Category Archives: Gardens

Recipes for Diversity

A few years ago I attended a panel about local food where a speaker asked the audience: “who here is trying to eat more vegetables?” I was one of the few people who did not raise their hand. I love vegetables, I’m great at growing them, and I eat lots of them. In fact, I just planted a garden full of them!

A Diverse Harvest

That said, I’m always happy to expand what I grow to add more variety, for my health as an eater and my resilience as a gardener. Permaculture principle #10 tells us to Use and Value Diversity and this is one place I can implement it.

In terms of health, there is always controversy over what an ideal diet is, but I am convinced that eating a wide range of foods is wise.

That has proven true for me. In my 20s I tried several restricted diets, for ethics and because of health problems. I eliminated processed white sugar with positive results, but all the other experiments failed: vegetarian, vegan, low-fat, candida, suspected food allergy elimination diets… In those cases, my health declined and I felt immediately better when I expanded my options again.

As humans evolved, we know that foraging hunter-gatherers (which we were for more than 90% of our existence as a species) ate a much wider range of foods than we have since we started settling and farming.  Then, over the last hundred years or so, the array of farmed foods has been shrinking dramatically.  There are even campaigns and programs now working to call attention to this issue. 

Sadly, no peaches this year

As a grower, I see how diversity is necessary for resilience. Most crops have good years and bad years. This winter’s temperature fluctuations killed all the peach blossoms in New England, however our berry crop looks great. In a hot, dry summer the tomatoes and eggplant often produce heavily, while the broccoli is not so big and healthy. When it’s cooler and wet the brassicas thrive while the tomato plants die of blight. Some years the squash borers kill most of our squash plants, while other years they barely make a dent. Every year is different (and the shifts are likely to become more extreme) and having lots going on means no year is ever a total loss.

At the same time – I do not want to grow food that I don’t want to eat. I see too many folks grow what is easy for them but then not want to eat it. That’s a good way to get turned off of gardening.

I’ve found the key is in getting good recipes or cooking directions. That can turn a food I didn’t think I liked into a favorite. Brussels sprouts are a great example. It wasn’t until someone roasted them in olive oil sprinkled in salt that I realized I don’t just not hate them but I absolutely loved them! Learning how to make a good salad dressing saved lettuce for me (along with the fun, fancy lettuce varieties). Mashed potatoes bore me, but roasted with garlic and onions in olive oil I rarely tire of. I started growing lots of snap beans after learning to roast them with onions then topping them with shredded cheese at the end of baking. I still didn’t like freezing them for the winter until I found a great three bean salad recipe.

Weird but Gorgeous – Beets

My latest discovery involves beets. I am an excellent beet grower and I enjoy growing them. I love how long lasting they are, and know they are really nutritious. But I just couldn’t find many ways I liked eating them. A few in a larger root veggies roast, ok, a bit of pickled beets in a salad, yes, but not much more. So, 10# a year was all I managed to eat when I could easily grow 50#. Then last summer, my neighbor & friend, Anna, brought a beet & kale salad to a potluck. It might not sound that special – but it is! I ended up buying beets this winter after we ran out so I could keep making it!

You can never have enough kale recipes!

Do you have any recipes or cooking tips that have made you appreciate a food that was previously unloved or unknown by you?  Any that you are looking for help bringing into your kitchen?

Here’s the Beet Kale Salad Recipe:

Roasted Beet Kale Salad with Goat Cheese and Walnuts

Ingredients

6 medium sized beets, any variety

2–3 T olive oil

6 c kale, chopped

4 oz fresh soft goat cheese, crumbled

1/2 c toasted walnuts or pecans

Balsamic Vinaigrette:

1/2 c olive oil

1/4 c balsamic vinegar

2 tsp maple syrup

2 tsp dijon mustard

Salt to taste

-Preheat oven to 400F

-Remove the tops and the roots of the beets. Cut the beets into 1-2 inch chunks. Arrange onto sheet pan, toss with olive oil and season well with salt. Roast for 35-45 minutes, tossing halfway, until beets are fork tender.

