adventures in eating

Now that the weather is warming up, the farmers markets in our area are all getting into the swing of things, and I'm going crazy eating things. It's like the first rush of spring for my taste buds; real, fresh, delicious, succulent FOOD! Last week I bought a head of cabbage to make cole slaw (MY way, with no nasty mayonaise.. all you mayo haters out there can hit me up and I'll send you the recipe - it's good) and I ended up eating shredded cabbage by the fistful before I even got the stuff made. It was so sweet and spicy and fresh! There is just nothing in the supermarkets that can compare to the gorgeous foods we can get locally. Or grow ourselves, for that matter. I just wish I knew how those Mennonites get their cabbage and greens and whatnot out so quickly (I'm definitely a novice gardener)... my cabbage has yet to head up, the tomatoes are just starting to blossom, as are the various squashes (is "squashes" the plural of squash, or is it just "squash"? hmmmm), peppers, and so on. I would have had plenty of lettuce by now if it weren't for the stupid ducks. Stupid ducks! They wiped out my collards, too. Oh well. I get plenty of exercise running after them with a stick, and I bet the neighbors think it's funny, too. Anyway. Back to food.
One of the things I love most about the farmers market is how it opens up whole new worlds of vegetable possibilities for us. For example - I had never had beets until I saw some gorgeous ones last summer, and couldn't resist bringing them home. Turns out that I don't like them cooked, but they were pretty tasty raw, sliced thin with a little salt and balsamic vinegar. We've bought and eaten just about every kind of pepper you can imagine (and I saved the seeds to grow at home!), as well as acorn, butternut, and pattypan squash. And just last week we discovered that turnips are freakin' tasty. I mean, seriously good. So good we went out the next day and bought seed to put in a row. Our vegetable vocabulary is so much bigger now than carrots, peas and potatoes. (Speaking of peas.... mmmm. I love fresh peas. That's all.) I look forward to my trip to the market every week to find out what new deliciousness might be in store. It's so much better than food out of a box or a can... even home-canned.
I think it would be awesome if everyone would stop and really look at the food they're buying, and ask where it came from, and what it really is. There is such an amazing variety of foods out there, grown virtually right next door. It's better for our economy, it's better for our health, it's better for the planet's health. Do something crazy - try some turnips!


(oh, and by the bye - I also tried rabbit a few weeks ago and can definitely say that it is tasty. Especially wrapped in bacon and grilled. It's also good in stew. Just sayin'.)

decisions, choices, and all that jazz

Lately we have been doing a lot of brainstorming on ways to make a living (or at least nicely augment our living) by farming. That was always our eventual goal, and now we've gotten to a place where we are ready to dig in and make a plan. We've kicked around all sorts of options, from raising critters for fiber (like angora bunnies and cashmere goats) to meat critters to produce. There are so many options to consider, and so many little details required of each one, all of which take time and, most importantly, money. It's hard to decide what would be the most profitable, and the most worth our time and effort. There is so much preparation that would have to be done. For starters, the groundwork to prevent the upper field from flooding so that we can use it for livestock or crops; fencing for goats, or llamas; housing for rabbits; tilling, irrigation, the list goes on and on. I think eventually we hope to try out all the grand ideas we've had. After all, we don't want to put all our eggs in one basket! Right now, though, we're just trying to figure out which of all these ideas will be our primary goal, and hopefully, moneymaker. Given our setup here, available land for cultivating, etc, we're strongly leaning towards herbs. They don't require huge amounts of land, are virtually pest-free, and have a fairly good profit margin. Plus, there are so many goods and products that we can expand to over time that would include the use of our herbs (herbed goat cheese, dips, flavored oils, teas, infusions, tinctures, sachets, lotions, soaps, etc, etc, etc!). It also doesn't hurt us at all that I am, and have been for a long time, pretty obsessed with herbs of all kinds. Of course, this doesn't mean that we won't still grow pumpkins and tomatoes and lots of other goodies, we'd just be primarily focusing on herbs, with the goal of eventually expanding to other, herb-related products. So. There it is. The Big Idea. Now we just have to figure out how to start putting it into action.

meanwhile, back at the farm...

