Thoughts on Surviving versus Living

On Survival Chick's newly revived blog, she recently posted a preview of a new post-apocalyptic movie based on Cormac McCarthy's book, The Road. While watching the movie doesn't particularly interest me, I was curious about the book. I found it in the library yesterday and finished it last night.

I didn't finish it in a single day because it was one of those books you can't put down; I finished it because it was a fairly quick read due to the style used by the author. I wasn't crazy about his style, but it was effective for this book. The world he portrayed, after some unnamed apocalyptic event has destroyed most life on the planet, was dreary and bleak, gray and hopeless.

The two central characters, a man and his son, are on a journey to the coast in hopes of finding warmer temperatures. Their lives consist of traveling, by foot, in ash-covered landscapes full of dead trees and no other life whatsoever save the occasional other human. And not all those humans are ones they want to encounter. There is no joy, there is no rest, there is no comfort, and there is little hope. Each day revolves around survival, trying to find something to eat where everything is dead and trying to avoid the "bad people" who take advantage of the only remaining living creatures - humans - on the planet.

What struck me while reading this book was wondering why these people - the good and the bad - had such a drive to survive. This was not a temporary situation that could be remedied with good compost, conserved water, and a few seeds. This was the end of life on the planet. I see no nobility or heroism in slowly starving to death while living every moment in fear of being found by others who would hurt you, kill you, and, yes, eat you. In their world, it won't be all that long until the last cans of foods tucked away in someone's remote home or bomb shelter will be found and eaten. There will be no food left, there will be no way to grow food, and there will be no more people left. Death is a given for them.

I've looked at some of the reviews of this book and many people seem to have liked it. They were moved by the father's love for his son and willingness to do whatever it took to keep going. Perhaps I don't share this view because I am not a parent, but maybe also because I don't see making it through another day, just to make it through another day, while starving a little bit more as a positive life-affirming approach. The boy's witnessing of the worst that humanity on the brink of extinction can offer will not make him, in my opinion, a better person. He will still die -probably soon - along with everyone else after the book ends.

I'm all for learning skills to live through the harder times I think humanity is going to face soon due to climate change (rising sea levels, drought, crop pests expanding their range, pandemics, melting glaciers leading to freshwater shortages, more severe coastal storms, famine, etc.) and peak oil (the end of "cheap" energy). We can adapt and live more simply without rampant overconsumption, we can transport ourselves with our own energy (feet or pedal power), we can grow gardens, and we can work as communities to supply our needs locally. Life is still possible, even if it becomes much different and more difficult than what we are accustomed to now. There is still hope and we can still find satisfaction and joy in it. Where there is only death, however, where there is no hope, there is nothing.

It is one thing to know that conditions on this planet may become extremely challenging for humans by the end of this century. If we pass all the tipping points, and some experts think we already have, pockets of humanity will likely still survive, and carve out new lives, on a more hostile planet of our own making. If the planet is dead, however, there is no life. There is only survival, and that only until the food runs out. That would not be a world worth living in, at least not for me.

Time to read a more hopeful book, Plan C: Community Survival Strategies for Peak Oil and Climate Change.

Ruthless Clutter Cutting

I was making very slow progress on the email clutter in my Chile inbox so I got ruthless this morning. For all the scanning through old comments I had already done, I'd only found a single link and one recipe I wanted to keep. I decided to ditch most of the remaining comments without reading them. This saves me considerable time that can be put to much better use....like training my new dog.

All I have left now are personal emails from other bloggers that I need to sort through to toss or refile. Since my total, however, is now under 1,000, I don't feel quite as much urgency to work on it right now. I have plenty of other clutter to tackle so keep an eye on that box in the sidebar. It will likely change periodically.

Dog Toy Sculpture

When your house is a mess, you have to find beauty wherever you can.

Out-of-Control Email Clutter

Observant visitors may have noticed the new little addition to my sidebar about my "Current Clutter Crisis." Folks, I am drowning in Chile Chews email messages. I wish I could say these were wonderful personal emails written to me by loads of dear Internet friends, but I can't. My clutter is the result of the double-edged sword that is email subscription to blog comments.

I love blogs that offer this option. We all have limited time and I suspect many of us like to visit more blogs than we really have time to keep up with. When I leave a comment somewhere, I like to know if the blogger responds or if someone else has interesting comments. Being able to check a little box that then sends their comments straight to my email saves me the mental anguish of trying to remember which blog had that really great post where I left a question and really want to know the answer. This way, it eventually magically appears in my inbox.

And there it stays. For days, weeks, months. Of course, I'll have the time later to go back and read it, maybe jot down the information, or even leave a 'thank you'. Yes, of course, tomorrow all time will be suspended and I can finally get totally caught up on everything.

Yeah, right.

Nope. The emails sit there, moving down the page, gathering friends and racking up the total count at the bottom of the screen. I knew this was happening but I kept pushing it out of my mind when I logged into my email. When the count passed 5,000, though, I knew I had to face down this monster and take back control of my inbox.

Yesterday, I ruthlessly deleted over a thousand emails in the morning. It was easy. I just deleted everything I had left anywhere. Now comes the hard part. Going through the comments from other people. There are links in some of them I want to bookmark. Recipes in others I want to keep. Reminders to go check for the latest happenings on their blogs.

It's that last part that's doing me in. To work my way through the remaining several thousand emails, I'm reorganizing them by which blog they came from. Then I go visit the blog to catch up. (I've been so busy that I am waaay behind on reading most blogs I enjoy.) Of course, I end up leaving comments to which I also subscribe and then receive more emails as a result. So, my desire to clean out the file is getting hi-jacked by my desire to see what wonderful things others are doing.

Is there hope? I'm not sure. My goal is to have that inbox under 1,000 by the end of the month. 'Course my goal months ago was to get to my ideal weight by the end of this year and that sure ain't happenin', even if I did manage to shed 3.5 pounds this last week. (Yay for vertigo killing the appetite!) See, I've gotten side-tracked again. This is why I can't seem to finish these long drawn-out projects anymore. This is why I like canning. You start and generally finish in the same day. It may be a long day, but it's not going to take weeks or months to accomplish.

My name is not Grace

I have never been graceful. The only time anyone calls me "Grace" is sarcastically after the latest clumsy thing I've done. Better descriptors for me include:

Clumsy
Butterfingers
Careless
Uncoordinated
Klutzy
Unlucky
Accident-prone
Injured

Let me give you a glimpse of what it's like to be graceless. For instance, it is not uncommon for me to ram my shoulder into a wall as I turn a corner too quickly in my own home. How is this possible?

Was I walking with my eyes closed? No.

Was I drunk? Despite the tasty homemade liqueur, no.

Did I forget where the corner of the wall was? Unlikely.

Was I daydreaming that much? Maybe.

Was I simply too focused on where I wanted to be instead of where I was at the moment? Possibly.

Along with being a total klutz, I have a propensity to injure myself in unique ways. Despite my clumsy nature, I have never broken a toe before. When I finally do, it's not from stubbing my toe, yet again, on the furniture that's in the same place it's always been, it's from my crazy new dog running over my foot.

I blew out a tendon in my wrist and injured my back when pushing a heavy object on wheels by myself. How could I have hurt myself if it was on wheels? The wheels were locked. Who knew those things could be locked?

I cracked my elbow by forgetting (again, how is this possible?!) that I was standing on a two foot wall rather than at the top of the steps going up to that wall. I took a step, expecting to land on the next step down and instead landed face first on the ground. Yeah, that was fun.

My sweetie met me while this arm was still in a sling; it should have been a warning to him. It only took me a year to total his car by swerving to avoid a young cyclist that turned unexpectedly in front of me. I rolled the car and walked away with only a bruise on my leg from the steering wheel. The lack of blood was rather surprising considering there was an open box of glass recyclables in the back. The damage was more to his trust of me, I think, than physical that time.

