Cattle Station Life - vol 1

The month of June has been unreal, full of new experiences and different jobs at the Cattle Station in the NT.

Playing "Ringer for the Day" - Droving 800 head of cattle 40km

We have started to get into the groove so to speak and are working out where and who everyone is. We have a fairly small crew of 9 adults - the station owners, Maddy & Morgan (plus their 2 lil' tackers), 3 Ringers, Dan, Jess and Pep, another young couple, Will & Eliza, who do cattle work but Will is also a diesel mechanic and Eliza helps Maddy out with the kids, and then Kel & I, job sharing the cooks role as well as a little bit of everything in-between, like gardening, butchering, loading trucks, feeding out hay, shooting pigs, general maintenance and caretaking a million acres when the crew is away mustering next door.

Our main job though is the cooking side of things, which is great when only cooking for 10 and less. We are located around 1000km southeast of Darwin and other than fresh beef we butcher on-site and a small amount of veges growing in the new vege patch, we order everything in. We have to have orders in by Thursday for delivery the following Wednesday, and then have to trek 180km each way to collect from the closest servo! We are lucky that we don't have to cook a hot breakfast each day but if the crew are heading out mustering or fencing, they pack smoko and lunches so Kel will prep the day before and make sure there is cold meat, salad stuff, baked biscuits and pastries to take with them. If they are around the homestead, we prepare a fresh smoko and lunch.

Dinner is usually served at 7pm and obviously beef is the main part of the meal but other than steaks and roasts, we also make a lot of mince so we can cook dishes like lasagna, rissoles, spaghetti, sausage rolls, nachos and cottage pie. We also use the lower cuts of meat for stews, curry's, casseroles and pies. After dinner most nights, Kel has cooked a chocolate slice of some sort for dessert but has also made a couple of cheesecakes, sticky date pudding, and homemade ice cream. Maddy & Morgan's oldest tacker, Teddy, has taken a fancy to Kel's Double Choc Chip Muffins, and will often be spotted trekking over to Kel's kitchen to see if there is any around, then once in possession of the muffin, he will cart it around for an hour or 2 before consuming! It's a laugh to watch!

Kel's Choc Chip Muffin Recipe

190g Plain Flour

45g Cocoa Powder

100g Sugar

1 tbsp Baking Powder

1/2 tsp Salt

220g White Choc Chips

245g Milk (1 Cup)

2 Eggs

1/2 tsp Vanilla Extract

70g Oil - can use coconut oil or vegetable oil

Mix flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder, salt and choc chips in a large bowl.

Mix milk, eggs, vanilla and oil in a large measuring jug and whisk well with a fork.

Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and mix well but be careful not to over mix.

Bake in muffin tray for approx 20 minutes at 175 degrees.

 have also recently finished the Smoker, which we have already run a couple of Briskets through and some Ribs and they have all turned out lovely, much to my surprise! There is no temp gauge yet on the Smoker so it's a bit of a guessing game, but so far so good.

From old water trough to an offset smoker!

First Brisket cooked in the new Smoker

We found an old water trough, scabbed up some other bit's laying around, and a few weeks later she was game on and re-born into a beef cooking machine! Hopefully it's something that they can use for years to come and I even personalised it with "GGG" on the counterweight as their business name is Ghost Gum Grazing.

After numerous recommendations from people up here, we use a wood they call "Snappy Gum", which is found in patches all over the Station. It's an odd-looking tree that seems to have multiple trunks, but it makes it handy for collecting firewood as the outside branches snap off and lay around the base. The flavour is so so good, nice and rich but not too overpowering.

The second week of June saw us finish up a 46 day working streak. The rest of the crew were heading to the neighboring station to help with a muster, so Kel & I headed towards the coast to King Ash Bay in the Gulf to have a look and chill for a few nights. We were able to stay at a shack the Station owners have on the McArthur River and had access to a dinghy to get out and explore. I'm never a fan of using someone else's gear, especially on unfamiliar grounds so we didn't push it too much and just went for a couple of small sessions. Using live mullet, we got smoked a couple of times and Kel managed to land a small Barra, which was awesome to see them around! It would be great to get back up there and trek out to the ocean for a look and maybe a reef bash. Not too sure if we'll have time before we head back south but it will be on the cards for next trip for sure!

First NT Barra!

Since getting back from King Ash Bay, we have mainly been caretaking the Station. The owners and the crew have been next door mustering and drafting cattle for the better part of 3 weeks, with only a couple of nights spent here to muster 1 paddock, so it's been nice and quiet. We've been able to catch up on some OldMate stuff and editing and also gardening and exploring around the Station.

We trekked down to a spring that runs all year round on the property which is about 13km from the homestead. It's a great swimming hole and also holds some fish so I was able to wet a line and get into some freshwater fishing which I'm not too clued up on, but it didn't matter because everything seemed to be hungry!! I threw a few small hard body lures into some of the deeper pools, and it was game on! Great fun on light gear. No Barra but they have been known to be caught there every now and then... maybe next time!

Tyre Springs

Ticked off a couple of new species for me anyway and was great to finally get into a few Sooty Grunter's which seem to be the main predator around the place. I'll put one on the coals next time and give them a taste.

Kel and I also recently spent the day helping drove around 800 cattle 40km from a holding paddock up to a back paddock. It was a big day as there were only 4 of us trying to keep them all together, 3 of us not being Ringers at all, but with a bit of yelling and successfully chasing down most of the bolters, we made it to their new home, and I even got to smoke a few pigs. We did a similar gig the next day but on a much smaller scale.

So we are back out here alone for the next week or so, catching up on jobs and doing a bit of work in the garden. Some parts finally rocked up to finish off a couple of fishing rod builds, and I'm nearly finished the Pink Ribbon Fishin' 2024 charity rod also. It's crazy to think it's already punching into July and the year is already half done but we feel we've achieved so much! We are already starting to plan out 2025 and what we'll be up to and have a plan B and C just in case.

Thanks everyone for your support!

Team Jelly