Blooming Where We Are Planted

The Zero Waste Family

2011-03-17T21:46:00.001-04:00

http://www.zerowastehome.blogspot.com/

no more throwaways

2011-03-17T21:44:00.000-04:00

OK, I'm officially inspired. I'm taking on the challenge of eliminating purchases in packaging. The Johnson's of California have been on a zero waste journey for the past number of years. If they can do it with 2 kids, surely we can do it in our small household. More later as I undertake the effort.

Benefits of Goats Milk

2010-01-20T10:21:00.002-05:00

Did you Know?

When compared to cow's milk products like cream cheese, goat cheese is lower in fat, calories and cholesterol. It also provides more calcium and fewer carbohydrates than cream cheese. Even though goat cheese has less calories, it has a full, rich and creamy flavor.

Goat cheeses are easier to digest than cow's milk cheeses because the fat cells are smaller, thereby more closely resembling human milk. This also allows the fat to be broken down and more easily assimilated.

Many people who are lactose intolerant or have other milk-related allergies can eat cheeses made from goat milk.

Thanksgiving 2009, Local Style

2009-11-27T23:11:00.000-05:00

Thanksgiving 2009 is a wrap, with leftovers to enjoy for a few more days. All 12 family members got involved, with some helping with food prep, table prep or cleanup. It was truly a joint effort and lots of fun.

Here's a list of the locally obtained foods:

Tom Turkey came to us courtesy of Tom and the Widmers at Creekside Farm in Goshen. He was alive and happy and tipped the scales at 19 pounds until he met with his demise on Monday. We salute him and his contribution to our Thanksgiving celebration.

We also enjoyed other local foods including gravy made from wine from St. Julian's winery in Paw Paw, Michigan and garlic from Green Meadow Farm in Middlebury. The dressing was made from saved bits of our homemade bread, oregano from our indoor herb garden, parsley from Creekside and local chestnuts and onions from the farmers market. The mashed potatoes were compliments of Grandpa's garden in LaGrange. There was corn we froze this summer from Sweet Corn Charlie's, raw carrots and cauliflower from the farmer's market, (the Bontragers and also Dale at White Yarrow Farm) pumpkin dip with pie pumpkins also purchased from the Bontragers at the farmer's market, chevre and camembert cheese from Charlie Bussard's goat milk. There was green bean casserole with beans I canned from Uncle Paul's garden in Goshen, and the honey in the cranberry sauce was from Creekside Farms in Goshen.

The local food abundance at our table was astonishing in its diversity, flaover and ability to nourish us and add to our enjoyment of a special day. Chuck read this blessing before our dinner, and all of us shared something we were thankful for.

"We receive this food in gratitude to all beings
Who have helped to bring it to our table,
And vow to respond in turn to those in need
With wisdom and compassion."

Thank you, local farmers and cooks, for our food!

Choose Real Milk

2009-11-12T10:28:00.001-05:00

Kitchen Remake

2009-11-08T23:14:00.001-05:00

I've always thought of a kitchen remake in terms of new cabinets and countertops. Instead of new cabinets and countertops, we now have a more cooking-friendly kitchen. On the journey of eating local foods, this remake has become a function of needing the proper equipment and organization to really cook again. It doesn't take much kitchen equipment or organization to open and heat food in packages and cans.

Some of the changes began in late spring, with a trip to St. Vincent's, Goodwill and Salvation Army to buy canning jars and freezer boxes in preparation for summer food preservation. One find was a large supply of old blue Ball canning jars. These quart jars turned out to be so much thicker than the modern ones, I couldn't fit 7 of them in the water bath canner at once. Their rims are also so thick that they didn't seal reliably with modern lids. This led to some research into the jars and the discovery that they were actually made in Muncie, Indiana in the 1930's from sand from Lake Michigan! Talk about a local product! Despite not being able to use them for canning, they have historic and local value, and are beautiful to boot.

Other changes were more daunting, and caused me to revisit a scary memory in order to make the change. After much fuming about not having a good way to preserve green beans (I don't like the taste of frozen ones), I bought a pressure canner. The first batch of green beans was an anxious affair, as I recalled the last experience of using a pressure cooker 20 years ago. I was cooking (not canning) dried beans, and one clogged the pressure outlet, causing the cooker to explode and fly off the stove and across the kitchen. The cooker made a big gouge in the cabinet 8 feet away. No one was hurt, but I never quite got over the fright and the potential deadly consequences if one of my children had been in the line of fire of that pressure bomb. Despite the fact that I was canning only, not cooking with the pressure canner, it was a tense experience to use one again. I am happy to report that all went well, and we have beautiful jars of green beans in the pantry to show for the effort.

