From Lisa Barnes

My children’s preschool is revamping their snack offerings to the kids. They weren’t doing a poor job before, but thankfully there is an interest and effort in making improvements and of course getting the best value for the children’s health and the school’s money.

I helped the director review menu items and vendors to provide a variety of fresh, healthy foods including hummus, whole wheat crackers, veggies and dips, edamame, yogurt etc…  For St. Patrick’s Day the school was planning a green menu for snacktime and asked me to make my green hummus. I of course said I’d be happy to. I packed each container for the 4 classes: the mouse class (age 2), the rabbits (age 3), the monkeys (age 4) and the giraffes (age 5).

The teachers were all very appreciative when I dropped by with the hummus. The director and I were secretly wondering how the children would receive the “green dip”.  When I got to my son’s class (the upperclass giraffes) I was greeted by a shout from my son’s friend, “What’s That?!”  The teacher said “look it’s leprechan dip”.  He replied “Oh.  I don’t like green stuff!”  My son said “Don’t worry Zach.  My mom made it and she doesn’t know any leprechans”.

When I picked up my kids, I was greeted by my daughter (a mouse) who said “I ate all the green dip!”  The teacher said all the kids and teachers really enjoyed it.  Then I saw the director and she summed up the tasting experience which was very interesting.  The younger kids were more likely to try the dip, and then like it and eat it. However the older kids were less likely to try, having a preconceived idea of “green stuff”. When I got to the giraffe class the teachers said about half tried it – mostly the girls. And my son couldn’t get Zach to try it – handmade by leprechan’s or not.

I made some extra for our family, to serve with my other St. Patrick’s favorites, corned beef, cabbage and Irish soda bread.

Organic Spinach Hummus Recipe (from Petit Appetit Eat, Drink and Be Merry)

Is your family ho-hum for hummus? Try this variation using spinach. This is quick and easy dish to perk up a crudité plate for a play group or simply pack with pita points in your child’s lunchbox.

Makes 1 1/2 cups

8 ounces canned organic chickpeas, drained and rinsed (3/4 cup)
1 clove garlic
1 cup packed organic spinach leaves
1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
½ teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon kosher salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
Pita points or vegetable sticks, to serve

In a blender or food processor, combine chickpeas and garlic and puree until smooth. Add spinach, lemon juice, cumin, salt, and pepper. Blend thoroughly. With motor running, gradually add olive oil and process until smooth and creamy. Taste and adjust seasoning as needed.

To make the task even easier, purchase prepackaged organic spinach or baby spinach leaves, but still remember to wash.

*Spinach is on the Environmental Working Group’s Dirty Dozen list and also high in nitrites. Reduce your family’s exposure by buying organic.
~
See also Lisa’s two new books out at bookstores and online:

Cooking for Baby: Wholesome, Homemade, Delicious Foods for 6 to 18 Months

Eat, Drink and Be Merry: Easy, Organic Snacks, Beverages, and Party Foods For Kids of all Ages.
~~
Lisa Barnes is author of The Petit Appetit Cookbook: Easy, Organic Recipes to Nurture Your Baby and Toddler, Williams-Sonoma: Cooking For Baby, and Petit Appetit: Eat, Drink and Be Merry and lives in Sausalito, California.
OrganicToBe.org | OrganicToGo.com
[Permanent Link] [Top]

From Jeff Cox

For most of mankind’s history, there were no refrigerators or freezers (unless you lived, you know, next to a glacier). Most people lived on family farms, and when winter settled in, you ate what you’d put up or you starved (nods to the ant and the grasshopper).

So typical winter fare in pre-industrial times would include cabbages pulled roots and all and hung upside down from attic rafters. They’d last all winter that way. So would onions braided into long strings and hung from rafters. Cabbage, by the way, was also made into sauerkraut, which would keep in a crock all winter just fine, since it was already fermented.

Potatoes and root crops went into the root cellar, which, 12 feet underground, always had a temperature in the upper 50s Fahrenheit. The fall milk was made into cheese that kept easily overwinter. Apples did many duties. In colonial times, hard cider was the breakfast, lunch, and dinner drink of our ancestors. Some farmers distilled it into apple jack—apple brandy. Sound whole apples went into the apple barrel in the root cellar, whence we get our saying that one bad apple spoils the bunch. Other apples were cored and cut into slices that were strung on strings and dried in the warm central room of the house where there was a fireplace.