-Meanwhile, make the vinaigrette by combing all ingredients in a mixing bowl or mason jar. Shake or whisk; set aside.

-Place kale in a large bowl and drizzle with a few T oil. Using your hands, massage kale for 30-45 seconds; set aside.

-To assemble, top kale with roasted beets, nuts, and goat cheese. Add vinaigrette as desired.

Beets Growing in the Garden

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2022 on the Homestead

Before the 2023 growing season starts, I am taking some time to pause and assess last year on the homestead, in our permacultural ‘observe and interact’ way.

As an overview, I would say it was a tough year due to yet another drought, but that we managed to have a respectable harvest anyway due to adaptations we made. As always, some crops thrived while others did not. For consistency, in this blog I have kept the same topic headings as in previous years – plus a special section on new projects including our experiment with wheat growing!

Starting Seeds

Starting Seeds Indoors

My growing season got off to a solid start in March with indoor seed starting. I continue to be satisfied with the peat-free seed starting mix from Organic Mechanics mixed with our worm castings.

Sticking with newer seed and storing it well has kept my germination rates high the past few years. I am also doing more of my own seed saving, which means a yearly refresh of my supply. Some seed saving is easy, like flowers, herbs, and beans. Other types require more thought but are accessible, like lettuce, radish, and tomatoes. Still others are challenging, like squash, and biennial roots. My strategy is to add one or two types of seed to my repertoire every year rather than overwhelm myself by trying to do it all right away.

Weather and Water

Unfortunately but not unexpectedly, serious droughts are coming more frequently (‘abnormal dryness’ and ‘moderate’ droughts do come and go here somewhat regularly). In 2016 it felt like a shock after nearly two decades of normal precipitation. It was a relief when that ended, but an even worse dry period hit us in 2020. That one barely let up before another started in mid 2022.

Rain Water Storage

So, we relied on the upgraded water catchment system we installed last year, with four 275 gallon totes. Watering is not as thorough as rain, and it’s a lot of work, but it did save our plants and allow for a decent harvest.

Rodents, Pests and Diseases

Rodents continue to be a problem for us, especially voles. Now, I am aware that small mammals are critically important in our ecosystems and that populations are collapsing in some places (examples include China and England).  Loss of biodiversity is a dangerous and heartbreaking phenomenon, so I really don’t want to complain too much about healthy numbers of critters! However, the voles are taking too much of my root crops to be ignored.

I think there are two main reasons my preferred strategy of waiting for their predators to bring numbers back down is not working. First, our milder winters allow more of them to survive and breed. Second, because we have extensive fencing to protect our animals from predators, our gardens from deer, and now our orchards from porcupines we’ve created an especially safe haven for the furry little ones.

Raised Beds for Root Crops

So, we are starting to institute more drastic measures for crop protection. Last year I moved these crops out of the annual garden, but the voles just followed me. Friends gave me two very raised garden beds when they moved last year and they grew some

Carrots from the Raised Beds

awesome, not-at-all-chewed-up carrots. We’ll be building more, although we will put them on the ground with metal hardware cloth under them and see how that works.

 

We are considering growing our potatoes in large plastic barrels. I avoid plastic as much as possible and would rather grow everything directly in the ground, but I need to try something.

We have attracted the attention of porcupines. I find these animals adorable and love the sounds they make. They were, however, starting to do some real damage in our orchard. They especially love young pear trees. Deer are always an issue as well, so we did a serious fencing expansion that should keep both species at bay without our having to become more aggressive with them. We’re hoping that good fences will make good neighbors in this case (although I am much more a supporter of ‘tear down the walls’ actions in human interactions)!

Otherwise, we didn’t have major pest or disease outbreaks, which surprised me during such a stressful drought. In fact, there were so few vine borers we had the best summer squash harvest of our lives! I did have my usual struggle with caterpillars in the brassicas, which row cover and hand picking mostly kept in check. The Brussels sprouts were a little bit overrun, with all those nooks and crannies that the critters can hide in.

