Compare cheese making.

WELCOME TO OUR BLOG YOU ARE INVITED , TO BROWSE AS LONG AS YOU LIKE. Anyhow, here I will publish my own diary and what I see happening in the world, and when I do not have much to say, I will write posts from my life story. 

Anyhow, you can also find this article at, http://oldman-lifeworks.blogspot.com,  

My other sites; http://frankmenchise.com,http://diybrickwork.com,http://manneedsgod.co.uk  

You can see more at this addresses, DIY brickwork  and,  http://diybrickwork.com,   

This article can also be found at this link, Compare cheese making. 

Today there are many types of cheese in the world, this photo is from a factory that has these wheels of cheese to mature. Cheese is made from milk, it is one of the most important food to eat, it is very yummy, it can be eaten in many ways, and can be added to a lot of foods. 

Welcome to my article,  Compare cheese making. 

Dear readers, in this article of farming and cheese making, let us talk about the milk that the cow produce; as we have said farming it is based on the assumption of waste not want not, this apply also to the milk that we take from the cows and other animals, because this milk must be put to good use, and since in those times there were not many choices, we made cheese from the milk that we had; so, I will describe the procedure how we made our cheese.

Today cheese is an extremely popular food; to understand its importance of cheese, we need to look at food preparation, and how often the chefs use cheese in preparing their food. Now apart that cheese can be added to many dishes at the end when preparing the food, there are things that the cheese is the main ingredient, cheesecakes, macaroni and cheese and others dishes, you can even make a cheese sandwich by itself or with other ingredients, I love cheese so much that sometimes I eat a small piece of it with nothing else, it leaves my mouth sweet and my stomach satisfied and happy, I even use it to replace cough candies, when I haven’t got them and usually it works, but that is up to the individual taste and what sort of cheese you use to do that.

Anyhow here under are a couple of links that will show you how cheese can be used:

Cheese Recipes collection - www.taste.com.au

Cheese types cooking tips - Ingredients - Taste.com.au

We could say more about cheeses and their uses, but perhaps it is better if we go back to talk about my life story, and how we made cheese the old way, and how we believe making cheese started.

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How we started to make cheese. 

There are reasons to believe that cheese making is very ancient, in fact, there is no way to know how early humanity started making cheese, I have not seen anything written in the history books when cheese first appeared, even though they talk about herds of sheep and cattle, so, we must assume that since they had sheep and cattle, they would milk them and use their milk in many ways. Since they had this milk somehow ancient people discovered that they could use milk to make cheese and since then we have made cheese.

There are several theories how making cheese started, some shepherd found that if they stored their milk for a long time, it would turn into curd and then a piece of acid cheese, it would not be as good as the cheeses that we make today, but they started to make cheese, because they needed to save whatever they could; anyhow, knowing that the milk can become cheese, they started to make cheese. Because the ancient people had to use whatever they had to feed themselves, so, they used this cheese and slowly worked out how to make cheese better.

So, since early times we humans learned how to make cheese, and then how to cure cheese and keep it for a long period of time, so, we have been making cheese and eating cheese ever since. Cheese has one of the best nutritional values and could easily be stored, so, today we are making several types of cheeses.

But, let us tell the younger generation where cheese comes from, since they are not exposed to the natural ways of life as we did in the past, therefore, for them is hard to imagine how cheese is made and where cheese comes from, they think that it just comes from the supermarket.

So, I am going to describe how the cheese is made, and where it comes from, because I happen to know this firsthand, since in our family farm we made cheese. Now the first thing that we need to know is that we use farm animals to milk them and then make cheese form their milk.

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This is how we used to milk the cows in the past. 

Today it is hard to believe, that this is how milking the cows was done in the past. You see, there were no milking machine for thousands of years, so, everything had to be done by hand the hard way. . 

To make cheese we milk farm animals. 

Now, to understand how cheese was/is made, you need to imagine that you are living in a farm in the past; say seventy years ago or more, because life then was different from today, so, many things were done in a different way including cheese making.

While I was living in the farm not only, I learned how to make cheese the old ways, but other things as well, because I was observing everything around me, as you know it is natural to observe everything around you, since it is the way that helps us survive. I have observed Mother Nature, where everything happens at the right time, you see, most of the farm animals give birth to their offspring when there is plenty of food to go around, and when there is plenty of food they make plenty of milk, it happens also when mild and fine weather is usually expected, this is how Mother Nature has set everything to work and it works well.

