Today's Moment: Favorite Food

Here's today's "Take a Moment": Favorite Food

What is your absolute, must-have, favorite food? Chocolate? Pizza? Burgers? Carrot Cake? Fish and Chips? Hot Dogs? Turkey and Dressing? Chicken Nuggets? Sodas and Shakes? Ice Cream?

Why did you choose this as your favorite food? Comfort? Memories? Taste? Additives? Convenience?

If your favorite food isn't healthy, what can we do about it? First, we need to understand that health is wealth in this world. If we are healthy, we can work, and will spend less time at the doctors and less money at the pharmacy. Don't care much for healthy foods? Retrain your palate. That's we're planning to do in the year 2009. Nutrient-dense food feels so satisfying and leaves us feeling full. Junk food makes us crave more junk food.

Plan your schedule around eating. Eat about the same time every day, making sure to ingest something (including snacks) every 3 hours or so. Focus on non-processed foods (unless you've done the processing yourself). Snack on nuts, seeds, fruits and veggies. Eat beans/peas/lentils at least 4-5 times a week.

Give it a try. In 2-3 months, could you answer "what is your favorite food" differently that you did today?

Busy Busy Busy with Recipe Creating

We've been so hard at work creating 365 days of grain-rotating menus and recipes that we've let other things fall behind. Hoping we'll catch up this week since Hubby is off work. Of course, he has a long honey-do list to work through, like working on the essentials-replacement list, pollinate our indoor tomato plants, take care of our hydroponic greenhouses, clean up the backyard, shovel the snow (that was today - about 4-6 inches) from the sidewalks/porch/stairs/driveway, and clean the carpet.

Son has lots of schoolwork to do, even though somehow between last Thursday and today, he's lost his language arts workbook. Interesting, huh?

And I have more work to do on the 365 rotation diet, and recipe experimentation.

And we all still have the flu. Fun fun.

Dinner Experiment with Lentils

We've never cooked lentils before. But since they are high in protein and good for us, we thought we'd give them a try. So Wifey cooked them with a little onion powder, drained off the extra water, then added them to our green salad, kinda like people do with chickpeas. Made Son promise to eat at least a teaspoon of the lentils. Added a few carrots from our garden, and bran muffins (cranberry-orange for Wifey and Hubby, and Son got plain). Simple but healthy dinner. We try.

Our Thanksgiving: Food, Family and Fun

I realize it's Saturday morning, but we're still fighting this flu and it's hanging on. So here's a bit about our Thanksgiving:

Hubby had work off, so the three of us (plus dog) played and enjoyed being a family. Around 11 a.m., Hubby started his shower, Son finished his schoolwork (yes, on Thanksgiving), and I started the food. By the time we left at 12:30, all three of us were showered and cleaned up, the food for Picky-Eater-Son was prepared, and the green-bean cassarole (our assigned dish) was cooked and in a towel-packed box, ready for transportation.

We got to Cousin-Ellen's house a bit early, but that gave us a chance to chill with family, and for me to get to know them a little better (after all, I'd only met them twice: once at our wedding April 2007 and again last Thanksgiving). The rest of the family started to arrive, and soon, the house was full with kids and parents, with the loud greetings and delicious smells. Dave said grace after a moment of silence, then we ate: turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes with marshmallows, my green-beans, Dave's odd but yummy stuffing, rolls and herbed butter, Mo's corn bake, green salad, squash and rice dish, homemade gravy, and Floyd and Helen brought pumpkin and pecan pies. Everyone ate until full. The kids watched Willy Wonka upstairs then went to a nearby park. It was an enjoyable time, and I appreciated the chance to get to know more of Hubby's family. Son enjoyed playing with other kids, and Hubby seemed somewhat relaxed. A good Thanksgiving.

What is our little family of 3 thankful for? A roof over our heads, clothes, food, love, friendship, laughter, conversations, books, fun. Even though the economy is tight, we have just enough to pay the mortgage and other basic bills. And even though our attempts to get pregnant haven't worked, we have healthy, fast-growing and fun Son. We believe this family is blessed, even in this hard time.

Thank you.

Apple Recipes

How exciting! While I'm waiting for Hubby to finish shaving and showering and getting ready for our big day, and Son is doing schoolwork (yes, even on a Holiday!), I'm working on our recipes for apples.

