Farm Blog

Daniel and I went to our local grocery store for a pre-Food Challenge extravagance just before New Years. Slightly hungry, and shopping for the Seattle Global Peace Dance snack table, we splurged on some personal treats. I was eating my donut before we left the parking lot. Brushing sprinkles from my face, I said, “I will reclaim my tastebuds from you, Industrial Sugar!” Without added sugar in my diet, a carrot or a glass of milk tastes incredibly sweet. It’s a process of

“It’s the least we can do, a small way to give back,” says our friend Ana. She’s arranging to bring us a very non-Food-Challenge dinner before we embark on our year of hand-harvested food. “Nothing you have to pluck, harvest, or preserve. Now, what would you like to eat?” I tell her some of the foods we have been relishing. “Salmon, broccoli, corn chips and salsa, and pineapple. That sounds like items from one of those cooking shows!” Ana and her daughters come over to o

Cookie the Cow produces at least 50 pounds of--let's call it Cookie dough--every day. Before milking her in the morning and evening, I fill my little garden cart with pies and soaked straw from her stall. What to do with it all? Build a palace for it, that's what. In the Pacific Northwest, 30-plus inches of winter rains leach nutrients out of any compost left uncovered. I pride myself on keeping nutrients on the farm. We save our kitchen scraps, compost humanure, and tre

Behold a lovely lump of butter made from a half-gallon of Cookie the Cow's cream. Golden, eh? I kneaded it over the sink to clean the buttermilk out. This way the butter keeps longer. Gee, I I wouldn't want to waste any of the butter crumbs that fall in the sink! I had better pop them into my mouth. Oh. Except if the third butter crumb I pick up actually happens to be a flake of dirty cellulose sponge.

After the Mr. Corncakes debacle--let's just say that I will always ask permission before I post pictures of my beloved in his long johns ever again-- I wanted to stick with a safe, sweet... POP QUIZ OF CRUCIFERS! From the slideshow, how many autumn brassicas can you name? Aren't they gorgeous? Plants in the cabbage family are called brassicas, from the genus Brassica to which many common garden varieties belong. They are staples of the Pacific Northwest winter garden, sinc

My last post was wordy and intellectual, so this week has a much more corporeal corn theme. I give you a photoshoot of Mr. Corncakes grinding blue corn flour. Enjoy.