Therefore, it is for this reason that in springtime most of the animal’s offspring are born, starting from the goats, sheep, and the cows that usually calf once every year and they make plenty of milk especially when there is plenty of green food to eat; we milk the cows, to make cheese and other dairy products from it. So, hereunder we are going to talk about, how we made cheese at the time when I was young, and then how we made ricotta cheese, I know that what I am going to say here is old fashioned, but anyhow, here we are talking about my life story and the way of how things were done when I was young.

But before we do that, just to compare, let us talk that today they make cheese in the factories like Parmigiano Reggiano, which is a well-known cheese all over the world, and it is used a lot on culinary things. Perhaps this will make us compare the great difference, between the way they do it now, and the ways that we used to do it in our family farms when I was young.

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Parmigiano cheese making. 

Cheese making

There are many types of cheese in the world, one of the best cheese in the world is Parmesan cheese, which is a cheese that is used in many culinary things, you need to watch one of these cooking shows to see how many times this type of cheese is used. Now we want to talk about from where this type of cheese comes from, as this cheese has a special recipe that is protected even today, so, let us talk about this cheese, since it is one of the most popular cheese:

The king of cheeses must be Parmigiano Reggiano, as its name suggests it is from the province of Parma and surrounding territories in northern Italy, here I want to point out, what is the Difference between Parmesan and Parmigiano-Reggiano?

The answer to this question is this: (I am going to use this explanation from the internet) Due to Italian D.O.C.laws that protect the names and recipes of certain cheeses, a cheese cannot be called Parmigiano-Reggiano unless it is made using a specific recipe and production method within the provinces of Parma, Reggio-Emilia, Modena, and specific regions in the provinces of Bologna and Mantua. The D.O.C laws are meant to preserve the integrity of traditional cheeses by insuring the flavor and quality. Therefore, any cheese made outside of these regions with a slightly different recipe or production method cannot be called Parmigiano-Reggiano.

Parmigiano Reggiano - Parmesan Cheese

One may guess that the recipes for this great cheese has been the work of many generations of Italian cheese makers, and then many generations of organizing the great factories of cheese making, one has to look at some of these photos where they cure and store the cheese until it matures to see what we mean.

Now, we have talked about Parmigiano Reggiano because it is one of the best-known cheeses in the world. Anyhow, in the old times lots of people made their own cheese; in fact, I have made cheese myself in our family farm of southern Italy and I want to tell you how it was done in the old ways, as most farmers had to do it, because we the farmers had to use as much as we could from what was available and to turn milk into cheese was one of them. So, let us see how I learned to make cheese the old farmers’ way.

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Cheese making in the farms. 

Cheese making in the farms when I was young

When I was young, while working in our family farm, I learned how to make cheese the old way, so, I want to tell you how it was done. anyhow, I must tell you that this is not like making Parmigiano Reggiano cheese, but is it more like the poor farmer cheese. So, I am going to tell you here-under how to make this type of cheese and ricotta my grandma way, I am saying my grandma way, because my grandma taught me how to do it.

Now, what I am writing here has happened in the fifties, but a lot of things have changed since the fifties, but the principle of how these things were done the old times does not change much, so, what we were doing then was the same ways that it had been done for thousands of years, this same way can still be used today, so, let me tell you how we were making cheese then?

In southern Italy and in many other parts of the world, the farmers use to milk the cows the goats, the sheep and perhaps other animals as well, so that they can use their milk and they can make cheese and other milk products. Now I need to explain that milking is done twice a day, in the morning and in the evening, milking is a must to do at the right times otherwise the animals will suffer, and if you don’t milk them then those animals will produce less and less milk. So, what to do with all this milk that we collected by milking the cows, goats, sheep, etc. You need to know that the most constant and important rule in farming is waste not want not, so, we had to use everything available to us to achieve the best results, and one of these was to make cheese from this milk, since there was not a milk market, and there was not much demand for milk locally.

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Cheese making grandma way. 

In our case we had two milking cows, so, we would collect up to 30 liters of milk every day in springtime, when there was plenty of green food for the cows to eat. In those times everybody needed to be self-sufficient and nothing would be allowed to go waist, the theory was waste not want not, therefore, everybody was ready to do those things necessary to save whatever had to be saved, therefore, the milk that we had collected from the cows we used to make cheese, this is what most farmer did in the old days, here I am going to explain how this was done.

