Thread: Getting back to living off the land.....

Wild rabbit and cherry tomato pie and rabbit soup in the slow cooker for tomorrow

That looks very good. Particularly the glutinous-looking dollops of gravy in amongst the other tasty-looking tidbits. I have often found rabbit to be 'dry' in texture. That meat doesn't look dry. How was it?

It was moist as. I used this recipe for the legs etc and did them in the crockpot until the meat fell off the bones. I used some of the cooking liquor and thickened it with cornflour and mixed it in with the meet and cherry toms in the pie

https://www.krumpli.co.uk/slow-cooked-rabbit/

A bowl of wild rabbit, tomato, leek and watercress soup for lunch. Trying to use up everything and waste as little as possible

Everything on these plates was produced off our wee Waikato block, with the exception of the cheese which was made by our very cheese-iferous expert neighbour.

Beef, salad & veg, spuds. Nowt more required.

Originally Posted by Flyblown

Everything on these plates was produced off our wee Waikato block, with the exception of the cheese which was made by our very cheese-iferous expert neighbour.

Beef, salad & veg, spuds. Nowt more required.

Attachment 160704

We had a pig that kept getting into the garden. It was a bugger of a thing and would even push under an electric wire. So in the end I killed it for pork instead of growing it out for bacon.
My wife took great pride in her garden and the abundant veggies. One evening when we were having a pork dinner wife said to the kids "everything on your plate is out of the garden!".
"Yes" 4 year old replied "even the pig".

A couple of days ago I too my mate Beth out for her second hunt. She'd already shot her first goat (about 10-days earlier) and this time nailed a 25" billy for her second goat and first billy! I couldn't believe it as goats over 23-ish inches are hard to find in Taranaki; especially on DOC land. It's really blown me away to see the reactions of a new hunter. Here's a super quick vid of her reaction to shooting it. I'll write a proper hunt report soon

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65WkFb9gbUM

Oh and a fun quick video of us trying the fillets off the old billy, One of my friends often jokes that I’m a “hard up hua” for eating goat. Here, for a laugh, we try eating the fillets of a 7 or 8-year old billy goat

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gdiiRIjet8&t=5s

Awesome, my first goat was as 29" billy (South Otago), have never seen a bigger one.
We didn't take any meat off him just the head, stunk to high heaven
We were fortunate to be able to clean up several young nannies for tucker which was really good eating

Otago has way better heads than Taranaki, here they tend to be scrubby things. As a youngster we would trophy shoot nearly every weekend. We'd walk for 2-3 hours into DOC blocks and only look for trophy billies and it was super difficult to break out of the 25" range. I eventually got a 29" after about 5 years of trophy hunting. And about 6 years ago shot a 31" head.

Beth used the meat off this billy for her dogs. I showed her how to cut it up yesterday. She is absolutely hooked on hunting!

Your hunting mate is a lot tidier than any of mine. A lot less facial hair. You are doing good work.

@CheekiBreeki Yup; east Taranaki

The best thing about being able to go hunting on a regular basis again is that I've been able to give so much meat away to the people that have helped me out over the last few years; very satisfying ��

Venison Scotch fillet seasoned with pepper, rosemary and thyme searing in the frying pan.

Good on you. Sharing the catch is great public relations for all hunters in general. Thank you.

Originally Posted by Coote

Good on you. Sharing the catch is great public relations for all hunters in general. Thank you.

It is. I gave 2 back legs and 10kgs of mince away from those 2 deer we got a couple of weeks ago. And from the little goat I shot 3 weeks ago gave away the back legs and made up a big curry to take to friends with everything else bar the loins and fillets. Goat gone; but replaced yesterday..... ;-)

I give away meat too. Some folks give feedback, but I don't hear anything back from others. I get the occasional deer, but mostly it has been pigs, possums and goats. I often cut up the 2nd grade meat and boil up these chunks for people's pets.