Real (Fast) Food--a book review and a giveaway.

Trina and I grew up on adjacent homesteads on the same hill top in upstate New York. Even though our families were not on speaking terms for most of that time, our lives were somewhat similar. When her family first moved out to rural NY, they lived in a tepee while her dad built a log cabin. She learned to cook over a campfire outside, then graduated to a wood cook stove inside the cabin. As she got older Trina was in charge of her family's large vegetable garden and her family raised meat chickens. Today she is a busy home schooling mom with three small children.

I learned to cook on a open fire in the fireplace in our little log cabin. I did that almost everyday from the time I was seven or so until I left home at age 26. I learned to cook with home grown vegetables and beans from our garden, whole grains, and mostly wild game meats. I leaned to bake bread in a dutch oven over the open flames and in a cast iron pan propped up in front of the coals. I made cheese and butter and yogurt from the raw milk from our cows.

I believe I'm twelve in this photo...this is a "summer fire". Just a few sticks and a small flame. It is big enough to cook a stew or bake a casserole, but not large enough to make our little log cabin hot inside.



When I left home I continued, as much as I could, to cook whole foods from scratch. I make my own soup stocks, bake my own bread, grow a lot of my own vegetables and continue to cook mostly with whole grains and beans.

  I never really got into cooking anything from packages or mixes. To this day if you hand me a mix I get confused.  There is good and bad in that. It means we don't eat much processed food or food that isn't high in nutrients. On the flip side, it also means that when I'm completely overwhelmed and don't have time to cook, we eat a lot of spaghetti (one of the few things my husband knows how to cook!) and bananas and peanut butter sandwiches. With a busy nursing job that has a somewhat unpredictable schedule, and mountains of paperwork, there are often times that  I just don't have time to cook.

So when Trina wrote an e-cook book that includes many time saving methods for cooking real food, I was very interested to see how it would help me. After reading and using this book for a few months, I would recommend it almost anyone who has a busy life and still wants to prepare real food from scratch. It isn't just a cookbook. Real (Fast) Food includes lots of  recipes, but more importantly, shows you how to take a lot of the work out of cooking real food.

The two chapters I found especially helpful  for me and being able to toss together a quick real food meal  are Menu Planning Made Simple and Batch Cooking, She shows you how to plan your menus (and even includes a printable blank menu for you  to print and fill out so you can get started.) then shows you how to prepare ingredients in advance so you can quickly make a real meal when you are crunched for time.

In addition there are sections dedicated to breakfast, lunch, and dinner, as well as some healthy desert recipes. Trina shows you how to make whole wheat sandwich bread,  how to make whole wheat pasta, how to sprout your own grains then grind them for breads, how to make yogurt, how to make chicken and beef stock, as well as many other real food basics.

My big disappointment with the book is that vegetables barely get mentioned. When I cook, vegetables make up the base of most of my meals, and since they take the most time to prepare, when I am in a crunch for time they are the first thing to get pushed aside. I would have liked to see at least a chapter on ways to incorporate vegetables into real fast food cooking. 

The other thing is, Trina 's recipes tend  feature a lot of animal and dairy products. If you are a vegetarian or allergic to dairy, many of the recipes will not be helpful. However, you will still find her time saving tips and chapters and the chapters on breads and grains helpful. (Case in point--I am allergic to dairy, but still found her book very helpful in a lot of ways.)

One of the chapters I enjoyed a lot is her chapter on soaking quick breads and muffins. Soaking grains to make them easier to digest is something  I had been wanting to learn to do properly. And actually it fits right in with a busy schedule. I make a husband a batch of whole grain muffins every week so he has something to tuck in his lunch box for a healthy snack. I often mix up the batter in the evening and put it in the fridge to bake in the next day or two as I get time. Properly soaking the muffin batter takes no more time and you end up with an amazingly moist and tender muffin, even with whole wheat flour. I'm sold on it and would soak muffin batter for no other reason than to get a more delicious product.

Trina has graciously offered to give away a copy of her book to one of my blog readers. Here is how you can win a copy of  Real (Fast) Food:

1) If you already follow Dandelion Haven, or are a regular commenter, just leave a comment. If you aren't already a follower, please go to the right upper hand corner of this page and subscribe in one of the three convenient options, then come back and let me know that you did so.

2) For a second chance to win, go over and like the Real (Fast) Food facebook page, then come back and let me know that you did.

This giveway ends 10/18/11 at 9:00 pm. I must have a way to contact you to let you know that you have won.

Trina is also doing a giveway at her own blog, All That is Good. Go over then and enter for a chance to win, not only the book, but also a lovely handmade apron, and other prizes.

Linked to Farm Girl Friday. and The Barn Hop.

Improvised Herb Drying Rack

Today I harvested peppermint, apple mint, lemon balm and alfalfa from my herb garden and collected wild red raspberry leaves from the woods. I also picked some red clover flowers from the meadow surrounding my garden.

