First harvest

First basket of goodies brought in from the garden! Parsley and calendula. 

I'll be making tabbouleh tomorrow. It is one of my favorite summertime foods : fresh herbs, flavorful from the sun (parsley is called for in any recipe you'll find. I sometimes like to mix it up with whatever is growing/comes in the CSA share: mints, thyme, oregano, etc), chewy bulgur, the pungency of onions (scallions work too!), a ripe tomato if you have it, all tied together with generous amounts of a good olive oil and bright lemon juice. It keeps well for days in the fridge and is a simple, easy, quick meal fix. 

The calendula will be dried and stores for making salve. I've got a baby coming whose bottom needs to be protected from any possible incidence of diaper rash with the family diaper rash salve recipe that hasn't been made probably since my younger sister was potty trained. She's now a PhD student so, you know, it's been a while! 

The lettuce doubled it's size overnight it seems and could bear with a trimming for a salad bowlful tomorrow. 

In the garden: June 25

Joining in with SouleMama for a tour of what is growing and thriving and green:

You will notice that I just discovered an app that lets me
write on photos!

The garden this year is still small, but its growing food (and flowers)!  It is a nice change, this year, to actually be home this year - instead of away at Yoga School - through the heart of the summer.  Wildfire smoke notwithstanding.

Fireweed, calendula, and baby sunflowers

You can't see it in this photo, but there's parsley here, just about ready for a trimming that will be the first harvest from the garden!

This is what I'm probably most excited about!  I planted a couple dozen strawberry plants last year, and was so good about pinching off all the flowers, so that the plant's energy could go into root growth.  And it worked!  16 of them came back this year, and a couple are sending out runners.  Many had an abundance of delicate white flowers, and are now showing promise of a handful of fruit!

My dear friends over at Maple&Me gave me starts of a Siberian tomato from local heirloom seed folks at Pingo Farms. 
I planted these two out in the garden, and the rest in pots on the upstairs (sunny! warm(er)!) porch:

We shall see, but so far, the garden planted tomatoes seem happier and more robust and vigorous.  Which totally disproves my hypothesis that they would be happier in containers on the porch.  Isn't science fun??  The real test, of course will be in another year or three when we get the greenhouse built!


P.S.  All photos were taken at 10 pm last night.  Three cheers for the Solstice sunlight that penetrates through the thickest smoke!

Cutting Calendula.

I believe I counted 96 calendula seedlings planted this summer?  A couple of them are still blooming, under two snows, in the garden.  Many of them are valiantly surviving the cold in their pots on the porch steps.  I was afraid I would loose them all at the first sign of frost.  I didn’t'.

Most of the ones from the garden I pulled up last week, and out of time, let sit on the kitchen counter – a giant pile of plants.  Between the freeze and the undignified heap they sat in for a few days, I lost a bunch of the leaves...  but I still managed to dry a quart Ziploc bagful from them.  I grow calendula for the flowers, because they are beautiful and because they are healing.  Bonus: they attract aphids away from other things you are growing.  But I also harvest the leaves.  They're edible, did you know?  Calendula is the classic "potherb."  My leaves though, are dried and sent with instructions on poulticing and plastering to my father – he with the varicose veins the size of golf balls in his legs.  They're good for that, the leaves.  I hope he actually uses them.

I think I must have a love affiare going on with my herbs.  Affaires are mutual things, you see.  I love them.  And I think that efficacious herbs, the healing ones, must have a truly deep love for humanity.  They could have evolved in so many other ways.  The amount of phyto-chemicals and trace nutrients and good energy that healing herbs put into their herbal parts is astounding.  When you think that all of that energy could have evolved to have been directed towards something else... or towards the same plant parts, without creating the effective herbal medicines...  There is so much love right there.  Calendula has been giving me flowers ALL SUMMER LONG.  Now she gives me her leaves.  And in exchange, I save her seeds.  I've got some collected already, from seedheads accidentally collected before their time.  From some recent seed heads, fully mature.  The seed head its self will appear dried and ready to harvest long before it really is.  It is not until the vital energy has withdrawn from the stem, leaving it brittle and brown, rather than strong and lush and green, that the seeds have absorbed all the procreative energy they can hold. 

