oregano in the greenhouse
I’ll be at the Charlotte Regional Farmers’ Market tomorrow with sweet potatoes, hard red winter wheat and just a few of beet greens & this and that. It’s been 3 weeks since I’ve picked anything and nothing has grown since. But there are beets, beautiful lettuce, radishes and turnips all half grown, just waiting for some warmer weather to get them going again.
I’ll have our grass fed Angus beef in these cuts: ribeyes, NY strips, cube steak, ground beef, sirloin tip roasts, bone-in chucks, soup bones, hot dogs, andouille sausage.
I had a million things to tell you but now I can’t remember any of them.
We had a great time in the snow, Shane pulled me around on the sled with the Gator at the speed of light, throwing me off several times until I caught major air and landed on my head. Ow! I don’t know why the video is so grainy but anyway this is not the one where I hit my head.
Is my voice really that squeaky? Our neighbor has a little certified organic dairy and she invited me to come over while she has her inspection. We got to talking about using molasses for growing, and then I talked about it with my other neighbor Carl from Carlea Farms, and he picked me up a gallon of organic molasses when he went to get feed. I googled how to use it when transplanting because I was about to set out some leeks and green onions, and wanted to try it. Apparently the only people doing this are pot growers? Anyway they recommend 1 tsp of molasses per gallon of water to stimulate biological activity which helps make more nutrients available to the plant. Also, they day fire ants hate it. I’ll be exploring this, because fire ants are the reason I don’t have any kale right now.
With very little fresh food growing, we’ve been eating out of the freezer for a while now. it’s so nice to have all the stuff I froze in the summer! Sweet heirloom tomatoes, bell peppers and mini sweet peppers that are still delicious stuffed with this no bake chickpea dip, boiled peanuts, edamame, onions, berries, corn and even muscadines, ginger and turmeric. Plus I still have pickled hot peppers and pickled ginger, so good! But since there aren’t any greens for juicing, we’ve been having this for breakfast lately:
Homemade raw milk yogurt (so easy, so illegal in our state) with cooked wheat berries, chia or flax and some fruit from the freezer. I like it with chopped apples too. If you haven’t made raw milk yogurt, here’s the recipe I use, but let me just say how easy it is; all you do is heat the milk to 110, whisk in a couple tablespoons of store bought plain organic yogurt then pour it into quart jars and I set the jars in my crock pot – don’t turn it on – and fill it with 110 degree water. Cover it up and go to sleep and in the morning, Voila! I love that it isn’t pasteurized because I feel like without all the fresh food I’m used to having, we really need all the beneficial bacteria and enzymes we can get. One time I did turn the crock pot on, just to slightly warm it but then forgot and cooked the yogurt like crazy. It was still amazing! It was very thick, like Greek yogurt.
It’s time to start onions, so I got in the greenhouse and got everything ready just to find the Thorvin kelp I use in my organic fertilizer mix was ruined. So I called (actually texted, because I never ever call anyone ever) both of my nearby organic farming neighbor friends and thank goodness Dean from Laughing Owl had some on hand he was willing to share. The place I buy my ammendments is far far away. So, got all those done and now it’s time to start potted herbs that will be for sale mid-April and I’m going to attempt some greenhouse cukes right now even though my little voice says they’re going to attract disease and bugs into the greenhouse and spread them to my baby tomato plants which would be horrible and maybe ruin my life. These are special greenhouse cucumber seeds: ok with cooler temps, self-pollinating and resistant to disease. I think they were $14 for 10 seeds which I would normally never pay, but these are supposed to be supercalifragilistic and I really love cucumbers. Hush, little voice.
oakleaf and butter
Not sure if I’ll come next Saturday (hope to) so don’t forget your hot dogs for the Superbowl Disco Wieners 🙂
I’m always a little embarrassed to post this recipe because it’s so not like the typical recipes I make, but we just make it one day a year for the Superbowl and it’s so good! My mom always made it and I buy organic ingredients but it still sounds so bad.
It’s just equal amounts of grape jelly and plain yellow mustard, mixed together in a pot and heated until just starts to simmer. Add a pound or 2 of hot dogs cut into 1″ pieces, stir, cook until hot! I feel like i need to apologize, but YUM.
See you tomorrow!