The pork liver pate is now ready to try and not surprisingly it has an overwhelming aroma of port.

I have been cooking a lot today and I am quite proud of the varied amount of our own home grown produce I have used.

The pate has our fresh pig livers in from Thursday, along with our own pork sausagemeat and the port!

I have made  chilli con carne for the return of my daughter Polly from skiing and that is using our own beef mince.

The dogs will be eating the lungs from the pigs again tonight which they both devour greedily and finally there are two ducks in the Aga now which were shot on the farm by Ollie from down the road. ( Farmer Chris' eyesight is not so good- well that is the excuse he uses when he goes out shooting and comes back empty handed!).

Carrying on with our self sufficiency day Farmer Chris is servicing Polly's car which will hopefully save a few pennies. Farmer Chris has just come in saying that the chickens were helping him to service the car by climbing in the socket set and generally making a mess!

Earlier I collected 11 eggs and we have our first broody hen of the year- a maran- who is now in a fowl mood as I removed her from the nesting box!

Well lots of eating to do- no doubt the odd glass of wine and an ever expanding waistline!

Susan the farmers wife