Cooking pits – Experiment 1/ execution

The Pit

A rectangular pit with the measures 1,5*2 m were dug to a depth of about half a meter. The bottom was then covered with a layer of stones. The stones where in sizes ranging from 1 to 3 fists, and quite uniform in shape. I tried to lay them out so that I covered most of the base of the pit. Since the sheep was a fair bit smaller than the pit and the walls straight rather than curved I did not bother to cover the walls of the pit. Upon this a great pyre was lit and kept alive for almost five hours. This time may be shortened, but was partly due to this being a public project.

Preparation of the sheep

In the meantime we prepared the sheep. In order to avoid the smell of burnt wool permeating the meat when cooked in the pit we tried to remove as much hair as possible. As we did not have any shears we first tried to shave it with a knife which was a slow and tedious process. Regardless if we were using a traditional shear or a knife, there would still have been quite a bit of stubble left. This was solved by holding the sheep above a fire burning of the rest of the hairs. This proved to be quite an efficient if smelly method.

When the sheep was more or less freed from hair we started to fill the cavity with fragrant herbs. In this case we used what was available at the site meaning that it was primarily filled with gale and meadowsweet. More as a token than an actual taste a bottle of beer was poured into the cavity as well. The cavity was sewn shut, but before we could tie the legs to the the body a torrential rain came pouring down.

Baking the sheep

So the sheep was placed in the pit as it was. We tried to move a few of the hot stones to the top side of the sheep, which was then covered with turfs with the grassy side down. On top of the turfs we covered the pit with earth making sure that no air would reach the sheep. On top of the mound we leaned a makeshift plank construction so that some of the rain was poured off.

The sheep was then left in the pit for approximately 18 hours before being excavated. This period could possibly have been shortened but again due to being done in public it had to be adapted to opening hours and such.

Excavating the sheep

Digging down into the pit, we tried our best to avoid digging into the sheep. As we came further down the turfs was turned over carefully and the earth brushed of the sheep. As it was freed from stones, turfs and earth, main part of the body was rolled over onto a flat grid iron and then lifted out.

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