We decided earlier this year to start moving towards Jacksonville, NC where my family is from for quite a number of reasons, mostly to be closer to my paternal grandmother who lives on the old family farm all alone. The house that we are moving into is the house that I was born in and lived in until I was 8 years old and comes with three acres of land which should give us quite a boost in our homesteading endeavors since we will have more space and no subdivision covenants.
Sine April, we've been working on fixing up the inside of the house before we move in. So far we have painted the living room and the master bedroom and gotten one coat on what will be our office (no pictures yet). After the office is done, we will have our spare bedroom and our hallway to paint and all the trim and then we will be ready to move in!
I have also started a blog about cooking and recipes and will probably be posting a bunch of family favorites shortly. So keep an eye out!
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
St. Patrick's Day Menu!
We will be having my mom over for a St. Patrick's Day meal on Sunday. This is our menu:
Corned Beef
(cooked with a bit of water and the spices that come with it in the crock pot)
Braised Root Vegetables
2 tablespoons butter
1 pound packaged baby carrots
1 rutabaga, peeled and diced
1 onion, diced
Salt and pepper
2 cups chicken or vegetable stock
Heat a skillet with a cover over medium to medium high heat. Add butter, carrots, rutabaga and onion. Cook veggies 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Add broth or stock, bring to a simmer, and reduce heat and cover. Cook vegetables 15 minutes or until fork tender. Remove from heat and set aside.
Colcannon
4 medium to large all-purpose potatoes, such as Russet, peeled and cut into chunks
Coarse salt, for boiling water
2 cups chicken or vegetable stock
1 head dark curly kale, chopped
2 tablespoons butter
3/4 cup whole milk, eyeball it
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg, fresh or grated
1 teaspoon ground thyme
2 scallions, sliced
A handful of fresh parsley, chopped
Irish Soda Bread
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/3 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 egg, lightly beaten
2 cups buttermilk
1/4 cup butter, melted
Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.
Combine flour, baking powder, sugar, salt and baking soda. Blend egg and buttermilk together, and add all at once to the flour mixture. Mix just until moistened. Stir in butter. Pour into prepared pan.
Bake for 65 to 70 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the bread comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack. Wrap in foil for several hours, or overnight, for best flavor.
Corned Beef
(cooked with a bit of water and the spices that come with it in the crock pot)
Braised Root Vegetables
2 tablespoons butter
1 pound packaged baby carrots
1 rutabaga, peeled and diced
1 onion, diced
Salt and pepper
2 cups chicken or vegetable stock
Heat a skillet with a cover over medium to medium high heat. Add butter, carrots, rutabaga and onion. Cook veggies 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Add broth or stock, bring to a simmer, and reduce heat and cover. Cook vegetables 15 minutes or until fork tender. Remove from heat and set aside.
Colcannon
4 medium to large all-purpose potatoes, such as Russet, peeled and cut into chunks
Coarse salt, for boiling water
2 cups chicken or vegetable stock
1 head dark curly kale, chopped
2 tablespoons butter
3/4 cup whole milk, eyeball it
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg, fresh or grated
1 teaspoon ground thyme
2 scallions, sliced
A handful of fresh parsley, chopped
Boil potatoes for 15 minutes in salted water. Drain potatoes and return them to the hot pot and mash.
Heat stock or broth to a simmer. Chop kale tops, discarding tough stems. Add kale to broth and cover. Simmer 10 to 12 minutes.
In a large skillet over moderate heat melt butter and add milk. Season with nutmeg and thyme and add scallions to the pan. Remove kale from cooking liquid to the milk and butter mixture using a slotted spoon. Stir in 1/2 cup of cooking liquid. Add mashed potatoes to milk and kale and stir until combined and creamy, 1 or 2 minutes. Stir in parsley and season with salt and pepper, to taste.
Both the Braised Root Vegetable and Colcannon recipes are from Rachael Ray.Irish Soda Bread
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/3 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 egg, lightly beaten
2 cups buttermilk
1/4 cup butter, melted
Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.
Combine flour, baking powder, sugar, salt and baking soda. Blend egg and buttermilk together, and add all at once to the flour mixture. Mix just until moistened. Stir in butter. Pour into prepared pan.
Bake for 65 to 70 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the bread comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack. Wrap in foil for several hours, or overnight, for best flavor.
Chocolate Guinness Stout Cake
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/3 cup Guinness stout
1 cup flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/3 cup low-fat buttermilk
Preheat oven to 350 degrees and place rack in middle of oven. Grease and lightly flour 9-inch cake pan.
In a small saucepan, combine cocoa powder and stout and heat over low-moderate heat until smooth. Set aside to cool.
In a medium bowl, sift together flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt.
In a large bowl with an electric mixer on low-medium speed, beat butter until creamy. Gradually add sugar and beat until pale yellow in color. Beat in eggs, one at a time, and vanilla.
Stir buttermilk into cooled cocoa and stout mixture.
With the mixer on low, slowly add one-third of buttermilk mixture into creamed butter until incorporated. Add the flour mixture in three parts, alternating with the remaining two parts of the buttermilk and ending with the flour. Batter will look grainy or appear to be breaking up.
Pour batter into cake pan and bake for 25 to 35 minutes or until the cake pulls away from the sides of the pan and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Remove to wire rack with parchment or waxed paper beneath it. Allow cake to cool in pan for 10 minutes, then slide knife around the edge of pan and invert to release cake, bottom side up, onto wire rack. When cool, use a fork to poke holes generously into bottom side of cake.
Makes one 9-inch cake.
Chocolate Guinness Sauce
1/4 cup Guinness draught stout
4 tablespoons light or dark brown sugar
2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
Mix ingredients in small saucepan and heat over low heat until smooth. Allow to cool. Spoon 3/4 of the sauce over bottom of the cake, allowing sauce to seep into cake. Invert cake right side up onto serving platter. Poke holes in top of cake and spoon remainder of sauce on top of cake.
Chocolate Ganache Glaze
10 ounces (11/4 cups) heavy whipping cream
10 ounces semisweet dark chocolate, chips or bar broken into small pieces
Bring cream to a simmer in a small saucepot. Turn off heat and stir in chocolate pieces until sauce is smooth and creamy. Pour onto finished cake, smoothing ganache atop and along sides of cake. Ganache will pool at bottom of cake and can be removed with a knife.
If desired, spoon extra ganache into ziplock bag, snip corner and squeeze atop cake in zigzag lines or decorative pattern. If ganache is too runny allow to thicken in bag until stiff. Or, reserve extra ganache in refrigerator to spoon over ice cream or form into truffles.
Recipe from sous chef Carol Light, Kells Restaurant and Pub, Portland, Ore.
.Monday, March 10, 2008
My Goals
Since Fenrirwulf has shared his goals, I suppose I should share mine.
- I want a job that allows me to express my creativity versus a boring desk job.
- I want to live somewhere that is peaceful and quiet so that I can explore that creativity (please note, as I write this at 10:00PM EDT that my next door neighbors are shooting off firecrackers and disturbing the concentration I'd normally use on my writing).
- I want to raise as much of our own food as possible for our own health. I want to know where our food comes from, what it was fed, how it was treated and that there were no hormones or unnecessary chemicals used before it was slaughtered and processed.
- I want to find a group of like-minded people with whom to spend time and further explore my chosen religious path.
- I want to be closer to my family and learn some of the knowledge of my grandparents' generation before it is lost to my generation forever.
Friday, March 7, 2008
Cooking Thoughts
Our drive towards cooking with basic ingredients is more difficult than I first would have guessed.
Growing up, I had always had home cooked meals provided by my Mom; eating out was a rare treat. I also learned to cook at a pretty young age, around the 13-16 range, but it was always cooking for myself. Mom never really wanted anyone in her kitchen and, honestly, it never crossed my teenage mind that she would want me to cook something for her and the rest of the family.
Once I moved out, I continued cooking at home and dining out on occasion. When my bro and I, along with a friend from high school, moved to our own place in Greenville, we had communal groceries and each night one roomy was responsible for a home cooked dinner for the house, so the habit continued.
It was not until I started going out with Chandler that most of my food didn't come out of my own kitchen. Not that I am blaming her, it was more along the lines that we were living off credit anyway, so why cut corners. By dining out, not only was I able to learn to like a great variety of foods but, I also was able to avoid washing dishes for weeks.
Once we were married and carpooling, it was always much easier to stop and grab a bite to eat while we let the worst of the rush hour traffic go by. This went on for years and I developed a pretty eclectic pallet. She made the mistake of taking me to my first Mexican restaurant, something I am sure she regrets considering the amount of times I suggested we go visit one. If it were completely up to me, and money nor any long-term well-being was a factor, I think I would never stray from the grand triumvirate of Chinese, Mexican, and Deli foods.
Cooking at home is much more difficult than just stopping in at whatever dining facility you happen to crave at the moment, but it is a lot cheaper and healthier.
Currently we plan our menu two weeks at a time revolving around Grocery Day which is the Wednesday following payday. (We hold out until Wednesday so that we can take advantage of whatever sales the grocery stores just started). Planning a two-week menu is no 'piece of cake' either. You have to try to balance a variety of dishes to tickle your taste buds around the ingredients you have on hand and the time you have available to prepare said ingredients.
