The Dirty Chef

by Matthew Evans

  The apples we get to eat are tree ripened. Once you’ve tasted the glorious honeyed notes of a real Golden Delicious, it’s hard to go back. Once you’ve felt the sting of tannin in Kingston Black, or bitten into the first, slightly tart, full-flavoured crisp Gravenstein in late January, you realise that apples are an incredible fruit. As good as mangoes. As good as peaches. It’s just that commercially we’ve devalued them by making them available to everyone, all year round, despite the seasons. We’ve succeeded in making apples dull.

  Sadie and I have had our own apple journey since moving to Tasmania.

  I made my first cider using juice from Clive Crossley’s press. I watched Bob Magnus scrat (pulverise) windfalls and press the juice, brought a big jar of it home to ferment, then drank a lightly fizzy, wild yeast-driven apple juice as a result. Souza, it’s called, in Switzerland. I’ve picked surplus apples that would’ve rotted on the ground at Adrian Steenholdt’s farm and fed them to my pigs.

  I’ve watched Tony Hammond, a man who once ran a 70-acre apple farm, graft the remnants of my old trees—the once-common Delicious—back to 25 heritage breeds of apple. And we now pick apples at any time from late January to May, though soon we may be able to extend the season, and certainly the varieties, by a month or two. The windfalls, those apples dislodged by wind or the birds or possums, are fed to the pigs.

  Apples have defined the course of the Huon over most of the last couple of centuries. They have created the community in which I live and work, first by their presence, and increasingly by their absence. Like many, I’m a proud apple grower, wanting to preserve a little of the past on my land and on my table.

  It’s a bit of history that we can revel in, every time we reach up to the tree and take a bite of the fruit.

  Brussels sprouts

  There’s an old Chinese saying that I’ve quoted a few times in my life. If you want to be happy for a week, take a wife. If you want to be happy for a month, kill a pig. And if you want to be happy for a lifetime, plant a garden. The older I get, the more I see what the proverb is trying to say.

  I’m only now beginning to fully understand the happiness of a garden. The joy that goes way beyond the usual satisfaction of a job well done. A garden is such a complex system. You’re dealing with life on a microscopic level. With the structure of soil. With predators and nutrient finders for your plants. And you’re dealing with weather, which in Tasmania means you’re really having to deal with the weather.

  So to succeed, even in a small way, at growing your own food, well, there’s a sense of achievement that goes far beyond the usual.

  My first attempt at gardening on Puggle Farm was a bit hit-and-miss. The vegie garden was netted already, complete with some beds—hidden beneath weeds a metre and a half high. Presumably the garden had decent soil of some kind already in place. You don’t get weeds that big out of nothing! I kickstarted my garden with some more topsoil and a good day’s work with a wheelbarrow and a shovel. And I planted my whole winter crop—Brussels sprouts, kale, cabbages, broccoli . . . all the brassicas, a family of plants very closely related to each other, and those able to grow in winter.

  The day after I planted them I was in the car when I heard a legendary local gardener doing talkback radio. Peter Cundall was host of Gardening Australia (and the show’s predecessors) for 40 years. He’s famed for being the first gardening talkback radio announcer in the world. What’s more, he’s a Tasmanian so he knows the seasons well in our corner of the world.

  ‘If you’re only planting your brassicas now,’ I heard Peter say to a caller new to the state, ‘then I’m sorry to say you’re about a fortnight too late.’

  Harrumph. My vegies were already in, so nothing would change that now. What would Cundall know anyway?

  A lot, methinks, in hindsight. The fading light, the chill in the soil, the nature of the seasons in Tasmania means we have to plant our winter gardens in summer. In the height of summer. But I hadn’t realised that. What’s more, when I did hear it, I didn’t really believe it.

  But as I watched my crops limp along for the next few months, struggling to put on the leaves they’d need before the winter really set in, I began to suspect Peter was right.

  But I’ll never know what my first garden may have provided for the table. About three months after planting, a weak spot in the netting was breached by the local wildlife. A possum— the tree-climbing, occasionally omnivorous marsupial despised by orchardists and gardeners—had far less trouble than me in finding the hole. Night after night, and despite my attempts to fix the netting, to trap and relocate the bugger, the possum, at least one, came and feasted on my greens. My silverbeet was stripped to the stem. My brassicas were all eaten down to near ground level. The only thing that survived were the broad beans, and then probably only because they were still small and were able to revive when we rebuilt the net. (If I learnt one thing from this, it’s the really seasonal nature of gardening. Who knew broad beans can be planted much later than brassicas, any time from April to July, really, and then only provide fruit in spring?)

  Eventually, when the net was back in place, a few of the original brassicas did manage to hold on to life. I did manage to salvage a handful of Brussels sprouts, very late that year. Tiny, loose-headed things they were. Brussels sprouts grow out underneath the leaves of the plant, almost like a sucker on the stem. Crisped in olive oil and used in pasta, or softened in pork fat with garlic, they tasted unlike any Brussels I’d bought.