When I was young my Grandma who was staying and sleeping in town overnight would come to the farm to help us in the farm, so, she would make cheese from this milk that we had milked from the farm animals, this happened for a few years, and then she taught me how to make cheese. The whole process was simple but at the same time it was hard for a young bloke, but as I grew older and stronger and able to do it, I was left most times on my own. So, let me go over the process, because I want to make a record of how these things were made in the past. You see, today in the farm things are different, because now there is a vehicle that collect milk from these farms and take it to the cheese factory to make cheese and any other milk products. But let me tell you how we made cheese and ricotta when I was young and how my forbear had made cheese themselves for centuries if not thousands of years before me.

After milking the cows, the evening before and the morning we had about 30 liter of milk that we could make cheese with. Now the first thing that I had to do was to light a fire in the fire place of the farm and make sure that there was enough fire wood ready beside the chimney for the whole process, set a strong three legged steel device on this fire that I had started that was capable to hold the weight of the milk in this special container safely. Then I would get this large copper kettle, now this copper kettle had to be clean for a start, beside that had to be treated from a specialist once a year with a coat of tin or something like that, this treatment is very much like galvanizing the inside of the kettle, and it needs to be done properly, so that all copper surfaces inside the kettle should be covered in full. Now that I had this large kettle ready, I would strain the milk with a fine strainer while I am filling the kettle with the milk, after that I am ready to make cheese.

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Making cheese the old ways. 

Making cheese and then ricotta the old ways

So, now that I have the fire going steady but at a slower pace, and had this three legged device set over the fire to hold the kettle safely, if nobody was around to help me lift the kettle, I had to be extra careful to lift the kettle containing about 30 liter of milk over the fire without getting burned; then I had to be careful that the milk would warm up to 37-38 degrees only and no more, otherwise the process would not work well. So, once the milk reached this temperature, I would take the kettle off the fire. Now to make cheese you need to add something like enzymes or an extract, in the milk while it is around 37 degrees to make the milk curd. In my young days I was lucky because this extract could be bought at the chemist, and it was a lot easier that the very old ways, when you had to prepare your own extract. Anyhow at this point I would measure the amount of this extract and mix it in the milk with a wooden devise which was purposely made.

You see in the old time people had to do most things in wood for this purpose because wood does not rust, it does not conduce heat, so, while one end is hot the other end will not be affected and remains cool, and also it does not react with milk, therefore, wooden utensils were safe to use. 

Anyhow, we have left the milk to curd for 10 minutes or perhaps a quarter of an hour has passed since we have added this extract to the warm milk and now the milk is firm like jelly, our next move now is that we use the wooden devise that we stirred the milk with and push it into this curd and start breaking it to small pieces. After that we stop and wait a moment for the particle of fresh cheese to start sinking to the bottom as the whey and the cheese become separated, I put my washed clean hands in the kettle and go to the bottom of it, the fresh cheese has all sunk at the bottom, so, I start pushing it slowly to one side of the kettle, by doing this I am slowly compacting the new cheese by pushing the whey out of it, I am going to do this until a firm ball of new cheese is formed.

Once I have this firm new ball of cheese in my hands, I lift it into a container; the container is a woven basket purposely made for this task, so that the whey can continue to run out the fresh cheese. Now I have about four to five kilogram of fresh cheese and by the time it matures may become three kilograms. The whole process does not end here, because there are a couple of other things, we need to do to complete the first part of cheese making. One is that I need to get all the whey back into the kettle. so that I can make ricotta from it, and after I make ricotta, I have to dip for a few minutes the new fresh cheese that I have made into the hot whey after I have made ricotta. This action is a sort of pasteurizing the new cheese, since the whey is very hot after making the ricotta; you see the milk that we have used to make the cheese has never been pasteurized as we have warmed it below 40 degrees. Having made the new cheese and dipped it in the whey for a few minutes, now that cheese needs to be cured for a few months, this curing usually involves sea salt and vinegar. Now in this article we have talked about how we made cheese and in our next hub we will talk about, Making ricotta my grandma way. 

To see more click on this link, Compare cheese making.  

  See you soon. 

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Springtime in the farms.

WELCOME TO OUR BLOG YOU ARE INVITED , TO BROWSE AS LONG AS YOU LIKE. Anyhow, here I will publish my own diary and what I see happening in the world, and when I do not have much to say, I will write posts from my life story. 

