Poor cat.
I may be a farm-girl but I had never heard of fainting goats until this morning. If they're new to you, too, here's a video. My favorite moment is around :50
Oh, dear. After being away from the house 13 hours, I came home and guess who was waiting for me? The big girls!
-she didn't say Val is sexy but I thought it would be a good neighbor plug
Baby-doll climbed curled up on my lap and I rocked her whilst Baby-girl told me all about her new teacher, her old teacher and how well they got on. It was fun seeing them but Tante was fairly tired. Finally, I started my evening process (cleaning lunch dishes toted to work, doing laundry, eating supper and cooking the next day's food). The girls wanted to play my out-of-tune piano. Fine with me! They banged on it about 30 seconds and shifted into using some free weights I haven't touched in goodness knows how long. They crack me up.
I told her, "Sometimes when we learn new words, it's fun to experiment with using them." That's the kind of Ta I be.
Ah, yes, and we've reached the time in the summer when my husband and I look at each other pitifully and wonder why the fuck we keep doing this. It happens. Over the next month and a half or so, until the growing season really goes kaput, we'll groan and mutter and whine and rub each other's aching shoulders (at least I don't have two cords of wood to split...my heart and shoulders ache for my poor husband and his wood-splitting chores) and slog through it all.
In addition to the previously referenced subscription to Gourmet, I also get a magazine called Mother Earth News. It's full of great information about gardening and composting and building your own solar contraptions and all sorts of other stuff for people who are just sick to death of the overconsumption, wastefulness, and helplessness of modern life. In this issue, one of the letters suggests that this way of life--the canning, the homemade solar contraptions, etc.--is not, in fact, a "simple" life. She suggests that going to the store and buying canned spaghetti sauce is "simpler" than canning your own. She has a point, on the one hand; it's a lot of bloody work. (Hot work, too: The temperature around my pickle station today, as I was putting up jars of oregano-scented giardiniera, was 103 F, which I believe is the official boiling point of my brain).
On the other hand, I think she's missing the point. The idea that this is the "simple" life (although I also find that to be a sort of silly thing to call it) is that it's simpler in terms of the technology and systems required to run it. The canned spaghetti sauce in the store has a lot of technological support, from the types of tomatoes that have been bred for commercial processing to the mechanical harvesting to the trucks that deliver it to your store and the various systems that the store itself requires. Certainly, that sauce is simple for you, the consumer, but nothing else about it is simple at all. On the other hand, the technology required to grow and harvest paste tomatoes and then cook and can them in your own kitchen is practically medieval, transparent, and available to all (or pretty close). Similarly, hanging my clothes out on the clothesline to dry in the sun is not simpler for me; indeed, it's a pain in the ass. However, in terms of technology and energy use, it's vastly simpler than using a dryer (besides just the obvious, we also require no dryer sheets as no static builds up in our clothes). So, I guess I'm saying that "simple" for you on a micro level takes a lot of (often invisible) complexity; pain in the ass for you means simple on a macro level.
Anyway, I've begun a new offensive on winter: I am dehydrating kale. Kale is one thing we have tons and tons of. It's really a shame that more people here don't eat kale (they don't--I tried selling some of our excess at the farmer's market, and people had no idea what to do with such an item. "Wash it, cut it up, cook it with some bacon," said I, but still no takers. Sigh.) since it is one of the few things that will grow here way past frost and be happy about it. We actually have three varieties of kale this year which, admittedly, seems excessive (we have that Tuscan black kale, a Scotch blue curled kale, and a Red Russian--they don't taste a whole lot different, but there are textural differences). Anyway, it is producing so well that we have started wondering what the heck to do with it all, so now we're drying it. Greens dry fairly well and then you can add them all winter long to soups and rice while it cooks or whatever, quite easily.
