Homestead Weekend: a weekend devoted to the productive arts (22 degrees this morning)

1. Squirrel Confit: Every New Year I make confit with the goose legs from our roast goose. It occurred to me that one could make a confit (meat cured in salt and preserved in lard) with anything at hand. What was at hand was a squirrel. Cured in salt, garlic, thyme and basil for 48 hours. Browned in in a skillet with lard. Placed in a pan with enough lard to cover for three hours at 250 degrees in the oven. Pulled out and allowed to cool the squirrel was stored in a mason jar and covered with the lard. Delicious! The remaining meat will be shredded and served over a small portion of pureed split peas as an appetizer.
2. Kimchee: I created a version of kimchee with cabbage, Hungarian and Hatch peppers, ginger, garlic, green onions, fish sauce and salt. Tossing it all together it was packed into a ½ gallon mason jar where it is fermenting nicely. Should be ready in 2-4 weeks.
3. Turnip Kraut: Ten pounds of purple top turnips and greens shredded, salt added and packed into ceramic crock. Fermenting nicely and should be ready in 4-6 weeks.
4. Lard: Five pounds of leaf fat (fat from around the kidneys of a hog) rendered out into beautiful snow white lard. Perfect for baking.
5. Bread: Cindy has been busy baking outstanding bread the past few days.
6. Strawberry Mead: Four pounds of honey, water and a pint of frozen strawberries from our patch, natural yeast and the mix is fermenting quietly in the corner of my study. The mead should be ready in six months.
7. Pork Link Sausage w/figs, brandy and nutmeg: replicating a reference I found to a traditional German Christmas sausage. Four of my favorite food stuffs…how could it go wrong? Making this one later today.
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Reading this weekend two early Christmas presents: The Art of Fermentation by Sandor Katz (ah, that explains the above) and Faviken by Magnus Nilsson, a great cookbook when you are trying to figure out what to do with your “perfectly shot and mature hazelhen” and that handful of lingonberries, or a backstrap loin of moose.

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