Celebrating the Seasons with the Yorkshire Shepherdess: Farming, Family and Delicious Recipes to Share

Introduction

Am I a photographer of critical acclaim? No. A writer of literary brilliance? No. I am a shepherdess, mother, wonderer and dreamer. As a child I was always a reader, though never a writer. What mattered to me was finding authenticity in all that I read. I whiled away countless hours poring over books, but it was one particular volume that really spoke to me – Hill Shepherd by John and Eliza Forder, a photographic journal that followed the lives of hill shepherds in the Yorkshire Dales and Lake District. Although I was living in Yorkshire, in Huddersfield, I felt a world away from the mountains, moors and fells that filled the pages. The proximity to nature, the connection with the animals and the wild freedom that came with shepherding sheep fascinated me, and from that moment onwards it became my sole ambition and goal in life. I established myself as a contract shepherdess, slowly working my way up the farming ladder, gaining practical know-how and knowledge in the complicated and often-closed world of shepherding. By twenty-one I was married to Clive Owen and was living at Ravenseat, one of the highest and most remote hill farms in England.

I started sharing the story of life on the farm through posting pictures on social media, writing books and later appearing on television. I feel privileged to live and work at such an outstandingly stunning place and enjoy documenting the ever-changing seasons through my photography, come rain or shine and everything in between – as is often the case with Yorkshire’s weather!

I don’t see myself as a photographer, or even an author for that matter; just a visual diarist and an observer of what goes on around me. Every which way you look there is a photograph to be had, a combination of children and animals – the two things you are told to never work with – set against the glorious backdrop of Yorkshire’s big skies and dramatic landscapes. The spontaneous nature of photos that aren’t choreographed are what I seek to share. I prefer to turn away from the classic view, to find something unconstrained and natural, simplicity itself, a snapshot of a moment in time.

I am very aware of how fortunate I am to be in a position to share some of what our great British countryside has to offer, whether in the practical sense of the food we put on our plates or, from the more holistic point of view, the mindfulness and healing powers that nature can bring into our busy, frantic lives.

The recipes you will find in this book are not meant to be followed to the letter, but are merely starting points. Switch the vegetables according to what you have in your cupboard, substitute and adapt whenever and wherever you can, make use of what you already have available – whatever will make your life simpler.

This is not intended to be an instruction manual for how a life should be lived; I am the last person who would see my life as being a perfect example for others. This is simply an account of life at Ravenseat, a glimpse into the place where we live and work, the family dynamics and our interactions with nature and the countryside within the specific confines of our farm. It follows what is happening outdoors and indoors through the seasons, and the link between the two.

January

I’d challenge anyone to find a more dramatically spectacular place to be in January than a snowbound Ravenseat. Granted, a kinder, simpler home would be easier, but for wild dynamic beauty, Ravenseat has to win, hands down. The farmstead sits neatly and squarely in a small valley, cosily hemmed in and dominated by the moors that surround her. With the farm comes a well-documented history going back centuries, the human presence visible in the walls and buildings. Much older, still, are the fossils visible in the sandstone cobbles dug from the nearby quarry, and the water-worn swirls on flagstones hauled from the beck.

It is pretty much a certainty that all will be covered in a thick blanket of snow, drifts gathering beside the walls, delicate and pure windblown sculptures that glisten in the rare moments that a weak winter sunshine breaks through the heavy leaden skies so common at this time of year. Blizzarding snow and ice mean that we may well be cut off for at least part of the month, but we know the drill by now, and make sure we are well prepared. I fill the dairy with staples – sacks of rice, potatoes and pasta, big bags of sugar and flour and plenty of tins. It is well within the power of every farmer to furnish the table through all seasons with wholesome dishes from the dairy, if preparations have been made.

