Sweet and Sour Maple Venison

Compile in a good heavy pan:

4T cooking oil
2T butter
1 large coarsely chopped onion
1 large clove garlic finely chopped
* Optional: a little lovage if you have it/celery if you don't

Saute until onions begin to turn clear

Add:

A couple of pounds of venison stew meat

Saute until brown

Toss in:

Italian seasoning to taste
*Optional: A little more garlic
* Optional: A tiny pinch of salt

Dump on:

1/4 C vinegar
1/4 C maple syrup
1/4 C Ketchup

When all ingredients are nice and brown and bubbly and the house begins to smell really, really good,

Add:

Two or three cups of water.

Seal the pot tightly with foil or a good, tight-fitting lid, and cook in a 325 degree oven until the meat is fork tender and succulent.

Around here that is for about as long as milking and chores take.
Anywhere normal it would probably be around 2 1/2-3 hours, more or less. Take care that it doesn't cook dry as the "gravy" is the best part.

Serve over rice or potatoes.

****This recipe is a happy accident I came up with the other day while working on 1001 ways to cook venison when your freezer is full of deers and you are out of beef. We really liked it and hope you will too.

Hmmmmm

DELAP Payments Being Sent

According to NY Farm Bureau USDA has said that payments will be mailed by December 24th.


Below is an earlier press release on the topic.

USDA Announces New Dairy Economic Loss Assistance Payment Program to Provide Financial Relief to Struggling Dairy Producers

WASHINGTON, Dec. 17, 2009 - Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack today announced the implementation of the new Dairy Economic Loss Assistance Payment (DELAP) program. The 2010 Agricultural Appropriations Bill authorized $290 million for loss assistance payments to eligible dairy producers.

"Through this program, eligible dairy producers will receive economic assistance that will help stabilize their operations during these tough economic times," said Vilsack. "I have personally heard from hundreds of struggling dairy farmers from all across our country who have been hit hard by declining prices over the past year, and now, we'll be able to offer them help."

Milk prices declined substantially through early-to-mid-2009, with the national price for milk averaging $16.80 per hundredweight (cwt.) in the fourth quarter of 2008 and averaging $12.23 per cwt. in the first quarter of 2009, a 27-percent decline. On average, the price U.S. dairy producers received for milk marketed in the summer of 2009 was about half of what it cost them to produce milk.

"The dedicated employees of the Farm Service Agency deserve a great deal of credit for acting quickly to provide this critical assistance to America's dairy farmers," said Jim Miller, Under Secretary of USDA Farm and Foreign Agricultural Services.

Eligible producers will receive a one-time direct payment based on the amount of milk both produced and commercially marketed by their operation during the months of February through July 2009. Production information from these months will be used to estimate a full year's production for an operation to calculate the payments, using a 6-million pound per dairy operation limit.

Dairy producers who have production records at the USDA Farm Service Agency (FSA) county office because they participated in another FSA dairy program do not need to apply for the program. FSA will use existing production records for February through July 2009 to calculate and issue their payments.

Producers who have not provided production data for those months to FSA, and have not already been contacted by FSA to provide such data, have 30 days, until Jan. 19, 2010, to apply. FSA officials estimate that more than 95 percent of eligible producers will receive benefits without having to fill out a new application.

A national per hundred weight payment rate will be determined by dividing the available funding of $290 million, less a reserve established by FSA, divided by the total pounds of eligible milk production approved for payment. Based on current information, FSA estimates that 875 million cwt. of milk production will be eligible for payment. The reserve will cover new applicants and appeals. The expected payment rate is approximately $0.32 per cwt.

To be eligible for DELAP, the dairy producer and the dairy operation in which the producer has a share:

• Must have produced milk in the United States and marketed milk commercially at any time from February through July 2009;
• Must have milk production data for those months;
• Must certify to all milk production produced and marketed by the dairy operation during that time.

Also, any dairy producer who has an annual average adjusted gross nonfarm income of more than $500,000 for calendar years 2006 through 2008 is not eligible for DELAP.

For more information and eligibility requirements on the new DELAP program, please visit your local FSA county office or www.fsa.usda.gov.

Better

Got nuttin' today. It is 8 degrees and sunny. The world is coated in an icy shield about three inches thick. Went back to wearing old sneakers to work as it is impossible to walk in hard plastic. It is good to see the sun shine just the same.

However, other folks have done better than I and have had interesting things to say this past week...

Liz has a good solid list that will help you know whether or not you are a dairy farmer.

Willow Witch has a story that will bring tears to your eyes and shivers up your spine.

Lisa is finishing up the barn loft.

Wish Linda a happy blogoversary.

If you drove one of those wonderful muscle cars...or just wish you had, go see Jeffro and dream of joys gone by.