Anyhow, you can also find this article at, http://oldman-lifeworks.blogspot.com,  

My other sites; http://frankmenchise.com,http://diybrickwork.com,http://manneedsgod.co.uk  

You can see more at this addresses, DIY brickwork  and,  http://diybrickwork.com,   

This article can also be found at this link, Springtime in the farms. 

In springtime everything is growing quickly, so, it is interesting to look at the progress of whatever you are growing, look at this green field of wheat or barley in late spring, if you look closely, you can see the ear of wheat or barley coming out of the stems. Here I would like to point out that barley was used to be cut at this stage, to feed the animals at night during springtime. 

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Welcome to our article, Springtime in the farms. 

Dear readers, in our last article we were telling you, how boring was in wintertime in the farms. Anyhow, after winter comes spring, and spring is the season of hope and dreams; but nobody can experience this feeling of hope and dreams more than the farm people, because everything is happening right in front of their eyes.

Therefore, from the farmers’ point of view, spring is a happier season than winter, even though we can say that the farm life is the same even in springtime, because first and foremost you have to look after the farm animal, since the farm animals were the backbone in farming in those days.

You see, up to the time when I was young everything was done by using these animals strength to plough the fields, to carry heavy weights around, and to pull the cart, because, when I was young there were not that many tractors, they were coming out but they were too expensive to buy, so, we had to rely on the farm animals to do the jobs that needed to be done. Now, I want to point out that since then several farm machineries have come out and have helped farming a lot, so, today farming is easier than it was then. But changes can bring good things and causalities, and I became one of the causalities.  

To understand the benefit that the farmers and the entire community has received form this modern way of wheat farming. See this article, Farming today compared to the old way.

Anyhow, here we want to talk about the farm life in spring of those bygone days. So, let me describe the changes that springtime brings to the farmers and to the farms’ animals. You see, in the temperate zone of these Southern Italy towns, every season brings a new way of life and spring brings big changes.

Now, during the winter, we were hand feeding all farm animals, which was a boring job, day in day out. In spring the way of looking after the farm’s animals changes, because in springtime all the animal that are grass eater will start eating grass in the paddock, at the beginning for only a few hours a day, and then it will reach a stage when most of the farm’s animals will be feeding on grass and nothing else, and most of them will be grazing in the paddock during daytime, at night most of us small farmers would bring them inside the farm stables for security reasons.

As we have said, during the winter, the large farm animals have been hand fed in the stable with straws, oats and hay, but in spring they will be grazing in the paddocks. So, as soon as the grass in the paddock grows enough in early spring, the cows are let loose in the paddock for a few hours each day to begin with, and then as the grass starts growing faster they will graze in the paddocks all day long. The next on line to graze in the paddocks are the pregnant mares, followed by the rest of the animals: So that in mid spring all the animals that are grass eater will be feeding only on grass; during the day in the paddocks and at night with fresh harvested grass, purposely grown and cut from the farmers.

So, the farmers are still busy to look after the farm animals, but now it is not as hard as in winter times and the weather is fine, and every day that go past it becomes warmer, so, a more relaxed way of life can be enjoyed.

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What relief spring brings to us farmers? 

In the farms, springtime brings a smile to the farmers faces, because this new season brings hope to everyone, and if you are in the farm this feeling is felt even more, it is our human nature and because the farmers are closer to Mother Nature they can feel this more than the rest of the community.

Here we must say that all the living animals love springtime too, because spring  bring a new beginning to everything, it brings new hope and it brings new life and we humans are all waiting for the good things that will come during the year, you see spring is completely different, from wintertime.

From a young would be farmer point of view, the very first thing that we notice in spring is that the temperature is becoming milder, everything around you are becoming greener; wherever you turn you can see this happening right in front of your eyes, and that is a wonderful thing to see.

We can say that the only time that living in the farm for a short period can be more interesting than living in town is at spring time, because those things that make life interesting in the farms happen one after another, you see, we can observe Mother Nature wonders as they occur at close range; and springtime is the time when most of those wonders occur one after another.

For us farmers early in spring when the weather is fine it is nice and warm to stay outside doing odd jobs, like preparing the soil in the kitchen garden and planting some seeds that will soon grow, while we are doing that we imagine how these new plants will grow and bear fruit in summer; you see, in the temperate zone as the days grow longer and the temperature rises the plants start growing very quickly, so, we are thinking about harvest time whatever we are planting. I know that this seems like dreaming good things, but that is a way of life farmers live; they need to dream good things to come, to continue to do their farming. Now, let us describe the spring season that we young farmer would see happening right in front of our eyes.

