Encyclopedia of Country Living blog

Baking Bread from Scratch

2012-01-26T15:36:00.000-08:00

Some daughters bond with their dads through soccer, football or any number of other sports. Cheering for our teams during the NFL playoffs with my dad certainly brought us closer, but it's the activity that we did while watching these games that is one of my fondest childhood memories.

In addition to making the usual hot dogs and hamburgers for these events, my dad, sister, and I would bake homemade bread while watching the games. For us, the smell of freshly baked bread sprinkled with salt, the taste of the deliciously crunchy crust, and the feel of the soft interior was a perfect accompaniment to our football parties. Happily, my dad didn't limit his bread to Superbowl Sundays and we were treated to it year-round.

Here is a simple bread recipe from Carla Emery to inspire you to try it on your own. I especially enjoy her suggestion to add extra ingredients like onion or cheese to this versatile recipe.

Virginia's White Bread

Mix 21⁄2 c. liquid, 3 T. sugar, 1 T. salt, and 2 T. shortening. Dissolve 2 envelopes (or 2 T.) yeast in 1⁄4 c. lukewarm water and add to other ingredients. Mix in with spoon, then by hand, 7 to 71⁄4 c. flour. Turn dough out on floured board and let rest about 10 minutes. Knead until smooth and elastic (8 to 10 minutes). Grease bread dough and put in a large bowl or pan. Cover with a cloth and let rise in a warm place out of drafts until doubled in bulk.

You can test this by jabbing 2 fingers into the dough. If this causes the dough to slowly collapse, it is ready to punch down. Punch and fold it into a firm ball and let rise again until almost doubled in bulk. Divide into 2 pieces. Let dough rest on floured table 10 minutes. Shape into loaves. Put in pans. Grease. Let rise to just above top of loaf pans. Bake at 425˚F for 25 to 30 minutes. Turn out on racks to cool. This dough may be used for sweet rolls, buns, cinnamon loaves, and cheese or onion loaves by adding the appropriate extra ingredients when shaping the bread.

Desserts from an Unusual Cookbook

2011-12-21T13:54:00.000-08:00

The Bible means different things to different people. For some, it is a divine text. For others, it is a compelling story. But one thing some people don't realize, as Carla Emery points out, is that it is also a cookbook!

That's right, flip through the pages of this scripture and you will find loads of information about food. I had never really thought of it myself, but take a look. Passages of unleavened bread, fish, lamb and other delicacies fill the pages! What better way to bring the food of the past to our kitchen then by taking it straight from the Old Testament? As Carla references in The Encyclopedia of Country Living, the Bible reads, "And behold there was a cake baken!"-Kings 9:16.

Christmas is just a couple of days away, and we all love to gather around the tree, enjoy our family and friends, open presents, and be merry. However, like any American holiday, we are most certainly obligated to feast upon dessert. Carla gives us her special Pennsylvania Dutch Scripture Cake recipe, filled with ingredients listed in Carla's handpicked verses from the Bible.

Pennsylvania Dutch Scripture Cake Read the verses and bake the (spice) cake.

Mix Judges 5:25 (1⁄2 c. butter); 1 Kings 4:22 (2 c. flour); Leviticus 2:13 (1⁄2 t. salt); 1 Samuel 30:12 (1 c. chopped dried figs); Jeremiah 6:20 (11⁄2 c. sugar); Luke 13:21 (2 t. baking powder); Genesis 24:11 (1⁄2 c. water); 1 Samuel 30:12 (1 c. raisins); Isaiah 10:14 (3 eggs); 1 Kings 10:10 (cinnamon, mace, cloves); Proverbs 24:13 (1 T. honey); Genesis 43:11 (1⁄2 c. chopped almonds). Blend butter, sugar, spices, and salt. Beat egg yolks and add. Sift in baking powder and flour. Then add the water and honey. Put fruits and nuts through food chopper and flour well. Follow Solomon's advice for making good boys (first clause of Proverbs 23:14). Fold in stiffly beaten egg whites. Bake 1 hour in 375˚F oven.

Now that you have been given a scriptural recipe, see if you can figure out the ingredients referred to in the passages Carla has provided below! I have included her key, which you can read by highlighting the blank text at the bottom.

Mystery Scripture Cake You've had one to practice on. See if you can figure this one out from scratch! Matthew 10:42, 1 c. Jeremiah 6:20, 1 c. I Samuel 25:18, 1 c. Matthew 25:4, 1 t. II Chronicles 9:9, 11⁄2 t. Psalms 35:23. Isaiah 38:21. Luke 16:24. Then add: I Kings 4:22, 2 c. I Corinthians, 1 t. Luke 14:34, 1⁄4PP t. Genesis 43:11, 1⁄2 c. Isaiah 2:4. Leviticus 26:26. Luke 15:23.

Key to Mystery Scripture Cake Ingredients

1 c. water, 1 c. sugar, 1 c. raisins, 1 t. oil, 1 & 1⁄2 t. spices. Stir. Boil. Cool. Then add 2 c. flour, 1 t. leavening, 1⁄4 t. salt, 1⁄2 c. nuts. Beat. Bake. And eat.

Why Buy Toys When You Can Make Them?

2011-12-15T09:06:00.000-08:00

Christmas is really an odd tradition, when you think about it objectively. We spend hundreds of dollars on gifts for people, some of which we hardly know! Parents storm toy stores and malls at 4 or 5 in the morning, fighting each other for that one toy which will brighten their children's eyes Christmas morning. We all strive to buy the gift that ensures others we care about them enough to buy them something great.

However, perhaps the greatest gift we can give is the care we take to ensure we get something our loved ones will like. When you think about it that way, Christmas isn't about the money at all. It is about the time spent just to let someone know we care about them.

So then why should you have to buy anything at all? I will let you in on a little secret: you don't! In Carla Emery's book The Encyclopedia of Country Living, she lays out some instructions to create toys and crafts of your own for this Christmas season! Don't go out in the cold weather in search of that perfect toy. Just try some of these homemade concoctions, and let the caring show through your creativity!

Great Bubbles Recipe 1: Combine 6 c. water, 2 c. liquid dishwashing soap, and 3⁄4 c. light corn syrup. Start blowing! Recipe 2: Combine 1⁄3 c. baby shampoo, 11⁄4 c. water, 3 t. sugar, and blow! Optional: Add food coloring. Dip a wire loop with a handle into bubble solution and blow! Or blow through a pipe cleaner shaped into a bubble loop, or a slotted spoon.

Homemade Modeling Clay Optional: Mix in food coloring. Store the clay in a plastic bag or a jar with a tight lid so it doesn't dry out. Combine 1 c. flour, 1⁄2 c. salt, 2 T. cream of tartar, 2 t. cooking oil, and 1 c. water in a pot and cook at a moderate temperature for several minutes. Take off heat. When cool enough to get your hands in there, knead it until the texture feels smooth.

Homemade Silly Putty Combine 1 c. liquid starch with 2 c. white all-purpose glue. Mix well. Store airtight (zip top bag or jar with tight lid).

Face Paint In each cup of a muffin tin, put 1⁄2 t. coldcream, 1 t. cornstarch, and 1⁄2 t. water. Add a bit of foodcoloring-a different color in each cup. Stir well. Use a small brush to paint children's faces. This paint will wash off withsoap and water.

Growing Crystals Arrange small rocks or pieces of coal on the bottom of a shallow glass bowl. Combine 6 T. salt, 6 T. liquid bluing (from the laundry section of your store), 6 T. water, and 1 T. ammonia. Pour the mixture over the rocks or coal. Add a few drops of food coloring. Your crystals soon will begin to grow. To keep them growing, add more water now and then.

Washing Your Clothes, Country Style

2011-12-08T13:22:00.000-08:00

These days, washing our clothes is easy. As Carla Emery puts it in The Encyclopedia of Country Living, we "wear a garment part of one day and then put it in the wash." Before technology became a model of convenience instead of necessity, this wasn't an option. Not only weren't clothes washed in an electric machine; they were only washed when they were absolutely filthy.

I will be the first to say I love washing machines. We all deal with enough in our days that we appreciate going home and not having to scrub clothes clean. But in this economy, hand-washing your clothes does not seem like a ridiculous option anymore. The amount of water you save is tremendous, and with your washing machine out of the picture, you will keep a few green papers in your pocket.

There is not just one way to hand-wash your clothes. One way, according to Carla, is to boil your clothes. "In the old days," she wrote, "'Washing' clothes meant boiling them, which is also a natural technique for agitation-and sterilization!-when you think about it." When this water gets dirty, you should throw out the wash water and replace it with rinse water.

Then comes the real labor of hand-washing. Add soap and lots of water, keeping the temperature of the water as hot as your hands can stand. "I push the clothes in and out of the water, counting as I go: maybe 100 squishes of the material for this one, only 25 for something less dirty."

The goal is to release dirt by squishing the water through the surface of the cloth. However, using your hands alone is not the only way to do this. You can also use a washboard or a plunger. "A rubber toilet-type plunger is actually easier on the clothes and still gets them clean. The good thing about a plunger is your hands don't get raw from the detergent."

Carla then says to rinse "at least two waters" to get as much soap out of the cloth as you can. Then, wring out the clothes, and hang up to dry on a clothesline. The easiest weather to hang clothes is on a dry summer day, but if you are facing alternative conditions (windy, not hot enough, indoor drying), use clothespins to prevent doublings. In the winter, dip in salt water first to keep them from freezing, or dry indoors.

If you are looking for other simple ways to wash your clothes, Carla has some innovative tips to keep your fibers fresh!

Non-Electrical Washing Machines.

Washers that don't use electricity are available by mail from Lehman's. There is a James Hand Washer with wringer. You push a rod back and forth to cause the agitation action in the 16-gallon tub and use a hand crank to run the wringer. You can get a washboard, a clothes stomper, or a gas-engine-powered washing machine there also. Another system: If you have a car and a bumpy road, put your laundry into a 5-gallon bucket with a tight lid and then into your car before you go to town. Driving over the rough road agitates and washes your clothes!

The Wonderwash is a plastic container that can hold 4-5 lb. of the dirtiest clothes you have. Add 1 T. biodegradable soap, and water as hot as that fabric can handle. Put the lid on, tighten up, and crank. The hot water turns to steam under pressure in the sealed, sloshing churn. That pressure knocks the dirt out of the clothes. Two minutes of cranking will do it. (This machine will also churn butter.)

How to Grow Delicious Asparagus

2011-12-01T10:31:00.000-08:00

You know a meal is special when asparagus is involved. It is a vegetable that refuses to conform with those other boring, mundane greens. With that sweet and crunchy satisfaction that goes just right with a little garlic, you can't go wrong with asparagus!

As good as asparagus tastes, it is equaled by the amount of effort you must put in to produce it yourself. The growing process of asparagus is not measured by weeks or months, but rather, years. If you enjoy asparagus, however, it may be worth the effort.

As it so happens, we are coming upon asparagus season in many parts of the United States. The southern region is ripe for growing. So if you live in one of those farm states, lucky you.

There are several factors to take into account when planting your asparagus: Where should you plant them? Should you plant seeds, or roots? How long do asparagus take to grow? Carla Emery answers all these questions in this week's passage from her book.

Planting Asparagus

Choosing Seed or Roots

NOTE: Asparagus seeds are poisonous.

Will you grow asparagus from seed? Or from roots? From 1-year-old roots? Or from 2-year-old or 3-year-old roots? The younger the roots (called "crowns") are, the cheaper they are but the longer it takes them to produce, a difference measured in years. You will harvest lightly from seeds in 3 years, normally after 4. You will begin getting a heavy harvest from 1-year-old crowns in 3 years, from 2-year-old crowns in 2 years, from 3-year-old crowns after 1 year. (You can get a light harvest earlier than that.) If you do buy roots, plant 15 for each family member. Most northern growers plant roots in the early spring. Southern growers tend to plant them in the fall.

Choosing the Site. You do this only once every 25 years, so it's worth investing some effort. Choose your site carefully, one where the asparagus plants will not be in danger of being plowed up. Putting them in a long row at one side of your garden works well. It should be sunny and well-drained - because asparagus dies in waterlogged ground! For either asparagus seed or roots, your seedbed soil should be light and rich. Cultivate deeply. If the soil is not loose and light - if it's heavy clay, for example - add a little sand and a lot of compost. Like artichokes, asparagus is a heavy feeder. Start it out with a compost- or manure-rich soil.

Planting Seed. Asparagus seed is usually planted in a special seedbed or in seed flats. You can also use seeds to occasionally replenish your permanent bed of asparagus plants. Or plant directly to your garden. Start by pouring lukewarm (not hot!) water over the seed, and let it soak until cool. Pour off that water and do the same thing 3 more times. Or else soak the seed 48 hours at 85 to 90˚F if you have a way to control the temperature. Plant the seeds 2 inches deep and about 1⁄2 inch apart, in rows 18 inches apart, as early in the spring as possible. Plant some radish seed together with the asparagus to mark row location for cultivation because asparagus takes 3 weeks to germinate. When the plants are 2 inches tall, thin to about 1 inch apart. Weed frequently enough to keep out weeds. Be careful not to cut or disturb the asparagus when cultivating. From a seedbed, transplant the following spring, using directions for asparagus roots. If you planted in seed flats, transplant to your permanent site when the plants are well rooted.

Planting Roots. Proceed with care. Dig trenches 18 inches deep in rows 4 feet apart. Why the deep trench? Because a thriving asparagus plant has a strong root system that spreads as much as 6 feet horizontally and goes 6 to 8 feet down. The deep digging of the soil before you plant helps with that spreading, and the deep trench ensures that you get the asparagus' root system established below cultivation level, so you can use a rototiller within much of that 6-foot horizontal root-spreading area. Cover the bottom of the trench with a 6-inch layer of well-rotted manure. Spread 6 inches of topsoil over that. Now set in the asparagus crowns, 12 to 18 inches apart. Cover them with 2 inches of soil. As they grow, gradually cover them with more soil. Keep them weedfree.

How To Finish Your Feast: Sandwiches

2011-11-23T11:31:00.000-08:00

It is nearly impossible to eat all the food available on Thanksgiving. So just because the Thursday festivity has come and passed, it doesn't mean we can't keep eating. For some, the best part of Thanksgiving is the food left over!

Thanksgiving is the one time of year you really buy/prepare food in bulk. It is a waste not to continue eating, especially with our tight food budgets. Plus, what luxury is there but having an excuse to eat as much food as possible? I say it's got to go somewhere.

The best way I have found putting Thanksgiving leftovers in my stomach has been by means of the sandwich. The sandwich is a revolutionary invention of its time, with the ability to be loaded with a sizeable chunk of food in a relatively small amount of space. This equates to more food in your belly and less food sitting uselessly in the refrigerator.

In honor of this November holiday, please use Carla Emery's sandwich recipes as inspiration for your own. The list might have just the thing for your post-Thanksgiving meals.

Sandwich Mixes

These sandwich fillings are meant to be spread on homemade bread. Store-bought bread is too salty and generally "strong"-tasting for them. Any leftover meat can be made into a fine sandwich filling. Just remove bone and fat (except for old-time potted ham). Slice or grind the meat. Moisten the grindings with a salad dressing, such as mayonnaise or tartar sauce. You can make plain meat fillings this way or with the variations that follow. Croquettes are another good way to use meat leftovers. So is sliced meat warmed up in leftover gravy and served with rice or sliced boiled spuds that have been sautŽed in a little butter with some chopped fresh green onion.

Ham and Egg

Grind the ham with chopped hard cooked egg. Moisten with mayonnaise or cream dressing. Add finely chopped red or green pepper and mustard.

Ham and Pickle

Grind 2 c. ham. Mix smooth with 1 small ground pickle, 2 t. prepared mustard, 2 T. butter, and 1Ú2 t. pepper.

Ham and Everything

Mix together 1 c. chopped ham, 1 chopped hard-cooked egg, 2 T. chopped green pepper, 2 T. chopped sour pickle, and a pinch of pepper. Moisten with mayonnaise. Add thin pickle slices and strips of green pepper, if desired.

Old-Time Potted Ham

Grind one-third fat and two-thirds lean meat to a smooth paste. Add salt and cayenne pepper to taste. Heat and pack in small pots.

Ham and Chicken

Grind 1 c. cooked chicken meat, white or dark, and 1Ú2 c. cooked ham. Mince 1Ú2 c. celery and 1 T. green pepper, and mix with meat. Moisten with about 1Ú2 c. mayonnaise.

Chicken Salad Sandwich Filling

Grind cooked chicken and moisten with mayonnaise. Add crumbled crisp bacon or chopped celery.

Chopped Veal

Grind about 11Ú2 c. veal and season with 1 t. salt, 1 T. lemon juice, and a little pepper and mustard, if desired.

Special Recipes for a Special Holiday

2011-11-17T09:50:00.000-08:00

It's that time of year again.

Thanksgiving. The time of year when we gather with our families, give thanks, love each other, and stuff our faces full of whatever food we can get our hands on.

I love this holiday. It's the one time of year I can eat any amount of food and not one person will judge me for it. I have a tremendous appetite, especially when there is enough food being served to feed a village of Hobbits.

For those of you who have as big of an appetite as I do, you know what it's like. We deserve to have a day of deliciousness every year. In a world where we sometimes feel frowned upon for occasional self-gratification and gluttony, Thanksgiving wipes the whole slate clean and gives us one whole day to eat! To me, that is amazing.

You know what else is amazing? Thanksgiving recipes, and that is exactly what Carla Emery has written in a portion of her book The Encyclopedia of Country Living. Sure -- turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy are all great, but perhaps you have been pondering some alternative Thanksgiving ideas this autumn season. Well, Carla has provided recipes from her unique Thanksgivings in 1972 and '73, years she claims were her "banner years for home growing and good cooking." Yes, her recipes are a bit unorthodox by American standards, but they are every bit as delicious. Here are her menus from these special years:

Thanksgiving 1972

Gander (the turkey that bit our son Danny twice) stuffed with sage dressing; sliced tomatoes (last of the fresh ones - picked green just before frost and stored to ripen gradually)

Cooked pumpkin mashed with butter

Boiled green beans with onion and bacon

Boiled potatoes with giblet gravy

Sweet crock pickles

Bread and cheese;

Brandied peaches (buried in September and dug up for Thanksgiving)

Root beer.

Thanksgiving 1973

Roast goose stuffed with sauerkraut

Giblet gravy

Mashed potatoes

Baked acorn squash halves (a dab of butter and honey cooked in the heart)

Boiled Swiss chard

Brandied peaches

Mincemeat pie.

Chopping Wood The Right Way

2011-11-10T10:49:00.000-08:00

Its officially fall. You can see it in the trees, which have stripped themselves of their bountiful vegetation. While trees are now missing their most lustrous beauty, they offer us an opportunity to use them.

Chopping wood is an essential task if one is living outdoors. It is also a more adventurous way to warm oneself than simply turning up the temperature. Whether chopping wood to build a fire or house, this activity offers a great opportunity to learn about living off the land. It is also a great father-son bonding experience; there isn't a dad out there who hasn't attempted to teach "survival man" tactics to their son or daughter. At least with this particular task, it is a practical activity that can be applied to many situations, especially as we approach winter.

When chopping wood, it is essential to know proper technique. But more important than chopping technique is safety. When using a sharp, heavy tool like an ax, it is important to remember you are wielding a dangerous object. Carla Emery chopped wood all her adolescence, and details her knowledge of chopping technique and safety in the Encyclopedia of Country Living.

Chopping Safety.

Strive for accuracy before you strive for force - at least enough so that you don't hit your foot. Then, once you're sure you can put the blade onto the wood, you want to give it all the power you can. Use a good big ax, a heavy one, because you can get a lot more force with it. Wear heavy boots in case you miss. Chips can fly up into an eye or the ax blade can hit a knot and be deflected, so don't let children, or anybody, stand near when you're chopping. If you want to be really safe, wear goggles, a hard hat, and steel-toed boots!

Chopping Technique.

Everybody's got his or her own way of chopping. A friend of ours only lifts the ax to shoulder height, then brings it down with a big grunt and the wood splits. Another friend raises it straight over his head. He holds the ax strong in his left hand, loose in his right hand, and then brings it down kind of pulling with the left hand and pushing with the right hand. The best stroke for me uses both hands on the ax - as if you were holding a baseball bat, only farther apart. To do it my way, if you're right-handed, start the ax out back of your right shoulder behind your head with your back arched backwards just a trifle (or you can alternate shoulders with every swing) and then bring it forward and down, moving your shoulder and chest forward at the same time. Try to hit your block of wood right in the center. You don't want the ax absolutely perpendicular to the stump when it strikes. I aim to get it square on. If your wood doesn't split from the center you can try taking slabs off the edge awhile before you tackle the heart. If you can get your ax into the tree but not out the other side, pull it out and try again. Look for a natural crack to strike into. There usually is one in old wood. If you're still finding it hard, use wedges and a wood-splitting maul or sledgehammer instead of the ax.

A Post-Halloween Pumpkin Treat

2011-11-03T14:14:00.000-07:00

As children are stuffing their faces with candy and goodies, we can now acknowledge this year’s ghostly tradition has passed. Over are the trips to the doorsteps of neighbors for handfuls of candy. Done with are the costumes that frighten us, and so, some say, is the usefulness of our festive pumpkins.

Halloween may be over, but the usefulness of our pumpkins is just beginning! While pumpkins have served us well in acting as canvases for our carving delight, I refuse to believe we should simply toss them into our yard wastes! Like yard waste, this would be a waste.

Each year, we make a visit to the pumpkin patch and purchase these orange fruits to decorate our porch. They are plants that perfectly fit our spooky fall season, but by no means are they useless carcasses just because the month has changed. So if you have a pumpkin sitting on your porch, why not use it for a post-Halloween feast? Give this Pumpkream Pie recipe a taste.

Baking.

Arrange your peeled pieces cut side down in some sort of baking pan. Bake about an hour at 400˚F. Then scoop out the part that stayed soft and mashable. Another system is in Ruth’s Vegan Squash Pie recipe a bit later on. Of that one, Lane Morgan says, “That’s how I always prepare my pumpkins for pies, except I scrape out the seeds before I bake because I don’t know how good they’d be for roasting after being cooked in all that moisture. You don’t have to peel or chunk the pumpkin, and I hate peeling pumpkin. Don’t use a rimless baking surface because the pumpkins will ‘weep’ as they cook. I save that liquid to get the puree going in the blender.”

Pumpkream Pie

Mix together 1 c. granulated sugar, a pinch of salt, 1 t. cinnamon, 1⁄4 t. cloves, and 1⁄4 t. nutmeg. Beat in 2 eggs. Then add 1 c. wellcooked–down (cooked-dry) pumpkin. Add 1 c. thick cream or whipping cream. Bake in an 8-inch pie pan, which will be full, for 20 minutes at 425˚F. Then reduce to 375˚F and bake until it rises and then makes small cracks around the edge.