As I said, we try to cook big meals on the weekend that will both provide us with lunch throughout the week, and provide dinner for at least Mon and Tues. Dinners towards the end of the week usually consist of crock-pot meals. After eating the same meal for 2-3 nights, not only do you want another dish, but I also like to rotate the kind of meat we have. I try to work in fish every now and again but considering the cost is a rarity. I am usually rotating through beef, pork, and chicken. As you can guess, trying to figure out what you will be interested in eating next Tuesday is hard enough, but given the other restrictions, menu planning can be difficult.
As with all things, I expect it will get easier with practice.
Monday, February 25, 2008
A Day of Cooking
For some reason I decided to be productive on Sunday, don't ask me why. I had a long laundry list of things that needed to be done and was having some problems deciding what I should do first. Chandler, as wives often do, made the decision for me. Sundays are often days she spends in the kitchen cooking up some vittles for the upcoming week. This Sunday morning she didn't quite feel well enough to tackle any big cooking jobs so I thought I would try it.
First was lunch for the upcoming workweek. I made two big dishes of Cheeseburger Macaroni based off this Betty Crocker recipe, which I tripled and added two pounds of beef (Next time, I
think I'll double it and use a pound of macaroni and a pound of beef). Chandler usually makes this and starts with a béchamel sauce but, lacking her culinary talents, I wanted something a little more basic. This was my first time making Cheeseburger Macaroni from scratch. I had made it plenty of times previously using Hamburger Helper and a family size box of mac & cheese but that didn't fit in with our goals of avoiding convenience foods and building recipes on a more elemental level. It made 18 12oz servings and does quite well in a thermos.
Once I was done with Cheeseburger Mac, I moved on to take another stab at bread baking. I hadn't tried again since the first time, which was mostly a negative experience.
I had been reading on HT about whole wheat bread baking and a few people mentioned working the dough longer for whole wheat to get the gluten going. I tried that this last time and it was a good workout but the end product wasn't really any better. The bread still did not rise as much as it should and was very dense. Since I had worked the dough much longer this time, I may have mixed in too much flour, but I think the problem was the yeast. We are still experimenting with the recipe and I think we made a miscalculation on how much we should use or I should have just let it bloom longer.
Though the bread turned out heavy and is most likely destined for life as croutons
, I did have one success. The recipe we use makes 4 1.75lb loaves with dough left over. I am more apt to blame the yeast than the flour for the disappointing texture of the bread simply because this is the first time that either of us ended up with 4 of the 1.75lb loaves and I still have over a pound of dough left. I took the recipe creator’s suggestion and made Schnecken, which is a nutty sweet roll. Those were absolutely awesome! Easy to make: just butter, chopped nuts, brown sugar, cinnamon, and your dough, but amazingly tasty. The brown sugar and butter gave the nuts a nice gooey caramel covering. I can't wait to make them again the next time we need to make the bread.
First was lunch for the upcoming workweek. I made two big dishes of Cheeseburger Macaroni based off this Betty Crocker recipe, which I tripled and added two pounds of beef (Next time, I
think I'll double it and use a pound of macaroni and a pound of beef). Chandler usually makes this and starts with a béchamel sauce but, lacking her culinary talents, I wanted something a little more basic. This was my first time making Cheeseburger Macaroni from scratch. I had made it plenty of times previously using Hamburger Helper and a family size box of mac & cheese but that didn't fit in with our goals of avoiding convenience foods and building recipes on a more elemental level. It made 18 12oz servings and does quite well in a thermos.Once I was done with Cheeseburger Mac, I moved on to take another stab at bread baking. I hadn't tried again since the first time, which was mostly a negative experience.
I had been reading on HT about whole wheat bread baking and a few people mentioned working the dough longer for whole wheat to get the gluten going. I tried that this last time and it was a good workout but the end product wasn't really any better. The bread still did not rise as much as it should and was very dense. Since I had worked the dough much longer this time, I may have mixed in too much flour, but I think the problem was the yeast. We are still experimenting with the recipe and I think we made a miscalculation on how much we should use or I should have just let it bloom longer.
Though the bread turned out heavy and is most likely destined for life as croutons
, I did have one success. The recipe we use makes 4 1.75lb loaves with dough left over. I am more apt to blame the yeast than the flour for the disappointing texture of the bread simply because this is the first time that either of us ended up with 4 of the 1.75lb loaves and I still have over a pound of dough left. I took the recipe creator’s suggestion and made Schnecken, which is a nutty sweet roll. Those were absolutely awesome! Easy to make: just butter, chopped nuts, brown sugar, cinnamon, and your dough, but amazingly tasty. The brown sugar and butter gave the nuts a nice gooey caramel covering. I can't wait to make them again the next time we need to make the bread.Tuesday, February 19, 2008
So finally...goals
To put it as shortly as I can, my goal is to be a self sufficient as possible. Anything I can provide for my family with my own two hands will be...eventually.
The first and foremost goal will be food. I want to grow our own vegetables and raise our own meat. Now I am not a complete novice in this department. While I was growing up my paternal grandparents always had a big garden (or two or three). I have done bits and pieces of most gardening duties. I started picking strawberries about the time I started to walk it seems, but most of said berries made it into my mouth not the basket. I have dug potatoes, strung butter beans, shucked corn, harvested apples, snapped snapbeans, picked squash, thumped watermelons, you name it I have done it. (Except okra, Dad talked incessantly about how he hated everything about okra, and if my Daddy hated something, I hated it also, end of story.) Once I got old enough I was promoted to plowing with the tractor. Thinking back, I spent quite a bit of time on that tractor between plowing, mowing pastures, and just puttering around with it. I learned quite a bit about small scale farming from the time I spent with my grandparents.
Their farm wasn't the only exposure I have had. When we moved to outside of Charlottesville, Va Dad created what was basically a little homestead though at that time I had no concept of the word. We had chickens for eggs, rabbits for pets, and a bit of garden. I learned early on that gardens have no love for hard red clay. There was also cultivation of native edibles. We had wild blueberry bushes around that I occasional made use of but the gem was a very large blackberry patch. From memory I would guess it was about a 20 foot by 20 foot patch but this is back when I was in middle school, so there is no telling how large it actually was. The point is that it was a significant patch and just not a couple bushes. It was very wild and unkempt when we started, but after a bit of work we were able to tame it. The biggest improvement it that we built a frame out of nearby fallen limbs and small trees so that the large plants would have something to support the heavy fruits and we would also have a tunnel underneath the canopy to access the innards of the patch. We never had any home-raised meat because Dad is not the type to be able to kill an animal he has raised. We did have some friends of the family use one of our buck rabbits for stud and repaid the favor in rabbit meat. Needless to say eating an animal I had been brought up to view as a pet was not the most enjoyable of meals.
Though I may have grew up a country boy, I was only ever a helper. I have never really grown anything in the garden to have it survive to the point of harvest. While I have collected eggs, I have never slaughtered a chicken. I have just enough knowledge to understand how little I know.
As I said, through gardening, animal husbandry, and maybe even a little hunting and fishing. I plan to supply as much of the food my family eats as possible. We are being cautious in our planning and are laying out steps on how we turn what is now the 'brown house' as my wife's family likes to call it into a full fledge producing homestead. The first step will be raised bed gardens. The number we start out with will be controlled by the availability of both money and land. To start with I only want to try to grow enough to feed the family (including being able to give some produce to our parents, grandparents, etc) and have enough left to can some produce to help us out over the winter. One of the advantages to moving to the coast instead of the mountains is the milder winter and longer growing seasons. With a greenhouse we may have fresh veggies year around. I have read about having cherry tomatoes as houseplants and the possibilities of having a constant supply of fresh tomatoes is quite tempting.
Along with a garden, we also plan to raise chickens for eggs and meat. When we add this once again depends on when we have the funds for the infrastructure they require. I keep researching breeds and think I will go with Barred Rocks. I like the black and while contrast of their feathers and they will fit in well with our border collies. I am also drawn to them due to the fact they are one of the oldest American breeds and were originally bred as a barnyard flock. I am still deciding whether I would want a separate laying flock and meat flock. I worry about the feed to egg/meat conversion of a dual purpose breed. I at first was drawn to Jersey Giants since the chickens will be mostly for meat and the eggs will be simply an added bonus of the process. I shied away from those simply because from my research they were slower to mature than a normal sized chicken. Chandler liked the Jersey Giants because she called them goth chickens, and I agree a good size flock of these huge black birds would be a sight, but I am not sure they are what we are looking for as beginner chicken-raisers. Right now I am considering just ordering a couple extra Jersey Giant and Cornish roosters to start working on my own meat hybrid. I am sure the plans will change in between now and when we can actually get started but to me the planning is half the fun. If I can find a reliable market for eggs or meat things will greatly change. Right now the plan is to have a small flock to provide for us. Given an egg market, I will add production layers to the mix. Given a meat market, I will further research the meat breeds. My plans don't rely on farm generated income but I will keep an open mind in order to take advantage of any opportunities that are presented.
