Dark Days 12 – Breakfast

Usually my husband makes the dinners in our family.  But I am the one to make breakfasts if we’re going to do anything other than fend for ourselves.

We were down to the wire on the week, hadn’t had a dark days meal and weren’t going to be home together on Friday night for dinner (we did all meet at the high school basketball game – Holy Toledo! what a game – we lost in the last second of overtime 50 to 49 – to the top ranked single A team in the State – we’re ranked 5th – hard fought for sure). 

Anyway, I had picked up bacon and cream at the Farmer’s Market last week.  We had local flour too.  Biscuits and bacon for breakfast.

First I made the butter. The cream was cold, and so it took longer to become butter than when it is room temperature – but that also meant that I could scoop out some when it was just whipped cream.  I thought the kids might want it, but there doesn’t seem to be any interest in unsweetened whipped cream, so I see a cup of chai with a wonderful topping in my near future.

 

The butter came out fine along with 3/4 of a cup of butter milk.  Here’s the take from a pint of cream.

 

 

 

Then the biscuits.  I used a very simple recipe, just flour, baking powder, butter, and milk.  I used the butter milk from the butter making – and of course the butter.  The flour was local, and as usual, seemed to be  responsible for their tastiness.  This recipe seems especially well suited for biscuits that you might add things to, like cheese, or garlic, or other herbs.  There is no salt or sugar to interfere with the taste of additions.  For breakfast they were just fine with the butter and honey (local, of course).

 

Bacon.  You know what bacon looks like.  Happy pigs make yummy bacon though.  Granted, we usually eat turkey bacon, and as healthy for you as it is suppose to be, it just doesn’t live up to pork bacon in flavor. 

My husband had coffee, a SOLE (sustainable, organic, local, and ethical) exception, my daughter had milk (the local, natural, yummy milk – source of the cream for the butter and buttermilk also).  I had very local (from the tap) water – had my (non-local but organic) tea earlier.  The baking powder for the biscuits was the only other non-SOLEful ingredient. 

I may have to go run around the block to work off the calories from this meal. 

A beautiful me!

Last weekend a friend and I did a little shopping and at our local Bergner’s department store (somewhere between JC Penney’s and Macy’s in “class”) they were doing free makeovers.  Hair, nails, chair massages, and make up. 

I had my hair curled with a curling iron and then kind of pulled back off my face as if it were in a ponytail but with bobby pins rather than an elastic  – it was suppose to be casual, but looked a tad fancy.

I skipped the nails, just wasn’t in the mood – and they’d been breaking so much with the dry winter weather that there wasn’t much nail to do anything with.

I did get a chair massage from a friend’s daughter.  I think a group of us women will have to have a massage party in the near future and pay this young woman to massage us all.

And finally, my friend made me get a cosmetics make over.  I’m not much of a make up girl, but in the past decade my use has increased some.  After my youngest was born I started using make up to draw attention away from other parts of my body.  That is still an issue (although I do weigh less than I did post 2nd baby).  Now that I’m post-50 I rarely go out without concealer and a bit of blush – at least in the winter I just look rather beige.  Except if I haven’t slept well, then I have these incredible circles under my eyes – not good.

Anyway, it was a Lacome counter and the young woman who did my face was a good listener and did what I wanted – which was minimal and natural looking.

I was impressed.  I really liked the tinted moisturizer and even the lipstick – and I don’t do lipstick.  That might change.  My friend was also impressed, and except for my eyes, which were a bit more done than I’d do for everyday, my husband seemed to like the make up look also.  The hair – well, it was fun and I’m actually going to use that style next week (relevant posts to come).  By the end of the make over my head was way overdressed for my sweater and blue jean clad body.

Now luckily, I had actually forgotten my wallet at home, so I couldn’t buy $100 worth of products at the Lancome counter.  And that was good because I really did want to do some research on natural and organic make up – especially a tinted moisturizer – before I went investing in this new look.

A bit of googling and I settled on Physician’s Formula.  I liked that there was a range of products by one company, including several organic products – and importantly – tinted moisturizer. I also liked that where the Lancome moisturizer was going to cost $40, Physician’s Forumula costs $10.  Finally, Physician’s Formula, in theory, is sold at a whole bunch of different stores.  “Not all products will be available at all stores” I tried a local K-Mart and found nothing, but hit pay dirt at the local Target.  Here’s the moisturizer (to the left).

 

 

 

I got some blush and bronzer also – on clearance for $8.67 – luckily it was the color I wanted most.

 

 

Mascara also.  I wish they had brown; I settled for black (as opposed to “ultra black”).  It does have a recyclable “eco-brush” – even I wonder if we’re doing a bit of green-washing there.

 

 

Anyway, Target also happened to have one lip gloss left – also on clearance ($4.85).  The shade was what I was looking for too – a kind of “non-shade”. 