We decided to come up with lots of e-books for recipes, and are separating them out by main ingredient. Thought we'd start with apples (we recently picked a whole tub full). This morning, Hubby gathered all of our cookbooks and my special recipe files. I'm going through them, looking at my notes and pulling cards. I've already come up with 27 apple recipes, and still have to finish going through our family's cookbooks.

Then... we'll spend the next week making delicious apple goodies... from Waldorf Salad to Apple Brown Betty to Ambrosia and Apple Cake. Some are lactose-free, some are gluten-free, some are heart-healthy, and some use stored foods. Some are all of them! And ALL are delicious! Most will even pass my Son-Test.

Ok, it's my turn for the shower, and then I need to get the green bean cassarole in the oven. Son is done with schoolwork (finally) and needs to walk the dog before taking his own shower. Wonder if I should curl my hair?

Happy Thanksgiving, EVERYONE!

(Also posted this at www.survival-cooking.blogspot.com)

Another Monday

Today was busy.

I finally finished re-working Weslee's school curriculum, so he got started on that today with math, reading, language arts and writing. Check out his paragraph on friendship: http://kid-whispers.blogspot.com/2008/11/from-weslee-what-is-friendship.html. He also snuck and read a book that he doesn't think I know about.

Meanwhile, I did research for our other blogs so Doug and I can write today's entry(s) together. And used a bread machine. And prepped chickpeas for tomorrow's soup experiment. And finished drying a batch of tomatoes. And took pictures of various things for future blogs.

Doug had a very busy day at his job, coming home and after helping with the blog postings, immediately got busy on his work's laptop. He came down to help with dinner, and went right back up. My goodness, I like overtime.

However, my carpal tunnel and leg problems are compounded with the beginning of a migraine so I'm calling it quits for today.

Beautiful Monday to you all!

Vikki
http://www.newviewgroupllc.com/

Getting Ready for Winter

After 3 days of Weslee's birthday celebration (family fun time), Saturday and today were spent doing chores, and getting ready for the Winter.

A definite chill is in the air, and it's not just outside. We have leaks at the bottom of our front door, our screen door, and a couple of windows in our bedrooms. Plus we think the door leading to the garage from the house has enough clearance for a little field mouse to get through. So Doug has been working on those projects.

Saturday I tore down the sunflowers in the front yard (pictures to come soon). I placed the heads where they could finish drying out so we could eat the seeds this Winter. Doug and Weslee finished breaking off the sunflower stalks at the ground, and then Weslee attacked the corn and sunflower stalks still in the backyard corn patch.

Today they finished tearing down the tomato plants and "plowing" them under, they spread peat moss on the strawberry and raspberry plants. The plastic and blankets that protected them are in the basement, and the tomato cages are still waiting to go into the shed.

I've sliced up another dehydrator-full of varous tomatoes (ripe and unripe) and they are drying right now. Our indoor tomato plants are thriving under the grow lights and Weslee's regular watering, although he did kinda flood them yesterday.

Gotta get back to fixing dinner - taco meat and refried beans in quesadillas, and freshly harvested carrots! YUM!!!

Vikki
www.newviewgroupllc.com

10/25: Weslee's Ingrown Toenail (ugh)

Kid Whispers:
As you may have read in an earlier post, Weslee had his ingrown toenail surgery on Thursday. The phys assist injected him with a numbing agent 3 times but because the toe was so infected, the shots didn't really take. The p.a. had to work on the toe anyway, so she took off part of his toenail and part of the infected part, wrapped him up and put him in a post-op shoe. My brave boy.

Weslee is recuperating nicely, although he won't stop walking around. I'm about to tie him down to the bed.

In between soaking the toe in warm water 15-20 minutes, 4 times a day, we're trying to keep him occupied with newly-purchased magazines, and we just watched a Netflix: "Nim's Island" (also pretty good). Scheduled for tomorrow are: "Journey to the Center of the Earth" and "Spiderwick Chronicles" plus "Greatest Presidents of the United States" (history lesson).

To get his mind off of the boredom, early this afternoon we took him to see "Beverly Hills Chihuahua" at the theater. This was the first time we've been to a movie in a theater in ages. The theater was newly opened, called Cinebarr. Movie tickets were cheap but the food was waitressed, and very expensive. The movie was good, though. Hilarious!