When the time is right we would like to further expand into diary and meat goats, cattle, turkeys, lambs, and anything else I can think of, depending how much land and time is available. Not only would cattle and goats provide some luscious red meat, but also a variety of dairy products. A fruit and nut orchard would be nice, but those take years to yield and therefore are a longterm goal on the back burner for now. As I said I would love to be able to make some income from the farm by selling produce, eggs, or any other product but an income in not the main goal. While I believe their is a market for pasture raised meats and eggs I haven't done the research as to whether the market is already saturated. We are moving to a more rural area so not only will their be less people there will also be more of a supply. I cannot count on making a living through our homestead so all the plans are geared toward providing healthy food for the family. Another important advantage to raising our own food is that it should be cheaper and that will make it easier to transition to a one income family so that a parent can stay home once we have children. That has been the biggest delay to starting a family, the fact that both of us refuse to allow daycare to raise a child.
We are moving to an area such that we could eventually buy as much land as we wanted, but I never want to be a strict commercial farmer. I never want it to be about the money, I fully understand that it will most likely always require one of us to work off the farm to generate the income needed to run it. I almost prefer that. Once your sole income comes from your farming endeavors it will be too tempting to cut corners to increase profits. A strong dislike for the current practices of corporate agriculture is one of more important reasons we want to move to a homestead lifestyle. Animals raised on feedlots in unhealthy crowded conditions leads to a paradise for disease propagation which is controlled through heavy use of antibiotics and other drugs. It is more cost efficient to have fast growth through the use of hormones than it is through the use of high quality feed. All of these substances are ultimately passed on to the consumer of the meat. I will never be a vegetarian, I enjoy the taste of meat too much. By raising the animal myself I can be assured that the animal was healthy, treated well during its short lifespan, and slaughtered in the most humane way possible.
The main goal is healthy food, but I look forward to what I will learn in the path to that goal. I am interested to learn how things were done during my grandparents' generation when homesteading was a normal way of life. I worry that society as a whole is becoming to specified in each person's knowledge and a lot of what was common sense 2-3 generations ago is being forgotten. Being the techno-geek I am, I will also look for ways to apply current technology to improve on the practices of my ancestors. By mixing old and new I hope to have a true modern homestead. Raising your own food is not the only way to be self-sustaining. I also hope to eventually supply the majority of the electricity used. There are plenty of sun drenched roof tops that are just begging for solar panels. With the flat land of eastern NC, a wind mill may be usable. I want a root cellar if possible to help reduce energy required to preserve food, but I worry that the water table in that area may be too close to the surface. When adding chicken coops and other farm-type structures I plan to use recycled materials whenever possible while also making use of the more 'green' techniques such as strawbale and cordwood construction. I am already checking craigslist for the area to see if I can find a reliable source of pallets. They are an excellent source for free. recycled wood. I have seen sheds and other buildings built from them. Most of the time they use the pallets whole. My plan would be to disassemble the pallets so as to give me the greatest flexibility when using the wood.
Obviously the plans are many and goals great. Now I just have to get our current house in market ready condition, that and a big second mortgage is what is holding up the move currently. Oh, and finding new jobs. /sigh
It is still closer than it was the day before, that is the important part.
The first and foremost goal will be food. I want to grow our own vegetables and raise our own meat. Now I am not a complete novice in this department. While I was growing up my paternal grandparents always had a big garden (or two or three). I have done bits and pieces of most gardening duties. I started picking strawberries about the time I started to walk it seems, but most of said berries made it into my mouth not the basket. I have dug potatoes, strung butter beans, shucked corn, harvested apples, snapped snapbeans, picked squash, thumped watermelons, you name it I have done it. (Except okra, Dad talked incessantly about how he hated everything about okra, and if my Daddy hated something, I hated it also, end of story.) Once I got old enough I was promoted to plowing with the tractor. Thinking back, I spent quite a bit of time on that tractor between plowing, mowing pastures, and just puttering around with it. I learned quite a bit about small scale farming from the time I spent with my grandparents.
Their farm wasn't the only exposure I have had. When we moved to outside of Charlottesville, Va Dad created what was basically a little homestead though at that time I had no concept of the word. We had chickens for eggs, rabbits for pets, and a bit of garden. I learned early on that gardens have no love for hard red clay. There was also cultivation of native edibles. We had wild blueberry bushes around that I occasional made use of but the gem was a very large blackberry patch. From memory I would guess it was about a 20 foot by 20 foot patch but this is back when I was in middle school, so there is no telling how large it actually was. The point is that it was a significant patch and just not a couple bushes. It was very wild and unkempt when we started, but after a bit of work we were able to tame it. The biggest improvement it that we built a frame out of nearby fallen limbs and small trees so that the large plants would have something to support the heavy fruits and we would also have a tunnel underneath the canopy to access the innards of the patch. We never had any home-raised meat because Dad is not the type to be able to kill an animal he has raised. We did have some friends of the family use one of our buck rabbits for stud and repaid the favor in rabbit meat. Needless to say eating an animal I had been brought up to view as a pet was not the most enjoyable of meals.
Though I may have grew up a country boy, I was only ever a helper. I have never really grown anything in the garden to have it survive to the point of harvest. While I have collected eggs, I have never slaughtered a chicken. I have just enough knowledge to understand how little I know.
As I said, through gardening, animal husbandry, and maybe even a little hunting and fishing. I plan to supply as much of the food my family eats as possible. We are being cautious in our planning and are laying out steps on how we turn what is now the 'brown house' as my wife's family likes to call it into a full fledge producing homestead. The first step will be raised bed gardens. The number we start out with will be controlled by the availability of both money and land. To start with I only want to try to grow enough to feed the family (including being able to give some produce to our parents, grandparents, etc) and have enough left to can some produce to help us out over the winter. One of the advantages to moving to the coast instead of the mountains is the milder winter and longer growing seasons. With a greenhouse we may have fresh veggies year around. I have read about having cherry tomatoes as houseplants and the possibilities of having a constant supply of fresh tomatoes is quite tempting.
Along with a garden, we also plan to raise chickens for eggs and meat. When we add this once again depends on when we have the funds for the infrastructure they require. I keep researching breeds and think I will go with Barred Rocks. I like the black and while contrast of their feathers and they will fit in well with our border collies. I am also drawn to them due to the fact they are one of the oldest American breeds and were originally bred as a barnyard flock. I am still deciding whether I would want a separate laying flock and meat flock. I worry about the feed to egg/meat conversion of a dual purpose breed. I at first was drawn to Jersey Giants since the chickens will be mostly for meat and the eggs will be simply an added bonus of the process. I shied away from those simply because from my research they were slower to mature than a normal sized chicken. Chandler liked the Jersey Giants because she called them goth chickens, and I agree a good size flock of these huge black birds would be a sight, but I am not sure they are what we are looking for as beginner chicken-raisers. Right now I am considering just ordering a couple extra Jersey Giant and Cornish roosters to start working on my own meat hybrid. I am sure the plans will change in between now and when we can actually get started but to me the planning is half the fun. If I can find a reliable market for eggs or meat things will greatly change. Right now the plan is to have a small flock to provide for us. Given an egg market, I will add production layers to the mix. Given a meat market, I will further research the meat breeds. My plans don't rely on farm generated income but I will keep an open mind in order to take advantage of any opportunities that are presented.
When the time is right we would like to further expand into diary and meat goats, cattle, turkeys, lambs, and anything else I can think of, depending how much land and time is available. Not only would cattle and goats provide some luscious red meat, but also a variety of dairy products. A fruit and nut orchard would be nice, but those take years to yield and therefore are a longterm goal on the back burner for now. As I said I would love to be able to make some income from the farm by selling produce, eggs, or any other product but an income in not the main goal. While I believe their is a market for pasture raised meats and eggs I haven't done the research as to whether the market is already saturated. We are moving to a more rural area so not only will their be less people there will also be more of a supply. I cannot count on making a living through our homestead so all the plans are geared toward providing healthy food for the family. Another important advantage to raising our own food is that it should be cheaper and that will make it easier to transition to a one income family so that a parent can stay home once we have children. That has been the biggest delay to starting a family, the fact that both of us refuse to allow daycare to raise a child.
We are moving to an area such that we could eventually buy as much land as we wanted, but I never want to be a strict commercial farmer. I never want it to be about the money, I fully understand that it will most likely always require one of us to work off the farm to generate the income needed to run it. I almost prefer that. Once your sole income comes from your farming endeavors it will be too tempting to cut corners to increase profits. A strong dislike for the current practices of corporate agriculture is one of more important reasons we want to move to a homestead lifestyle. Animals raised on feedlots in unhealthy crowded conditions leads to a paradise for disease propagation which is controlled through heavy use of antibiotics and other drugs. It is more cost efficient to have fast growth through the use of hormones than it is through the use of high quality feed. All of these substances are ultimately passed on to the consumer of the meat. I will never be a vegetarian, I enjoy the taste of meat too much. By raising the animal myself I can be assured that the animal was healthy, treated well during its short lifespan, and slaughtered in the most humane way possible.
