http://dandelionladyseeds.blogspot.com/2010/03/independence-days-update.html

Harvest- Turnips, lettuce, green (Egyptian) onions, broccoli leaves, eggs, and milk.

Preserve- nope

Waste not- Every year at butchering time I salt and save my hides intending to tan them, but it never happens. This week I tanned up three hides only using lye and egg yolks (and a lot of elbow grease). Like most of the self sufficiency skills I am amazed at how time consuming but simple it is. I had been putting it off for nothing! Considering I am the kind of person that would have no problem walking around in buckskins this is a really exciting step. Our goats provide us with milk, meat, wool (cashmere), tallow (which I use to make soap and candles), and now beautiful leather. Not to mention the manure and phosphorus (burned bones) for the garden. I’ve come to understand why in some cultures livestock equal wealth.

Want not- No, I spent the first part of the week digging in the garden and the rest of the week snowed in (gotta love spring in the mountains;)).

Building community- nope.

Eat the food- Turnip greens and spaetlze in chicken broth. Lots of salads. Though we’ve been eating a lot of garbage this week too.

Harvest—We picked some of the spring onions.

Preserve—I added 4 quarts of vegetable soup to the freezer. My sister brought me some more venison from the deer that my brother-in-law took this weekend. We added it to our stored meat in the freezer.

Waste Not/Reduce Waste— We didn’t do any better this week with our garbage as compared to last, which was a little disappointing. Yet the fact that we had the same amount of trash even with guests in town, our daughter’s birthday, and the prep work for her party I guess is a positive. We recycled what we could at her party at the church, and we used read plates, cups and silverware for most of the dishes. (We ran out of plates and had to switch over to paper plates. We didn’t have enough punch cups and used some paper cups.) The castle that my husband made out of refrigerator boxes was moved to the church basement after the party was over in hopes that the church can use it for the children’s program before recycling it.

We ate leftovers from the party on Saturday evening and Sunday to avoid food waste.

Want Not/Prep/Storage—I bought some teas, organic lollipops, and eco-friendly toothpaste from Frontier. I added some canned corn and green beans to the pantry.

Building Community Food Systems—I picked up local milk for our group of friends. I worked with a friend on a group order from Frontier co-op. I worked in the food pantry for a little while last week, and I have a lot more to do this week. I’ve been helping some with the annual FREE tamale and chili supper at church (March 20th, 5-7pm, all are welcome), and I’ll be doing some more shopping for that this week. The stewardship committee met this week at our home, and we planned a pancake breakfast for March 28th (again, all are welcome).

Eat the Food— The birthday party food was pretty special, and it was so nice to see so many people enjoying it. It pained me a little to use so much of our homemade jam on the cream cheese and strawberry jam sandwiches, but it made me happy to know that it was appreciated. We’ll have to ration the rest of our jam until the strawberries are in season again. The farmer who we have always bought the berries from, per info from friends, isn’t going to be growing them again this year. If anyone knows a farmer in the East TN area that either does not spray or has a only “if necessary” spray policy, I’d appreciate the info.

I used the last jar of the canned green beans this week. Having home canned green beans in the pantry has been such a nice treat. I hope to put up at least twice as much as I did this year.

Harvest something: lettuce, parsley, oregano, lemon thyme, basil, chillis, amaranth

Preserved something: made yogurt.

Waste not: usual composting, worm-farming & recycling. Borrowed large roasting pan from neighbour instead of buying extra stuff for the kitchen.

Want not: re-stocked bulk supplies of basmati rice, soy milk, soy sausages & chai tea (all were on sale). Made bulk pancake/muffin mix for pantry.

Build Community Food Systems: Last week’s veggie shop was from farmer-direct market.

Eat the food: More pancakes with home-made cherry jam, ‘pantry & garden’ dinner of homemade falafels, bulk-purchased flatbread & salad with garden lettuce & herbs.

http://spelledwithak.blogspot.com/2010/03/independence-days-year-3-week-2.html

Plant: 2 varieties of lettuce (Michelle and Anuenue), elecampane, and parsnips, all in a flat for later transplantation. A la Ecology Action, I am starting many root crops in flats this year. Lynne, I also use the half size flat plan from Ecology Action. My DH made several for me this year. They are great! I also re-seeded one lettuce variety and two pepper varieties that didn’t germinate well after 2+ weeks in their flats. I pricked-out 96 tomato seedlings and 10 nasturtium seedlings from their flats and planted them into roomier quarters, either 2″x2″ pots (for the 30 tomato plants for our garden) or 6-paks (for the extras I’ll give away or maybe sell).

Harvest: a few sorrel leaves for a quick snack.

Preserve: my DH made kimchi from (purchased) napa cabbage and Serrano hot peppers I’d grown, dried, and stored in the freezer.

Waste not: ate one of the stored butternut squashes, the one going a bit wrinkly, for lunch; it was as delicious as ever. Saved the seeds too, for later roasting and eating. Checked on the potatoes I’m storing for planting in the next few weeks; they are fine. Put the flats that had been on the heat mat in the basement out into the cold frame, as most nights are above freezing now (that could change next week, but I can bring them back inside for a few days if needed), and turned off the heat mat and lights. The seedlings grow better in sunlight anyway.

Want not: it looks like we will get some old bricks from a chimney being torn down at the house next door to our Zen Center. We can use these for various garden projects. Our neighbor had several bread knives, we had none, so she gave us one of hers. We in turn fed her dinner, as she got to our house just in time for that. We got the filter for our collected rainwater up and running, so we are now drinking and cooking with collected and filtered rainwater coming off the roof.

Build community food systems: I posted on Facebook about having extra seedlings. My DH posted about his newly made batch of kimchi.

Eat the food: stored Jerusalem artichokes from last fall made it into a stir-fry and a potato-choke-onion-carrot-cabbage saute. Last season’s frozen Ancho hot peppers also made it into various dishes. The week before last I made a pumpkin pie and pumpkin bread from one of the two remaining Lady Godiva pumpkins from last year’s crop. My variation on the pie is to use coconut milk in place of cream and cardamom in place of the usual pumpkin pie spices. Both the pie and the bread (made from the excess pie filling) got rave reviews. And, of course, I saved the seeds for later eating.