Posts labeled “garden”

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Garden Recipe: Spaghetti Squash Lasagna

There's so many garden recipes I have been cooking up lately to use up our fresh garden produce, but I have hardly had a second to post them on the blog. For now? Here's a new family favorite: Spaghetti Squash Lasagna. It's adapted from some magazine pullout from long ago, but you can really just fly on the cuff with this one.

I recommend cooking option 2, simply because it cooks more thoroughly and evenly. If using the microwave, just make sure that the squash is all the way cooked. Pierce with a fork and stick the entire thing in the microwave. At the end of cooking, pull out the fork again and check for tenderness. Then you cut it open, throw away the seeds and gross strings around the seeds, then scrape the flesh out into a bowl.

So cook it up, scrape out the flesh, and season to taste with butter, salt, pepper, and italian seasonings.

We used pork that we raised in the backyard. I have to admit a few things: we definitely eat meat more sparingly now that we raise our own meat. And B) never been much of a piggy eater but this pork has been a delicious protein boost in the home.

So we're about to start our layers. Spray a 9X13 pan with cooking spray, then we're ready to go.

Mostly mozzarella, with a sprinkling of full-flavored italian cheeses does the trick nicely. I love to buy the already grated canister called "Mario Batali Italian 4 cheese blend". Sam's Club has it and it has aged provolone, asiago, parmesan & romano shredded cheese. This will add a lot of flavor to the dish.

You repeat the layers twice *with the exception of the last layer of cheese. Save that for the last 5 minutes of cooking*. Got it?

So from bottom up layer: half squash, half meat, sauce, then cheese. Now repeat but save the last layer of cheese.

Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. Then sprinkle last layer of cheese and bake for 5 minutes longer or until cheese is melted. Let stand 10 minutes.

Garnish options: Fresh Parsley
Other options: add chopped olives with your meat layer.

Enjoy!

Labels: garden, recipe

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Writhing With Joy

I am currently in my harvest paralysis. In the corner of the kitchen lies a basket of corn, picked 5 days ago, still waiting to be shucked, boiled, cooled, cut, bagged, and frozen. I'm signing it off as a starchy mess to be sent to the chickens.

However! Celebrations are in order partly because I actually got most of my corn into my freezer, and it was still tender, delicious, and sweet.

I'm not sure if my absolute joy and honestly is coming through in this photo. Seriously, about 75% of my two outside rows of corn presented gooey chewing worms having breakfast, lunch, and dinner in the garden. By the end, I had a cereal bowl half-filled with worms forked out of the corn, which were then thrown to the chickens (seriously, are you thinking you need chickens yet? They are awesome).

Last year? I probably would have been a little grossed out by this, and maybe disheartened that the corn was diseased or something.

This year? It was proof of good food insurance. It was a little annoying, but evidence I had grown organic food...as opposed to science.

Earlier this year we watched the documentary "The Future of Food". It was fascinating! I learned about the basic operations of genetic modification of food as well as the green revolution and the use of pesticides and herbicides. Then I learned that there has been developed corn that is actually registered as an insecticide. Every kernel has been genetically modified so that any grub, worm, or bug that eats it will die!

The result? Beautiful unblemished corn that looks healthy and ready for dinner. Which makes humans delight to eat it, because it's so pretty and because we are not worms. Also, science tastes delicious as opposed to food. Mr. Twinkie even told me so.

So this year? I delighted in my worms. I killed them quick with help from my chickens. We cut around the mess they made on the cob. But in the end, I knew my corn was food...not science.

Please watch this clip from the film. It's really long, but the part about corn is between minutes 5:00 and 6:00.

Enjoy!

p.s. sometimes I eat science. I try not to, but it happens. Cinnamon bears people!

Labels: garden, responsible agriculture

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Happy To Announce

It's a harvest moon, and for the very first time...

and it was delicious!

Labels: garden

Monday, July 26, 2010

For the Love of Men and Land

In 2008, we left our little Victorian house with neighbors 20 feet away on two sides. We opted for a change of scenery and a steadier, more rooted, pace to life. We felt so blessed to find a home in a nice neighborhood that already had a finished basement apartment. Mortgage eater built in--awesome!

My baby was 7 months old, and I was just picking myself up from some annoying and dangerous hormonal fluctuations. I prayed that the environs would lift my heart and bring me back to myself.