I'm leaving the seed heads on the plant, on the porch, out in the cold, even after harvesting another giant basket of leaves.  I want to see if next years plants will remember the cold.  Will they grow more fiercely in the early season?  More vibrantly?  Be even less susceptible to frost in the fall?  How does evolution happen anyway?  There is an intelligence in seeds.  In plants.  I feel we all too often vastly underrate that intelligence.  If I contemplate the possibility that our human DNA carries with it some load of karma from our ancestors, why should I not entertain the possibility that the prana (life force) at work in seeds can remember the cold, and tell next year's plant to prepare for it?  How else do we get cold-hardy varietals??

CSA Cooking:Rhubarb Pie for the Fourth of July

"As American as apple pie" might as well be "as American as rhubarb pie," since both the apple and the rhubarb originated east of Europe and both were brought to America and then spread westward as pioneers pushed the frontier across the continent.  In fact, in The First Four Years Laura Ingalls Wilder refers to the rhubarb by the then-colloquial name of "pie-plant," which says much for the tart stalk's perception on the American frontier!  While the rhubarb never had the icon of Johnny Appleseed to grow its fame, it does have the distinction of being legislated into a fruit.  Though by a botanical definition the rhubarb classifies as a vegetable, in 1947 a New York State court declared the stalk a fruit on the basis of its common usage as fruit.  Today, for the purposes of food regulations and import/export duties and tariffs, rhubarb is a fruit.

Rhubarb pie is one of my very favorite pies in the world (and thats saying alot, coming from me!).  We've decided that the rhubarb bed will be along 2/3rds of the front of the house: I hope to get the baby plants in the ground before the end of the summer.  And next year, plant well-started strong sunflowers behind the row of rhubarb, right up against the house.

 There's been stalks of rhubarb in the last two CSA shares, so I figured I'd bring a pie to the extended-family 4th o'July gathering.  Cousins are in town from Minnesota!  Newly engaged cousins at that! (extra super bonus points for deciding to propose on a mountain in Alaska, cousin-in-law!)

.... and then between this and that, sleeping in, and cuddling huskies, I didn't make the pie.  Maybe I'll make it tonight, while the man is out of town, playing a concert gig?  Then I can eat the whole thing allll by myself....

So there's no picture of a scrumptious pie, but I've still got more information than you never knew you didn't want to know aout rhubarb!

rhubarb (n.)

late 14c., from Old French rubarbe, from Medieval Latin rheubarbarum, from Greek rha barbaron "foreign rhubarb," from rha "rhubarb" (associated with Rha, ancient Scythian name of the River Volga [along the banks of which rhubarb grew wild per wikipedia]) + barbaron, neuter of barbaros "foreign."

Grown in China and Tibet, it was imported into ancient Europe by way of Russia. Spelling altered in Medieval Latin by association with rheum. European native species so called from 1640s. (etymonline)

**Fascinating, is it not?

The import of Rhubarb into Europe began as early as the 1300's, but was used primarily medicinally until the widespread availability of sugar in the 1700's.   

"Rhubarb has been used for medical purposes by the Chinese for thousands of years,^[2] and appears in The Divine Farmer's Herb-Root Classic, which legend attributes to the mythical Shen Nung, the Yan Emperor, but is thought to have been compiled about 2700 years ago" (wiki!)

** The Divine Farmer's Herb-Root Classic.  The title alone holds so much promise, and the books legendary attribution only increases my desire to read it!  Just think what a cultural shift it would encompass if we modern westerners retained a sense of farming as an active engagement with the divine!

"The expense of transportation across Asia caused rhubarb to be highly expensive in medieval Europe, where it was several times the price of other valuable herbs and spices such as cinnamon, opium and saffron. The merchant explorer Marco Polo was therefore much interested to find the plant being grown and harvested in the mountains of Tangut province. A measure of the value set upon rhubarb can be gotten from Ruy Gonzáles de Clavijo's report of his embassy in 1403-05 to Timur in Samarkand: "The best of all merchandise coming to Samarkand was from China: especially silks, satins, musk, rubies, diamonds, pearls, and rhubarb...".^{" (thank you wikipedia for your information!)}

**I find this both fascinating and also slightly hilarious, since the seeds of the rhubarb plant have been a peasant survival food staple in Russia for centuries.

