Cost: $100 (mostly recycled materials).Value? priceless.

After a hard day of trampling paths up & down the hill or shoveling the 22″ of snow that have graced us since Friday (or plowing snow for Keith, including the road and the driveway of several neighbors), we have worked quite an appetite. Tonight dinner is homemade pizza (the dough was rising while I was - of course! - shoveling snow; canned tomato sauce from last summer) and a big mix green salad of lettuces, arugula, mache, parcel, frisee endive - freshly harvested at 4:00 pm today. Dessert? Quince fool (canned quince from last fall). We may even try the quince liqueur. That’s probably still too rough though, so we may have to settle for strawberry liqueur instead… sigh…

Like El at FastGrowTheWeeds, I see my pantry as the traditional dry pantry, the freezer and the fresh outdoor pantry that the hoophouse is. Not only do we eat fresh, but the chicken get to have something green too. Rather precious at the moment. And you know, chickweed grow really well in there, really really well…

It’s a good thing we build the with metal arches - PVC would have collapsed - and we put the arches closer than suggested…

I trudged up through the snow to clean it off the hoophouse before the thaw and freeze cycle started. I mostly had to clear by hand. For sure I got exercise today! The garden was blanketed by 20″+ of snow, but inside the hoophouse, it was as beautiful as ever… and smelling so good…

To go or not to go?

She went.

She is - after all - partly Turkish Van.

A dish of oxtail soup is a thing to share with those you love. Or not. (depends how much you love them)

What’s not to like about oxtail?

It’s traditional farm fare, a simple country dish with robust complex favors - many parts of the world have perfectly succulent ways to use oxtail as a matter of fact. It’s a slow simmered dish, perfect for cold days. It’s a dish that can be made in advance and in quantity. Reheating it makes it even better.

Never had oxtail? If you like osso bocco, you are simply going to love oxtail. It might take a little looking to find them, although they are becoming more popular. It used to be a throwaway part of the animal - and used to be very inexpensive. But chefs in search of robust flavors obtained from slow traditional methods and the new-again emphasis on eating from nose-to-tail, is making oxtail almost trendy. So more expensive. It is one of the few cuts that I buy retail: there is after all only one tail in cattle, so when I buy a split beef half, I get - at most , if I am lucky - one tail. Hardly enough. The farmer I buy it from sells it for less than burger meat, typically the cheapest cut. So, still a pretty good deal.

Maybe oxtail is intimidating because people think of it as offal and are grossed out. Technically it is offal, but it is not an organ. Not that that would stop me from eating it if it were. Or maybe people are intimidated because they do not know how to cook it. It’s simple really, it should be cook slow. Very slow. A day in advance if possible so it has a chance to sit and mellow even more. Read more »

Can you guess which one is the river and which one is the road (and that’s less water running through than early this morning)

No matter, we are stuck here! And the rain’s not over yet.

First order of the day was to move the chicken to higher - and drier - pasture, since the one where they were is under water.  While they did not like their coop moved (while they were inside), they certainly don’t seem the worse for it and are now joyfully attaching fresh grass. Lots of chicken butts to see.

And one of the big advantage of an electronet is that you can move it fast and easily. Also it catches leaves and straw debris from the running water. At least I get to keep some of my organic materials.

Although I am sure the water will leave debris behind too.

Isn’t that how the Nile Valley used to be fertilized?

They love insects, worms, caterpillars, maggots, larvae, meat if they can get it. They do need animal protein for a balanced and healthy diet - which means also chicken and eggs healthy to eat - and delicious.

If anybody ever doubted that chickens are not vegetarians, they should have been here a few morning ago, when I broke through the frozen top layer of the small compost pile housed in the current chicken area. It has been so cold that the compost pile surface has frozen. Inside was warm enough though… Of course, as always curious, they follow me to see what I am up to. Plus I had the fork, and they know it’s the tool I use to lift rocks or dig out perennial weeds (all of which bring up all kind of good food to the surface).

So, as soon as I started to turn the pile, the race was on! Get that worm, girl! and that one! here! another! quick!

Vigorous scratching that sends clumps 4 feet away, heated conversation (yes chicken do converse), diligent industrious pecking, excited chatting and calls about a tempting juicy plump cache of worms… that’s what happens. And worms and other bugs just get gobbled up, fast and methodically. I love watching the chicken being chicken and expressing their joie de vivre through being able to do what chicken evolved to do.

Bugs the hell out of me when I see “vegetarian feed only” on boxes of supermarket eggs.

who? what? when? how? why?

I had never eaten homemade sauerkraut until I started to make it last year.

I can’t say that I really like the store-bought canned stuff - but I really like a Reuben sandwich, and you do need sauerkraut for that.

In my quest for more local homegrown or homemade food and in learning new (to me) ways of preserving food (and prompted by a post of Food in Jar on Home-Made Sauerkraut), I decided to give homemade sauerkraut a try and turned some of my spring cabbages into sauerkraut in early July last year. I used whey to kick-start the process as my research indicated fast fermenting was needed in warm temperature.The whey was supposed to introduce lactic acid right away to help fermentation takes over before spoilage happens.. I made several small batches experimenting with the amount of salt and the spices used. Some were so-so, some were OK, and a couple were darn good. The big surprise though was fermented spicy ginger carrots. THAT was terrific, and hooked me onto fermented vegetables. I decided I would try again come fall. Read more »

This is Swiss Chard in the garden today, unprotected, after weeks of cold weather, night in the teens (F/- 7 C to -12 C) and days of bone-chilling howling winds with gusts at 50 miles/ h (80 km). Not pretty, right? Certainly not much to harvest…

This is Swiss Chard (and more) in the unheated hoop tunnel. Need I say more?

A few hours of labor, $100 in materials (some second hand), one layer of greenhouse plastic - and we moved at least one zone south, maybe 2 . Not bad for January, eh?

2 feet of snow last week-end, temperatures in the lower teens (F/ about -12 C). I have not been in the hoophouse for about a week, and frankly I was not sure how it was going to be in there. Would I have mush? It after all, got cold quite suddenly after a long mild fall, and I was not sure the plants had a chance to harden off.

But it all looks good when I went in today to harvest a big bouquet of cilantro and leaf celery for a Vietnamese-inspired rice and goose. In winter, I often do a version of my basic “Chicken Soup with a Twist” varying the vegetable and the meat.

Since we had a roasted goose for Christmas (I needed after all to replenish my store of goose-fat), I simmered the carcass and the bones with some aromatics for a dark rich fragrant broth. Sautéed some carrots, shallots, lots of ginger. Added a handful of already cooked rice, some chopped goose meat, a little fish sauce, and some braised cabbage to the pot. Covered with goose broth, simmered for 15 minutes, added handful of chopped cilantro and leaf celery, some hot sauce, and voila, a very tasty and warming lunch!

Cornmeal is simply not used enough in sweets.

There, I said it: eat more cornmeal.

I like soft polenta (mush) and hard polenta (either - like oatmeal - taste sooo much better when made with milk instead of water). I like cheesy grits and creamy polenta. I like it with bits of smoky bacon and fried fresh sage leaves too. I like upside-down cranberry cornmeal cake and cornmeal cranberry loaf - actually anything with cornmeal & cranberries. As in those cookies. Read more »