What started as 4 baby chicks and an experiment at gathering eggs has blossomed, if not exploded. A handful of hens soon became 15. A year later some goats were added to the mix. The next season a couple of pigs as well as some raised vegetable beds.

The Mister of the House has made it all happen! I am forever at the crossroads of decision and what-iffing. Because our baby goats are over the land limit, they are not a permanent fixture. My heart smiled after the birth of the baby goats, when The Mister exclaimed: I feel like I should keep growing my herd!

Indeed our heart and our dreams are growing bigger than our single acre.

For our family, and our childhood love of nature that was lost with careers and bill-paying, we have grown so much by just having a little piece of our own dirt. It has seemed like a dream come true in so many ways.

And then I remembered something from long ago. Something I had yearned for to the depths of my soul, and had somehow forgotten. How is that possible?

Enter Mrs. Olsen into Florida jungles. It's 1997. I'm single right? Still in the middle of my schooling. No money. Wearing a dress for a year and a half straight while inviting sweaty southerners to come check out the message.

It was there as a missionary, where I was only known as "Sister Anderson", that I discovered the power of prayer. The focus of my new prayers? Maybe I sensed my student life would never catch up to real estate growth? Or perhaps it was me knocking on door after door of cramped, shut-up, rot inside with a television trailer parks that I desperately wanted to have my own chance someday with my own piece of dirt, and with a river if at all possible. So my prayer was this: Dear Heavenly Father, Please help me have some land someday. I will try to be a good steward. I love you. Amen.

Every day we'd hit the streets, preach the message, pray for the people, for our prophet, and for the spirit...and then I would add my petition. Oh and if it's not too much to ask, some land would be nice someday.

The vision was clear even as a newlywed I think. But we were still students, still scraping by and fixing up. I knew I had some time to wait. Then came babies, job changes, more school, and making ends meet, and the cloud of busy living pulled me from my once-clear-vision.

So when we moved to our little acre a couple years back, I was so caught up in getting rental income, recovering from my hormones, and wishing I knew how to garden that I had forgotten my years long petition to the Lord. It wasn't until just this year that I remembered that girl in the dress, winding through trailer parks and thinking how dirt could keep her grounded in the grown-up world. I wondered how I had forgotten that I had prayed for this! And with my remembering, came some thanking.

I forgot but you remembered. You knew I needed this, and brought opportunities to make it happen! You remembered even when I forgot! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!

So with all this reminiscing of mission life, and remembering of former prayers, I was delighted with this recent quote from the LDS General Conference. Elder Dieter F. Uchdorf stated:

Every one of us is called to wait in our own way. We wait for
answers to prayers. We wait for things which at the time may
appear so right and so good to us that we can't possibly imagine
why Heavenly Father would delay the answer....We must learn that
in the Lord's plan, our understanding comes at the price of
patience....Often the deep valley of our present will be understood
only by looking back on them from the mountains of our future experience

That quote seemed so perfect for me at this time, especially with my burst of remembrance that brought me to my knees. But with that remembrance came a recollection of another sister missionary, indeed my very own mission companion who served with me for 4 months in Brunswick, Georgia.

Like me, Elizabeth wore a dress and became a sister in the sweaty south. Back home was Mitch, who sent packages on a weekly basis, and who cheerfully and faithfully waited until Elizabeth came home. Anyone who knew Elizabeth, knew Mitch. I served with Elizabeth while she was diagnosed with lupus. I knew that diagnosis would forever change her life, and wondered if the cheesy and cheerful mission packages would diminish.

They didn't.

Elizabeth and Mitch got married after she got home. They lived in the desert where the warmth kept her in better health. He took care of her and loved her.

And just last week he suffered a surprise attack of the heart with a clogged artery. He was gone hours after finishing a hike with his kids. He leaves behind Elizabeth 38 weeks pregnant with child number four!

I think of me and my old mission companion, one praying for a dream so long she forgets to notice its fulfillment, and the other biding her time as a nun just long enough until she can blaze into a dreamy love story with a great man.

The quote I found so perfect for my waiting for the land, takes on a new meaning when I think of the new life, the unanswered questions, for my dear friend who will have a lifetime of waiting to know the purpose of this detour.

Signed,

Lay awake at night counting the little things I'm grateful for and chalking this one up to one of The Mysteries of God

Labels: garden, religious musings, responsible agriculture

Monday, July 19, 2010

July on the Farm

So I'm here to give a shout out to all amateur gardeners. The ones who love the pretty yards in Better Homes & Gardens but then get their water bill, have a newborn, or become temporarily addicted to saving the princess. I want to have a pretty garden, I want self-reliance, but I have always become burned out in July.