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Wonderful spring is here. 

During early spring it is wonderful, if we can forget all worries in the world, and look at the work of Mother Nature at its best; flowers are everywhere, and everything is alive. You see, today you look at one tree and you wonder whether it is alive or dead, because its twigs seem lifeless; but in a few days, when you look at that same tree again you can see a few flowers and some small leaves on its twigs, and in a few more days the whole tree will be in flower, and also its leaves will be growing on its twigs very rapidly, the trees grow quickly at springtime after a cold winter, also all grass and seedlings grow faster and everything is greener and full of life; the birds that throughout the winter seemed timid and sad, now start to sing and they sound happy. In the country there is a change in the air in springtime and everything and everybody feels happier, because there are lots of sunny mild days in spring, so, the sunshine and the mild days tell you that the dreadful winter is past, so, this brings happiness to everybody and everything.

Of course, we must look after the farm animals, because that is a chore that never ends, but now it is easier and the weather is usually fine, in spring times every day that go past the weather becomes warmer, so, a more relaxed way of life can be enjoyed and there are other happy happenings, you see, spring is the season of hope and in spring we start to harvest many things, there are plenty of vegetables in spring as everything grows pretty fast, also in the fields things grow fast, there are plenty of fresh peas, green beans, broad beans; the farmers go around and hope to harvest plenty of everything, when they are ready to be harvested.

But even in this happy season there can be problems; because the farmer’s life is not an easy life; so, while the farmer is dreaming about the good harvest that can be coming, at the same time they are worried; they fear bad weather that can ruin their crops. These natural facts, that nature can unleash is a real problem when stormy weather approaches, because the work that the framers have done during the year can be ruined in a few minutes. So, hope and heartbreak go hand in hand, and even in this season that is better that the rest, it is not easy being a farmer. Here I have to say that this was one of the reasons why I left farming and migrated to Australia when I was still young, hoping for a better and easier life in Australia which I did.

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The farm animals.  

Now let us talk about the farm animals, and what happens in springtime. If we observe, we must admit that the ways that Mother Nature has set up for reproducing the species is incredible, and the way of how most natural things happen in the animals world is almost faultless, for a start most of the farm animals give birth to their offspring when there is plenty of food to go around, and when mild and fine weather is expected, it is for this reason that in springtime most of the animals offspring are born, starting from the cows that usually calf once every year and they make plenty of milk especially when there is plenty of green food for them to eat, also other animals have their offspring in spring, the sheep have their lambs, the mares have their foals, and other animals have also their young’s according to their specie.

Anyhow, most of the farm animals are born early in spring, so that they can grow big and strong during the spring and summer, so, when the cold weather comes back they are able to cope with it easily, this is how Mother Nature wants it to be, you see, everything is set in a way that all living things will get the most benefit that they can get, while they can in the good and warm season, and that is the way that Mother Nature wants it to be. But we humans sometimes interfere with Mother Nature.

Now there is something that I hate to say, but I must say it anyhow, you should understand that farmers to run their farms properly, they are pushed to do things that are cruel. You see, we people sometimes do things that seems against Mother Nature, because we need to control everything around us for our own benefit, one of those things is that we take away the veal from mother cow, after we have done that, then we can happily milk the cow.   

We milk the cows and what we do with it is dairy products, dairy products are a wide range of products, of many shapes and forms, starting from plain milk that can be of various sorts and many sorts of cheeses and other things; but here in these articles we are only mentioning, what we did with the milk that we took from the cows and other farm animals, at the time when I was young.  

You see, we used that milk to make cheese; some of the reasons for making cheese was that in those times, there wasn’t a real milk market that you could sell the milk to, so, we had to do something with the milk that we had. You see, farming is mostly based in waste not want not, so, nothing should go to waste, therefore, we made our own cheese from the milk that we had. Anyhow, in our next article we will be talking about, how we made cheese the old way when I was young. Of course, things have changed a lot since then, but nevertheless it was a way of life that we used to live, so, let us tell it just the way it was happening then, in our next article, Compare cheese making. 

To see more click on this link, Springtime in the farms.  

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My farm life story continues.

WELCOME TO OUR BLOG YOU ARE INVITED , TO BROWSE AS LONG AS YOU LIKE. Anyhow, here I will publish my own diary and what I see happening in the world, and when I do not have much to say, I will write posts from my life story. 

