A Day in The Dairy

I started my day in the dairy this morning with Eileen milking the cows, which was very interesting. It’s a small dairy, and they are only milking four cows at the moment, they stop milking before a cow has a calf to give their body a rest, so that is the reason one (maybe two) of the herd weren’t being milked this morning, and I actually can’t remember why the others weren’t. Eileen loves the cows so much, it is so neat to see her with them, she’s gentle and treats them like her babies. She talks a mile a minute, and has a very thick Irish accent, with the noise of the milking, I missed tid bits here and there. They’re all Jersey cows on the farm here, and at the moment they are getting 60L of milk from the cows each day, quite impressive.

Had a really good morning in the kitchen, Phillip, (the butcher!), was my teacher, although I think I will have Finola for the rest of the week. I made glazed carrots, which don’t sound as nice as they are, it’s a pinch of sugar, a pinch of salt, a dollop of butter, and water, which you boil / reduce back into the carrots, so all of the nutrients and flavour end up back in the carrots, makes sense doesn’t it? Chocolate mousse, a roast leg of lamb with cumin and gravy were on my order of work as well. I was able to segment an orange, make brown soda bread, roux, and cinnamon fork biscuits as well.

Demo ended early today, which was nice, came back to the cottage, had a cup of tea, and had to head down to the diary for cheese making with Tim. Very interesting, and I am trying to figure out how I can get my cheese back to Edmonton with me. We finished at 7:20 or so, and I had to go back at 7:45 to turn my cheese, and again at 8:30. Ended the night with a warm bowl of chicken noodle soup, and it couldn’t be a better day for it. The dairy, the kitchens, dining rooms, and demo room were all freezing today.

Tomorrow I am meeting Denise down to the diary at 7:30 to turn my cheese, and then we are going to make yoghurt before we start our morning’s cooking. I will take back some whey from our cheese making tonight to make ricotta during the morning as well. I am looking forward to tomorrow night, Erin, Alexis, Max and Theresa are coming to our cottage for dinner. Keeping with the cheese and butter theme, I am making mac and cheese.

Tim told us such a nice story about how their daughter Lydia was named. I asked him what came first, Ballymaloe House or the farm in Shanagarry (that is now the cooking school). I guess I should give a bit of background for anyone that doesn’t know the story. Mrs. Allen (Tim’s mum), started Ballymaloe House in 1964. Darina went to work at The House when she finished school, and that is how she met Tim. Later, she started the school, that is very much The Cole’s Notes version of the story, but, you can see why I wanted to know what land came into The Allen Family first. If you go to The Ballymaloe House website (https://www.ballymaloe.ie) at the bottom of their page there is a video about Mrs. Allen and how she started, and her impact on Irish food, it’s worth watching. Anyway, I always thought the land that the school is on came second, but I was wrong. So, Kinoth (Tim and Darina’s House) and the farm was bought by Tim’s father Ivan, he grew tomatoes, mushrooms and apples on the land here (part of the school is the old shed from the orchards). The family that owned this land before Tim’s father were worried about the future of the land because there was an unmarried brother and sister living here in the end, the sister was called Lydia. When Tim and Darina decided to have kids, they had one name picked out, Lydia, when she was two, they found out that the original Lydia was born 100 years before their Lydia to the day. Right, for some people that bit might make no sense, and as Darina would say, “End of… Whatever that was.”

It is now nearly 10:00 and I have to do my order of work, make a hot water bottle and get to bed.

“If I was only allowed to have one fresh herb, which would be torture, I think it would be annual marjoram.” – Darina Allen

The cheese after the first turn.	My mousse with a layer of Jersey cream.	My carrots!
"The first snow drops, that definetly means the worst is over." Darina	Cuting the curd.
Tim draining the whey.	She likes to be milked last.	The girls coming down to the diary.
Sunrise!	"Don't mash the curd." - Tim
The big girl on the left is Cleo's mum, she is currently producing the most milk.	Lamb leg!	My cheese!