I did get whiplash once but it was not from a car accident. It was from sneezing. Do you have any idea how stupid you sound when customers at your workplace see your whiplash collar and ask, "Oh, were you in an accident?" and you have to reply, "No. I sneezed."? It was humiliating.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Public Service Announcement

If you sneeze violently as the norm, and by this I mean that your typical sneeze scares people around you, then you must obey one simple rule. When you sneeze, sneeze straight forward. Do not turn your head to the side as a violent sneeze could result in whiplash (and humiliation).

Cover your nose with a hanky, if possible, or turn your whole body to face away from someone or the table, but do not turn your head only. The force of the sneeze puts a lot of abrupt stress on the neck which it can more easily handle if moving straight forward rather than twisting.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Recently, I fell off my bike going less than 5 miles per hour because I took both hands off the handlebars at the same time to pull my shirt down so my undies wouldn't show. I know I can't ride without at least one hand on the handlebars so why did I do this? Someone, please tell me! Why do I do these stupid things?!

This morning, in typical fashion for me, I knocked a small heavy glass bottle off a cabinet shelf. It landed, also typical for me, squarely on my one bruised and broken toe. I have ten toes. Did it have to land on this one? Needless to say (but I will anyway), I am not a Happy Camper right now.

Is it any wonder my sweetie won't buy me power tools? I mean, I've had to prune branches six inches in diameter by hand with a pruning saw! However, I can't help but agree when he says he really doesn't want to have to call me Stumpy.

Attack of the Tasty Tomatoes

I’ve only had a whole flat of tomatoes to play with once before. Sure, I’ve had more than a handful occasionally, but rarely enough to do serious canning. And my previous haul of tomatoes resulted in a bad pressure canning experience which made me search this time for recipes that would not need to be pressure canned.

Yesterday I finally processed the tomatoes. Let me back up. I’d planned to do it over the weekend but needed some time off from the solar cooking demo work. You knew that already. What you didn’t know is that we headed out to a mesquite tasting held by the Desert Harvesters Saturday evening. They are putting together a mesquite cookbook and wanted people to sample and rate the recipes. There were a number of very tasty products, including crackers, cookies, muffins, and even ice cream made with mesquite. Unfortunately, something I ate that evening triggered my vertigo by the early morning hours and I was not up to canning or much of anything else on Sunday.


It didn’t help that Polie decided to do crazy runs in the house and ran over my toe. I don’t know if it’s broken but it sure turned black & blue and hurt when I walked. I haven’t bothered going to the doctor since not much can be done with a broken toe except staying off of it.

This is two days later. How am I supposed to stay off my feet to process a flat of tomatoes? Huh? Would someone tell me that. And while you're at, tell me why we adopted a new dog that eats more than Angel, sheds three times as much as her, and demands four times as much attention. What is up with that?!

So, anyway I planned to do the tomatoes on Monday. When I woke up and noticed what a mess the house was, I wanted to get it straightened up first. That took far longer than expected. Then Angel threw up on the carpet and that clean-up took another hour. I still needed to run a couple of errands and by that time I definitely needed a break. I had a late but relaxing and healthy lunch at Sweet Tomatoes (salad bar & buffet). By the time I got home, it was after 3 pm but I figured I could get the BBQ sauce done in a few hours.

Ha! HA! There were two big problems with this plan. I had not read the recipe closely so had not noticed all the cooking times: 30 minutes to soften veggies, 45 minutes to reduce, an hour to make the magical transition into BBQ sauce, and 40 minutes to can. The other problem was I decided it was time to try out two different food mills I’d picked up in thrift stores.


This one did not work for the fresh tomatoes at all. I’m very disappointed but it explains why so many show up in the thrift stores.


My Italian mill worked fine, once we figured out how to get it set up. For some reason, though, it leaves a lot of flesh on the tomato skin it extrudes.


After processing the tomatoes through the mill above, I put the extruded parts through my Chinois food mill and got plenty of pulp and juice to make jam.

Earlier in the day, it crossed my mind that I should chop the vegetables needed for the BBQ sauce ahead of time. Did I do that? No, of course not. Finally, though, I got everything simmering. After half an hour, all had to be blended before reducing. The 45 minute reduction actually took more like an hour and a half. No worries, we watched the ‘B’ movie on TV about a meteor hitting the moon. It wasn't great but I had to get up every 5 minutes to stir the sauce anyway.

Eventually, the vinegar, sugar and seasonings made their way into the pot and the final hour of simmering was underway. The hour was getting late. My sweetie abandoned me for the siren song of his pillow. I settled down with a crossword puzzle. After that hour came 40 minutes in the water bath canner. Would I never get to bed?!


This is what time I fished the jars out of the canner. This recipe took me almost 7 (SEVEN!) hours to complete from start to finish. All for 5 pints of BBQ sauce.


This had better be some damn good sauce.


It started all over this morning with eggplant tomato relish. With the peeling and chopping of eggplant, tomatoes, onions, and peppers, and then another hour long simmer, I’ve just now finished canning the relish. I’m taking a break now before two more recipes.


The first will be the tomato jam made from the leftover tomato puree. Thanks to a couple of suggestions in the comments, I’ve decided to make jalapeno-tomato jam. I have a jalapeno leftover from the BBQ sauce so I put together this recipe from several others online. Don’t worry, I did not alter the proportion of lemon juice to vegetables. I have no intention of poisoning myself.

Jalapeno Tomato Jam

4 cups fresh tomato puree
1 large jalapeno, seeded and roughly chopped
1/3 cup vinegar
1/4 c lemon juice
5 c sugar
1 box dry pectin

Sterilize canning jars & lids.
Puree jalapeno in food processor with vinegar.
Pour tomato and jalapeno purees into large saucepan. Simmer 10 minutes, stirring often to prevent burning. Measure 3 cups into clean saucepan.
Add lemon juice. Mix well.
Stir pectin into tomatoes. Bring to a boil over high heat, stirring constantly.
Dump all sugar in at once. Stir and bring to a full rolling boil that can’t be stirred down.
Boil hard for 1 minute, stirring constantly.
Remove from heat. Skim off foam.
Pour into sterilized hot jars, leaving ¼” headspace.
Wipe rims, put on lids.
Process in boiling water bath for 5 min at sea level; 10 min from 1000-6000 feet.
Makes 6 half-pint jars.



Finally, with the few tomatoes left after all this, I will combine them with other leftover vegetables from the CSA and the store to make a stupendous spaghetti sauce for dinner. It will have eggplants, celery, onion, and green pepper in it, as well as some of my frozen basil-tomato puree and some fresh oregano.


I’m already hungry thinking about dinner or is it just because I never got around to eating breakfast this morning?

Be Prepared

Read my latest thoughts on foods to store for emergencies. Although my list is specific to strict vegetarians eating a low-fat diet, you can easily add oils, nuts, and animal products to your storage, if you want, for a well-rounded emergency diet.

Being prepared for an emergency is not paranoia. It is a form of insurance against man-made and natural disasters. It is insurance that is in your hands, not that of a company that also seeks to make a profit. It can make the difference between thriving or barely surviving an emergency.

As I've mentioned before, denial is not the same thing as preparation. Denying the possibility of a natural disaster and power outages does not keep your family fed during the storm of the century. Denying that water may stop coming out of the tap does not parch your thirst when the water main breaks. Denying the possibility of a pandemic doesn't keep your family healthy if the flu sweeps through your community.

Prepare now and thrive later.

We now return to our regularly scheduled life...

The second solar cooking demo went well yesterday, despite the cloudy weather. I plugged in the Tulsi hybrid solar cooker and was able to heat the beans and breadsticks for the crowd. I know that I've told you all the various dishes that I made for people to sample at the CSA but Sharon pointed out in an email that I never indicated the volumes of food I was making.

