Jasper Ackroyd doesn’t just dream of the Slow Life- he lives it. His home is a Yurt on an organic farm in Wiltshire. He lives “off the grid”, relying on a gas-fired generator and solar panels for electricity, but the generator will soon be replaced by a wind turbine. He eats vegetables grown on the farm and drinks unpasteurised milk straight from the cow. He rises with the birds and goes to sleep with the birds, so that in winter he lives in what he calls a state of semi-hibernation.
Jasper makes his living from curing meat. All is explained in his website- http://www.baconwizard.co.uk/, which also contains his fascinating biography. I met Jasper at a Slow Food meeting at Prue Leith’s house in the Cotswolds (see entry for July 17th) after which he kindly agreed to abandon the comfort of his Yurt to spend a few days in the Lake District teaching my chefs the art of curing pork, for which we have today supplied a whole saddle-back pig, cut neatly in two. About which, more later….
Tags: bacon, jasper ackroyd, pigs, Slow Food