Posts from the “Sustainable Life” Category

Plotting. I mean Planning.

Posted on March 27, 2014

There are things you do in the winter to keep from going bonkers that it has been below zero for five days in a row and there are an estimated 14 more inches of snow on the way.  One of them is to dream about how lovingly you will mulch your dirt. Oh, just me then?  Ok. And then there’s plot planning.  Seth and I were late on this, but it doesn’t really matter so long as you get it done before seeding time.  And even then, you can futz with things.  Which is good, because frankly my plot plan has already changed from this version. The beds are all to scale.  Not so much the paths, and I couldn’t be arsed to draw…

Categories: Garden News

Garlic Crusted Pork Loin

Posted on February 1, 2014

You ever have one of those weeks where you’re too busy to think? Because you’re having guests over tomorrow, and the bathroom sink is draining slow, and the washing machine is out of commission so the laundry is piling up, and you have to update the dog’s rabies vaccine before your next encounter with Animal Control? This is a good recipe for that week. It looks impressive, tastes great, and you can throw it in the oven and forget about it while you turbo-plunge the bathroom sink before the guests arrive. It’s good for non guest weeks as well. I’ve been making it twice a month all winter. I roast it some dim afternoon, and then I stand there and pick the garlic crust…

Categories: Food

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Shoveling Shit

Posted on December 28, 2013

Winter Solstice is our holiday.  Seth and I celebrate with a hike or snowshoeing, homemade gifts, and lighting candles.  We skip Christmas except to chase my five nephews around a noisy house, and then we got to bed early for the New Year.  It’s an exciting life, what can I say? This year was a little different.  We thought maybe a hike for the Solstice, except someone in the house has no hiking boots, only winter boots with a 2″ heel.  Seriously — who sells winter boots with a heel?  More importantly, who buys them? (They were a gift.) To top it off, I was still hoping to pile manure onto the garden beds on one of my free days.  The manure is free for…

Categories: Garden News

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Compost Reconnaissamce

Posted on November 29, 2013

In a perfect world, I would have nabbed the compost from my backyard and moved it to the garden before we moved. It would have been a nice end to the growing season, and then we I could have spent moving day not thinking about how my beautiful compost was going to waste. Of course in a perfect world, I would also be eating supper right now instead of sitting next to the oven listening to supper roast. Sometimes things don’t always turn out like you plan. For example, we moved to the next town over, to a building without a backyard for our compost bin. We were busy the days leading up to moving day, thanks to my new job and to Seth’s…

Categories: Garden News

Garden in Progress

Posted on November 23, 2013

Took to the dog to the garden this morning to see what was left, and the answer is: not much.  I began prepping the beds for the winter by pulling up all the vegetable matter left.  Some schools of thought say to leave it to decompose.  Some say remove it to a compost pile.  I’m still deciding. The next step is to lay down multiple sheets of newspaper over each bed and then pile on manure.  The theory is this will smother the weeds, prevent nutrient losses in the soil, and break down into compost over the winter.  Come spring, I should have ready beds! If you look closely in the bed all the way to the left, you can see a profusion of…

Categories: Garden News

Drat

Posted on November 10, 2013

I missed the deadline for the Cornell Beginning Farmers online course registration for their fall course.  To be fair, Seth’s father passed away, I started a new job, and we moved to a new apartment — all in the time-span of three months.  Things have been hectic.  Maybe that’s an understatement. We’re settling down now, and I have a new plan: sign up for the class that starts in January.  Yes!  In the meantime, I sense lots of cooking, some bike riding, and plenty of dog walks in my future.

Categories: Oops

Day 3 of the Great Pickle Experiment

Posted on August 7, 2013

I heard that lacto-fermented cucumber pickles are a sight harder to make than lacto-fermented sauerkraut.  But I didn’t grow any cabbage this season. I grew cucumbers.  And one of the things they don’t tell newbie gardeners is that cucumbers appear in the blink of an eye.  One minute I had spiny lumps resembling overgrown caterpillars, and the next thing I knew, there were six cucumbers wider around than my wrist. I stole a grape leaf from a neighbors garden and put it in a jar with salt, water, mustard seed, garlic, dill, and the cucumbers.  And then I waited.  I have bad luck with lacto-fermentation in that I need mold-free food (surprise!), so I’m trying a method where I fill a little plastic bag…

Categories: Food

The neighbors are abuzz

Posted on August 6, 2013

What we have here, ladies and gentlemen, is a wasp nest the size of a football — only you wouldn’t want to play football with this because it is humming with activity. And it’s growing a mere four feet away from my tomato bed. Whenever I prune the tomatoes closest to this thing, wasps buzz around in dismay. What are you doing? Those are OUR tomatoes! I don’t think so, my six-legged friends. But I’m too scared — er, I mean smart — to try to reason with them, and instead I steer clear. The wasps live on the other side of my neighbor’s garden fence, nestled along the edge of his towering weed bed tucked behind the hundreds of cloves of garlic. I’m…

Categories: Pests

Public Enemy No. 1

Posted on July 29, 2013

This.  This is what’s causing our bean plants to die a painful death.  I have no idea what these are, but they’re eating my leaves down to the veins. Across the garden path, our neighbors plucked a leaf off their own beans and showed us how they spray with a mixture of dishsoap and water.  Potato beetles, they said, but I’m not so sure.  My frantic Googling suggests a Mexican Bean Beetle.  Whatever the case, our neighbors across the way weren’t too concerned.  Their bean plants are six and seven feet tall with fat bean pods despite the lacy leaves.  I try not to be jealous.  Seth, I think, feels it worse than I do.  It’s hard not to be envious in a community…

Categories: Pests