The main goal is healthy food, but I look forward to what I will learn in the path to that goal. I am interested to learn how things were done during my grandparents' generation when homesteading was a normal way of life. I worry that society as a whole is becoming to specified in each person's knowledge and a lot of what was common sense 2-3 generations ago is being forgotten. Being the techno-geek I am, I will also look for ways to apply current technology to improve on the practices of my ancestors. By mixing old and new I hope to have a true modern homestead. Raising your own food is not the only way to be self-sustaining. I also hope to eventually supply the majority of the electricity used. There are plenty of sun drenched roof tops that are just begging for solar panels. With the flat land of eastern NC, a wind mill may be usable. I want a root cellar if possible to help reduce energy required to preserve food, but I worry that the water table in that area may be too close to the surface. When adding chicken coops and other farm-type structures I plan to use recycled materials whenever possible while also making use of the more 'green' techniques such as strawbale and cordwood construction. I am already checking craigslist for the area to see if I can find a reliable source of pallets. They are an excellent source for free. recycled wood. I have seen sheds and other buildings built from them. Most of the time they use the pallets whole. My plan would be to disassemble the pallets so as to give me the greatest flexibility when using the wood.
Obviously the plans are many and goals great. Now I just have to get our current house in market ready condition, that and a big second mortgage is what is holding up the move currently. Oh, and finding new jobs. /sigh
It is still closer than it was the day before, that is the important part.
Thursday, February 14, 2008
How Did I Get Here?
I will agree with Fenrirwulf regarding my scoffing at him buying books and magazines about self-sufficiency in the beginning of our relationship. I could never imagine myself doing anything that far removed from the vast consumerism that is city life.
I was born in Jacksonville, NC and for the first 8 years of my life, my parents, my younger brother and I lived in the house next door to my paternal grandparents on their farm. I remember following my grandfather through the fields and helping him pick vegetables. I remember counting corn cobs into bushel baskets and helping him sell watermelons off the back of his truck (and also helping him count the money he had made). I also remember countless hours sitting across the counter from my grandmother watching her make cakes and pies (this is where my love of baking and cooking was born). These are all happy memories but this was only a small part of my childhood.
When I was 8, my dad was transferred to Raleigh with his job. He worked up the chain at his job until he became a manager when I was in High School. This job kept him away from the family for 16 hours a day Monday through Friday and sometimes he would even have to go in to work on Saturday and Sunday. Because of his job, he missed the only play I was ever in and almost every chorus concert I had during High School. I'm not blaming him for his choices, he did what he felt he had to do to provide his family with every opportunity they could possibly want and I appreciate that. But, I never thought the time he missed spending with us was worth the material benefits we gained.
Because of the sacrifices my dad made when I was younger, I have always had easy access to everything I wanted. This has continued into my adult life since both Fenrirwulf and I make respectable salaries. We have a house filled to nearly bursting with junk that we don't appreciate because we haven't had to work for any of it. I often look at the things we have and think back to my junior year in high school when my chorus class was taking a trip to New York. My parents did not want me to go but told me that if I worked at my part-time job and saved up all the money it would take to go (the trip itself cost $450) then I could go. But, they would not contribute one penny to this cause. I worked my heart out that year and saved the cost of the trip + $300 in spending money. I had more money in my wallet when I set out on that trip than any of my friends did (and I was the only one that worked for mine). I enjoyed spending every penny of that money and I appreciated what I bought with it because I had earned it fair and square. I want to feel that way again about everything I bring into my home.
Also because of growing up in this atmosphere, I decided that I would never let my career come before my family or before myself. I like material things as much as the next person but, it's just not worth losing precious moments with the people you love. Right now, I have a career in the field of Human Resources but in the past couple of years, it has not been fulfilling some basic need inside of me. The job I have is ok but it does not allow me to express myself or my creativity very often and I feel like I am being wasted. I've come to realize that if we had a homestead like we have talked about, I could make and sell things and run my own business which fulfills one of my ultimate goals in life.
I have a 56 mile commute one way to work. I have to drive or ride (since Fenrirwulf and I carpool as much as possible) through rush hour traffic twice a day. These drives are unsafe and they also take a huge chunk of time out of my day. I hardly have any time to keep the house the way I want it to be kept or to cook a healthy meal. So, instead, we tend to go out to restaurants every day and eat junk (or we buy pre-packaged foods from the grocery store that are filled with preservatives and chemicals that are probably adversely affecting our health). So our health is declining as our weight is increasing. I want to know where my food comes from and that it is wholesome and healthy.
I'm looking forward to a lifestyle that will offer me physical activity and hard work and the satisfaction that I've come by everything I own honestly. I think this will be a healthy change for us both mentally, emotionally and physically and I cannot wait to get out of the city!
I was born in Jacksonville, NC and for the first 8 years of my life, my parents, my younger brother and I lived in the house next door to my paternal grandparents on their farm. I remember following my grandfather through the fields and helping him pick vegetables. I remember counting corn cobs into bushel baskets and helping him sell watermelons off the back of his truck (and also helping him count the money he had made). I also remember countless hours sitting across the counter from my grandmother watching her make cakes and pies (this is where my love of baking and cooking was born). These are all happy memories but this was only a small part of my childhood.
When I was 8, my dad was transferred to Raleigh with his job. He worked up the chain at his job until he became a manager when I was in High School. This job kept him away from the family for 16 hours a day Monday through Friday and sometimes he would even have to go in to work on Saturday and Sunday. Because of his job, he missed the only play I was ever in and almost every chorus concert I had during High School. I'm not blaming him for his choices, he did what he felt he had to do to provide his family with every opportunity they could possibly want and I appreciate that. But, I never thought the time he missed spending with us was worth the material benefits we gained.
Because of the sacrifices my dad made when I was younger, I have always had easy access to everything I wanted. This has continued into my adult life since both Fenrirwulf and I make respectable salaries. We have a house filled to nearly bursting with junk that we don't appreciate because we haven't had to work for any of it. I often look at the things we have and think back to my junior year in high school when my chorus class was taking a trip to New York. My parents did not want me to go but told me that if I worked at my part-time job and saved up all the money it would take to go (the trip itself cost $450) then I could go. But, they would not contribute one penny to this cause. I worked my heart out that year and saved the cost of the trip + $300 in spending money. I had more money in my wallet when I set out on that trip than any of my friends did (and I was the only one that worked for mine). I enjoyed spending every penny of that money and I appreciated what I bought with it because I had earned it fair and square. I want to feel that way again about everything I bring into my home.
Also because of growing up in this atmosphere, I decided that I would never let my career come before my family or before myself. I like material things as much as the next person but, it's just not worth losing precious moments with the people you love. Right now, I have a career in the field of Human Resources but in the past couple of years, it has not been fulfilling some basic need inside of me. The job I have is ok but it does not allow me to express myself or my creativity very often and I feel like I am being wasted. I've come to realize that if we had a homestead like we have talked about, I could make and sell things and run my own business which fulfills one of my ultimate goals in life.
I have a 56 mile commute one way to work. I have to drive or ride (since Fenrirwulf and I carpool as much as possible) through rush hour traffic twice a day. These drives are unsafe and they also take a huge chunk of time out of my day. I hardly have any time to keep the house the way I want it to be kept or to cook a healthy meal. So, instead, we tend to go out to restaurants every day and eat junk (or we buy pre-packaged foods from the grocery store that are filled with preservatives and chemicals that are probably adversely affecting our health). So our health is declining as our weight is increasing. I want to know where my food comes from and that it is wholesome and healthy.
I'm looking forward to a lifestyle that will offer me physical activity and hard work and the satisfaction that I've come by everything I own honestly. I think this will be a healthy change for us both mentally, emotionally and physically and I cannot wait to get out of the city!
Monday, February 11, 2008
The History Behind Our Decision
To put it as shortly as I can, my goal is to be a self sufficient as possible. Anything I can provide for my family with my own two hands will be...eventually.
The first and foremost goal will be food. I want to grow our own vegetables and raise our own meat. Now I am not a complete novice in this department. While I was growing up my paternal grandparents always had a big garden (or two or three). I have done bits and pieces of most gardening duties. I started picking strawberries about the time I started to walk it seems, but most of said berries made it into my mouth not the basket. I have dug potatoes, strung butter beans, shucked corn, harvested apples, snapped snap beans, picked squash, thumped watermelons, you name it I have done it. (Except okra, Dad talked incessantly about how he hated everything about okra, and if my Daddy hated something, I hated it end of story.) Once I got old enough I was promoted to plowing with the tractor. Thinking back, I spent quite a bit of time on that tractor between plowing, mowing pastures, and just puttering around with it. I learned quite a bit about small-scale farming from the time I spent with my grandparents.
Their farm wasn't the only exposure I have had. When we moved to outside of Charlottesville, VA Dad created what was a little homestead though at that time I had no concept of the word. We had chickens for eggs, rabbits for pets, and a bit of garden. I learned early on that gardens have no love for hard red clay. There was also cultivation of native edibles. We had wild blueberry bushes around that I occasional made use of but the gem was a very large blackberry patch. From memory, I would guess it was about a 20 foot by 20-foot patch but this is back when I was in middle school, so there is no telling how large it actually was. The point is that it was a significant patch and just not a couple bushes. It was very wild and unkempt when we started, but after a bit of work we were able to tame it. The biggest improvement it that we built a frame out of nearby fallen limbs and small trees so that the large plants would have something to support the heavy fruits and we would also have a tunnel underneath the canopy to access the innards of the patch. We never had any home-raised meat because Dad is not the type to be able to kill an animal he has raised. We did have some friends of the family use one of our buck rabbits for stud and repaid the favor in rabbit meat. Needless to say, eating an animal I had been brought up to view as a pet was not the most enjoyable of meals.