 

And finally, not organic though, I bought an eye liner pencil.  It doesn’t seem to have nasty stuff in it (dermatologist approved, hypoallergenic and fragrance free) – and it’s taupe.  I’m not into the goth or emo dark-lined eyes – barely lined is more my style.

So now if I’m going to wear make up, at least it will be either good for my face, or not bad.

I’m all set to get pretty.

Dark Days 11 – Meat and Potatoes

A little from the basement, a little from the pantry, a little from the farmer’s market – put it together and you have a Dark Days dinner.

This week it was pork chops, roasted potatoes, salad, and green tomato relish.   The pork and salad were from the farmer’s market – local and ethical, not 100% sure of the organic-ness.

The potatoes were from our basement – well, originally from the garden.  My husband used a wavy knife I got him for Christmas to cut the potatoes and said it made the potatoes a lot easier to flip since there wasn’t an entire smooth side to stick to the pan.

The green tomato relish was canned by my husband at the end of the summer when we had lots of green tomatoes and not enough frost-free days to ripen them on the vine.  It was delicious – I used mine not only with the chops but also on the salad.  Not a great dressing, but not bad either.

Exceptions to the SOLE-ness of the dinner were spices on the pork, balsamic vinegar on my potatoes (and ketchup on my husbands), and salad dressing for my husband and daughter too I suppose.  My daughter had the local, natural, not quite organic milk.  (My son was ill so his meal doesn’t count at all).  My husband drank water (local – straight from the tap) and I had seltzer – made with my Sodastream seltzer maker – so I guess that makes it local too.

Produce Labels

In a recent edition of Mary Jane Farms there was a page on produce labels. I learned something new!

Those little stickers on the produce – those little oval jobs on your apples  – they have numbers on them called price look-up codes or PLU – and they tell more than just a code for the cashier  – it contains important information for us consumers too.

On that little sticker is a four or five digit number.

…A four-digit number means the produce has been conventionally grown using synthetic pesticides and fertilizers.  A five-digit number beginning with 8 means the produce was genetically modified.  And a five-digit number beginning with 9 means you’re getting organically grown goodies.  (Note: This number isn’t found in barcodes. It will typically be printed on a sticker affixed to an item.)

So – keep an eye out for 5-digit numbers beginning with a 9.  And remember, it is most important to aim for organic when the produce has an edible skin.

Better Butter

I had good success once making butter from cream and a miserable experience the next time.  So I turned to the Internet and searched butter making. 

There are a bazillion sites – and apparently putting marijuana in your butter is a way to incorporate that medically sanctioned stash you have into your diet –but I just wanted to know how to make it.

First I realized that I could make it in the food processor rather than the blender or with a hand mixer or standing mixer (or the old standby – shaking it in a jar).  And then I stumbled on a 1978 piece from Mother Earth News on making butter.  It had several pieces of information that I found useful.  For instance, use room temperature cream.  In retrospect it makes sense that the temperature would matter – for best whipping you should your cream should be cold.  I don’t know that I would have figured that warmer was better for butter though.

I’ve done it twice now.  Room temperature cream in the food processer is FAST!  You zip past the whipped cream stage.  The fat separates from the butter milk and I save the butter milk for my husband to use in baking.

Then you rinse the remaining butter milk.  I found you can add fresh water to the food processor and mix it up some more, drain, repeat.  Then you squish the remaining water from the butter and you’re done.  Mine is in the fridge at the moment – just because any remaining butter milk will sour eventually and make the butter smell icky and then start to taste a bit sour.  I will probably split this last batch in 1/2 and put 1/2 in the freezer.

I don’t think I have the process down perfectly, not well enough to claim a failsafe approach worthy of pictures and step by step instructions.  But I do say don’t be afraid of trying – the worst it will do is cost you the price of the cream (I start with heavy cream) and you’ll have learned something in the process anyway (at least I did – - don’t rinse with warm water – duh!).  If you want a bit more guidance, the Internet is loaded with it.

I love the taste of fresh butter.  And I love that the cream is from my favorite dairy and is minimally processed, and most of all, hormone-free.  My husband does 90% of the family cooking.  This is one of my little contributions that I’m increasingly proud of.

Dark Days 10 – Brats

No, not a complaint about the kids – in the Midwest “brats” rhymes with “tots” and is short for bratwurst.

Our local year round farmer’s market sells local, ethically raised meat products and my husband had picked up some bratwurst.