This is the third summer we have been in our new home and I finally have my life together enough to dry some herbs for winter teas and herbal remedies. My only problem was where to hang the leafy herbs to dry. My kitchen has a very low ceiling and the one room that would be suitable has way to much direct sunlight. I don't have a rack that would work. After puzzling this over for a while I spotted the broken stepladder that was by the tree house when we moved in. The perfect herb drying rack! I wiped it down and brought it inside.

Drying herbs for tea, cooking, and medicinal use is simple and easy.

Perennial leafy plants are usually best harvested just as the flower buds are starting to open. This is when herbs like mint, thyme, lemon balm, and yarrow, etc are at their peak for flavor and medicinal value. Gather flowers such as calendula and red clover when flowers are fully open but before they they start to fade.

1) Gather the herbs on a clear dry day after the dew has dried. Inspect the leaves for insects, dirt and dead leaves. I pick off any brown leaves, and remove any insects. If there is a small amount of dirt I usually just brush it off. If there is a large amount of dirt that doesn't easily brush off, I usually discard that portion of the plant. I try to avoid washing the leaves if I don't have to as hanging them up wet can lead to mold problems.

2) Bunch the herbs into airy bundles. Air needs to be able to flow to the center of each bundle, otherwise the inner leaves could mold. You should be able to see through your bundle when you hold it up.

3) Hang the bundles to dry in a dry well ventilated place that is out of direct sunlight. Direct sunlight causes the herbs to loose both color and flavor.

4) It will usually take 3-5 days for the herbs to dry. Drying time depends partly on humidity and partly on how much moisture is in the plants.

5) Once the herbs are dry, take them down and put them away as soon as you can. Though having bunches of dried herbs hanging in your kitchen may look pretty and decorative, heat, moisture, light, and air are all working on leaching the color and flavor out of the dried herbs. Also if they stay up too long they will start to collect dust. Gently strip the leaves or flowers off the stems (I usually do this into a large bowl or five gallon bucket). Discard any woody stems.

6) Store in air tight containers away from any heat sources. If you are using glass jars, place them in a dark cupboard or pantry. Heat and light are the enemies of flavor and color.  

This post is part of Garden Life at No Ordinary Homestead and the Barn Hop over at Homestead Revival.

The Kitchen Sink

We installed the vintage washboard sink last week. It isn't in quite as good condition as I had thought it was, but it is a huge improvement over what was there. Once we cleaned off the layers of paint and grime, there are some stains and pitting and it will need to eventually need to be refinished. But it is so much more practical and looks far better than the sink we took out (which really wasn't a bad sink--it was a standard double basin stainless steel sink). I must say, these double washboard sinks are the ultimate sinks for utility. It makes me wonder why no one has come up with a similar, but modern design. This is supposed to be a temporary installment. At some point we are going to put in more counter top and cabinets and the sink will be moved and permanently installed then.

We had another lovely sunset on January 2nd. This time of year we savor any bit of sunshine we can get since we don't see the sun that often.

The sky a few minutes after the sun set.

Antique sink

We found a Craig's List treasure today. A cast iron double basin washboard sink for only $100! It is really dirty, but otherwise appears to be in excellent condition, with no chips or scratches. Here is an example of the same sink in the same condition that sold for over $1,000. We had one in our previous home and I knew I wanted one for my new kitchen when we get around to remodeling.

Here are photos of the one we had in our previous home. Gosh, looking at the photos of the kitchen we left behind makes me want to get to work remodeling. The kitchen I have right now does not lend itself well to more than one person working in it at time.  But I am planning on saving up some more money before we start so we can pay cash for everything.

Of Apple Pie, Bad Odors, and Spider Webs....

For the past week my husband has been complaining that something smells bad in the kitchen. He swore it was coming from the fridge. Okay, so there was a decaying package of tofu in there (don't ask!). I removed and fed it to the chickens who went crazy with delight over it (you just never know what might tickle a chicken's taste buds). Apparently that didn't take care of the problem, though.

Terry continued to complain of the stench coming from the kitchen--and it was he was sure it was still coming from the fridge. He even went so far as going through every item in the fridge and throwing some things out, even though he kept telling me he couldn't find the one item that was causing the problem. I couldn't smell anything until yesterday evening. When I came in after being gone most of the day I was hit with this overwhelming foul odor as soon as I walked in the door. And it sure didn't seem like it was coming from the fridge. Of course I was too tired to do anything about it and even though Terry complained about it some more, he didn't seem motivated to do anything about it either. (He worked hard on fixing and cleaning my car all day so I'm not complaining--I'll take a clean car that runs any day over a clean house!)