Tomorrow Alan and I must go to Potsdam to bring Becky home....wonder what the Dacks will have to show us this time.

A Real Farm Take on FarmVille

This gave me a chuckle, but it is quite true. The farming games are a lot of fun and I play them too, but they are pretty far removed from reality (which is fine...they are games after all.)

Hope and Change

The dairy industry is changing rapidly these days, and in fact many days I feel as if it is changing right out from under us. I put a post up here on the Dairy Economic Loss Assistance Payment Program or DELAP a couple weeks ago, with a link to what was known at that time about this bail out for desperate farmers.

I soon started getting a few hits a day as people looked for news on the much needed assistance program. And since that day no more information has emerged...or not that anyone can find...and each day I get more and more hits from all over the country as farmers try to find out what is going on with it.

With all this change there seems to be little room for hope. Even if the government gets its payment into the hands of farmers really soon nobody is making enough to pay the bills....milk costs around seventeen bucks to produce and we have been getting ten all year. The price is up to thirteen now, but that isn't going very far to make up all the losses. We are all discouraged and grateful for any shred of good news that might come our way.

Yesterday we had another lousy day with a visit from our milk inspector to deal with some equipment malfunction that was damaging our milk quality. We pride ourselves on receiving quality premiums every month so that was a blow.

After a long day of coping with that and all the usual other stuff I stood outside the milkhouse door with Alan during the last few minutes of chores. I can't remember just why we were standing there, but we were right beside my shorthorn, Broadway's, stall.

I glanced over and noticed a curious bulge waxing and waning along her right flank. She is a bit of a skittish young lady so I had to be very slow and careful to lay my hand there (she milks off the other side and doesn't worry about what I do over there). I stroked the wiggly bulge. It thumped at me and slid around under her thick, red skin. Every touch of my hand elicited a more than equal and opposite push or shove in the other direction.

Then I had Alan put his hand there and pet her side a bit. You should have seen him grin as the bulge danced against his hand. At that point, big old BW started swatting at us with her tail so we stopped bothering her, but it is nice to know that there is a lively calf in there waiting to be born next February.

Hope. It is still there I guess, in the future, and in the next generation of cattle with which we will mingle our lives and dreams. I hope B-Dub, as I call her, has the calf all right....don't care if it is a bull or heifer; we will keep it either way as we need a service sire for heifers. Hope we are still doing this when she has it and haven't had to sell them to pay the folks to whom we owe money....

Milk Truck Roll Over

Right across the river. The boss's dear aunt heard about it on her scanner and gave us a call. Not our truck and no one hurt, but much excitement in the little village of Fonda.

Wordless Wednesday

Looking Forward

Becky will be coming home this week. I am looking forward to it more than you would believe. It just can't come soon enough.

Maybe Facebook Likes Me After All

Check it out here

"We’re all big fans of strong bones at Facebook and we will soon revise our promotions guidelines to lift the complete ban on dairy and simply prohibit giving dairy away as a prize."

"

What Do You Give

BEFORE the storm yesterday

The girl who has everything....except enough feed to go through the winter?

It has been such a bad year here. The boss was still haying two weeks ago as we had rain almost continuously since last May....and still there isn't enough out there in the ag bags...now we have snow and there will be no more.

So my dear younger brother and his kind wife bought...and delivered...eleven huge bales of baleage for us yesterday. It was snowing and then freezing, soaking rain, and Lisa is sick with a nasty cold...but they still worked out in the weather to get that feed to us. They also took the time to drive back home...and they don't live close by any means...to pick up Matt's homemade, but really cool three-point-hitch fork lift attachment when our skid steer proved unequal to the task of unloading. So Alan got them off Matt's friend's trailer after a while....

Last night Liz and Alan and I tore open a bale and unwound it and fed a couple of wheelbarrows to the girls.

They devoured it. I went around after milking and fed an armful to each of the high producers and they devoured that too.
I was happy to know that they had that good stuff to fill them up.

Thanks guys! What you did was well and above and beyond the call of duty. I am very thankful and so are our ladies. That went right to the top of the list of the best Christmas presents ever!

Sunday Stills...Technology

For more Sunday Stills....

Went Looking For This

For you and for me too....Yeah, it's just a dandelion, but wouldn't it look good right now? Especially if it was surrounded by knee high green grass? Balmy spring breezes, birds singing......

I know I'm whiny, but it sure is cold. The guys worked three hours yesterday fixing the reverse curve on the stable cleaner, not a fun job in the best of weather, but brutal when it is so cold with the wind a'howlin;. It meant they never got in to sit down for more than maybe fifteen or twenty minutes all day. The heifers are in so they are another job to be added to the list. Never got the last field of corn in, although maybe we will get a short thaw so they can get it.

