Can you grow your own food and eat it too?

Something has just occurred to me today. I cannot do everything. I’ve been involved in my local church, home raising my children, coupon shopping for the things I can’t grow (yet, I tell myself), trying to have a social life, trying to please my family, trying to grow more and more of our own food, trying to cook from scratch. Yesterday I spent most of my day tending baby chicks (layers-to-be), and planting our summer garden. Somehow in between all of that I changed a few diapers and parented my children.

But for the past two days, we’ve eaten almost no homegrown food, in fact we ate chicken nuggets and tater tots for dinner! My husband and kids were thrilled to eat the factory food, but I felt like a failure as a grower-cook. I really need to pace myself so that once I’m done with the work in the garden, I still have the energy to cook real, quality meals for my family instead of relying on the processed foods I’m trying to renounce through my efforts in the garden.

Planting Time

It's been a busy pre-spring!
An unusually warm and sunny February inspired me to plant peas in the tiny area of the garden not currently being used as chicken pasture. The little pea seedlings are now growing well. I also lined the outside of the chicken fence with rotted hay bales, added a few inches of potting soil to the top of the bales, and planted lettuce there. The warmth from the composting bales seems to be giving the little seedlings a boost.
Two days ago we purchased eight infant chickens and brought them to live in our dining room for the next two months! The children are delighted, the husband is not. But we love eggs and therefore need more chickens!
Now it's already the middle of March and planting time is in full swing. Time to get turnips, carrots, beets and radishes in the ground. I could have plants in the ground now if I'd started them inside in pots 6 weeks ago. But better late than never, so my big plan for tomorrow is to start my broccoli, cauliflower, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, squash and melons in repurposed plastic strawberry containers filled from the bottom up with old hay, manure, coffee grounds (for tomatoes and peppers only), and store-bought seed starting mix. I'm going to stack the containers in the dining room till they sprout, and then keep them outside during the day to get sun, and bring them in at night to keep them warm.
Dreaming of wagonloads of fresh produce and an abundance of orange-yolked eggs!

Summer Garden Dinner

It's the greatest time of year in the kitchen garden, with an abundance of sweet corn, green beans, tomatoes, cucumbers, summer squashes.... we even had some watermelon this year! In the past I've enjoyed my homegrown vegetables alongside sandwiches, steak, chicken, potatoes, rice, etc. But it suddenly occurred to me that with such abundance in the garden, supplementation with grains and meat was completely unnecessary. After eating this meal, which took 10 minutes to prepare, I felt completely satisfied and energized. The 2 corns on the cob (what exactly is the plural form of "corn on the cob", anyway?), 1 cup of green beans, 2 Roma tomatoes, 1 pear tomato, and one lemon cucumber provided a 10 grams of protein, over 70% of the RDA for vitamin A, and over 100% of the RDA for vitamin C! Sound like a balanced meal?

Cloudy Spring Day Roasted Taters and Veggies

Radishes grow quickly, so they're the perfect way to get food coming out of a new garden quickly. So, getting a late start planting in the garden at my new home, I planted them, despite the fact that no one in my house really likes them. Now that they are ready to eat, what do I actually do with them?
I'd never thought of cooking radishes, but it turns out to be a great way to rid the radish of that radishy flavor that I don't like!

So here's my recipe, a quick and easy dinner or hearty lunch for a cloudy day.
4-6 Russet potatoes
10-12 radishes (or more, but that's all I had)
broccoli florets and stems (I only had a few, more would have been better, use your judgment)
olive oil
salt, pepper, seasonings of your choice


Cut everything into bite size-pieces. Place in baking pan. Drizzle with olive oil. Salt and season to taste. Bake at 375F for 35 minutes or until potatoes are tender.

GMOs

Genetically modified organisms haven't made the mainstream news lately, but they've been on my mind since I saw the bags of herbicide ready corn in the back of my dad's truck, destined to be planted and then doused with glyphosate in my dad's field uphill from the creek. I'd heard of GMO's -organisms altered with DNA from other organisms (usually bacteria)- but didn't realize how prevalent they are until a few weeks ago when I saw those seed bags. The label on the bag claimed it contained "Miracles of Science." An oxymoron since modern science denies the possibility of miracles. By the miracle of science, these agriscience companies have made a seed which you must purchase from them every year so that you can spray on it a chemical that we will also sell you, which will wipe out all plants but the ones they sell. Stripping the farmer of independence, placing another barrier between the farmer and the ecosystem.
I have since learned that nearly all corn and soybeans grown in the US are from GM seeds.
How can individuals maintain freedom if the food is controlled by a few powerful corporations? The only way to maintain freedom is to support local, sustainable growers and grow your own.

Canning Tomato Sauce

What could be more satisfying than making your own tomato sauce from fresh, organic, local tomatoes, and preserving it to use all winter? The pride of eating local, being more self-sufficient,avoiding pesticides and genetically modified food..... Well, after today, I can think of several thousand things I'd rather do. But perhaps I learned some things to make this work better if I do it again...

Yesterday I spent $30 on 15 pounds of tomatoes from a market gardener and the Farmer's Market and picked about another 5 pounds from my own plants. I used several types of tomatoes. Here's what some of them looked like:

The next morning, after my coffee, I put my jars in the dishwasher, set up my SauceMaster, and began rinsing tomatoes, cutting them, and putting them in my enormous stockpot.
I started heating them to a boil by about 9:30. It wasn't easy keeping them at the right temperature so that they would simmer down but not scald. I waited and stirred and waited and stirred. I read my kids some books. I stirred. I worked on math with my 6 year old. I stirred. I worked on reading with my 4 year old. I stirred. I put my . I stirred. After several hours, I figured it must be cooked down enough to put into the sauce master.




"Time to crank!" I called to the two kids who were still awake. Having been waiting all day to turn the crank on the SauceMaster, they came running. When the crank was turned, the sauce came out like water. I had to dump it back in the pot, cook it down some more. Then we sauced the whole batch, but I decided it was still too thin, and had to cook it down some more.

The kids went out to play with the neighbors when they arrived on the school bus. I cooked the sauce down some more.
Finally, it got down to the right consistency, and I had enough to fill 7 pint jars. That's it. $30. 20 pounds of tomatoes. Seven measly little jars. Enough to make seven batches of spaghetti. For 20 pounds of tomatoes, cooked for six hours made seven little jars.

Simple Summer

Finally, now that it's almost over, summer has arrived. The beans, climbing up stalks of corn, have finally produced enough for me to eat. The cherry tomatoes just keep coming. We've been enjoying fresh cucumbers. The zucchini has not been as prolific as usual, but satisfies our needs. We had one solitary cantaloupe, about the size of a softball, which we split into 8 slices to share amongst our family and with the visiting neighbor kids. It's finally that time of year where I can literally eat out of the garden all day long.