Garden greens

I am enjoying an abundance of spinach, lettuce, and kale right now. I pick a fresh salad for lunch every day, but I realize there are still more greens than we can keep up with here. The Farmers Market doesn't start for another month, so we'll be on a green diet here.



Kale and spinach, before, freshly picked.



Kale and spinach after. It really shrinks, but it's good with sesame seeds, pine nuts, and fresh ground pepper.

Bread making, again, and other stuff I'm trying to do

I gave the bread machine a long hiatus, because I was somehow not finding enough time to even throw together the ingredients and let the machine do the work. But lately I've been thinking just ow hard it is to find good bread, something that has mostly organic ingredients and doesn't come in a plastic wrapper. Ugh, I've come to hate the ubiquitous plastic wrapping that our modern food must have. If I could eliminate the plastic wrapper, and all the energy it takes to ship a loaf of bread to my grocery store...I think it would make a difference.

Last night The Hermit was saying how he missed good homemade bread. So this morning, after the kids got on the bus at the ungodly hour of 6:30 AM, but they wanted to, and they woke up on their own, I put the stuff for a caraway rye in the bread machine. It didn't take too long, and it would be even quicker if I made up a dry mix, put it in jars, and just had to add the eggs and oil and water.

The loaf is almost gone as of this evening. All of the kids had PBJ sandwiches with it, and The Hermit and I got a taste with butter.

In other things, the next homemade item I want to try is salad dressings. I have all but sworn off Kraft and other major commercial brands, due to the amount of soy oil and corn syrup, and I'm thinking: I could probably make something better than the bottled variety, with extra virgin olive oil, vinegar, and fresh organic spices. I could store dressing in pint jars in the refrigerator, without buying and having to rinse and recycle new bottles.

It's one step at a time, this life I want to live.

stinging nettles for dinner

Does that very title give you goosebumps, like it does me? I admit, I was very skeptical about cooking and eating the things. After all, I've had enough run ins with them to know they can be very irritating in their raw form. They cause a blistering rash that lasts an hour or so.

But actually they are very good steamed or sauteed; once they are limp the chemical that causes the rash has been deactivated. They can be dried and steeped in a tea or infusion as well. Nettles are very rich in nutrients, even better than spinach or just about any other green.

These are the raw leaves. I wore gloves as I picked small plants and cut the leaves off. I don't know why some of them are purple on the underside; this disappeared with cooking.

I steamed them in a small amount of water, then added butter for flavor. I knew the amount of nettles I picked would not make for much of a meal, but The Hermit had a work function to attend tonight and I had no intention of inflicting this on the kids...yet. This was my substitute for spaghetti noodles. I'm trying to go gluten free, or almost so, for a while to see if I may be sensitive to it.

The nettles have an incredible rich green flavor, better than spinach or Swiss chard. But I think you'd have to have them picked young, and very fresh, to get the kind of flavor I experienced tonight. I guess I'm lucky to have them growing wild, in unexpected places like one of my garden beds. Maybe there's a market for them at the Farmers Market!

more owww

A day or two after the serrated knife incident, I burned my index finger on the same hand so subtly I didn't even know it for a while. Okay, I might have known that I was using a pot holder mitt that had a thin spot in it, and that pot holder mitt ended up in the trash, but I was surprised to wake up with a huge blister on that finger, two days later. Of course the blister broke off, then the raw sore rubbed against something, and well you know. Never use a worn oven mitt.

The thumb, miraculously, is almost healed.

Owww...

So, the lesson to be learned is this: Serrated knives and somewhat dry,tough bread are not a good combination.

I was trying to cut a loaf of good, organic, but day old bread, with a serrated knife.

Need I say more, except I didn't cut the entire tip of my right thumb off (I'm left handed), it just hurts.

Basil revelation

I had a revelation of sorts as I was cooking tonight. I just happened to need some dried basil, since I have no fresh this time of year, and I opened up a plastic jar of store bought basil. For some strange reason, I sniffed it. Nothing there, really. A vague sweet aroma, but that basil was clearly past its prime.

There were, however, several whole basil plants that had been stashed in the corner, dried, since the first frost in September. I sampled a leaf, and found it full-bodied, spicy, fragrant, unlike the store-bought basil. I proceeded to strip the leaves from most of the basil I had left, storing it in the jar I had recently emptied of store bought basil. There just is no comparison.