  So my first year’s garden was a bit of a fizzer thanks to the possums, and my late planting. However, I can tell you that for the next three years the garden flourished. I’ve had asparagus, finally, after leaving it to shoot for the requisite two seasons prior to harvesting. I’ve eaten plenty of raspberries, which I rammed (possibly erroneously) in between the rows of apple trees and the fence. The apples are now fruiting reasonably well. We’ve grown zucchinis, pumpkins, tomatoes, strawberries, gooseberries, cape gooseberries, tomatillos, corn, all the brassicas and more in a space the size of a domestic vegetable garden. And all the while we’ve been honing our skills.

  Sadie, having left a bedsit in inner city Sydney to live on the farm, is now in charge of propagating heirloom plants from seed. And she loves it. We’ve trialled companion-planting with a few crops. We’ve watched our tomatoes sit green in a particularly cool summer, until the second week of May when we pulled them undercover and prayed for them to ripen. We’ve changed the layout of the garden, mulched and composted and nurtured and grown a large proportion of the vegetables we eat, all from a space of four garden beds, each about 2 metres long. What has surprised us is the work involved. Strangely, it is far more labour-intensive to produce vegetables by hand than it is to produce meat. In an age when the cost of labour is enormous compared to the cost of oil, it is vegetables that take much of our time for relatively little on the plate. If we had to pay someone to grow them, they’d be the world’s most expensive cabbages.

  Thankfully, gardening is about much more than just the vegetables. I can’t help but feel that many of us, myself included, are hard-wired to get our hands dirty. Digging in the soil, weeding, planting, mulching—these basic activities give me a sense of satisfaction that’s hard to describe. It’s rewarding on a deep and meaningful scale. Perhaps other gardeners, those who are actually very good at it (and maybe even those like us who aren’t), get that same thrill. It’s exhilarating in a slow way. In a nuanced way. Planting and caring for my little garden at Puggle Farm is one of the best things I’ve ever done for my soul.

  Gardening, I’ve learnt, isn’t just about toil. It’s physically engaging, mentally challenging, gastronomically uplifting and emotionally satisfying. Far from the drudgery we’re often led to believe about the lives of our agricultural ancestors, gardening can be good for the spirit.

  A little garden, however, doesn’t fully prepare you for the challenge of a big garden. And one day, our big garden would be quite big indeed. But for that garden, we’
d need a very effective way of keeping out the possums.

  Chickpeas, Brussels sprouts and goose fat

  Serves 6 as an accompaniment

  To be honest, I often cook this with pork fat or duck fat, because I’m far more likely to have those on hand than goose fat, but the end result is just as good. If I had chestnuts, in that brief moment they’re in season each autumn, I’d use those instead of the chickpeas.

  3–4 tablespoons goose fat, or use good free-range pork fat

  1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) Brussels sprouts, dry outer leaves removed, sprouts cut in half through the stem

  6 garlic cloves, crushed

  500 g (1 lb 2 oz) cooked chickpeas

  125 ml (4 fl oz/½ cup) water

  salt and freshly milled black pepper

  Heat half the fat in a large heavy-based frying pan over a medium–high heat and cook the sprouts, cut side down, until brown. You’ll need to do this in at least two batches, unless you’ve got an enormous frying pan, adding more fat as need be to ensure the sprouts fry rather than scorch. When they’re all done, remove with a slotted spoon and keep to one side. Add the garlic to the pan and fry well until just starting to colour ever so slightly.

  Add the chickpeas and water to the pan and allow to warm through. Then fold in the sprouts, cover with a lid and turn right down to cook. The sprouts may break up as you stir occasionally and that’s just fine. Cook until the sprouts are tender, probably about 10 minutes. Season well with salt and pepper and serve hot.

  Prosciutto

  Suddenly, and it did feel like it was suddenly despite the time it took to find the place and move in, I found myself on a farm. I woke up with a dog, ten chicks and 22 acres of paradise. I had to pinch myself each morning to believe my luck. I could never have dreamed I’d have ended up with such a big patch of dirt in a lovely valley after all the false starts I’d had early in life. And yet, here I was, rejoicing in summer’s long days, not dreaming of having my own little farm, but actually planning what to do with the one I’d just bought. For someone who had no real experience with a garden, who’d been a share-owner of dogs but never the sole carer, let alone chooks, there were equal parts of excitement and trepidation. Just how do you go from being an urban dag to a country boy, without any experience of the bush?

  When other kids at school were visiting friends on sheep properties outside Canberra, I was camping at the coast or bushwalking in the wilds. When I could’ve been learning some practical building skills with Dad while I was growing up, I’d been far too keen to eat, and instead spent time inside with Mum, learning how to cook. I did know one end of a pig from the other, but I didn’t actually know anything about housing, feeding, rearing or moving them.

  How quickly I learnt.

  Pigs had always been a part of my small-holder dream. Good pork, a meat so debased by the industrial food system, was the aim. I wasn’t hoping for more pets. God knows Cari kept me busy enough on that front. I wanted to have high-quality meat to cure and preserve. Pork makes unbelievable terrines, hams, sausages and bacon. Pork lard is the most versatile animal fat. The animals themselves are great recyclers, making use of vegie scraps or surplus milk or unwanted fruit like no other livestock.