Though I may have grown up a country boy, I was only ever a helper. I have never really grown anything in the garden to have it survive to the point of harvest. While I have collected eggs, I have never slaughtered a chicken. I have just enough knowledge to understand how little I know.
As I said, through gardening, animal husbandry, and maybe even a little hunting and fishing. I plan to supply as much of the food my family eats as possible. We are being cautious in our planning and are laying out steps on how we turn what is now the 'brown house' as my wife's family likes to call it into a full fledge producing homestead. The first step will be raised bed gardens. The number we start out with will be controlled by the availability of both money and land. To start with I only want to try to grow enough to feed the family (including being able to give some produce to our parents, grandparents, etc) and have enough left to can some produce to help us out over the winter. One of the advantages to moving to the coast instead of the mountains is the milder winter and longer growing seasons. With a greenhouse, we may have fresh veggies year around. I have read about having cherry tomatoes as houseplants and the possibility of having a constant supply of fresh tomatoes is quite tempting.
Along with a garden, we also plan to raise chickens for eggs and meat. When we add this once again depends on when we have the funds for the infrastructure they require. I keep researching breeds and think I will go with Barred Rocks. I like the black and while contrast of their feathers and they will fit in well with our border collies. I am also drawn to them due to the fact they are one of the oldest American breeds and were originally bred as a barnyard flock. I am still deciding whether I would want a separate laying flock and meat flock. I worry about the feed to egg/meat conversion of a dual-purpose breed. I at first was drawn to Jersey Giants since the chickens will be mostly for meat and the eggs will be simply an added bonus of the process. I shied away from those simply because from my research they were slower to mature than a normal sized chicken. Chandler liked the Jersey Giants because she called them Goth chickens, and I agree a good size flock of these huge black birds would be a sight, but I am not sure they are what we are looking for as beginner chicken-raisers. Right now, I am considering just ordering a couple extra Jersey Giant and Cornish roosters to start working on my own meat hybrid. I am sure the plans will change in between now and when we can actually get started but to me the planning is half the fun. If I can find a reliable market for eggs or meat things will greatly change. Right now, the plan is to have a small flock to provide for us. Given an egg market, I will add production layers to the mix. Given a meat market, I will further research the meat breeds. My plans do not rely on farm-generated income but I will keep an open mind in order to take advantage of any opportunities that are presented.
When the time is right we would like to expand further into diary and meat goats, cattle, turkeys, lambs, and anything else I can think of, depending how much land and time is available. Not only would cattle and goats provide some luscious red meat, but also a variety of dairy products. A fruit and nut orchard would be nice, but those take years to yield and therefore are a long-term goal on the back burner for now. As I said, I would love to be able to make some income from the farm by selling produce, eggs, or any other product but an income in not the main goal. While I believe there is a market for pasture raised meats and eggs, I have not done the research as to whether the market is already saturated. We are moving to a more rural area so not only will there be less people there will also be more of a supply. I cannot count on making a living through our homestead so all the plans are geared toward providing healthy food for the family. Another important advantage to raising our own food is that it should be cheaper and that will make it easier to transition to a one-income family so that a parent can stay home once we have children. That has been the biggest delay to starting a family, the fact that both of us refuse to allow daycare to raise a child.
We are moving to an area such that we could eventually buy as much land as we wanted, but I never want to be a strict commercial farmer. I never want it to be about the money, I fully understand that it will most likely always require one of us to work off the farm to generate the income needed to run it. I almost prefer that. Once your sole income comes from your farming endeavors, it will be too tempting to cut corners to increase profits. A strong dislike for the current practices of corporate agriculture is one of more important reasons we want to move to a homestead lifestyle. Animals raised on feedlots in unhealthy crowded conditions leads to a paradise for disease propagation that is controlled through heavy use of antibiotics and other drugs. It is more cost efficient to have fast growth through the use of hormones than it is through the use of high quality feed. All of these substances are ultimately passed on to the consumer of the meat. I will never be a vegetarian; I enjoy the taste of meat too much. By raising the animal myself, I can be assured that the animal was healthy, treated well during its short lifespan, and slaughtered in the most humane way possible.
The main goal is healthy food, but I look forward to what I will learn in the path to that goal. I am interested to learn how things were done during my grandparents' generation when homesteading was a normal way of life. I worry that society as a whole is becoming too specified in each person's knowledge and a lot of what was common sense 2-3 generations ago is being forgotten. Being the techno-geek I am, I will also look for ways to apply current technology to improve on the practices of my ancestors. By mixing old and new, I hope to have a true modern homestead. Raising your own food is not the only way to be self-sustaining. I also hope to eventually supply the majority of the electricity used. There are plenty of sun-drenched rooftops that are just begging for solar panels. With the flat land of eastern NC, a windmill may be usable. I want a root cellar if possible to help reduce energy required to preserve food, but I worry that the water table in that area may be too close to the surface. When adding chicken coops and other farm-type structures I plan to use recycled materials whenever possible while also making use of the more 'green' techniques such as straw bale and cordwood construction. I am already checking craigslist for the area to see if I can find a reliable source of pallets. They are an excellent source for free, recycled wood. I have seen sheds and other buildings built from them. Most of the time they use the pallets whole. My plan would be to disassemble the pallets so as to give me the greatest flexibility when using the wood.
Obviously the plans are many and goals great. Now I just have to get our current house in market ready condition, that and a big second mortgage is what are holding up the move currently. Oh, and finding new jobs. /sigh
It is still closer than it was the day before, which is the important part.
The first and foremost goal will be food. I want to grow our own vegetables and raise our own meat. Now I am not a complete novice in this department. While I was growing up my paternal grandparents always had a big garden (or two or three). I have done bits and pieces of most gardening duties. I started picking strawberries about the time I started to walk it seems, but most of said berries made it into my mouth not the basket. I have dug potatoes, strung butter beans, shucked corn, harvested apples, snapped snap beans, picked squash, thumped watermelons, you name it I have done it. (Except okra, Dad talked incessantly about how he hated everything about okra, and if my Daddy hated something, I hated it end of story.) Once I got old enough I was promoted to plowing with the tractor. Thinking back, I spent quite a bit of time on that tractor between plowing, mowing pastures, and just puttering around with it. I learned quite a bit about small-scale farming from the time I spent with my grandparents.
Their farm wasn't the only exposure I have had. When we moved to outside of Charlottesville, VA Dad created what was a little homestead though at that time I had no concept of the word. We had chickens for eggs, rabbits for pets, and a bit of garden. I learned early on that gardens have no love for hard red clay. There was also cultivation of native edibles. We had wild blueberry bushes around that I occasional made use of but the gem was a very large blackberry patch. From memory, I would guess it was about a 20 foot by 20-foot patch but this is back when I was in middle school, so there is no telling how large it actually was. The point is that it was a significant patch and just not a couple bushes. It was very wild and unkempt when we started, but after a bit of work we were able to tame it. The biggest improvement it that we built a frame out of nearby fallen limbs and small trees so that the large plants would have something to support the heavy fruits and we would also have a tunnel underneath the canopy to access the innards of the patch. We never had any home-raised meat because Dad is not the type to be able to kill an animal he has raised. We did have some friends of the family use one of our buck rabbits for stud and repaid the favor in rabbit meat. Needless to say, eating an animal I had been brought up to view as a pet was not the most enjoyable of meals.
Though I may have grown up a country boy, I was only ever a helper. I have never really grown anything in the garden to have it survive to the point of harvest. While I have collected eggs, I have never slaughtered a chicken. I have just enough knowledge to understand how little I know.
As I said, through gardening, animal husbandry, and maybe even a little hunting and fishing. I plan to supply as much of the food my family eats as possible. We are being cautious in our planning and are laying out steps on how we turn what is now the 'brown house' as my wife's family likes to call it into a full fledge producing homestead. The first step will be raised bed gardens. The number we start out with will be controlled by the availability of both money and land. To start with I only want to try to grow enough to feed the family (including being able to give some produce to our parents, grandparents, etc) and have enough left to can some produce to help us out over the winter. One of the advantages to moving to the coast instead of the mountains is the milder winter and longer growing seasons. With a greenhouse, we may have fresh veggies year around. I have read about having cherry tomatoes as houseplants and the possibility of having a constant supply of fresh tomatoes is quite tempting.
Along with a garden, we also plan to raise chickens for eggs and meat. When we add this once again depends on when we have the funds for the infrastructure they require. I keep researching breeds and think I will go with Barred Rocks. I like the black and while contrast of their feathers and they will fit in well with our border collies. I am also drawn to them due to the fact they are one of the oldest American breeds and were originally bred as a barnyard flock. I am still deciding whether I would want a separate laying flock and meat flock. I worry about the feed to egg/meat conversion of a dual-purpose breed. I at first was drawn to Jersey Giants since the chickens will be mostly for meat and the eggs will be simply an added bonus of the process. I shied away from those simply because from my research they were slower to mature than a normal sized chicken. Chandler liked the Jersey Giants because she called them Goth chickens, and I agree a good size flock of these huge black birds would be a sight, but I am not sure they are what we are looking for as beginner chicken-raisers. Right now, I am considering just ordering a couple extra Jersey Giant and Cornish roosters to start working on my own meat hybrid. I am sure the plans will change in between now and when we can actually get started but to me the planning is half the fun. If I can find a reliable market for eggs or meat things will greatly change. Right now, the plan is to have a small flock to provide for us. Given an egg market, I will add production layers to the mix. Given a meat market, I will further research the meat breeds. My plans do not rely on farm-generated income but I will keep an open mind in order to take advantage of any opportunities that are presented.