This morning I got up and went off to work. On my way home I stopped a neighbor's house and we both agreed that we ought to get together more often. A spur of the moment decision was made to invite another neighbor that Terry and I hadn't met yet over to our house for pizza. She would bring the pizza and I would provide a clean house to hang out in (my house was a total mess when we made the arrangements, but I was planning to clean this weekend and what better motivation to clean the house the is there than to have people you've never met over?)

When I walked into the front door, that mysterious odor hit me stronger than ever. Oh, crap. I had totally forgot about it. If I hadn't forgot about it, I might not have been so quick to volunteer my house! Terry and I had a long discussion about possible sources. He still firmly believed it was the fridge. I was sure it was coming from the carpet and found a wet area on the carpet under the rug that we hadn't noticed before (both of us firmly deny any knowledge of how that area got wet!)  He declared the carpet didn't smell and I couldn't smell anything in the fridge.

In any case, we had two hours to get rid of the obnoxious smell before any arrived. I opened all the windows to let in some fresh air and  started cleaning out the fridge and Terry response, "What are you doing that for? I thought you said the carpet smells, not the fridge!"

"Well, you seem convinced it is the fridge, so I'm scrubbing it out!"

In the meantime he set about cleaning the large wet spot on the carpet, even though he still wasn't convinced it was the problem.

An hour later we had a sparkling clean deodorized fridge and still damp, but fresh smelling carpet. And just in case there was any remnants of odor left, I threw together an apple pie and put it in the oven to bake--while I quickly straightened up the rest of the house. My entire motivation for making the pie was its air freshening, odor masking effects. (It smells way better than artificial scents from a can and people don't wonder what it is that you are trying to cover up!). Plus, a homemade, from scratch pie always seems to be an effective way to impress upon  people that you are an amazing home maker (while in reality, right now in my life, it seems like nothing could be farther from the truth!)

Anyway, they loved the pie and the kitchen no longer seems to stink, so life is good. :) Now if only I could have enough energy to keep the place clean longer than a few days...

I will leave you with a lovely spiderweb I photographed a few days ago...maybe spiders have the right idea--make a home that lasts a day and make a new sparkling clean one each night, then at least you would never, ever have to vacumn....

Garlic scapes

I have to thank a fellow blogger for inspiring me to finally try eating  garlic scapes. Diana and her husband are starting a new career in their retirement as organic farmers, and one of their focuses is garlic.  In all the years my family has grown garlic, we never ate the scapes. Garlic scapes are the garlic plant's immature flower buds and stems. They need to be cut while they are still young so that the plant's energy will be channeled into growing large bulbs.

I've always enjoyed the interesting twisty stems, and even though we never ate them, I would always use some of the scapes in  flower arrangements to add a dramatic touch. When I finally tried eating them this week, I was pleasantly surprised at how mild the scapes are. Raw they are far more mild then garlic cloves and  when they are fully cooked, they taste more like green beans then garlic. They truly are a vegetable in their own right.  So far  I've added a very liberal amount to a stuffing for a roast chicken, sauteed them and mixed a good half cup of the sauteed scapes with  a serving of pasta, and  added the minced  raw scapes to salad. I also have a jar of herb vinegar steeping in the kitchen that is a combination of tarragon, basil, and garlic scapes.

Garlic scapes are only available for a few weeks out of the year. If you are so fortunate as to have garlic growing in your garden or if you see them at your local farmer's market, I would encourage you to give them a try. Check out Diana's blog for recipes. My food processor decided to die yesterday, but when I get a new one (hopefully  in the next couple of days), I am most definitely going to try the garlic scape pesto.

This year's harvest of garlic scapes.

Upstairs Kitchen

Two views from the living room:


And then looking into the living room:

It is stocked with dishes and cookware and ready for use. :)

Home Sweet Home

It is good to wake up in the morning and be HOME. I never felt at home during those 9 years I lived in town. When we closed on our new land back in July, it wasn't excitement I felt. It was a sense of deep peace and relief. I finally had a HOME. Not that the home we had in Ann Arbor wasn't nice place to live. We had a nice little house with a big beautiful kitchen and a half acre lot that I turned into flower and vegetable gardens. It was a place that a lot of people would have loved to live. And I did truly appreciate that we lived in a quiet place in town and had a big lot and was able to grow a big garden and raise my little flock of (illegal) hens. If you had to live in town, Ann Arbor was certainly the town to live in. But my heart was not at home there, and I knew it would never be home there. I felt crowded in and claustrophobic and as if I could barely breathe. My heart ached for space and sky, woods and stars. And hills. My heart is at home here, though I know a part of me will always be ache for the hills of upstate New York. But at least I have a few little hills on my 13 acres!

Wood smoke from the chimney on a chilly November morning.


The tree house woods.

The gate to the garden meadow.