On Wednesday my husband made some rolls for the brats.  He used the local flour and substituted local honey for the sugar in the recipe.  According to the information we have about substituting honey for sugar he did it wrong.  He substituted it 1 for 1 (1/3 cup of honey in place of a 1/3 cup of sugar).  In theory you should use 1/2 has much honey and also cut the liquids back by some magic amount.  He didn’t – and rolls were wonderful. They were moist, not crumbly, and stayed moist for the days it took us to eat them all (I had the last one with lunch on Friday and it was great).  They were a bit sweet, and that tasted perfect with the bratwurst.  Later, the sweetness, I think, made them especially tasty on their own without butter or jam.

We had the usual local hydroponic greens salad (because that is the only thing resembling SOLE food my son will eat – - sigh).  We used olive oil and balsamic vinegar for dressing (not SOLEful I’m afraid).  The kids had their Kilgus milk, and DH and I had wine from the local monks (what they call a chardonnay).

I have a few pictures, but frankly, brats are not photogenic, nor were the rolls.  Believe me, it is better to imagine this meal than to see it – but it tasted great.

A car in our future

Early this month our Ford Focus hit 200,000 miles.  It runs fine, can still get 30 mpg on a 72 degree day (i.e. no need to use the heater or air conditioning), but it is time to face the fact that sooner rather than later it is going to give up the ghost.  I would like to be proactive rather than reactive in regards to car buying for a change. 

So today I took the car to the dealer for an oil change, tire rotation, and a new turn signal bulb knowing full well that this might be the last servicing this car gets (in fact, that is why I decided not to invest $200 in a new door latch, we’ll just have to keep dealing with the faulty one, letting my daughter out from the outside – it won’t open from the inside).  While I was at the dealer’s I talked to the him about Escape Hybrids.  A few years ago he was not enthralled with hybrids, but he has recently had a turn of heart after driving one.  He is now going to be on the look out for a used Escape Hybrid (front wheel drive) for us. 

Why this particular car?  Well, we live in a small town that just so happens to have a car dealership.  A significant proportion of the sales tax on purchases at the dealership goes to the city, and a significant proportion of the total sales tax money the city gets comes from this dealership – so I want to support the city and buy the car there.  Plus, this dealership has done well by me over the past 13 years – both in car purchases and in service (including saving me significant dollars on a major repair job). I want to give them my business.

But why an Escape Hybrid? It turns out to be the only Ford with some cargo space that will get 30 mpg.  I have a 60 mile round trip commute, so 30 mpg is my minimally acceptable fuel efficiency mark.  Plus, we are a family of four that takes road trips.  We either need a vehicle with some cargo room or we’ll have to rent one several times a year. 

I don’t know when this will all come about.  I did some Internet searching myself today and saw a few possibilities in the area – but the dealer probably has more contacts than that and knows more about cars, so I’ll let him find me some options.

I am excited though.  It’s been 8 years since I’ve had a new-to-me car.  Plus, I’m excited that it will by a hybrid.  My fingers are crossed this all works out.  Meanwhile, the Focus is running fine (even got 30 mpg on the last tank of gas), everyday the car runs is money in my pocket, so there is no big hurry either.

Week 9 – Dark Days Quesadillas

As anyone who has followed this blog at all knows, this is not a food blog.  I think the fact that I’m really not all that interested in food – I eat to live rather than live to eat – is making the dark days challenge all the more challenging.  That and finding dark days meals (sustainable, organic, local, ethical) that at least the majority of us will eat.  Then there is that in the heartland here we can get local or we can get organic, but both local and organic – especially in the dead of winter – is a challenge (well – duh – that’s why it’s called the Dark Days Challenge and not the Dark Days Easy as Pie).

One thing that the kids will make for themselves are variations on quesadillas – or what we often call tortilla pizzas.  So – why not have quesadillas for dinner?

We have local wheat – everything it touches is delicious.  DH made Indian flatbread recipe he found in a cookbook.   Next time we’ll make some changes.  He’ll roll it out more thickly and cook it for less time so it is more flexible – this was very brittle, but tasty.

 

 

We had a variety of local cheeses from a cheesemaker in the next city to the East.   And some nonlocal organic mozzarella, because some people in our family who shall remain nameless won’t eat any cheese with actual flavor.

 

 

 

We had local, organic, hydroponic greens for salads. 

As usual, the kids’ milk was the local, natural, hormone-free, minimally pasteurized. 

 

The wine was from the local monks – this time we tried the merlot.  Lighter than what you would usually think of as merlot, but tasty none the less. 

Not an elegant feast, but no one left the table hungry.

HAPPY 101 AWARD!

