The pigs are no longer foraging the front lawn. The lawn has been sown with wildflower seed and the pigs are now pork. As the previous air dried hams were such a culinary success we decided to make four air dried hams. You can never have too much air dried ham, it's an absolute delight. Similarly you can never have too much saussison or salami which is why we made less sausage and more salami this time too. The only problem is the waiting and salivating in anticipation. We shouldn't have too much longer to wait for the salami but the hams were so large it could be another three months before they are ready. However, it's most certainly worth the wait.
We hang the salami in a muslin lined chicken wire cage and the hams are wrapped in cotton pillowcases to deter scavangers.
So we are without pigs at the moment but hope to get more weaners in July which is good timing as it means we will have more pork to process in the Autumn. October is a great time to be working on pork. It means the weaners have been growing during spring and summer when wild food is bountyfull and the weather warm, so the extra foraging they do adds to their flavour and the concentrate feed we give them goes further as less calories are burn't off to keep warm. And ideally, in October, there are few flies and the weather is cool, ideal conditions for butchering.
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