I resurrected the food processor which had been gathering dust in the basement, and the bread machine. I purchased a more functional convection-toaster oven that allows me to bake small pans of food without heating an oven. I bought a roaster, a big stainless steel skillet and a stockpot. I asked for some decent knives for Christmas, which my son and daughter-in-law kindly supplied. My best friend and excellent cook RoyAnne got me great, high quality spatulas and a pastry brush for my birthday, which were a great addition.

We have been purchasing goat's milk every week since April, which has spawned the requirement for an entire world of equipment to transform the milk into the products we use, such as cheese, yogurt, butter, and ice cream. I got a larger yogurt maker, and I also picked up a counter top ice cream maker which has turned out to be a great addition. We can now have homemade ice cream rather than store bought. yum! Then there are the milk containers, cheese molds, glass cheese storage containers, cheese cloth, cultures, salt, strainers, a cheese hanging hook, ladles, sterilizer, thermometers, etc., etc. Weekly bread making has its own set of requirements in the availability of a fairly large quantity of flour, yeast, honey, and oil.

Then there is the whole question of storing all of this equipment and food. I have a typical L-shaped kitchen configuration in a subdivision ranch house. I'm fortunate to have a pantry, but as my friend pointed out, an entire wall of pantry would be just a good start to accomodate my needs. Since I don't have a wall of pantry, it has required a great deal of creativity regarding the storing and accessing of equipment and food, and has caused me to rework the storage space several times (and I'm still not done).

Plans are in the works for a small root cellar in the basement (blue styrofoam insulation surrounding a metal shelf unit) to store potatoes, onions, and squash. We repurposed a metal storage cabinet from my old office for garage storage of large cooking items such as the roaster, crockpot and canning supplies. This is a great kitchen cabinet space saver. My next challenge is reorganizing the spices, grains and flours to be more accessible. I also have storage in the basement, but have found I tend to not use equipment that is on a different floor than where I am cooking.

The decision to eat locally is a decision that is made in the planning and preparation stage and is enacted on one's feet in the kitchen every day. It requires shopping lists, good recipes, and washing lots of dirty dishes. If I don't have the right equipment and food on hand and if it is not easy to use and clean, reliable, and at my fingertips, eating good tasting, local food gives way quickly to reaching for something in a package.

Food Preservation '09

2009-10-30T23:41:00.000-04:00

Food preservation 2009 by the numbers:
11 bags frozen carrots
16 qts green beans
11 qts frozen applesauce
19 qts whole tomatoes
7 pints & 3 qts chili sauce
4 qts spaghetti sauce
5 qts tomato juice
17 bags frozen broccoli
6 bags frozen red peppers
6 bags frozen edamame
5 pints blueberry jam
3 pints strawberry/rhubarb jam frozen
3 pints wild raspberry jam
11 pints & 1 qt frozen corn
4 bags dried green beans
21 bags frozen blueberries
4 bags frozen spinach
18 bags frozen strawberries
5 bags frozen cauliflower

eating locally is HARD WORK (and rewarding too)

2009-10-04T23:58:00.000-04:00

It's been an educational spring, summer and fall, with numerous lessons learned, oftentimes the hard way, with hands in a bowl of produce or a sink full of mountains of dirty dishes, with aching backs and feet. Here is a short synopsis of a few of the more memorable ones.

A. Don't start plants in the spring indoors in a house with practically no south facing windows
B. Don't grow vegetables outdoors in cement-like soil with no full sun
C. Don't wait until Oct. 2 to try to find peaches to can or freeze
E. If one starts making applesauce at 5 p.m., one will still be working at 12 a.m.
F. You get about 4 quarts of spaghetti sauce out of 1.5 pecks of tomatoes. And every large container you own will be dirty
G. Real butter is real easy and real fun to make. So is real ice cream
H. It takes an awful lot of wild blackberries to make 3 lousy pints of jam
I. Those cheap Ronco food dehydrators are cheap for a good reason; they take FOREVER to dry anything, and then only if you move the trays about every 2 hours
J. It is possible to overcome fear and use a pressure canner again (a pressure cooker "blew up" on me 25 years ago, and just last week I used one again for the first time, with nary a hint of danger)
K. I have a long ways to go to mastery of mozzarella
L. I remember now why I gave up canning years ago (I already have a full time job)

Given (L.), why did I decide to attempt, this summer, to: 1.) grow vegetables, 2.) preserve the local harvest, 3.) learn how to make various milk products, and 4.) make all our bread?