There are 470 members in our CSA. When I was preparing food, I was dealing with quantities like 10 pounds of potatoes for potato salad, plus two quarts of homemade refrigerator dill pickles, two pints of sweet pickled onions, and a pint of soy mayo. The summer salad used 12 cups of boiled corn, all cooked in the solar oven and cut off the cobs, plus 4 huge Armenian cucumbers, another two pints of sweet pickled onions, and a flat of tomatoes, which were all seeded to keep the salad from getting too soggy. The 6-quart pot of beans barely fit in my solar oven. Due to the sheer mass of beans and water to heat, it took five hours to cook. Many breadsticks to roll out, and so on and so forth.

Let me put this another way. I'm tired! Don't get me wrong, it was a fulfilling experience - cooking and preparing wonderful food to inspire members to try cooking with the sun and find new ways to use what they get in their CSA shares. But, I'm happy to finally have my refrigerator and freezer space back, as well as time to catch up on everything that I've let slide for the past month. (Yes, I've been working on this for a month - canning green tomato relish, candying citrus peels, pickling onions and cucumbers, freezing corn, and so on!)


What's on my schedule for the next month?

Clean (out) the house
Cleaning has been ignored for a bit, with the exception of making sure my working area in the kitchen was sanitary. I still have clean underwear so the laundry must not have gotten out of control yet.

The house, though, is so cluttered, it's scary. I don't think there are any overdue bills lurking under the piles, but I won't know for sure until I look....or the lights won't come on when I flip the switch.


Organizing the fridge & freezer
There's food in there, good food, but it's been so crowded I've had a hard time finding it lately. It's time to inventory again and get back to meal planning for a while.


Food preservation
Canning
BBQ Sauce: This is on the schedule for the very near future. I've got a flat of tomatoes to process. After poring over recipes, I want to try my hand at homemade barbecue sauce. I've made it from scratch starting with tomato sauce before but never from raw tomatoes.

Tomato Jam: To get the sauce to cook down quicker, I'll be seeding the tomatoes. I don't want to waste all that flavorful juice, though, so I think I'll try adding one or two tomatoes to the seeds to make tomato jam. Has anyone ever made tomato jam? What do you use it for?

Eggplant & Tomato Relish: another interesting looking recipe from the Joy of Pickling book I found in a used bookstore. I've liked every recipe I've tried in this book so far. Oh darn! When I searched for a link for the book, I found out there's a new completely revised edition out....with 25 new recipes. How long until Christmas? Hm, can we have Christmas in July maybe?

Condiments
Vinagre: Yesterday I picked up an organic pineapple at the farmer's market. The closest the vendor can get them is from Oaxaca. I specifically purchased it to try making Vinagre (Spicy Pineapple Vinegar) as featured on Daisy Cooks! I don't like habaneros and no chiles are ripe locally yet so I picked up a poblano pepper from the Mexican market this morning.

Dried Tomatoes: I dried a bunch of cherry tomatoes this week. I love the taste of them but have never used them regularly in cooking due to their cost. Any suggestions? Best ways to keep them in storage?


Exercise!
I've missed my self-defense classes for the past week while we gave the new dog a chance to get used to his new home. I'm looking forward to starting up again next week. I'm loving, absolutely loving, punching and kicking my weight bag at home. Talk about working out stress issues! Even my TMJ is improved after a good workout.

Now that my time isn't so strapped, I'll get back on my bike for errands...provided I can get them done before it hits 105 degrees outside (the forecast temperature for all of next week). Oops, I need to remind my sweetie to fix the handlebars.


I tweaked them (to the left) when I fell off my bike last week heading over to take care of a friend's cats while she was away. My knee looks worse than the handlebars and we won't talk about the bruise I got from falling forward on the bike. Let's just say that if I were male, I probably still couldn't talk yet.

I should get my new orthotics within the week and be able to start walking in the canyon again. I've missed my nature fix.


Train my dogs
Classes start next weekend. Daily follow-up is going to be important if we want to end up with two good, well-behaved dogs.


How can you help?

• Tell me about your experiences with tomato jam.


• Suggest good uses for dried tomatoes.


• Send dog training treats.


• Drop a hint with my sweetie about the new edition of The Joy of Pickling.


• Come eat up some of the leftover potato salad from the demo!

When the Weatherman Lies

I often check The Weather Channel online for the forecast in order to plan my solar cooking. Most of the time, the information is useful. Today, however, they are lying to me. I input my own zip code and it told me the current weather conditions were sunny and 82 degrees.


This is a picture from my back yard. Does this look sunny to you? No, the sky is completely overcast, which is not very conducive to solar cooking.

I started randomly inputting various zip codes in Tucson and found more lies. Some parts of Tucson were supposedly mostly cloudy while others were sunny. Here's an example of two zip codes (not mine) within blocks of each other:



Something's fishy here.


Despite the cloudy weather, all is not lost for this afternoon's final solar cooking demo. I plan to plug in the Tulsi Hybrid solar oven and demonstrate the convenience of the electric cooking option on it.

Pictures from a Demonstration (on solar cooking)

My Tulsi oven (left) warmed up the breadsticks while the Southwestern Beans re-heated in the Global Sun Oven (right).


In his oven, the CSA Coordinator had shredded beef heating in its prickly pear sauce with steamed nopalitos (cactus pads).


One table had flyers with information on solar cooking, examples of cooking pots that work well in solar ovens, and a can of high-heat BBQ black spray paint for use in touching up the inside of the ovens. The flowers were part of Tuesday's CSA share.


This is the spread of solar-cooked food offered for sampling. (Recipes here.) You can click on the photo for a larger view of all the delicious dishes. From left to right in the front row: candied grapefruit peel, nopalito salsa, shredded beef in prickly pear sauce with nopalitos, and Southwestern beans. In the back row: summer (corn) salad, green tomato relish, garlicky breadsticks, and potato salad. The empty pitcher on the left was later filled with ice and citrus seltzer.

Everyone really enjoyed the food and was impressed at what could be cooked in a solar oven. Many people sampled the beef but quite a few vegetarian members were happy to hear the other dishes were all made with no animal products. Besides showcasing the versatility of solar cooking, people always appreciate finding new ways to use the foods they get in their CSA shares. I hope at least a few were also inspired to get a solar oven.

Tomorrow, I do this all over again for the Friday pick-up.

Jealousy is a Strong Motivator

Angel came into our home almost two years ago. At the time, she had no idea what toys were, leading us to wonder what kind of life she'd had before us. When you get a rescued dog, you don't know the past history. She was also flabby and terribly out of shape.

Over time, we got her in much better shape but had a hard time getting her interested in toys. The best we could do was get her to "play" with the two that could hold dog treats. She wasn't so much playing with those as she was working to get at the tasty tidbits. Any attempt to get her to play with balls or chew bones was met with complete disinterest.

Enter Polie. This dog understands the value of play. He's really just a big, goofy puppy still. He sniffed at the dog toy basket within his first few days here, so we tossed a toy his direction. He immediately pounced on it and began to chew. Within minutes, Angel decided she needed a toy. She picked up a bone, carried it to another room and laid down for a nice gnaw. A few minutes later, she came back and got another bone. In another few minutes, she fetched yet another, making herself a nice little pile. A pile that Polie couldn't have.


This morning, Polie was bored so I tossed him the chew toy he so enjoyed a few days ago.


Moments later, Angel gladly took the one I offered her. It's just amazing that all it took for her to get into toys was bringing a new dog in the house. I think she's much happier, too, when Polie has a toy instead of treating her like his personal chew toy.

Solar Cooking Resources

See the Tucson CSA website for a copy of the flyer from my solar cooking demo. This flyer includes reasons why you should cook with the sun, solar-cooking tips, what supplies you will need, and a list of the types of food you can prepare in a solar oven.