I drive thirty miles to Catterick Garrison where I can buy in bulk, partly in a bid to maximize efficiency by keeping trips to a minimum, and partly as it makes financial sense. With a family to feed, and a sizeable one at that – eleven people round the table, all with healthy appetites – keeping hunger pangs at bay is no easy feat in winter. Normally bulk-buying poses no issue, but in 2020, when the pandemic lockdown was introduced, it became far more difficult to stock up in the way in which I was accustomed. Furtively loading up a trolley, I would constantly be looking over my shoulder, aware that to my fellow shoppers it would seem as if I was greedily hoarding food.

I get potatoes by the sackful from the local agricultural suppliers, who stock them alongside the animal feed. The price varies depending on the season and availability, but even at their costliest, £12 for a twenty-five-kilo sack is still a bargain. They are unwashed, encrusted with a little soil so they store well without rotting or sprouting. They will keep for weeks if left in a cool, dark place. How we store food is so very important – waste is to be avoided at all costs. It is undoubtedly difficult to incorporate much in the way of seasonal fruit into our diets. Other than cooking apples, frozen autumn berries and stewed rhubarb there’s little to be had. But that is how it should be; periods of plenty (a glut, if you like) and times of scarcity. An awareness of seasonality is of huge importance, and often overlooked in a world where everything is available at all times. There is a time for everything, and it comes as no surprise that eating what is in season is easier on the pocket, and naturally more nutritious and flavoursome.

While I leave everyone to sort their own food for dinner time, around midday, everyone pulls up a chair and gathers around the kitchen table for tea. Talk will inevitably be about the animals, and the jobs that were done that day. We make vague plans for the following day, working out logistics to maximize efficiency and tackle problems. Our enjoyment is as much about the conversation as it is the meal itself, but it is during these coldest of days that everyone craves filling, hearty meals. ‘It’s yer belly that keeps yer back up’, as they say, so we will eat potatoes all ways, heaps of root vegetables, roasts, soups with homemade bread, and pies, sweet and savoury, crumbles and custard.

Once the plates are sided away it is back outside to do the bullocking up – the term used for feeding up and bedding all of the housed animals and readying them for the night. Everyone has their own chores to do, from feeding the dogs and hens to filling up the log basket and coal buckets. It’s all to do before nightfall. We milk our house cow twice a day, first thing in the morning and last thing at night; twelve hours between milking is ideal so there’s no undue pressure on the udder. And cows are creatures of habit who get to know and love regular routines. It settles them if they know what to expect, and when.

The three smallest children, Clemmy, Annas and Nancy, like to sort out the stables. They are very capable of stuffing haynets and poo-picking. Sidney and Violet see to the calves, mixing up milk bottles or buckets and filling their hay-racks. Miles often lets the sheepdogs out of their kennels for a gallop up to the beck, where they can get a drink. If they have worked with us all day, they do sometimes choose to stay in the kennel, no doubt tired from all the miles covered.

Edith is tasked with bottling the milk from the house cow. I bring her a pail of warm milk and she will first strain it through a stainless-steel sile with a circular dairy pad that fits in the bottom, then decant it into glass screw-top bottles. Sometimes we change tactic, putting the milk into a wide dairy bowl and letting it cool in the fridge. Later we skim off the cream to use in ice cream or in a pudding. After Raven left for university, Edith was determined to take on more responsibility, and now deals with a good many of the indoor chores, too, such as helping to clear away dinner and giving me a hand with sorting through the washing.

Miles is still fanatical about his chickens. Reuben, too, never changes, and will stay outside in the tool shed crafting away at some mechanical project until bedtime.

When Raven is back home I rely on her massively. She knows what needs tackling, and gets stuck in, whether it is dealing with the horses in the field, getting the little ones bathed, or whipping up a batch of bread.

I can honestly say that it’s rare for me to have to say a wrong word to the children when it comes to their chores. Everyone knows what needs doing and gets on with it. And I am hardly a real homemaker, and can’t expect things to be ‘just so’. That is not in my nature. Ravenseat is not a show home – there is too much clutter and busyness for it to be orderly – but it is a place that invites, exudes warmth and comfort. Unless you stand on Lego or sit on a dozing terrier – but that’s the risk you run in our home.