Thankfully Weslee is very healthy, with a great immune system. I attribute it mostly to his diet (lots of fruits and veggies, nuts and seeds, and tons of water). Thus, he should heal quickly. He hopes to be able to trick-or-treat for Halloween.

Weslee says: "Thanks to all for the good healing thoughts."

Vikki
http://www.newviewgroupllc.com/

10/21: Onions and Garlic

Backyard Grocery:
As you may know, this was our first year to actually try to grow our own food. We did lots of reading books and on the internet, but it's never the same as getting your hands dirty.

We got seeds for white and red bunching onions, and white and red big onions. My mouth watered as I made the seed tapes, spacing the seeds just so.

Mid Spring I sprinkled a few bunching onion seeds in the kiddie pool where we had broccoli (we didn't harvest it before it bloomed - ooops) and lettuce. We've harvested a few of them but I guess not enough germinated or maybe they were picked up by birds or maybe we didn't sprinkle enough.

Then I made the mistake of planting the onions in with the soybeans. Okay, now we remember that those two are the OPPOSITE of companion plants. The soybeans grew ok but probably would have done better without the onions. As for the onions ... not even one sprouted. So much for that plan. Onions HATE beans. We'll remember next year.

As for garlic, we bought the bulbs to plant, but that was before we decided to move in the Spring. Can't really plant them this Fall, can we?

So, this Winter, either we can buy fresh onions and garlic from the store and hope they are local and not contaminated or we can get dehydrated. Dried sounds better, just in case prices go up further, or we get snowed in just when we need them. So we went to Vitamin Cottage and bought out the store for onion flakes and garlic flakes. The are pretty cheap, so we got enough to last through to next Summer, probably. Also got "dehydrated soup vegetables"- I'll grind them into a powder to add to the veggies we grew and dried to make our all-vegg powder (to sneak veggies into our diet).

Maybe we'll try to grow a few bunching onions indoor, now that we've brought in some tomato plants. A couple a week would be ok for fresh taste.

Vikki http://www.newviewgroupllc.com/ and http://newviewgroupllc.lefora.com/forum/category/all/page1/

10/17: Bits and Pieces

Here's just a few thoughts:

New View Group:
See: http://newviewgroupllc.lefora.com/forum/category/all/page1/

We finally got our forum's topics all set up; looks good, doesn't it!! For those interested in having a "backyard grocery", there's the gardening topics, like pests, container gardening, and companion planting. And for those who want to help the new kids of today, there's the "kids" topics like labels, "planet protectors", education, and special gifts. Please feel free to check out our forum, and contribute to or start a discussion!

Backyard Grocery:
Our across-the-street neighbor has a couple of apple trees in his back yard. Doug and I noticed them as we were walking our dog, Spirit, past his house last week. A day later, Doug walked over and asked the owner if he would trade some of his apples (yellow and red) for some of our tomatoes. The neighbor said we could have as many as we want; he hadn't sprayed them this year and they were full of worms. We took over 2 plastic crates, but found only enough decent apples to cover the bottom of each. Unfortunately we had to leave many because they had squirrel bites or worms or were rotten. (In exchange, we took over a gallon-size baggie of tomatoes, jalapeno peppers, etc.)

We've dehydrated some (yum - with cinnamon), and plan to dry some more tomorrow (Saturday). It's a time consuming process because of all of the rotten and wormy areas. Then once the dehydrator is loaded again, we'll use the rest to make homemade applesauce. First time!

I walked outside today to check on the front yard sunflowers, and was amazed. A butterfly had alighted on the biggest sunflower. For a good 5 minutes I watched it go from one bit to another, went inside for the camera, and since it was still there, I snapped a few pictures of it. I'll post them when I can get a moment to download them.

Kid Whispers:
Weslee continues to amaze me. He's terrified of spiders but he sweetly and efficiently waters our tomato plants, indoor and out. He must have said "thank you" to me a hundred times today.

When do children outgrow their love for the cartoons they loved when they were preschoolers?