Labor

I continued my new pattern of driving to events less and using Zoom more thus having a little more time to keep up with the work here. I also did cut back in a few areas because I have been dealing with tendonitis in my arm, which made my workload more realistic. Which brings me to…

Animals: Bees

I have decided to take a break from beekeeping. My arm injury was definitely being exacerbated by the particular stress of frame lifting and moving the boxes. Bees are also difficult and many years disappointing, so a break from that is welcome. I hope to try again in 2024.

Animals: Goats and Pasture

Lily with this year’s kids

Spring birthing went well for both Lily and Georgia, our two pregnant does for the year. Pasture management was more challenging in the drought but we did ok in keeping the land covered and green. We could use more land to rotate the goats through for better parasite prevention in the herd, but what we’re doing is working well enough for now.

The big goat news is the arrival of new boys! In order to avoid inbreeding, we need some amount of turnover in the buck population and it was time. We found a breeder who had similar practices, made arrangements when kids were born in the spring, and picked up a pair – a buckling for breeding and his wethered (neutered) brother as his forever friend. I don’t like to buy or sell just one animal. I think going alone to a new place where they are likely to be quarantined for weeks is far too stressful. Zac and Ike (named for characters from 800 Words, FYI) have since joined the other boys – Marley the buck and Pinky the wether. Zac already got to prove his worth this Fall, spending two afternoons with Diana, who will be giving birth in early April!

Zac, Ike and Pinky

Animals: Poultry

This was an area we thought we’d pare back our plans to be sure of having enough good pasture. We hatched out 26 chickens and 2 ducklings. However, one of the hens had other ideas.  Without our even noticing, she made a nest in the brushy field and successfully brooded 14 chicks! I only figured it out when I heard that loud, distinctive peeping and found her strutting around surrounded by little ones. So, whoops, suddenly we had 40 chickens in the works. We were impressed with and grateful to the mama, and embraced the abundance, even if it was a little overwhelming.

New Projects: Maple Syrup and Wheat

Our Own Maple Syrup

Given that we are having trouble with the bees, we decided it was time to try maple sugaring. We had done a batch about 10 years ago, tapping a few red maples on our property and boiling the sap indoors leading to a harvest of… a pint or so. Not impressive! This time we invested in equipment to more easily collect the sap and boil it outside. We also reached out to neighbors for permission to tap their trees, too, if they weren’t doing it themselves, including a few sugar maples. The extra investment and work improved our yield to about 2 gallons. It is significant work, but we appreciate that it comes at a time of year that is otherwise quiet for us. We plan to keep that going and do even more in the future.

Years ago at a NOFA Summer Conference, I attended a workshop on home-scale grain growing in the Northeast, something I hadn’t considered even possible. I was so excited, but also intimidated to try it myself. A few years ago I gave it a try but the harvest was eaten by birds, mostly goldfinches. This past year, I tried again, growing a test plot in a bed 3 feet by 8 feet. I am thrilled to report that it worked! We managed to bring it in before the songbirds ate it all, dried it, threshed and winnowed, ground the wheat berries… and made an amazing loaf of bread! Threshing was the hardest part and I hope we can refine that. But, I am convinced now that it’s possible and planted 4x as much in the fall for a 2023 harvest. The global wheat shortage is likely to only get worse, so I’m doing my part to help localize this crop. We’ve been buying wheat berries from Maine for years, and this was the first year they sold out of the variety we wanted.

Growing Wheat

Drying Wheat

Bread from our own Wheat!

 

 

 

 

Harvest totals 2022

This accounts for what we brought into the house and remembered to weigh, which we mostly succeed in doing – except many overgrown cukes, kale, basil and zucchini were fed straight to the animals this year.

