I’m convinced I have the bubonic plague. How else could I still be sick going on SIX WEEKS? And people, I’m not sickly. I’m finally trying to get in to see a doctor this week so hopefully the menu here will pick up soon beyond Met Market chicken noodle soup and homemade breadsticks.
These were made using hard white wheat grown in Dufur, OR. It’s my pizza dough recipe which I don’t think I’ve posted yet but will shortly. I simply roll it out on a cookie sheet press course salt in it and roll it in, cut into strips, then twist and bake. You can bake them until they are soft or leave them in until they are crunchy. It’s nice to have something crunchy to dip in your soup that doesn’t take long to chew when you can’t breathe through your nose.
Garden kale and carrots combined with juiced Tonnamaker apples that I had previously made and frozen made the basis for chocolate breakfast shakes using local milk and freezer peaches from Rama Farms. Of course the cocoa powder wasn’t local and neither was the yogurt.
I made yogurt last year but I had too many fermentation projects in my tiny kitchen and my fil milk, yogurt and buttermilk cultures all married in the same way all the women in a group end up in the red tent together. I may start yogurt up again but while I am sick is just not the time.
A caramelized onion, Willipa Blue and Met Market mozzarella pizza. Just missing pears and walnuts, neither of which I had or it would have been perfection. I’ve taken my whole wheat pizza dough all over the board this winter and finally realized it’s the technique and not the combination of gluten or grain, or how finely you mill the grain that gets you the bubbles. I’ll share my secret when I post my dough recipe later this week since we also had tacos which I forgot to photograph and we have some meat left. Sounds like a taco pizza on the menu for week 15.
The tacos were my standby recipe using Cascade Range Beef hamburger, freezer corn and I had to use canned tomato sauce finally since I had made 2 gallons of tomato ketsup/sauce but overcooked it with the spice bag and it’s gross. Next year I swear I will not buy tomato products! I do still have some jars of canned romas but that won’t give you that saucey-ness you need for a taco or sloppy joe. Rather than make tortillas I stuffed large mustard leaves from the garden and we ate them spring roll style. I was thinking what a great option that would be for someone on a no-grain diet.
Here is my ace in the hole. My plan B for when the recipes don’t work out and I don’t have any little freezer squares to pull out for dinner or tortillas to whip up burritos. My plan C is always eat out but we’ve only had to resort to it once. I won’t tell you how many melt downs I’ve had trying to force a recipe to work or rebundle it as something else for the dinner table. Azure Standard in Dufur, OR grows their own duram wheat and makes their own line of pasta. It’s outside the 150 mile radius for dark days but it meets my personal guidelines by being the closest dried pasta that I can find for those times when I just can’t make it myself. And that’s pretty frequently these days.
I used it to make a quick carbonara using ham from our Akyla Farms pig, backyard eggs, Golden Glen cream and Rumiana parmeson (again out of range but there is no local parmeson and montasio is not an equal substitute.) At least it’s from California and not back east.
I served it with kale and turnip greens from the garden.
And finally, blueberry spelt muffins with nearly the last of the freezer blueberries, backyard eggs, Lentz spelt and home clabbered buttermilk from Dungeness Farms milk. I’m sad to see the blueberries go but hopeful that this summer we’ll have loaded bushes that we aren’t able to keep up with.
Happy Dark Days Everyone!
So sorry you’ve been sick for so long! We’ve been totally sick this past week, and it’s the worst. I’ve heard that this year’s cold is particularly tenacious. Feel better!
What inoculant do you use for yogurt?
I’ve been making two quarts of raw yogurt per week since last June. First I was using Stonyfield organic yogurt as a starter – I don’t use the regular yogurt starter powders because they all contain powdered milk.
But two months ago I learned about GI ProsStart yogurt starter (made by a Massachusetts company) which is dairy, gluten and preservative free and contains Streptococcus thermophilus, Lactobacillus bulgaricus and L. casei.
I’ve made four batches with this starter and they all turned out perfect. Very nice taste and consistency.
Another company, Custom Probiotics, makes a similar product and they are based in Glendale, California.
Sending more healing vibes your way. :]
So sorry you’ve still been under the weather, this year has gotten most everyone down at one time or another. Hope you feel back to normal soon!! Wish I had blueberries for those muffins, they look delicious!!
I am always amazed by all the projects you have going on. Wow!
So, do the kids eat the kale and turnip greens? Frost just ate half a bag of snap peas but they only eat one mouthful of kale and then say they are “full”.
I suspect that being full is the problem. I should starve them a bit more.
I too share the sorrow of fewer freezer blueberries. My step-uncle in Vancouver BC, bought 30lbs on blueberries from a local farm and they were all eaten by January last year. I bought and froze about 15lbs and they are gone too. My bushes never produce enough for freezing.
Now, when you feel better I would love your thoughts on this faux spring. Do we plant early just in case?
I have changed our garden beds this year and so I have no idea how the new beds will go. I have 5 beds in various amounts of [faux] “full sun” and I have no garden plan.
I do want FLOWERS too. It doesn’t seem so improbable with all this sun.
Thanks guys. I finally went to the doctor today and the questionnaire asked what kind of communities I had. I listed this as one because it truly is! I started on antibiotics and we’ll see how quickly I rebound. Hopefully in time to get the garden kicked off.
Hi Auburn, I had bought cultures from a place called Niki’s Natural Nook that has an ebay store but that stunk because I had to buy each item separately and they never consolidated my shipping charges even though they shipped in one box. I had plans once to start a “truth in shipping” movement but sometimes I’ve just gotta let go some of my ideas.
It was a piima culture though and I really liked it but my dh could never get over the texture (like the Straus’ European style, very viscous). Since I bought that I discovered http://www.culturesforhealth.com and they have an amazing variety of stuff. Next time I would order from them.
Sara, just like I am buying California lemons right now maybe you could buy some Northern Cal or OR blueberries this summer and freeze them. Along with raspberries and wild blackberries they are my favorite freezer fruit.
Sandy, I do run myself ragged though so do as I say, not as I do. ;p
Shannon, love to! The kids eat the kale once it’s juiced and I put it in chocolate things so they don’t know. Breakfast smoothies are the best since the enzymes are still intact. It also makes a fun way to flavor bread which they will eat if I put cheese and garlic in it too. Imagine 1/3 loaf dyed red with beet juice, 1/3 loaf left natural color and 1/3 loaf dyed green with kale juice. Then give them blogs and let them make shapes which they can eat once you’ve cooked them. The beet juice I also use to dye frosting and cakes or muffins although in the batter I like to leave fiber (not juice). Somewhere on here I have a recipe for chocolate beet muffins that they love.
What exactly do you put in these breakfast smoothies??? The ice cube idea is great for juicing and sneaking more veggies in! and fortunately I will have lots of berries locally this summer, just none yet and last year I wasn’t thinking about preserving anything. I am excited for all our local bounty this year that I hope to put away somehow!!
Hi Sara,
It was juiced apples, carrots & kale, frozen peaches from last summer, cocoa powder, pinch cinnamon, pinch sea salt (if you are eating processed food you don’t need this), splash vanilla and/or mint extract is good too, a few tablespoons of melted coconut oil drizzled in if you have it (again, if you are eating processed snack foods you don’t need this), whole milk and yogurt and your favorite sweetener (stevia, agave syrup, honey, maple syrup). If peanut butter and bananas were local to me I would have used and 1 T of pb and frozen bananas instead of peaches but we stopped buying bananas. I’m really hoping our almond trees take off and we get some home grown almond butter since my kids are allergic to the hazelnut trees that I planted which will grow in my climate.
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