Winter squash kept just fine on the floor of a cold room, as long as they didn’t freeze. Dried shell beans stored well as long as the weevils and mice were kept at bay. Wheat, barley, millet, rye, and other grains kept perfectly well over winter—and a trip down to the mill stream and the miller’s grinding stones was a common and frequent task for family farmers in those days. Fresh-ground wheat flour makes an unbelievably good smelling and tasting loaf, especially given a slather of the farm’s home-churned butter. Summer berries, plums, and other fruits could be pounded with grains and beef fat for pemmican or mashed and dried for fruit leather.

Pigs were typically slaughtered in November, and some parts made into scrapple and sausage and preserved under a topping of lard and stored in the root cellar. Bacon was salted and smoked, and that preserved it quite well. Hams were salt-cured and hung up to dry and they’d last for years that way. Beef could be torn into strips for jerky. The farm’s hens would lay a few eggs in the winter—though not many. And the roosters and old hens were always available for the stewpot.

Apricots, peaches, cherries, and other summer fruits were put in crocks with sugar and brandy, and they made festive desserts in the dead of winter. Oh, there was plenty to eat if the farmer’s family was diligent about putting up the bounty of the land. What there wasn’t much of was fresh, green vegetables.

That’s why, when the snows began to melt off and the wild onion spears showed the spring’s first green, someone would get the idea of making the spring tonic. This was a wild salad gathered from the spring’s first new growth. It was usually very bitter, so the children had to be admonished to eat their portion—but it was so welcome after all the heavy foods that had kept the family going for five months or so in the cold regions of the country, that even the kids would like that first taste of crisp, icy, bitter-sweet greens.

The main ingredient of the spring tonic was dandelion greens. The dandelions make an early start in the cold regions. Their tender, young, early leaves are gathered in abundance for the spring tonic. If you gather some, just make sure they’re not from lawns treated with herbicides, pesticides, or chemical fertilizers.

Along swift-flowing streams and the outflow from springs that carry comparatively warm water from deep underground to the surface, watercress will be a familiar wild volunteer, and start growing when most other plants are still just waking up. Watercress sprigs go into the spring tonic. Those wild onions are pulled up, their green spears chopped like scallions and their tiny bulbs peeled and sliced. In they go. Violets appear early in the spring woodlands, and a few violet flowers are just the thing.

If the farmers were smart, they planted spinach in the fall and covered the young plants with a couple of feet of hay. In March, they’d pull the hay back and harvest the young leaves just breaking out of their winter dormancy for the spring tonic. Depending on where the family farmers lived, they’d find plants they knew were edible to add to this salad. In some areas, the mints would be making new growth because they thrived near springs or places where flowing water occurred. In California, there’s the spring bounty of miner’s lettuce, a tender green that kept many a gold prospector alive in the mid-1850s.

Though I have an abundance of greens year around now at the market, something in the very early spring—in the last two weeks of March—calls to me to make a spring tonic salad from whatever I can find in the wild. It’s still bitter, but it’s oh so sweet when I think about those many generations of yeoman farmers and their families who looked forward to the first green of spring.

Is it coincidence that we wear green on March 17, whether we’re Irish or not? And as poet Robert Frost observed as he saw the sun backlighting the first leaves of an oak tree, “Nature’s first green is gold.”
~
See also Jeff’s Local, Seasonal and Organic
~~
Jeff Cox is author of The Organic Cook’s Bible and The Organic Food Shopper’s Guide, and numerous other cooking, gardening, and wine books, and lives in Sonoma County, California.
Image Credit: Dandelion Greens at Budget Gourmet Kitchen
OrganicToBe.org | OrganicToGo.com
[Permanent Link] [Top]

From Gene Logsdon
Garden Farm Skills

As far back into childhood as I can remember, every morning and every evening I went to the barn to “do chores.”  “Chores” on the farm then (and now) meant feeding the chickens and livestock, gathering the eggs, and milking the cows. This work must be done every day come hell or high water—- especially come hell or high water. I did chores even in seminary college— I  much preferred being in the barn than in chapel. That’s how it finally dawned on me that the priestly life was not for me, so I can say with all honesty that doing chores guided me to my true place in life.  I am still doing chores although I have bowed to age and given up everything except sheep and chickens.