Soothing Sachets

2011-10-11T14:23:00.000-07:00

As someone with sensitive eyes and poor sleeping habits, I know what it’s like to suffer from painful and frustrating headaches. When headaches become part of my weekly routine, however, I hesitate to pop pills for every minor complaint. Maybe it’s just me, but I really don’t like the idea of swallowing a bunch of chemicals each time my head hurts—and I like the idea of becoming dependent on those chemicals even less. So as of late, I’ve tried exploring more natural headache remedies: drinking water, a cool washcloth on the forehead, lying down in a dark, cool room. Each of these remedies helps ease minor headaches, so I can save the pills for the rare but potent ones.

One of my new favorite headache remedies is an herbal pillow. Certain herbs can have a soothing effect when you inhale them or rub the oils on your skin—and Carla Emery knows just which ones to use. Whether it is for curing a nagging headache or keeping your closet smelling fresh, Carla Emery has fantastic tips for making your own sachet or herb pillow.

What is a sachet?

Basically, these are cloth “pillows” made to hold dried, crushed herbs and flowers. Sachets are tiny bags for scenting clothing, sheets and pillowcases, or stationery—one usually places them in a drawer or closet to transfer a pleasant fragrance to the other items in the enclosed space. Herb pillows are several times larger and are traditionally used to overcome a sickroom smell and soothe nerves.

What herbs should I use?

You can experiment to get your favorite scent. Lavender is traditional, but don’t be afraid to try other mixtures. Lilac, rose petals, sweet peas, mint, rosemary, and thyme are all suitable. Or use lavender, sage, peppermint, and lemon balm in some combination, or sage, peppermint, and lemon balm without lavender. If you are making sachets intended to keep moths away, try a mixture of the insect-repellent herbs: cotton lavender, mint, rosemary, rue, southernwood, tansy, and wormwood.

The scent, whatever its source, will not last. To renew scent, every couple weeks or so, crush the sachet bag a little between your fingers to break some herbs and expose a new supply of their fragrant oil for scent. The aromatics will eventually run out; sachets need to be refilled at least every year.

Preparing the Contents

Choose a dry morning to collect the herbs and flowers, after the dew has dried. Pick blossoms that have just fully opened early in the day. Avoid roses that have already been fully open for several days or have been in a vase for a week—most of their fragrant oils will be gone.

Collect about four times as much as you expect to need, because the leaves and petals will shrink in drying. Use the petals and buds of flowers only. Pull them carefully from the rest of the flower, which you discard. Dry them away from light, spread them out in a shallow layer on clean paper or cloth, and stir a couple of times a day. Dry to a papery state.

Once your planned ingredients are harvested and dried, mix them and grind to a powder in your spice mill, mortar, or blender/food processor. Add a fixative like orrisroot. If you are making a large quantity of powder at once (more than you need to fill your sachets or pillows) store in a small tightly-lidded bottle in a cool place and protect from the light.

Making the Sachet

Pack the powder into “pillowcases” of cotton, and sew up the open side. You can make a large herb pillow by sewing together two men’s handkerchiefs. You can cover the inner pillow with velvet, gingham, percale, ribbon-trimmed lace, or any other scrap material you have. To hang or pin in place, sew a loop of ribbon or bias tape into one corner as the fourth side is sewn. Just make sure the material and the seams are tight enough so that dust from the contents doesn’t leak out.

Headache Pillow: A Midwestern pioneer recipe. Mix together ½ oz. cloves and 2 oz. each of lavender, marjoram, rose petals, and betony rose leaf. Proceed as above. Sniff to cure your headache.

Herb Sachet: Mix 1 part each dried sweet basil, dried thyme, dried marjoram, and dried rosemary leaves. With this one you don’t need any fixative.

To Ease Melancholy and Put You To Sleep Pillow: Mix 2 oz. rose petals, 1 oz. mint, and ¼ crushed clove for pillow.

Guerrilla Tree Planting

2011-09-28T11:57:00.000-07:00

Someone once asked Martin Luther, “What should I do on the last day of earth?” Luther replied, “Plant a tree.”

It’s a wonderful, spiritual thing to plant a tree. Each tree is a living thing that can share the rest of your life. It will grow and give you shade, elegant beauty, food to eat, clean air to breathe, and branches for birds to nest in and children to climb in and for you to hang your hammock on and take a well-deserved nap.

Carla Emery loves trees so much that she came up with the most wonderful idea: guerrilla tree planting.

The idea here is that wherever you are—in an urban or rural area—don’t miss an opportunity to plant new life wherever you see fit. Pick a neglected space on private land or an open one on public land. Then you sneak up and plant your tree there. Plant trees on your holidays. Don’t leave town without some seeds or seedlings in your back seat! Don’t go picnicking or backpacking without a few gifts to the earth in the form of seeds or seedlings: evergreens, or fruit or nut trees. Keep a private tally of how many trees you’ve planted so far and take pride in it. Go back and visit some of them years later and say, “Hi, I’m your parent. My, but you’re looking good!” Expect some losses; it’s okay. Thankfully, Carla Emery has a few tips to make your next guerrilla tree planting venture a success:

Consider your climate

Is your climate subtropical or tropical, or temperate? The amount of sunshine falling on leaves directly affects the plant’s rate of food production in its leaves. The more sunshine there is, the greater the fruit production per acre. The farther north you live, the higher in altitude you are, the shorter your frost-free season.

What is your pollinating situation?

Some nut and fruit trees, and vines (such as kiwi), can’t make fruit alone; they can be either male or female, and they need another tree to be a pollinizer for them in order to bear fruit. Other trees are “self-fruitful” or “self-fertile” or “self- pollinating.” There are trees that are kind of in-between; they’ll produce some harvest, but only a small crop unless they get cross-pollinated by a different plant. Trees that are to be wind-pollinated should be planted within 100 feet of each other.

How much space do you have?

One of the main questions you have to ask when shopping for a tree is, “How big will it get?” Little seedlings can grow into awesome 100-foot giants. When guerrilla planting, make sure you are planting trees that will only grow to a manageable size and won’t require pruning or major upkeep.

No matter what, plant one or more trees every year. And plant as many — or more — as what you take out. If you’re planting various kinds of trees your harvesting will be staggered because they grow at different rates and you may be harvesting different sorts of products from them. You can sell Christmas trees, nuts, maple syrup, firewood, fence posts, sawlogs, and fruit. If you have livestock fodder trees, you can get rich selling pork, because pigs can more easily get a total diet from tree crops than any other animal. So plant some nut, fruit, sugar, stock forage, timber, or woodlot trees every year on your land. And if you don’t have land, or have no more room, then plant them on someone else’s land, doing your share to guarantee our mutual future.

It takes a long time for a tree to grow, and some of them may not make it. And, sooner or later, grown trees, like people, die of old age. But then they can be fuel or building material, or a home for wild things until they finally decay and become food for other trees in the fullest completion of their life cycle. In the space where they once lived, plant new trees, continuing their spirit of hope. Plant a tree for your housewarming, and one for each anniversary, one for farewell — any excuse will do, the more often the better!

Celebrate Fall with a "Pop!"

2011-09-21T10:33:00.000-07:00

As the leaves start to change color here in Seattle, the wind starts up and the temperature drops, I can’t help but think that fall is in the air. Just breathing in the cool air conjures up images of steaming hot cider, reading by the fireplace, and taking chilly walks through piles of collected leaves. Of course, one of my favorite aspects of this season is the food—pumpkin and acorn squash and cranberries and anything spiced with cinnamon!

Carla Emery shares my appreciation for fall’s bounty with the delightful crop of maize. It’s a bread, it’s a vegetable, it’s a decoration. The husks can be made into paper, rope, or stuffing. The cobs provide fuel to burn. The stalks and leaves are as good as hay for winter-feeding. The vegetable you might know as corn has a rich history of its own and provides one of my favorite fall snacks—popcorn!

An A-maize-ing History Lesson

The Latin name for corn is Zea mays. The word “Zea” is ancient Greek for “cereal” and comes from the verb “to live.” Similarly, the Native American word for corn was “maize,” which means, “that which sustains.” To Europeans, the word “corn” translates to the hard kernels of any common grain: wheat, oats, barley . . . or maize. That’s why the pioneers called maize “corn” — and why Europeans are still confused when we say “corn.”

Corn was first created by the genius of Native Americans thousands of years ago from an annual grass that had an extraordinarily high natural mutation rate. There’s nothing comparable to it among all the wild grasses; corn was created by farmers’ careful seed selections over the millennia (and is still being thus “created”). All the original corns, of course, were Native American. It was they who originally developed the flour, hominy, pod, popcorn, flint, and dent varieties, and all the colors and color combinations of corn.

POPCORN

Popcorn (Zea mays var. praecox or everta) is the only kind of corn that pops and turns inside out. It is considered by archaeologists to be the most ancient of the corns, popped and served for thousands of years. Popcorn is tougher than other corns (it has an extra hard outer covering called endosperm) and is difficult to work with unless you pop or grind it. When it has some moisture content (about 12 percent) and is heated, pressure builds up inside the tough outer covering that is preventing that water vapor from escaping until the whole thing explodes with a pop!

Popcorn takes longer to mature than most sweet corns. Harvest it as you would other field corns, first drying it in the field. Then hang it in the house like seed corn and dry another 3–4 weeks. The kernels of popcorn need to be hard on the outside in order to get the proper explosion of the remaining moisture at the center of the kernel when it’s heated. Popcorn is also the hardest of all corns to shell. To keep from hurting your hand, shell by rubbing one ear of corn against another or cover your hand with an old sock before you rub kernels away from the cob. Store popcorn in tightly lidded glass jars (so kernels don’t become too dry to pop).

Popping

Dutch ovens are good popcorn poppers. So is an iron frying pan with a lid or a commercial popper. Allow ½ cup dry corn for every 1 gallon popped corn that you want. Melt about 1 T. cooking oil in your Dutch oven or some other heavy pan with a tight-fitting lid. When the oil is hot enough to get broken lines across it and is just starting to smoke, it’s ready for the popcorn. Add the popcorn, cover, and cook over medium heat. Shake the pan on top of the heat constantly until you don’t hear much more popping; then immediately take it off the heat to prevent burning. To butter the popcorn, melt some butter in another small pan, pour it over the popcorn, and stir to mix. Sprinkle with salt if you like.

Classic popcorn is wonderful with just a little butter and salt, but Carla Emery has recipes for some great seasonal gourmet versions as well!

Cinnamon-Raisin Popcorn Mix -- Mix together 2 T. melted butter, 3 T. brown sugar, 1⁄2 t. ground cinnamon, 1⁄4 c. raisins, and about 1⁄4 c. apple chunks. Toss together with 8–10 c. freshly popped popcorn.

Cheese-Coated Popcorn -- Grate cheese to make 1⁄2 cup. Sprinkle cheese onto still-warm popped corn. Mix well. If you bake this for 15 minutes, it will dry out and be a bit crisper.

Honey-Nut Gourmet Popcorn -- Mix together 2 qt. freshly popped corn, 1 c. chopped peanuts, 1 c. raisins, and 1 c. sunflower seeds. Heat 1⁄2 c. honey and 1⁄2 c. water together in a pan, stirring, until you get to hard-ball stage. Add 1⁄2 c. butter and stir to melt. Pour the sweet mix over the dry mixture, stirring until the kernels are all coated. Spread it out on 2 greased cookie sheets. Bake 15 minutes at 350 degrees F.

How to Mind Your Own Beeswax

2011-09-13T10:55:00.000-07:00

Lately, I’ve been facing a difficult dilemma. I’ve recently come to the age where I need to start thinking about what I eat. As a kid (and even through high school and college, I have to admit) I pretty much ate whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted, and rarely experienced any consequences to make me consider changing my behavior. But as I begin to acknowledge my own adulthood, I’m realizing that processed foods—while often tasty and satisfying—might be doing more harm than good in my diet. Refined sugars, for example, are ever-present in packaged food and many dessert recipes, but serve no nutritional purpose. So here is the dilemma: how can I live without the unhealthy sweets for which I yearn on a daily basis?

Luckily, Carla Emery has the answer: honey.

Honey has been around longer than refined sugar and is easier for your body to digest. Honey is composed of simple sugars, mainly fructose and glucose. Best of all, you can substitute honey in nearly any recipe that calls for refined sugar and trade guilt for flavor!

Carla Emery has all kinds of advice for personal beekeeping to pollinate your crops and collect honey, but if you feel a bit squirmy about spending a lot of time with these buzzing pollinators (like I do), you can also buy wholesale honey direct from another beekeeper. If you are purchasing honey from a beekeeper, she suggests buying in 5-gallon quantities to supply an average family for a year.

Storing Honey

Honey keeps easily — better than just about anything else. Unlike most food storage, storing honey at a warm temperature, in a closed bottle, does not result in any loss of flavor. It doesn’t need to be frozen, canned, or even refrigerated. In fact, storing honey in a cool place can actually speed up the granulation process. (Your honey may crystallize into a stiff whitish texture—this is normal and doesn’t harm your honey, but each time you re-melt it your honey may lose some of its flavor and nutrition.) It keeps just fine in glass, plastic, pottery, or metal, inside or outside. But store where it won’t get warmer than 75 degrees Fahrenheit since above that temperature it may lose flavor and color (the higher above 75 degrees F, the faster the change). Ideally, pack your honey in wide-mouthed 1-gallon jars in comfortable room temperature (chilly, stiff honey won’t mix with other ingredients very easily).

Cooking and Baking with Honey

The sweet taste of honey tends to be more concentrated than that of sugar, so you can substitute less honey than the sugar called for and end up with your dish equally sweet tasting. You can substitute honey for sugar in any recipe, but because honey is a liquid you should then also decrease the liquid in the recipe. Carla Emery has a helpful cheat sheet for substituting honey for sugar when cooking:

· 2/3—3/4 cup honey = 1 cup sugar

· ¾ cup honey = add 2-3 T. liquid

· 1 cup honey = add ¼ cup liquid

· Baked goods with honey will brown faster than with sugar, so bake at a temperature 25 degrees lower than called for.

· Honey is acidic. If there is as much as 1 cup of honey in the recipe, you can add ½ t. baking soda (per 1 cup honey) and get a leavening action as well as neutralize the acidic quality.

· Honey is easiest to measure if your measuring container has first held the oil or other fat for the recipe, or if you first coat the spoon or cup with oil (or with nonstick pan-coating spray). Then the honey won’t stick in the measuring container and you’ll be able to get it all back out easily.

· Combine honey with other liquids in the recipe.

· If liquid isn’t called for in your recipe (like for cookies) add 4 T. additional flour for each ¾ cup honey.

· Cakes, cookies, and breads will be moist and stay fresh longer because of honey’s moistness.

And here are a couple of Carla Emery’s mouth-watering recipes to try without losing an ounce of sweetness!

Honey-applesauce cookies:

Cream together 1 ½ cup honey and 1 cup shortening. Add 2 beaten eggs and beat mixture until smooth. Add 2 t. soda to 2 cups applesauce. Sift in 2 t. cinnamon, 1 t. nutmeg, 1 t. salt, and 3 ½ cups flour. Stir in 2 cups quick-cooking oats (or rolled wheat), 2 cups raisins, and 1 cup walnuts. Drop on cookie sheet with a spoon. Bake at 325 degrees F for 10 minutes.

Honey-Fudge Brownies:

In a saucepan over low heat, melt together ½ cup butter, 2 squares unsweetened chocolate, ½ t. salt, and 1 t. vanilla. Mix well. Remove from heat. Blend in 1 cup honey, ½ cup unsifted flour, and 1 t. baking powder. Add 2 well-beaten eggs. Beat the mixture well. Pour into a thoroughly greased 9-inch-square pan. Bake at 325 degrees F for 35 minutes (or until done in center). Cool on wire rack 15 minutes before marking in 16 squares.

Cow Psychology 101

2011-09-07T10:18:00.000-07:00

I once had the opportunity to milk a cow on a small farm in Northern California. Sitting on a low stool, leaning towards the underside of the cow, I was awed by the sheer size massive mammal allowing me to glean nourishment from her body. Though I was nervous, the owner coached me through the milking and assured me that I was not hurting her in any way. It was a fascinating process and helped me to appreciate the origins of some of the food I regularly consume. Up until then, I had always just grabbed a carton of 2% milk from the refrigerator in the supermarket and thought no more of it. Considering our dependency on cattle for enriching our diets, Carla Emery encourages us to learn a bit more about cows and they way they think and behave, instead of taking them for granted.

Worldwide there are literally hundreds of beef, dairy, and dual-purpose cattle breeds and at least 35 common ones—including both dairy and beef—in the United States. Among the many breeds, cows vary wildly in gentleness from a sweet pet of a Jersey family milk cow to a huge, mean, wild range bull. All cows are powerful, however, and have the potential to do serious damage if the handler doesn’t fully understand the way they think and behave. Here is a little Cow Psychology 101 to help with safe cow handling.

Cow psychology is very much influenced by the design of a cow’s body—her senses work differently from ours, which is important to understand when handling cows.

A cow’s strongest sense is her smell. She can smell her calf 3 or 4 miles away. A bull can smell a cow in heat that is miles away.

Cattle have good hearing, too, and respond well to auditory cues and calls. They dislike high-pitched sounds like the crack of a whip.

A cow has 360° panoramic vision. She can actually see beside and behind herself without turning her head. This means that she can put her hind foot into the bucket or kick it over on you and it’s not a lucky accident for her. However, cows cannot see color. Everything is black and white to them, so it doesn’t matter what you wear. They are very sensitive to stark black and white contrasts, though, and have poor depth perception. White lines painted across a road can look like a cattle guard to them. It’s hard for a cow to tell the difference between a shadow and a hole in the ground so a dark shadow can scare her into going around it.

Your cow’s closest relative on the farm is the sheep. They’re both herd-oriented, humble animals. (For least stress and best production keep 2 or more calves or cattle.) Like sheep, cowherds form social hierarchies with a ‘boss cow’ the others follow. Large cattle herds will form smaller subherds with an order of dominance in each group.

Carla Emery’s Golden Rule for Safe Cattle Handling: Move your cattle patiently, quietly.

Cows are frightened of new places and are made nervous by changes in their daily routine. They don’t take easily to learning anything new and they actually resent being forced to do anything.

Avoid exciting or hurrying them because a running cow does its own unpredictable thing whereas a slowly walking one is likely to go where you want. The safest and smoothest approach is true patience and a plan to outsmart rather than outfight them.
Cows follow the leader. If you can coax the first 1 or 2 through a gate, etc., the rest are likely to follow naturally.
To turn a cow you can make some noise and make yourself look large by waving your arms widely, but do this from an angle, not right in front of the animal because you may lose. Standing straight ahead in the cow’s way invites you getting knocked down and hurt.
Teach your cattle to come to a certain familiar call to get a treat of grain or a bale of hay. When you feed them frequently and handle them gently they learn to trust and depend on you. Then you can call and lead them where you want. Always follow the call with the food reward or they’ll lose faith. (This, of course, works best if they’re hungry!)

"That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet"

2011-08-31T14:48:00.000-07:00

Today, many of us appreciate roses as something to be admired in a solely visual sense. What with modern plant hybridization, the vast majority of rose varieties commercially available have little to no fragrance. But Shakespeare was right in noting the sweet scent of the rose as its most distinctive and valuable attribute (Romeo and Juliette, II, ii, 1-2). According to Carla Emery, “the scentless rose is a modern reality” and one definitely worth avoiding if you want to do more than look at your rose plants. Though they may be thorny, fragrant roses have a lot to offer in the kitchen and for arts and crafts. Carla Emery suggests sticking to “old-fashioned” roses like Damasks, Bourbons, Centifolias, Albas, and Gallicas to use in potpourris, rose jars, beads, and food.

But what exactly is it about the rose that we can find useful? Emery focuses on the hips and the petals.

Rose Hips—These are the round orange-to-reddish “fruit” formed after the flower of a rose has bloomed. The hip is the seedpod of the plant. Some hips are better tasting and bigger than others; Carla Emery recommends Japanese rose varieties, sweetbriar eglantine, or wild rose hips for their generous size and doses of Vitamin C!

Rose Petals—These are a bit more obvious: the petals of the blooming flower contain oils you can use for scent or flavor. Harvesting rose petals takes a bit of attention, though:

Gather just when the rose has fully expanded. If you wait a day longer, until they start to fade, they will have lost some of that precious fragrance. Gather in the morning after the dew has dried, but before they have gotten really warmed by the sun. Dry before proceeding by pressing them gently between layers of cloth. Dry them in a dehydrator or on a muslin cloth laid over a screen in an airy, shady place.

Here are a few ideas to make the most your old-fashioned roses:

Rose Hip Tea

Boil dried coarse-ground rose hips with water, about 1 T. for each cup of tea. The longer you boil, the stronger your tea. Mash the hips with a spoon to get out all the juice, and strain. Sweeten with brown sugar or honey.

Rose Brandy

To flavor sauces for cakes and puddings, gather rose petals while the dew is on them. Fill a bottle with them. Then pour into the bottle a good brandy. Steep 3 to 4 weeks. Strain and rebottle.

Rose Petal Honey

This recipe was a favorite of Martha Washington’s. Bring 2 pints of honey to a boil. Add 1 pint rose petals. Let stand 4 hours. Heat again. Strain into jars.

Damp Rose Potpourri

Dry the rose petals just until they feel leathery — 8 hours or overnight. Use ice cream-type salt that is coarse and not iodized. Layer salt and rose petals in the bottom of a glass jar, 1⁄4 c. salt to 2 c. petals. Add some orrisroot, too. Keep a lid on the jar and open only when you want to let out some fragrance.

The Magical Fruit

2011-08-23T10:49:00.000-07:00

Fact: The peanut is a bean, not a nut.

Fact: The chickpea is also a bean, not a true pea.

Fact: The soynut is the seed from a bean plant, not a nut.

Confused? I was too, until I took a little time to get to know the legume family—the large group of healthy and tasty foods to which all of the above belong.

Legumes are part of the family Leguminosae, or the “pea” family. Legumes all have clusters of fruit that matures in pods. Beans are actually just a small subgroup of this huge category. There are about 200 edible species of legumes cultivated worldwide, with about 1,500 different varieties from snap peas to lima and runner to lentil, soy and black-eye. There are so many different types of legumes that it is difficult to tackle them all in one post, but here are some key facts true of all legumes that can help to clarify what they are and why we should eat them!

Carla Emery says that legumes are incredibly important foods. And when Carla Emery says something is important, I listen. Here’s why:

Since most of the common legumes are nitrogen fixers, they are great for renewing fertility in a crop rotation following heavy feeders, and they make perfect “green manure.” Till legume roots into your soil along with the leftover coffee grounds from the last post!
They dry easily and store well under the simplest care, even increasing their protein value in storage.
Together with a grain, they make a complete protein. So, after grains, beans are the most important food on the planet. So don’t neglect your beans, especially when grains are present in a meal.

A bit about combining beans and grains. All over the world beans are regularly eaten in combination with a grain, creating a complete protein combination essential to all human diets. Both grains and beans are good foods, but no bean or grain by itself contains all the amino acids necessary for human health, unlike meat and dairy (and mushroom) products. For example, corn is low in lysine and tryptophan, 2 essential amino acids. Beans are rich in lysine and tryptophan but lack zein, which corn can provide. So grains and beans together are as good as drinking milk or eating steak (an important detail for vegans or vegetarians to consider). But they must be eaten in the same meal for it to work. You get the same result with corn and bean stew (succotash), baked beans and bread, beans with barley or rice, beans and pasta, or corn chips and bean dip.

