Replenishing our meat supply..(Warning:: photos of dead animals and meat )

Every few months  as the level of meat in the freezer drops, and the full jars of canned meat  numbers also decline, we get in and  butcher a couple of lambs.
This time we did three, two of ours and one of the next door neighbours)

The one belonging to the neighbour was trussed up tighter as they were  taking it to have a spit roast
We hung them in the cool room for several days before processing them.

We had quite a few problems with the bandsaw this time, the blade kept slipping off but eventually hubby and our friend( who was having the 3rd sheep as a barter for work he helped with  here)   managed to  fix it and  were able to continue without any more major  issues.

We got   a whole heap of great  meat packaged up and into the freezer, but this time we decided to bone out the belly flaps  and the shoulders.

 We made up a stuffing mix(  albeit a prepackaged one, to which I added more herbs and garlic to),

and then spread a layer of this over the  rectangular flap meat.

I then rolled this up firmly into a neat roll.

we then  tied the stuffed rolls up with  butchers string and bagged them.

We then repeated this with  the shoulders which we  boned out as well.

The next day we  cooked one  of the stuffed flap rolls all day in the slow cooker,

We decided not to eat it hot  and refrigerated it overnight and ate it as cold meat the following day.

It was delicious !!, We definately will be keeping them  for this purpose always in the future, until now we had always cut up the flaps into smaller pieces  and kept them for doggie treats for our Old Blue Girl, but we will have to find other treats for her.

When we puchased our turkeys, we were on the understanding that we had 1 gobbler and 7 hens, but it turned out we had 5 gobblers and 3 hens.
This was a situation that couldn't remain so we decided to  process 4 gobblers.
We  bought a new metal garbage bin , 2/3 filled with water, added a little laundry powder and heated it on our outdoor gas burner.

Hubby did the deed and we dunked the birds into the  hot water to help with the feather removing  process.

We also hung the four  turkey carcasses in the cool room for several days before processing further.
We were very pleased with their dressed weight. We got  5.2 kgs,  6.1 kgs, 5.5kgs and 6.8 kgs.

We then  cut the birds into pieces  to suit our  desired cooking  methods, smaller  roasting pieces,( as we don't want to be roasting a whole turkey)  we also  got about 6 kilograms( 12 lbs) of sliced breast meat for stir frys and numerous  cuts for soup and stocks, most of which will be canned.

The next day I  made two pots of turkey/vegetable and chick pea soup, which I slow cooked on the old wood stove all day.

I then filled  14 quart jars with the soup, wiped the rims, placed caps on and pressure canned at 15 lbs pressure( for my altitude)  for 90 minutes.

After the allotted time , the canner was turned off , and when pressure  returned to zero, I took the lid  off and  removed the jars  out onto the bench to cool overnight.

So then this morning, I removed all the bands, washed  the jars , labeled them  and stored in the pantry. I will make a few more batches over the next week or two.
These are really handy ready meals to have on the pantry shelves, and are really delicious.
An old  friend  who had started to clean out her deceased Uncle and Aunts home, came across some preserving jars and thought I may  be interested in purchasing them, I was and we went and picked up  several boxes of really dirty jars and several of clean jars   from the home and after a heck of a lot of scrubbing the jars below are what we purchased from her.

These  are mainly Fowlers Vacola jars, with about 20 Agee Utility  mason jars  as well( the left hand jars in the top photo)
Since my last post on here We have had the pleasure of becoming grand parents for the fourth time, this time to a gorgeous baby girl who arrived about a week earlier than planned.
Below is a photo of my 90 year old mum holding her  great granddaughter for the first time.

While Mum and the new bub were in hospital, we had the pleasure of the company of Miss 2,
she and her Poppy had such a wonderful time together and she was such a big help to him.

She followed him around  like a little shadow, helping him get wood for the fire and wheeling it down,

and then helping Poppy to build a new swing set that we decided to  have here for the  grand kids to play on.

We had a wonderful visit with  this little munchkin, she is such a sweet heart and has now returned home with her Mum, Dad, and the baby  to resume her big sister duties.
We have had  a very  busy few weeks, between  building renovations, new babies, meat processing, and  just general everyday running of this small  acreage , but over all it  has been worth every hectic minute.
I hope we are able  catch up again soon,
Take care everyone,
Cheers,
Jane.