Meet Breakfast

Back in January, when I started talking about this nose to tail challenge of eating Everything But The Oink, I stated that I had no intention of eating a whole pig.  I was content at eating a bit of everything that was on offer and not having to deal with two whole hams and a belly full of bacon.  However, over the last few months I realised that there are some bits of pig that will be very difficult to get hold of unless I befriended a farmer.

Through the wonderful medium of Twitter I had a number of exciting conversations.  Pork farms were suggested left right and centre.  People told me who their favourite butcher was.  The promise of butchery and charcuterie classes were dangled in front of my eyes.  But none of this was going to help me a lay my hands on a pig's spleen.

The only farm that I had an existing relationship with was Swillington Organic Farm.  Along with cattle and chickens, Swillington rear free range, rare breed pigs.  Saddlebacks to be precise.  I've bought meat and vegetables from their farm shop and from various markets around Leeds previously.  I have even had a couple of their monthly meat boxes delivered to my house.

During the planning* stage of Everything but the Oink, I emailed the farm to pick their brains.  I was interested in the quantity of pork a pig produces and price per pound.  We continued our chat in person on a snowy Saturday in January.  We had popped to the farm shop to pick up some meat and had an impromptu tour to show R the chickens.  It wasn't long before the conversation turned to pigs and this challenge.

Up until that moment I had no idea that you could sponsor a pig to be reared on your behalf.  I wasn't entirely sure that I wanted a whole pig.  If the truth is known I wasn't sure that I wanted to have a relationship with a pig prior to eating it.  I left the farm that day with more questions buzzing around my head that I had space for.  Firstly this was not a cheap undertaking.  We're talking about a whole pig here, not a chicken a duck or a goose, a whole pig.  I asked around to see if anybody would like to share the cost and the pork but there were no takers.

Even though nobody wanted in on the action, everyone that I told about the piggy possibility was very enthusiastic.  The problem was that everybody assumed that I was going to go through with it and sponsor a pig.  I hadn't made my mind up but the more I told people about the idea the more enthusiastic I was becoming about it.

Breakfast

So today I took R on another visit to Swillington, this time to look at the piggies.  R loves farm animals** so the idea of seeing them in person had him bouncing off the walls.  I did have the ulterior motive of choosing my piglet and paying for it.  The little chap in the photo above is Breakfast.  He's a week old and part of a litter of 10.  There were more traditional looking Saddleback pigs but I needed to be able to recognise him and pick him out of a crowd, so I went for his distinctive spotty markings.

Breakfast will live at the farm with his brothers, sisters, Mum and extended family for between 6 to 7 months before his time is up.  During that time I will be visiting often to check on his progress.  I don't intend on getting too attached to him and I know that giving him a name might not have been the best of ideas.  I am just going to keep in mind the quality of the meat that I have had from Swillington in the past.  I also promise to make the very best use of everything that Breakfast has to offer.  For the next 6 months I'll be cooking as much pork as I can so that when I do get him home there will be no disappointing meals.

**UPDATE**

I have just heard from the good people at Swillington Farm that Breakfast is a Boar.  This means that I now have a source for testicles which were high on my list of pig bits that are hard to find.  I was under the impression that male piggies were castrated at an early age to make them easier to raise but this is not the case at Swillington.  To make sure there are no unwanted piglets Breakfast will be kept way from his sisters once he starts getting interested in girls.

*let us, just for one moment, pretend that all of this is planned and hasn't just accidentally happened shall we.
**apart from the "big Daddy cows" which were so noisy at Home Farm that he was terrified.  We are not allowed to do cow impressions at home now which makes reading certain bedtime stories interesting.