I am flying high!  The last 48 hours have been filled with one happy surprise after another:

• I had an e-mail from my friend Susan.  I haven’t heard from her in months and months and knew she had a really rough 2009, so it was great to hear her outlook is up and life is good.
• I ran into a friend who was coming out of the gym.  He has been getting chemo for non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma but said his last PET scan was clean. 
• I had my usual several times a day e-mail conversation with my friend Vicky.  It is so great be able to dash off a quick observation, respond to something she has said, or share a funny – at least as good as a daily phone call – and much cheaper. 
• My husband e-mailed and not only will we be having a date this Saturday but it will include a couple that I really want to get to know better. 
• I had a meeting – a drug prevention task force meeting – the type of meeting that could be deadly dull – but was actually filled with people in good-humor and we all laughed a lot while we also had a very productive meeting.
• I had a surprise e-mail from the editor of a textbook I authored.  They want a third edition!
• I had an e-mail from the publications office at work.  They are interested in the story behind some survey research I’m doing on beekeepers.
• Today in the mail I received my first copy of MaryJanesFarm: The Everyday Organic Lifestyle Magazine, a Christmas present from the aforementioned Vicky.
• And as if that weren’t enough – Retro Housewife Goes Green gave me (and 9 others)  the Happy 101 Award!  I would like to thank all the little people who have made this possible…

Here are the rules for the Happy 101 Award (yes, an award with rules – there are no free lunches in this world):

• List 10 things that make you happy. (Try to do one of them today)
• Tag 10 bloggers that make you happy.
• Make sure to link back to the person that tagged you.

So here goes – my 10, very self-centered, things that make me happy:

1. A conversation with my husband
2. Making my teenager laugh
3. A hug from daughter
4. Knitting, beading, or reading a good book (hmm, I need to get to the library and pick up this month’s book club book)
5. Making myself a cup of tea
6. Doing a jigsaw puzzle
7. Chocolate
8. The scale going down
9. A cat curled up next to me in bed
10. Writing – writing my blog, writing my column, heck – even writing lectures (on interesting stuff anyway)

[It’s been a good day, I’ve done 9 so far – and there is still time to make that kid laugh.]

And here are 10 of the many blogs that make me smile – a Happy 101 award to each of you!:

1. Squash Blossom Farm – Susan and her family’s adventures on their new small farm
2. Nyack Backyard – reminds me to keep my eyes open to the nature around me (hey! I’ve seen a bald Eagle twice this week!  another happy thing)
3. The Mommy Porch – “meandering thoughts on food and life” – sums it up pretty well
4. (not so) Urban Hennery – started reading it for the bees and then continued reading – and now she has got me involved in The Dark Days challenge
5. My Green Conscience – a fantastic approach to encouraging an eco-friendly lifestyle
6. Fessenden Farmstead – chronicles of Stacey’s urban farming and homesteader lifestyle
7. Are We There Yet? – fun and candid observations
8. Mayberry Mom – comments about and from a life with young kids – such a fun reminder for me
9. Divine Nature – beautiful photographs
10. A+A Adopt a Baby – a new baby in a happy family – what’s not to like?

Thank you Retro Housewife for the award!

Garden Planning – First the Seeds

It is January, it is cold, there are 9” of snow on the ground and the kids have had a four day weekend thanks to 2 snow days.  It is time to think about the garden.

My friend at Nyack Backyard woke me up with a reminder to consider the source of my seeds; in particular, I might want to avoid seeds from companies associated with Monsanto, the fertilizer, pesticide, genetic engineering giant.  If you want a reason to be concerned about Monsanto, check this site, Millions against Monsanto. Nyack Backyard also pointed me to a list of seed companies that sell seeds free of ties to Monsanto.

This isn’t an anti-Monsanto post, or an anti-big-business or anti-business done the American way post.  This is just a post about getting seeds I’m happy with and realizing that maybe my usual source isn’t 100% consistent with my values. 

So what do I want from my seeds?  Organic and untreated.  Actually, options are pretty good.  When I googled “organic seeds” there were plenty of places to go.  I settled on Natural Gardening Company for no good reason other than they claim to be the oldest certified organic gardening nursery in the United States.  That’s not really a great reason, but I didn’t have the gumption to comparison shop and I wanted a one-place and get it all nursery and this seemed to fit the bill (almost).

Actually, being the oldest certified organic gardening nursery made me think they might be from back east – perhaps somewhere near Monticello – Jefferson was a big gardener.  They’re not – they’re in California.  Doesn’t matter.

So my husband and I spent an hour or so this morning picking seeds and seedling types for the garden.  It won’t be cheap, but still less expensive than not gardening.  Most everything we’ve bought is an heirloom variety and described as being able to withstand a variety of weather conditions.  We do not baby our plants.  They get mulched and that’s it.  We don’t even water. 

Because this year is more expensive than previous years we are hoping to make a project of saving seeds.  Why buy more seeds each year when our plants make millions on their own?  Check back and see if we carry this out.

Meanwhile, we wait for the seeds to come and the snow to melt.  I don’t want to wish time away, and I do enjoy the winter – but it is fun to think about the spring too.