Anyhow Liz made them some venison and rice for a really late lunch (like maybe 4PM) and then made us all grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup for supper after chores (we usually get in around 8). That meal is not exactly punishment, what with her homemade bread and the award winning cheese the milk coop gave us for Christmas....and even a cup of humble Campbell's tomato soup is pretty darned good with a little rice thrown in and some Italian seasoning. Pretty welcome when you are cold all the time...

Hope you are all staying nice and warm.....me, I am wearing so many clothes that if I fall down on that relentless ice out there I am just going to roll away...so if you don't hear from me, check the bottom of the hill.

More Melamine in Chinese Dairy Products

Story here

And it appears that suing someone who causes you harm is a bit harder there than here.....

Facebook Hates Me

After all the time I waste playing there, making money for them.

Below are some of the site's rules, which are posted here

Section 2. Prohibitions

You may not publicize or administer a promotion on Facebook if:

2.1 The promotion is open or marketed to individuals who are under the age of 18;

2.2 The promotion is open to individuals who reside in a country embargoed by the United States;

2.3 The promotion, if a sweepstakes, is open to individuals residing in Belgium, Norway, Sweden, or India;

2.4 The promotion’s objective is to promote any of the following product categories: gambling, tobacco, dairy, firearms, prescription drugs, or gasoline;

2.5 The prize or any part of the prize includes alcohol, tobacco, dairy, firearms, or prescription drugs; or

2.6 The promotion is a sweepstakes that conditions entry upon the purchase of a product, completion of a lengthy task, or other form of consideration.

I cannot imagine why dairy products would be classified under the same heading as gasoline and gambling....well, I suppose gasoline is sold by the gallon too, but still. They don't ban other drinks

I am not pleased with them! I won't say that I am going to quit playing Mafia Wars but....

I Would Love Your Thoughts

On this strange story: Men Spray Paint Cows.

Hey, Copenhagen

Gotcher Global Warming right here. Yeah, as we read about naturally occurring gasses, (essential for all life on earth.. like the CO2 that keeps all the plants we depend on for...well for everything...alive and thriving)..... being regulated by a greedy bunch of money-grubbing hypocrites, all in the name of Anthropogenic Global Warming (try typing that before you have finished your first cup of coffee) it is not warming here. We have had a cold, miserable summer. One of the coldest Octobers on record. November was warmish, but alas it is over.

Today NY has a storm. It is not in any way, shape, or form a warming storm. (Maybe we are just not global enough.) Traffic, what there is of it, has slowed to a crawl, even down on the usually speedy Thruway. As I lay under about six covers, including three knitted afghans, this too darned early morning, thinking about getting up....but procrastinating, even though it is milk tanker day, the room was aglow with reflected light. Um....unless there is a really big moon, and right now the moon is smalling down pretty quickly, that means lotsa snow. I came downstairs and plugged in the coffee maker...Houston...we still have power. However, it didn't look too pleasant down across the river. The sky is pink from the lights in town bouncing off a curtain of snow. It is frigid.

And indeed Gael would not go out to tend to Mother Nature. Just stood on the porch shivering and glaring at me...well, alright, but you'll be sorry later.

Yeah, we gotcher Global Warming...it is falling all over the ground and piling up on the trucks and fences.

It is also here, where my good friend Earl needs a Zamboni for his kitty dish

And here, where one of our lovely Lindas has been without power and is freezing at around 35 below in this "warmest decade on record" weather

And here, where our other delightful Linda is also experiencing something less than toasty, sunny and warming

And here, where if you click on the picture of Loveland Pass, as seen through the window of a tractor trailer, your heart will probably leap right out of your chest like mine did...well almost....seriously, hop over there and click on that picture...

They have Global Warming down in North Carolina too.
Pennsylvania
Knoxville Tennessee
SoDak Maine

If that nasty little conference in Denmark got to experience a big, fat, weeklong blizzard it would be poetic justice, which is about the only kind we are likely to see within ten thousand miles of it.

Big Storm

Predicted for tomorrow. Not sure which thing to do first to get ready. Hmmmm

Stop Exhaling

Stop now!

Frosting...no Pumpkins

Saturday we had a weird little storm. It snowed most of the afternoon with an inch or two of accumulation. What was odd was that it stuck to everything.
And stayed.





On Sunday morning it was still glued in place on every tree and wire. That is a very unusual phenomenon. Normally you can expect either wind or rain when the snow sticks like that and it usually arrives very quickly after the end of the snow.





Although I am no fan of winter, it was amazing to look out the big windows Saturday evening and see the trees over in the town across the river, coated in white and lit up by the street lights. It may be trite to say it but it looked like a Christmas card.
PS, this post was written and scheduled before I read about the accident below.