one more long, narrow and deep one planned for tomatoes only. Should be about 17X2 feet by 18 inches deep.

In other news, I've finally got some fertile Bourbon Red turkey eggs in the incubators. Its a wonder given that our poor turkey gobbler, Fred, got himself all caught up in the electric fence wire. I've bought some more Bourbon Red eggs off of Ebay...time to genetically diversify our flock. Hopefully they will arrive soon and not be completely scrambled from a trip through the USPS.

The new hens we bought last fall are laying eggs like crazy with the warmer weather and longer days we've been having. We've been getting anywhere between 12-15 per day. Mrs. W sent out an email to her office offering them for sale and to our great surprise, we suddenly had orders for 20 dozen! Finally, these chickens are coming somewhere close to paying for their existence. The 14 year-old daughter of one of the ladies who bought eggs wouldn't eat them because the shells were green and brown....she thought they were rotten. Stewpid, stewpid child....and even more so---the parents---for not teaching their children were food comes from and that not all eggs are brilliant white.

Last weekend, we met our friends Phyllis and Bob at the location for the Burlington Company Shops Market (http://www.companyshopsmarket.coop/), the new Co op that we have joined. Phyllis and Bob hope to sell their beef here. We hope to do most of our shopping here as soon as it opens in the fall of this year. I mentioned to Phyllis about this contraption called a Whizbang Chicken Plucker that can be made at home from simple materials and will allegedly pluck a chicken in about 15 seconds flat...she was very intrigued. Later in the day, she emailed to say that she'd found the instructions online and that Bob would be making one pronto! Now we will be able to raise our own chickens to eat!

Well, that's all for now...check back soon for a list of the vegetables to be planted in the garden!

I

Ina Garten's Honey White Bread

This morning I was up early and talking to our friend Jonas in Boston over Gmail chat. He was telling me that he likes to use Ina Garten's recipe for Honey White Bread from her book Barefoot Contessa At Home. So, I pulled out my copy and decided to give it a try (and document for posterity)

Proofing the yeast...

Egg yolks.....the top two are from our new Americauna hens that have just started laying tiny eggs. The bottom yolk is from a store bought extra large egg. Farm eggs are far superior...much larger yolks and such a deep yellow color.

Finished dough on my grandmother's well-used bread board. Ready for the first rise.

After 1 hour in the warm oven.....

Punched down and shaped into loaves.....

Back into the oven for a rise in the pans.....

And baked! Yum....house smells good.

Building a Raised Bed

Inspired by the incredible Heirloom Garden plan from Beekman 1802 , I decided it was time to start a raised bed garden. Along with looking very tidy (Mrs. W mostly enjoys this aspect) raised beds are much more productive than gardening directly in the ground. They warm up faster in the spring, they allow for much more uniform soil, and allow one to plan much more densely than in a traditional garden (because you don't have to leave room for a tractor or person to get through between rows for weeding and harvesting) space thereby increasing productivity per square foot.





I'd like to build several for this year's garden, however, I've only built one so far. 4 feet wide, 6 feet long and 1.5 feet tall. I used pressure treated lumber from Lowes, but plan to line the inside with heavy plastic to make sure no chemicals leak out into the soil.

For the soil, I've found what appears to be a good recipe on http://www.squarefootgarden.com/. 1/3 compost, 1/3 peat moss, and 1/3 vermiculite. I think this mix will be very soft and good for veggies.

Welcome!

Welcome to the first posting of Pursuits of a Gentleman Farmer! I plan to use this blog as a way to document my various putterings and projects around our farm. You're liable to read about anything cleaning our our chicken house to cooking to building raised beds to ordering seeds. Never know what might show up because, we are, if nothing pleasantly eccentric. I'll leave you today with a picture of two of our heritage Black Jersey Giant hens from back in the summer.