We raise Swaledales here, a distinctive, hardy, native breed with coarse wool, long tails, mottled legs and black-and-white faces. During January our main task is to keep them fed and safe. We have around 850 of them, and if all has gone to plan, the majority of the females will be in lamb by January. Ravenseat comes with grazing rights for the moor, and we leave sheep on their heafs on the moortops for as much of the winter as possible. It is where they belong, and where they are at their happiest.

When the weather is clashy, and the wind is blowing, we often find the sheep ‘hurling’ – stood with their heads down, backs up and bottoms turned towards the wind, their thick tails providing protection for their udders. The practice of docking tails is not required here, where the tail is seen as a valuable asset in keeping the weather at bay. A long tail can become soiled and attract flies, but this tends to happen in areas with warmer weather and more tree coverage, which means more flies, including bluebottles, and where flystrike is a concern. Prevention is better than a cure, so in those areas docking will stop a mucky build-up and save the poor sheep from being eaten alive.

Being a shepherdess brings with it a fair share of responsibility, and never more so than in the depths of winter when we will see our sheep every day, familiar faces come looking for their daily rations of food. Our job is to keep our sheep healthy and settled, and we know their welfare rests on our shoulders. We deal with day-to-day minor ailments such as foot rot and blind illness ourselves, but we get the vet out for anything of a more serious nature. We take an annual review of the health status of our flock and herd so that we can address any issues that might have arisen. One year we had a higher-than-average number of abortions in the flock, and by blood-testing we were able to ascertain the strain of virus that was to blame and vaccinate accordingly. The cows are part of an accredited High Herd Health Scheme, which means they are all blood-tested annually by the vet, and we are then given a certificate that states our animals are free from highly transmissible diseases such as BVD (bovine viral diarrhoea), Johne’s disease and tuberculosis.

Our youngest three girls are very willing aides during visits by the vet, asking a whole host of questions and offering up advice, whether wanted or not. Recently Annas was proudly wearing the stethoscope around her neck after being shown how to listen to a calf’s heartbeat and the noises in its stomach – a sign of healthy rumination. Once the patient had been released back to the herd the children began to listen to each other’s heartbeats. What I hadn’t noticed was that the other indicator of good health, the checking of body temperature, had also been undertaken by the vet. Obviously, since this was a bovine, the thermometer had not gone under the tongue . . .

We had only turned our backs for a minute when I glanced over to see Clemmy taking Nancy’s temperature, the thermometer in her mouth.

Generally a serenity pervades at the start of the year, a feeling that January is almost the calm before the storm, but not always . . . As I write in 2021 there has been a snowfall every day since Christmas, a dry, light snow, that was picked up and sent swirling around by the wind. Layer upon layer of powder-fresh snow made a great surface for the children to sledge and snowboard, but wasn’t so good for snowballs, which wouldn’t stick together without the help of some muck from the midden – not the most pleasant missile to get in the face!

There was no talk of a storm, just a gradual accumulation of snow, day after day. The sheep were coping well, settled on their heafs – the area of moorland they recognize as their own – at the moors, so we let them be, foddering them daily. Then one morning we woke to a heavier snowfall, enough to prevent us from taking a vehicle to the sheep. Clive and I went to the heafs together on foot, an epic undertaking at the best of times; walking uphill, bent double under the weight of bales of hay. It was hard going, and the higher we climbed the deeper the snow became and the more we were forced to exaggerate our steps. Meanwhile the wind whipped up loose snow which stung our already-reddened faces.

We both whistled up the 175 sheep that were out in this heaf, and from the snow-white wilderness they came, pleased to see us – or at least our offerings.

While they don’t have boundaries, the sheep tend to stick to their heaf and certainly don’t stray far during hungry times, as they learn to expect their daily ration of food. Also they are not really loners, seeing safety in numbers. We were definitely short