And, one can never get too much basil. I am upping my seedling production tenfold!

no deposit, no return

I hate packaging. Most of it is unrecyclable and it makes up the bulk of our garbage, which I would like to reduce to next to nil. When eating off something other than Chinets from Sam's Club becomes a viable alternative. :)

Glass, fortunately, is recyclable, although re-using it is the preferred alternative. To that end, brewing beer at home, storing it in re-usable glass bottles, and using the bottles for another batch of beer, seems to be a good option for reducing our impact on the planet. A little over a week ago I bottled our Baltic Porter, in bottles that had previously stored Three Hearted Ale and some Belgian Witbier. Using 23 ounce bottles reduces the number of bottles that must be washed, and who stops at just one 12 ounce beer anyway. :)

Unfortunately, our beer consumption still greatly exceeds our brewing capacity, so there is a net loss of screw top bottles to recycling, but any hobby that teaches a useful art is a step in the right direction.

venison jerky

My kids love jerky. I don't know how they developed a taste for it, since until yesterday, I had never made homemade jerky. I suppose it was some of the expensive, store-bought variety that got them addicted. It is a pretty healthy snack, and we had some venison steaks in the freezer, so this unexpected, long weekend I thought I'd try making some.

Two words: Easy. Delicious. The only thing is, it takes a bit of patience while it's drying in the oven.

The hardest part may be slicing the meat thin enough, which fortunately I didn't have to do because the venison steaks were pretty thin already. A good sharp fillet knife would work for slicing thicker cuts, and if the meat is partially frozen it's easier to cut thin.

The strips are coated with a small amount of liquid smoke and seasoning. I used, as I do for so many other dishes, Louisiana brand Cajun seasoning. Then when the excess moisture has evaporated a bit, the meat strips are placed in a covered bowl overnight in the refrigerator.

The next day, lay the strips on the oven racks, turn the oven on to about 150, just warm enough to dry the meat, and wait about 6 hours, checking every once in a while. When it's dry enough it should still bend a little, but not feel plump or "juicy" anywhere. The seasoned flavor really comes out when most of the moisture is gone.

We need to get more deer next year.

By the way, the recipe book that appears in this and the preceding post is a wealth of tips and recipes for wild game: Wild in the Kitchen, by Bob Schranck. It's probably out of print, so I'm trying not to spill too much on our copy.

pickled northern pike

The Hermit and I enjoy pickled fish on crackers as a winter appetizer. Pickled herring is readily available at the grocery store, but we much prefer pickled northern pike which can cost $4-$5 for a tiny jar containing maybe ten tiny chunks of fish. Luckily, northern pike are abundant here in Minnesota and the process of pickling them isn't exactly rocket science. And I think home-pickled northerns taste much better.

I suppose a catchy name for this recipe would be "pickled pickerel", but around here we don't call members of the Esocid family "pickerel". They are northern pike, or just simply "northern". Before the days of heavy fishing pressure and big motors and fish finders, there would be a 20 pound lunker or two lurking in every lake. Nowadays it is more common to find abundant numbers of northerns that are mostly 3 pounds or less. A lot of people don't like to mess with these "hammer handles", even though you can get good fillets off them, because they have "Y" bones that are like the little plastic filaments that hold the tags to your new shirt. These bones can be removed by cutting the fillets a certain way, but if you pickle the fish the bones dissolve completely.

I work with a guy who has recently rediscovered the tradition of fish spearing. He really doesn't like eating fish, however, so recently he gave me fillets from two northerns he had speared. I didn't want to bother with cutting out the "Y" bones, so instead I pickled them. I had recently "practiced" on some store-bought northern fillets, with excellent results.

With any wild-caught fish, there is the possibility of tapeworm cysts in the flesh, so it's a good idea to freeze the fillets for 48 hours, which will kill any cysts. Then, the first step is to cut the fish into bite size chunks. Put the fish into containers and cover with a brine of 2 cups white vinegar, 1/2 cup pickling salt, and about 1/2 cup pickling spice. Recipes will vary on how long to keep the fish in the brine, but usually it works out to be 5-6 days when I do it. Shake the fish every so often to make sure the brine gets everywhere.