In childhood, I didn’t always go to the barn happily, but now, except in the coldest weather, I still prefer my barn to any church or any public meetinghouse. Farm animals are so appreciative of getting fed and watered and when you get to know them well, they make good company. They are always glad to see me and do not try to tell me how to vote or pray. If you have only a few of each, they become your friends or at least your close acquaintances, each with his or her own personality. When I shell a little corn off the cob by hand to feed to the hens, one of them, always the same one, parks herself right between my feet to get the first kernels that fall. More than once I have stumbled on her. Our golden-feathered rooster is so utterly vainglorious that when I watch him strut about the barnyard, I can’t help but think of Donald Trump.

My sheep and chickens, not to mention the cats,  have my work habits memorized and anticipate my every move. When I stomp up the steps to the hay loft the ewes all rush into the barn, stand by their ricks, almost always each in her chosen spot, and stare up at me, waiting for the hay to come plummeting down. If I start up the tractor, they rush out to the pasture because they know I will be hauling a bale out there to feed on top of the snow.

The two Plymouth Rock hens almost always roost side by side even though they grew up with absolutely no differentiation in handling or feeding from the Rhode Island Reds and Buff Orphingtons. One morning when I stepped into the chicken coop, the hens panicked, as if a raccoon had walked in among them. For awhile I could not understand why they were suddenly so flighty. Then it dawned on me. I was wearing quite a different hat and jacket than I usually have on.

When you have only a few animals, you don’t necessarily have to feed and water them twice a day. If you want to take a little trip, you can figure out ways to provide them with enough to last for that long. If you keep a calf with your milk cow, you don’t even have to milk every day either. As for feeding livestock, a pasture with a pond in it will keep them quite adequately for days at a time in warm weather  But it is much better, even if you are going to be away for only a short weekend, to have a working arrangement with a neighbor to keep an eye on things while you are gone. Livestock seem to have an uncanny ability to know when you are away. That’s when they are likely to find a hole in the fence so they can take a little trip too. Fortunately, our son lives close by and he keeps an eye on things when we are away and vice versa.

The most important chore with chickens these days is making sure they are safely penned in their coop at night. Otherwise they are at the mercy of coyotes, foxes, minks, weasels, raccoons, opossums  and skunks.  When I was a child, there were not so many varmints to contend with because people during the Depression years hunted them for food and trapped them for pelts that might bring in a little precious cash. In those days the main worry was human chicken thieves, not wild ones.

Choring is more difficult in winter. I don’t have electricity or running water  in my barn (on purpose— I don’t want to worry if I left a light on or the water running) so the chickens’ water freezes up at night sometimes. Water is of course just as important as food for your animals. For a waterer I use the bottom half of a plastic gallon milk bottle. I can just rap it over the chicken roost or whatever when the water freezes, and the ice shatters out without hurting the container. But it means carrying water from the house to the barn in the morning— easy enough to do with only a dozen hens. The sheep can get by eating snow for a few days (so can chickens actually, but eating snow should be only a temporary emergency source of water). Otherwise, I break a hole in the ice on the pond.

Many people are once again expressing interest in “going back to the land”, as we say rather euphemistically. (Why not forward to the land?) If you intend to keep animals you are making a commitment to a home-centered life.  You have to take time for chore time. My sister, Jenny, says that to enjoy husbandry, one must have farmer genes. Not everyone does.

I have a hunch from my mail that many more people would enjoy husbandry however. On a soft early spring night, doing chores in the twilight, I throw hay down to the sheep and then sit up in the loft listening to them crunching away and making contented little snuffles of pleasure as they eat. Otherwise, all is quiet and utterly peaceful. I am aware that far away sirens are blaring, bombs are exploding, traffic is roaring, and people are screaming in fear and rage. I am so lucky, so happy to be where I am. I have to believe that millions of other people would also be happy to be where I am, if only they knew. If only they knew they could.
~
See also Gene’s First Spring Things
~~
Gene and Carol Logsdon have a small-scale experimental farm in Wyandot County, Ohio.
Gene is author ofThe Mother of All Arts: Agrarianism and the Creative Impulse (Culture of the Land),
The Last of the Husbandmen: A Novel of Farming Life, and All Flesh Is Grass: Pleasures & Promises Of Pasture Farming
Images credit: © Beatrice Killam | Dreamstime.com
OrganicToBe.org | OrganicToGo.com
Gene’s Posts
[Permanent Link] [Top]