Besides providing you with a complete protein in a meal, legumes can have quite long-term health benefits, since consuming legumes regularly can reduce your risk of both heart disease and cancer. In fact, Carla Emery says that eating at least 5 servings of fruits and vegetables a day reduces you cancer risk by half.

For a healthy and tasty snack, try dipping corn chips in your own homemade hummus!

Hummus—made from the “garbanzo bean” (as it is known in Spain) or “chickpea” (in England). This legume is actually grown all over the world in warm climates and is prominent in national dishes from India, Italy, the Middle East and Latin America.

2 cups precooked garbanzos

1 garlic clove (or 5, if you boil them ahead for a milder taste)

¼ cup olive oil

¼ cup lemon juice

Puree garbanzos and garlic. Add olive oil and lemon juice. If it seems too thick or dry, thin by adding a little water. Chill before serving.

Change it up! Try adding sesame oil or tahini for a nuttier flavor. Or add roasted bell peppers or sun-dried tomatoes and spread on crackers or wheat bread for a perfect protein!

Wake up and smell the coffee

2011-08-17T10:09:00.000-07:00

For many people, Seattle is synonymous with Starbucks. And sure enough, my fellow Seattleites and I are avid drinkers of this satisfying beverage, and even boast ownership of the birthplace of famous Starbucks Coffee from Pike Place Market. However proud we may be of our city’s role in the modern celebration of the coffee bean, it is easy to forget the origins of the plant and the process required in order to hold that fragrant, steaming mug of caffeine in our hands. Thankfully, we have Carla Emery to fill us in.

The coffee plant is native to east Africa. It looks like a small tree or shrub and grows up to 8 feet tall in a pot (up to 15 feet outdoors). A dwarf variety gets only 3 feet tall. Coffee can be grown in a temperate-zone garden if you transplant to a container and bring inside for the winter. The coffee plant is quite ornamental with its scented white flowers and shiny dark green foliage. The coffee plant can’t survive a frost and needs some shade to protect it from excessive sun. It can be grown outdoors in the California coastal area from about Santa Barbara on south.

Planting

Keep seeds dry before planting. Plant coffee seed on the soil surface in a sand-peat or half-organic mix. Keep warm (about 85 ̊F) and allow a sizable time (a month or more) for germination. Once well started, transplant outdoors or to 4-inch pots. Grow potted coffee in well-drained soil; situate in a sunny window. Young coffee plants grow best at 70–75 ̊F. If you have trouble with brown leaves, it means you’ve been watering too much, need to move the plant to a larger pot, or both.

Harvesting

For flowering and fruiting, the plants need 55–58 ̊F night temperatures. Without those conditions, the plant will just grow bunches of lovely dark green glossy leaves — no flowers, no beans. Also be cautious with pruning. Cutting off the top does no harm, but trimming branches eliminates your crop, since flowers and beans grow there. The white flowers evolve into 1⁄2 - inch fruits that are first green and then red, purple, or scarlet when ripe. When ripe, harvest them.

Using

Each pod contains 2 coffee beans, which you rescue from the outer pulp, dry, roast, grind, and soak in very hot water to make your beverage.

If you live outside of the ideal temperature zone or just don’t have the time or means to maintain your own coffee plant, there are other ways to localize your participation in the coffee industry—for example, garden maintenance or composting.

If you buy coffee and cook it at home, you can use the leftovers to give back to the earth in your own garden. “Coffee grounds are a first- class, environmentally harmless deterrent to ants. To keep ants out of your house, or any other building, just lay a solid 3-inch layer against your foundation all the way around. To deal with an anthill, surround it likewise with a sizable ring of grounds. Grounds will also prevent cutworms (as do wood ashes). Just dig a shallow ditch around vulnerable plants and pour grounds into it. As they break down, they’ll also add fertility to the soil.”

Coffee grounds are also a great addition to your compost pile. “Earthworms love them and will quickly turn them into rich humus. And a manure/grounds/leafy mulch mixture added to poor soil will practically instantly make it fertile.” Carla Emery warns that consuming the large quantity of coffee it would take to produce grounds for a large garden could be a strain on your pancreas. She advises not to drink all the coffee yourself, but “contact a business that brews coffee in quantity, and ask them to let you take all those unwanted coffee grounds off their hands!”

Fun Facts About Fowl

2011-08-11T12:06:00.001-07:00

Let’s talk about birds—geese, specifically. When I think of ideal household pets or livestock, geese are not the first creatures to come to mind. Actually, until about a week ago, I thought of geese only as large, flapping, non-cuddly producers of gooey droppings. Thankfully, Carla Emery has forced me to reconsider this opinion. If you are feeling similarly on the fence about these great waterfowl, here are a few fun facts that may help sway you in their favor.

Geese are basically a hardy cash crop.

Believe it or not, geese can thrive on no more than grass. “In fact, except in winter, geese fare quite well with very little care. It’s not unusual to see them foraging through snow. They are extremely resistant to disease and parasites, and they need only a little shade in summer and a bit of shelter against extreme cold. Waterfowl are actually hardier in resistance to poultry diseases than chickens and seldom suffer disease when kept in small flocks. (However, when waterfowl are raised in very large numbers in a small area, they, like all animals under those conditions, are more likely to be affected by disease.)” Geese are generally raised for their meat, but will also lay eggs for an amazing number of years. (Carla Emery also suggests that this could be an example to us on the benefits of plain living and moderation.)

They can moonlight as watchdogs

Geese often form strong attachments to their owners and can manifest this connection in useful ways, like sounding the alarm when a predator or unfamiliar visitor enters the scene.

“Sylvia Nelson, Hillsdale, WY, wrote me, ‘Our first batch of geese, gray Toulouse, imprinted on me and just worship me. We also have a few white Embdens and 2 crossbreeds, hatched out last season, our first successful hatching. Toulouse and Embdens are supposed to be gentle, but a couple of years ago we learned how fierce they can be. My husband woke up one night, with a terrible ruckus going on in the duck and goose yard. He looked out, and saw a fox in the yard. We had seven geese at the time, and each one had a mouthful of fox, and were each pulling in a different direction. The next morning we found a couple of scratches on the geese, no missing geese or ducks, and chunks of fox fur all over the yard, plus a 1-inch-square piece of hide. The fox never returned!’”

Geese are classier animals than you might think.

Carla Emery points out that certain goose breeds carry themselves with a certain amount of grace, and that they look nearly as lovely on the water as swans. Additionally, geese tend to act fairly conservatively in regards to mating.

“Geese generally choose partners in the fall. Once the groupings are established, it is difficult to add more geese. Geese do not mate on first encounter like so many other animals. If your proposed partners are new to each other, you’ll have to allow them time to get acquainted. Many ganders do not change partners easily. Previous companions have to be completely absent for as long as a month before such a gander will accept one or more new ones.”

Since geese are such low-maintenance, useful livestock, I am forced to reconsider my aversion to their size and droppings and admit that their desirable qualities make them entirely worthwhile to keep. Geese can make a fine roast for a holiday dinner, and their eggs can be prepared just as you would use one from a chicken (though they are considerably larger, so you use fewer). Goose feathers can be plucked from a live or butchered bird and used to make pillows, quilts, beds, clothing, and even quill pens!

If you’re still not convinced, just wait until your mouth starts watering over one of Carla Emery’s favorite goose recipes!

Braised gosling

This is a delicious way to prepare a bird that has just reached roasting size. Use a roaster with a rack at the bottom of it. Put a chunked carrot, an onion, a turnip, a pared and cored apple, and a stalk of celery on the grating. Lay the bird on that. Rub salt, pepper, and a little sage on it. Pour some boiling water in the side. Cover and roast at 350 ̊F, 15 minutes to the pound. Baste with butter.

To make the gravy, remove the gosling when done, and mash the vegetables by pouring them and the cooking liquid through a sieve into a bowl. Skim away as much of the grease as possible after it has set a moment. Chop the cooked giblets (except the liver, which you discard), and add them to the broth. Put about 3 T. of the goose grease into a frying pan. Thicken with flour, then add the broth gradually, stirring the lumps out before adding more liquid, until it has all been added. Season your gravy to taste. Serve the bird on a platter, the gravy in a bowl. Have mashed potatoes ready to pour the gravy over. Applesauce, and green peas or lima beans will complete a wonderful meal.

Garlic: more than vampire repellant

2011-08-04T13:59:00.000-07:00

I am not terribly concerned about vampire attacks for one simple reason: I love garlic. I put garlic in almost any savory dish from scalloped potatoes to homemade hummus to scrambled eggs. And I’m not talking about a single clove here or there—I go through probably one or two heads of garlic per week. One way to demonstrate the potent and enduring nature of my love for garlic is this: when my dad and I make garlic bread together, we plan ahead and make one loaf bursting with garlicky goodness for ourselves and another designed for normal human beings who prefer the taste of bread with a hint of garlic. Personally, I just can’t get enough of it.

Carla Emery might not be as overly enthusiastic as I am about garlic, but she has some good information about the nature of garlic and its multitude of uses.

“Garlic is a hardy perennial (though usually grown like an annual), the strongest member of the onion family in its sulfide of allyl content — that good stuff that acts as wormer, disinfectant, etc. Shallots, its closest relative, are basically a mild-flavored garlic variety. Like shallots, garlic blooms (pink flowers), but it may or may not make seed depending on the variety and circumstances. Instead garlic is usually propagated by garlic bulbs or “heads” that grow underground (roots go as deep as 2 feet). Each head is made up of a cluster of smaller ones, each called a “clove.” Garlic is a type of onion, a semihardy perennial that, since it’s not damaged by frost or light freezing, can be left in the garden over winter in the Pacific climate — or can be dug up and stored like onions. It’s grown both for the kitchen garden and for commercial sale (it yields a good profit from a very small acreage). Store-bought garlic is usually too dry to plant. Buy a cluster of garlic cloves from a plant nursery or mail-order source.”

A few interesting facts about garlic:

If your garlic tastes bitter when cooked, it means you cooked it over too high a heat. Many cooks throw onions and garlic in the pan together, but garlic takes less time to cook than onion, so make sure to give the onions a few minutes before adding garlic.

There is a cure to garlic breath! Carla Emery suggests chewing on raw parsley or celery leaves.

Garlic can be used as an insect repellent. Carla Emery says, “to fight insects and plant blights, blend several garlic cloves with some water and 1 T. cooking oil or soap emulsion. Strain. Dilute to 1 qt. and spray on. It works very well but must be done very often if you’re in a serious battle situation.”

Garlic is good for you. And that goes beyond adding it to everything you cook (like I do).

“Garlic has genuine antibiotic properties. Garlic juice, lemon juice, and some sweetening mixed in a cup of warm water are good for a sore throat. Garlic juice applied to ant bites helps make the pain go away. For a patient with a chest cold, mix garlic juice and a vapor rub ointment. Smooth that on a square of cloth, cover with another cloth, and place on chest. Garlic is also a diuretic that thins blood and lowers blood pressure. To prevent travelers’ dysentery, eat a clove per day. It has been used to treat patients (humans and animals) who need worming and has no toxic side effects. To worm a large cat, give one crushed clove each month. So whether you use it for medical or culinary reasons, have at it!”

If you’re a fan or garlic or just looking for a tasty power food, try an easy recipe at home!

Quick Garlic Soup

Heat 12 cloves crushed garlic for about 8 minutes in 3 c. rich milk.

Roast Garlic Spread

Cut the tips off a whole head of garlic (don’t peel or separate cloves). Wrap the head in foil; bake at 350 ̊F until cloves get soft and pulpy. Squeeze the mush onto crackers, toast, or good fresh bread. From The Good Food Guide, edited by Lane Morgan (Sasquatch Books, 1992).

Sweet Summer Delights

2011-07-28T13:17:00.000-07:00

It looks like the Pacific Northwest is beginning to embrace the concept of summer a little bit (knock on wood), and I say we had all better take advantage of the glorious sunshine while we can! But in what way should we express our appreciation of this generous dose of Vitamin D? Carla Emery suggests homemade popsicles for a refreshing treat on a warm day—a favorite for both the young and old!

Homemade popsicles are great because they are “cheap, easy, and even more fun for the children than going to the store. Children like strong, sweet juices like grape and cranberry for popsicles—but when kids are hot anything will do,” even popsicles made from puddings or soda pop! You can buy do-it-yourself popsicle molds from Tupperware and Back to Basics (I actually have a small one from Target, and I’ve been using it all summer, even on the cooler days) or you can make your own from regular household items. Use small sturdy bowls or cans for containers—or even the ice cube tray in your freezer—and wooden sticks or toothpicks for handles.

Using whatever popsicle-making container you prefer, pour your favorite juice into the molds without filling completely, insert your handle, and freeze. (Extra tip: if your containers and handles are makeshift rather than store-bought, you might have trouble keeping your handles completely upright. If you allow your liquid to freeze partially before you insert your handle, you’ll have a more solid consistency to hold the handle up straight.) Obviously, freezing time will vary quite a bit depending on the size and shape of your molds and the temperature of your freezer, but don’t pull on the handles “until you’re sure the center of the popsicle is solidly frozen and you have loosened the sides by running hot water over the back of the mold. Otherwise they might pull out of the container prematurely, leaving a hole that it won’t freeze back into. You don’t have to unmold all the popsicles at once. Just loosen as many as you need. Refill the emptied units and return to the freezer.”

You can use any kind of fruit juice you like for your homemade popsicles (lemonade works great and is particularly refreshing on a warm day), but of course Carla Emery has a couple of recipes working from scratch.

Basic Fruit Popsicles

Puree 1 c. any kind of fruit or a mixture of fruit, and mix with 1 c. water. Pour into your ice cube tray. When they are starting to freeze, add a wooden stick or toothpick to each section.

Pudding Popsicles

Susan Staley was in Germany when she sent me this recipe. She said, “If your children love the Fudgsicle-type popsicle, you can easily make them. Just make up a batch of pudding and freeze it in your popsicle molds. They’re delicious and you can make different kinds besides chocolate. Butterscotch is very good. In fact, any flavor of pudding your children love hot, they’re bound to like cold in hot summer weather.”

Any Fruit Ice

You could juice pomegranates or barberries or red currants, or cook and strain quinces, or grate pineapple, or boil and pulp apples or rhubarb — whatever you have. Sweeten to taste, add lemon juice if the flavor needs it, and freeze.

For the Love of Cheese

2011-07-21T13:06:00.000-07:00

Whether you are curling up by the fire on a rainy day with a wedge of baked brie and dried cranberries, toasting a Riesling with your special someone over an aged gouda, or packing your child’s lunch with an exquisite cheddar sandwich, I think we can all agree—cheese can be a pretty darn wonderful thing.

A wine-and-cheese pairing event last weekend got me thinking about the wonders of my beloved animal by-product, so naturally I consulted Carla Emery’s wisdom on the glory of cheese. Of course, she had plenty to say about cheese making for the individual as well as general information about the world of cheese.

Here are a few things any avid cheese-lover should know:

Homemade cheeses can be safe, traditional, and delicious.

As Carla Emery points out, “the importance of cheese viewed as a traditional food is that it’s the only way to preserve milk when you have no refrigeration…Milk in the form of cheese, after 60 days, is guaranteed free of bad germs because the cheese-making process kills them, so [historically,] where pasteurization was impossible and there were health problems with the milk, cheese was the safe way to eat it.” Additionally, there is no need to be concerned about attaining the expensive equipment and controlled conditions of a big factory. “The fact is, from a historic view, factories are very recent arrivals on the cheese scene,” and the Encyclopedia of Country Living is full of recipes and helpful information for the small-scale cheese producer.

Cheeses are much like people; they come in many shapes, sizes, and colors.

“There are 5 basic types of cheese: soft, semi-soft, firm, hard, and processed.

Soft cheeses are unripened, fresh ones: cottage, cream, pot, ricotta, gjetost, Neufchatel. The soft cheeses that ripen naturally in just a few days include Brie, Camembert, and the double and triple creams, which have thin white crusts and almost fluid insides.

The semi-soft cheeses are ripened using specific types of helper bacteria and yeasts or molds: Basic Swiss, Brick, Muenster; Liederkranz, Limburger, Port Salut; Roquefort and Gorgonzola. These are among the most difficult for homestead cheese-makers because of the special organism culture you need and the special “rip- ening” conditions needed to control how they grow.

Firm cheeses are Cheddars, Cheshire, Lancashire, Caciocavallo, Swiss Emmenthal, Gruyere, Jarlsberg, etc.

Hard cheeses are made like the firm cheeses but are matured to a grainy texture for grating: Asiago, Parmesan, Romano, Sapsago, etc.

Processed cheese is called “American” cheese and comes from factories, and thank God if you don’t have to eat it. It’s made of chemicals, artificial flavor and color, and a wide variety of other nondairy items with some milk thrown in. Your homemade cheese is just milk plus curdling agent.”

Try making your own!

Chevre

Stir 1⁄2 c. warm cultured buttermilk into 1-gallon still-warm-from-the-animal milk or into 1 gal. of pasteurized milk warmed to 85–90 ̊F. Stir in 6 drops of liquid rennet. Stir only 1 to 2 minutes. Cover container with a cloth. Let stand in a warm room all day. Line a colander with boiled muslin. Pour chevre into the colander. Drain off whey. Tie corners of cloth together and hang the remaining curds to drain overnight. Refrigerate. Use like cream cheese.

Gardening with a Philosophy

2011-07-12T12:57:00.000-07:00

Growing my own herbs and vegetables has been a bit of a domestic fantasy of mine for some time now. I’ve been held back from realizing this dream by the semi-nomadic lifestyle of a college student, along with a potentially crippling ignorance of what Carla Emery refers to as “Garden and Farm Philosophies”—until now.

“If you think of agriculture as a religion, those who use poisons and chemical fertilizers belong to one major religion; those who don’t belong to another.” She says that “the very different and very embattled religions are chemical vs. organic growers; or heirloom, open-pollinated seed savers vs. the people who are creating, defending, and using genetically modified plants.”

Certainly there are arguments available to defend each denomination depending on the values and goals of the farmer or gardener. One farmer may value the production success of genetically modified plants in order to grow mass quantities for sale. Another may prefer to promote biodiversity and soil biological activity to enrich plants rather than chemicals designed to kill pests to their crops. Carla Emery, while identifying as “organic,” provides explanations and reference texts for a variety of gardening denominations. Here are a few, if you are garden-philosophy-shopping:

Biodynamic Gardening: “Biodynamics began with a European, Rudolf Steiner (1861–1925), who taught an agriculture based on a healthy, living soil plus specific steps for a positive relationship to cosmic forces. His method works with natural life processes, supplements natural catalysts such as trace elements and enzymes, and includes unique spiritual concepts such as every grower’s property has a specific spirit presence. Their philosophical concepts are considered essential to this gardening denomination. Mainstream physical-chemical tests have demonstrated that the specialized biodynamic preparations and practices work. Biodynamic farms and farm products compete well in the organic marketplace in many countries.”

For more information, check out Biodynamic and Organic Gardening: www.biodynamic.net. Or “Biodynamic Farming & Compost Preparation” by Steve Diver of ATTRA: www.attra.org/attra-pub/biodynamic.html.

Organic Gardening: “Organic means the natural condition of living things. This gardening denomination, which refuses the use of petroleum-derived fertilizers or pest-killers, was popularized by the Rodale family’s publishing endeavors: their magazine, Organic Gardening, and the many other excellent books. Now organic agriculture is an “ecological production management system that promotes biodiversity, biological cycles, and soil biological activity.” Folks who rally under the banner of “organic” are a powerhouse of resistance to chemical agriculture. The original principles of organic gardening have been embraced by most of the other denominations listed here.

As organically grown food products become increasingly competitive with mainstream products, the U.S. federal government has increased regulation. Organic farmers meeting specific qualifications must now apply for and earn certification under the USDA’s National Organic Program (NOP). For more info, visit www.attra.org or the NOP’s web site at www.ams.usda.gov/nop.”

Carla Emery suggests reading The New Organic Manifesto (1986) by Lee Fryer, Profitable Organic Farming (1995) by John Newton, and Rodale’s All-New Encyclopedia of Organic Gardening (1997), edited by Fern Marshall Bradley and Barbara W. Ellis.

Permaculture: “During the 1980s, Bill Mollison founded the permaculture gardening denomination in Australia. It has now spread all over the world. It’s based on designing integrated systems of food production, housing, and community that are environmentally responsible. Thus it places organic agriculture in a wider context of things as they should be, both general and specific: natural gardening/farming, natural building, composting toilets, water conservation, private energy generation, etc. The audience and ambience is heavily university-style academic and scientific, but in complete opposition to mainstream chemical, corporate agriculture.

There are many good books by writers who identify with the permaculture persuasion, more than I can list here. The authors are an international assortment: Permaculture in a Nutshell (1993, UK) by Patrick Whitefield; Getting Started in Permaculture (1995, Australia); or The Future Is Abundant (1982, U.S.). That last was an early classic on permaculture by the Tilth organization, focused at the bioregional level (Pacific Northwest), now available online at www.tilthproducers.org/tfia/contents.htm. Introduction to Permaculture (1991) is by the movement’s founder, Bill Mollison with Reny Mia Slay; or read Mollison’s Permaculture: A Designer’s Manual.”

Before starting your own garden or farm, Carla Emery recommends looking into the garden philosophies that interest you. “Each gardening denomination has developed an associated array of marketers pushing soil amendments, testing services, or other products to that clientele. ATTRA warns that some products have been demonstrated by scientific testing to actually do more harm than good when applied to soil or plants. On the other hand, research has shown others to be terrific helps. Make careful choices.”

Of course, there are plenty of factors that should contribute to your choice in garden philosophy. Your budget and space available as well as personal values might serve as markers for your personal path to garden enlightenment. Once you have chosen, Carla Emery suggests you tackle the position, arrangement, timing and the many other decisions involved in laying out your garden.

DIY Granola

2011-06-30T14:09:00.000-07:00

Granola is one of those superfoods I don't remember to eat as often as I would like to. It's wonderful for breakfast, providing you lots of protein and fiber to get you through the morning. As a girl, Carla Emery enjoyed this too. She says,

"When I was a little girl, I liked a bowl of raw rolled oats with milk and honey for breakfast in the summertime. Then somebody came along and invented granola, which is even better. You'll have to visit your health food store (or grocery store) for some of these ingredients. It's pretty hard to grow almonds, coconuts, and carob in your yard unless you live in southern California. Granola recipes are fun to make, so good to eat, and so healthy! Store any granola in an airtight container. It will keep several weeks. It's best stored in the freezer or in plastic bags or jars in the refrigerator."

The easiest way to enjoy granola is to buy it at the grocery store, as many of those classic granola ingredients are difficult to grow. But it can be an expensive item. Luckily, it is possible to make granola at home. I think Carla's Basic Baked Granola recipe sounds delicious and could be varied to fit your specific tastes:

Basic Baked Granola Mix together:

1 c. rolled oats,

1 c. rolled whole wheat,

1⁄2 c. grated dried coconut,

1⁄3 c. Wheat germ,

1⁄2 c. chopped nuts (almonds, cashews or peanuts),

1⁄2 c. hulled sunflower seeds

7 t sesame seeds, if you can get them.