Anyhow, you can also find this article at, http://oldman-lifeworks.blogspot.com,  

My other sites; http://frankmenchise.com,http://diybrickwork.com,http://manneedsgod.co.uk  

You can see more at this addresses, DIY brickwork  and,  http://diybrickwork.com,   

This article can also be found at this link, My farm life continues. 

A large farm building with cows grazing in the paddock, life in the farms seems to continually be the same day after day, it inly changes slowly as the four seasons change, so, the ways of life in the farms is usually peaceful but boring. 

Welcome to our article, My farm life continues.    

Dear readers, in my last article I was telling you, how I have felt during my life; and all those negative things that happened to me, but I have tried to turn those negative things into positive thinking. 

Anyhow, now let me tell you about my farm life when I was young, in a different way, because I feel better knowing that somebody else knows my life story. Anyhow, I know that my life story, does not tell you anything important, except that you can compare my sad life story with your own life story.

Therefore, let me review what I have done during my life, starting from my first job in the farm, with the intention of telling you my life story, I know that I have told you part of my life story, but I want to tell you what I believe I have not told you yet, and if it happens that what I am writing next you know already, then I want to explain the reasons why I am writing my life story, in a language that is not my mother tongue which happen to be Italian, but I am writing my life story in the English language, which I had to learn as a grown up, because I migrated to Australia.

Anyhow, I feel that I am one of the few people left in the world that is willing to tell you the story of my life. I want to tell you how the world was when I was young, and what we did, so that a simple record can be kept. What I want to say is that everything is changing these days, but people don’t take the time to record those changes that occur, for this reason the old ways of life will soon be lost, because nobody is writing about it. But I believe that it is good to know how we used to live in the past, perhaps to compare the past with the present ways of living. Speaking for myself, I can easily compare the ways of life that I have lived myself, to the ways of life that my forbears were telling me about themselves, and then to the ways of life that we are living today.

Here I must say that the way of life is changing more quickly all the time, hopefully for better times to come. Anyhow, I believe that overall our standard of life is improving, as I have pointed out in our article called, Farming today compared to the old way, where we are trying to show you the great difference, how we lived then, and how hard it was to earn a living, compared to today ways of living, it is worth reading it if you want to understand the great difference, between today farming and the past. So, let us start telling you my first job in the farm.

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This is a small flock of sheep, they are somehow similar to the sheep I had to mind when I was young, anyhow, I had to take the sheep out in the fields and make sure that they did not go in somebody else fields, and also keep them away from the fields that still had a crop. 

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My first job on the farm. 

Dear readers, I started to work in the farm at the tender age of eleven. Now I want to say here, do not feel sorry for me for having lived my early life in the farm, because in those times it was the normal way of life that farming people used to live, anyhow, I was working in our family farm and not in a stranger farm, where people can be mean to you, so, it was not as bad as it sounds. For comparison sake I want to point out that even today there are people that are worse off than I was then; you see, in the poor countries even today they not only start to work early in life, with a boss that pushes them to do more; but they also go hungry and thirsty, so, I say, think about them, before you think about me, and if any of you are in a position that can help, then try to help them if possible. Sometimes even shaming those people that use this slavery can help; you see, to feel sorry for me now is useless because nothing can be done as it is in the past, anyhow, let me tell you my life story and my first job in our family farm, in southern Italy.

When I went to work in our small family farm in Southern Italy, I was going to turn eleven that year and the first job that I did was looking after a small flock of sheep, which included also a ram and a couple of goats; I had to do that job because the lad that my family had hired to look after the sheep left us suddenly, so, I had to replace him for a few months until we were able to sell the small flock of sheep. It was a boring job to take the sheep out of the sheep-pen and into the fields to graze twice a day, I had to mind them that they would not graze in fields that didn’t belong to us, or fields which there was a crop still growing, I had to water them by driving then to a small creek also. I had to take them out early in the morning and then in the afternoon for a few hours each time, because this is how the sheep are grazed over there in summer times. Then when the town’s Fair was held, we were able to sell the small herd of sheep, we had to sell them because it would cost us more to hire a youth to look after them, than what we could earn from keeping them. Anyhow even though we sold our sheep I had to continue to stay in the farm helping with the other farm animals.

