This recipe was provided to me a while back by Brent Barlow, editor of Community Capers, MC of the annual Rylstone Street Feast and one of the head honcho’s of KRR.fm. As someone who always has a few of our ducks to spare, as well as a ton of their eggs, I’m always on the lookout for new recipes to use up our mouth-watering waterfowls.
This following has become an absolute favourite in our household! Whilst a bit too spicy for our kids, my wife and I love it and the leftovers are great to heat up at work the next day. So without further ado, enjoy Brent’s Curried Duck.
*Season the duck with salt, put the pan with oil on a high heat and brown on both sides. Set aside.
*Pour oil from pan into sauspan. Put onion in the saucepan on medium heat. Add the garlic, ginger, whole coriander, turmeric, cayenne pepper, curry powder and cinnamon stick. Slowly stir until the onion becomes translucent.
*Add the tomato and stir. Add two cups of water and further stir for a few minutes.
*Add duck pieces, cover and simmer for 1 hour.
*Add coconut milk and garam masala, stir and simmer uncovered on a low heat for another 15 minutes.
*Add fresh coriander and lemon juice to taste. Serve with Jasmin rice.
Camping is awesome! Getting away from it all and setting up ya tents by a river out in the wilderness, just nature and some good friends and family.
And what makes camping even better? Good food! Fie I say on those who are content with just a couple of snags – Big Camper Trev don’t swing that way, no sir! Ya got’s to keep ya strength up in the wild and what better way than with Big Angry Trev’s Campfire Lamb Shanksrecipe!
Check out the video for an audio description of the recipe I use (some coarse language), then find the full list of ingredients below. All you need is a set of good hot coals, a cast-iron cooking pot, a few hours and then you are set!
Ingredients:
*4 Lamb Shanks
*2 Large Potatoes – peeled & quartered
*1 Large Onion – peeled & quartered
*2 Carrots – peeled & halved
*4 Garlic Cloves
*4 Fresh Bay Leaves
*1 Tin of Diced Tomatoes
*1 Tin of Water
*1 Vegetable Stock Cube
So get ya tent, head out bush and cook yourself us some excellent tucker! Enjoy!
Here in NSW we are facing an unprecedented level ofBushfire danger. ATotal Fire Banhas been instituted for the entire state, aState of Emergencyhas been declared and some parts of the state have a danger rating of‘catastrophic’– a rating that has never needed to be used before!
Living on a fairly remote farm that backs onto a huge state forest, our family has been very concerned. So much so that we have instituted our ownemergency fire planshould worst come to worst.
There are plenty of official sites that can guide you through how to come up with your own emergency plans, and I heartily encourage every reader to visit the sites relevant to their state as well as download the relevant apps. What I’m going to share here is some of theevacuationprecautions I and my family have taken, in the hopes it may provide you with someideas of your own. In particular – ouremergency bags.
We have several emergency bags packed. The whole idea of these is that they are pre-made and ready to go, saving valuable minutes if you need to get out fast. Our emergency bags are packed with such items that can stay in them forever –notitems that we will have to remove a few days later because we need them. Hopefully these bags will hang on hooks for the rest of their lives unused, but better safe than sorry.
Clothing for the day
Despite the heat,long clothingisessential. Should you end up in an area with sparks flying through the air, you don’t want those sparks touching your bare skin. So long sleeved tops and long pants are the order of the day and they should be natural fibres like cotton, not synthetics that have the potential to melt onto your skin.
Leather bootsare also the most preferable footwear to have. In our case my wife and I own heavy duty leather boots but our children don’t, so we would put them in their most suitable footwear and carry them if required.
We have a bag packed specifically with clothing to change into at a moment’s notice. Again, every minute you can save counts.
EvacClothing Bag
Chances are you might not be able to return to your home for a couple of days until the fire has passed. So you will need a few changes of clothes, but taking into account you should notover packas space in your vehicle will be at a premium.
For each member of our family we packed the following:
*2 T-shirts
*1 Jumper
*1 pair of Long Pants
*1 pair of Shorts
*2 pairs of Socks
*2 pairs of Underwear
*1 pair of Pyjamas
EquipmentBag
There will be specificequipmentthat you may need when fleeing from a bushfire. All this should be kept together and easy to access if needed.