Now heat to just under a boil. Add:

5 t. honey,

5 t. vegetable oil,

1 t. vanilla

Mix with dry ingredients.

Spread about 1⁄3 to 1⁄2 of the mixture in a thin layer in a large shallow pan.

Bake in a 325˚F oven for 25 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Repeat with remaining mixture, or use 2 or 3 pans.

Then add:

1⁄4 c. seedless raisins or chopped dried fruit like prunes, dates, currants, or apricots.

Be sure to stir in the fruit while the granola is still warm.

Store.

Granola is delicious all by itself, but here are a few unexpected ways to use it:

Add a cup or two to your bread or cake (you'll have to add more liquid, too), or to poultry stuffing, cabbage roll stuffing, or apple stuffing. Eat it plain as a snack or use it as an ice cream topping. Serve stirred into yogurt instead of with milk. Or use it as a topping on cooked fruit. Or make candy out of it by mixing it with peanut butter, honey, and powdered milk and rolling into little individual balls. Or start with an egg and 2 T. milk, add enough granola to make a batter, and fry in a greased skillet for pancakes (top with yogurt).

Weird Ways to Deter Pesky Pests From Your Home Garden

2011-06-23T11:50:00.000-07:00

Here on the streets of Seattle, the only wild fauna I ever encounter is the occasional sneaky raccoon or opossum scurrying down my alleyway. However, if you live in a suburban or more rural area and are growing a garden, you will have to worry about losing your hard work to hungry critters. The main offenders will most likely be birds, deer and rodents. In The Encyclopedia of Country Living, you'll find some standard methods for tackling pests, as well as some more unusual ones, courtesy of Carla Emery.

If birds are a risk, there are several ways to deter them, including purchasing a bird control net that you can stretch over your garden. Carla suggests trying an old-fashioned method, which might be fun to make - the scarecrow:

"A well-made scarecrow that moves in a breeze really will help keep them away, especially if you supply it with real people-clothes, shiny foil hanging strips for 'hands,' and a foil face."

If you live in a suburban area, you have probably seen deer in your garden or lawn. Although beautiful to look at, their increasing population is making them bolder as they search for food. To keep your garden safe from deer can be tricky, Carla recommends high fencing to keep them out. Or, you can try one of these effective methods:

"Other deer deterrents are human hair, human urine, and rotten eggs. Ask your local barber or hairdresser to save cut hair for you; spread that around the outside edge of your garden. (Put out fresh hair every few weeks.) Or break rotten eggs around that garden edge. Or send the family's males to urinate around that garden perimeter. Or blast music. Or bring home lion and bear manure from the local zoo and spread it around the perimeter. Or spray garden veggies with hot pepper spray. Or any combination of these."

Rodents will also try to eat up your crops before you can get to it. Gophers and moles are two creatures that exasperate many a gardener. Traps, poison gases, or bait can eliminate them, all of which you can purchase at any garden supply store. Or, try gum:

"One old-timer kills the gophers around his eastern Oregon garden with gum. He digs down to a part of the hole under the mound. He unwraps the gum (don't touch it and leave your scent), and puts 2 sticks down in the hole. He uses large leaves (or paper) to cover the hole where he dug down, and puts dirt on top of that. (Block the light, but don't cover the gum with dirt.) Only one kind of gum works for this. It's 'juicy' and 'fruity.'"

The Perks of Having a Chicken Coop

2011-06-16T13:39:00.000-07:00

Raising chickens in your own backyard can be a wonderful experience, and even urban dwellers can try this small act of self-sustenance. Imagine eggs in the morning and a fresh chicken on the table for dinner.

If you want eggs to eat, and not to hatch, you should hold off on buying a rooster. You will want to collect the eggs several times a day and refridgerate them immediately. Don't worry about the color of the eggs, they are exactly the same on the inside.

If you come across a nest and are unsure of the freshness, the best way to determine if it is safe to eat is by looking at it. Carla Emery says the egg will be "hard to crack because the membrane inside the shell has become tough. It may smell bad, and if you just start to crack the shell, yucky stuff may come oozing out." Or, try placing it in a pan of water: "Fresh eggs will lay on their sides on the bottom of the pan. If the egg's a few days old, one end will tip upwards. If stale, an egg will stand on end. If plumb rotten, it will float."

Fresh chicken meat is another satisfying and delicious perk of owning chickens, but comes at a price - you will have to kill the chicken. Assuredly, one would want to do this in the most humane way possible, with the least amount of distress for the chicken. Much more information on this matter can be found in the Encyclopedia of Country Living. Here are a two of the simplest ways it can be done:

Buy a killing cone: "You can mail-order a commercially produced killing cone from a poultry supplier or from a local farmsupply store or make your own."

To make a homemade killing cone

* Cut off the bottom of a 1-gal. plastic bottle.

* Cut about 2 inches from the top and handle.

Or, opt to hire out: Lots of communities have backyard chicken butchering entrepreneurs. You bring them live birds in the evening and pick up dressed, bagged, chilled chicken the next morning.

The Sweet and Exotic Persimmon

2011-06-09T12:21:00.000-07:00

Growing up, we had a small persimmon tree in our garden that never got very much attention, although it didn't seem to need it. We never ate them - I guess we didn't know how, but it makes me smile to remember our miniature dachshund jump into the tree, grab one of the unripe persimmons with its teeth, and shake until it came loose. Although for us humans, Carla Emery points out: "Persimmons are memorably puckering - just like a walnut hull, until they ripen; don't even try it"

Persimmons make excellent additions to gardens, as they are virtually disease-free in the United States. They thrive best where there is generous sunlight, but can make it in even the poorest soil. They are quite drought-resistant as well; some can get by being watered just once a month. Once persimmons ripen, they become incredibly soft and "make a sudden, miraculous transformation, and become - and one of the most delicious - of all fruits."

If you're thinking about planting a persimmon tree, or have one in your garden already and are wondering what to do with the fruit, here are a few helpful tips and recipes:

Ripening Persimmons in a Hurry

Put them in a plastic bag together with a few ripe apples. Close the bag so that it is airtight. Leave at room temperature for as long as 4 days. The apples release a gas that has a ripening effect on the persimmons.

Using and Preserving

Low-tannin persimmon varieties can be eaten while still crisp, like an apple. For high-tannin types, wait until the fruit is very soft, then eat it with a spoon; or substitute it in any recipe calling for applesauce or bananas. Persimmons are traditionally eaten either raw, dried, or in a pudding. A dried whole American persimmon resembles a dried fig except there are no seeds inside (if you have a seedless fruit). In modern times, we also freeze them, or even can them.

Persimmon Roll Candy

Start with 2 c. fresh or frozen persimmon puree.

Mix in 1 c. sugar

1⁄2 c. brown sugar

1 lb. smashed graham crackers

1 c. chopped nuts

1⁄2 lb. miniature marshmallows

Lay out a sheet of waxed paper and spoon 1⁄3 of persimmon mixture onto the paper in a roll shape about 3-4 inches wide. Roll it up in the waxed paper, with a sheet of aluminum foil or plastic wrap on top of that, and freeze it. Do the same with the rest of the mixture. To serve, partially thaw a roll, and cut about 8 slices, each of which will be an individual dessert serving.

Canned Persimmon Pudding

Phyllis Bates, Tangier, IN, invented this, and her husband, Allan, learned how to can it. "It's yummy."

For every 2 c. persimmon pulp

add 2 beaten eggs

1 c. of either dark or white sugar

1⁄2 t. double-acting baking powder

1⁄2 t. baking soda

1⁄2 t. salt

1⁄2 c. melted butter

2 c. milk

2 t. cinnamon

1 t. ginger

1⁄2 t. nutmeg or allspice

To eat right away, bake the pudding in a 9-inchsquare greased baking dish, at 325˚F for 1 hour. To can it, fill pint jars only two-thirds full. Can at 15 lb. pressure for 25 minutes.

Good Enough to Eat: Face Masks

2011-05-26T11:45:00.000-07:00

After a long winter, some of us are left with dull, dry skin. Spring is the time to rejuvenate, but spa treatments, cosmetics and creams can be expensive and often disappointing. Beautify from the inside out, and try experimenting with some DIY beauty treatments. They are simple to make, gentle and natural. Most importantly, be aware that what you put into your body affects its appearance significantly. Adequate sleep, exercise, and healthy eating are the best beauty treatments of all.

Carla Emery suggests starting by identifying your skin type:

What you put on your skin should be appropriate for its type. Only very oily skin should be dosed with highly acid treatments like citrus fruits (lemon, lime, grapefruit), Concord grapes, strawberries, or apples. If you don't have very oily skin but want an acid skin treatment, use fruits that are a little less acid than the previous list - peaches, apricots, grapes other than Concord, and tomatoes. If you want a beneficial fruit treatment whose acidity is about the same as that of normal skin, use bananas, green peppers, cucumber, watermelon, or persimmon. If you want a treatment that will moisturize dry skin using substances very low in acid, go with carrots, iceberg lettuce, cantaloupe, avocado, or honeydew melon.

What could be better than playing with food, as well as enjoying an improved complexion? A variety of fruits, vegetables and other ingredients can be combined to make a mask. Here are some basic mask recipes to get you started:

Egg White Mask

This helps drag blackheads and whiteheads out of your pores. Slightly beat an egg white and spread it fairly thickly over your face. Let it dry. Do the same thing with another egg white right on top of the first.

Oatmeal Mask

Mix together 2⁄3 c. oatmeal and enough honey to make a pasty consistency. Optionally, add 2 tsp. rose water.

Honey/Lemon Mask

Mix 2 T. slightly warmed honey with 1 t. lemon juice. Put the mixture on your face and leave for about a half hour.

Brewer's Yeast Mask

Mix yeast with enough water to create a paste. Smooth it over your face (not into eyes!). Let dry. Then remove with warm water. Do this 1-2 times a week. For dry skin, add 1 T. wheat germ oil or 1 egg yolk to mask. You can also add 3 t. brewer's yeast to milk or fruit juice and drink it daily.

Snails: How and Why You Should Try Eating These Garden Pests

2011-05-19T13:51:00.000-07:00

Snails: Small, slimy, and a common pest in your garden. You might not know that these small brown creatures are identical to the "escargot" variety in France and are often quite edible. Why not avoid pesticides and eat the snails instead? They are high in protein and minerals. However, use caution. Carla Emery notes:

"There's a lot to know about collecting and eating snails. Some are not good to eat. Some need special treatment."

Research your snail varieties to learn which snails are safe to eat, and cook them properly before you decide to eat them. These directions are crucial to follow when eating snails:

Purge. Snails collected for eating must be purged of any off-flavor or toxic materials from previously eaten food. Put about 1⁄2 inch of damp cornmeal in the bottom of a container such as a plastic wastebasket, metal pan, or crock. Put snails in the container and cover with a ventilated top; a wire refrigerator shelf, hardware cloth, cheesecloth, or nylon netting provides plenty of air and let you observe the activity of the snails. The cover should be weighted with bricks or tied securely so the snails do not escape. Place the container in a cool, shady area and let snails purge themselves (by eating the cornmeal) for at least 72 hours. Snails can be kept in containers for a long time if the cornmeal is replaced every other day to prevent it from molding and souring. The snails will feed and then crawl up the side of the container to rest; use only active snails. Throw away without eating those that remain inactive on the bottom. After 72 hours the snails can be removed from the container and washed thoroughly with cold running water to remove the cornmeal from their shells. They are now ready for blanching, another essential procedure.

Blanch. Plunge the live snails into boiling water and simmer about 15 minutes, as is done in preparing live shrimp, lobster, crab, or crawfish. (A bay leaf in the cooking water will give this operation a pleasant aroma.) The water will foam as the snails cook, so heat should be controlled to prevent the kettle from boiling over. After blanching, turn snails into a colander to drain. Then, with a toothpick, nut pick, or pointed knife, pull the snail meat from the shell. Save some shells for later use.

Remove Gall. Remove and discard the dark-colored gall, about 1⁄4 inch long, which is found on the tail end, where the snail is attached to the shell. Wash snail meat several times under cold running water.

Snails can be cooked in a variety of ways and have a tendency to take on the flavor of other ingredients while adding a subtle, earthy flavor of their own.

Homemade Crackers - Easy to Make, and Fun

2011-05-12T12:46:00.000-07:00

Homemade crackers are making a comeback. Crackers are an unfussy, easy alternative to baking your own bread and they are infectiously good, as well as versatile. And, as Carla Emery points out:

It's a lot healthier than feeding the children half-food/half-cookies, or the adults heavily salted treats. Instead you can make their crackers out of all healthy things!

Try experimenting with dried fruit and any herbs you might have in your garden. They are much more impressive at a dinner party than store-bought crackers, and you can pair them with a cheese platter or a creamy dip. Here are three of the many recipes for making your own crackers:

Quick Rye Crackers

Combine:

2 c. unsifted rye flour

3⁄4 c. unsifted white or unbleached flour

1⁄2 c. wheat germ

1⁄2 t. salt, 1 t. baking powder

6 T. butter or margarine.

1. Cut in the butter with a pastry cutter or 2 knives until you have a mixture with particles about the size of cornmeal.

2. Add 3⁄4 c. milk and 1 slightly beaten egg. Mix, roll out, and cut into diamond shapes by making parallel lines one way diagonally and then the other.

3. Lay the crackers onto a cookie sheet, prick with a fork, and bake at 325˚F until lightly browned. Takes about 30 minutes.

Great Crackers From Esther Adams, Poulsbo, WA

Combine:

11⁄2 c. white flour

1⁄2 c. whole wheat flour

1⁄2 c. sugar

1⁄2 t. salt

1. Using an electric mixer, food processor, or pastry cutter, mix in 3 T. butter (at room temperature) until mix is as grainy as cornmeal.

2. Slowly add 1⁄2 c. milk (you may need a little more). Knead 5 minutes. Roll out a fistful at a time to 1⁄8 inch or thinner on lightly floured surface.

3. Cut into 2-inch squares. Place squares on baking sheet (not touching). Sprinkle with salt. Prick each cracker with fork 2 to 3 times, and bake until golden brown.

Sour Cream Whole Wheat Crackers

Combine:

1 c. sour cream

1 T. melted butter

a pinch salt

1⁄2 c. sugar

1 t. soda

1. Add enough whole wheat flour to make a stiff dough that can be rolled. Roll out to about a 1⁄8 - inch thickness.

2. Cut into the shapes you prefer and bake at 325˚F for 30 minutes (or 400˚F for 10 minutes).

Food Dye the Natural Way

2011-05-05T11:40:00.000-07:00

Recently, the FDA has called in researchers to scrutinize the link between common artificial food dyes and hyperactivity in children. The long-held belief that these dyes pose no threat to our bodies is being questioned, and so there is no better time to set our minds at ease and learn how to dye our foods ourselves using the vibrant colors found in nature.

Dye: Homemade colorings from herbs and other food products are more soft and subtle than artificial ones. Here's what you can use to make different colors:

• Black: barberry leaves

• Blue: blueberries

• Brown: nut hulls (walnuts are best), tea, coffee, rose hips, tobacco, hickory chips

• Green: beet tops, sunflower seeds, birch leaves, Spanish onion skins (outer leaves only), elderberry leaves, spinach, cabbage, rhubarb leaves

• Orange: orange juice

• Pink: cherries; beet and sassafras roots

• Purple: blackberries, cherries, huckleberries, cranberries, raspberries, grapes, purple cabbage

• Red: red onion skins, bloodroot, fresh beet juice, madder root, and logwood

• Yellow: the stem, leaves, and flowers of apple bark; barberry stems and roots; cinnamon; curry; ginger; the stems, leaves, and flowers of goldenrod; hickory bark; mustard; paprika; pear leaves; saffron; tanglewood stems; turmeric

Natural Food Coloring. For a brown color, use a little browned flour, a little burnt sugar, or caramel. Pounded, uncooked spinach leaves make a rich green. Adding some spinach leaf puree makes a lovely deeper green. This green can also be used to tint icings, desserts, etc. Another way to make a cooked-spinach green coloring is by washing some spinach, boiling it until tender, and pouring off the juice for your coloring extract. For a stronger green, let the spinach cool, squeeze dry, mash by pounding, and then put through a sieve. Cooked green peas make a lighter shade of green; split pea soup makes a very pale green color. The coral of a lobster pounded and put through a sieve yields red, as does vinegar or water that has stood on sliced boiled beets.

Take the guesswork out of food dyeing with this helpful chart:

Color Blending Chart. Commercial vegetable colorings can be varied like this:

• 2 drops yellow, 1 drop green, and 1 drop red = blue

• 1 drop red, 2 drops green, and 1 drop blue = gray

• 2 drops blue + 1 drop green = dark green

• 3 drops yellow + 1 drop blue = light green

• 12 drops yellow and 1 drop green = olive

• 2 drops red + 1 drop blue = orchid

• 3 drops red + 1 drop yellow = orange

• 3 drops red, 4 drops yellow, and 1 drop green = tangerine

The Leaves We Eat: Harvesting, Cooking, and Preserving Greens

2011-03-24T11:09:00.000-07:00

Along with the few scattered days of sunshine come my cravings for anything fresh and green. Whether I am picking the last of my winter greens, with their characteristic sweetness from the cold, or just planting my spring lettuces, I just can't get enough of them. Greens were perhaps one of the last vegetables that I acquired a taste for (second only to beets), and now I eat them with most meals, sautéed in butter and folded into an omelet, or simply tossed with a few other ingredients into a salad.

Harvesting

There are 2 different ways: by cutting off the whole plant about 2 or 3 inches above the ground, and by picking only the outside leaves and leaving the center ones to develop. If you cut off chard, endive, lettuce, mustard, and spinach the first way, they'll grow back just like grass. But for collards, kale, and New Zealand spinach, you must do it the second way. Take those outer leaves by cutting with a scissors or snapping them off by hand. If you keep up with them, you'll keep the outer leaves tender. If they get ahead of you, the outer leaves are likely to get tough. In that case, give them to chickens, cows, etc., and go in an- other layer to get the now-tender ones.

Cooking

Which greens to eat cooked is really a matter of opinion. Some people eat anything and everything raw. Some greens you can eat raw at one stage or in small amounts, but at maturity (or over-maturity!) or in quantity you'll definitely want to cook them. An advantage of cooked greens is that you can preserve them by canning, freezing, or drying. To cook greens, first wash your leaves. Boil with or without salt. To add flavor, use water in which meat or vegetables have been cooked. Or serve buttered and peppered. Or with vinegar. Or season with bacon drippings, salt, and hot sauce. Mustard, kale, and turnip greens are specially good cooked in the water in which the meat has cooked and then served with the meat.

Preserving

Step-by-Step Greens Freezing

1. Wash off bugs and dust from leaves. Put a big pan of water on to boil. (I bring greens into the house by the 5-gal. bucket.)

2. Cut in lengths of about 21⁄2 inches.

3. Drop a load of greens into the boiling water. Let boil 3 minutes. (You can also blanch by steaming or even stir-frying!)

4. Scoop greens into a colander to drain. (I fish the greens out of the water using 2 potato mashers, the same way I do corn on the cob, one masher on each side.)

5. Hold under running cold water just long enough so that you can handle them. Or cool (immediately!) in ice water.

6. Pack in baggies, squeeze out most of the air, and fasten the neck with one of those little wires or tie it in a knot. Pack enough chard in the baggie for 1 meal for your family.

7. Immediately put in the freezer.

8. When you want to eat frozen greens, just turn out the frozen lump into a little water. Thaw and heat. Either butter them or serve them with vinegar.

Canning Loose-Leafed Greens.

It is safer and tastier to freeze greens than to can them. If you do can, you must use a pressure canner. Choose fresh, tender greens. Wash and cull out bad leaves. Remove tough stems and midribs. Make sure you have rinsed away all the dirt. Blanch by steaming, briefly boiling, or stir-frying until wilted. Loosely pack hot greens into hot jars. Optional: Add 1⁄4 t. salt per pint, 1⁄2 t. per quart. Pour over enough boiling water to cover, but leave 1 inch headspace. Process in pressure canner: pints 70 minutes, quarts 90 minutes. If using a weighted-gauge canner, set at 10 lb. pressure at 0-1,000 feet above sea level; at higher altitudes, set at 15 lb. If using a dial-gauge canner.

Jumpstart Your Spring Garden with Transplants!

2011-03-17T15:01:00.000-07:00

For all those serious about self-sufficient gardening, planting early and growing late-transplants are necessary. Plants such as green peppers, eggplants, tomatoes, and cabbage are great to start from seed and germinate indoors. Just start them about 2 months before transplanting.

Read on for Carla Emery's advice for starting transplants:

Sunshine: Start your seeds in the house or greenhouse rather than in a cloche or cold frame, because most seeds require much warmer soil to germinate than they need to grow. Inside you can give them ideal conditions in their tender early stages. They don't need much space. You can grow your transplants on a windowsill that's sunny at least part of the day. For more plants, make shelves across your window. Remove anything underneath that could be harmed by dripping water.

Water: You'll want to water the plants every other day or whenever they look dry. Several light waterings beat one big flood, which has a tendency to go right through, leaving the plant still dry.

Containers:

Milk Cartons?

Mary Ann Shepherd, Del Mar, CA, wrote me, "I use milk cartons as collars to blanch celery, around my new lettuce seedlings to discourage cutworms, and to start all sorts of cuttings (both flowers and vegetables) and seeds. For collars, cut off tops and bottoms. For all else, cut off tops (or open up) and use a tri-cornered beverage opener ('church key') to cut a drain hole on all four sides at the bottom (not in the bottom itself). When I go to transplant I slit the sides and bottom and plant the whole thing - the carton eventually disintegrates and you don't disturb the roots that way. My pine seedlings take about year to germinate and grow to about 4 inches tall, and they have lived happily in milk cartons for up to 2 years before I've transplanted them." Cardboard Boxes.

I sometimes start the plants in "seed flats" (for me, that means a cardboard box with dirt in the bottom) and then transplant to tin cans. If I don't get them out of there pretty fast, the bottoms get too soggy.

Cans.

Cans of any size are good. I like those big tins that canned hams come in, and gallon tins are great. You have to punch small holes in the bottom. Big containers of dirt are better than small ones. I use 1 plant to 1 soup can or peat pot once they are started in the seed flats, or about 6 to a ham can.

Peat Pots.

Plants in peat pots dry out fast and have to be watered every day. Set them out, pot and all, or you'll be breaking off roots that have grown right into the pot side. Tear off the part of the rim that's above ground to prevent it from acting as a wick and causing the plant to lose water. Other than that, and the fact you have to pay for them, peat pots are great. NOTE: Be sure to label each flat with the variety of plant in it.

When to Transplant? The best time to set transplants out is the beginning of a cloudy, rainy spell. Cabbage sets are hardy and can go out in the garden when you plant your green onions. But in my garden, if I plant too early I risk losing my plants to cutworms. A little later is perfect. Tomato sets can go to the garden when you're positive the frosts and near-frosts are over. Green pepper and eggplant sets should wait till the nights are not cold at all. Because plants I set out too early may be wiped out by cutworms or cold, I first set out a sampling and then wait a few days to see what happens.