I've also discovered a little trick that I think is quite clever. I already mentioned, I think, that I am trying to stockpile herbal teas, because my son and I drink a lot of tea during winter. Well, we've been out picking wild raspberries (I think these are actually thimbleberries, a relative of raspberries, but what the hell?), and I had noted previously that most "raspberry" herbal teas actually contain raspberry leaves rather than raspberries. Same with strawberry. Anyway, so now whenever we go pick the berries, I get some of the leaves, too, and now I have a significant stockpile of those, along with my chamomile and goldenrod and such. It's kind of amazing to think how much money I would have spent on that this winter had I not finally thought to just start bringing some of the leaves home. I'm going to go ahead and dry the leaves of our strawberry plants at the end of the season, too. I mean, why not?
So, tomorrow, I have to: harvest beets; dehydrate most of the beet greens along with some more kale; pickle the beets; harvest coriander, dill seed, and poppy seeds and get them in the solar contraption to dry; harvest chamomile and calendula and get them to drying; feed the worms (we have a vermicomposter, aka "the worm farm," in the basement, and if I don't feed them, then they don't poop for me) and get their poop and spread it where we just harvested the All-Blue potatoes tonight; plant daikon and other radishes in that spot, amongst the worm castings; experiment with the cucumbers (I'm going to try freezing cucumbers that have been purged, i.e., salted and allowed to drain thoroughly; I'm wondering if purging the cucumbers will let them freeze successfully. Purging eggplant before freezing it works a charm in keeping it a reasonable texture, so I'm hoping it might work for cukes. And, besides, for a lot of applications I purge the cukes first, anyway. So...maybe. It's worth a shot, anyway); make chokecherry something or other, probably jelly and syrup since we have a lot of bleedin chokecherries this year (I want to make chokecherry wine, but I just don't have that in me right now).
All of that is just to say that I'm sorry I'm not responding to anyone right now or reading anyone else's blogs or emailing or anything at all right now. If I get all distracted by actually corresponding with friends and family, the beets and kale will rot in the ground and we'll starve to death this winter. Alright, that's an exaggeration, I know. But, still. After another 6 weeks, I'll be back to my usual prolix bitching. Well, I might be around more in a couple of weeks because that's when my semester starts again, so I'll be online anyway.
Oh, man, now it's getting late and I did not get the onion relish done...so I guess I have to do that tomorrow, too. These computers are the biggest damned distraction ever.
One last thing...has anyone reading this read any Murakami Haruki? I just read After Dark, and that was the first Murakami book I ever read, and...I don't get it. All the reviews I read said it was brilliant, but if it's brilliant, then I am clearly not. I mean, I understood it, but I don't understand what's supposed to be so brilliant about it, I guess, which means I'm missing something? Or...? The dialogue really grated on my nerves badly, but since I was reading it in translation I can't necessarily blame Murakami for that. Feck. Maybe it just irritated me that two of the main characters make a show of asserting that they're totally not the type of people who go to love hotels, like it's some kind of terrible thing to go to a love hotel. THERE'S NO SHAME IN GOING TO LOVE HOTELS. Anyway, it isn't just me. I also recently read (finally!) No Country for Old Men, and I not only got it but sooooo much loved it. It could have been me. I spend way too much time in the summers analyzing canning and pickling cookbooks. Sometimes I can't remember what it's like to think of things that do not involve vinegar.
Yes, I'm thinking this in a pirate accent.
OK, Maura. Here's a complete meal just for you that will accomplish what the NuWave Oven claims to do for you and probably tastes a whole lot better. You will be baking everything in the oven at the same time reducing the amount of energy required to cook the meal. This is a dinner that's nice enough to impress guests. For tonight's dinner we are going to have roasted chicken and vegetables with rosemary and olive oil.
Roasted Chicken
- One whole chicken
- olive oil
- salt
- pepper
- rosemary
Remove the chicken from the packaging and wash it off under cool running water. Take out any giblets that are inside. Pull off any big hunks of fat that you see near the openings. If you see any feathers still sticking to it, pull them out. Pat the chicken dry.