Check out the Solar Cooking Archive for everything you ever wanted to know about solar cooking, including recipes and how to build your own solar oven.

The Sun Ovens website also has recipes and solar cooking information. Invest in a huge Villager Sun Oven to feed your town or start a Sun Bakery!

Solar-Cooker-at-Cantina-West has a lot of information on solar cooking plus useful comparisons of many different types of cookers.

There is a Yahoo Group on Solar Cooking and another one for Arizona Solar Cookers.

Of course, you can also read more about solar cooking here on this blog. Simply click on "solar ovens" or "solar cooking" in the sidebar index. Peak Oil Hausfrau also writes about her solar cooking experiences.


How can you get your own solar oven?

Make one yourself with plans from solarcooking.org.

Buy one:

• They are sold online by various vendors.

I got mine through Earth Easy. (Prices as of today are Sport $149; Sun Oven $225; Hybrid $249. Plus shipping.)


• One local Tucson vendor is The Solar Store on Country Club. They carry the Global Sun Oven ($289).

Menu & Recipes for Solar Cooking Demo

At my CSA today, I'll be doing the first of two solar cooking demos. This flyer will be available for those people who are inspired to get or make their own solar oven and start cooking with the sun at home.

Here are the foods I’ll be sampling today and Friday afternoon. Most of the produce came from the CSA shares.


Local Meat - contributed by the CSA Coordinator and cooked in his new solar oven (purchased with one of my coupons).

On Tuesday, we will have grass-fed beef chuck roast in prickly pear fruit sauce with nopalitos. The beef is local and sold at the CSA in prepaid shares occasionally. The prickly pears were harvested locally and the nopalitos came in our CSA shares.

On Friday, we will have naturally-raised pork tenderloin in grapefruit (or apricot) sauce with nopalitos. The pork is also local and sold at the CSA in prepaid shares. The grapefruits and nopalitos are from the CSA.


Nopalito Salsa

The CSA Coordinater had some solar-steamed nopalitos left over so he put together this delicious salsa.


Garlicky Breadsticks

I posted this recipe a couple of weeks ago when I did a trial run on the breadsticks. They take about 45 minutes to bake in a preheated solar oven. Use a dark metal pan for best browning. Line it with parchment paper to prevent sticking.

It's a good idea to check the weather forecast and conditions before you get all of the breadsticks rolled out and ready to bake. (I was forced to bake some in the regular oven this weekend when we had a cloudy day. The weather forecast Friday morning said sun all weekend but that changed!)


Southwestern Beans

Pinto beans (from CSA)
Dried red chile peppers (from CSA)
Peppercorns
Salt
Liquid Smoke

Sort and clean beans. Soak in water overnight.
Drain and put in a cooking pot with plenty of water to cover. Add dried red chiles and a few peppercorns for flavor.
Cover and place in preheated solar oven. Let cook until tender.
Drain off some excess cooking water (or save for soup).
Remove peppercorns. They will be softened from the cooking and can be smashed with the flat side of a knife and then minced to add back to the beans.
Remove dried chiles. Using the back side of the knife, scrape the rehydrated flesh from the skin. Mince and add back to the beans. (Compost the skin.)
Add salt and Liquid Smoke to taste.


Green Tomato Relish

This flavorful relish tastes wonderful spooned on top of the pinto beans. The recipe can be found at the National Center for Home Food Preservation, a great resource for canning and preserving your CSA surplus. The relish is a tasty way to use the green tomatoes we get from the CSA at the beginning of summer.


Potato Salad

Red La Soda potatoes (from CSA)
Yukon Gold potatoes (from CSA)
Dill pickles (I made the Refrigerator Dill Pickle recipe from the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving, using the CSA Armenian cucumbers.)
Sweet pickled onions (Recipe here, using diced CSA onions)
Celery, sliced (optional)
Nasoya fat free soy spread (soy mayonnaise)
Prepared mustard
Nutritional yeast (1 tbs per 8 potatoes)
Salt & pepper to taste

Steam potatoes whole in a closed cooking pot in a preheated solar oven.
When cool enough to handle, remove peel and chop potatoes.
Toss immediately with some pickle juice. This step needs to be done while the potatoes are still warm.
While they are cooling, chop pickles and celery.
Mix a small amount of mustard in with the mayonnaise, along with the nutritional yeast, and pepper. Do not add the salt yet.
Add pickles, onions, celery, and dressing to potatoes and mix well.
Taste and add salt if needed.
Let chill at least one hour before serving.


Summer Salad

Corn on the cob (from CSA)
Fresh tomatoes (from CSA)
Cucumber (from CSA)
Sweet pickled onions (or diced red onion from CSA)
Basil vinegar*
Olive oil
Salt & pepper to taste

Heat water in a large covered cooking pot in a preheated solar oven.
Add corn to pot, cover and let cook until tender. This can take up to half an hour.
Meanwhile, dice tomatoes and cucumber. The Armenian cucumbers don't need to be peeled but you may wish to peel other varieties. If the cucumbers are large and seedy, you may wish to remove the seeds before dicing. (Feed the seeds to your chickens or your compost pile.)
Drain corn and let cool. Using a sharp knife, cut kernels from cobs.
In a large bowl, mix the corn, tomato, cucumber, and onions.
In a small bowl, whisk the basil vinegar, olive oil, and salt and pepper together. Toss with salad.
Serve cold.

*To make basil vinegar, clean and pat dry one CSA share of basil leaves (small bag). Place in a pint glass jar and bruise with a wooden spoon. Heat 1 1/4 cups of vinegar almost to a boil. Pour over leaves. Cover the jar with plastic wrap or a non-reactive lid and set in a dark closet for a month. Strain through cheesecloth before using.


Candied Grapefruit Peel

I made these last month from CSA grapefruits. Here is the recipe for thick candied citrus peels. Here is a photo. Some of the simmering was done in the solar oven.


Candied Orange Peel

I also made these last month from the CSA oranges. I used the same recipe (process) as for the grapefruit peels. Here's a photo of the peels boiling in syrup. Some of the simmering was done in the solar oven.


Citrus Seltzer

Before candying the peels of the grapefruits and oranges, I juiced them to make the CSA recipe for a refreshing summer seltzer.


I hope all this tasty food inspires at least a few CSA members to start cooking with the sun. Water may not be abundant here in the desert, but sunshine sure is!

Upcoming posts this week: Solar Cooking Tips and Photos from the Demo.

Kneading Tip

Everyone loves homemade bread but the kneading can take its toll. Do you get worn out from kneading bread dough for what seems like forever in order to reach that magical stage of "smooth and elastic"? Do you long for a bread machine but know you'll never get one because you stubbornly want to make your bread entirely from scratch?

Well, let me give you a tip that can make kneading the dough easier: you don't have to do it all at once. You don't have to stand there and knead the dough for 15 minutes straight; you can break it up into smaller time chunks. The gluten will develop just as well, and perhaps better, if you give it a rest here and there.

Here's what I mean. Knead your dough for about four minutes or so. Turn your mixing bowl upside down and cover the dough. Now walk away for a minute or two, shaking out your arms to rest them if desired. Come back and knead the dough for three to four minutes. Let it rest again for a minute or two. Repeat until the dough is smooth and elastic. You will still likely knead the dough about the same total length of time but with some rests for your arms. Each time you come back, you'll find the dough a little softer and easier to work with.

Suppose you don't need a rest. You can still employ this tip and get a good arm workout. While letting the dough rest, grab a couple of cans off your kitchen shelf and do several sets of bicep curls. If you make bread several times a week, you'll have buff arms in no time!

(p)update

We didn't think the dogs would ever settle down last night but eventually they got the hint after all the lights went out. I slept fitfully, and was awakened about 1:30 am with an urgent (?) request to go outside. This, of course, got them all riled up again and it took a while for them to settle back down. Thankfully, no accidents in the house or shredded belongings greeted us in the morning.