But I am hanging in there this year! My garden still totally sucks when compared to my neighbor (how did her vegetables get sooo big already?) but I'm definitely improving.

Thing A: losing a little weight is totally helping me tolerate the heat better (go figure.duh.)

Thing B: information is motivation! After reading this book, watching this documentary, then this documentary, and lastly singing the primary song called "The Prophet Said to Plant a Garden" I feel like I am finally getting the vision to stick out the heat, keep the weeds down low (at least in the veggie patch...let's not talk flower beds right now) and delighting in the good things of the earth.

First my teepee. I have planted melons and beans along the base. Then the feathered ladies came for a visit. So then I re-planted melons and beans around the base. Hopefully my melons have enough time to actually give me some fruit. Let's just say that I hoped those chickens would eat my garden bugs but all they did was take dirt baths and pull up my plants. Oh, and scatter my straw.

So they got cut off last week.

Back to the teepee.

I have beans! That is all.

Does your landfill offer a truckbed full of bark for $7.50? If not, I feel sorry for you. As you can see it totally helped me create an inviting path right smack dab through the middle of the garden. And since I'm kicking it in high gear, I created a little resting area to enjoy the pleasing things of the earth. And in cobalt blue no less! And for just $16 at Wal-Mart (which I love to hate, or sometimes it's hate to love) how could I resist?

You heard me. Plastic adirondack chairs that don't need to be painted for 16 bucks. Nobody tell me these are bad for the planet please.

Back in the spring, our neighbors called and said they had some more baby chicks and did we want them.

Only if they're hens, we said.

Oh we are pretty sure we have figured out a way to tell. We'll give you all hens.
Three roosters later, we are creating the neighborhood wake-up call at 5:45 a.m. Plus those hens are running for their lives all the day long, poor little things.

But just look how those rooster feathers shine in the sun?

Hmmmm..what else?

Stinkin' cute goats that's what. They are so playful and cute. Look at those ears!

I was so excited to get a picture of a chicken on the bridge, that I totally forgot to take the screen out of the water. Darnit!

Why is there a screen on the water. Because of an exciting pond project which I will update you all on later. Oooh, be excited! I am.

And a last parting shot...

I'm tired. Good night!

Labels: fun with nature, garden

Thursday, July 8, 2010

Organic Pest Control

While I desperately try to become a competent gardener, my flower beds have gone to...the seeds. And last year, they sensuously conceived hollyhock seeds and now I'm waiting for these pillars of color to explode.

These little devils are waiting too. In the meantime, they are having an outdoor picnic every day in my flowerbeds.

I'm a little slow to the draw. Here we are in our 3rd summer out in a lil'-bit-country living and I finally realized (hopefully in time) that big, juicy, highly mobile grasshoppers are just a month away.

Here at our local seed store, you can purchase this little cup for eight bucks. Inside are 2 egg sacs filled with sleeping baby mantids.

They pull them out of their refrigerator, and with warmer temperatures they wake up and get ready to roll. Prop them on a branch high enough that little ground creatures won't get them, and low enough that flying bat creatures won't get them, away from the sprinklers too...well, then I should have 200 or so preying mantids ready to devour harmful bugs. Make that 800 or so. Four mantis pods in all, and I'm hoping there's enough pests for them to eat that they don't go cannibal on me.

Wish me luck!

Labels: garden

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

Garden Delights

My garden life typifies the battle between flesh and spirit. Late winter and early spring I think about how I need to plan out my garden, I marvel when I hear that people planted lettuce and onions in March, and I am certain! to have the beautiful, blossoming, tamed wilderness in my own backyard. Then July hits. I wither in the heat. I crawl into my basement and dream of dewey, windy, blustery and beautiful Oregon Coast.

Now? It's June and unseasonably wet and cold. Everyone's complaining but I'm still in my honeymoon phase of gardening. The excitement began back in April when I found some recycled composite raised garden beds. No deteriorating! No staining! I was sold! The Mister of the House brought home 6 boxes (essentially twelve 3.5X3.5 foot squares), and I was left to configure them on the lawn. I pored over these suggestions of stacking and staggering the boxes.