From Jesse Cool
with Jonah Cool

The trees may lack it, but at this time of year the farmers markets (if they are going yet!) are decidedly green. Leafy greens lack the sex appeal of spring berries, asparagus, and early tomatoes but they retain a warm and sensual side that is worth savoring while we can. Light a fire, open a book, and enjoy slow roasted greens. It is all about roasting and braising. Toss greens with the fat or drippings and make a side nearly as warming as the meat. Crisping up greens in drippings or bacon fat is an age-old tradition. No meat? No drippings? No problem. We frequently toss garlic, chili flakes, a little lemon zest, and great olive oil with the greens and put in the oven at 400 for about 20 minutes. Delicious.

Mornings are my favorite time to enjoy my garden, regardless of the season. California is quickly warming into spring while Jonah is experiencing a slightly slower transition on the East Coast. Amidst the sea of rabbe, kale, and chard, signs of spring are popping up in gardens. New potatoes are growing, asparagus is coming up, and young fava bean leaves are nearly ready to be paired with a lightly acidic slice of strawberry. All of this action is exciting and gets me in the mood to take full advantage of my garden. One morning last week we talked ourselves into a frenzy of hunger and quickly grabbed a few eggs from the coop, a handful of greens, and some little spring onions before heading into the house. In a pan we grilled a few rashers of bacon and then tossed the onion and greens in the pan. We soft scrambled our eggs and placed them next to the bacon and greens. It was symbolic that the hunger for spring manifested itself into a fleeting celebration of winter.

My enthusiasm for winter is tough to convey. I love rich, tangy, and wholesome leafy greens with slowly braised meats. However, root vegetables seem to dominate recipes during this time of year with little regard for Kale, Chard, and Collards. For many people farmers markets are a summer time activity. I would not claim that a late winter farmer’s market has the same colors and smells, although the charm remains. I love to be at the market in the winter when booths as well as people are a little thinner and I can sit and talk with my farmer friends. In the winter I frequently lose myself admiring and appreciating all that these amazing men and women cultivate. This time of year the anticipation about the crops to come is palpable; spring has nearly sprung.

So throw in some thick leafy greens in the oven and enjoy winter’s bounty while you still can.
~
See also Jesse’s Organic Balsamic Asparagus with Cheese Toasts Recipe
~~
Jesse Cool is author of Simply Organic: A Cookbook for Sustainable, Seasonal, and Local Ingredients and many others, is owner of CoolEatz Restaurants and Catering, and lives in Menlo Park, California.
Image Credit: © Anna Jurkovska | Dreamstime.com
OrganicToBe.org | OrganicToGo.com
[Permanent Link] [Top]

From Rosalind Creasy

Arrive at a party with this lovely treat or serve it as an appetizer with focaccia or as part of an antipasto. Once the cheese and tomatoes have marinated, use the richly flavored olive oil for dresings or serve it with rustic bread for dipping. These mozzarella balls will keep in the refrigerator for about a week.

1 cup organic dried tomatoes
¾ lb fresh 1-in mozzarella balls
8 organic garlic cloves, minced, divided
1 teaspoon chopped fresh thyme, divided
1 teaspoon chopped fresh marjoram, divided
1 teaspoon whole green peppercorns or capers, divided
½ teaspoon salt, divided
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, divided
Approximately 1¼ cups organic extra-virgin olive oil

In a small bowl, pour 1 cup of boiling water over the dried tomatoes and let them sit for at least 15 minutes, or until they’re soft. Drain them and set them aside.

Remove the mozzarella balls from the brine and drain them.

In a quart jar with a lid, layer half the tomatoes on the bottom, then make a layer using half the garlic, herbs, and seasonings. Layer all the mozzarella balls next. Make a top layer of the remaining tomatoes, then the remaining garlic, herbs, and seasonings. Pour the olive oil over the final layer, making sure to cover all the ingredients. Refrigerate to marinate for at least 24 hours. Makes 1 quart.
~
See also Rosalind’s Creating Bountiful Gardens with Organic Edible Landscaping
~~
Rosalind Creasy is author of Rosalind Creasy’s Recipes From The Garden: 200 Exciting Recipes from the Author of the Complete Book of Edible Landscaping and many others.
Images Credit: Rosalind Creasy
OrganicToBe.org | OrganicToGo.com
[Permanent Link] [Top]