After breakfast and a walk, we picked up a harness for Polie to rein in his husky-inspired pulling. While at the store, we decided to sign both dogs up for obedience training. We could do it on our own, but we are far more likely to stick with a program if in a class with assigned weekly homework. The other advantage is having an expert direct our efforts rather than the two of us disagreeing on the best course of training.

Polie also got a bath today and lots more brushing. I should have taken the pictures yesterday before I brushed out the tufts on his haunches. We've already filled a small trash can (equal to a grocery bag) with fur! He seems to be settling in pretty well, although he is still excitable. We're working to curb the, um, incestuous behavior...on both of their parts... They can find more appropriate ways to play and work out who's going to be boss dog. Tomorrow, shots, heartworm test, and chip.

Please rest assured this is not going to turn into a dog blog. This weekend, dogs are dominating the scene but my life will find balance again soon. At least this (p)update is better than a rant about the annoying clouds that blew in as soon as I rolled out the breadsticks meant to be baked in the solar oven for the demo. I had to bake them inside unfortunately; now the question is whether to fib* at the demo and say they were cooked outside.


*Yeah, right. I'm compulsively honest about this kind of stuff. Sigh...

Double the Fun, Quadruple the Fur

We adopted a new dog tonight from folks in the neighborhood that couldn't keep him any longer. Polie is an energetic German shepherd dog-Siberian husky cross with pretty blue eyes (behind the eye shine) and a heavy undercoat that he sheds frequently.


He and Angel have been playing together for the past couple of hours. She says "This is my bed, Dude!" I suspect she's going to miss out on a bit of her nap time for a while with this pesky younger intruder pestering her all the time.


This photo gives a little hint of the size difference between these two. Polie is about half again bigger than Angel. We hadn't planned on getting a second dog until after we'd moved but sometimes life doesn't go as planned. If we all make it through the night, we'll order more dog food tomorrow. I have a feeling he can really put it away.

Chile's Summer Stollen

Stollen is a traditional German sweet yeast bread with nuts and candied or dried fruit. My mother used to bake it every Christmas with a recipe similar to this one and we’d savor each toasted slice at breakfast slathered with margarine. I have not consistently made it every Christmas as an adult. This past year, like many others, I planned to but just didn’t get around to it.

Over the years, I’ve made a number of changes to her recipe. I use vegan versions of the milk and butter. When I started making my own candied citrus peels, I switched to using them instead of buying the little tubs of sticky peels available in the grocery store’s produce section each holiday season. I use dried cherries to replace the artificially colored Maraschino cherries and their texture also works to substitute for the raisins. I use whole white wheat flour for some of the white flour.

This year, I’m making two more changes. One is to omit the almonds due to my problems with tree nuts and vertigo. The other is to omit the steps of rolling out the dough, spreading with butter and cinnamon-sugar, folding it over and shaping it into a crescent. By omitting these steps, as well as the powdered sugar glaze on top, I can reduce the fat and sugar in the recipe, as well as the amount of work to get this made.

Since I am also making this in the summer, I decided to write up my own recipe. You can make and enjoy this bread anytime of year. Use local and homemade ingredients as much as possible.

Chile’s Summer Stollen
Makes 3 loaves.

1 ½ cup vanilla soymilk
¾ cup natural cane sugar
¾ tsp sea salt
1 tbs dry yeast
3/8 cup warm water
1 ½ cups bread flour
¾ cup candied grapefruit peel, minced
½ cup candied orange peel, minced
¾ cup dried cherries, chopped
Grated rind of a lemon
1/3 cup + 3 tbs flax seed egg substitute (recipe follows)
½ cup Earth Balance (or other soy margarine), softened
3/8 tsp nutmeg
¾ tsp cinnamon
3 ½ cups whole white wheat flour
2 ½ cups bread flour

Heat soymilk to scalding.
Stir sugar and salt into hot soymilk and cool to lukewarm.
Dissolve yeast in warm water in large bowl and let rest 5 minutes.
Pour soymilk into bubbly yeast.
Stir in 1 ½ cup bread flour.
Beat with a whisk until smooth.
Cover with a linen towel. Let sponge rise in a warm place until doubled in bulk – about 1½ hours.
Punch down.
Fold in fruit and lemon rind.
Add flax seed mixture, Earth Balance, and spices.
Stir in whole wheat flour and 1 cup of bread flour. Mix until smooth.
Turn out onto floured surface and knead with remaining bread flour until dough is smooth and elastic.
Divide dough into thirds and shape into loaves.
Place in three buttered loaf pans.
Loosely cover with wax paper and linen towel.
Let rise 1 hour until doubled.
Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
Bake loaves for 50-55 minutes until golden.
Let cool 10 minutes before turning out of loaf pans and then let cool completely before slicing.



Note: you do not have to use the candied and dried fruit specified in my recipe. Feel free to substitute whatever you want, keeping the total amount of fruit at about 2 cups. If you prefer dates and dried apricots, by all means, use those instead; you're the one who will be eating it, after all! You may also add a cup of sliced almonds, if desired.

Health Note: I've already cut the amount of margarine in this bread by half. The next time I make this, I'm going to try omitting it altogether. I may also use more of the whole grain flour.


Flax Seed Egg Substitute
1/3 cup whole flax seed
1 cup water

Grind flax seeds in blender until pulverized.
Add water and blend on high speed until mixture thickens.
Store in the refrigerator in a tightly covered jar for up to 10 days.
Use 3 tablespoons in place of each egg in recipes for baked goods and pancakes.

How do I get started canning?

This question came up in the comments on my list of all the foods I've preserved. Here is the advice I'd give to wannabe canners.

Buy the latest edition of the Ball canning guide. The current book's title is Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving: 400 Delicious and creative recipes for today. Edited by Judi Kingry and Lauren Devine, published 2006.

I know it's tempting to just go buy a used book since old canning guides always show up in the used bookstores, but avoid the temptation. Canning guidelines were tightened some years ago for safety reasons. It is worth the investment in the current information to avoid botulism!

An excellent website is the National Center for Home Food Preservation. It has information and recipes for canning, freezing, drying, curing & smoking, fermenting, pickling, making jam & jelly, and storing food. Another good online resource is Pick Your Own.

Canning fruits, especially making jams and jellies, is often the easiest place to start as they are hard to mess up. If a jelly might not jell completely, you can always use it as syrup or reprocess it with more pectin. Most vegetables are low acid and must be pressure canned for safety unless you are fermenting them or adding vinegar to pickle them or make relishes and salsas. All of this information is in the Ball book - browse through the recipes, read the text, and jump in. If you know someone that already cans, ask if you can come help one day in order to learn how to do it yourself.

To keep your initial investment low, look for a waterbath canner at yard sales. If you can't find one, they are only $20 in most hardware stores. You can pick up used canning jars at yard sales, church rummage sales, and thrift stores for half or less than retail. Check carefully for cracks or nicked rims. You want to avoid those as damaged jars will not form a proper and safe seal. The lids are two-part. You can re-use the rings but you will have to buy new lids (the flat part) for each use. Still, with re-usable jars, your cost should come out to be less than store-bought goods, as well as tasting a lot better and, hopefully, using local and organic produce.

Have fun!


Want to read more? Check out my past posts on food preservation and canning.

My Dog the Cat

Dogs like to look out windows to see what's going on in the world. Most that I've seen in other people's windows, though, just have their front paws up on the windowsill so they can see out.

That's not good enough for Angel. She has to get all the way up on the windowsill, which in this case is a ledge 6" deep. The first time we came home and saw this, it cracked us up totally. Of course, I never take the camera with me so I figured I'd never get a shot of her doing this. A black cat in the driveway drew her up today and no way was she going to let it out of her sight, even if I was being really annoying with the camera.