I officially purchased 12 squares, but I longed to have a stacked look. By redirecting the middle support beam OUT instead of IN on the bottom row, we were able to butterfly 4 boxes out from the main line. Does that even make sense? By pulling out the support centers (with the exception of the row 2) I was able to have 11 squares intact for planting, and still keep the easy to reach and mighty-perty stacked center.

Boxes 3 and 4 we planted perennial crops asparagus and strawberries. Because they are proficient spreaders, we put them in the box that is enclosed on all sides. For asparagus, you dig down 8 inches and then plant. As they shoot through the dirt, you pile more dirt on them. Look how they have already taken off (box 3)! It will be two more years until we start harvesting them. Be excited!

We tilled up the grass, put down weed barrier, and halfway enclosed the garden with 6 cedar posts. The posts are 8 feet apart and in the middle are some newly planted grapevines. These vines will be trained along the wires at 2 and 4 feet, and include table grapes and raisin grapes, all seedless. In the above pic you will see the fake owl that is supposed to scare the birds away from my garden. Not quite sure if it is really working yet.

This butterflied box is on the east side, so in the afternoon it is a little shaded by the middle stack. I planted lettuce there because it prefers colder temps, and I knew it wouldn't mind. It was just yesterday that I had my FIRST salad cut fresh from the garden. Delish!

Here is a picture showing the full configuration. 5 rows long with 4 butterflies, and a regular 2 square at the edge. Filled with compost, peat moss, vermiculite and poop...we're ready to roll!

From June2010

So I have to admit, I was pushing for the raised beds because A)my buff neighbor Katrina grows a killer garden and has them ....and B) I have been LooooOoving this book "The Backyard Homestead" and it talks about how great raised beds are to have warm dirt in the spring, plant things closer and utilize space, and keep weeds out. The full title of the book is "The Backyard Homestead: Produce all the food you need on just a quarter acre". Here's a snippet.

Another tip I got from this book was a teepee trellis for vining crops. So when I found some 10 foot tree limbs in the canyon, I brought them home and made this makeshift play-place for the kids. Here is our teepee that we planted pole beans and melons around the base.

I am totally a novice gardener. It was just yesterday I found out that if you grow melons and squash next to each other, they become cross-dressing transvestites. By that I mean you will have a disgusting pumpkin flavored watermelon. No thanks! So we just transplanted squash (i.e. pumpkins) away from the melons and we'll see if we get any crop from these heat-loving crops that need 100+ days to mature. Yikes!

The pole beans are already starting to do their work.

In the main old-fashioned garden bed we are planting potatoes and corn. Since we have animals, we used the old hay and straw to keep weeds down and mark pathways in the garden.

So all I have to say is CHICKENS! They have kicked out all my straw searching for bugs. I was excited to have chickens to eat bugs in the garden, but am wondering if they will do more harm than good (i.e. pecking new buds on my baby grapevines and stories of chickens pecking ripe delicious produce). One peck is all it takes for the floodgates to open.

So considering keeping the chickens out of the entire yard. Hmmmm.

Here we are at Old Faithful last week. While we were vacationing, the chickens were busy scattering my straw. Argh.

Labels: chickens, FreshGreens, fun with nature, garden

Monday, March 8, 2010

Bountiful Baskets vs. Field to Families

Within a couple of days of each other, I learned of two food co-ops that deliver fresh produce to my area. The first was Field to Families. What I love about them is they deal with local and regional growers, and although not certified organic, aim to work with farmers that are pesticide free.

Their delivery locations range from Pocatello, Idaho in the north to Bountiful and Heber in the south. Salt Lake and Provo are currently not on their list, but new locations are added monthly. I wouldn't be surprised if you sign up for a free account, they would work to add pick up areas near you.

The second food co-op is Bountiful Baskets. This entity seems more established and is popular enough that they can get away with a completely stupid web-site. For instance, you have to battle every week for a spot for that week's order (which as I write, is currently down). It sounds like a weekly cattle call, and if you're willing to go through the hoops over and over again...you win! Who knows, by the time you click this link it may be up again. They service areas in Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Nevada, and Washington. One plus side, they also have international spices, muffins, and other sundries to meet more grocery needs.

So there's my review. Bountiful Baskets is popular, looks good, but give me a break! I've signed up for a monthly service with Field to Families, and for $15 each pick-up, I get 8 units of produce. My first pick-up, and first 8 units looked like this:

So until I start failing in my garden again...we're eating good with Field to Families this week!

Labels: FreshGreens, garden