Well, having asked some local farmers to help me, Florence loaded first time on Wednesday afternoon and made me look a complete liar in their eyes (typical). Three hours at the abattoir this time, and a pen with no bedding, just a concrete floor. There were no cows in there to make the place warm, just seventy other pigs and an ever decreasing number of lambs. In the end the poor soul was shivering so much that I had her lying on my Barbour jacket with my fleece over her, and me lying almost on top of her to try and keep her comfortable. We must have made a pathetic picture. Why, oh why, couldn't she have been allowed to stay in the warm straw-filled trailer until nearer the time?
Was supposed to go straight from the abattoir and Florence to the butcher and Rosie, but thank goodness they decided it was too late and re-scheduled for Friday - I think I would have ended up a blubbering wreck
. But I have to say that being at the butchering of both carcasses was quite cathartic and I felt heaps better for it. The meat quality was good and had a reasonable layer of fat. We tried chops on Saturday and our first homemade sausages on Sunday - delicious
.
The paperwork arrived from the abattoir today - oops, the pigs were heavier than we had estimated. As we thought, Florence at 88.7kg was lighter than Rosie at 94.1kg, but surprisingly she had more back fat.
A word of advice for anyone getting pigs back from the butcher for the first time - plan what you want from them, take some labels so you know which cuts are which (there is so much meat it is easy to lose track), and if you are planning to make bacon, try and have some of your cures ready for when you get home - all the things we will do next time!!!!