It’s Right There

Side o’ bacon

Thank you for all the thoughtful comments pertaining to Friday’s post. The wheels are slowly beginning to turn. Stay tuned. 

We’re on something of a food production bender, what with it being October and all. Last weekend, it was kimchi and the lambs we relocated to the freezer, plus a passel more of applesauce and dried kale and whatnot and so forth. This weekend was all about the swine.

We’re big on pig. For starters, they’re eminently likable animals that when managed properly can do a whole lot of good and important work. With only minimal effort on our part, we’ve turned and cleared numerous acres of pasture with our hogs, land that was recently forest but now grows sweet, lush grass our cowsies and sheepsies covert to copious quantities of milk and meat. Furthermore, pigs are what’re known as “easy keepers.” They’re an unfussy species, prone to contentment. I like animals that are prone to contentment, perhaps because they remind me of how I might best make my way in this world. Furthermore again, pigs are relatively easy to slaughter and process at home, eliminating the complication, inconvenience, and expense of transport and butcher fees. Further furthermore again, there is no tiring of sausage, at least ’round these parts. Finally furthermore, we have access to quantities of organic waste milk and colostrum, significantly reducing the primary expense associated with critters whose sole purpose for living can occasionally seem to be the snarfing of exorbitantly expensive grain products.

Brine bucket

We made 60-odd pounds of sausage yesterday, a process that actually began on Friday. In order to facilitate cutting, the carcass must cool for at least a dozen hours, because hot meat is just too soft and squishy to cut. So we killed on Friday afternoon and left the big fella hanging from the tractor bucket overnight to stiffen up a bit. On Saturday, we hauled him inside (if you ever want a good laugh, you ought stop by and watch me and Penny laboring to get a 150-pound side o’ pork through the front door), splayed him across the counter, and commenced to hacking. Chops – check. Bacon in brine – check. Loin roast – check. Shoulder and ham chunked for grinding – check. Leaf lard bubbling on the wood stove – check. Organs cleaned – check.

We’ve been doing pigs like this for the past decade or so; oh, we did pigs before that, but there came a point when it occurred to us that we might’s well just keep the whole process in-house, so to speak. Our friends Ralph and Cindy taught us how to kill and dress (by-the-by, my favorite chapter in my first book is by far the one on Ralph and Cindy), and we were off to the races. It would be difficult to overstate how anxious I was the first time I approached the pigpen with a loaded .22 in my hands. I could not imagine ever slaughtering a large animal with confidence. I still experience a particular heightening of awareness in the moments before I pull the trigger (or, as has been the case for the past half-dozen or so pigs, the moment Fin or Rye pulls the trigger), but it is no longer from lack of confidence. Rather, I think it is from the sense of responsibility I feel toward the creature whose life I am about to take. I understand why many people are not comfortable being so close to this responsibility; it forces one to face something in themselves. It compels intent and intent can be discomfiting. I think it might be easier to live without intent. Poorer, to be sure. But easier.

Pig and lamb hearts for the sausage

Over the intervening years, we’ve slowly invested in handful of used commercial-grade processing implements – a grinder, a slicer, and a sausage stuffer that was actually a gift from our buddy Pete. We still do our cutting with a handsaw and a cleaver, and as such, our chops and roasts can be a little, um, inconsistent. Which is to say, if you come for dinner and we serve pork chops that are an inch-and-a-half thick on one end and three-quarters-of-an-inch thick on the other, it’s not because we were drunk when we cut ‘em. Well, it’s not because Penny was drunk, anyway.

I can’t say I love killing and processing pigs. Frankly, it’s hard work, and it takes a lot of time. Between set-up, killing, dressing, and cleanup, Friday’s slaughter took us about two hours. Cutting and wrapping took maybe three hours. And yesterday, what with all the grinding and mixing and stuffing and tasting and wrapping and cleaning, we’re talking at least five hours.

But there are compensations, and they are not limited to the abundance of meat in our freezer or the bacons brining on our porch. Because while the boys scoured the woods for the entirety of the weekend (trapping season opened on Saturday, and they are in a state of high agitation), Penny and I cut and sliced and ground and wrapped. And as we did so, we chatted, our hands slick with fat. We talked about the kids, about work, about our farm, about us. We chuckled about the fact that our notion of a date had somehow evolved to this point: A dead pig in pieces before us, our sons deep in the forest, their pack baskets laden with the implements of their trade. “Hey, at least I’m a cheap date,” said Penny. Damn straight, and only one of the many reasons I love the woman.

Penny on the stuffer

As someone who is still perhaps best known for writing a book about the local food movement, I frequently hear from folks who want to “get closer to their food” or some version thereof. Good for them, I say, with all sincerity. But the truth is, I know something they don’t: It’s not their food they’re looking to get closer to. Rather, it’s that same slightly uneasy sense of responsibility and intent I feel in the moments before I pull the trigger. It’s that same sense of satisfaction Penny and I feel as we wield our respective blades against the yielding flesh of the hog laid out before us. It’s that same sense of togetherness and common purpose toward the fundamental necessity of feeding our family. It’s that same sense of gratitude and awe that a meaningful life really can be as fundamentally simple as all this. I said “simple,” not “easy.”

So, yeah, it’s not food these people are looking to get closer to. It’s themselves. And the beauty of it is, it’s there. It’s right there.