Snap and Scribble

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I worked a full day on Saturday - it was my first full day’s paid work in over 6 months now. I went to the Weald Show with a couple of other Essex Hog Roasts workers and a couple of roast pigs. We were operating a stall selling “hog roast baps” - pig rolls, in other words.

I picked up Kim in Maldon and drove over to Fambridge, where we were picked up by Ashley in the Hog Roast van. Even though ithe front was separate from the back of the van, the smell of fatty roast pig somehow managed to waft its way into the cab as we drove. Our destination was Weald Country Park, which is near Brentwood, a bit over half an hour’s drive away.

Here’s a picture of Kim and Ashley and one of the pigs:

Getting into the part of the park where the show was being held was fairly straightforward, and we were soon getting the pig stall set up. The pigs themselves are cooked overnight in portable oven-like things. They’re heated by bottled gas and have a spit which is operated by an electric motor. They’ve got wheels at one end and a stand at the other and they’re fairly heavy objects to drag down the ramps from the back of the van and into place on the grass.

Once they’re in place, the burners are lit and the pigs get another hour or so’s cooking before we start carving them. They don’t rotate during this time, as there’s no electricity available and there’s no need, anyway, because they’re already cooked.

The park was beautiful. There were lots of trees around the space where the show was being held, and a big lake at the bottom of the hill behind us. But there didn’t seem to be very much there, really. We were down the bottom end of the show ground, next to a bouncing castle. There was a big gap between us and the next stall on the other side though. That stall sold handmade wooden stuff, including a bit of furniture. And there were a few other stalls down our end, but most of the action seemed to be up the other end of the field.

When i went for a wander later on, i discovered there was a sort of medieval tent village up that end, with a whole horde of weirdos all done up in medieval gear and armour etc. It was kinda freaky really. Before i got to them, i passed a row of old cars, all nice and shiny and with their bonnets up so you could admire their nice clean engines! It takes all sorts, i suppose!

Between us and the cars, there were several rural tool type displays. First was a couple of guys demonstrating a rather neat little portable sawmill. I didn’t look very closely at it though. Then there was a display of antique timber working and farm tools - including a gigantic ancient chainsaw. It looked like it would be harder work felling a tree with that than it would be using a hand saw! And there was a section where people were using adzes and other old hand tools to work on timber - it had a fine mesh net in front of it, to stop flying wood chips from hitting the punters.

There was a small arena, not far from us, where a logging team were putting on a display of chopping logs and felling trees standing on planks slotted into cuts in the side of the tree (well, it was a log on a stand, really) - in the old Australian style. They did a commentary as they went and they said this sport was brought to Britain by a Tasmanian team a long time ago.

A couple of times during the day, the medieval people put on some sort of archery display or mock battle or something, in a big roped off area right in the middle of the field. I couldn’t see clearly what they were up to and didn’t really pay much attention to the commentary, so i’m not sure what it was all about.

There weren’t very many people there though. This was the first of two days and apparently the Sunday was a lot busier. But most of the time we didn’t have much to do. We probably sold a hundred and twenty or so pig rolls, but i don’t think that was enough for the business to make a profit. They were there the next day too - although i wasn’t with them - and they did much better. Partly, i suspect, because we managed to get the organisers to allocate us a better pitch for the next day.

All in all, though, it was an enjoyable day’s work. I got to stand around in a field all day. And i got paid for it - or, at least, i will do when i catch up with the boss!

If you want more information about the hog roast service, check out the Essex Hog Roasts web site.

Tags: Life //