Secrets of Getting the Most from a Small Garden

2011-03-10T13:04:00.000-08:00

Although I grew up ten minutes from Seattle, I was fortunate enough that my parents had about four acres of land to plant and garden, not to mention the plant nursery next door and tracts of undeveloped land. We had space enough (and irrigation enough) that our only concern for planting was the sunlight needs of the plants. A patch of corn would easily be moved to the other end of the property the following season if it needed more light, the rabbit hutches were displaced by plum trees if needed, and we lost track of all the blackberries, apples, and strawberries that grew wild in neglected parts of the property.

Now, I have twenty square feet to grow a garden, half of it heavily shaded and a good portion on a street, and for the first time in the Northwest, I have run out of space. Luckily, Carla Emery knows how to get a small plot to produce to the maximum it can:

1. Make use of semishaded areas unsuitable for tomatoes or root vegetables by growing leafy vegetables like lettuce, chard, mustard, or endive there.

2. Don't overplant herbs. Two parsley or chive plants can quite likely produce all you need unless your family is large.

3. Avoid sprawling varieties. You can plant 6 rows of carrots, beets, or onions in the same square footage that one row of squash would take because squash simply will spread out all over the place, but root vegetables don't. So limit or refuse summer squash, winter squash, cucumbers, watermelons, muskmelons, cantaloupes, and corn, because they take more space than they're worth. Or use the recently developed compact "bush" kinds of melons, squash, cucumbers, and and pumpkins.

4. Consider interplanting so that fast-maturing vegetables use the space between slower-maturing ones that will later spread; for instance, plant radishes or lettuce between vine plants like squash or pumpkin. They mature so fast that you get a crop before the vines need that space.

5. Give preference to continuously bearing vegetables; for instance, choose chard over spinach, because spinach has a brief period of productivity but then is done for the whole summer. Chard will keep making harvest for you until frost kills it. Other continuous bearers are tomatoes, broccoli, kale, lima beans, squash of allsorts, eggplant, peppers, cucumbers, chard, and Brussels sprouts.

6. Use wide-row and succession planting methods to give you the most vegetable productivity per square foot. For instance, peas have a relatively brief production season, but they produce heavily while they are at it, and then you can till up the ground they were in and plant something else. Succession planting works best with a long growing season, but in most places peas, lettuce, radishes, beets, and carrots mature quickly enough that you have time for a second crop if you plant as soon as the first is harvested.

7. Harvest daily in season. Broccoli, cucumbers, summer squash, beans, and chard, for example, will stop producing if they aren't harvested. But if you keep them faithfully and regularly harvested, then they keep producing and you maximize their production.

8. Encourage your garden to grow up rather than across: Try climbing beans (pole or runners) or cucumber strained to grow up something. Use a big vine such as runner beans, kiwi, or grapes to screen out an ugly area, make shade, or hang from a basket.

9. Plant tall crops such as corn or sunflowers on the north end of the garden so they don't shade other plants.

10. Practice deep watering; it allows you to plant closer together because the roots will go down instead of spreading sideways.

Spicy Marinated Bamboo Shoots and Other Grassy Ideas

2011-03-03T12:36:00.000-08:00

Perhaps you've seen bamboo groves in the woods or in backyards in the Northwest; they're very popular in gardens. Growing up, my family always had a patch of bamboo on their property and every spring we would watch in amazement as the shoots would grow as much as 30 feet in the year. Of course, we used the bamboo for forts and other crafts, but it never occurred to us that we could eat the new shoots of bamboo asparagus style, raw in salads, or dunking them in a dip. This year, as spring gets closer, I'll be waiting to nab the little shoots to try them in a dinner dish.

For more information on the tastiest varieties of bamboo and more bamboo recipes, take a peek inside the Encyclopedia of Country Living.

Spicy Marinated Bamboo Shoots

Slice 1 lb. bamboo shoots. Cook (as for bitter shoots, if needed) until just tender. In blender (or with mortar/pestle), blend or mash together hot chili to taste, 4 cloves garlic, and 2 T. fresh cilantro or mint (different tastes, both good). Toss the bamboo shoots in the seasoning mix until coated. Then put them in a jar and cover with rice wine vinegar. This will keep several weeks in the fridge.

Using and Preserving Bamboo

Serve your boiled bamboo slices hot in stir-fry recipes or soups, or fry them in miso. Or serve cooked and then chilled, mixed into a potato or green salad. To freeze bamboo, bag slices (boiled if bitter) in plastic and freeze. To dry bamboo, boil the shoots 15 minutes, slice, salt, and dry.

Seasonal Menu Ideas for Winter

2011-02-24T14:51:00.000-08:00

Although spring has made a few tentative appearances, we are very much still in the heart of winter. If you're running out of ideas about what to put on the dinner table or how to use your preserves from other seasons, Carla Emery's got a few menus to keep everyone full, warm, and satisfied! And, of course, they only use homemade, home-cooked, and seasonal ingredients.

Winter Suppers

1. Boiled sliced turnips; roast and gravy; baked potatoes; pickles; bread and butter; junket pudding

2. Elk roast and gravy; sage dressing; baked squash; spinach; mashed potatoes; mincemeat cookies

3. Pork chops; gravy; boiled peas; yeast biscuits; boiled potatoes

4. Steak and gravy; mashed potatoes; cole slaw with homemade dressing; cream-style corn; crumb bread and cherry jelly; canned apricots

5. Stew made with meat, tomatoes, carrots, cabbage; raw turnip slices dipped in herbed sour cream

6. Leftover sliced cold roast; bread and apple pudding; mashed boiled turnips

Snacks

Snacks are for company, for husband or children famished between meals, for an afternoon tea break or a bedtime family treat. Lots of old-time farm families have a regular midmorning and mid-afternoon mini-meal for the working men in summer, when they are putting in long days. Maybe we take sandwiches and a gallon of cold tea out to the field and the work stops for a few minutes. I blacklisted store-bought cookies, potato chips, pop, and candy. But I don't fight snacks that are home-grown and home-prepared: fresh, canned, or frozen fruit; dried fruit; pickles; popcorn; homemade popsicles; homemade crackers; jerky; bread with homemade jam or honey. Leftovers like cold sliced roast or cold boiled potatoes are good with some salt or butter. My husband Mike doesn't like to eat leftovers, except potatoes and meat, so if somebody doesn't snack them up, the chickens or pigs get them- except for bread, which metamorphoses into bread pudding or lunch dishes that I serve when it's just me and the children.

Carla's White Bread: Baking with Yeast

2011-02-17T11:44:00.000-08:00

I first learned how to bake bread on a farm in the mountains in France with packed dirt doors beneath my feet, a box of kittens tucked under the counter to keep warm in the chilly fall days, and a wood fire oven stoked so hot that the rock was white with heat. Every Tuesday we baked brioche and sourdough breads using a sourdough starter like from Sweetly Simple Sourdough Starters, and bake about eighty loaves to feed the farm and sell at the farmer's market.

It was a job I didn't anticipate liking before arriving at the farm; it seemed like a massive amount of work for so little return. I soon changed my tune, however. I had heard that baking bread was meditative, yet I hadn't anticipated how engaged-both mentally and physically-I would be, hands kneading dough until they ached, carefully feeling for the perfect time to stop. Every step of the process involved attention. In my world, full of multi-tasking and supermarkets, I hadn't experienced what it felt like to be completely focused on my food for that length of time.

Carla Emery says that she rarely uses a recipe, and if a loaf turns out too dense or burnt, she simply gives it to the pigs and moves on. Be sure to check out the full chapter in Encyclopedia of Country Living for her tips for raising bread in chilly kitchens, shaping, and kneading. Here is the recipe that she learned how to bake bread with:

Carla's White Bread

Scald 1 c. milk until there is a little rim of bubbles around the edge of the pan. Add 6 T. sugar, 2 t. salt, and 6 T. margarine or butter to the hot milk. When the milk mixture has cooled to lukewarm, proceed. Into your big bread bowl, measure 3 c. lukewarm water. Dissolve 2 pkg. yeast in the water. Add the milk mixture and about 5 c. white flour. Mix until smooth. Keep adding flour until you have a kneadable dough. Flour your breadboard, turn the dough out onto it, and commence kneading.

Allow the dough to continue to absorb flour, and knead until smooth and elastic. When it is ready, let it rest while you wash out the mixing bowl, dry it, and then grease it inside very lightly. Put your dough into the greased bowl, turning it once to grease the top. Cover with a dishtowel and leave in a warm place until it doubles in bulk.

Punch down. Prepare 4 bread pans. Cut the dough carefully into 4 sections. Take 1 section at a time and fold under to turn in the severed edges, seal, and shape into a loaf. Put each loaf into a bread pan. Cover and let rise again until doubled in bulk. Bake in a preheated 400˚F oven about 30 minutes.

Herb Sachets to Cure Headaches, Melancholy & Insomnia

2011-02-10T12:17:00.000-08:00

I have rarely lived in the same place for more then six months, which leaves little time for planting gardens. But everywhere I have lived, from Seattle to the Andes to East Asia, I have been able to find herbs, which have been a wonderful luxury. In Ecuador, it was from the mystic in the market who gave me the same plants that she used to ward off evil spirits from babies. I declined the ceremony, but excitedly took the plants to plant in my patio next to the river. In Korea, I tentatively held out foreign currency to a man with piles of plants in the back of a flatbed. Although I couldn’t read the characters used to label the plants, I could smell their familiarity; crushing a variety of basil between my fingers to smell their pungency as the man demonstrated that these were plants you could smell and eat by proceeding to eat parts of every herb in his truck. I smile and think he was desperately trying to share the magic of his herbs with me, a foreigner, on the side of a twelve-lane road in Seoul.

And so, I have had lavender flourishing in high-rise apartments, dried and tucked under my pillow, the smell reminding me of my mother’s garden, and fresh basil all winter long to evoke summers in the Northwest. Herbs are truly a pleasure to grow and harvest.

Carla Emery loves herbs, too, and uses them in balms, poultices, cooking, and even sachets to help with headaches, insomnia, and melancholy.

Sachets and Herb Pillows:

These are cloth “pillows” made to hold dried, crushed herbs and flowers. Sachets are tiny bags meant to be placed in a drawer or closet to scent clothing, sheets and pillowcases, or stationery. Herb pillows are several times larger and are traditionally used to overcome a sickroom smell and soothe nerves. You can experiment to get your favorite scent. Lavender is traditional, but don’t be afraid to try other mixtures. Lilac, rose petals, sweet peas, mint, rosemary, and thyme are all suitable. Or use lavender, sage, peppermint, and lemon balm in some combination, or sage, peppermint, and lemon balm without lavender. If you are making sachets intended to keep moths away, try a mixture of the insect-repellent herbs: cotton lavender, mint, rosemary, rue, southernwood, tansy, and wormwood.

As in the case of potpourris, the scent, whatever its source, will not last. To renew scent, every couple weeks or so, crush the sachet bag a little between your fingers to break some herbs and expose a new supply of their fragrant oil for scent. The aromatics will eventually run out; potpourris need to be refilled at least every year.

Preparing the Contents

Once your planned ingredients are harvested and dried, mix them and grind to a powder in your spice mill, mortar, or blender/food processor. Add a fixative like orrisroot. If you are making a quantity of powder at once— more than you need to fill your sachets or pillows— store in a small tightly-lidded bottle in a cool place and protect from the light.

Making the Sachet.

Headache Pillow A Midwestern pioneer recipe.

Mix together 1⁄2 oz. cloves and 2 oz. each of lavender, marjoram, rose petals, and betony rose leaf. Proceed as above. You’re supposed to sniff it to cure your headache.

To-Ease-Melancholy-and-Put-You-to-Sleep

Pillow Mix 2 oz. rose petals, 1 oz. mint, and 1⁄4 crushed clove for pillow.

Herb Sachet

Mix 1 part each dried sweet basil, dried thyme, dried marjoram, and dried rosemary leaves. With this one you don't need a fixative.

Country Wisdom for Better Habits

2011-02-03T09:28:00.000-08:00

The New Year brings feelings of fresh starts and resolutions, but by February our enthusiasm has faded. This year, I'm trying to change a few things so I can get more stuff done, like learning how to can or keeping my apartment plants alive. The first on my list? Get more sleep. After that, I am focusing on the quality of the things that I do over how many things I do. Time to stop running around and getting nothing done.

For years, people have been asking Carla Emery just how she gets everything done. Just one look at her Encyclopedia of Country Living, and you wonder just how she does it all, from recipes to herb remedies to how to break an animal to lead, all while having good humor and recounting stories at every turn. So just how does she do it? She says:

People are always asking me how I manage to get so much done. My husband asks me how I manage to keep track of it all. The honest truth is that I don't: I don't really get that much done, and Lord knows I don't keep track of it all. But for what it's worth, here are some habits that help me accomplish what I do.

Helpful Habits

1. Don't discuss the obvious.

2. Don't own a television

3. Quite a job when you're losing efficiency.

4. Go to bed when you're tired.

5. Eat less salt and sugar, use less heat.

6. Keep lists of things to do and things to buy.

7. Then get somebody else o do as many of those things as possible.

8. Don't drink coffee, tea, cola, or alcohol; smoke cigarettes; chew snooze; or use illegal drugs.

9. Sing a lot.

10. Pray a lot.

What are your habits that keep you feeling healthy and getting everything done?

Turning Nettles into Comfort Food

2011-01-27T09:52:00.000-08:00

Thinking of nettles has, admittedly, never occurred in my mind as delicious comfort food. Some of my first memories of hiking-or simply wading through some underbrush-are accompanied by the discovery of nettles. You too, I'm sure, have seen stung and have felt the red welts which always appear at the slightest touch. Certainly nettles are not a popular weed to run into, let alone seek out for food.

While Carla Emery certainly doesn't recommend planting this stinging weed-she too has been stung and clearly remembers avoiding the plant while hauling water up from the crick-she knows how to disarm this plant by cooking it, a Cream of Nettle Soup for example, perfect for rainy days or if you need a conversation starter at the dinner table. Talk about bringing out the best in a plant!

And now, how Carla Emery tames the nettle:

Don't touch nettles with bare skin until cooked!

The points are tiny silica needles that inject formic acid. Use gloves to pick, clean, and work with them in the kitchen! Use the tops of young plants in spring, when they are about 6 inches tall. Otherwise, take only the top rosette of just growing eaves and the topmost bud plus the few leaves just under that. You can go on harvesting to mid-June.

Don't let them sit around. Pick and then boil them. The cooking disarms them. Serve sprinkled with caraway or dill seed. Nettle leaf tea, sweetened with honey, is an old-time remedy for a stuffy nose or a sore throat. Nettle root makes a yellow dye. A nettle poultice is an old-time remedy to stop the bleeding from a wound.

Cream of Nettle Soup

Steam 4 c. young nettle leaves until soft. Puree. If they need more liquid, add a little meat or vegetable soup stock. Melt 2 T. butter. Cook 2 T. grated onion in the butter. Add 2 T. flour to that and cook, stirring, until mixture is turning brown. Now gradually add

2 c. more stock, salt and pepper to taste, and the nettle puree. Simmer on low heat 10 minutes. Add 2 c. milk and heat just warm enough to serve. Good with grated cheese sprinkled on top.

Uncover the Secrets to Glorious Gravy

2010-12-16T10:28:00.000-08:00

Gravy. Just typing the word unleashes a Pavlovian salivation reaction. This wonderful creation (one of the best cooking inventions ever, in my opinion) is great at any time of the day. Yes, you may want to hit the gym both before and after indulging in this down-home country treat, but trust me, it can be worth it.

Or… not. There’s been many times when I have decided to pamper myself with an order of biscuits and gravy at a small diner, only to be served a bowl of gray, lumpy mush, far from the creamy brown goodness I was expecting. In these situations, it’s all I can do to suppress a gag reflex.

So how can it be that the same ingredients can produce heaven and can also mix to create something akin to vomit? It all comes down to technique.

Gravy is a culinary skill requiring some serious trial and error. Perhaps you recently found that out during the past holiday. Did your Thanksgiving gravy turn out too lumpy? Or maybe it was too runny? Wondering where you went wrong? Since there’s no tried-and-true recipe, sometimes creative license can run amuck of good taste.

Quick, now’s the chance to perfect this oh-so-touchy holiday staple before it can ruin another holiday dinner. Or Sunday breakfast. Or Tuesday breakfast. Or midday snack. Or… you get the picture.

Once again, Carla Emery comes to our rescue:

Good gravy to go on the potatoes can be made any time you fry or roast meat. When your meat is done, remove it from the pan. Estimate how much gravy your family can use. If you want 1 cup, pour off the grease until you have about 2 T. left, 4 T. for 2 cups, and so on. If you don’t have that much, add a little melted butter, bacon drippings, or lard. Loosen all the good brown bits in the bottom of your pan (assuming you don’t have a burnt mess, in which case salvage some grease by pouring off the top and start over in another pan), and add 2 T. whole wheat or unbleached flour per 2 T. grease.

For heaven’s sake, don’t stop to actually “measure” the hot grease and flour. You can learn to estimate close enough by looking at it, and it really doesn’t make that much difference if you use a little more or less of either. Just don’t have a whole lot of extra grease, because it will float on top of your gravy and look and taste yuk!

Over medium heat make a paste of the brown bits, grease and flour with your fork, and let cook a couple minutes, stirring constantly. This accomplishes the browning and cooking of your flour and gives you almost an “instant” gravy. Your mashing action with the fork will break up potential lumps. Now pour in a little liquid.

Stir it in until the lumps are gone; then add more and stir again until the lumps are out. Repeat until all your liquid is added. You can add more liquid each time, but start with very little. Stop adding liquid when your gravy is as thin as you want it.

For liquid, use your potato water, water from another cooked vegetable, or milk. Or juice from a pot roast or stewed chicken, if you have it. I drain the vegetable waters into the gravy (or else add them to the animal pail) and then cook that down to the wanted density. Pork-chop gravy is good with half milk and half water or all milk. Chicken gravy is good with half or all milk. Beef gravy is good with part milk or just your vegetable water. Deer, elk, and other game gravies don’t get along with milk. Game gravies are much improved by adding a couple tablespoons of currant, wild plum, or some other tart jelly. For roast turkey, duck, or goose, use no milk, but add the chopped cooked giblets and the giblet broth for a delicious gravy.

If you get the gravy too thin and watery, you can boil it until it thickens enough to suit you. Finally, salt and pepper to taste. Taste it until it seems right, but don’t burn your tongue! Good gravy seasonings are black pepper, onion powder, thyme, sage, marjoram, and basil. For a final garnish, sprinkle freshly chopped parsley, dill, chives, or scallions on top. Then serve to pour on your meat and mashed potatoes, rice, or thick slices of bread in a sturdy bowl with a good dipper. And put the pan to soak in the sink, so it won’t be a chore to wash.

Savory Snails: Delicious and Home-cooked Escargot

2010-12-09T10:17:00.000-08:00

Is your garden plagued by pesky garden snails? Instead of poisoning them, do like the French and gather them up for a delicious snack. It might sound strange, but those slithering creatures are the very same sold in fancy French restaurants. So if you need a creative appetizer for a holiday party that will have all your friends talking, look no further than your own backyard. Make sure you introduce your backyard snails as escargot, and you’ve got one classy party.

But wait: before you gather up all your garden snails, pop them in the microwave and stick colored toothpicks in them, Carla Emery has some tips on how to prepare these slippery yet succulent creatures.

First, purge. Snails collected for eating must be purged of any off-flavor or toxic materials from previously eaten food. Put about 1⁄2 inch of damp cornmeal in the bottom of a container such as a plastic wastebasket, metal pan, or crock. Put snails in the container and cover with a ventilated top; a wire refrigerator shelf, hardware cloth, cheesecloth, or nylon netting provides plenty of air and lets you observe the activity of the snails. The cover should be weighted with bricks or tied securely so the snails do not escape. Place the container in a cool, shady area and let snails purge themselves (by eating the cornmeal) for at least 72 hours. Snails can be kept in containers for a long time if the cornmeal is replaced every other day to prevent it from molding and souring.

The snails will feed and then crawl up the side of the container to rest; use only active snails. Throw away without eating those that remain inactive on the bottom. After 72 hours the snails can be removed from the container and washed thoroughly with cold running water to remove the cornmeal from their shells. They are now ready for blanching, another essential procedure.

Blanch:

Plunge the live snails into boiling water and simmer about 15 minutes, as is done in preparing live shrimp, lobster, crab, or crawfish. (A bay leaf in the cooking water will give this operation a pleasant aroma.) The water will foam as the snails cook, so heat should be controlled to prevent the kettle from boiling over. After blanching, turn snails into a colander to drain. Then, with a toothpick, nut pick, or pointed knife, pull the snail meat from the shell. Save some shells for later use.

Remove Gall:

Remove and discard the dark-colored gall, about 1⁄4 inch long, which is found on the tail end, where the snail is attached to the shell. Wash snail meat several times under cold running water.

Prepare the Shells:

Boil the empty shells for 30 minutes in water to which about 1⁄4 t. baking soda per pint of water has been added. Drain the shells, wash them thoroughly in cold running water, and then dry them. Use them to serve snails in recipes calling for cleaned shells.

Recipes:

Stuffed Snail Shells

Simmer cleaned, blanched snail meat in salted water until tender. Chop snail meat, mix with minced garlic, and saute in olive oil or margarine about 5 minutes. Stuff cleaned shells with the chopped, seasoned meat. Seal shell opening with garlic butter. Place under broiler for a few minutes until butter bubbles. Serve immediately.

Fried Snails

Simmer cleaned, blanched snail meat for 10 minutes in water seasoned as desired with salt, bay leaf, parsley, thyme, allspice, etc. Roll cooked snail meat in fine cracker or bread crumbs seasoned with salt, pepper, and garlic powder. Fry in oil until browned, as you would fried oysters. Sprinkle with lemon juice to serve. These may be served as an entree or, pierced with toothpicks, as hors d’oeuvres.

Curious to learn more about these versatile garden animals? Check out Sasquatch’s new book, The Secret World of Slugs and Snails: Life in the Very Slow Lane available now!

Cooking Your Catch: Winning Wild Meat Recipes

2010-12-02T12:49:00.000-08:00

It’s hunting season. Although opinions run high on this controversial “sport,” there is no doubt that it has its avid followers. Traumatized by scenes from Bambi, you will never catch me wielding any sort of hunting apparatus, but that doesn’t stop friends and relatives from arming themselves and heading off into the great outdoors. And it’s not just for men; my perky blonde friend jumps at the chance to go deer hunting every year.

So despite my aversion to killing (hypocritical since I enjoy a juicy steak as much as the next girl) I have a lot of respect for those hunters who actually hunt for food and utilize every part of their catch. Though this is admirable, the “gamey” taste of wild meat can often be a deterrent for some of the best-intentioned hunters. (My perky blonde friend included.) So Carla Emery comes to the rescue again, providing us with some great ways to cook our catch so eating becomes just as satisfying as hunting.

