Escape to River Cottage… Again

Courtney and I loved the DVD’s we watched last February so much that we wanted to watch them again.  We wrote about it a year ago.  The DVD’s were from Courtney’s uncle and a number of them were scratched so we missed several episodes and parts of episodes.  This week, we’ve discovered the entire collection on on YouTube!  Each evening after things calm down, we sit and watch an episode or two.

You can watch them too if you search for the person’s profile who posted them “zodiacza1″.   Zodiacza1 even put together a sequence for each season where it will automatically load the next episode in line when you finish the previous episode.  They are high quality too.  I know we’ve all seen those YouTube videos where someone obviously used their camcorder and taped their television and the posted it on YouTube.

These videos are inspiring and we encourage everyone to check them out.

Thanks, Robert.

Here’s an update from me, Courtney.  It’s helpful to know the order that the series was aired because each series has a different name.  The first series is Escape to River Cottage and you can find the complete list here on wikipedia.

Garden Carts

Not sure if many of you have ever used a garden cart before.  They are amazing and I’ve always admired the hard work they can do.  The quantity and weight that these carts can haul make any job easier, from distributing compost early in the season to harvesting the heavy root crops later in the fall.  A garden cart is an essential tool for any homestead.

They are awfully darned expensive though ($350 for a new one), so I made my own.  I used a plan book from Herrick Kimball, (buy from Amazon or directly from Mr. Kimball) the man who also made the plan books for my chicken plucker and the cider press.  I bought the plywood, stain, wheels, metal axle and wooden dowel for the handle.  The rest was from my favorite local junkyard.  My total cost into this project was maybe $140.

I can’t wait to try it out and I’ll be sure to let you all know how it works.

Thanks, Robert.

Deciding on a Grain Mill

We are in the market for a grain mill.  We can’t wait to join the thousands hundreds dozens of other folks who spent countless hours preparing their own flour.  Now you know us, we don’t want just any ol’  electric mill that you can buy at Walmart and that will grind your flour in mere seconds.  We want one that you have to crank yourself.  And we want one that won’t break.  That appears to be a tall order.

So we’ve done some internet searching and consulted our favorite bloggers.  At least those who like to do things the slow way old fashioned way.  I think we have settled on a Country Living Grain Mill.  Everywhere we look, we only find satisfied customers.  We were also considering the Wonder Junior Deluxe mill, but the reviews were mixed.  One reviewer said it took her 1 1/2 hours to grind wheat fine enough to use for bread, which required double grinding.  That seems like a really long time to me.  The cost is about half that of the Country Living mill so we are tempted to try it.

And talk about getting the horse before the wagon, we’ve already purchased a supply of wheat, corn and oatmeal.

Thanks, Courtney.

Ricotta with my Home Ec Club

We made ricotta a few weeks ago.  We, as in my friends from church, and ricotta, as in the cheese.  That’s right folks you heard correct, I made cheese.  Even though I really just watched, I still consider it a personal accomplishment.  I’ve tried 3 times in the past to make mozzarella and 3 times it ended in tears.  (It was all the milk’s fault; it was UHT milk, not at all the right thing)

Now about the Home Ec Club, that’s what we’ve coined it, a group of ladies from church, all with an interest in seeing how cheese was made, got together and did it.  Just like that.  Everyone brought different talents to the party, we had two dairy farmers, one woman who pasteurizes goat milk, one experienced cheese maker, one food scientist who can’t make cheese to save her life (that’s me), one mom who was happy to leave her kids at home with dad, one mom who was just happy to get out of the house and one mom with four kids who love cheese, and cartoons.

We started out our lovely cheese making adventure by enjoying a cup of coffee, or two, or three and chatting.  An hour later we watched a pasterization demo, chatted, watched two far more talented ladies than myself make the cheese, chatted some more and then ate lunch.

It was so much fun.  I encourage you to start asking your friends if they would like to learn how to make cheese too.  You may end up making new friends as well as cheese.

Oh and I was sent home with a wedge of fresh ricotta.  It was delicious.

Thanks,  Courtney

My favorite dollies

You may have noticed lately, especially if you have flipped through a Pottery Barn catalog or the recent Martha Stewart Living magazine that handmade dolls are trending right now.  I can see why.  They are so individual and charming, so unlike a cookie cutter doll from Mattel.  I recently ordered two matching dollies for our twin god daughters.