In ours we have:
*One torch with fresh battery
*One small fire blanket
*One first aid kit
*One tube of burn cream
*One pack of face masks
*One pair of fire resistant gloves
*One battery powered radio
Pet Bag
If you have pets you naturally are going to want to take them with you. In our case because we have two pet goats this would entail hooking up the trailer. But for most people your pets may consist of a dog and cat (which we also have). So when packing make sure you have enough pet food for a couple of days and leads for every animal – you don’t want to escape the fire just for your cat to run away or your dog to go hungry. A dish to put water in is also advisable.
Food & Water
Chances are wherever you evacuate to will have food and water available. But again that motto – better safe than sorry. Have a bag packed full of food that does not need to be refrigerated and can keep you all going for a day or two. Pre-packaged food likemueslibarsand biscuitswill serve you well, as well as bags of nuts. Also tinned food such as ham, salmon, tuna and so on. Take as much water as you can reasonably fit. Because we would be taking autewe can afford to take a 25 litre container in the back.
MiscItems
These are items that you don’t need to survive but will be incredibly hard to replace should you lose your home. This includes forms such as birth certificates and passports, as well as more personal items such as jewellery and family photos. What you pack in this bag is up to you, but one of the bags you may need to give the most thought too. Also, because these are items that youcan’tstore in anevackit permanently, make sure you know the location of these items in your house so they can be collected up quickly.
So these are just a few different suggestions for what to take if you need to evacuate and a possible way to have them prepared. Again, I encourage everyone to check out the official sites in order to get even more guidance and information about the best way to go about this, but hopefully this blog willgive you a good starting point on advisable things to pack.
Got any other tips on what to pack in case of Bushfire? Pop it in the comments section below.
Here in Australia they are classed as an Invasive Animal Species and official pest. Responsible for financial losses totaling $225 million per year, they cause land degradation and compete with native species for both food and rock shelter.
We’ve had a big pack of feral goats that turn up periodically on our farm from the forest it backs onto. Except for the odd bit of damage to a boundary fence, it hasn’t been not too much of a nuisance in the past as we currently have no herds of grazing animals.
But now they have discovered our two pet does – twin-sisters Milly and Molly.
Because the Billy’s in particular have such an interest in our two nannies, and indeed twice we have had to go find our goats (who are free range) because they have taken off with the pack, we decided to do something about it.
Not owning a gun, capture was the next best option. And, especially during a drought, it’s surprisingly easy! Here is how:
Billy Goats are like 18 year old boys
Caught via his own passions
*Its truer than you think. They smell bad, they’re constantly hungry and they are constantly horny (pun partially intended). So if you think like a teenage boy then you can lure them in.
*My does are both on heat and have been putting their scent out on the wind. So we have had all the local feral Billy’s showing up, making it easy to capture one. First I left the back gate to the does pen open (which I do most days as they free range and come back themselves of an evening).
*Then I made sure there was a salt-lick in their yard and their water trough was full. During drought goats, like most creatures, are in constant search of water sources.
*I made sure there was some fresh Lucerne in their yard.
*Now think like a teenage boy and think what the scents on the wind are telling the Billy Goat. They are saying ‘Hey! You know what? I know this place we can go! There is tons to eat! There is tons to drink! And there are twin-sisters that are hot to trot big time!’
Look, they even do tabletop dancing!
*So with the promise of free food, free drink and a couple of hotties who are gagging for it, like the 18 year old human male, the Billy Goat cannot resist. They turn up and quite quickly make their way into the pen. I’ve caught two 100+kg Billy Goats with this technique this month alone!
Capture is easy – containment is hard.
The trouble containing feral goats is that they will throw themselves at the fences, charging full pelt with horns down, trying to escape. I have enough fencing skill that I’ve put up a few around the farm, but they are certainly not of a professional standard. The one I built around my goat pen is strong enough to contain our does and proved strong enough to withstand the punishment of a Feral Billy until it gives up and accept its lot in life. However we encountered a problem…
… a competing Billy Goat.