For roasts, Carla Emery writes: I usually cook these in a Dutch oven, usually with the lid on, usually at about 350˚F but sometimes less, and I usually brown the meat in a little fat in a frying pan to just sear and seal the outside before commencing roasting.

Spicy Oven-Baked Wild Meat

Combine 1⁄2 c. flour with 1 t. salt, 1 t. curry powder, 1⁄8 t. pepper, and 1⁄8 t. paprika, making sure the seasonings are well distributed in the flour. Cover meat pieces (cubes, tips, small animal parts — whatever you want to cook) on all sides with the flour-seasoning mixture.

Fry meat in oil or fat until well browned on all sides. Then move meat to a baking dish, add 1 c. water, cover, and bake an hour. If you like, you can make a gravy before serving by adding flour and water to thicken liquid.

Barbecue-Sauce Wild Roast

This recipe is good for 1 entire small animal cooked whole or for a chunk of a bigger one. Cover meat with cold water, add salt, and 1 small hot pepper. Cook over low heat until just tender. Pour off the water; place meat into baking pan. Roast at moderate heat, basting often with barbecue sauce, until it looks done to suit you.

Onion-Smothered Roast

Mix together 1⁄2 c. flour, 1 t. salt, and 1⁄2 t. pepper. Flour your meat pieces thoroughly in that and then fry them until browned in just enough oil. Move meat to a baking dish. Add 3 large chopped onions, and 2 bay leaves. Bake in a moderate oven until tender.

For more great recipes using a Dutch Oven, check out the bestselling Dutch Oven Cookbook.

Sourdough Selections Part 2: Recipes

2010-11-18T09:17:00.000-08:00

Congratulations! Half the battle toward taming sourdough supremacy has been won. You have followed one of Carla’s recipes I posted last week and have created your own sourdough starter to have on hand. Now that you’ve made your delectable sourdough starter, you must be looking for some recipes to put it to good use. Carla Emery’s Encyclopedia of Country Living has some easy gems, and I’ve included a few to get you started.

Sourdough Pancakes

Mix 2 c. lively starter, 2 c. flour, 2 beaten eggs, 1 T. sugar, 1⁄2 t. salt, and 2 T. melted butter or oil, plus enough milk to make a good pourable batter (about 11⁄2 cups, depending on how thick your starter is). Lastly, add 2 t. baking soda. Mix well; then let it rest a few minutes. Heat your griddle or frying pan. Shine it with oil before each panful of pancakes. Fry on medium heat. It helps to make dollar-sized pancakes. Be sure they are cooked through. You can’t make good pancakes in a big pan on a little burner; you need even heat and heat over the entire bottom of your pan. Sourdough pancakes taste even sourer if underdone.

Sourdough French Bread

Soften 1 pkg. yeast in 11⁄2 c. warm water. Blend in 1 c. sourdough starter, 2 t. salt, and 2 t. sugar. Add 21⁄2 c. flour. Beat a few minutes with a strong arm or mixer. Cover and let rise until it’s bubbly. Combine 1⁄2 t. soda and 21⁄2 c. flour, and stir that into your dough. Continue adding flour until you have a stiff dough. Knead on a floured surface almost 10 minutes. Divide your dough into 2 halves, cover with a cloth, and let rise in a warm place for 10 minutes. Now shape into 2 French bread loaves. Place them, not touching, on a greased baking sheet. Let rise until it doubles and then bake at 400˚F for 35–40 minutes. Just before your loaves are done, take them out of the oven long enough to generously spread butter on their tops. Then return to oven for a few minutes. Serve in about 1-inch slices, cut somewhat on the diagonal.

Sourdough Cornmeal Cakes

Beat well together 4 c. flour, 2 c. cornmeal, 1⁄2 c. milk, 1⁄2 c. starter, 3 eggs, and 2 t. salt. Let rise overnight in a warm place. Bake on a griddle in the morning.

Sweetly Simple Sourdough Starters

2010-11-11T09:07:00.000-08:00

We have a tradition in my house of eating sourdough pancakes for breakfast every Sunday. My dad’s trusty sourdough starter has a permanent spot in the corner of our refrigerator, necessitating a stir or two every few days. Come Sunday morning, he lovingly spoons it onto his old griddle, sometimes adding blueberries or raspberries in the summer, and ushers us all to the table for a big, old-fashioned breakfast. Whether you want to make sourdough bread for sandwiches or sourdough pancakes like my dad, you’ll need a trusty sourdough starter. Carla Emery has several quick and easy starter recipes, so you’ll be creating your own sourdough masterpieces in no time.

Glen Howerton’s Starter

Mix 1 c. flour with 1 c. water. Leave it covered with a light cloth 2 or 3 days.

Hazel’s Starter

Mix 1 pkg. dry yeast, 21⁄2 c. warm water, 1 T. sugar, 1 T. salt, and 2 c. sifted flour. Dissolve yeast in 1⁄2 c. lukewarm water. Let stand 10 minutes. Stir and add remaining water, sugar, salt, and flour. Mix well. Let stand in a covered bowl for 3 days at room temperature (78–80˚F). The container should be big enough to let the starter rise to about 4 times its starting size. Stir down every day.

Polly Wants a (Homemade) Cracker

2010-11-04T11:19:00.000-07:00

Favorites of parrots, toddlers, and snack aficionados everywhere, The Cracker is a versatile and delicious food eaten on its own or as an accompaniment to cheeses of all kinds. The popularity of The Cracker means that an entire aisle is devoted to them in the grocery store, but their contents can often be dubious. Ingredients too long to comfortably pronounce, like sorbitan monostearate or polysorbate 60 combined with ingredients we know are bad for us like partially hydrogenated soybean oil, high fructose corn syrup and saturated fat abound in store-bought crackers. To avoid them, make your own!

Basic Bread Cracker Recipe

Chill the bread for easier cutting. Then trim the crust off closely. Cut into 1⁄2 – inch slices for a zwieback, 1⁄8–1⁄4 inch thick for a melba. Make slices about 11⁄2 inch wide and as long as you want. Spread out on a cookie sheet. Bake in a preheated 350˚F oven for about 20 minutes, or until dry and crisp clear through. Then store in a dry place, such as a tightly covered glass jar, or in a plastic bag in your freezer. Serve as needed. Good to keep on hand for the children.

Zwieback

If you’re not familiar with zwieback, buy a package at the store just to give you a notion of where you’re trying to get to. Your homemade zwieback will taste and look very much like the store product. It’s a great cracker for toddlers.

Scald 1⁄2 c. milk; then cool. When lukewarm, add 2 T. yeast and dissolve. Add 1⁄4 c. sugar or 1⁄4 c. honey, 1⁄2 t. salt, 3 eggs, and enough flour to make a workable dough. Make the dough more tender than for regular bread (use less flour). Let rise in bowl until light. Shape into oblong rolls about 2 inches in diameter and 4 inches long. Space about 2 inches apart in a buttered pan in parallel rows. Let rise again. Rolls will more than double. Bake 20 minutes at 400˚F. Remove from oven when agreeably browned. Let cool. Then chill in refrigerator. When cold, cut carefully into crosswise slices 1⁄2 inch thick — like store-bought bread slices. Brown evenly in the oven at 400˚F about 10 minutes. They need to be dry all the way through.

Melba Toast

Slice day-old bread very thin and toast until it is very crisp. The bread should be fine-grained to start with so it will cut into thin, even slices. Unleavened bread works well. Any older bread that is thoroughly chilled will cut thinner than fresh, warm bread. Ideally, melba toast is a delicate brown all over and is totally dry. Cut the slices 1⁄8–1⁄4 inch thick. Lay them in a pan side by side and bake in the oven at 250–325˚F for 15 to 18 minutes.

Not Your Average Cornflakes: Healthy, Filling Homemade Cereal

2010-10-28T12:11:00.000-07:00

While it may be easier to grab that box of sugar cereal on sale for $1.99 at the local grocery store, making your own cereal can be rewardingly fun and nutritious. Carla Emery gives us recipes that will help keep you full all day long.

Basic Cooking Procedure: The general rule is the larger your particles, the longer they will take to soften and the more water they will absorb. For cereals ground as fine as cornmeal (or finer), you add the cereal slowly to rapidly boiling water, stirring at the same time. In the case of fineparticled cereal, stir continuously until it has set and not at all afterward if possible. Cook until done. Watch carefully so it doesn’t scorch, or cook in a double boiler. Particularly fine-grained, flour-type cereals should be first mixed with cold liquid to keep them from lumping, or made gravy-style.

Cooking Whole Grains: Cooking in a double boiler is the safest method. Cooking in a pressure cooker is the shortest. Cooking whole brown rice, barley, or other medium- hard grains takes 40–45 minutes in a regular pan or 20 minutes in a pressure cooker. Cooking cracked wheat or precooked or soft grains takes only 20–30 minutes regular, 5–10 pressure. Whole wheat berries, whole rye, whole oats, and other very hard grains take 1 hour or more regular, 35 minutes in the pressure cooker. When pressure cooking grains, be sure to use enough water, especially for the hard grains. They soak up a lot!

Homemade Quick-Cooking Cereal

Coarse grains like whole or cracked grains take a while to cook. You can speed that up by precooking them for 2 or 3 minutes in boiling water and then letting them soak in that liquid for several hours, or better yet overnight. Then they will cook up faster than they would have otherwise.

Cooking Ground Grains: You can thicken the cereal in any recipe by adding more grain, or thin it by using less. You can cook it in milk instead of water, in part milk and part water, in all water, or in a fruit sauce. You can add raisins, dried, fresh, or canned fruit, nuts, any sweetening, or yogurt at any stage. Salt isn’t necessary. In general, about 4 parts liquid to 1 part cereal is appropriate for coarsely ground cereals from the whole grain. Rolled cereals take 2 parts liquid to 1 part cereal. A “gruel” means a very thin cereal. A “mush” is a medium one, and a “porridge” means a very thick one.

Precooked Cereal

This is how you can have homemade cereal for breakfast without getting up earlier than you want to. Cook it the day before and refrigerate overnight. If you cooked it in a double boiler, it can be warmed up in the same container. Or start it very late in the evening and let cook all night at a low temperature. If you plan to warm up cracked wheat, oatmeal, or another coarse grain preparation, use an extra 1⁄2 c. water when you make it the night before. It also helps if you heat the milk or cream to be used on warmed-up cereal. I like cereal for lunch with the children, too. And, ah, yes, it is modern times, and cereal reheats nicely in a microwave.

Squash Season: Just like a Fairytale

2010-10-21T09:50:00.000-07:00

With gorgeous fall weather in full swing, our gardens are winding down. Though it’s always a bit sad to see things in such decline, not everything is on its last legs. Squash is the fall and winter favorite filled with fun possibilities. Squash can be used for lots of things, from birdfeeders to table centerpieces to Halloween decorations. Cinderella’s fairy godmother even managed to make a carriage out of a squash. But in my opinion, the best thing to do with squash is to eat it. Recipes using squash are as varied as our fall weather. So while I don’t have any advice on how to turn a pumpkin into a carriage, I do have lots of great squash recipes from Carla Emery to share with you.

Cooking Squash and Pumpkin: Basically you start any recipe by boiling, baking, or pressure-cooking the flesh. If you then mash, you’ve got the equivalent of the canned pumpkin that is called for in most recipes. Just substitute from there.

Boiling. Halve the fruit and scoop out the seeds and stringy fibers that are mixed up with them. Peel and cut what’s left into cookable-sized pieces. Boil until tender (a half hour or so). To pressure-cook, cook the peeled pieces 15 minutes at 15 lb. pressure.

Baking. Arrange your peeled pieces cut side down in some sort of baking pan. Bake about an hour at 400˚F. Then scoop out the part that stayed soft and mashable. Another system is in Ruth’s Vegan Squash Pie recipe a bit later on. Of that one, Lane Morgan says, “That’s how I always prepare my pumpkins for pies, except I scrape out the seeds before I bake because I don’t know how good they’d be for roasting after being cooked in all that moisture. You don’t have to peel or chunk the pumpkin, and I hate peeling pumpkin. Don’t use a rimless baking surface because the pumpkins will ‘weep’ as they cook. I save that liquid to get the puree going in the blender.”

Instant Mashed Squash/Pumpkin

Blend 2 c. cut-up pumpkin with 1⁄2 c. water until smooth. If you aren’t going to use your puree in a recipe where it will get cooked, you can cook it plain in a pan, but you have to stir constantly to prevent burning.

Squash Half (or Chunk) Baked in the Shell

This is my family’s winter squash favorite. We use acorn squashes. I cut them in half (or into appropriate-sized baking sections) and remove seeds. In the cavity of each squash half, I sprinkle a little brown sugar and butter. Or some cooked bacon bits and butter. Or maple syrup. Or a honey/mustard mix. Or I mix 1⁄2 c. orange juice concentrate, 1⁄2 c. honey, salt, 2 T. butter, and 1⁄8 t. nutmeg and divide this among the squashes. Or combine prefried crumbled bacon (about 4 slices), half a small onion (cut up and sauteed), 1⁄2 c. brown sugar, a big pinch of ground cloves, and 11⁄2 c. peeled apple sections. In any case, put filled squashes in a loaf pan, sprinkle bacon bits on top, and bake in a loaf pan at about 350˚F until fork-tender. Or stuff with a meat-loaf mix and bake. Or fill with a mixture of chopped apples, raisins, bread crumbs soaked in orange juice, a little honey, cinnamon, and cloves. Then serve. Since it’s hard for any child (or most adults) to eat an entire half of an acorn squash, we carve them up at the table and serve the pieces, trying hard not to lose much of the filling in the process. Then just spoon the squash off the rind into your mouth. Use mashed leftover squash in any baked goods (bread, cookies, cakes, and muffins).

Squash Stuffing

Mix together 2 c. mashed squash, 1 egg, 1 c. each finely chopped onion and celery, 1 T. chopped parsley, 1 chopped green pepper, 2 T. melted butter, 1⁄2 t. sage, and a dash of thyme.

Vegan Squash Pie

From Ruth: Cut 1 large or 2 medium butternut squashes (you can substitute any other winter-keeper squash) in half lengthwise and bake, cut side down, for an hour (till very soft when forked). Discard seeds.

Then scoop out flesh and puree in blender till smooth — add 1⁄2 c. maple syrup or honey, 11⁄2 t. cinnamon, 1⁄2 t. nutmeg, 1⁄2 t. ginger, 2 T. tahini (sesame seed butter), and 1⁄2 c. rice (or soy milk). Bake in pie shell or glass baking dish at 375˚F for 30 minutes, till slightly browned.

Pumpkream Pie

It was a red-letter day for me indeed when this one came in the mail from Esther Shuttleworth, mother of the famous editor of Mother Earth News (John):

Mix together 1 c. granulated sugar, a pinch of salt, 1 t. cinnamon, 1⁄4 t. cloves, and 1⁄4 t. nutmeg. Beat in 2 eggs. Then add 1 c. wellcooked– down (cooked-dry) pumpkin. Add 1 c. thick cream or whipping cream. Bake in an 8-inch pie pan, which will be full, for 20 minutes at 425˚F. Then reduce to 375˚F and bake until it rises and then makes small cracks around the edge.

Ivy’s Pumpkin Pie from Scratch

Ivy Isaacson lives here in Kendrick and helped me a lot with mimeographing earlier editions of this book. I got a request in the mail for a pumpkin pie recipe from scratch, and Ivy offered hers. Here it is for everybody: Cut pumpkin in pieces; peel and cook in small amount of water. Drain well, mash, and put through strainer. Line a 9-inch pie pan with plain pastry. Set oven at 450˚F. Mix 11⁄2 c. of your cooked and strained pumpkin, 1⁄3 c. brown sugar, 1⁄3 c. white sugar, 1 t. cinnamon, 1⁄2 t. ginger, 1⁄4 t. nutmeg, 1⁄2 t. salt, 2 slightly beaten eggs, 11⁄2 c. milk, and 1⁄2 c. cream or evaporated milk. Pour into pie shell. Bake 10 minutes; then lower heat to 300˚F and bake until firm (about 45 minutes). For spicier filling, add 1⁄4 t. cloves.

Vegan Pumpkin Pie From Ruth of Bonaire:

“Take 2 c. cooked-down pumpkin, 1 c. rice cream cereal (cooked and cooled), 2 T. tahini, 1⁄2 c. apple juice (or 1⁄4 c. juice and 1⁄4 c. honey), 2 t. each of allspice and fresh grated ginger root, and 1⁄4 t. cloves. Puree all that in a blender until very smooth, and then bake in an ungreased glass baking dish 30 minutes at 375˚F or until set.”

Have a Fiesta with Homemade Tortillas

2010-10-14T09:34:00.000-07:00

October brings with it a bit of a chill in the air. If you aren’t quite ready to let go of the last vestiges of summer and start bundling up against the winter freeze, perhaps now’s the time for a Mexican fiesta. Impress your friends and family with homemade tortillas, add some spicy salsa, mix up some margaritas, and pretend like you’re sitting on the beach in Mazatlan.

Here’s how to do it.

Cornmeal Tortillas

Stir 1 c. boiling water into 1 c. cornmeal. Add salt and a couple teaspoons bacon grease and mix. Pat into thin cakes and bake on a griddle the same as for masa tortillas If you make tortillas out of flour and mashed potatoes, you have lefse (a Scandinavian dish). If you make the tortilla out of flour, you get another kind.

Lupe’s Tortilla de Harina

Merry Collins of Kennewick, WA, told me this easy way to make tortillas, easy because “all the ingredients are warm and liquid. Mix together 3 c. flour, 1 T. baking powder, 1 t. salt, 3 T. vegetable oil, and 1 c. very hot water. Form a large dough ball. Let rest for a few minutes. Form small dough balls. Grab as much as you can pull off in your left palm. That’s just the right amount. Make the glob of dough round by pulling the edges in but keeping it against the left palm. It makes the top nice and smooth. Then the balls are rolled out with a rolling pin until round and flat, put them on an ungreased preheated griddle (cast iron) at a medium heat. After bubbles begin forming, turn and cook on the other side. We store them in a crockery pot with a lid or in a plastic bowl. They should be stacked inside a clean dishtowel. It took me quite a while to be able to get these tortillas rolled out round. I used to get teased about my tortillas. They were so misshapen.”

Hazel’s Rollout System.

“When ready, make small balls and set aside about 8 or 10. With hands slightly moist, dip them in flour. Now work the balls into flat round disks. Either roll out or, as I do, turn the dough and stretch it until you have a tortilla with no holes, about the size of a bread and- butter plate and about 1⁄8 inch thick. I cook mine on a lightly greased griddle — that flat kind (do not fry). Cook on both sides. A little scorch won’t hurt. Just don’t burn holes.

As they come off the griddle, place between 2 towels or a folded towel. This will soften the tortillas so you can roll them when you get to the filling.”

Stressed? Give Yourself Red Carpet-Worthy Pampering Right At Home!

2010-10-07T09:26:00.000-07:00

A trip to the spa can often set us back a few hundred dollars. With Carla Emery’s excellent organic recipes, we can give ourselves soothing facials right at home, minus the hefty price tag.

Steaming. This is a good treatment for skin problems and a general pick-me-up. I’ve enjoyed it many times. It deep-cleans your facial pores. To experts, steaming means putting your face in a hot towel tent. To me, it means spending 5–10 minutes with a few hot washrags on my face. When you’re done, wash out any dirt that’s left; then close those pores with cold washrags or an astringent.

NOTE: Don’t use this or any other heat treatment on a face that already has broken veins, because it can make them worse.

Face Masks. A mask consists of a “binder” (which makes it adhere) and other ingredients mixed in with the binder.

Choose your binder according to whether your skin tends to be oily or dry. For oily skin, use yogurt or egg white as a binder. For dry skin, choose lanolin, honey, sour cream, or egg yolk. Experiment with the other ingredients. You can blend vegetables and fruits and combine them with your binder, or use any of the recipes below. Wash your face clean before applying the mask. Don’t ever put a mask onto the area around your eyes. Rinse off after a half hour or as soon as the mask dries. (While you’re waiting, it’s a good time to take a nap.) To remove the mask, use a washrag and warm water. Then use cold water to close your pores.

NOTE: If you feel any irritation, rinse off immediately!

Egg White Mask

Oatmeal Mask

Mix together 2⁄3 c. oatmeal and enough honey to make a pasty consistency. Optionally, add 2 t. rose water.

Honey/Lemon Mask

Mix 2 T. slightly warmed honey with 1 t. lemon juice. Put the mixture on your face and leave for about a half hour.

Brewer’s Yeast Mask

Mix yeast with enough water to create a paste. Smooth it over your face (not into eyes!). Let dry. Then remove with warm water. Do this 1–2 times a week. For dry skin, add 1 T. wheat germ oil or 1 egg yolk to mask. You can also add 3 t. brewer’s yeast to milk or fruit juice and drink it daily.

Herbal Steaming Facial

Moisten your hot washrags with an herb tea — chamomile, nettle, rosemary, or peppermint.

Pasta with Pizzazz! How to Make Oodles of Homemade Noodles

2010-09-30T09:17:00.001-07:00

There’s the old standards of spaghetti, macaroni, fettuccine and linguini. But then there’s the lesser-known bavettine, lasagnette, maltagliati and tortiglioni. Transport yourself back to the narrow streets of Lucca or the wide plazas of Rome by making your own delicious pasta, complete with homemade noodles. For those of you who’ve never tried homemade noodles, Carla Emery and I agree that you will never go back to those store-bought ones again! Plus, not only are they scrumptiously delicious in a multitude of fabulous recipes, they are also super easy to make. See if you can invent your own new and fantastical pasta shape with any of these easy recipes!

Basic Noodles This makes more than enough to thoroughly noodle up a stew: 2 eggs, a pinch of salt, and all the flour the eggs can absorb.

Delicious Eggy Noodles Combine 6 eggs, 6 T. light cream or canned milk, 1 t. salt, and about 41⁄2 c. flour. This dough can be kneaded. Divide into fourths. Roll out on lightly floured board till paper-thin. Dry 30 minutes. Cut into strips. Drop into boiling salted water and cook.

Leftover-Yolks Noodles This dangerously rich noodle is as delicious as most things that are bad for you. To 1⁄4 c. egg yolks, add 1 T. rich cream plus enough flour to make your stiff noodle dough.

Eggless Noodles Just an eggshell of water with a pinch of salt; then add flour. A teaspoon of butter and some special seasoning helps: a pinch of pepper, ginger, or nutmeg.

Green Noodles Cook a small batch of your garden spinach or other greens. Drain and put through a sieve. Drain again. Combine 3 eggs, 1⁄2 c. of the spinach, 2 t. butter, and enough flour to make the dough.

Potato Noodles Use the equivalent of about 4 large potatoes, cooked and mashed. Leftover mashed spuds are also fine to start with. Now mix in 1 egg and a pinch of salt, and maybe a little nutmeg. Add enough flour to get a good noodle-type dough. Roll out, etc.

Fettuccine Use one of these noodle recipes. Cut in strips 1⁄2 inch wide. They should be flat, long, and ribbonlike.