This last point deserves a bit more elaboration. Why indeed would we go to all this trouble? We didn't do it to save money, although I suspect we will if we keep this up. There was an upfront minor investment in food preparation materials, canning and food storage equipment. But the savings is likely offset by the potential value of our labor, if we had used the time spend on food production to earn money. So it wasn't about the money. We could say that it was for the environment with little transportation costs for our locally produced food. Or that it was because factory farm foods are less nutrient rich than locally produced food. Or that we objected to the unethical treatment of both animals and the people who work in these industries.

While all this is true, and these reasons did cause us to change our food habits, there is a more fundamental reason I have persisted. As I began to shift to using more local foods, I became aware of a subtle sense of connection that was absent in the preparation of supermarket foods. I began to feel I was doing something of real value. After years spent working in the business world, I craved doing work that I could see and experience a result, and hold in my hands, something I could offer to others that I was sure would nurture and heal them. I want to see a direct result of my efforts. I want to nourish us, our family and friends. I want to eat food that tasted good. No, more than good, food that tastes fabulous, alive. I want to be a part of the dance of soil, rain and sun to hands that nurture plants to hands that pick, prepare and preserve. I want to know the animals that lay their eggs and create the milk. I want to know the men and women who milk and gather eggs and feed the animals. I want to feel connected to something, to some place and know that I am a part of a larger dance of creation and re-creation.

We are planted at this point in time on this piece of earth and we have a choice, to either bloom where we are now or wither and die slowly of nutrient and visceral connection starvation. I chose to bloom where I am planted. To be present to my world and to the work of my hands and life.

Bloom here now.

BLOOM AND CHEESE SEPT

2009-10-04T22:20:00.001-04:00

Click here to view these pictures larger

Dinner from China and India

2009-09-18T10:43:00.000-04:00

Thanks to China, India (and daughter) and Charlie & Joy's chickens, we enjoyed a great meal last evening, and didn't have to leave home or purchase a thing from outside our area.

Dinner menu:

- egg casserole with goat ricotta, goat mozzarella and Charlie's chicken's eggs
- buttermilk biscuits with goat buttermilk and goat butter on top
- salad with goat feta
- zucchini cake with Charlie's chicken's eggs, goat butter in the cake and goat milk frosting

When I was preparing dinner I was not consciously attempting to see how many goat and egg products I could use. It was only upon reflection that it became obvious how our lives and our kitchen has been transformed.

It is remarkable to experience day to day the variety and abundance of use of these simple products. The benefits to our health and well being of eating locally grown and home created foods has been evident. The benefits are evident to our wallet as well, as the cost to purchase mozzarella, feta, ricotta, and other products would be substantial, even if we only purchased the grocery variety. Imagine the cost if we were to try to purchase all these products with the "organic" label attached.

Thank you, Charlie, Joy, China, India and company! You do important work!

Hooray for Michelle Obama and the White House Garden & Farmers' Market!

2009-09-17T15:24:00.001-04:00

Plans for White House Farmers' Market Move Forward

Shared via AddThis

2009-08-31T15:00:00.001-04:00

Here's a few pictures of our local food journey.

http://thelocalfoodjourney.shutterfly.com/

Time to Change Our Habits

2009-08-31T14:03:00.001-04:00

Article in Mother Earth News this month:

It's Time to Throw Out the Throwaway Economy

The Story of Stuff, a great 20 minute video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLBE5QAYXp8

Shared via AddThis

Charlie milking goat

2009-08-31T09:08:00.001-04:00

Click here to view this video

2009-08-30T22:46:00.000-04:00

The table was groaning, and after dinner, so were we! For more pictures of the event and activities of the Eating Locally group at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Elkhart, go to:
http://eatinglocallygroupuufe.shutterfly.com/

2009-08-28T16:52:00.000-04:00

Celebrate a week of eating locally in Indiana! Eat something grown in Indiana every day from September 6 to 12. My goal will be to eat everything local that week, at least from September 8th on. We will be camping in Michigan until September 8, which will make this a bit more challenging until then.

http://www.goinglocal-info.com/my_weblog/going-local-week.html