Thanks for reading! Vikki... http://www.newviewgroupllc.com/

9/25: Bits and Pieces

Politics/Economy/MOAB:
Okay, it appears this Mother of all Bailouts (www.survivalblog.com) is $700 billion, and still stands to not help individuals very much. From George Bush' speech last night, he again is not taking any responsibility for even a little bit of this economic mess. Can people really convince me that the cost of this "war" has/had no impact on America's financial state?

Garden:
Picked a huge overlooked couple of cucumbers. There's a couple of watermelons (Golden Midget) that are ready to eat - might be something good to go with dinner (Doug and I are having sushi, Weslee gets his favorite: leftover pepperoni pizza and vanilla goat yogurt).

Health:
Weslee's toe is beginning to look a tiny bit better. I went to the cardiologist this morning and am now wearing a holter (heart) monitor until 9 a.m. tomorrow. There's a little button I push when I get a symptom, and diary to keep of symptoms and corresponding times.

Business:
Still waiting to get problems with software provider resolved, but so far, nothing much. Doug and I are working on a possible alternate. V

9/12/08: Pic Catchup: Dehydrating

Still playing photo catchup: From 8/18/08: The next four pictures are the four dehydrator trays. I absolutely had to start drying them before they went bad so we separated them by color, sliced and filled the trays. Added basil from the big bush in our front yard in the hopes to preseve it but, although it made the entire house smell like tomato/basil soup (per Doug!) for several hours, the basil does NOT like to be dried. Recommend it be crushed with olive oil and garlic, frozen in ice cube trays, and then placed in baggies to thaw and use later. The dehydrating took only about 7 hours with this particular dehydrator, which does not have a temp setting.

The next picture is from 8/19/08 - after I took out the dehydrated tomatoes and basil, I loaded the dehydrator with squash, zucchini, squaw-kini (cross between squash and zucchini), and sweet green peppers.

Vikki www.newviewgroupllc.com

9/11/08: Bits and Pieces

Garden:
While we did get the spinach and lettuces planted the other day, we're still behind sowing some more seeds for carrots, radishes, peas, beets and bunching onions. Hopefully this afternoon after Doug comes home from work. Meanwhile, our little pea seedlings are beginning to pop up in the front yard!

As I watered the tomatoes yesterday, I almost cried. They are starting to dry out and die. They produced so much and now ... it's this horrible weather - highs in the 50's and 60's. Of course the tomatoes and other plants are going to say to themselves: "guess I've done my job - time to die". Arrgh! We're going to bring in one or two plants (they are all in containers because of our bad soil), find our grow lamp and hope to keep them going through the winter. However, I'm thinking about starting a new one, "white currant tomato", which didn't sprout last Spring but we really wanted to try it out! We have some great southern windows where we'll have not only a tomato or two but also lettuce, carrots, string beans and squash. I call them "windowsill meals".

By the way, the little purple tomatoes we thought were razzle dazzle from Burpee aren't. Razzle dazzles are supposed to be big, for slicing. Now that I've researched "black cherry tomatoes", I'm thinking that's what we grew this year, ate, froze and dehydrated. See picture below - they were very light green before turning purple. (Ignore the red tomato - two plants together.)

As to the poor corn bed where the three sisters have produced so much... the bindweed has become too much for me. My hands can't pull any more weeds, and Weslee still doesn't identify the weed correctly. Doug's busy so .. guess we gotta let the corn patch go. The bindweed is choking the sunflowers so that they are bent over so far then touch the ground. The pumpkins and other squash vines are drying up because the bindweed is strangling them. As to the stringbeans, they are competing for the corn stalks and I can't really tell whose winning. I was so upset yesterday that I stepped on a spaghetti squash, thankfully not squishing it but I could have!

Guess being near Denver, Colorado and these beautiful Rocky Mountains, there was no way to extend the harvest indefinitely anyway. Bummer.

Our pumpkins haven't finished turning orange. Does that mean we can't use them? But we'll have 3 spaghetti squash, 2 butternut squash, 2-4 pumpkins and about 5 Mexican X-Top cushaw squash for our winter-eating pleasure. And at least our freezer is full and we've dehydrated a lot for our special all-vegg powder!

Good Morning America:
Follow the link to read the story: http://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=5771263&page=1 // Here's their teaser...