Ruth’s Vegan Noodles “I never have used eggs in pasta-making! Just water or rice milk and flour. Sometimes tamari or spinach or mashed potato, sweet potato or squash. Or even beet puree — for red noodles! Rye flour noodles in a cabbage-tomato stew are great!”

An Apple A Day… All Year Long

2010-09-23T13:51:00.000-07:00

September means apple season. Just over the mountains, Eastern Washington apple orchards are brimming with fruit. Washington state grows the best apples in the world (though I suppose I’m a little biased).

Maybe you are lucky enough to have access to these beautiful orchards, or maybe you’ve just noticed apples on sale at the local grocery store. Either way, now’s the time to stock up on delicious Washington apples. With some clever preserving techniques, you can find yourself eating local apples all year long.

Canning Apples

Wash, peel, core, and quarter or slice your apples. Drop into a solution of 2 T. salt and 2 T. vinegar per 1 gal. of water. That prevents darkening. Then drain, rinse, and boil them for 5 minutes (in either thin sugar syrup or plain water). Then pack your hot fruit into hot, very clean jars, leaving 1⁄2 - inch headspace. Pour boiling liquid from the cooking over up to your headspace limit. Put on lids. Process in boiling water — for either pints or quarts: 20 minutes at altitudes 1,000 feet and lower; 25 minutes at 1,001–3,000 feet; 30 minutes at 3001–6,000 feet; and 35 minutes at above 6,000 feet.

Canned Applesauce (and Other Fruit Purees)

I make lots of applesauce. It’s a good way to preserve apples that wouldn’t keep otherwise. Cut large fruit into pieces. Simmer until soft. Add a small amount of water, if needed, to prevent sticking. Put through food strainer or mill. Add sugar to taste. Reheat to simmering (185–210˚F) and pack hot into hot jars, leaving 1⁄2 - inch headspace. Adjust lids, and waterbath can. From sea level to 1,000 feet altitude, process pints 15 minutes, quarts 20 minutes; from 1,001 to 3,000 feet, process pints 20 minutes, quarts 25 minutes; from 3,001 to 6,000 feet, process pints 20 minutes, quarts 30 minutes; above 6,000 feet, process pints 25 minutes, quarts 35 minutes.

Freezing Apples for Pie

For apples to use in making pies and so on, just wash, peel, core, and slice them.

About 50 lb. of apples will make about 35 frozen pints. To keep them from turning dark, quarter (or slice) them into a solution of 1⁄2 c. salt per 1 gal. water. Or else dunk them into boiling water for 11⁄2–2 minutes. Then drain the apples, rinse them under cold water, and drain again.

Method 1:

Scald, drain, chill, cover with a thin syrup (1 c. sugar per quart of water plus 1⁄2 t. ascorbic acid), leave headspace, and freeze.

Or Method 2:

Mix 1 qt. apple slices evenly with 1 t. ascorbic acid and 1⁄2 c. sugar. Then put into plastic bags or freezer boxes, seal, and freeze.

Or Method 3:

No sugar. Just pack ’em plain. The slices break apart quite easily while still frozen for making apple pie or crisp, or you can add a small amount of water and make applesauce.

Or Method 4:

Freeze whole apples, unpeeled. Just wash, put into plastic bag, seal, and place in freezer. To use frozen whole apples, thaw under cold running water until they can be peeled. Then remove the core and slice. (Work fast; an apple that thaws before peeling darkens.)

Freezing Applesauce

Applesauce turns out nicer, I think, canned than frozen, but you can freeze it by just making it, then cooling, packaging, and freezing.

Drying Apples

You have to slice them; they aren’t dried whole. Fully ripe sweet apples are ideal. Usually they are peeled and cored and what’s left is made into doughnuttype rings about 1⁄4 - inch thick to oven dry, 1⁄8 - inch to sun dry. Let the slices fall into cold water while you are working to prevent “rusting,” 1⁄4 c. lemon juice or 1 t. ascorbic acid per 2 c. cold water. If your apples are small, wormy, or too mealy to make into doughnut rings, cut into slices of whatever shape you can. Old-timers then strung them on a thread and hung them in the sun, but now we usually just spread them out on a surface. Using an oven or dehydrator, dry them at 140˚F on a cookie sheet — turning once in a while — until they are leathery.

Tips to Minimize Eating Poisonous Residues

2010-09-16T12:11:00.000-07:00

We all know we should eat organic. But sometimes, organic isn’t readily available or a meager budget gets the best of us. Thankfully, Carla Emery has a few easy tricks to minimize our pesticide and chemical intake and help keep us healthier.

1. When eating meat or fish, discard the fat.

2. Don’t eat organ meats: liver, brains, sweetbreads, kidneys, heart, or gizzard. The poisons tend to concentrate in organs.

3. Avoid smoked foods and cured meats such as bacon and ham. They contain potentially carcinogenic nitrates and nitrites as well as the usual run of contaminants.

4. Meat from young animals is less likely to be contaminated than meat from older ones. Contamination is a lifelong accumulation.

5. About food from water: Choose fish over shellfish, ocean fish over river or lake fish, deep-ocean fish over shore- or bottom-feeding fish. In the case of meat-eating predator fish, choose small fish over large fish (the more they eat, the more they grow and the more foodchain poisons have accumulated in their bodies). Fishfarm fish are normally raised in water that doesn’t contain PCBs, mercury, or other chemicals, so they’re the best of all from that point of view; however, they are typically fed small doses of antibiotics every day.

6. When eating dairy products, eat products that are skim or as nearly skim as possible. The best dairy foods are skim milk, nonfat yogurt, and nonfat cottage cheese.

7. But use butter rather than margarine! You need some fat in your diet to be healthy — for your brain to do its best. Margarine is much worse for you than butter!

8. Choose fruits and vegetables that can be peeled. Wash them with unscented dish soap and rinse well. Then peel before eating. Forget everything you’ve heard about vitamins from eating peelings. A baked potato with peel has an average 30 percent more pesticide residue than a peeled, boiled one. It’s even worse with waxed fruits and vegetables. The wax that is applied to them typically contains fungicides (another poison). In addition, the wax layer seals in the previous layers of pesticides; if waxed, you can’t wash anything off. But you can still peel some residues away.

9. Peeling doesn’t guarantee that there are no residues. Cooked foods are always safer from the residue point of view, although cooking destroys vitamins. The “systemic” kinds of poisons get into the flesh of the fruit or vegetable rather than just lodging on the peel. Cooking detoxifies some — but not all — of them.

10. Concentrated fruit products have concentrated residues. Raisins, prunes, jams, jellies, fruit juices, and wine are all more likely to have residues than single fruits, because they’re made of concentrations of fruit.

11. Sweeteners are low-residue foods. This really turns the long-standing wisdom on its ear. For some reason or other, honey, corn syrup, maple syrup, and molasses — and yes, white sugar too — are all exceptionally low-residue foods and therefore are good from this point of view! Chocolate, however, is sometimes contaminated.

Carla’s Simple Button-Growing System

2010-09-09T09:25:00.000-07:00

Ever wonder where those miraculous morsels called mushrooms come from? Though their technical category of fungus doesn’t exactly entice, button mushrooms, with their smooth and creamy texture and snow white skin, are both beautiful and delicious.

And did you know that you can experience the fine flavors of fungi from the comfort of your own home? Carla Emery shows us how.

1. Where?

Decide where you’re going to grow mushrooms — in a cave or fallout shelter, under the kitchen sink, or whatever. Mushrooms are the only “plant” crop that doesn’t need light to grow, since they make food from manure and other decaying organic material rather than from sunshine. In fact, until the mushroom is actually ready to fruit, its growth is held back by the presence of light. So mushrooms are best grown in a basement, cellar, cave, or mine; in the dark, damp space between the floor of any building you have and the ground under it; or in a windowless building like a garage or barn, as long as it doesn’t get too cold inside.

Commercial growers build special mushroom houses where they keep the temp at 55–65˚F. Your growing place will work best if the temp hovers around 45–60˚F, but the mushrooms won’t die unless they either freeze or get way too hot.

2. In What Containers?

The growing boxes can be heavy, waxed cardboard, but wooden boxes hold up better in the long run. Make your boxes at least 6 to 8 inches deep. You can just spread them out. Or to use space more efficiently, build a shelf arrangement for them. Make the bottom shelf at least 6 inches above the floor. Make the next shelves 2 feet above each other. You can go as high as the ceiling height allows.

3. In What Soil?

Mushroom-growing soil is called “compost,” and that’s basically what it is. Different mushrooms grow best in different soils. Shaggy mane mushrooms like horse manure. Shiitake and Enoke like a sawdust/bran mix.

Buttons and oysters will grow on this mixture:

Start with 4 parts grass or straw. The compost process goes best if you plan to work a 500-lb. lot at a time. Shred the grass or straw (lawn-mowing clippings work too). Wet it with nonchlorinated water, cover, and let soak several days. Now you’re going to make a compost heap. Spread out your straw/grass a few inches high. Spread a layer of fresh cow, horse, or other manure over it. (Mike Hess says, “Horse manure’s the best. Cow and pig are inferior and to be avoided.”) Spray with water and keep adding more layers the same way until you’re out of shreddings and manure. Cover with plastic and let ’er heat! After 5 days, start checking every day to see how the center temp is doing. When the temp starts dropping, turn and circulate the heap, water as needed, cover, and continue composting. You’re done when turning no longer results in an increased temp. You have to let the manure age enough so that it won’t heat up to more than 85˚F, which would harm your mushrooms.

4. Bake the Growing Soil.

This sterilization step is really important; please don’t skip it. (You’ll hear much more about sterilization from Mike later.) Mushrooms have quite a few natural enemies: bugs, worms, molds. This step protects them; it also ensures that you won’t grow any kind of mushroom-toadstool–looking thing except exactly what you intend to. Bake each box, dirt and all, in your oven at 200˚F for at least 1 hour. Let the oven get hot before you start timing the hour. Other ways to accomplish this are to compost the manure mixture beforehand and make sure it gets up to at least 170˚F. After your soil has cooled down to no more than 70˚F, make sure it’s loose and not hardpacked.

If the compost is so dry that it doesn’t feel moist to the touch, spray before planting.

5. Load Growing Boxes.

Put your growing mix into the boxes 6 to 10 inches deep. Don’t pack it tightly. Smooth the top with a fork.

6. Plant the Spawn.

Dried spawn keeps a long time in a cool and dry place, but spawn that is moist must be refrigerated or planted right away. Sprinkle spawn over the surface. Then sprinkle more pasteurized manure-compost mixture a couple inches deep over that; work the spawn flakes with your hands gently into the soil mixture; or lift some soil, spread the spawn with a teaspoon, and then replace the soil over it. Make these plantings about 8 inches apart.

7. Maintain Humidity and Dampness.

Now sprinkle with lukewarm water and plan on keeping the mixture wet. It works best if you water with as fine a spray as you can manage. Check often enough to make sure the mushroom bed doesn’t dry out, because if you let it completely dry out, that could be the end of your hoped-for mushroom crop. For a single, small box, it helps at first to put a damp cloth over the tray. Or rig up some constantly dripping water to keep humidity high in your mushroom-growing area. On the other hand, you can drown your mushrooms with too much water. If you can squeeze some of the growing mixture in your hand and no water comes out, it’s still on the okay side. A plastic tent over your growing boxes helps hold in humidity without keeping the dirt itself oversoaked.

8. Do Casing.

About 4 weeks after you plant your spawn in the boxes, your mushroom crop is ready to . . . “flower”? . . . “fruit”? . . . grow mushrooms. For, believe it or not, the mushroom you eat is a sort of flower. Or maybe it’s more of a fruit.

The mushroom, in the form of that mycelium, does most of its early growing below ground, where the food is. It doesn’t create the part of the plant that you think of as a proper mushroom until conditions trigger its reproductive phase. There has to be enough of a mycelium, which then builds and feeds the mushroom. When mycelia — silky white threads that look like cotton — have grown out from each of your planting sites until they almost meet, it’s casing time. You may even already see the first sign of life from your mushrooms above ground — a small knob growing above ground from that mycelium underneath. Mike Hess: “If the mushroom forms a ‘knob’ above ground before casing, then casing is probably unnecessary. But no knob will form, generally, until after you case. That’s what casing is for.”

Casing works because it’s a layer of soil that’s not sterilized and, for some unknown reason, the introduction of vigorous microscopic critters atop your mycelium growth at this stage triggers fruiting! So casing encourages the mycelium to make an aboveground mushroom flower/fruit.

Here’s how to do it:

Sprinkle on anywhere from 1⁄2 to 1 inch of screened clay loam (or plain loam, but not sand and not soil with any partly rotted composting material in it).

9. Ventilate.

During the fruiting stage, the plants need some fresh air. Don’t overdo it to the point of drafts, but have enough air circulation so that the natural metabolic gases can’t accumulate. At the same time, the mushroom growing place needs to have a temp as nearly steady as possible in the 50–60˚F range.

10. Pick.

About a week or 10 days after the casing, you’ll see mushrooms starting to form. Ten days after that, you’ll be able to start picking. Harvest every day. Pick them just before they open out. When you pick, twist to prevent pulling up lots of “root,” which would cause damage to the mycelium. Water as needed, just enough so the growing soil stays damp. But if you see spotted mushrooms, that means you need more ventilation and much less water. Your beds will now continue to grow mushrooms for about 3 to 6 more months, as long as the good temperature conditions hold and bugs and other competition stay out.

11. Raise Your Own Spawn.

A box where mushrooms have been grown for several months has what is called “running spawn” all through it, at the level where you first planted spawn. You can use that dirt (unpasteurized, of course) to plant other boxes. If you dry the dirt in an airy but shaded place, you can store it under dry, dark, cool (but above freezing) conditions for maybe up to 10 years. Or the used box of soil will be a good addition to your garden or potted plants.

Canning Cukes

2010-08-31T12:19:00.000-07:00

In a pickle because you’ve got more cucumbers than hungry mouths to eat them? Ben Franklin said, “Hunger is the best pickle.” I’m not sure exactly what that means, but why not save some of those cukes for later? Carla Emery has two fabulous pickle recipes that are sure to satisfy any craving.

Garlic Dill Pickles

Season: Mid- to late summer

Yield: 6 to 7 pints

Store: Cool, dark pantry

4 pounds pickling cucumbers, about 4 inches long, scrubbed and cut in half lengthwise

14 cloves garlic, split in half (28 halves)

G cup pickling or other fine, noniodized salt

2I cups cider vinegar

3 cups water

14 heads fresh dill weed

28 peppercorns

Heat the garlic, salt, vinegar, and water to boiling. Remove the garlic and place 4 halves in each hot, sterilized jar (if the cucumbers fill only 6 jars, add the remaining halves to 4 of the jars). Pack the cucumbers into the jars and divide the dill and peppercorns evenly among them.

Pour the hot vinegar solution over the cucumbers, allowing H inch headspace. Adjust the lids. Follow water-bath canning instructions (page 34) and process for 10 minutes. Store for at least 6 weeks before serving.

Bread-and-Butter Pickles

Season: Mid- to late summer

Yield: 7 to 9 pints

Store: Cool, dark pantry

6 pounds pickling cucumbers, cut into J-inch slices

H cup pickling or other fine noniodized salt

Crushed ice

4 cups cider vinegar

4 cups sugar

2 teaspoons celery seed

1 tablespoon whole allspice

2 tablespoons mustard seed

Combine the cucumbers and salt in a mixing bowl and mix. Completely cover with the ice and let stand for 3 to 4 hours. Drain thoroughly, picking out any remaining unmelted ice.

Bring the vinegar, sugar, celery seed, allspice, and mustard seed to a boil in an 8-quart saucepan, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Simmer uncovered for 5 minutes. Add the cucumber slices to the vinegar syrup and return to a simmer; stir gently to make sure heat is evenly distributed throughout the mixture.

Carefully ladle the pickles into hot, sterilized jars, allowing H inch headspace. Follow water-bath canning instructions (page 34) and process for 10 minutes. Store for a least a month and then refrigerate before serving.

Variation: For traditional bread-and-butter pickles with onions, add 1 cup peeled and thinly sliced small white onions along with the cucumbers to the vinegar syrup and proceed with instructions.

And if you’re looking for more ideas for your garden veggies, check out the Fresh From the Garden Cookbook

Cooling Down the Eco-Friendly Way

2010-08-26T09:31:00.000-07:00

Seattleites pride ourselves on the preservation of those “quintessential” Seattle neighborhoods, peppered with charming Craftsman-style homes, small fruit tree-enhanced yards, and a general lack of parking space. But these small and sweet homes are rarely equipped with air conditioning. Despite our temperate climate, we can have our fair share of heat spells, but their infrequency means that our houses are usually ill-equipped to handle the heat. But air conditioning is not the answer. It’s not only costly to install and run, but energy inefficient and extremely detrimental to the environment. In fact, air conditioning is the most energy consuming appliance in a house, using 16% of an average home’s total electricity! Not only can this cost you an average of $280 per year, but you are releasing over two tons of CO₂ into the air, making you decidedly not very Earth-friendly. Carla Emery has seven eco-friendly cooling techniques that will help both your budget and the planet.

1. If you cook, bake, and can in the house rather than in an outdoor summer kitchen or campfire, do it in the evening so the house will have all night to cool off. But minimize cooking by serving salads, raw fruit, cool herb teas, and grilled or quickly heated foods.

2. Get cool air indoors. After the sun goes down and the outside air becomes cool, open all your windows and get as much of that good cool air inside as possible. Using fans, especially an attic fan, will help accomplish that quickly. (A fan doesn’t need as much energy as does air conditioning, and it doesn’t use chemical refrigerants!) In the morning, close all your windows to keep in that wonderful cool night air you collected.

3. Ceiling fans are inexpensive to operate and can help keep rooms cooler.

4. Hang heavy insulating blankets in all south- and west- facing windows, at least while the sun is shining on them. The more you can prevent summer sun from directly shining into your house’s rooms, the cooler they will be.

5. A cool shower before the afternoon nap or bedtime helps keep both grown-ups and children cool.

6. Drink lots of pure water or water with a little fruit juice added.

7. Arrange your work schedule as they do in hot desert countries: Take a siesta or stay inside quietly in your coolest room during the hottest afternoon hours. Make up for it by working in the evening, when the temperatures are comfortable, doing what in winter you would have done in the afternoon. Plan to do hard mental jobs in the morning and expect to have brain meltdown during the hot hours, compensated for by that nap or undemanding time. It’s a simple physiological fact that we don’t think and function as well under extreme heat.

The Campfire Kitchen

2010-08-19T10:23:00.000-07:00

With the beautiful summer weather in full swing, Seattleites are fleeing the city in droves for the cool and peaceful forests right on our doorstep. But does the thought of camping induce a mild panic at the thought of having to survive on granola and beef jerky for a weekend? Are your Eagle Scout badges a little dusty… or non-existent? Carla Emery helps sharpen those rusty fire-starting skills to help get you out on the open trail with the promise of a full belly. Now the only thing you have to worry about are the mosquitoes.

First, you need a good place to build your fire and plenty of fuel for all its stages. You will be glad for a work table — maybe a plank between two stumps, so you don’t have to set everything on the ground. Anything that can be cooked in frying pans, kettles, or reflector ovens can be managed with a campfire. Don’t use pans with handles that will burn. Handles that aren’t metal will promptly burn or melt. If they’re all you have, let them do it, and then you can get on with it. Stick to simple ingredients and simple procedures when you’re cooking, because you didn’t bring your kitchen. If you are able to plan ahead to do all your cooking over an open fire, you especially need one or two cast-iron frying pans, a Dutch oven, a campfire coffeepot, and a big pan to heat dish and washing water in.

Second, you need to start the fire. Campfire cooking means starting a fire and controlling it until you don’t need it any more. There’s a real skill to it, which you’ll acquire with practice. The easiest way to do camp cooking is to pack a proper wood cookstove, set it up in your camp, and use it. Gather wood on dry days and store it under shelter to use on wet ones.

You can do this in a semi-permanent camp. If you’re living on the trail, start a fire like this: Lay a little mound of really flammable dry stuff in an open place, on dirt or sand if you can, and away from dry brush or grass. (Please don’t start a forest fire!) Place very loosely wadded toilet paper, dry grass, the wrappers from tin cans, or one of my book brochures crumpled up on top of that. You crumple it because paper doesn’t burn well flat. You’ve got to get air in there.

Now make a tipi of very slender dry sticks over that, then bigger and bigger ones over that. Set aside some yet bigger ones to add later. Use 3 matches bunched together to start the fire.

With your campfire, there are three different cooking methods you can employ: frying, stewing or baking.

Frying: Try to allow enough time to let a good roaring blaze burn down to coals. When desperate, though, you can fry on a flame. Have a circle of big flat-topped rocks around the outside of your fire circle. They will help hold the heat.

Stewing: Just make a place for your kettle down in there among the rocks. Some tribes of native Americans cooked their meat by digging a hole, lining it with a hide, filling it with water, and then adding hot rocks and pieces of meat. This had to be the first crock pot!

Baking: Use a reflector oven, Dutch oven in a hole, or build a mud oven. If you have clay soil, building a mud oven is a natural. Start by building a strong, dome-shaped frame of willow branches and sticks about 2 feet wide by 3 feet long. Cover your branch canopy with a layer of mud 6–12 inches thick. Cut a square opening at one end to be your oven door. At the top opposite end, insert a large tin can that is open at both ends; that will be your chimney. After the mud is completely dry, build a fire inside and burn out all your wooden framework. Cool and scrape the insides clean. To bake in your mud oven, first build a fire inside it and heat the mud to red-hot. Then rake out the fire and put in your sourdough bread, bannocks, stew, or roast. Close the door with a slab of flat rock, and it should bake wonderfully.

A Watered Plant is a Happy Plant

2010-08-05T10:52:00.000-07:00

For many weekend gardeners, the plant watering process goes something like this:

1. Turn on water valve.

2. Direct nozzle of hose in direction of plants and squeeze.

3. Spray until arms tire.

4. Turn off valve and give hearty pat on back for job well done.

Another popular method, particularly in our little corner of the world, is the following:

1. Wait for a rainy spell and hope for the best.

It’s easy to forget that despite their conspicuous lack of emotive expression and conversational skills, plants are living—some would even say, sentient—organisms that require no less nurturing and nutrition than any other creature in order to prosper. (I do not, of course, include weeds in this category, as they, like cockroaches, seem fully perfectly capable of thriving on nothing but pure spite.) For vegetables in particular, water is like mother’s milk; it should be administered liberally and often.

So even if you aren’t sold on the idea that murmuring sweet nothings to your plants will help them grow (conclusive results are still pending on that one, anyway), you can still do the right thing by making sure that they’re well watered. And while you’re at it, you may as well throw in some sweet nothings, too.

1. Plants can absorb food from the soil only if it is in solution. So in effect, plants must have damp feet in order to eat.

2. A desert is usually rich farmland that happens to be lacking water. If you add water by irrigation, those arid lands will bloom. Only land whose topsoil has eroded or that has poisonous materials in the topsoil is true desert. Water supply and temperature are the two great determinants of what plants can be grown where.

3. The best time to water is in the morning. Plants do most of their growing during the day and need the water for photosynthesis. Watering in the morning also allows plants to dry out by evening, which reduces the chance of mildew and rot.

