Cold weather and busy days. There’s so much I’d like to get done before the new year, but the short days run by so quickly, and I’m left wondering to myself how it’s so easy to stay up so late knitting by the fire when the nights are so long. There are lettuce and collard…
Tag: autumn
Holiday Madness
Everyone always tries to do too much for the holidays. Our version of that this year was an apparent fit of madness in which we decided to take advantage of the cool weather and slaughter a giganormous pig just before Christmas. Bee was actually our first Gloucester old spot to have piglets on the farm….
10 Things I’m Profoundly Grateful For, And Some All-Local Recipes To Make Your Holiday Extra Special
This year was a difficult beginning. Ethan had been out of work for months, and no opportunities for a living wage seemed to present themselves. At times it felt as though darkness had swallowed up the happy life we had, and we were adrift, every day heading towards an uncertain future. In the midst of…
All-Raw Eggnog
There was a raccoon raid on the chicken coop last night. We had seen the scoundrel lurking around the barn earlier in the evening, and in retrospect we should have dispatched him then. But everyone was tired and chilled, and Ethan felt really ill. Much later, long after the restless teenager had ceased to flick…
Radish Salad With Roselle Dressing
Radishes are one of my favorite things to grow, although they weren’t always. They are very easy and reliable, some years the only vegetable we could manage to grow in the early years of gardening, before we had cows and goats to enrich the land. I’ve pickled them, served them with butter, chopped the roots up for salad, …
Misty Mornings
In the summer time I always try to wake up early to finish the chores before the heat of the day sets in. This season the beauty of the early mornings has drawn me outside into the pearly air and dew-drenched grass. Mists have crept out of the forest and settled in the low places…
Callaloo Curry With Flatbread
The cold weather is here at last! Sweet-smelling woolens have been taken out of the cedar chest to air in the beautiful dry air, and we are enjoying the last of the summer garden’s offerings…. spinach-like amaranth greens. Amaranth is really more of a weed than a garden plant; indeed, the spiny, weedy amaranth torments…
Dried And Frozen Persimmon Treats
Glowing orange and as sweet as candy, the cultivated persimmons are ripe and abundant right now. They are one of the delicious treats early fall has to offer, along with sweet potatoes, roselle, and pumpkins. These cultivated persimmons seem huge and mild compared to the wild persimmons we have already enjoyed. This was the first year we…
Roselle Soda
The garden is behind. With Ethan out of town it has been hard to get things going when i had wanted to, but I’m not too worried. Those fall greens grow so quickly, and the roselle is in its fall glory, laden with deep red pods waiting to be picked. This, I know from experience,…
Sam’s Shrimp And Roselle Leaf Curry
Roselle is a large, beautiful hibiscus relative that bears fleshy red calyxes that can be cooked or dried and made into sauces, jellies, desserts, tea, etc. It is also called the Florida Cranberry for it’s cranberry-like flavor. I have almost always grown roselle in my garden. It becomes a large, beautiful plant, over my…
Wild Persimmon Tartlettes
The wild persimmons are ripe, hanging from the fall-tattered branches like small ornaments. Wild persimmons are, at best, a gamble. They are rather like how my brother’s girlfriend once described my mother’s cooking – either really good, or really bad. It all depends on the particular tree. Some trees bear fruit that will…
Toadstools And Fairy Rings 