  The region I found myself in also had a bit of history with pigs. Most small farms would’ve had a few pigs to fatten in years gone by. Small herds dotted the region, many of them fattened on the apples the region specialised in. As I scoured the valleys looking for a property, it would fill me with joy to find a couple of porkers still snouting up a paddock near the road. I liked the idea of home-raised pigs—one for the family, and the other for the neighbours.

  So pigs were very high on the list. Luckily, a friend was not only breeding pigs but also had a very old, very rare breed of pig, called the Wessex Saddleback. Famed for their sweet, clean-flavoured meat and decent fat content, Saddlebacks are also known for being relatively docile and a great free-ranging animal. Perfect, if you ask me, for the small-holder. A recent litter meant there were surplus weaners coming on the market too.

  Pigs, I learnt, need company. Jen refused to part with just one, simply because they’re so sociable, even though two of them would provide too much meat for my simple needs. Pigs eat, play, dig and sleep together, so a pig on its own is a lonely pig. Some compare them to dogs, and we socialise with our dogs. (They’re also compared, intellectually, to a three-year-old child. But more on that later.)

  I was pretty inspired when I first saw the pigs. Jen’s farm was what I wanted mine to look like one day: slightly chaotic, but filled with life. There were chooks of several breeds scratching in the farmyard. Sheep grazed just outside the fence. Greengage plums grew along one boundary and there was a goat for milk, plus a lush vegie garden, and pigs who’d managed to trash their sty, knocking over a pile of bricks to wallow in glorious, glorious mud.

  Jen’s young sons had named the breeder pigs. Peter Pan was the boar, a great big bear of an animal with a tender personality and the start of some mean-looking tusks. Tinkerbell and Wendy were the sows, and it was Tinkerbell—a gentle, proud mother, despite her nearly 200 kilograms—we came to visit. Her litter were all still tiny when I first saw them—gorgeous lop-eared piglets (that one day I’d learn to call ‘slips’), with black bodies and a white shoulder band. It was Tinkerbell’s nature that convinced me these were the right pigs for my farm, and to take two girls home when they were weaned.

  Wessex Saddlebacks spend a lot of time looking down. Their lop ears, meaning ears that hang down, obscure their view to the front somewhat, making them easier to handle, some say. It also means that you rarely look a Wessex in the eye, as they’re constantly peering down at their feet, and digging as though somewhere 3 metres down is a truffle. At nine weeks, the piglets are impossibly cute, the black and white colours in strong definition, though the colours do pale slightly with age. The two I bought were already highly energetic and pretty feisty. If you ever want to see a definition of curious, watch a pig.

  I knocked up a shelter with stuff from the tip shop, and set the pigs in their new paddock underneath the pines. When I say ‘knocked up’ I mean I attempted to use a cordless drill for the first time, while being filmed. Max Burke, our director/ cameraman, luckily had one in his car. And knew how to use it too, so he gave me a couple of quick lessons. And Russell Hawkins, vegan sound-bloke and all-round assistant, helped lift the roof on when the camera wasn’t running. To say I knocked up the shelter is perhaps a little ingenuous, because it really was a team effort.

  Anyway, the paddock where we built this shelter, as sturdy as a bunker, had shade on hot days, a north-facing aspect for warmth in winter, and a fair amount of space for the pigs to wander. I put out a bath for their water, and started sprouting the barley and foraging for windfall apples under feral trees in the valley. The pigs had grass to eat (and its roots to dig), a tree to scratch on and some serious new fencing. I had to get a man in to do the fence, but the super-taut wire designed to help prevent the pigs from straying was worth it. My girls loved being patted and stroked, and I did it daily, though I often felt odd when surreptitiously testing their bellies for fat.

  I would wander out and give them a scratch behind the ears at feeding time, and at other times in between. I would visit them in the course of doing my chores, to watch them grow and play and forage. And every time I came past, they poked their curious noses at me through the fence. Pigs, I now know, experience everything in the world through their mouths and noses.

  I find the pigs endlessly fascinating, the way they frolic and play. The way they pile up on top of each other to sleep. The way they eat, greedily, yet surprisingly delicately. They can pick out one type of grain from another.

  I gave them names. Food names, because despite their good looks, despite their intelligent, playful natures, despite the fact I enjoyed having them with me on Puggle Farm, they were going to be dinner one day. I bid a warm welcome to Prosciutto and Cassoulet, my first Wessex Saddlebacks.

  The
Wessex Saddleback, when I first heard about the breed, was down to about a mere 50 breeding sows left in the world. That’s not just a rare breed, it’s a critically endangered breed. Today, there are perhaps 150 or so registered sows left in the world, half of which probably live on one farm in Victoria. They’re in the Slow Food Australia Ark of Taste, because of their endangered status combined with their incomparable flavour. With a propensity to put on fat, a strong dislike of confinement, slow growth rates and relatively low birth numbers, they’re considered commercial suicide. One website puts it thus: ‘The Wessex saddleback pig is enjoying some popularity at the moment as it has featured on a few lifestyle programs on television . . . Don’t get caught up in the hype or it may cost you dearly.’