My blogger friend, the dollie’s creator, has the cutest little blog Meg + Andy Made with all kinds of DIY stuff, like hair bows and bow ties.  She is an artist and creates all these great things in her spare time which consists of practically nothing since she is a stay at home, homeschooling mother of 4 (including a set of 3 year old twins)!!  Somehow she manages to whip up the cutest dollies and sells them at art fairs and at her online dollie shop.

Here are some pictures of the dollies that she made for me. And here is a link to more pictures of the dollies posted on her blog.   Please try not to snicker at my terrible photography once you see her shots of the dollies.  Clearly she excels in not only doll making but photography as well.

All I did was contact her and tell her their hair and eye color.  She has an amazing sense of style so I wanted her to design them completely.  She’s like that hairstylist that you love because you just sit down and they instantly know what hair cut and color will look best on you.   Anyways, I just love them.  I reeeeally wanted to keep them but I couldn’t see how depriving two little girls was a good thing.  I do get to order one for my daughter but I have to wait until I can tell what color her eyes and hair are going to be.

I’d love for you to check out her dollies.  They make such great gifts for little girls.  Plus it supports an actual artist who puts love into her work.

Thanks, Courtney

Temperature control during fermentation

As you progress as a homebrewer, one of the things you quickly learn that temperature control during the fermentation process is a large contributor to quality of the end product.

As an example, I’ll refer you to one of my larger mistakes.  Hopefully it can be a lesson for someone out there on the interweb, because it sure was for me.  Three or four years ago, while living in the San Francisco Bay Area, I bought a lager ingredient kit.  I did this in October because the outdoor temperatures were cooler, making it easier to maintain proper fermentation temperature.  Lager yeast ferments in the 48-55°F range and ale yeast ferments in the 60-72°F range.

So what do you think happened?  We had a heat wave during the week after I brewed that batch.  It was very hard to maintain the proper temperature.   When a lager ferments at higher temperatures, fruity esters are produced.  My lager tasted like bananas – yuck.  I didn’t let it go to waste, though, I drank it all… slowly.

Here in Colorado the reverse is the problem.  A blizzard went through our general area last weekend and it is very cold.  I’m fermenting an ale right now.  As tempting as it is to keep our house at the correct toasty temperature, my wallet says “no”.

Enter my mini-water bath.  This is the bottom half of a plastic 55 gallon barrel.  The top half became my chicken plucker.   I put the fermenter in and fill with 68°F water.   It will maintain the temperature all day and into the night.  When I wake up in the morning, the temp has fallen to 64°F.  I use a 2 Quart saucepan and dip some of the water out and boil it and them dump it back in.  Usually two pans of boiled water bring it back to 68°F and hold it there until the following morning.

Courtney thinks I’m crazy and overdoing it.   We’ll see – the proof will be in the pint-glass soon enough.

Thanks, Robert.

Gardening tip: Make all beds the same size

It’s garden planning time around our house.  Just so you get a feel for what it’s like around our house right now, our coffee table is stacked high with gardening books, seed catalogs and graph paper.  Robert and I are both obsessed and our poor children have to either scream for our attention or physically remove the book from our hands.  I like to think that I am the master gardener in the house but he seems to think that he is.  This leads to many arguments over where to plant things and what to plant.  Our latest argument is about how much to plant.  I always want to plant less, he always wants to plant more.  Since he usually wins the how much to plant argument, we need to figure out where it all goes.

Since reading Four-Season Harvest by Eliot Coleman, which I highly recommend, Robert recommended that we use a technique talked about in the book and that is make all beds the same size and all the foot paths the same size.  Why didn’t I think of that?  As I sketch out the garden I am constantly consulting Johnny’s Selected Seed catalog to find out plant spacing and row width, etc.  I get a little carried away, as is my habit, and the plans end of being somewhat complicated.  So to simplify, this year we are making all our beds 30 inches wide and all our foot paths 12 inches.  Done.

If you want to learn more or how to plant different veggies in those sized beds, you’d better check the book out of the library or order it on amazon.  It’s a good one.  I have consulted it at least a few hundred times in the last week alone.

Thanks,  Courtney

Wish me luck on my upcoming battles with self proclaimed master gardener, Robert. 