4. Mulching helps to keep soil moist as well as to suppress weeds. (But wait until the ground gets thoroughly warm before putting on mulch.)

5. Plant species differ a lot in water requirements. Vegetables need a lot of water; most vegetables are about 85 to 90 percent water. Flowers, trees, and bushes can all survive longer without water than vegetables.

6. Erosion happens when wind or water moves soil. If you garden or farm on sloping land, you risk erosion. Grass planted in strips across slopes, summer mulches, and winter cover crops help prevent erosion. Strategically placed diversion ditches also help.

7. Watering must be faithful. If stunted by water shortage, many vegetables never grow normally again.

8. Watering needs to be generous. Almost all vegetables produce much more with abundant water than with a skimpy supply. For a minimum, your garden needs about an inch of water a week, from either the sky or your irrigation system.

9. Surface runoff, puddling, and evaporation are all wastes of water.

10. For newly planted seeds, water often enough to keep the soil continuously moist—morning and evening, sprinkling every day until they are up. You want them to come up as fast as possible. The moist ground also helps discourage wild birds and the family poultry from digging up the seeds and eating them.

11. Once your plants are well started, give them a good soaking rather than morning and evening sprinkles. Light sprinkles encourage shallow root systems because unless the soil gets wet to the level of the deeper roots, the shallow roots develop at the expense of the deeper ones. But those shallow roots can’t do as good a job of finding soil nutrients. Because the surface of the soil dries out faster than the deeper soil, shallow watering also creates a vicious cycle in which more frequent watering is needed to keep the plants from wilting. Deep soakings, on the other hand, encourage deep root systems, and deep roots don’t have to be watered as often.

12. For that “deep” watering, you want to water until the soil is wet to a depth of 4 to 6 inches. How long that takes depends on how fast your irrigation system delivers water and how fast your soil type absorbs it. When the soil gets dry, water again, to a depth of about 4 inches.

Small Gardens, Big Potential

2010-07-27T09:47:00.000-07:00

Sad to say, the lawn size of the average American home seems to be steadily shrinking by the year. I can fondly recall how the backyard of my first childhood house, hardly a palatial estate, was still spacious enough to accommodate a pretty decent doubles volleyball match, not to mention the giant igloo my brothers put together during the heavy Seattle snowfall of 1990. Along the sides of the yard, my grandfather, a natural gardener, planted fruit trees, garlic, lettuce, and fragrant sesame that he’d harvest year after year to use in our kitchen and send along as gifts to our friends down the street.

My parents’ current house in the suburbs east of Lake Washington possesses many of the accoutrements popular with modern homeowners—e.g., granite-top counters, hardwood floors, a roaring fire at the flip of a switch—but alas, volleyball games are a thing of the past, and any attempts to insert a fruit and vegetable garden onto the property will take a good deal of creativity. The problem is compounded for the thousands of city dwellers who yearn for homegrown goodies of their very own but despair of ever finding ample space for them on their tiny urban plots.

If either of these scenarios sounds familiar to you, here’s cause for hope: with a little bit of well-informed planting and care, even a small patch of earth is capable of sprouting forth a surprisingly substantial quantity and variety of produce. So take in the following suggestions, stop despairing, and start planting!

1. Make use of semishaded areas unsuitable for tomatoes or root vegetables by growing leafy vegetables like lettuce, chard, mustard, or endive there.

2. Don’t overplant herbs. Two parsley or chive plants can quite likely produce all you need unless your family is large.

3. Avoid sprawling varieties. You can plant six rows of carrots, beets, or onions in the same square footage that one row of squash would take because squash simply will spread out all over the place, but root vegetables don’t. So limit or refuse summer squash, winter squash, cucumbers, watermelons, muskmelons, cantaloupes, and corn, because they take more space than they’re worth. Or use the recently developed compact “bush” kinds of melons, squash, cucumbers, and pumpkins.

5. Give preference to continually bearing vegetables; for instance, choose chard over spinach, because spinach has a brief period of productivity but then is done for the whole summer. Chard will keep making harvest for you until frost kills it. Other continual bearers are tomatoes, broccoli, kale, lima beans, squash of all sorts, eggplants, peppers, cucumbers, chard, and Brussels sprouts.

7. Harvest daily in season. Broccoli, cucumbers, summer squash, beans, and chard, for example, will stop producing if they aren’t harvested. But if you keep them faithfully and regularly harvested, then they keep producing and you maximize their production.

8. Encourage your garden to grow up rather than across: Try climbing beans (poles or runners) or cucumbers trained to grow up something. Use a big vine such as runner beans, kiwi, or grapes to screen out an ugly area, make shade, or hang from a basket.

9. Plant tall crops such as corn or sunflowers on the north end of the garden so they don’t shade other plants.

10. Practice deep watering; it allows you to plant closer together because the roots will go down instead of spreading sideways.

Seasoning with Style

2010-07-20T10:27:00.000-07:00

Since the anti-trans fat movement first reared its head in full force some five years ago, Americans in several regions across the country (including our very own King County, WA) have stood meekly by as restaurants and eateries stripped their menus of the heart-clogging culprit. Suggest a similar move for salt, however, and people are liable to rush at you wielding pitchforks and salt mills.

That’s what Assemblyman Felix Ortiz of Brooklyn discovered earlier this year when he proposed a measure to ban salt from all New York City restaurants. No sooner did he open his mouth than the streets and media were up in arms, questioning the validity of sodium studies and singing personal paeans to salt. Needless to say, the salt-free revolution will be a long time coming.

My attitude is that, while salt is indeed a wonderful thing, there seems to be little wisdom in tempting fate by drowning our food in the stuff, especially when there are so many fun and flavorful alternatives. Carla Emery offers up a smorgasbord of seasonings for our tasting pleasure, a number of which are listed below. Regardless of where you fall on the salt issue, you’ll have to agree that these mixtures are delightfully uncontroversial.

N.B.: For salt mixtures, use uniodized salt and dried ingredients. Crush and mix the mixture using a wooden spoon or mortar and pestle. Seasoning mixes should be stored in airtight containers in a dry, cool place—not over or beside your stove!

Low-Salt Herbed Salt

Combine ¼ c. salt, 2 t. dried basil, 1 t. dried tarragon, 1 t. dried chives, and ½ t. dried oregano. Get it all very fine and well mixed. Good on popcorn, etc.

Low-Salt Seasoning Salt

Combine ½ t. garlic powder, ½ t. dried lemon rind, ½ t. onion powder, 2 t. paprika, 6 T. salt, ½ t. dried thyme, 2 t. dry mustard, ½ t. curry powder, and ½ t. powdered cumin. Blend well. This is good with anything: veggies, meats, fish, or salad.

Bouquet Garni

This classic French herb mix is packed into little 4-inch packets of cheesecloth. Spread the cloth out flat. Measure into the middle of it 1 bay leaf, 1 t. marjoram, 1 T. parsley, 1 t. savory, and 1 t. thyme. Bring together the corners of the bag and tie them with a string so it looks like a miniature peddler’s bag. Good in soups and stews. You can vary it to taste, adding or subtracting herbs as you please.

Poultry Seasoning

For each 2 T. commercial poultry seasoning called for, substitute 1 t. sage, 1 t. marjoram, 1 t. thyme, and 1 T. dried parsley; or 1 t. each of sage, thyme, savory, and marjoram.

Best No-Salt Seasoning

Combine 1 T. garlic powder, 5 t. onion powder, 1 T. paprika, 1 T. thyme, ½ t. celery seed, 1 T. dry mustard, and ½ t. white pepper. Store tightly covered.

Dessert Spice Blend

Combine 2 t. powdered cinnamon, 2 t. ground nutmeg, 1 t. powdered ginger, ½ t. powdered allspice, and ½ t. powdered cloves. Optional are ½ t. mace, ½ t. ground coriander, and ½ t. ground cardamom. This blend is nicely balanced in flavor and is good for spice cakes, cookies, and pies.

Taco Seasoning

1) Combine ¾ c. chili powder, 9 T. paprika, 10 T. cumin, 6 T. onion powder, and 5 T. garlic powder. Or 2) Combine 1/3 c. chili powder, 4 T. cumin, 2 T. garlic powder, 1 T. onion powder, and 1 T. oregano. To either mixtures 1) or 2), add as much or as little crushed red pepper as you like. Then mix well, divide into serving-size packets such as small zip-top bags, and store.

Potent Potables: Summer Edition

2010-07-08T11:38:00.000-07:00

Hallelujah, it’s here. After weeks of doubts, delays, and disappointment, summer weather has finally reached Seattle, and the city breathes a collective sigh of warm relief.

Now, what to do about all this heat?

For a case of sun overdose, the ancient Greeks swore by the temperature-lowering effects of chamomile, while their neighbors the Romans relied—probably to less efficacious results—on amber beads. My own preferred cure is a quick, ice-cold shower or a dip in the pool if one happens to be near, but sometimes the most expedient remedy is just a cool drink in the hand. To that end, the ECL blog is happy to provide a smattering of summer drink recipes in typical Encyclopedia of Country Living style: wonderfully simple, bursting with fresh fruits and herbs, and, of course, delicious!

Ginger Ale

Dissolve 2½-3 c. honey or 5¼ c. sugar in 2 gal. water. Add the beaten whites of 3 eggs and 1 T. ginger moistened with water. Put into a large pan and bring to the boiling point. Skim and set aside to cool. (You’ll think you’re losing all the ginger, but don’t worry. Even though a lot of it gets caught in this skimming, the flavor is there.) When lukewarm, add the juice of 4 lemons and ¼ t. dry yeast. Stir well. Let stand a few moments. Strain through a cloth. In 48 hours it will be ready to drink. Note: If it’s hot outside, be prepared to refrigerate it as soon as you have the desired amount of fizz. It takes only a couple of days for it to work enough to be a real “pop” beverage.

Unfermented Ginger Ale

Cut 4 oz. ginger root into small pieces and mix with 4 lemons. Cut into strips as thin as you can manage. Pour 2 qt. boiling water over the mixture and let set 5 minutes. Strain out the solids and chill your liquid. Add 2 c. lemon juice and sweeten to taste. Dilute with cold water if it tastes strong or if intended for small children. Serve with ice and mint leaves in the glass for a hot weather special.

Balm-Mintade

Combine ½ c. lemon balm that has been cut fine, ¼ c. honey diluted with ¼ c. water, ½ c. lemon juice, and ¼ c. orange juice. Let stand an hour. Now add 4 qt. ginger ale—homemade or store-bought. (see ginger ale recipes above)

Raspberry-Mint Drink

Combine 1 c. sugar or ½ c. honey, 1 c. water, and the grated rind of 2 lemons. Cook, stirring over low heat until your sweetening is dissolved. Boil 5 minutes more. Cool. Add 2 c. crushed raspberries, 1 c. lemon juice, and 4 c. water. Serve with some mint leaves in the bottom of the glass (and in the pitcher) and a mint leaf on top.

Sun Tea

Fill a gallon jar with water. Add your tea or herbs. Screw on a lid tightly. Shake a moment. Let set in the hot sun 4-5 hours—or more, like a day…or two…or three. Shake occasionally. Now strain out the tea leaves or herbs. Add honey or lemon juice. This is also a good way to fix dried fruit such as prunes, plums, or apples; just combine fruit, water, sweetening, and cinnamon, and let it set in the sun all afternoon.

Strawberry or Raspberry Ice

Remove the green stem from fruit, enough to make 3 or 4 cups. Pour ½ c. honey over the fruit. Mash the mixture with a potato masher until you have it pulped as finely and mixed as well as you can. (If you like, strain out the seeds.) Add 1 c. water and the juice of 1 lemon. Freeze, stirring occasionally.

As American as Apple...Cider?

2010-07-01T12:42:00.001-07:00

The apple pie has long served as an emblem for all things American, right alongside the Stars and Stripes, the Liberty Bell, and the great golden arches of Mickey D’s. However, the Founding Fathers as well as the rest of Colonial America were more apt to take their apples in a different form: cider. John Adams confessed to starting each day with a “gill” (about a half cup) of hard cider, while Thomas Jefferson ensured that homemade cider was always on the table at Monticello. What better way then to celebrate the fruits of their brave efforts this Independence Day than to indulge in a little homemade cider of your very own?

Unpressed Cider

You’ll need about a bushel of apples to make each 2-2½ gal. cider (or “juice”). Any kind of apples can be used, and you can try different blends for the sweetness-tartness qualities you prefer. Professional cider makers or serious hobbyists can get really picky about how much of what kind of apple, but hey, it’s all apple juice. The important thing is to find a way to make use of what you have. In general, good eating apples are also the best cider apples. The only apples you seriously shouldn’t use are sprayed apples, partly rotten apples, or apples that have been lying on the ground very long.

Fortunately for most of us, it’s not necessary to have a cider press to make cider. Just clean and cut your apples, making sure to cut out any wormholes. Usually it’s handiest to cut all the apples in two pieces as you go, in order to get at the wormholes. Cut out rotten spots or scarred places where the apple rubbed against the tree. It isn’t necessary to take out the seeds. Then put the apple pieces through a grinder or chopper, saving all the juice. Squeeze your grindings through a strong cloth bag, and voilà! Apple cider!

For those who like their cider in a more solid form, here’s a delicious recipe for apple cider butter that’s great on toast, pancakes, or waffles:

Old-Fashioned Apple Cider Butter

This is the traditional apple butter made of pared apples boiled down with cider. Boil 6 c. apple cider in an enamel or stainless-steel pan. (Optional: For extra redness start with 12 c. cider and boil it down to 6 c.) While the cider is boiling down, core and quarter about 10 lb. of apples. Add apples when the cider is ready and continue cooking slowly until they’re tender. Put it through your colander. Put your butter back into the pan and add 1 ½ c. brown sugar (or more to taste—it depends some on the sweetness of your apple variety). Optional: add ½ t. ground cinnamon, ¼ t. allspice, ¼ t. cloves, and a pinch of salt. Continue cooking over very low heat, stirring a lot, until the cider and sauce do not separate when a spoonful is placed on a plate. Then pour into containers for canning or preserving.

If drinking (or eating!) cider to observe the national holiday just isn’t enough, try this inspiring read from Sasquatch Books:

The Not-So-Secret Art of Pruning

2010-06-24T09:09:00.000-07:00

I’ve always thought that there was something mildly esoteric and Zen about the art of pruning trees and shrubs. This attitude is perhaps a reflection of my having grown up watching Mr. Miyagi in The Karate Kid waxing poetic about bonsai trees. Or it might have something to do with the fact that I’ve never been very good at pruning. (I’m reminded of the time I hacked away at an ailing rosebush and it ended up looking like an amputation victim gone awry.)

Once again, Carla Emery comes to the rescue, this time with some basic do’s and don’t’s on pruning that even the lowly lay-gardener like myself can apply to keep shrubs and trees flourishing year after year. Give them a try and your garden will thank you with generous gifts of fruits, flowers, and foliage. And who knows, you might even discover your inner Karate master along the way.

Potentially unfamiliar terms are explained in the mini-glossary below.

1. First, and always, take out all of the dead wood.

2. Take out the worst crossing, rubbing branches.

3. Take out the worst wrong-way branches. These are the ones that start on one side of the tree, head the wrong way through the center, and come out on the other side.

4. If you have a grafted tree, carefully prune off any suckers* growing up from the roots or out from around the base of the main stem below the graft line.

5. Take out some of the suckers and watersprouts.** Leave some alone (don’t cut off the tips), since they will flower and fruit and be pulled over and produce more spurs later. Head back some suckers to thicken them up into second-story branches. Try to head back to another upright side branch and not to a horizontal branch that would sucker back madly. Thinning back some of the branches, especially toward the top (even a few big branches) increases light penetration and lowers your tree. This helps ripen the fruit lower down. It increases air circulation, too, which is important in order to discourage the numerous bacterial and fungal diseases that spoil the fruit.

6. The conventional wisdom for regular pruning is to remove weak crotches.*** Both horizontal connections and very narrow crotches may be vulnerable. The preferred connection is wider than a 45-degree angle, but less than a 90-degree one.

7. But to encourage more fruiting on your apples and pears, prune for more horizontal branches. Horizontal branches bear more fruit than vertical branches. You can head back laterals to force more spurs to form.

8. Mature fruit and nut trees can be pruned to let more light into the tree. That will make for larger, better harvests.

Warning: Too much pruning can weaken your fruit tree enough to result in sickness. Also, for home fruit tree pruning, don’t use hedge clippers or a chain saw. Hedge clippers are intended only for very fine twigs, and chain saws produce too rough a cut.

* Suckers are branches that grow from the underground or bottom trunk part of a grafted tree.

** Also sometimes called suckers, watersprouts grow straight up from higher portions of the tree.

*** A crotch is where a branch connects with the central leader. If a branch is very upright, making a narrow angle between it and the trunk (less than 40 degrees), it’s called a “weak” or “bad” crotch.

A Tree for All Seasons

2010-06-17T12:32:00.000-07:00

Nothing embodies the lushness and fecundity of Mother Nature quite like a fruit tree. Raising fruit trees on your own takes a good deal of care and dedication, though the payoff is undoubtedly well worth the effort. Fortunately, there are several varieties beyond your standard apple or plum tree that can withstand tough conditions, bear copious fruit, and beautify any garden.

So, pencils out! Here’s a quick quiz for you to show off what you know about these lesser-known trees and shrubs. If you’re not feeling too confident, don't fret; take the quiz anyway and chances are you’ll learn a useful thing or two about some pretty terrific trees.

1. What tree will thrive on steep, rocky, poor-soil, arid hillsides, and though it takes 40 years to reach full maturity, will then produce a generous human-food and stock-food crop annually—even through drought and total neglect—for centuries?

2. What temperate-zone fruit has an 8- to 12-inch deciduous leaf, bears a delicious 5-inch fruit, is hardy to -30˚F, can grow in partial shade, can handle the competition of being in the middle of a lawn, and is virtually pest- and disease-free?

3. What tree, hardy to 20˚F or able to live in a container and winter in a basement, will bear two crops of fruit, one in June and the other in August, and (out of the South) is usually not bothered by pests or diseases?

4. What temperate to subtropical zone fruit will grow in subsoil clay where all the topsoil has washed away, or in sand; is drought-resistant once established; can grow in a lawn; can provide ripe fruit continuously from August or September to December or February; will store fruit in good condition on the tree all that time; bears fruit generously; and yields prized carving wood?

5. What plant that is not a pear, but is related to the pear, can produce yellow, baseball-sized fruits in zones 5-9 despite late frosts or drought and is a good choice if you have poorly drained soil?

6. What temperate-zone fruit tree can grow almost anywhere, can handle the competition of a lawn, heavy or poor soil and poor drainage, could get along on one deep watering a month, needs little pruning, is immune to fire blight, can produce for up to 75 years, and bears fruit you can store in your cellar 2-3 months while you get around to eating or preserving them?

Answers: 1. Carob. 2. Pawpaw. 3. Fig. 4. American persimmon. 5. Quince. 6. Keiffer pear.

(Check out our blog next week for tips on proper tree pruning.)

The Plant Doctor Is In

2010-06-15T10:22:00.000-07:00

The fight against garden pests and pestilence can feel like a losing war, leaving you with a yard full of plant casualties and a headache to boot. On the other hand, too often a pristine garden is the result of treatment with harmful chemicals and pesticides that compromise your plants’ health as well as your own. Try some of the following simple suggestions for coping with common greenery woes and make your happy, healthy garden grow!

1. The best defenses against bacterial and fungus problems are well-nourished soil, plenty of sunshine, and plenty of water.

2. Consider companion planting with these plants, which have pest-repellent talents and/or attract pest-eating bugs: marigolds, alliums, evening primrose, wild buckwheat, baby blue eyes, candytuft, bishops flower, black-eyed Susan, strawflowers, nasturtiums, angelica, and yarrow.

3. To combat greenhouse insect pests, careful screening is the simple, basic answer.

4. In urban areas, the “plant doctor” is the equivalent of the rural vet. You can get a beloved plant diagnosed and treated by the doc’s house call, although it costs. It’s more likely to need more or less water or more or less light than to suffer from a disease.

5. Move each vegetable’s planting place around in your garden every year. This helps avoid a build-up of one kind of pest or pestilence in a part of your garden. Don’t let them just lie in wait to devour next year’s crop. Move the target!

6. Buy disease-resistant seed varieties whenever available.

7. Use diatomaceous earth, copper stripping, or iron phosphate-based organic baits to combat slugs and snails. A well-placed saucer of cheap beer will also lure them to their demise.

8. Use beneficial insects: ladybugs, predatory mites, praying mantis, beneficial nematodes, parasitic wasps, mealy bug destroyers, etc.

9. Use sprays of environmentally safe (biodegradable), natural (plant-originated) material such as garlic, hot pepper, pyrethrum, nicotine, or rotenone as a last resort. Or mulch with coffee grounds, etc.

10. Don’t leave disease-infected plants in the garden, and don’t put them on the compost pile. This goes for clubroot, late blight in tomatoes and potatoes, and any other soil-borne contagion. Put them on a separate trash pile or burn them.

Burgers 2.0

2010-06-01T09:35:00.000-07:00

It’s that time of year again: the air is warmer, the days are longer, and the backyard grills are emerging from their months of hibernation. Walk down any neighborhood street on a balmy Saturday afternoon and chances are you’ll be greeted with the deep, smoky scent of outdoor cooking wafting from over a nearby fence.

Burgers have long been a mainstay of the neighborhood cookout, thanks to their simplicity and near-universal appeal. Gourmet (and not-so gourmet) chefs have been spending recent years concocting creative and sometimes outrageous ways of reinventing the humble combo of patty-on-a-bun, from adventurous alligator and kangaroo burgers to the Kobe beef, black truffle, and gold flakes whoppers being served up in Manhattan for a small fortune. For those of you who’d like to extend your burger repertoire without exceeding your budget, you might try these scrumptious (and gold-less) alternatives:

Herbal Hamburger

Melt 1 T. butter with 1⁄2 t. dried rosemary in a frying pan. Stir a bit to let rosemary flavor butter. (Don’t brown butter.) Add about 1 lb. hamburger shaped into patties, and cook. Remove hamburgers when done. Add another 1 T. butter to pan drippings together with 1⁄2 t. dry mustard and a dash Worcestershire sauce. Stir a minute. Pour over hamburgers.

Mushroom Burgers

Stir together in a bowl 1⁄4 lb. cleaned, finely chopped mushrooms, 1 large finely chopped onion, 1⁄4 c. bread crumbs (the homemade kind), 2 beaten eggs, 3⁄4 c. grated Cheddar cheese, and salt, pepper, and oregano to taste. Form into hamburger-type patties and fry in a pan on very low heat. Tastes even better if you put some garlic slices in the pan to float around and cook with it. Done when crisp on the outside and moist inside.

Vegan Pecan Burgers

Combine 1 c. ground unroasted pecans, 1 c. wheat germ, 1 c. bran flakes, 1 c. grated onion, 2⁄3 c. grated carrot, 1 T. tamari, and water enough to moisten, if needed. Shape the mix into patties. Fry on a nonstick or potato-rubbed skillet. Serve on buns together with your favorite toppings.