My kitchen. This is going to get some major remodeling, hopefully sooner then later. The house has two kitchens. We are living downstairs (it is actually a walkout basement). The downstairs has the nicer bedroom and view, this tiny kitchen, and a tiny bathroom. It also has the woodstove, which was the detemining factor in which level we wanted to live in at least for this winter. (Well that and the fact that the bedroom was a lot nicer then the two bedrooms upstairs!). The kitchen upstairs is bigger and actually nicer, but is very dark and narrow and would be much harder to remodel because of the way the house is laid out. This one at least has a sense of coziness, and should be quite nice when we are done with it.

The pantry. I'm still working on getting it organized.


Because it is a bi-level, the house has some identity issues. This is really the front of the house, and if we were living in the upstairs this, this would be the front door.

But since we are living in the in the walk out basement, the back of the house is the front of the house for us. This can get really confusing when Terry and I are trying to talk to each other about the front yard and the back yard!

We still haven't given our little home and farm a name. I will probably have to live through all the seasons here before I come up with the right name, but I am open to suggestions!

My kitchen

Everyone keeps asking me if I will miss my gardens. "You've put so much work into them, it must be hard to leave." Honestly, I can't wait to get out into the country and be able to breathe. Having grown up on 90 acres in practically the middle of nowhere, I feel claustrophobic with houses on every side. I always knew this place was temporary and even though I put a lot of work into the gardens, I knew at some point I would be walking away from them.

It looks like that time might be very soon. Our offer on the 13 acres was accepted yesterday. I signed the paperwork today and got my preapproval letter for the loan. Of course nothing is set in stone at this point, our offer was contingent on our house selling. We have to see if that will happen. But there has been a lot of interest. Yesterday was the first day we had showings and 3 couples came. Today two couples came--but one of them came back three times. How's that for interest! Tomorrow there are more people coming to see the house.

I won't miss my gardens because I will have plenty of opportunities for planting lots more. And the way the house and land is situated at the new place, it will lend itself beautifully to landscaping. I am hoping I will be able to take starts of some of my favorite plants with me. I'm not sure if that will be able to happen, and I am okay with it if it doesn't. I know how to use craig's list and get more for trade or free!

What I will miss is my beautiful kitchen. The kitchen in the house we put the offer on is decent, but is nothing like the one Terry remodeled for me. With my work as a visiting nurse I get to see the insides of lots of homes-from the poorest of the poor to million dollar houses. I don't see many kitchens I love. I've come to realize that this is a spectacular kitchen, especially given that the house is only 1,200 square feet.

Antique washboard sink. I want to take it with me! And the window looks out into the back yard so you can watch the chickens and rabbits and enjoy the flowers and garden while you work.

Oak cabinets, a double convection oven, a big island, and a stainless steel cooktop. Once you've baked in a convection oven, you never want to go back to a regular oven. The difference is amazing.

Tile floor. Terry and I put that in together. It was one of our first projects together. And yes, that is a second sink in the island. How do people live with only one sink? I guess I will have to find out...

I'm so in love with this tile backsplash. This was put in 2 days ago as we are franticly getting all the odds and ends done to get the house ready for showing. I accidently bought the wrong tile, but it turned out to be a blessed mistake. It goes so perfectly with my phlatzgraff stoneware. And the tile is actually real cut stone, it is not ceramic. I want the exact same thing in my new kitchen! And that is granite counter top. I want that in my new kitchen, too.

This is a view of the kitchen from the living room. That is a soapstone wood stoves, one of the very best woodstoves money can buy. (We are planning on taking that with us, so that will be in our new house.)

I will miss my kitchen very, very much.

Another set of Pflatzgraff...

So yesterday I was looking through Craig's List and lo and behold, there was another set of Folk Art Pflatzgraff dishes....this time some different pieces (including the bigger bowls Terry said he needed for his ice cream). Of course I instantly e-mailed the seller and told her I had to have them.

This was a set of nine place settings and it did cost a bit more than the first set ($100 instead of $80), but I'm thrilled because now it won't matter so much if we break some. I'll store the extras in the basement and bring up replacements as needed.

I wonder, just how often does the same set of dishes come up on Craig's list twice in the same week?

The perfect everyday dishes

Yay! I finally found a set of every day dishes that I really love. These are pfaltzgraff dishes "Folk art" pattern. I bought the set on Craigs list for only $80. There are some cracks and chips, but not counting those, there are 11 complete place settings. It is so warm and cozy and antique looking. The best part is, even though they are a retired pattern, replacements aren't expensive as you might think they would be, so I will actually be able to afford to replace some pieces. Plus, Terry has informed me we need to get some bigger bowls. I love the cute little soup bowls, but Terry took one look at them and said, "You can't even get a full serving of ice cream in those." (I guess his definition of a serving of ice cream is somewhat different than my definition...), anyway, it will give me an excuse to find some larger soup bowls on ebay. And I need to find a serving bowl...