When the time is right we would like to expand further into diary and meat goats, cattle, turkeys, lambs, and anything else I can think of, depending how much land and time is available. Not only would cattle and goats provide some luscious red meat, but also a variety of dairy products. A fruit and nut orchard would be nice, but those take years to yield and therefore are a long-term goal on the back burner for now. As I said, I would love to be able to make some income from the farm by selling produce, eggs, or any other product but an income in not the main goal. While I believe there is a market for pasture raised meats and eggs, I have not done the research as to whether the market is already saturated. We are moving to a more rural area so not only will there be less people there will also be more of a supply. I cannot count on making a living through our homestead so all the plans are geared toward providing healthy food for the family. Another important advantage to raising our own food is that it should be cheaper and that will make it easier to transition to a one-income family so that a parent can stay home once we have children. That has been the biggest delay to starting a family, the fact that both of us refuse to allow daycare to raise a child.
We are moving to an area such that we could eventually buy as much land as we wanted, but I never want to be a strict commercial farmer. I never want it to be about the money, I fully understand that it will most likely always require one of us to work off the farm to generate the income needed to run it. I almost prefer that. Once your sole income comes from your farming endeavors, it will be too tempting to cut corners to increase profits. A strong dislike for the current practices of corporate agriculture is one of more important reasons we want to move to a homestead lifestyle. Animals raised on feedlots in unhealthy crowded conditions leads to a paradise for disease propagation that is controlled through heavy use of antibiotics and other drugs. It is more cost efficient to have fast growth through the use of hormones than it is through the use of high quality feed. All of these substances are ultimately passed on to the consumer of the meat. I will never be a vegetarian; I enjoy the taste of meat too much. By raising the animal myself, I can be assured that the animal was healthy, treated well during its short lifespan, and slaughtered in the most humane way possible.
The main goal is healthy food, but I look forward to what I will learn in the path to that goal. I am interested to learn how things were done during my grandparents' generation when homesteading was a normal way of life. I worry that society as a whole is becoming too specified in each person's knowledge and a lot of what was common sense 2-3 generations ago is being forgotten. Being the techno-geek I am, I will also look for ways to apply current technology to improve on the practices of my ancestors. By mixing old and new, I hope to have a true modern homestead. Raising your own food is not the only way to be self-sustaining. I also hope to eventually supply the majority of the electricity used. There are plenty of sun-drenched rooftops that are just begging for solar panels. With the flat land of eastern NC, a windmill may be usable. I want a root cellar if possible to help reduce energy required to preserve food, but I worry that the water table in that area may be too close to the surface. When adding chicken coops and other farm-type structures I plan to use recycled materials whenever possible while also making use of the more 'green' techniques such as straw bale and cordwood construction. I am already checking craigslist for the area to see if I can find a reliable source of pallets. They are an excellent source for free, recycled wood. I have seen sheds and other buildings built from them. Most of the time they use the pallets whole. My plan would be to disassemble the pallets so as to give me the greatest flexibility when using the wood.
Obviously the plans are many and goals great. Now I just have to get our current house in market ready condition, that and a big second mortgage is what are holding up the move currently. Oh, and finding new jobs. /sigh
It is still closer than it was the day before, which is the important part.
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
Dirt under the nails
So this weekend was a magic time, the first bit of gardening for the year. I don't know what possessed me but somehow on Saturday I pulled myself away from the computer and ventured outside for some good old fashioned yard work. The plan was to break through the thick layer of grass covering my smallest raised bed to get it ready for a cool crop planting experiment. For a bit of background, being a gardening novice I am not sure when certain plants will sprout and grow, and whether it is based of length of sunlight exposure or ground temperature. Being the info-addict nerd I am, I have done research on the net with conflicting results. For some reason it suddenly occurred to me that hell, I can plant some seeds and see what happens. So the plan is take the 4x4 bed, abandon the strict 16 cell configuration demanded by the square-foot-garden mantra and plant in wide rows. I want to try turnips first, they are supposed to be almost impossible to not grow (a theory I will most certainly test), then also swiss chard, spinach, corn salad, and an early lettuce mix. If my mom was reading this she would have passed out before believing I would eat that many greens. (Please note, I was able to completely avoid suggesting we plant any of the dreaded collards.) I hope to get the seeds in the earth this Sunday since we are planning a trip to Boone to see the flurries they are calling for on Saturday. I will also throw together a hoop house using 8ft pvc piping, heavy plastic, and the ever holy duct tape. (Seriously, I have mulled it over, how do you attach the plastic to the piping without the tape?) I just have to hope I can both figure out a way to secure it against the terrible winds we have at home, and that it survives said blow. So that is the plan, now for the action.
As I said, the grass had completely covered over all my beds in a nice thick mat that centipede is so well known for. If only it would grow that well in the front yard. I had made the beds early last spring, but had never put them to use due to a nasty combination of lack of 'follow-through-ness' and the beginnings of the hellish drought we are currently under. So out I drag my trusty weedeater, or is it trusty at all. The thing refuses to start, mostly because of the solidified fuel in the lines. Being the lazy yet stubborn person that makes me who I am, the fact that is won't start doesn't stop me from continually pressing the little valve on the side in a vain hope that following the starting directions will work this time even if it hadn't the 20 times before. After finally reaching my limit, I go primitive and grab the shovel and rake. Now as anyone that has dealt with centipede is aware it may have been easier to get a garden rake to pierce concrete than put a dent in the hefty weave that had invaded my precious garden plot.
This sends me right back to the weedeater in hopes that I can cut the dead grass back then chew through its' defenses with the tilling attachment for said weedeater. So more fiddling, cursing, pulling on the start chain, and finally the most fun part of any mechanical endeavor, disassemble. Once I start seeing what pieces I can remove without the use of tools, I notice there is a bubble in the gas line where there used to be a solid chunk of fuel. That was a most promising sight, and after adjusting the choke that I didn't know was there, the beast finally starts. Now here is a conundrum. I am excited because I will soon be playing in the lush dirt of my garden, but I am also saddened because the first task is a most hated one, the cutting of the grass. I hate cutting grass, as the overlong dead grass in my lawn will prove. Sometimes I feel as though most summers of my youth was spent cutting someone's yard, and the more I consider the amount of time I have wasted riding a mower around in circles the less I want to continue. So there we are, the second of February and I am cutting grass, oh the humanity of it all. Not only do I trim the grass back on the small bed, but continue to trim around all the beds and move on to the base of the bird feeder. I get a nice reward of actual green plants which can now be seen since the dead grass towering overing has been obliterated.
Finally, I get to do what I first set out to do which is work on the garden bed. I must admit, the Mel Mix from the SFG guy is a very nice soil mix, being equal parts compost, peat moss, and vermiculite. Despite sitting for months and months unloved by the human hand it is still light, and even moist which is a rarity given the current climate. As I dig through it pulling foot long roots out, the soil is cold yet has a lush feel and smell. I move on to the next bed in the row, which is a strong contrast. I did not stick to the Mel Mix for my 3 4x8 beds, mostly from the trouble of finding coarse vermiculite. I was lucky to find a 4 cu ft bag at the Hudson's Hardware in Garner, but they only had the one bag, and they were the only ones to carry it. The vast majority of that bag was used in the 4x4 leaving very little for the other beds. Lowes did carry it in smaller bags, but at triple the cost. So after doing pricing checks the cheapest way to go was a half and half mix of top soil and turkey compost supplied by the pick-up truck load at a local landscaping company. I did add in some peat moss here and there, but from tilling in this second bed, I did not use enough which is not a surprise since I was really just adding in the last of what I had on hand. The difference between the two really drove the point home in regards to the superior texture of the Mel Mix The dirt is more like normal soil and less like the dense potting soil consistency of the Mel Mix. However, we must remember, texture is not the most important aspect of garden soil, the ability to produce is key. Regardless, I am still quite happy to sit and dig through the dirt tool-lessly, removing clumps of grass roots and other weeds. I am not sure how to explain it but the act of nurturing and caring for a garden is extremely therapeutic. Even at this early stage I found it tiring, yet relaxing at the same time. It was a small taste of what was to come, and it got me revved up for the upcoming season.
Left on the to do list:
our own compost
leaves from the in-laws' yard
peat moss
vermiculite
As usual, what I actual add in will be decided during the heat of the moment.
