This is the story of how it all started. I went across the world to the Nevada desert to meet a guy named John who lived one suburb away from my home. We bonded over a game of Giant Jenga at Burning Man and upon our return back to Brisbane I had the opportunity to head out to his permaculture farm for a party beneath the misty peak of Mt. Warning.
I decided to stay an extra night and recover from the party and he asked if I’d assist in shelling a garbage bag full of pigeon pea. He had harvested them from a couple of plants he’d had growing with the aim to use the seed to scatter over his 100 acres and thus increase the amount of nitrogen fixing vegetation available to his dirt.
When I was growing up we always had yoghurt in the fridge. It’s so cheap and simple to make. Some people stuff around with getting their milk to 67.84341°C and then trying to maintain temps while it forms. My Mum would mix a tablespoon of yoghurt into a bowl of milk, cover it in cling wrap and shove it on a shelf out of the way. 8 hours later it was yoghurt and ready for the fridge. No thermometers no special tools.
Every year a group of lads head out bush trying to find the coldest place to camp and do a bit of 4wd’ing. This year we decided to do a whole pig on the spit. Needless to say I was excited about this project.
In the preceding weeks we were getting email and video updates from Ironpaw on the spit building and testing.
Adjustable Legs to raise pig above heat.
Getting the Speed right.
Spit Roast almost done!
We pre-ordered the pig from Carey Brothers Butchers in Warwick, about 15mins from where we were camping. All up it cost around $200- @$8.80/kg.
I asked the butcher why the whole pig was $8.80/kg yet their website mentions they sold half pigs all butchered up nicely for $6.80/kg. We were told that they don’t normally have young whole pigs in stock and that it had to be specially ordered in by one of their brokers.
We arrived at The Springs 4wd park on Fri lunchtime, set up camp and then began salting the pig. I made a rub of mustard, garlic and ginger powders mixed with salt. This was rubbed all throughout the inside of the carcass. The outside was kept simple with a hefty rubbing of salt. We then wrapped the pig up in the plastic sleeve it came in and then a second layer of plastic sleeve with two bags of ice in between the layers (That way if the ice melted it would not waterlog the pig). This was all them rolled up in a tarp for storage overnight. We weren’t too concerned about the temp as we were expecting it to be well below 4°C overnight.
We then focused on getting the fires going. One ludicrously large one for our general warmth and a secondary one to cook the pig on the next day. You would think that dragging two whole trees as well as dozen or so large 6″ thick branches to feed the firepit would suffice but this is Brass Monkey and pretty much all was consumed come morning.