Now I want to tell you what we did in the farms of those days, so, you can have a better idea, what sort of life I had to live in the farm when I was young, I will start by trying to describe you how a day in the farm was spend doing the farm chores, that seemed endless since they are repeated every day. Now to make it easier for me, I am going to start with those days when there was not much to do in the farm, because the hard work in the fields had been done and all we had to do is look after the farm animals.

So, let me tell you about a day in wintertime, when all the main works of sowing had been done, and we were resting and waiting for better weather and longer days. Those were the days which we were only looking after the farm’s animals, but we also did some odd jobs around the farm, so, even in those days there were lots of things to do in the farm. So, let me describe to you what we did in a winter day in the farm.

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Winter days in the farm. 

This is how life was in the farms of Southern Italy in the early fifties; in the morning we would get up early before dawn, as the days are short in winter, they are about 8 to 9 hours of sun light; so, as soon as we got up we start doing our chores, we would start by feeding the horses and other farms animals, and at the same time we had to clean the stables, virtually we collected all the manure that the horses and the other stable animals had made during the night, we loaded it on a strange devise like a field stretcher made of timber and wire, and then two of us would lift it and carry it to the manure heap, which was outside about 20 meters or so away from the building, at the same time we would be grooming the horses with a hand brush, and at the same time we would continue to feed the horses and other farm animals, such as cows, pigs, chickens, and other animals with fresh serving of straw, oats, hay, grain, and whatever else was needed according to the animal’s needs, and sometimes according to the tusks that those animals were supposed to do during the day, because if the horses were going to do some work, we would give them more oats than normally did, when they would be staying in the stable the entire day.

Once we had finished grooming the horses and cleaning all manure from the stable, the chicken coop, the pig stay, sweep the floors and everywhere else; then one of us would go to the well with a couple of buckets or other containers, so, we could bring some clean fresh water for the small animals to drink, and also for ourselves to drink and to wash our hands and face, and everyday even if it was very cold we used to wash our hands and face outside the building: Here I can assure you that this was the main hygiene that we had in the farm each day, and this was the only time and place where we used to clean ourselves; at any other time, when we got our hands dirty, we had to find a way how to clean ourselves with anything available around us; I know that for anybody that is used to tap water sounds terrible, but it was not that bad because in winter time there are several small creeks around the fields, where you could wash your hands.

Anyhow, by the time we had done all these chores, it would be time for the horse and the cows to be taken to the well to water them, (the horses and other large animals were watered only twice a day in winter timewintertime) here, we had to stand on the well head to draw water with a bucket attached to a rope, we had to let the bucket down the well, and then with a flick of the rope we would make the bucket turn upside-down to fill itself, and then we pulled the bucket up the well and empty it into the trough; we had to draw as many buckets of water as they were needed until all the animals would stop drinking. Today when I think about it, it was a hard and dangerous job for a youth of my age, but because it was normal to do it, we never thought that it was dangerous then.

After we had done all those chores, it was time to eat something, so, we would sit down on some wooden stools that most time we had made ourselves in our spare time. Breakfast was usually brought in from town, from one of us or one of our neighbors', there was always somebody on horseback that would go to town the evening before, and then bring prepared food in the morning. Breakfast would usually consist of a few fried dry capsicums and a few olives, and at the best one or two small pieces of sausage, or something similar which my mother would have fried in the early hours of that morning, and then placed it in a saucepan with a few drops of fried oil at the bottom, we set around a larger wooden stool which acted like a table, and with a slice of bread in one hand and a fork or knife in the other hand, we would eat our small share of breakfast from the saucepan with as much bread as possible, as there was plenty of bread of very good nutritional quality, but not much of anything else. At lunch or dinner time we would have something similar to eat, as we did at breakfast, and in the evenings, we had to do our own cooking, so, I am going to describe here how we used to prepare a warm quick and simple meal, by using stale bread.

How to prepare cooked bread. 

How we prepared a quick meal called (panecotto) cooked bread

This may sound strange to you, that we prepared a meal of cooked bread, but in the farms we did; it was called with the Italian farmer’s name “panecotto” anyhow, let us talk about this quick meal called panecotto. 

We know that when it is cold, we need to eat at least one good warm filling meal every day, to stay healthy and strong, especially if we have worked during the day, so, in the evening we had a large warm meal that we had to cook ourselves, sometimes we would cook pasta which could be bought from the shop or homemade pasta, but usually we made a quick meal called ‘panecotto’ which was easy to prepare, because it is just cooked bread; to you this may seem strange that we cooked bread a second time for our main meal, but then over there it was the simplest meal to cook in the farms and very filling, therefore, after a cold and long day of activities, this very simple meal was welcome, and it was easy to prepare, so, let me explain.

