Two Little Pigs Call the Farm Home and Chicken Chowder

The rain is coming down in sheets, but it doesn’t seem to bother the pigs at all. Oh. Didn’t you know we had pigs? Yes. They came on Sunday and now we have pigs. They’re pasture pigs, so we put them in the chicken yard, under the mulberry trees. Oh, my did Chicken Little have a fit about that! She spent the whole day squawking to anyone who would listen. She’s much better today, though. She’s discovered that a pig can be useful, after all. Now you’ll find her right behind them, scooping up all the worms their digging brings up.

I spent the morning moving leaves from under the big maple tree out front to the blueberry patch in hopes of 1. This rain will soak those leaves down good, keeping them right where I set them because 2. The leaves will (hopefully) keep out some of the weeds which love to call that patch home. Like I say all the time, this farming thing is nothing more than a practice in hoping.

Today is Halloween and for the first time neither of our two kids who are still at home want to go out. And it’s awfully hard to go out yourself when you don’t have a kid in tow. So, we’ll be spending the evening at home, with a nice pot of chicken chowder that I cooked up over the weekend. Because, as you know, any good chowder needs two full days to become that way.

So, on Saturday, this is what I did:

One whole pasture raised heritage chicken (which spent it’s life eating bugs and grasses in the warm sun) was placed into a large pot of fresh, cold water and set to boil all by itself for three hours while I went to the Farmer’s Market to get the corn and the onions which were needed. I already had the cabbage, tomatoes (I found a few more red ones hiding under some leaves), potatoes, and carrots (given to me by my dear friend Linda), so all I needed was the corn and the onions, both of which I had in canned form, if the trip to the Market turned out to be a bust.

Well, this is the way it went. Mema and I searched high and low for the corn, but it turns out we weren’t the only farm it was done growing for. I was just about to give up and admit I had to crack open a jar (something I swore I wouldn’t do until November) when I saw it. Six beautiful ears of corn. I squealed with delight and grabbed them before anyone else could. The Farmer selling the corn smiled. And my smile widened. “JAY??”

He beamed. “How’ve you been?” he asked, recognizing me.

“Great now,” I answered taking the corn and the onions from my dear, old friend. “And how about yourself?”

“Can’t complain.”

And on and on the banter went until I was reminded softly by my mother of the chicken boiling away at home waiting for the very corn and onions I was clutching.

We said our good-byes and got back at it, but can I just say for a moment how very good it is to buy corn and onions from a friend? How great it is that if you don’t have something yourself, to get it from a neighbor?

I took that corn, shucked it from the cob (saving the cobs to give to the chickens out in the pasture) and tossed it in the pot with the chicken, along with three diced tomatoes, a half of a cabbage shredded fine, five medium carrots peeled and diced, six medium white potatoes, treated the same, and the two sweet onions I bought from my friend. Ideally, I’d add celery and green beans, too, but everyone’s farms (including ours) was out of celery and I didn’t think we needed the green beans so much that I’d open a jar of the canned-variety, so we just went without both.

All was stirred in and salt and pepper liberally applied. When the chicken began to have enough and started to fall apart, it was removed from the pot and the meat taken from it’s bones. That meat was placed back in with all those veggies where it loosened up a bit more and, with some vigorous stirring, became one with the soup. Sorry. Chowder.

The pot was taken off the heat and left to cool before it’s contents were ladled into a gallon-sized container. The said container was then placed in the fridge where it has lived contentedly until tonight, when it will be poured back into a pan, heated, ladled into bowls, held between two hands, and sipped contentedly.