After the brine is drained, soak the fish in fresh water for about half an hour or more. While the fish are soaking, prepare a mixture of 4 cups white vinegar, 2 cups sugar, 3 T. pickling spice and 2 tsp. mustard seed. Bring to a boil and let cool. Caution: if you let it boil for a few minutes in an area that is not well ventilated, you won't be able to breathe in the kitchen. Ask me how I know.

Then, layer the fish in jars with slices of white onion, and cover with the sauce. I pour a little white wine in each jar if I have any, and add some whole peppercorns. Refrigerate for a week or so, and enjoy. The home economist food police say pickled fish should be consumed within one month, but I see no reason why it would not keep longer in the refrigerator. Freshness dates on commercial pickled fish are up to a year.

The permaculture of domesticity

Sharon at Casaubon's Book recently had a wonderful post with some thoughts on managing domestic tasks more efficiently. I generally dislike reading "household hints" type articles because they tend to offer solutions that are too specific, or irrelevant, delivered in a perky, know-it-all tone. However, Sharon, who almost has a Ph.D, takes the art of homemaking to a new intellectual level, and does so with eloquence and humor.

Permaculture can be defined as a design system for creating sustainable habitats by following nature's patterns; it stresses minimizing inputs and integrating elements to create a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. The idea was originally developed in relation to agricultural systems, but I can definitely see the applicability to running a household. Check out Sharon's philosophical framework for domestic permaculture.

I hope there's a Part 3 on the way!

living simply, acting deliberately

So what's a full-time modern career woman fisheries biologist like myself doing writing about being a homemaker?

I have given a lot of thought lately to my lifestyle. I am straddling the line between two worlds: the work-to-live lifestyle, which some would call Babylon, and my dream Utopia of a self-sufficient homestead, driven by spirit. While I don't think I will completely ever make the leap from the former to the latter, I've gone further towards the latter than I ever imagined.

Lately, however, walking the line has seemed a bit overwhelming. I have come to the realization that the double-income, suburban family is an impossible pursuit; divorce rates and alienated children attest to this. Heck, my husband is fortunate enough to work from home and spend a lot of time tending things here, in exchange for a few evening and weekend obligations, but still, how does one come home from work at 5:30, prepare a satisfying meal, wash the dishes, tend to the childrens' needs, and the needs of the marriage? Impossible, I tell you.

While I cannot yet shed the yoke of the full time job (health benefits are pretty hard to beat), I am striving for ways to make this life work much in the way I want it to. Specifically, I want to:

1. Maintain a peaceful household. That is, one in which I (or others) don't break down into fits of raised voices and violence.

2. Maintain an inviting household. I want my children to come home to fresh cookies and the smell of bread baking, and a stew cooking on the wood stove. I want the home to be comfortable, uncluttered, and homey.

3. Be as self-sufficient as possible. Yeah, I'm even thinking spinning and knitting wool socks. In my spare time, of course. When I'm done playing my homemade music for the night and drinking my home brewed beer. I want it all, dammit!

4. Live a joyful life. I'm fairly good at seeing the joy in day-to-day life, and I'm hoping to make myself more contagious.

5. Follow the Spirit-led path. I have some obstacles regarding Christianity that I can't seem to get over, but nevertheless I want to know that my actions are guided from above, from some God that is still speaking to us.

I really desire to be a homemaker. That commitment has not come quickly or easily; I have failed at one poorly-timed experiment in giving up the working life. Oh, right, make that two experiments. But now more than ever I feel that when I pull out of the driveway and make my 30 mile commute to work, I am missing out on the more important part of life.

So this blog will be my musings on trying to live more deliberately, to move to a more homemaking lifestyle, to pack as much living as I can into the hours I have. I do have another blog, but it seems to have taken on a life of its own and I want this one to be more focused on homemaking, and spiritual, issues, things that don't always blend seamlessly into my current blog.

My accomplishments for the day: I took the day off work, because The Hermit was on a business trip and I just could not deal with getting everyone to daycare and school and babysitting two puppies at work and doing chores after work. I met the older two kids at the end of the driveway after school because it was raining and somewhat cold, and I didn't want them to have to walk the distance to the house. I cooked spaghetti for dinner, with mostly home or locally grown ingredients. I gave my son a guitar lesson and helped my daughter with her piano practice. And, I took some time for myself and played some good music. :)