Then she sat, for all the world acting like a cat sitting in the window. Next thing you know she'll be hackin' up hairballs.

Foods I've Preserved

After I joined the CSA a couple of years ago, I dove into learning how to preserve food. I was lucky to learn about some food preservation as a child. My dad liked to garden and then my grandfather moved in with us when I was still young and began seriously expanding the garden area until almost ¼ acre was under cultivation. We got a lot of food from the yard and gave plenty of surplus produce to neighbors and church friends. Some neighbors quit answering their doors in the summer because they just couldn’t handle any more zucchini from us.

My mother preserved much of what her husband and father grew. Pumpkins and banana squash were cooked, pureed, and then baked into pies and breads, filling shelves in the upright freezer. Hot green chiles were roasted, cleaned, and frozen in bags. An entire bag could be defrosted for use or a small amount could be shaved off with a sharp knife for a hot kick in whatever Mexican dish was for dinner. Cucumbers magically turned into bread ‘n butter or mustard pickles. Tomatoes became delicious spicy homemade ketchup. Strawberries were often used fresh for shortcake but many found their way into jam jars as well. I remember watching the slow drip, drip, drip of juice through the jelly bag from the grapes off the small Concord grape vine my grandfather lovingly tended. Almonds, walnuts, and pecans were frozen both shelled and unshelled, and any peaches that escaped our hungry maws were sliced and frozen in a light sugar syrup.

I didn’t realize how much I enjoyed those homemade products until I had to settle for store-bought versions when I went to college and then entered the workforce. My studio apartments didn't have garden space and I had little spare time to do any canning. Finally, after leaving the full-time working world, I had the time and energy to get and process enough produce for my own condiments and preserved vegetables.

I have gone far beyond what my mother ever preserved, venturing into harvesting wild foods such as prickly pears, bartering with friends and neighbors for surplus produce, and trying out a wide variety of recipes. I’ve never listed everything I’ve preserved, though, until now. Many of these produced just a few jars and have long since been eaten up, but here is the list, as complete as I can remember. I've also included the source of the produce in parentheses.


VEGETABLES

Basil (CSA; garden)
Basil vinegar
Dried
Frozen cubes of basil-roasted tomato puree

Beans (CSA)
Dehydrated chickpea hummus
Dehydrated Great Northern bean-red pepper spread

Beets (CSA)
Frozen puree of roasted beets
Pickled beets

Cabbage (CSA)
Kimchi
Pink pickled cauliflower with red cabbage
Sauerkraut

Cauliflower (CSA)
Pickled cauliflower
Pink pickled cauliflower (with red cabbage)

Chard & Other Cooking Greens (garden; CSA)
Dehydrated
Frozen

Corn (CSA)
Frozen
Dried corn (raw – to make hominy and masa)
Dried chicos (roasted and dried)
Dried corn silk for medicinal tea

Cucumbers (CSA)
Achar (South Asian pickles)
Kimchi – several versions
Refrigerator pickles
Refrigerator dill pickles

Ginger (Asian market)
Ginger beer (only mildly alcoholic)
Ginger liqueur (strongly alcoholic)
Japanese pickled ginger

Jerusalem artichokes (CSA)
Pickled Jerusalem artichokes

Okra (CSA)
Pickled okra

Olives (harvested in town)
Brine-cured olives
Salt-cured Greek-style olives

Onions (CSA)
Dehydrated
Sweet onion relish
Sweet pickled onions

Peppers (CSA)
Chile orange marmalade
Chile vinegar
Dehydrated green chiles
Dried red chiles
Five-pepper jelly
Frozen roasted green chiles
Guero escabeche
Jalapeno escabeche
Jalapeno vinegar
Jalapeno vodka

Pumpkin (CSA)
Dehydrated slices
Frozen puree
Japanese pumpkin pickles
Pumpkin butter
Pumpkin pie leather
Sweet pumpkin pickles
Toasted pumpkin seeds

Purslane (CSA)
Pickled purslane

Radishes (CSA)
Black Spanish radish kimchi
Daikon kimchi

Sweet Potatoes (CSA)
Dehydrated slices

Tomatillos (CSA)
Frozen green enchilada sauce with roasted tomatillos
Tomatillo escabeche

Tomatoes (CSA)
Dehydrated Wonderberries
Frozen roasted tomato sauce
Green tomato relish

Wheat (CSA)
Malt – sprouted wheat berries, dehydrated & ground
Sourdough starter

Zucchini (CSA)
Dehydrated slices
Lemon zucchini relish


FRUITS

Bananas (Mexican grocery store)
Banana chutney – 2 kinds
Dehydrated chips
Frozen overripe for bread
Frozen ripe for smoothies

Blueberries (grocery store)
Blueberry cherry preserves
Blueberries pickled in molasses

Calamondin Limes (harvested in town)
Calamondin lime booze
Calamondin limes (whole) in brandy
Calamondin lime marmalade
Merlot-candid calamondins
Sweet Calamondin lime pickles with Indian spices

Cherries (grocery store)
Black Forest Macaroon conserve
Blueberry cherry preserves
Cherry sauce
Cherry wishniak (liqueur)

Figs (friend’s tree)
Figs in date syrup
Fig jam

Grapefruit (tree in yard)
Candied grapefruit peel
Candied grapefruit pith
Grapefruit marmalade
Frozen juice

Lemons (tree in yard; friends’ trees)
Candied lemon peel
Dehydrated lemon peel (for baking)
Frozen juice
Honey lemon syrup
Lemon extract
Lemon jelly
Limoncello
Preserved Lemons
Sweet lemon pickles with Indian spices

Limequat (friend’s tree)
Limequat marmalade

Melons (CSA)
Frozen puree of Sharlyn melon
Kimchi with Hami melon
Mustardy sweet watermelon rind relish
Watermelon rind chutney
Watermelon rind pickles

Oranges (CSA; friends’ trees)
Candied orange peel
Chile orange marmalade
Dried orange peel (for baking)
Frozen juice
Frozen segments in syrup
Orange extract
Orange liqueur
Orange marmalade
Orange syrup

Pomegranates (friend’s tree)
Anadana (dried ground pomegranate seeds)
Pomegranate chutney
Pomegranate jelly
Pomegranate liqueur
Pomegranate syrup

Prickly Pear (harvested in yard)
Prickly pear jelly
Prickly pear-Sharlyn melon fruit leather
Prickly pear syrup

Strawberries (grocery store)
Italian strawberry syrup (fermented)
Maple Strawberry smooch (sauce)

Tangerine (tree in yard)
Tangerine marmalade


After making this list, I'm hungry!

The Secret's Out

My friend, in response to accusations that she injects her produce with sugar before harvesting, sent me this photo of her cherry tomato plants to prove her innocence.

I guess she forgot to take down the IV bags filled with sucrose solution before snapping the shot.

Shame on you! (An open letter to a fellow gardener)

Dear Lady Banksia,

Thank you so much for the lovely cherry tomatoes and beautiful banana peppers you gave me this week. The tomatoes are the perfect size to just pop a couple in my mouth every time I walk by them and they are so sweet that I'm eating them like candy.

This morning, I was roasting chiles from another gardening friend and decided to toss your milder peppers in the broiler as well. I just finished cleaning off the skin and seeds, and, of course, sampling the final result.

Based on the incredibly high sugar content of these peppers and the candy-like attributes of your cherry tomatoes, I can come to but one conclusion: the night before you harvest your vegetables, you are stealing out to the garden with a hypodermic needle and pumping them full of sugar water. There is no other way they could be so sweet.

Shame on you for abusing your vegetables and making other gardeners feel so inferior. You should be reported to GOVEG (Growers Opposed to Vaccination-Enhanced Gardening) and stripped of your rights to eat anything you grow. All harvests should be immediately turned over to me for proper disposal.