As I said, the grass had completely covered over all my beds in a nice thick mat that centipede is so well known for. If only it would grow that well in the front yard. I had made the beds early last spring, but had never put them to use due to a nasty combination of lack of 'follow-through-ness' and the beginnings of the hellish drought we are currently under. So out I drag my trusty weedeater, or is it trusty at all. The thing refuses to start, mostly because of the solidified fuel in the lines. Being the lazy yet stubborn person that makes me who I am, the fact that is won't start doesn't stop me from continually pressing the little valve on the side in a vain hope that following the starting directions will work this time even if it hadn't the 20 times before. After finally reaching my limit, I go primitive and grab the shovel and rake. Now as anyone that has dealt with centipede is aware it may have been easier to get a garden rake to pierce concrete than put a dent in the hefty weave that had invaded my precious garden plot.
This sends me right back to the weedeater in hopes that I can cut the dead grass back then chew through its' defenses with the tilling attachment for said weedeater. So more fiddling, cursing, pulling on the start chain, and finally the most fun part of any mechanical endeavor, disassemble. Once I start seeing what pieces I can remove without the use of tools, I notice there is a bubble in the gas line where there used to be a solid chunk of fuel. That was a most promising sight, and after adjusting the choke that I didn't know was there, the beast finally starts. Now here is a conundrum. I am excited because I will soon be playing in the lush dirt of my garden, but I am also saddened because the first task is a most hated one, the cutting of the grass. I hate cutting grass, as the overlong dead grass in my lawn will prove. Sometimes I feel as though most summers of my youth was spent cutting someone's yard, and the more I consider the amount of time I have wasted riding a mower around in circles the less I want to continue. So there we are, the second of February and I am cutting grass, oh the humanity of it all. Not only do I trim the grass back on the small bed, but continue to trim around all the beds and move on to the base of the bird feeder. I get a nice reward of actual green plants which can now be seen since the dead grass towering overing has been obliterated.
Finally, I get to do what I first set out to do which is work on the garden bed. I must admit, the Mel Mix from the SFG guy is a very nice soil mix, being equal parts compost, peat moss, and vermiculite. Despite sitting for months and months unloved by the human hand it is still light, and even moist which is a rarity given the current climate. As I dig through it pulling foot long roots out, the soil is cold yet has a lush feel and smell. I move on to the next bed in the row, which is a strong contrast. I did not stick to the Mel Mix for my 3 4x8 beds, mostly from the trouble of finding coarse vermiculite. I was lucky to find a 4 cu ft bag at the Hudson's Hardware in Garner, but they only had the one bag, and they were the only ones to carry it. The vast majority of that bag was used in the 4x4 leaving very little for the other beds. Lowes did carry it in smaller bags, but at triple the cost. So after doing pricing checks the cheapest way to go was a half and half mix of top soil and turkey compost supplied by the pick-up truck load at a local landscaping company. I did add in some peat moss here and there, but from tilling in this second bed, I did not use enough which is not a surprise since I was really just adding in the last of what I had on hand. The difference between the two really drove the point home in regards to the superior texture of the Mel Mix The dirt is more like normal soil and less like the dense potting soil consistency of the Mel Mix. However, we must remember, texture is not the most important aspect of garden soil, the ability to produce is key. Regardless, I am still quite happy to sit and dig through the dirt tool-lessly, removing clumps of grass roots and other weeds. I am not sure how to explain it but the act of nurturing and caring for a garden is extremely therapeutic. Even at this early stage I found it tiring, yet relaxing at the same time. It was a small taste of what was to come, and it got me revved up for the upcoming season.
Left on the to do list:
- Plant the cool weather crops in hope they sprout.
- Make a hoop house for the 4x4 bed.
- Do a second till on the first 4x8 bed, and an initial till on the other three.
our own compost
leaves from the in-laws' yard
peat moss
vermiculite
As usual, what I actual add in will be decided during the heat of the moment.
- Start a true garden journal.
Wednesday, January 30, 2008
The Large Pot of Soup
A couple of Sundays ago, I made a big pot of chicken soup. I took a whole chicken and boiled it until it was done. Took the chicken out of the broth to let it cool enough for me to debone. To the pot full of broth, I added carrots, celery, onion and some parsley that was just going to go to waste otherwise. I seasoned it with salt and pepper and let it simmer till the vegetables were nearly done. Then, I added the chicken back to it all.
The next day, Matthew and I each took about a pint of soup to lunch each. When I heated it up and tasted it, I was so pleased, it was great soup, had been easy to make and tasted better than canned soup (and was probably less expensive). That night, we put away 9-10 quarts of soup in the freezer (there are only the two of us living in the house, so this soup should last us a good long while for taking to lunch at work).
A week later, we are still eating the soup. I'm getting tired of it but it's not bad. It still tastes good on the cold days that we've been having.
However, today, ten days later, I eat the soup and it nearly makes me sick even after taking a break from it yesterday. It's almost the worst thing I've ever tasted. It's very interesting to me that I've progressed from it being the most awesome soup in the world to something I can barely keep down.
This is the problem, I think, with bulk cooking for two people. Even normal recipes make way more than the two of us together could (should) eat but bulk recipes fill up our freezer and we eat on them until we can't even imagine eating that particular food again for a long long time. I think the next time I do a big bulk meal on the weekend, I'll do more than one so that we at least have some variety with our lunches. I just need to get better about managing my time on the weekends so I can get everything done that needs to get done (but that's another story).
I think tomorrow, I'll bring a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch...
The next day, Matthew and I each took about a pint of soup to lunch each. When I heated it up and tasted it, I was so pleased, it was great soup, had been easy to make and tasted better than canned soup (and was probably less expensive). That night, we put away 9-10 quarts of soup in the freezer (there are only the two of us living in the house, so this soup should last us a good long while for taking to lunch at work).
A week later, we are still eating the soup. I'm getting tired of it but it's not bad. It still tastes good on the cold days that we've been having.
However, today, ten days later, I eat the soup and it nearly makes me sick even after taking a break from it yesterday. It's almost the worst thing I've ever tasted. It's very interesting to me that I've progressed from it being the most awesome soup in the world to something I can barely keep down.
This is the problem, I think, with bulk cooking for two people. Even normal recipes make way more than the two of us together could (should) eat but bulk recipes fill up our freezer and we eat on them until we can't even imagine eating that particular food again for a long long time. I think the next time I do a big bulk meal on the weekend, I'll do more than one so that we at least have some variety with our lunches. I just need to get better about managing my time on the weekends so I can get everything done that needs to get done (but that's another story).
I think tomorrow, I'll bring a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch...
Monday, January 28, 2008
Adventures in Bread Baking: Bake Harder
Two weeks ago, Fenrirwulf tried baking bread from a step-by-step recipe that he found on the internet. The bread looked really pretty in the pans and it smelled really nice baking but we had some problems removing the loaves from the pans and the taste of the bread was also flat and a bit bitter.
I augmented the recipe yesterday and added 1/4 cup honey and 2 tbsp of salt to the recipe instead of what was listed. The bread rose nicely (I turned the oven on to preheat and sat the dough in a container on the stovetop so it was plenty warm this time).
I didn't get the four 1.75 pound loaves and one 1.25 pound loaf that I should have. Next time, I'll probably work in more flour...maybe one to two cups more. I had to have Fenrirwulf shape the loaves for me because I was getting very frustrated because I was trying to make bread in a very limited amount of time.
We sprayed the pans with Baker's Joy spray and they came out beautifully this time.
We tasted the bread last night and it tastes much better. Not at all bitter. But, it still needs more honey and more salt. I'll probably add 1/2 cup honey and 3 tbsp of salt next time.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Eat Your Veggies
One of our goals for this year is to eat healthier foods. To me, healthy means homemade (and ideally homegrown) so that you know what goes in your food and you know that you are eating quality food. Healthy also means the dreaded V-word. Vegetables.
For the first 8 years of my life, I lived on my paternal grandparents' farm and they raised all kinds of vegetables. Okra, cucumbers, tomatoes, corn, collards, field peas, green beans and yellow squash to name a few. While there were always a few vegetables I didn't like, my parents were both diligent about making sure we at least tasted our vegetables to make sure we didn't like them (and to at least get some nutrition from the bit we did eat). So, I have never had a huge problem eating most vegetables and I'm finding, as an adult, my tastes are changing and I like more of the vegetables that I hated as a kid.
Fenrirwulf, however, is a different story altogether. As far as eating the vegetables is concerned, he likes what he likes and that's what he wants to eat. His parents didn't really force him to eat things he might not like, like mine did. Sometimes this makes it hard to plan a nutritious meal because there are things he doesn't like or doesn't want to try (like okra).
So, what's a girl to do? My answer to that is to hide the veggies in whatever you are cooking.
Last night, I made what we normally call Pasta Bake for our lunches this week. We combine spaghetti sauce, ground beef and rotini and top it with cheddar cheese and bake it in the oven. When I do things with commercially canned spaghetti sauce, I like to add things to it to make it seem more homemade. So, to one can of Hunt's spaghetti sauce, I added 1 pound of browned ground beef (browned in olive oil), an onion, 3 cloves of garlic, 2 cans of diced tomatoes, 2 large carrots and some spices (salt, pepper and italian seasoning). I looked through our freezers and our cabinets to see what other veggies we could find (to both stretch out the pasta for more meals and also add some more nutrients to our diet). In one of the freezers, I found a half bag of yellow squash (which is a veggie we both like but is not something we would normally put in spaghetti). So, I took it out, defrosted it, diced it and added it to the sauce. I dumped the sauce into a baking dish and added about a pound and a half of macaroni (I did not pre-cook the macaroni), a cup of part-skim mozzarella cheese and a quarter cup of shredded parmesan cheese and baked it all in the oven for about an hour.