"You may know her as Sandee McCann, American author of numerous successful romance novels. But to her six children she was Sandra Gebert, their mother, who they claim disappeared without a trace seven years ago. The public first learned about this "runaway mom" when her story appeared in The Sun tabloid last month. Alex Firestone, McCann's daughter, told The Sun of her pain and anger when she discovered her... "

Here's my comment: Unbelievable that a woman supposedly leaves her "abusive" husband but leaves her children at his mercy. Doesn't sound right to me - you? I think she just followed her selfish urges to create a different life. Horrible horrible horrible - Sandee, would you like to give your side of the story? Feel free to e-mail me a short TRUE tale and I'll print it word for word.

Meanwhile, since I don't claim to be an impartial journalist ... someone needs to establish a fund to help that family, and arrange for an Extreme Home GIVE (not make-over) with scholarships for all the "children", and something special for the step-father. And someone needs to take on Sandee on behalf of the step-father, to sue for abandonment, back child support & alimony, and every penny she's made since she left. If she truly is living in Great Britain, someone over there needs to take this up and hold her accountable. And please, do NOT buy any more books by her (Sandee McCann) - it's not worth it!!

Incidentally, I googled Sandee McCann, and at the top of the list was her website: www.sandeemccann.com. I clicked on the link and, well, it appears it's no longer a valid website. Hmmm.. interesting.

At http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/hoax/forums/viewthread/7668/ there's some interesting comments.

There's a call for a boycott for Sandee McCann books - click here http://www.amazon.com/tag/book/forum?_encoding=UTF8&cdForum=Fx1KFACHA8ZWXO5&cdThread=TxOF5SIBQ2RGK0 to add your own comments. By the way, in case you didn't surmise, I agree.

And here's an interview she gave in 2006 - reading it made me sick. http://fallenangelreviews.com/Interviews/2006/Dec06-LindaL-SandeeMcCann.htm

Ok, that's enough on THAT subject.

Websites:
http://www.backyardgrocery.net/ and http://www.kidwhispers.net/ : Doug and I worked very hard last night on these websites. We're having such problems with the software that we're about ready to give up on them and find something else. However, despite the delays and major bugs, we're making progress. We have a few articles posted on each site, forums set up, and it's looking better. Still need to find and include chat room software. Whoo hoo!

Health:
Turns out Doug DID have a sinus infection among other things so he's on an antibiotic. He should be feeling better soon but still has the ringing in his ears. Don't get me started about my own problems!

Remembrance:

Our thoughts go out to those people who lost loved ones in on 9/11/01.

Vikki www.newviewgroupllc.com

9/08/08: Bits and Pieces

Palin/Fey:
There's a lot of blog entries and news stories out there about how Tina Fey looks so much like Sarah Palin that she's absolutely got to portray her on Saturday Night Live. I think it would take very little to make that work!

New School Year:
Weslee started 6th Grade today. It took me several weeks to work out his curriculum, and to plan the full 191 days. He's got (1) reading and literature (2) language arts with spelling, writing, speaking, handwriting and grammar rules (3) social studies with history, geography and civics with particular emphasis on the 2008 presidential election (4) science (5) math where he's really behind because it's a difficult subject for him (6) mixed bag of subjects which are basically workbooks with many topics in them including math and language arts, and (7) other which is art, health, first aid, music and what I call "life skills". He had four subjects assigned for today, and completed his work accurately and in a timely manner. Yeah!

Garden/Harvest:
Weslee and I pulled up the rest of the edamame (soy beans) yesterday. Since the plants only bear once, and since the plants had begun to die with leaves turning gold and falling off, we pulled up the entire plant, picked off the fuzzy edamame pods, and threw the plants to the side for the compost. We harvested enough for about 5 meals (times 3 people = 15 servings). Frozen now. We need to plant triple or more next year. They are unbelievable freshly picked and the beans gobbled up. Yummy lingering taste.

Doug and I also harvested some string beans from the corn patch. Various types - from Kentucky Wonder to Missouri Wonder and Black Valentine. We had enough to freeze for about 15 servings also.

Here's the leaves from our Mexican X-Top Squash (a cushaw - winter squash). Yes, those white spots are supposed to be there - it is NOT powdery mildew. I hope to post pictures soon of a couple of the cushaws. There's one that as big as my head!

