Harvest something: found a few more green tomatoes, lots of full sized christmas radishes (round like turnips, green with a red center), asian greens, beet greens, broccoli raab, and the last few okra pods (for seed)

Preserve something: made applesauce, and kim chi (with asian greens and christmas radishes, started some apple vinegar from the apple peelings and cores.. also froze some beet greens.

Waste Not: collected more brewery waste for composting

Want Not: picked up 4 bu potatoes and a box of beets for the root cellar. I stored the beets in sand in the root cellar. I ordered more oats. I’m trying to figure out a way to store the potatoes so that critters won’t get into them. I don’t think the root cellar is critter proof.

Build Community Food Systems: shared kombucha starter with a friend.

Eat the Food: One morning, i turned the oatmeal into a sweet potato pudding – cooked on the stove top (oats, raisons, toasted sunflower, mashed sweet potato, cinnamon, and an egg mixed in while it cooked over a gentle flame). I used a flame spreader , but double boiler would work too. I’ve been eating small amounts of the sauerkrauts, fermented mexican gherkins and fermented pickled green tomatoes at almost every meal. We eat sweet potatoes and white potatoes at several meals each week. – very satisfying. Also, lots of greens from the garden.

The cole family starts by rights should have died but they look just fine and much like the volunteers coming up here and there. I’m hoping that the starts mostly over winter and start growing again in the spring. I have some greenhouse plastic to cover them during the winter.

Finally got most of the tomatoes either canned or in the jam pot.

We’re still eating our own potatoes. I dug up a bunch and served a baked Navajo Blue squash from the garden with steamed potatoes and home made ketchup.

I don’t know if this counts in the community category, but I called in some markers from last winter’s handouts of first aid and beans. My car died right before I had to get a class 100 miles away and I borrowed one. Which is how I showed up for a class on sustainable urban design in a fully pimped out 1986 Cadillac.

Shira in Bellingham, WA

Highlight: Church bazaar season has started again!

Harvest something: spring onions, purslane, mixed lettuce, basil, mint, corn salad, (under ripe but hot) chillis. Beer!

Preserve Something: Kim chi, peach salsa.

Prep & Storage: Restocked dried beans. Cooked & froze fava beans for use over the next couple of weeks. Ordered a year’s supply of multivitamins.

Reduce Waste: Purchased a big mixed bag of seeds at a friend’s garage sale. Not sure how many will germinate, but if any do, it’ll be fine. Usual composting & recycling.

Eat the Food: First ever attempt at home-made seitan (from the Veganomicon recipe). Also first ever attempt at Robin Robertson’s recipe for slow-cooked BBQ seitan & veggies. The slowcooker recipe was a little underseasoned for my taste, but the seitan was a great success. Made chickpea cutlets again (yum) topped with the little bit of peach salsa leftover from bottling. Peach crumble for dessert.

Build Community Food Systems: Invited 2 household of friends (who are vegan-friendly & love gardening, & live within walking distance) to dinner – phase one of my plan to develop a dinner co-op.

Harvest—A handful of cherry tomatoes, 4 or 5 green beans, 8 or so red potatoes, a few turnip greens, onions.

Preserve—Saved okra and pole bean seeds. Froze chopped green onions.

Reduce Waste—We continue our energy reduction, recycling, and composting efforts. I composted the egg shells, coffee grounds, and banana peels left over from preparation of the men’s breakfast at church. One coy older man thought he would kid with me, “So, Gabrielle do you recycle banana peels?” I said, “Yes, I have a compost bucket right here.” All of the other men laughed and laughed at him because he turned red and didn’t have a come-back. He had never thought of “recycling” banana peels.

I helped with our church bazaar and rummage sale. I picked up a few homemade items from the bazaar section for gifts—bows, hats, and gloves. I donated some rice bags to the sale that I had made. From the rummage sale section we bought a puzzle, puzzle keeper, and some never used Christmas coloring books that will be either advent gifts or go in our daughter’s stocking. I picked up a water bath canner for a friend and another gift that shall remain nameless for a friend who reads this blog.

Prep/Storage—I stocked up on a lot of organics—butter, crackers, raisins, and cereal. The bulk order of organic maple syrup arrived this week. Hubby completed the first step in the soda making process. I pulled the weeds that have needed to be removed for weeks (ok, ok, months). I pulled down almost all of the tomato cages, leaving only the cherry tomatoes that are still fruiting. I pulled the bamboo poles from the beans and tidied up the gardens.

I checked all of our stores this week. The outside of a couple of cans needed cleaned and I took that as an incentive to completely rearrange one of the main food pantries downstairs. It is so nice to see almost all of my canning in one place—the beautiful peaches, beets, green beans, preserves of all types, tomatoes and pears make me smile whenever I look at them (not to mention when I eat them!).

Building Community Food Systems—I made up some more boxes for the food pantry. This year the church will be making up boxes with holiday food items inside, and I’ll be making a handout with some recipes to include in each. I bought a dozen eggs from a friend who has chickens. I visited a local farmers market to stock up on sweet potatoes for the winter and bought some for a friend. Picked up local milk for our small milk co-op. I helped organize the church Bonfire, Hayride and Wienie Roast. It was nice to see many people from the community join us this year. I made an effort to use the items we already had rather than purchasing something new. We also recycled at the event. My article entitled Eat Better for Less was released this week as part of the November issue of the Knoxmoms.com magazine.

I will be picking up over 80 pounds of pecans this week. They are within the 200 mile definition of local and are this year’s crop. The farmers in Georgia are ones we have been working with for years, and it always feels good to support them. The bulk buy is a fundraiser for an organization with which I belong and is always a big hit with friends.

Eat the Food—I’d say that my husband was the most excited about the Shepherd’s Pie this week. The potatoes, onions, garlic, and lamb were either grown by us or bought from local farmers. My daughter’s favorite was probably the persimmon muffins I made last night. The persimmons my family from Texas brought us were ultra-ripe and ready for use. I wanted to try something different, so I morphed about 4 recipes together. They turned out fantastic! The blueberries and cream were my favorite this week. They were ones we picked earlier in the year and had frozen. I took a little sour cream, sweetened it with a bit of rapadura, crumbled some leftover homemade graham crackers, and topped the berries with the mixture. They were yummy!

Plant: mulched new bluberry plants I planted 2-weeks ago. Also made cages to protect them from deer and rabbits this winter. Used old tomato cages, bird netting, and clothes pins. Worked great.

Began planning gardens for next year, including ordering seeds, layout in Excel.

Harvest: none

Waste: got new 3-bin compost system, got neighbors to fill it with their leaves, since the highschool boys raking our yard just didn’t get it, and hauled our leaves away. Compsted kitchen veggie scraps.

Prep: made loads of octoberfest beer mustard for holiday gifts; seven 8-oz jars cranberry chutney, and 7-pints and 1 8-oz jar of curried apple chutney which is more like raisin chutney (not really enough apples in there, since it was supposed to make 8 pints, but diddn’t). Have more apples and cranberries to can (waiting in fridge).
Stocked up on iodized salt, canning salt, baking powder & soda, wine vinegars

Build: none

Eat: ate locally grown buffalo & veggies.