Gardening time: Order your seeds

It’s that time of year, when the world falls in love…with seed catalogs.

Go ahead, buy way more than you need, we did.  We already placed our order with Johnny’s Selected Seeds.

Here’s what we ordered:

5 lbs Kennebec seed potatoes

5 lbs Adirondack Red seed potatoes

1 lb Russian banana seed potatoes

Belgium endive, Totem

Asparagus, Jersey Knight

Leeks, Megaton

Onion, Copra

Here’s what I forgot to order:  shallots, popcorn corn and cantaloupe.  Oops.

What are you planting this year?  Anything new?

Thanks,  Courtney

Book Review: Steve Solomon’s “Gardening Without Irrigation”

In searching for more books written by Eliot Coleman and Steve Solomon, I came across this link to a copy of the book on Scribd.  I wanted to share the link with you and offer a few thoughts.

Plant spacing has always been a problem for me in my gardening.  I have this problem with always wanting to maximize value or return, and so I squeeze in as many plants as I can into a given space.  Not only is that bad for the plants, but it is also water intensive.  In order to reduce or eliminate water usage, plant spacing is paramount.  One big idea learned in this book is that capillary action within the soil will draw the water in from much further than I thought possible.

Another idea discussed is mulching.  Steve Solomon is a big proponent of dust mulching.  I’ve been a big mulcher in the past, mostly with grass clippings, though.  I’m not sure I’m sold on the idea of dust mulching, because we live in an area that can get pretty windy and I don’t want my valuable topsoil blowing away.  As for me, jury’s still out on this one.  I would love to hear from other’s experience with dust mulching, though.  I’m still intrigued and open minded on this matter.

Thanks, Robert.

Bottling your Homebrew

Its bottling time!  Your beer has been brewed and fermented for two weeks.  First thing to do is prepare your priming sugar.  Usually each batch of beer calls for four ounces of corn sugar to be added to the beer at the time of bottling.  Corn sugar is used because it will provide sugar (food) for the yeast but does not impart any flavor changes.  The beer will be bottled immediately after adding the priming sugar.  Since that priming sugar is food for the yeast, it will become active again with a final stage of fermentation.  Because your beer will be in a sealed bottle at this point, though, the CO2 has no way of escaping.  That CO2 byproduct becomes the agent which gives your beer carbonation.

To prepare the priming sugar, first start a pint of water boiling on the stove.  Once boiling, add the sugar and stir in until dissolved.  Allow to cool.  I add the priming sugar to the bottom of my bottling bucket before siphoning in the beer.  The process of siphoning in the beer will thoroughly mix the priming sugars in to the batch of beer.  While siphoning, be careful not to make too many bubbles, etc because you don’t want to introduce too much oxygen at this point.

Here is beer being siphoned into the bottling bucket. The bottling bucket, by the way, is a plastic six gallon bucket with a hole at the bottom where a spigot is installed.  The hose used to siphon is later used to connect to the spigot.  To the other end of the hose you will then install a bottle filler, which is nothing more than a spring loaded release valve that permits beer to flow out of the tube when depressed in each bottle.

While filling bottles, start some more water boiling (a quart or so) and boil all of your bottle caps for ten minutes so they are sterilized.

Here is my brother filling some bottles.

Once all of the bottles are full, you’ll need to cap them.  One at a time, take your caps, place them on the bottle and then use the crimper to press the caps on to the bottle.  Caps are not reusable.  Buy new ones in bulk and they come flattened out.  The crimper presses them over the top and around the lip of the bottle for a tight seal.

Pressing caps on to the bottles.  Notice in the background that my brother is abiding my one of my homebrewing laws: “Always have a brew while you brew.”

Now comes the really hard part.  Waiting.  You must allow another two weeks for that final stage of fermentation to occur so that your bottles are properly carbonated.  They should stay in a cool dark place during this time period.  I’ll admit, I usually crack open the first one in about a week to see if it is ready.  Sometimes they are and sometimes they aren’t, it all depends on the type of beer and the conditions.

Once the bottles are ready, you’ll be able to enjoy the fruits of your labor.

Thanks, Robert.

To review, here are the other homebrewing how-to articles:

The Very Basics of Homebrewing

Preparing to Bottle your Homebrew