Spring is well underway, and we here at the farm are deeply in thrall. Davey and I both have become obsessed with planting and growing. He spent the last week tilling up a massive area for growing corn and pumpkins. And then he made the mistake of letting me have a hand in the planting, so now it's also got squash and zucchini and cucumbers and pole beans. (But I swear, I'm measuring this time!! I will NOT overcrowd! Scout's honor!) Tonight we're putting in a row of scallions and tomatoes, and even though it's really too late in the season, I'm thinking of planting some beets. Oh, and canteloup.. and.. and.. See what I mean?
We also got our pasture mowed by Davey's dad, and the whole place looks so great. We really need to get a tractor, but we're trying (HA!) to save for one and pay cash, and not go into debt. In the meantime, we're having to rely on the help of family to keep this place from getting out of hand. I kind of like that it's a community effort.
Up here at the house I'm having loads of fun puttering around in my little vegetable garden, planting flowers, and sorting my ridiculously large collection of herb seeds, trying to figure out how I can possibly make enough space up here to plant them all. I have a secret obsession with herbs, whether for culinary or medicinal use... I just find them freakin' intoxicating. Seeds in general appeal to my love of collecting little things - like beads and rocks and shells. I may never get them all planted, but you can bet I had a jolly good time sorting them into piles and dreaming of growing them. It's the simple things. Really it is.

Oh, and we also got some new critters over the weekend - turkeys! We picked up 2 turkey poults at the animal market, a Bronze and a Royal Palm, which I named Thanksgiving and Christmas, respectively. They're going to be delicious! But right now they're just tiny little things, and kinda cute. Thanky is especially friendly, too. He runs up to say hi every time I open the door to the coop. The little guy is fearless. This does not help my resolve to eat him in about 6 months. Oh dear.
We got a couple of quail as well, and again, tiny and cute!! It's kind of ironic that I don't want to eat things that are cute, but I also don't want to eat things that are ugly either... Oh dear.
We're also seriously considering how we can raise goats, both meat and dairy... especially with regards to containment, since goats are notoriously talented escape artists, and the local dogs are notoriously fond of goat for dinner. We're also looking into rabbits. I've never eaten goat, or rabbit, but I'm interested in anything that will reduce the grocery bill and our reliance on packaged food. And I've heard from fairly reliable sources that both are quite tasty. Of course, I heard the same thing about squirrel, and I found that to be VERY untrue. Oh dear.

We also decided over the weekend that worm farming seems pretty straightforward. Poop + rotten hay = earthworms. HUGE earthworms. Hundreds of earthworms. Anybody wanna go fishing? :)

of rain and cow poop

Rain wears a different dress for me now. Used to be that I only saw rain as a beach-day spoiler, at least for the 20 minutes it took to blow through (ah, summer afteroon thundershowers!). Now I find myself grateful for rain, even hopeful for it, because it means that my garden will be getting much-needed water (this is made even more imortant by the fact that we don't have cold water that actually runs, but that's another story for another time). Admittedly, I don't like it when our front pasture looks like this:

but I do love a nice spring shower. I even find myself planning my endeavors around the weather, not in hopes that it won't rain, but that it will. Yesterday I spent the day transplanting some flowers from my mom's garden to mine, knowing that sometime today we were due some rain, which would help all my transplants thrive. It's nice to look out the window and get a little thrill of joy when raindrops start to fall. I can't wait for flowers to bloom and tomatoes to grow. All my little seedlings are happy today, and so am I.