According to my mother-in-law (I was at work at the time) a white Billy turned up and had a big fight through the fence with the one I had captured. With two 100+kg Billy’s throwing themselves full force head first at the same part of the fence, it wasn’t long until it gave and the Billy escaped.
Not the fence it once was
However that afternoon he was quickly replaced. A 3rdBilly (a black one this time) turned up and I was able to catch him using the aforementioned technique. However as I had only had time to do a slapdash repair on the fence, it was not strong enough and with enough full-force attacks he was able to batter over the damaged fence and escape.
So, hopefully I can get the fence repaired properly before my does go out of heat and try and capture some more. All I have to do…
…is think like an 18 year old boy.
Got any goat-trapping tips yourself? Pop them in the comments section below!
Weeding – truly the bane of the gardeners existence! They steal the nutrients from the soil meant for your other plants, they grow prickles to sting you, spread fast and frankly are a pain in the posterior! On my last farm I had a 23m x 7m giant veggie patch and while it went great guns the first few years, I spent the last couple of years managing the weeds more than I grew food for my family.
So here on our new farm I’ve decided we are going to be weed free and to that end I am installing no-dig gardens. I’ve started with two plots for plants I am transplanting from my old farm that need to get in before spring – Asparagus and Comfrey. The whole idea of a no-dig garden is exactly how it sounds – no digging! No digging plots in the soil to plant in and no digging endless weeds out over the years.
Though time consuming, no-dig gardens are simple to create and they save a lot more time in the long run as well as providing a nutrient rich patch ready for planting. I have outlined the step-by-step process I went through below.
Note: This process goes through at minimum 5 layers. I like to do one layer a day. This means I can give each particular layer a good soaking which results in the new garden getting a good soaking 5 days straight. This aids immensely in it breaking down quicker.
Step 1: Choose your site. You can really build a no-dig garden anywhere (even on grass or concrete) but I chose a spot that was dirt and fairly bereft of weeds to begin with. Then your plants have the option of burrowing further if needed down the line.
And thus we start with an almost barren wasteland
Step 2:Cardboardand barriers.
And this is why I hoard cardboard after a move
A lot of people use newspaper but I prefer un-dyed cardboard. Firstly it is much thicker which means it is much harder for weeds to grow through from below, secondly it will take longer to disintegrate and thirdly there are less dyes and inks to seep into the ground. Lay your cardboard down in the shape you want your garden to be and then use logs or bricks to make some walls around it. Soak the cardboard.
Step 3: Put down a fairly thick layer of straw. Lucerne is best and pea straw isn’t bad. Personally I have acres of stubble so I just mowed a ton of that and stuck it in. Wet it down.
Step 4: Put in a layer of fertilizer.
Until I can source some local animal bums I have to go back to store-bought
Chicken manure is certainly the best as it has all the nutrients a new garden will need. I like to mix it up a bit with some cow manure as well. Put down a nice thick layer and once again water.
Make sure you end up covering all of the straw by the end
Step 5: A second layer of straw – this time a minimum of 20cm thick, 30 if you have the resources. Wet the straw down.
Step 6: Another layer of fertilizer.
More poop!
At my last farm I had a never-ending supply of fresh animal dung but here I am having to buy it (until my goats and poultry drop enough for my gardening needs) so I went a cheaper route and mixed it with a bunch of potting mix specifically intended for raised garden beds. Once again water.
150L for $20 – fairly economical
Step 7: Let all this break down. The longer the better. Personally I only had a week to let mine do so before my asparagus started coming back to life and needed to get into the ground. But even in that short period you will see the height of your no-dig garden lower as the straw starts to decompose and it will be ready for your plants.
The finished products!
And that’s it! If you would like to add more layers feel free – the more the merrier! Personally I will be adding some more potting mix around my plants when I put them in and then some straw around that to act as a mulch which will result in 7 layers all up. But to start off, simply follow the above instructions and you will have some nice new patches ready for planting. Once again, you can build anywhere you like and the best part is you don’t have to lift a shovel or pull your hair out over weeds down the line – happy gardening!
Got any other tips about no-dig gardens? Would love to read them in the comments section below!