We checked on the black turtle beans in the front yard. Some of the pods have begun to turn from green to purple to papery white, and the beans inside from green to black. The instructions I found said to let them dry on the bush so that's what we're doing. Couldn't resist, however, trying some out and boy they are yummy green OR black, just out of the pod and popped into the mouth. Figure we grew enough for probably 10 pots of black-bean soup or chili. Thinking we need more next year too, IF I can get Weslee to like cooked beans (he'll eat them raw tho).

Here's a black beauty eggplant. We aren't letting them get very big before we pick them, but they are quite tender and very prolific. Good to dehydrate to.

And can't forget to mention the watermelon! Doug picked a watermelon he thought was ripe and he wa absolutely correct. The two of us ate it (Weslee doesn't like watermelon) and felt marvelous that we grew such a delicious treat ourselves.

Put another big batch of tomatoes and a squaw-kini (cross between squash and zucchini) in the dehydrator. Should be ready in another hour or two. The squash, zucchini, tomatoes and eggplant that we dehydrated last week turned out great. Waiting till harvest season is over before I grind to a powder, and mix to make into a "all-vegg" powder to nutritionally enhance our wintertime meals.

Mabon/Harvest Celebration:
We're planning a little harvest get-together not this Friday but the next. Just a little celebration of how thankful we are that our "experiment year" was so very successful. To be joyous that we discovered the wrong way to grow the three sisters, how to more carefully mark our tomatoes, to separate gourds and squash more thoroughly, the varieties we really loved this year and those we'll never grow again, those things that weren't worth the space, water and time they took, and those things we really wish we'd grow more of, or at all!!

At our celebration, hopefully we'll have freshly-picked corn, eggplant and string beans (both rubbed with olive oil and a bit of sea salt) to grill, salad with tomatoes and just picked carrots and radishes, and watermelon. Probably have hot dogs and bratwurst that I'll keep warm in the crockpot or if it's cold enough, homemade chili with our black beans and homegrown tomatoes. If you're a friend or family member and will be in this area that afternoon, call so we can talk about the details.

The Weather:
The weather here in the Denver, Colorado area has been unbelievable. Can't believe that a month ago we were practically melting from the heat. And now, we had a very cold day last week then days in the 70's. Woke up to 42 degrees this morning - hope my plants, especially tomatoes, will bounce back. Not ready to give up fresh vegetables yet. Several eggplant are almost ready, and we still have most of the corn still on the stalks.

Today we got to a high of a whopping 51 degrees. Supposed to get close to 80 (ok, mostly 70's) for the rest of the week. Then rain and cold on Thursday and more high 70's for a few more days.

Glad we're not in a hurricane area but wondering why this year's weather is so completely odd. Hmmmm....

Health:
Doug's been fighting an ear/nose infection for almost a week. He called the doc last week whose office suggested antihestimine and use of a netti pot. Helped a little but mentioned during lunch today that he's feeling bad again. Hope he'll make a doctor appointment when he comes home today.

Weslee felt a little bad last week but he has an amazing immune system so was over it in 2 days. I starting to feel the ick late last week and am fighting it too. My immune system is majorly compromised so I get just about everything going around.

End:
Guess that's it for now. I still owe this blog a lot of harvest pictures and more. And still have more to do on the websites but I'm exhausted for today. Was up and working around 6:30 a.m. to finish getting Weslee's curriculum and assignment pages printed out. Arggh!

Vikki www.newviewgroupllc.com

Recipe: Ice Box Pickles & Pickle Relish

Here's the recipe for the pickles we made on Labor Day. I got the basic recipe from cooks.com but modified it a bit.

Recipe:

In a large bowl that has a snug fitting top (for later!), mix the following syrup until the sugar is dissolved:

• 1 cup distilled or apple cider vinegar
• 2 cups sugar
• 1 tablespoon celery seed
• 1 tablespoon pickling salt

Then add:

• 2 cups onion (sliced or chopped)
• 7 cups cucumber (thinly sliced - a mandolin works great)

Put top tightly on bowl and let sit for 24+ hours, stirring from time to time. I refrigerated it in between stirrings. Transfer to canning jars (or whatever you choose), label with contents and date, and store in fridge. Should keep for several months.