Fenrirwulf saw me put the squash in and kind of made a face, but I carried through and put it in anyway.
Today, at lunch, I ate the pasta for the first time. As far as I could tell, the squash had broken down and become lost in all the pasta. I couldn't really taste the squash at all, either, but I knew it was in there. I think that if he had not seen me put it in the sauce pot, Fenrirwulf would have never known the squash was there.
Now I wonder what else I can make and hide some veggies in so that we are getting a more diverse diet. It may be worth looking through both The Sneaky Chef: Simple Strategies for Hiding Healthy Foods in Kids' Favorite Meals and Deceptively Delicious: Simple Secrets to Get Your Kids Eating Good Food .
For the first 8 years of my life, I lived on my paternal grandparents' farm and they raised all kinds of vegetables. Okra, cucumbers, tomatoes, corn, collards, field peas, green beans and yellow squash to name a few. While there were always a few vegetables I didn't like, my parents were both diligent about making sure we at least tasted our vegetables to make sure we didn't like them (and to at least get some nutrition from the bit we did eat). So, I have never had a huge problem eating most vegetables and I'm finding, as an adult, my tastes are changing and I like more of the vegetables that I hated as a kid.
Fenrirwulf, however, is a different story altogether. As far as eating the vegetables is concerned, he likes what he likes and that's what he wants to eat. His parents didn't really force him to eat things he might not like, like mine did. Sometimes this makes it hard to plan a nutritious meal because there are things he doesn't like or doesn't want to try (like okra).
So, what's a girl to do? My answer to that is to hide the veggies in whatever you are cooking.
Last night, I made what we normally call Pasta Bake for our lunches this week. We combine spaghetti sauce, ground beef and rotini and top it with cheddar cheese and bake it in the oven. When I do things with commercially canned spaghetti sauce, I like to add things to it to make it seem more homemade. So, to one can of Hunt's spaghetti sauce, I added 1 pound of browned ground beef (browned in olive oil), an onion, 3 cloves of garlic, 2 cans of diced tomatoes, 2 large carrots and some spices (salt, pepper and italian seasoning). I looked through our freezers and our cabinets to see what other veggies we could find (to both stretch out the pasta for more meals and also add some more nutrients to our diet). In one of the freezers, I found a half bag of yellow squash (which is a veggie we both like but is not something we would normally put in spaghetti). So, I took it out, defrosted it, diced it and added it to the sauce. I dumped the sauce into a baking dish and added about a pound and a half of macaroni (I did not pre-cook the macaroni), a cup of part-skim mozzarella cheese and a quarter cup of shredded parmesan cheese and baked it all in the oven for about an hour.
Fenrirwulf saw me put the squash in and kind of made a face, but I carried through and put it in anyway.
Today, at lunch, I ate the pasta for the first time. As far as I could tell, the squash had broken down and become lost in all the pasta. I couldn't really taste the squash at all, either, but I knew it was in there. I think that if he had not seen me put it in the sauce pot, Fenrirwulf would have never known the squash was there.
Now I wonder what else I can make and hide some veggies in so that we are getting a more diverse diet. It may be worth looking through both The Sneaky Chef: Simple Strategies for Hiding Healthy Foods in Kids' Favorite Meals and Deceptively Delicious: Simple Secrets to Get Your Kids Eating Good Food .
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Menu for January 17 - January 30, 2008
01/16/08 is our grocery day for this paycheck. Here is our menu for this period:
01/17/08
01/20/08
01/17/08
- Breakfast
- Lunch
- Pasta Bake
- Dinner
- Salmon Cakes with Homemade Tartar Sauce, Au Gratin Potatoes, Salad
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies
- Breakfast
- Homemade Instant Oatmeal
- Lunch
- Pasta Bake
- Dinner
- Salmon Cakes with Homemade Tartar Sauce, Au Gratin Potatoes, Salad
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies
- Breakfast
- Homemade Instant Oatmeal
- Lunch
- Leftovers
- Dinner
- Turkey, Dressing, Green Beans
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies, Granola
01/20/08
- Breakfast
- Eggs, Bacon, Biscuits
- Lunch
- Leftovers
- Dinner
- Turkey, Dressing, Green Beans
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies, Granola
- Breakfast
- Homemade Instant Oatmeal
- Lunch
- Chicken Noodle Soup/Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya
- Dinner
- Spaghetti and Meatsauce
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies, Granola
- Breakfast
- Homemade Instant Oatmeal
- Lunch
- Chicken Noodle Soup/Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya
- Dinner
- Beanie Weenies (Made with homemade baked beans)
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies, Granola
- Breakfast
- Homemade Instant Oatmeal
- Lunch
- Chicken Noodle Soup/Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya
- Dinner
- Spaghetti and Meatsauce
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies, Granola
- Breakfast
- Homemade Instant Oatmeal
- Lunch
- Chicken Noodle Soup/Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya
- Dinner
- Pot Roast
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies, Granola
- Breakfast
- Homemade Instant Oatmeal
- Lunch
- Chicken Noodle Soup/Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya
- Dinner
- Pot Roast with Vegetables
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies, Granola
- Breakfast
- Sausage, Eggs, Biscuits
- Lunch
- Leftovers
- Dinner
- Fried Chicken, Hashbrown Casserole, Green Beans
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies, Granola
- Breakfast
- Bacon, Eggs, Grits
- Lunch
- Leftovers
- Dinner
- Fried Chicken, Hashbrown Casserole, Green Beans
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies, Granola
- Breakfast
- Homemade Instant Oatmeal
- Lunch
- Chicken Noodle Soup/Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya
- Dinner
- Hamburger Steak and Rice
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies, Granola
- Breakfast
- Homemade Instant Oatmeal
- Lunch
- Chicken Noodle Soup/Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya
- Dinner
- Blackened Chicken Salad
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies, Granola
- Breakfast
- Homemade Instant Oatmeal
- Lunch
- Chicken Noodle Soup/Chicken and Sausage Jambalaya
- Dinner
- Blackened Chicken Salad
- Snacks
- Apple Wheat Muffins, Homemade Yogurt, Brownies, Granola
Monday, January 14, 2008
Adventures in Bread Baking
So for some reason, I decided I wanted to bake some homemade bread on Sunday, from scratch, even went as far as to forgo the bread machine. The bread machine is fine when you just need to dump some ingredients and forget about them, but once you slice it, half the slices are mangled due to the mixing blade. Also the shape leaves something to be desired, the slices are two big to use two slices for a normal sized sandwich, but yet too small to cut in half for a serviceable one. Anyway, me not being a baker, I was a little surprised out how well it turned out. I followed the instructions at http://biology.clc.uc.edu/fankhauser/Cheese/Bread/BREAD_whole_wheat.htm and they were pretty clear cut and accurate. There were a few snags. First, due to Chandler being hot-natured and me being a cheap bastard, we keep the thermostat at a balmy 63 degrees. Not very friendly to the beasties that make bread rise. It only rose about half of what I the pics on the website suggested it should. Also, the taste is rather flat, Chandler says it needs salt and sugar and I agree. She thinks she can correct it, but only time will tell. Oh yeah, also, 3 out of the 4 loaves stuck to the pans. I brushed them with oil as suggested, but either that doesn't work or I misunderstood. The one non-stick pan I used (yes, Teflon is the spawn of Satan) made a pretty nice loaf if somewhat small. Despite all these minor imperfections, I am quite happy with how it turned out. Fankhauser's instructions on how to shape the loaves were perfect, each one came out with a nice, smooth top. The recipe as a whole came together quickly and easily, which is surprising due to my past record with baking. I am not a bad cook, I am just bad at following recipes. I preform a more freeform atmosphere where I can substitute at my whim. A big pot of chili is pretty forgiving, (I have yet to formulate a true recipe for it), but baking not so much. I ripped the bottom third off of one loaf trying to get it out of the pan. I think that loaf's destination may be croutons, something else I want to try at home. The other two that stuck are salvageable, but given that dull, lack-of-salt taste, they may end up also as croutons, or bread crumbs, or the ever-noble garlic toast.
I am actually eagerly awaiting my second go at this whole wheat bread recipe. All I am waiting on is an excuse to use up the first four loaves, and a recipe correction from Chandler. Other than her adding salt and sugar (that being in the form of honey and/or molasses) we will let the dough rise in the oven on its lowest setting next time. I will also be more careful about greasing up the pan, but whether I will resort to Baker's Joy or the old standby of Crisco, I think I will leave the decision to the heat of the moment.
I am actually eagerly awaiting my second go at this whole wheat bread recipe. All I am waiting on is an excuse to use up the first four loaves, and a recipe correction from Chandler. Other than her adding salt and sugar (that being in the form of honey and/or molasses) we will let the dough rise in the oven on its lowest setting next time. I will also be more careful about greasing up the pan, but whether I will resort to Baker's Joy or the old standby of Crisco, I think I will leave the decision to the heat of the moment.
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