Snowdrops, primroses and ‘lents’, as they call the wild daffodils here, are just coming out in the hedgerows and on a sunny day like today, you’d believe spring is on its way. But after a very cold and grey February, the land is still in its winter clothes looking anything but green. Usually the younger ‘leys’ of grass are growing by now, ready to turn out the ewes and lambs later in the month, but it’s been a hard winter and things are behind.
At least these last couple of weeks have been dry and Tim has been able to get on the land. First of all, muck spreading - which is probably the most important job of all for us organic farmers, putting the fertility from the animals back on the land, recycling waste. You might think I’ve been living in the countryside too long if I said how the muck smelled good the other day!! It must have been the positive feeling in the air that this was the start of spring cultivations, but when animals are kept properly on straw which combines with the dung, it really smells quite healthy, not the unpleasant stench of slurry which you get with intensively housed animals. However I did keep my distance when taking this photo just in case I got splattered! I think all these things affect the quality of our food and if it’s not farmed well, it doesn’t taste good either. Next it’s ploughing which is done by a local contractor who arrived yesterday and then Tim will harrow and work the soil before drilling the spring wheat. There’s plenty to do, but always weather dependent, if it rains now, the ground will be too wet to cultivate and plant, but then if there’s too little rain, the grass won’t grow either.

We still have plenty of lambs so there won’t be any shortage when Easter comes. Older lamb is often called hoggett, and is being talked up by food writers as being more mature in flavour and since we hang our meat well, also very tender. At this time of year when grass is short, the lambs graze root crops, tucking into turnips instead of bought in concentrate feed as we prefer that all our produce is fully traceable; even the food our animals eat is home grown.

Do get your Easter orders to me soon. Last delivery date will be Thursday 28th March with no delivery on the Friday that week as it is Good Friday, with last orders by Sunday 24th, earlier if possible. I do like a traditional roast leg of lamb at Easter but I’ll also cook a turkey and a gammon too as I like to have some cold and maybe a picnic or a pie. We are grounded in March and April during lambing time, and with family and extra people staying to help us, there’s lots of cooking to do. It’s Pie Week this week, so do check out some pie recipes on our Facebook page and post any good recipes you have too.

I hope you all enjoy Mothers’ Day this Sunday.

With best wishes

Jo and Tim and all at Higher Hacknell Farm

Happy New Year! I hope you had a very festive Christmas and enjoyed all the feasting - I know we did, although I never got around to making a turkey and ham pie with the left overs, which is one of my favourite meals after Christmas. There are still a few turkeys available if you missed out, or if you would like to put a turkey by for Easter

Looking back over the last year, the weather has been pretty memorable! Somehow we got through OK with Tim managing to make the silage and hay in one incredibly long week, which was the only week of sunshine we had last summer! We also ‘crimp’ the barley which means it is stored by ‘pickling’ it rather than drying, so the moisture level can be higher when we harvest it. The future will be much more about using farming methods which are adaptable to our very wet climate, I think. But who knows what it will do?

Today Tim has brought the ewes inside the barn, where they will remain until lambing. It is a huge relief to get them off our muddy pastures into a dry shed. They have had rain on their backs every day for I don’t know how long and they need a break! It is a struggle for them outside and they don’t ‘do’, as farmers say. Most of the cattle are inside now as well, so there are a lot of mouths to feed everyday with hay or silage and sheds to bed down with straw. Outside it is a depressing picture with the fields gone beyond saturation point! Every footstep and you sink down through water! Hopefully they will get a chance to grow and recover before spring now the animals are mostly in. It’s mild and the birds are singing, so we’re hopeful!

The butchery is back to our normal routines after the Christmas rush. Now is a great time to stock up the freezer and our winter warmer slow cooking boxes are perfect for making big batches of tasty and economical meals. The latest evidence on dieting seems to be that fad diets don’t do any long term good and cooking from raw ingredients as opposed to using processed foods is the best way to keep the pounds off! January is a good time to be planning for the year ahead and budgeting to make some savings, so do check out our customer loyalty scheme which offers either 10% extra free meat or free delivery on orders of £100 per month. It also saves you time and hassle as we keep a record of your preferences and contact you when your monthly order is due.

We wish you a very happy and healthy year ahead.

Best wishes
Tim and Jo and all at Higher Hacknell Farm

[email protected]
www.higherhacknell.co.uk
Phone 01769 560909

November starts off with our annual cider making. We have a bunch of family and helpers picking up the apples and building the ‘cheese’ , layers of apples and straw on the ancient press. Luckily they all seem to know what to do as this year Tim was planting the winter oats. It was forecast to rain the following day so he just had a small ‘now or never’ opportunity to get the crop in. They did a proper job, as we say here, although there were less apples due to the poor year and they were much smaller. My role is mainly feeding the workforce (they help themselves to cider!) and It makes me think what it must have been like in times gone by when the farmers wife had to cook breakfast, lunch and tea for so many people every day! So now that the Higher Hacknell farmhouse cider has been made for another year, the next celebration is Christmas.

It is only five weeks until we’ll be busily packing up and despatching the Christmas orders to you and I know that time will fly by. If you haven’t placed your Christmas order yet, you’ll find our full range of deliciously tasty turkey and goose, tender beef and all the festive trimmings on our website www.higherhacknell.co.uk. Just a few clicks and all that shopping hassle will be done and we’ll deliver to your door on Friday 21st December. Having just won a gold award for ‘On line Retail’ at the South West Flavour Awards, we aim to offer not only fabulous meat but an excellent and reliable butchery service too.

Catch a glimpse of Higher Hacknell lamb, beef and pork featured on T.V this week on More4 every weekeday at 7.30 pm (repeated on Sunday afternoon on Channel 4) as Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall and his River Cottage team cook some great dishes, which you can find here. The film company kept our butcher, Richard, very busy up till the last moment with various additions to their order just we were cleaning up the butchery at 5.30 and as I was about to jump in the delivery van! But as everything had to be in Axminster that same evening, Richard got back to work at the butchers block!

Down on the farm, the rams have been working hard as most of the ewes now have raddle on them to show they’ve been served. But it’s still depressingly wet, which makes everything much harder. Getting wood in and put by, usually no problem most years, has been almost impossible as even the quad bike is getting stuck in the fields. We have just put in a new wood fired boiler which heats my office here, so firewood has become all important. I am enjoying the cosy office though!

Keep warm and well and look forward to hearing from you soon.

Best wishes
Jo and Tim and all at Higher Hacknell Farm

telephone 01769 560909
[email protected]
www.higherhacknell.co.uk

The grass is growing, the animals are thriving here at Higher Hacknell, but we just need a few days of sunshine (and no rain) to get things done! June is usually a really busy month making silage and hay, our all important crops for winter feeding as our animals have a mostly grass fed diet. Although the fields do need cutting now we’re not too bothered by all this wet weather because on balance too much rain at this time of year is better than too little, as they say a wet June means you have a full barn! But last week we had extreme storms and flooding-it happened to be when Tim was out TB testing with the vet, they described seeing a lake coming down the hillside. The vet had to abandon his car and Tim only just got them through in the Land Rover.

Lets hope that Midsummers Day brings us summer weather at last and we can enjoy all those barbecues and picnics (the ones we didn’t have outdoors over the Jubilee Weekend!). Our BBQ boxes are fantastic value, still at last years’ prices and our best selling mixed box is great value at only £100. You can visit our website www.higherhacknell.co.uk to place an order on-line or do phone me on 01769 560909 to discuss what you’d like or how you’d like a cut prepared.

Look forward to hearing from you soon.

Best wishes
Jo and Tim and all at Higher Hacknell Farm