Alternatives: Add to taste: dill leaves/weed, mustard seed, or a pickling spice mix you can pick up in a store.

How to Eat:

We like pickles on our sandwiches, burgers, or sometimes just hanging out on our picnic plate. A good dose of fresh garden in the dead of winter.

Alternative: Ice Box Pickle Relish

To make relish,

1. Make the syrup the same as above
2. Add finely chopped onion and cucumber
3. Add 2 tablespoons of minced garlic
4. Add 2 tablespoons of mustard seed and 1 teaspoon turmeric powder
5. Add 2 tablespoons of minced green and/or red pepper
6. Stir and store as above. Yummy for hot dogs and potato salad.

Let us know how yours turns out, and what spices you used.

Vikki www.newviewgroupllc.com

Recipe: Taco Meat

I searched online for a recipe on how to make homemade taco meat using some of the produce we've picked from our garden, and was completely unsuccessful. Plus we are picky eaters and don't use salt and pepper. Oh yeah, and I hate to measure so here's my best guess:

Recipe:

In a big pot, brown one 10-lb log of ground beef, then drain of fat. Then add:

• 2 large onions, finely chopped
• 4 green jalapeno peppers, minus most of seeds, finely chopped
• 10 red paste tomatoes, finely chopped
• 2 orange paste tomatoes, finely chopped (for color - optional)
• 2 yellow paste tomatoes, finely chopped (for color - optional)
• 2 tablespoons dehydrated garlic flakes

Simmer for at least 30 minutes to allow the flavorings to mingle. Should last several meals.

Alternatives: add more jalapeno seeds (for more heat), chili powder, salt, pepper, green sweet peppers, tomato sauce, etc.

How to Eat:
Doug fills a bowl with the taco meat and scoops it out with corn chips. I like to fill the bottom of my bowl with corn chips, cover with grated cheese, add the hot taco meat, and top with a bit of sour cream, and sometimes lettuce, chopped avocado and more onion. Weslee doesn't eat beef so he prefers his corn chips covered in grated cheese, melted in the microwave and dolloped with sour cream. Enjoy!!

Vikki www.newviewgroupllc.com

9/02/08: Preserving Produce

We got a lot done yesterday. My fibromyalgia was acting up and instigated a migraine but between us three (Doug, me and 11 yr old Weslee with me mostly directing from a prone position on the couch), we did the following:

• picked tomatoes, washed and ready to dehydrate in a day or so
• picked string beans from the corn patch, washed, de-stringed, cut into thirds, and placed in snack baggies in meal-sizes and then in a quart freezer baggie, placed in the freezer
• picked about 1/4 of the Envy Soybeans (edamame) from the soybean patch, washed, and placed into snack baggies for meals and then in a quart freezer baggie, placed in the freezer
• used handy-dandy mandolin (Doug LOVES gadgets!) to evenly slice squaw-kini (cross between straightneck yellow squash and striata d'italia zucchini - not very tender) plus 2 zucchini, 3 roma tomatoes and 1 beautiful orange tomato which we believe to be a Big Rainbow Striped Tomato (YUMMY!!!). Placed all in dehydrator - was dried by evening.
• used the handy dandy mandolin again to cut cucumbers for pickles - made a simple ice-box pickle.
• Finely-chopped more cucumbers with another handy gadget to make pickle relish. Doug says it's missing mustard so we need to pick up some today or tomorrow. Need to get in fridge by this evening (after we put in jars).
• We checked on our winter squashes, pumpkin and melons to see if it's time to harvest. The melons are almost ready, but discovered that the winter squashes and pumpkins need to wait until it's almost time for our first frost. This has been a weird weather year so no idea when that will be.

With yesterday being so busy, we barely had time to enjoy the holiday. We made hamburgers for lunch and sliced a sweet juicy orange tomato (Big Rainbow Striped Tomato) on it. We picked 4 corn from our corn patch for our dinner... outstanding taste. Weslee enjoy picking off all of the little silks. And boy does he gobble it down, as does Doug. I ate the smallest and dearly paid for it (stomach problems). I'm thinking we'll have enough to cut off the cob and dry to use as cornmeal this winter. Well, a little bit.