And Finally, the theatre geek in me wants you to know that "In British theatre and early radio drama, the words "rhubarb rhubarb" were repeated for the effect of unintelligible conversation on the background.  This usage lent its title to the 1969 film Rhubarb and its 1980 remake Rhubarb Rhubarb" (wiki!)

^SOURCES

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhubarb

www.etymonline.org

Harvest Update

This summer has felt a bit wonky for me.  The weather, the timing, the whole thing.  I know rationally that it is mostly because I was gone for 5 weeks of it.  Missing the month of June wasn't just the shock and weirdness of going from one climate to another 4000 miles away, and then back again, missing out on the gradual and dramatic shifts of light and plant growth.  It wasn't just missing the roses and the irises.  It was also, albeit a conscious one, a choice to skip out on my usual early- summer activites.  The hauling garden dirt and top soil, planting, weeding, watering, harvesting.  Add that to a realization that my job is not truly serving my highest purpose, is draining my energy, and causing me to occasionally shut down and be unavailable for my loved ones; and the subsequent so-far-unsuccessful job search and really its no surprise my summer feels a bit wonky.  That and there's already frost in low lying areas in Fairbanks.  And one of the birch on my drive home has started sporting a golden bough...  I'm not quite ready to welcome fall, just yet....

But even with all of that, there has been some summer harvest and preserving going on.

I've been wildcrafting like crazy: yarrow, horsetail, plaintain, clover, and coltsfoot are all drying in my kitchen.  I've been drying continuous batches of (feral) red raspberry leaves in my mother's dehydrator I borrowed last year and have yet to return. ahem.  The calendula I grew from seed is far more prolific, flower wise, than the starts I've gotten from Calypso in the past.   So I've got lots of calendula being dried.  Bachelor buttons too.  Did you know they taste like nutmeg?  I have plans for teas and medicines and facial steams all winter!

Note to self: Next year, do lots of starting from seed!

A massive amount of canned nectarines and peaches await pies this winter, along with the cherries from an earlier post (I got nine quarts, by the way.  So that comes out to more like a $3 quart, which means it is half as expensive - and so much better - than buying canned peaches at the store.  Did you know Fairbanks has food prices comprable to Manhattan?). 

I've eaten so many and many raspberries off the feral canes all over the yard.  There's a quart or two in the freezer.  Next year, the raspberries will be re-tamed and cultivated in their own patch.

I went berry picking near my house, and got a few quarts that are in the freezer awaiting pies.  Can you tell I"m a fan of pies?  Our picking spot is all picked out by now (unfortunately other people know of it!) but there's a few later-fruiting spots that hopefully we'll get to too.

As far as updates go:  That birch gruit ale we bottled?  Turns out I'm real good at making vinegar.  Fortunately I have a friend who likes to drink vinegar for health purposes.  More power to him!  I know what he's getting this year for Yule.
The saurkraut I tried again?  Turns out I'm real good at making mold be really happy. 
The only thing I've been sucessfull with fermenting this season is Kefir.  But it is awesome.

Easter Egg Starts

We didn't do much to celebrate Easter.  Somehow this year, marking the solar equilibrium and the shift from the dark of winter to the sunlight of summer - whether the pagan Eostre or the Christian Easter - on a specific date with grand celebration has not felt truly appropriate to my heart.  Instead, it has felt like a slow and incremental process with lengthening days and slow trend towards warmth.  

My mother gave us Lindt chocolate bunnies, and there were some wilting tulips in a vase from the bouquet my mother in law gave me a couple weeks ago.  But that was about it.  Instead I planted seeds of Calendula and Echinacea.  In honor of Easter, and because they make frugal and ecological sense, I planted some of them in eggshells.  Planting starts in eggshells is an idea I saw on Pinterest, so I'm dedicating this post to Julochka's "pinspiration" series.  I can't find the original idea inspiring pin, but here's another that I have enacted in my kitchen but haven't taken a photo of.  Its remarkably effective.