Sincerely,

Chile

Solar Cooking Demo Plans

I've mentioned a couple of times that I will be doing a solar cooking demonstration at my CSA in a few weeks. My goal is to show members how easy it is to cook the foods we get from the farm in a solar oven, taking advantage of Arizona's abundant sunshine. Perhaps a few will be inspired to get their own solar oven.

I am perhaps biting off a bit too much in my efforts to show the wide variety of foods that can be cooked in the solar oven. I've talked the founder of the CSA into using his to roast a cut of the locally-raised meat that we sell, while I am preparing a host of other dishes using as many different foods we get from the farm as I can.

I'll be cooking pinto beans with dried red chile peppers, to be topped with a tasty green tomato relish that I've already prepared. The relish was cooked in the solar oven before canning. I've already made some sweet pickled onions to be added to two dishes. One will be a salad with the corn that I cooked and froze over the weekend. I'll thaw the corn and toss it with the onions, fresh tomatoes, fresh cucumbers, and some oil and basil vinegar. I juiced oranges and grapefruit to be mixed with club soda for a refreshing citrus seltzer and candied the peels, doing some of that cooking in the solar oven. Hopefully we will get cucumbers this week so I can make pickles to go in a potato salad with the pickled onions. The potatoes will, of course, be cooked in the solar oven.

I also want to do something with the wheat berries we get. I'd never baked yeast bread in the oven and was not happy with the results of my one past attempt at fatfree vegan quick bread several years ago. (It came out overly moist.) Yesterday, I finally had a chance to test a bread recipe in the oven. After deliberating over this for some time, I decided my best bet would be breadsticks. They'd surely bake through even if the temperature wasn't high enough and they would be easy to cut into pieces for sampling.


The recipe is very easy and I will share it with you shortly. I preheated both the SunOven and the flatter Tulsi Oven. My suspicion was the SunOven would do better because it typically gets hotter than the Tulsi. (The Tulsi has "booster panels" that can be attached to the side to increase the reflection and temperature but I forgot to try those out yesterday.) I mixed up my dough, rolled out the bread sticks, and set them outside to rise.


After filling two baking sheets, one large metal one that would fit in the Tulsi and a smaller glass one that would just barely fit in the SunOven, I still had a little dough leftover. I got creative and made a few braided breadsticks to bake after the others were done.

I put the breadsticks in the ovens. I didn't have thermometers in the solar ovens but I knew there was no way they had heated up to the 400 degrees the breadsticks needed so I set the timer for twice as long as the recipe suggested.


I checked first in the SunOven. They were not browned but a taste test indicated they were cooked.


The surprise came when I check the ones in the Tulsi. They had browned nicely on the bottom! I suspect this had more to do with the metal pan than the temperature.


The braids, baked in the Tulsi, also browned very nicely on the bottom in another metal pan. There are only two braids in this photo because I sent the prettiest one home with my friend that came for lunch.


Look what she brought me from her garden! Yellow banana peppers and cherry tomatoes that are as sweet as candy.

I am absolutely thrilled to have finally baked bread in my ovens and am happy I will be able to make these for the cooking demo. All I need now is for the weather to cooperate. After a wonderful hot clear day yesterday, there are high thin clouds blocking my sun today. This is partly why I have been cooking and canning or freezing much of the demo food already. I still need to do the beans and breadsticks, both of which could be cooked and frozen ahead (although I'm starting to run short on freezer space!), but there is no way to do the potato salad more than one day ahead of time. At the demo, the ovens may be used mostly to reheat all the food rather than cooking it fresh.


Garlicky Breadsticks
2 tsp yeast
2 tsp sugar
1/2 cup warm water (~110 degrees)
1 cup whole wheat flour + more for kneading (I prefer to use the lighter whole white wheat.)
2 tbs nutritional yeast
1/2 tsp granulated garlic (or garlic powder)
1/2 tsp salt
1/8 tsp granulated onion (or onion powder)
1/8 tsp black pepper

Mix the yeast and sugar in a medium bowl.
Stir in the warm water until the yeast and sugar dissolve.
Let sit in a warm place for 10 minutes until the mixture is foamy.
Combine the flour and seasonings.
Add to the yeast mixture and stir until smooth.
Turn out onto a floured board and knead until the dough forms a soft ball that is no longer sticky. Be careful not to knead in so much flour that the dough becomes stiff.
Cut into 12 pieces and roll out into long thin breadsticks.
Line two baking sheets with parchment paper and place breadsticks on them.
Cover with a dishtowel and let rise in a warm place until doubled in size.
Preheat a standard oven to 400 degrees and bake 8-10 minutes until golden brown.
OR
Preheat solar ovens and check after 15-20 minutes depending on your conditions.

Science-Book Challenge Reminder

Just a gentle reminder to all the folks who signed up for the Science Book Challenge: we're almost halfway through the year already. It's summer; crack open those books you said you wanted to read. We're anxiously awaiting your reviews!

I've already reviewed two books. The challenge asks folks to read just three science books this year. C'mon, you still have plenty of time. Heck, there's even time for new folks to sign up for the challenge. Scroll down to the bottom of this page and check out Jeff. He's already reviewed a dozen books this year!

So go read a book. It might hurt your brain a little at first, but it will be good for you, I promise.

Ranting at Myself

Why can't I keep a clean house? Why do I have to invite company over in order to force myself to clean? I like living in a clean house; I just hate cleaning. Why, oh why, didn't I marry someone rich enough to provide me with my own personal maid? Someone to clean up the huge messes I make in the kitchen. Someone to pick up all the dirty socks dropped on the floor. Someone to vacuum up the dog furs inside and pick up the dog droppings outside.

I have tried a zillion methods that promise to turn my house into a home that is always clean and tidy. Sorry to disappoint you but not one of them works if you don't like housecleaning. It doesn't matter if you are doing it fast, in small chunks on a regular basis, or, my usual method - a whirlwind of cleaning before company comes over. If you hate to do the actual cleaning, you are not going to do it until forced to.

Now don't get me wrong, I don't live in a pigsty. But, I will let the clutter, especially paper clutter, build up. The socks won't get picked up until laundry day. The drain rack bottom will get a bit grungy, along with the water buckets. The dust bunny populations will reach dangerous levels and the white tile floors will start looking a dull off-white. I have a thing about not having trash visible, though, so the trash cans are emptied regularly whether they need it or not. And after having dealt with several mass invasions of tiny ants in the kitchen in another house, I maintain the firm rule that all dirty dishes must be washed before going to bed each night.

For all this whining, however, I do appreciate that I have friends willing to come over once in a while. Otherwise, the house might really go to seed. Today's guest is a friend from the CSA; a lucky friend - she gets leftover Costa Rican food for lunch, plus a little surplus goat manure. Not at the same time, of course.

The kitchen is clean, the floors vacuumed and mopped, the toilet scrubbed, the cloth wipes folded neatly, the wipes bucket emptied and rinsed, and the clutter gathered into manageable piles. Now if I just remember to wash my face, brush my hair, and put on clean clothes before she gets here, all will be fine. I could use a nap, though, or maybe just some limoncello first.

Today's To-Do List (Now with updates!)

Stealing an idea from Ruthie, I'm posting my to-do list for today. I'll check things off as I complete them so you can see that I don't actually sit around all day eating bonbons while watching Mexican soap operas.

1. Decide on my dinner menu. The plan is Costa Rican cuisine. I’ve got a number of recipes to choose from, including Gallo Pinto (black beans & rice), Tico Rice (in place of Gallo Pinto rice), Costa Rican Potatoes & Beans, Costa Rican Vegetable Salad, Corn Tortillas - maybe, and Pico de Gallo (fresh salsa). I just need to pick the ones for which I already have most of the ingredients.
   *DONE - selected recipes in bold.
   
   NEW: Picture of Costa Rican dinner here.
   