My friend, Copper, gave me a great idea about preserving produce. She dehydrates just about everything then crushes into a powder and combines. Has everything from eggplant to beans to squash to tomatoes, onions, and garlic. Throughout the year, she sprinkles this all-vegg powder on rice or mashed potatoes. Thinking we'll do some as dehydrated chips as we'd originally planned but also create our own all-vegg powder and probably use on our salads and in mashed potatoes. Here's hoping the taste won't be strong enough for Weslee to detect until it's too late.

We need more information and ideas about preserving our homegrown produce. Please join at http://www.backyardgrocery.net/ and give your own ideas! They are desparately needed!!

Little problem with social security so need to go take care of that. And please send your thoughts and prayers to Doug's family - his Uncle Hugo passed this weekend. Thank you.

Vikki www.newviewgroupllc.com

9/1/08: Bits and Pieces: We're Behind!

Okay, so I still haven't updated the blog with more of Weslee's school or pictures from our garden, and I'm not so sure it will happen today either. We are soooo far behind in garden and house work. Well, in everything.

Garden:
Our edamame (soy beans), green beans and tomatoes need harvesting. We picked our first corn the other day and even though it was missing some kernels around the middle, it tasted so good that we three ate it right there in the middle of the corn patch!! Of course, since I can't eat corn any more, I was miserable for the next 24 hours, but that one bite I took was worth it. Sweetest corn I've ever eaten!

Doug and I think we have a watermelon ready to pick - it's got a yellow spot on the bottom. We'll thump it later today and probably take a chance. Meanwhile, I need to wash and freeze the edamame, same with the green beans, start dehydrating the latest batch of tomatoes and sqaw-kini (a mix between squash and zucchini), and make ice-box pickles with our cute little cucumbers.

Websites:
We have more work to do on the websites (http://www.backyardgrocery.net/ and http://www.kidwhispers.net/) - obviously didn't make our launch date of Aug 30 - but we're almost there. You'll know when they are ready!!!

Be sure to bookmark this blog so you can come back - early and often! Feel free to leave comments or e-mail us. Have a good holiday.

Vikki www.newviewgroupllc.com

8/06: Survival of the Prepared

Someone recently sent me a link to a story about the government buying up all the canned butter and dehydrated meals/MREs through end of 2009. The same person sent me a link about a stockpile of plastic coffins in Georgia (I think). The thinking is that the government is expecting the bird flu pandemic or something else that will either greatly reduce the population or that the Middle East war will go on much longer than expected.

It got me thinking about our family's preparedness for various situations. Sure we have a little garden growing some great stuff. I dehydrate or can whatever possible (because of rising food costs). I buy dehydrated veggies and fruits we can't grow (which I've been doing for years because it was the only way to get my son to eat certain things). I buy dried soy and rice milk (we have a lactose intolerant person here and dried is cheaper in the long run and longer-lasting). We have dried eggs and soy beans because the prices of those things are getting out of hand.

ABOVE: Our dried eggs (purchased from www.beprepared.com)

ABOVE: Our powdered rice milk (purchased from www.amazon.com)

ABOVE: Our dried soybeans and dried peas (purchased from www.justtomatoes.com).

Weslee also loves their dried blackberries, blueberries and mango.

Doug likes their "tropical treats", including the kiwi, mango and papaya.

I like the strawberries, bananas, pomegranate and... almost everything they have!

I buy toilet paper and shampoo in bulk when I find them on sale. We have rechargeable batteries because it's good for the environment. We bike or walk (ok, infrequently but sometimes!) not in preparation for no fuel but because it's good for us and the Earth.

I don't consider our little family survivalists. We don't have a 2-year stockpile of food, nor an electrified fence or guns to defend our home. We are simply working to take care of our family in a difficult economic time. Yes, we're prepared, or working to be. And yes, we're thinking things out. Does this make us survivalists?

Vikki

p.s. Started to rain here in Thornton around 4:30 and now we're worried about flooding. Still.... needed the rain!!!!

7/23: Weslee's Letter: GreenEarth

To: The World

If you want food, make it instead of buy it. If you want to know the news and weather, try this: they're called the newspaper and putting-your-hand-out-to-see-if-it's-raining, snowing, etc. Use less power, read more books, and let kids play outside more, too.

Weslee

7/23/08

Copyright (c) Weslee Lawrence 2008