My mom and I had a similar conversation yesterday about poop. I mean, who ever thought that cow dookie would be so exciting?! I love being able to say, "Oh, you need compost? I've got all the compost you need, just bring a shovel!" Seriously, I get downright giddy thinking of scooping all the poop our cow generates and putting it in my garden (I got a pitchfork and a wheelbarrow for Christmas!). Black Gold, indeed.

The new baby chicks are here, and they are so, so cute. I'm pretty excited about these little guys (or girls - they're all straight run so we won't know what we've got for at least a month or two). We found a lady breeding and selling locally, and she had some varieties that I've been wanting to get, like Welsummers and Cuckoo Marans. This means that we'll get some DARK brown eggs. Got more Ameracaunas, too, so I'm trying again for blue/green egg layers. We also got a Sicilian Buttercup, which I've been told is extremely rare. I'm thinking that Buttercup is not for eating. Since we don't have any full size chickens left, we're brooding them out in the coop, and they seem very happy with the setup. I have very high hopes for this batch of chicks. Now we just need to get the chicken run all fixed up and doggy-proofed for them.

I'm also getting really excited about the garden this year (not so much today, since it's pouring rain. Looks like my brilliant plan to put the seedlings in the ground before the storm was supposed to hit tonight is kaput.)
Davey and I spent the weekend creating two more beds to plant in, so I'll be able to grow a lot more this year. I'm notorious for trying to crowd too much into my garden beds anyway. I'm trying really hard to control that impulse, because it makes harvesting so much more difficult when you have to hack your way thru a jungle of tomato vines to get anywhere. I'm pretty hyped about the prospect of growing pickling cucumbers and cantaloupes on a trellis. Amazing what a girl can accomplish when she's not pregnant and puking all the time! Also, it looks like I will finally get my herb garden I've been wanting so badly. I'd love to be able to quit buying most of them from the store and just use fresh. It's always been my goal to eliminate supermarket shopping as much as possible. If I could get everything we can't grow from the Mennonite market, I'd be a happy girl. Still, little by little, I'm learning how to eliminate unnecessary stuff. The house is getting cleaner, we are happier for it, and life, overall, is good. I wouldn't trade this simpler life for anything... even if I do sometimes dream of hardwood floors and cold water that acutally runs. (I truly believe that God is using this house to teach me some humility.) After all, I get to wake up every morning to this:

And I know that my girls are going to get to grow up doing things I always wanted to as a kid: raising chickens and cows and (hopefully) goats and bunnies and things. Farming, gardening, learning how to really be self-sufficient and not so materialistic. I hope that we can teach them that life is about experiences, not things.


(Oh, and for the record: Toad at the Bijou Theatre was AWESOME. So was my Woodruff Downtown Nut-brown ale :) Yay for grown-up time!)