Anywho.  About the eggshell seed starters.  I'm pretty excited about the idea because it seems to me that when planting them, it will be really easy to crack/crumble the shell around the seedling root ball without damaging the little tender rootlets.  The problem with the "bio-degradable" kind of seed starter trays where you can supposedly just plant the cardboard little pot directly into the soil is that, well, you can't.  Because unless maybe if we're talking about corn starts, the roots just aren't vigorous enough to bore through the industrial compacted paper product.  So you either resign yourself to suffocating your starts' roots inside a tiny cardboard package, or you break and peel open the casing when you go to plant out.  Which traumatizes the roots that are stuck to it, and adds to the shock the plant experiences going into the ground.  I have high hopes for egg shells.

But.  I hadn't stared saving them soon enough.

And I found one of those industrial style ones for free.

As you can see, its the kind that has its own little plastic greenhouse deal.  I was grocery shopping a couple weeks ago, and as I was driving along the sort of little access road to the store, I saw, sitting right in the middle of the road, this brand new in-packaging seed start kit.  So I quick put on my flashers, hit the brakes, jumped out, and fished it out from under the truck.  It must have blown off of someone's neglected car roof, or out of the back of someone's truck.  Thanks to them, whoever they are.  I sure appreciate it.

I'm not doing 'much' of a garden this summer, what with being gone for June and having lots of projects and all.  But, I do have a basket of seed packets from last year as well as some that are dated for 2010 which I think we found at the Transfer Site.  We'll see how they do for germination.  Can't hurt to put them in some soil.  And I'd hate to waste seeds!  I'll keep you updated with what I plant as I do so....

In other news.  I saw my first spot of bare ground at home today!

2012: Goals and Resolutions

My birthday falls just shortly after the new year, and every year I write letters to my variously older self, and read the letters of previous years.  It makes for a very reflective beginning of the year that has little to do with toasts of champagne and resolutions that are made while in one's heart one knows they will be broken before the snow melts. 

My resolutions this year are to be kinder to myself and try to release the pursuit of perfection.
To commit to my yoga practice.
To embrace seasonality.

But there is a vast difference between resolutions and goals, and with the approach of Imbolc, when the roots of the rest of the year begin to stir, I have been thinking about my goals for the coming year.
Firstly - to drink more water.  I believe I may even make this a belated resolution : to drink water everyday.  I subsit on coffee too frequently, and while I have taken to drinking tea in the afternoon sometimes, it is also good to just hydrate.  Without the caffeine.

Over at Weeding for Godot, she has a sidebar list of goals, which she crosses out.  I may have to steal the idea!  But for now, I'm still contemplating, weighting the reality of work to be accomplished with my grandiose long term plans.
A few things I'm fairly certain will make the list:
Dig in the garden and prep for next year's planting
Grow tomatoes and basil on the deck
Plant kitchen garden of herbs and flowers
Dig in rhubarb and asparagus beds, or at least figure out where these will be.
Weed raspberry patches, and run wire strings between rows for orderliness and support
build coop
get chickens
Start (and hopefully finish) greenhouse.

Plan and plot as to eventual location of barn, pasture, garden, orchard, bramble, sauna, greenhouse, windmill, yard, tree house, woodstacks,  etc.

Roast Chicken

Last night I made the first real dinner we've eaten on the homestead. 

We had roasted chicken and root vegetables with a salad.
I had leftover stale storebought rosemary bread I cut up for a stuffing, and I drank wine instead of the beer from the brewery on our way home; but other than that, everything except the garlic, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, the sugar for the brine, and the salt and peper was local.

The chicken was from Homegrown Market, who got it from a local farmer.  The vegetables were alaska grown potatoes (from the store) and Calypso beets, onions, turnips, orange carrots and purple carrots from the CSA.  The salt rub on the chicken had oregano, thyme, savory, and parsley from my front porch herb pots.  The salad was mixed greens and snap peas and radishes and cucumber from the CSA and nasturshims off the front porch. 

Oh, it was so good!

No pictures, which is a shame, but the camera-habit has been misplaced somewhere amongst the bags from Lowes, and the piles of books and pictures waiting for shelves to be built to be placed upon...  when I uncover that habit, I'll pick it back up and wear it :-)
In an etymological sense, the word habit is pretty interesting: it didn't come into usage as "being in the habit of doing something" until the mid 1600's.  Before that it was the article of clothing -you know, like nuns wear.  And it is inter-related with the ideas of possessing and living - to inhabit, for example.
Kinda cool to think about one's daily habits as actions that we wear or that we live in...