In order to prepare this ‘panecotto’ all that was needed was a fire, which we had going in the farm chimney, or we would light one easily to keep us warm and to cook, you see in the farms to light a fire is very easy, because there is so much dry straws around in the mangers of the horse or other farm animals; so, all we had to do is grab a bundle of this straws put it in the chimney and light it with a match, then we could add wood to it and you have a fire going. Anyhow, to cook this meal called ’panecotto’ we had to make this fire more lively to boil some water, sometimes we would add to this boiling water some vegetable, since they were available in the farm, or some slices of potatoes, since we would grow our own in the farm; then when these vegetables or potatoes were nearly cooked, we would throw in this boiling water as many slice of durum wheat bread as required, and in a minute or so we would drain the water out of the saucepan; now let me tell you, this sort of panecotto works well if you use bread made from durum wheat, because the durum wheat is like the past, you see the best pasta is made from durum wheat, anyhow, over there in those times we did not need to look for durum wheat bread, because all the bread that we were eating in the farm was made from durum wheat; anyhow, once we had this durum wheat bread in the saucepan on a lively fire, in a minute or so we would drain all the water out of the saucepan, at the same time while we were cooking the bread, we would fry a small amount of olive oil in a frypan with garlic and pepper or tomatoes and when this was ready we would pour it on the cooked drained bread, or cooked bread and vegetable and that was all that was required, at this stage the ‘panecotto’ would be ready to be eaten, usually from a large plate and sometimes even from the saucepan itself, depending on how well we were organized in the farm, and how many people had to eat this meal.

Anyhow, this was one way of how to prepare a quick warm meal in the farm in those days; of course, there were other ways, but this was to most popular one, since we had everything there already and was easy to make. Now let us talk about what else we did in the farms during the day.

Some farm work in wintertime. 

Anyhow, now let me go back in the morning, after we had breakfast, weather permitting we did some minor jobs outside, like hoeing in the kitchen garden, which was about half an acre of land, or working in the vineyard, or going out to cut and collect fire woodfirewood for ourselves, and for our families in town, since they depended on us for their wood supply, in order to cook their meals including our meals and keep themselves warm, because in the town in those times there was nothing to burn, it all had to come from the country, so, we had to supply the wood to them to keep warm and prepare meals for themselves and us.

Now, I want to point this out to you, that in those days, this was the way of life that most people had to live, they had to look after each other’s, so, from the country side we would supply our produce and fire wood to the town, and from the town we would receive back whatever we needed and they could give us, it worked out all right both ways; anyhow let me go back to tell the farm work that we did.

During the day we would feed the animals every now and then and bring in the stable new straw and hay for the following night.

This is how life in the farm was in winter times, when the days were short and the weather was cold and wet.

But when the days became longer and the weather was fine, there was work to be done in the fields even if it was winter. We would have to get up earlier then, to feed the horses and get them ready for the tasks that they had to do: it could be that we had to plough a field or something similar, but to do that we had to harness the horses and attach them with their harnesses to the appropriate devices; all this had to be done early in the morning even if it was very cold, so that some work could be done during the short winter days in the fields. We had to start early also for safety reasons, you see, we wanted to be back to the farmhouse well before sunset, it was safer that way. 

In this photo, there is a single horse feeding on hay in a modern stable, we used to have in our stable up to a dozen large animals, like horses, mules, cows and donkeys, we would feed them in the manger. 

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Apart what I have said above, there were also other chores which had to be done in the farm in wintertime, like pruning and hoeing the vineyard, planting trees, pruning fruit and olives trees, cutting and collecting wood, and other small jobs, so, everyday there was always plenty to do.

But even though in wintertime we were busy in the farm, wintertime was very dreadful and sad especially for young people, because we were more isolated than at any other time of the year, therefore, it was boring and it was very easy for one to become dull, since we did the same things every day, therefore, if we young people became dull it was due to this harsh environment, at other times of the year it was better as there was more contact with the town’s community, and because there were some important happenings to talk about, even if it was in a restricted way, because in the farm we would still be isolated. So, we were happy to see springtime coming. So, in our next article we will talk about, Springtime in the farms, and what happens there. So, see you next time with our article. .

To see more click on this link, My farm life continues. 

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