Add salt, pepper, and rosemary into both cavities of the chicken. You can also gently pull away the skin on the breast to put seasonings in there.
Rub the skin all over with olive oil or spray with cooking spray. Truss your bird up nice and tight. This is not an art project. It doesn't have to be pretty. Just make sure it can't get away!
Place your chicken in the baking pan and pop it into the oven. It will probably need to cook about 30 minutes per pound. I check to see if it's done by wiggling the drumsticks (they will be very loose) and tipping the pan a bit so that juices run out of the abdomen (the big cavity). The juices should be clear. Transfer to a new dish before carving. Be sure to remove the twine before serving.
Roasted Vegetables
- You need an assortment of fresh (or frozen if you must) vegetables. I have used potatoes, carrots, and onion because that's what I had on hand. Use what you like.
- Cooking spray (I used olive oil PAM)
- Oil (I used olive oil)
- salt
- pepper
- rosemary (I used dried, but fresh would be better)
- baking dish with lid
Preheat your oven to 450 degrees. Spray the baking dish and lid with cooking spray (or you can rub it with oil if you don't have any cooking spray). Wash the vegetables and peel if needed. Cut them up into bite size pieces. I layer them in the dish with dense veggies (like potatoes and carrots) on the bottom and watery veggies (like onions and bell pepper) on the top. This allows the juices from the watery veggies to run down onto the dense veggies blending the flavors better. Salt and pepper to taste (you can always add more later if you don't get enough on them). I used about a tablespoon of dried rosemary. Drizzle olive oil over the top (maybe 2-3 tablespoons? I don't measure it.) [Note: I'm showing you enough veggies for about 4 people. We like leftovers.] Put the lid on the dish and bake for about 1 hour (stir it about half way through) until the veggies are done.
Here's what it will look like when you are done.
Valuable cooking notes:
Your chicken will most likely take longer to cook than the veggies so prepare it first and pop it in the oven while you're preparing the veggies. You want everything to come out of the oven at the same time. If the bird takes a bit longer than you anticipated it won't hurt the veggies to cook a bit longer.
If you wish you can prep the veggies a day ahead and put the baking dish in the refrigerator. If you choose to do this don't add the spices until you are ready to put it in the oven.
If you have nice variety of colors and textures in you veggies this is all the food you need to serve (I would have preferred something green thrown in that dish.) If you don't feel you have quite enough you can easily flesh out the meal with a tossed salad and fresh loaf of French bread. Include a bottle of wine and you have a feast!
Ken and I usually only eat the drumsticks and thighs on the first night. Tonight I think I'll make chicken quesadillas with the leftovers. Oh, and the rest of the veggies? Well, I also had a piece of leftover grilled pork from Saturday night which I cut up and threw into the leftovers of that. Today I got a fresh zucchini out of the garden which I will cut up, steam, and toss into the dish. Wednesday night it'll get tossed into the oven to be reheated for dinner.
** Maya, you'll be interested in this.**
The new voxers may not be aware but regular neighbors know I have the hots for Ira Flatow. Here's a 13 minute piece. Is the guy speaking strongly, sensationalist or simply direct?
I'll call it "Kiss Yer Arse Goodbye, World."
-also known as "For the people who bought an iPhone...you'll need to be saving as much scratch as possible for a while"
Say you're in B&N having a cuppa when you spot a groovy book. Hold onto your $4 hot beverage! Don't hand over the cash for that outrageously-priced book; look up the ISBN for a "biz-rate/ google-checkout" style price comparison.
I've added this to my homescreen (free, I manually typed it into Safari and clicked on the plus sign "add" icon) and I will use it. Sorry for the elcrappola screen shot. It looks better on the iPhone.
I have just recently become aware of a fellow Vox friend and quilter from Saudi Arabia. She has posted the sweetest story about her son and his bunny quilt. You can read it here. So sweet :-)
