Hurray for kale!

Who doesn't love kale?! We love it, and this probably won't be the last time I extol its virtues. Before we moved across campus on Monday, my fridge was overflowing with kale. We had to use it before we moved. I want to share our two favorite recipes: marinated kale salad and kale chips.

Marinated kale salad:
1. Rinse a bunch of kale and pat it dry. Tear the leaves into bite-sized pieces over a bowl with a lid.
2. Drizzle olive oil and balsamic vinegar over the leaves. Sprinkle with salt (sea salt tastes best) and pepper to taste.
3. Add a teaspoon or two of sweetener: agave or maple syrup tastes delicious.
4. Throw in a handful of raisins.
5. Toss the ingredients together with forks or your hands.
6. Taste to decide if you like the flavor. Often I will have to add more vinegar, salt, or pepper based on taste.
7. Put the lid on and let it marinate in the fridge overnight and eat for lunch or dinner the next day. You can also leave it on the counter for an hour or two and serve it after tossing a couple more times.

Kale chips:
1. Preheat over to 375 degrees.
2. Rinse a bunch of kale and pat it dry. Tear the leaves into bite-sized pieces over a bowl.
3. Drizzle a tablespoon of olive oil over the kale.
4. Sprinkle lightly with sea salt.
5. Toss the kale with your hands making sure the oil gets all over the surfaces of the kale pieces.
6. Lay the pieces of kale out onto baking sheet (you may need two sheets or you can eat the raw kale leftovers as is).
7. Bake for about 8 minutes or until crisp but not burned.

From now on when anyone tells me they don't like kale, I am going to suggest they try these two recipes and get back to me.

*Kale tidbit: Plant your own--it's perfect in a vegetable garden and is a beautiful addition to a flower garden. If you keep harvesting leaves from the outside of the plant, it will keep growing for a long time!

Blueberry deliciousness...

I'm totally hot for blueberries--oh wait, that might be because it is still 84 degrees in my living room at 11:30 at night. But still, if you could only taste the blueberry jam I made today, you would understand!

I made up a recipe for corn-free freezer jam. It's probably unwise to tell the county extension office, and please don't say you heard it from me...but I think it is safe from deadly germs because it will be in the freezer. Heat up 8 cups of local organic blueberries and 3 cups of (seriously un-local) organic evaporated cane sugar until they seem like they will be thick enough to spread on a sandwich after the jam hangs out for a few minutes. I can't describe this technique called sheeting, yet, (i.e. when it's thick enough to put it into the jars), but there seems to be a lot more leeway here than with strawberries. A longer window, maybe. (I'll work on a description for next week.) The batch should make 5 half-pint jars.

Just an aside, don't waste your time dehydrating blueberries. Not so great. Instead, buy a melon and try drying that! Although I have never tried it, my friend JD, a reliable source, says it is delicious. Some of you even live in places where the heat rages for months and you can actually buy local melons or even grow your own. Big smiles...

Remember dehydration! (Not the newest diet plan, but a food preservation tip)

Don't forget about dehydration! It's energy-efficient and saves space.

A good dehydrator is a worthwhile expense. You can use it for years, and it is versatile. Dehydrating saves space if you live in an apartment or small place. It is also a low-energy way to preserve; the dehydrator uses very little electricity. A dehydrator skirts the need for a big freezer. It also takes less TIME than canning. The dehydrator can be left alone to do its work while you are doing other chores or working. So buy, borrow, and share your dehydrator. Start with fruit! Later, we can explore other crazy possibilities...

RECIPE FOR DEHYDRATING STRAWBERRIES:
Clean, cut off the tops, slice into half-inch pieces and place on the dehydrator sheets. Dehydrate at 130 degrees for about 8 hours. Check them after 4 hours and 6 hours if you can. When they are dry, but still pliable, put them in a glass jar with a lid to store.

Tip: Put the end pieces of the strawberry cut-side up to make dried strawberry removal from the tray easier.

Food Preservation Posts Coming Soon

We're up to our eyeballs in fresh fruits and veggies. (Ok, this is not quite yet true in New Hampshire, but almost.) Let's start preserving...and drying...and freezing. One sure way to find local in the winter is to look in your own pantry (or basement). If you've prepared in July, you'll have much luck in January.

Who's the Dum Dum here?

Apparently I find it quite hard to strive for a more just life, keep my sons in one piece, become more "food secure," AND blog about it. Since I don't have much of a readership (sorry, Mom), I'm not going to feel too guilty...

Especially because I have built a chicken coop since I last wrote--almost all by myself. Thankfully my neighbor is not afraid of chicken wire! She led us safely through that dark tunnel of high school farm memories.

Neither of my children died tragically during the construction, but all of us unraveled as our two found it easy to sneak candy with CORN SYRUP while Mom was wielding the drill. (Should have told the bank a long time ago: No Dum Dums for us! Or at least hidden them before I had a chance to throw them away!)

The children are getting wiser. B read the New Yorker cartoons while I did the dishes tonight. (Not that he laughed. Has he caught on already?) Seriously, I have had to manage my increased craving of farming adventures with my increased need to be a more creative and diligent parent. (I actually thought I was doing pretty well. Can't rest on those laurels!)

So we spent the last few weeks with a very aggressive, angry 5 year old hopped up on corn syrup. Bad news and horribly depressing, but OVER til next time. One week after the last DUMDUM, we have our lovely, loving child back.

The coop still needs a door.

Thought of the Day: Home Economics 101

Did you have Home Ec. in high school? I’m beginning to think that we have done/are doing a disservice to most of our kids and families by not teaching everyone Home Economics. True Home Economics: how to run the economy of the home. How to make, cook, grow, buy, contribute and build community relationships—things that make a healthy, ethical (more local) economy possible.

Did we feminists throw the baby out with the bath water by arguing that we women didn’t need to know these things? We would “work,” of course, and pay other people to tend to our basic needs. What happens when we can’t work, or choose to raise a family and work within the home economy? Well, we have to educate ourselves.

Kitchen Freedom: I love the Vita-Mix!

I have missed posting, but I have had some other writing that was actually for a deadline! Not just for my enjoyment and/or your two minutes of distraction.

What I have been dying to write is an ode to my new vita-mix! I have been wanting this super-blender for several years, and since I'm a little frugal I have only now decided that I can't live without it.

What surprises me most (besides the way it beautifully shreds a coconut) is how free I feel with it in my kitchen. I know longer have to base my juice/coconut milk/nut butter choices on which inane supplier has the least precentage of unlabeled corn processing agents in its products! :)

Now, I'm like, who cares! I bought a bag of organic lemons, scrubbed the skins with baking soda, peeled them, dropped them into the vitamix with some water, agave, and ice cubes, and LEMONADE! My son actually proclaimed me the best chef ever, because I made him delicious lemonade. Go figure! He doesn't even know how much fiber and other goodness he was getting, because the vitamix is so powerful it basically turns the whole lemon into a slightly pulpy liquid.

I will rave about this machine and what it can do another time, I guarantee!

Until then,

Lemonade:
1 and 1/2 peeled lemons
3 cups of water
1 cup of ice
1/4 cup agave nectar

Blend on high for 30 seconds (in a vitamix if you decide you don't need to buy a working dvd player or a modern tv!). I don't know about other blenders. My practically defunct cuisinart would just make chunky lemon soup out of this mixture.