   The most important ingredient is the Lizano sauce. This is a regional (brand name) salsa of sorts, completely different from tomato-based Mexican salsas. The ingredients listed are carrot, onion, cucumber, cayenne, ginger, garlic, cumin, and cauliflower. The last time I looked (over a year ago), I could find no recipes online and I haven’t gotten around to trying to make it myself. I’ve guarded my last bottle since it’s not available locally and had to be ordered from Costa Rica (along with their wonderful coffee grown on volcanic slopes….back when I was drinking real coffee).



2. Pack Edible Plants & Animals book up for Allie. It’s been a month since the drawing and I feel really bad about not shipping it yet.
   *DONE



3. Bike to Post Office and ship book. Today.
   *DONE. It's hot out there!



4. Pick up bulk natural cane sugar ordered from natural foods store. I need this for jelly canning season. While there, pick up any random ingredients needed for dinner. I already know I'll need cilantro. Also need cucumber and can of Hearts of Palm.
   *DONE. Boy, organic sugar is expensive.



5. Do at least one load of laundry today before I run out of clean underwear.
   *TWO LOADS DONE & PUT AWAY



6. Write the overdue post acknowledging Rob’s blog award.
   *NOT GONNA HAPPEN TODAY



7. Start writing long overdue post on personal safety.
   *ALSO NOT GONNA HAPPEN TODAY



8. Do ankle and shoulder physical therapy, like I’m supposed to be doing regularly.
   *DONE



9. Record last two week’s expenditures for tracking spending.
   *DONE



10. Cook black beans in solar oven. They already soaked overnight.
    *BEANS & TICO BROWN RICE ARE DONE; HOPING CORN WILL COOK DESPITE HIGH THIN CLOUDS THAT JUST MOVED IN

And a bonus task: Maybe make stollen with the chopped candied citrus peels. (Recipe here)
*DREAM ON...

I'm tired just looking at the list so we'll see how much I actually get done. Wish me luck?

Totally Worn Out

If ya'll thought Saturday looked like a busy day, you should have seen Sunday. We'd planned to go for a nice canyon walk but my foot was hurting too much to do that. I let my sweetie sleep in while I tackled the compost pile.

One bin was more than half full of layers of kitchen waste, goat manure, shredded paper, and leaves and straw. I wanted to incorporate the cow manure from the goat ranch into that bin as quickly as possible to reduce the smell in the yard. The cow manure, even though it is a year old, still had a lot more odor issues with it than the goat manure. There was a strong ammonia element to it, as well, which worried me a bit. Sure don't need to neighbors thinking bad things are happening at the Chile household!

As I emptied out the compost bin, I ran into good soil in the bottom quarter. I started sifting it and filled several 5-gallon buckets for gardening. I like to put plant material on the bottom layer when building up a compost pile. I raked together some leaves and grass near the bin and carried a shovelful over to the bin. Eek! A mouse ran out of the debris when I dumped it in. Great. I just had to get rid of three mice from the compost over the past week and now I've introduced another one. And one of my mousetraps has disappeared.

I opened the bag of cow manure and remembered that it had been very compacted when I was getting it. It had to be broken into smaller chunks in order to break down well which meant this job was going to take a lot longer than I hoped. Whining doesn't get the work done, though, so I just dug in and started breaking up the chunks. I'd put in a layer of cow manure, water it down, add a layer of shredded paper, top it with the chunky unfinished compost, water it down again, and repeat. I fit all of the cow manure in the bin before filling it to the top edge. The lids are angled up so I put a very thick layer of the hay on top to keep odors down.


That bin is now closed until fall, except to add water occasionally. The temperature was getting hot already, but my sweetie was nice and brought me a cool drink. I took a quick break to set up the solar oven, too.

The second bin was 1/3 filled with old goat manure from our trip last September. I'd hoped to add that to the first bin but ran out of room. It's been mixed with shredded paper and some plant material, watered it occasionally, and this seems to have broken it down well. We decided to sift it and use it for the garden. After all, the chard was planted in it and has done spectacularly well. As I emptied out this bin, that pesky mouse ran through again. I'm going to have to set the trap and get it before it nests in the compost.

The second compost bin started with a cardboard box at the bottom, then a layer of fresh goat manure, and some straw. As I watered this down, I realized the box on the bottom was a mistake. The water just ran right out of the bin. With plant material, it seeps in better. I had to pile dirt up around the outside edges of the bin as a dam. I never did find the missing mousetrap despite pulling both bins out from the wall to clean behind them.

All this dusty dirty work required another shower. Before doing that, I asked my sweetie to fill the large pasta pot half full of water and put it in the solar oven. When I was cleaned up, I pulled out a dozen ears of surplus corn from the CSA to shuck. Once they were clean with the silks and a few worms removed, I broke them in half and added them to the pot in the solar oven. I had no idea how long it might take for them to cook since I usually only cook a couple at a time in a much smaller pot.

I checked on them in 20 minutes and they still tasted somewhat raw. After another 25 minutes, they were just right. I removed them from the water with tongs and added a new batch to the same water. Knowing my water temperature would have dropped from having the pot out for a while and that I'd have lost heat from the oven opening it up several times, I gave the second batch an hour. Perfect! I did one more batch to finish up all of the surplus corn.

I know an hour seems like it would overcook corn, but the water was not quite boiling and the corn was cold when it went in. Times with a solar oven differ quite a lot from stovetop or oven cooking. That's why testing food is important, and I sure enjoyed the excuse to eat half an ear of corn with each batch to test for doneness.

While each batch was cooking, I cut the kernels off the previous batch. I did a slight variation on the method I've posted here before. After watching Rick Bayless, of Mexico, One Plate at a Time, use a bundt pan to do his corn, I set a small glass jar in the middle of a big wide bowl. I set the widest end of the corn cob on top of the jar and cut carefully down the sides. This was not ideal as the top of the jar was a little too wide for the smaller ears and the glass was hard on the knife when I cut through too quickly. A bundt or angel food cake pan would work better but I own neither. In any case, I eventually got through all of the solar-cooked corn.

I still needed to freeze it somehow for the solar cooking demo at the CSA in a few weeks. I plan to use it in a cold salad with tomatoes, sweet pickled onions, and cucumber. I thought vacuum-packing it might risk crushing the corn kernels into mush so I spread half of them out in a very thick layer on a large baking sheet to freeze. Once frozen, I packed them into the bags for vacuum packing. That worked really well and lets me mark one more thing off the prep list for the demo.

The salad will need seasoning of some sort so I decided to try my hand at making basil vinegar with the surplus bag of basil I brought home Friday. Following a recipe in one of my food preservation cookbooks (found at a thrift store), I cleaned and dried the leaves and placed them in a glass jar. I used a wooden spoon to bruise them and then poured heated rice vinegar over the leaves. When it had cooled, I covered it and put it in the closet. Hopefully it will be ready by mid-June and will add a nice flavor to the vegetables.


While working in the kitchen, I noted there were several vegetables that would work well on pizza. I mentioned this to my sweetie but said there was no way I'd have the energy left to make dough. He volunteered, despite also being tired from using my compost siftings to do a whole bunch of container plantings. What a nice guy! (Note our resident lizard next to the bucket...)

While the dough was rising, I gathered the ingredients for toppings: a yellow tomato, a red tomato, garlic, sweet onion, eggplant, and mushrooms. Everything came from the CSA except the mushrooms. My sweetie sliced everything and grilled the eggplant, onion, garlic, and mushrooms. We talked about a sauce and decided to skip it in lieu of spreading my fake mozzarella cheese over the par baked crust and putting down a solid layer of tomato slices sprinkled with Italian seasoning and fresh basil.


Here is the pizza before baking. Isn't it gorgeous?

I was so exhausted last night, I could barely keep my eyes open until bedtime. I'm still physically tired today and have enjoyed a far less active schedule.