bye bye birdies

So. I've been working up to being able to write this for the last 4 days or so now, but first I had to filter through the outrage, the anger, and the terrible sadness. Friday morning our chicken flock was wiped out by some neighborhood dogs. We no longer have an egg problem. Friday morning I got up and started getting the girls up for the day, and I heard a howl from the side of the house the chicken coop is on, and looked out the window in time to see two dogs coming out of the chicken coop. Not good. I ran out to the coop, but it was too late. They had obviously had quite a bit of fun tossing the chickens around. At first glance, all of them were dead. It was horrible. I chased the dogs out of the coop and tried to assess the damage, but I was crying too hard at that point. So I went inside and called Davey and semi-coherently tried to sob out what had happened. I think all he managed to understand was that something had happened to the chickens. (Clearly I am not a calm person in a crisis. I should work on that.) I went out to the coop a little while later, after having a good cry, and reassessed the damage. Of 22 chickens, there were 9 still breathing and in various states of shock and injury. As of today, only 3 of those 9 are still alive, with one still questionable. My 4 baby Ameracaunas that I was so excited about were in the 19 killed. So was Pretty Girl, my pet Speckled Sussex. I understand that (with the exception of Pretty Girl, who was NOT for eating) all of these chickens were going to die at some point. And I was ok with them eventually ending up in the soup pot. And we've lost chickens to dogs before. But something about this massive slaughter just felt too awful. I guess because the chickens were in their home, where they should have been safe. The coop and the attached chicken run were intended to protect them from things like this, and clearly failed to do so (it looks like the dogs dug their way into the run). Plus, I'm all mommy-fied and soft now, with the hormonal need to protect everything I can remotely imagine needs mothering and nurturing. Maybe putting chickens in the soup pot is going to be harder than I thought. One thing is for sure. Since moving to the farm, we've become a lot more familiar with death. Ducks, chickens, a cow, even pets. And so far, none of them have died to feed us, except for a couple of squirrels, which didn't feed us much, and I sincerely hope will never have to feed us again. Blech. Anyway. I hope that this gets easier. And I hope that we get better at this whole farming thing. It feels like we've got a lot to learn. That we learn it at the expense of animals' lives makes the lessons costly, but ultimately memorable. For example, we now know that baby cows need wormer; and that ducks have a much better survival rate when you've got a mean ol' African Grey goose around to defend them. And I have a feeling we'll be learning a better way to build a chicken run really soon. So. Now we get to begin rebuilding our flock. We wanted to sort of mix the flock up a bit, and bring in some different breeds, we just intended to eat the chickens we culled out. And maybe take our time with it. For better or worse, the job was done for us. So, once we fix up the chicken run, it's time to start buying some new chicks. Fortunately the Mennonite Animal Market in Delano is at the end of this month. Something to look forward to!

spring fever

(which is, hands down, waaaay better than cat scratch fever. Just so you know.)

So tomorrow, I'll be dropping the girls off with Grammy and Grandpa, and Davey is going backpacking, which means that for a solid 24 hours, I'll be alone. I'm a little giddy.. hell, I'm downright drunk and slaphappy with the notion of doing pretty much whatever I want, with noone to answer to but myself. Unfortunately, this will probably go down about the same as when I knew that I had a chunk of spending cash coming for my birthday, and by the time I actually got my grubby paws on the money, I had it spent 14 different ways in my head, and deciding which way to spend it in reality was quite another matter. I ended up piddling it away and never really accomplishing much of anything. And these 24 hours are so much more precious than cash. I could go shopping (oooooh! the grocery store! the craft store! heck, every craft store in town!) and not have to worry about changing diapers, nap times, feeding times, grumpy kiddos and grabby hands. Not to mention lugging kids from one car seat, stroller, cart, etc to the next. I could go to the park and pass out on a blanket and get a righteous sunburn. I could spend the evening in the bathtub with a bottle of wine and a good book. I could go out with friends and enjoy some grownup girl time. I could stay up ALL NIGHT. Because I WANT to. Not because I've got a sick kiddo to look after. I could sleep in til 8. Wait, scratch that. I do that already :). I could finally get the curtains and cribskirt and throw pillow made for Maezie's room (and the living room, for that matter). I could finally clean out the utility room. I could accomplish any number of cute crafty things I've been wanting to do. I could work on the garden. I could scoop out the chicken coop (which, frankly, really NEEDS to happen). And I'll probably start every single one of these things and finish none of them. Or if I get them done, they wouldn't be done well. I don't think I have ADD, I think I'm just greedy.

Sooooo. Deep breath, slow down. I'm going to try my darndest to enjoy my 24 hours, and maybe even accomplish a few things. At the very least I'm going to get my shopping done, go to the craft store(s), and get me a Starbucks, and savor every wonderful sip, with no darling little distractions. And then I'll probably go home and cry myself to sleep, because seriously, who couldn't miss this?

And this?

and this?!?!

It's gonna be tough. But somehow I'll survive it.

(and right this moment I am thoroughly pissed at my camera, because there's this super cute picture I took yesterday of Punkin playing outside in the flowers, but I can't get ANY of my camera batteries to work so that I can upload it. Grrrrr. Maybe later.)