Alliums – garlic – 34.5 pounds (#) (185 heads); garlic tops – 180; leeks – 60.25#, perennial onions – 9.25#

Beans and Peas – snap beans – 90.75#; dry beans – 10#; sugar snap peas – 7#

Brassicas – broccoli – 13.75#; brussels sprouts – 9#; kale/collard – 42.5#

Harvest in July

Corn, popcorn – 7.25#

Cucumber – 128.5#

Eggplant – 13.5#

Greens – lettuce – 6.25#; nettles – 2.25#

Herbs – basil – 2.25#; dill – 1#

Mushrooms, winecap – 4.5#

Potatoes – 39#

Roots – beets – 4.5#; carrots – 45.75#; parsnips – 16.25#; radishes – 196 (here’s where the voles were: potatoes, beets, carrots, parsnips!)

Summer Squash

Squash – summer – 244#; winter (butternut, delicata, long pie and Seminole) – 790.25# (it was a great squash year)

Tomato – slicing – 30.25#; cherry -11.5#

Wheat – 2#

Fruit: azarole – 16.5; crabapples – 118.5#; currants, red and white -18#; elderberry – 5.75#; grapes – 40.5#; honeyberry – 2#; mulberry – 2.25#; peaches – 182.5# (from 4 trees); rhubarb – 12.5#

Maple syrup – 2 gallons

Sea salt – 3 quarts

We brought in 87.3 gallons of goat milk (from 3 goats); 83# goat meat; 10# goat lard

Our poultry harvest came to: 1,385 (115 dozen) chicken eggs from 12 hens; 710 (59 dozen) duck eggs from 7 ducks; chicken meat – 89.5#; duck meat – 6.5#

Stored Crops

Food Preserving

Preserving food for the off-season is necessary for us to eat from our land year-round. Here’s a summary of what I put up from the harvest I just detailed, plus some gleaned crops:

Canned: peaches -25 quarts; grape juice – 18 pints; grape jelly – 4 pints; clove currants – 13 pints; elderberry syrup – 4 pints; applesauce from gleaned apples – 6 pints; pears, gleaned – 29 pints; blueberries from berries picked at Tuckaway Farm – 15 pints; strawberries – 27 pints and strawberry juice – 11 pints from berries picked at East Wind Farm

Dried: peaches – 5#; kale/collards – 8 gallon bags; tomatoes – 1# ; grapes (raisins) – 2.5#

Refrigerated: lactofermented cucumber pickles – 10 quarts

Frozen: blueberries from Tuckaway – 2 gallon bags; snap beans – 10#; eggplant – 5#; summer squash – 30#; basil/garlic pesto – 5 pints; chevre cheese – 10 pints; mozzarella cheese – 10#; and most of the meat.

We also store these crops that aren’t preserved exactly, just handled and stored properly: dried beans, popcorn, garlic, potatoes, carrots, beets, parsnips, winter squash, pears and apples.

Looking Ahead

So far, 2023 has been a tough year for me. Despite taking many precautions, I had my first bout of COVID starting in January and after two months I’m still not fully recovered.  While not life-threatening, it was otherwise worse than I’d expected. The only upside was that it hit me in the quiet season on the farm. Meanwhile, my arm injury is still aggravated. I am therefore trying to allow for a less demanding workload coming up in an effort to fully heal. Taking a break from beekeeping is the major change I’ve made to that end. We also didn’t order very many trees for spring planting. Upkeep and getting the most out of what we have already going on will be the focus.

That will include a nice big garden, the expanded wheat trials, and more protective ways of growing root crops. We have goat kids coming in early April, and will raise more chickens.

I hope to keep writing, now that I have figured out how to use the speech recognition on the computer which saves my arm quite a bit of stress. Thanks for reading and I hope you had a good 2022 and your 2023 is going well so far! 

Here’s my most interesting image from 2022:

Snakes in our crabapple tree in the fall!

 

 

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Another Busy Busy Season

I may have planted too many beans this year!

During growing and harvest time, its easy for me to feel overwhelmed. I have systems and plans and projects that are bursting with life as I’d hoped – but not always going quite as I had planned. Control is elusive… ok, impossible. I suppose the whole experience is a good lesson in how much control is an illusion (or delusion) of the human mind. At the same time, to have any success as a farmer/gardener is to be organized and proactive about taking care appropriately and with good timing.

It feels like a contradiction: I should not try to control life, but I can’t lose control. That edge is really uncomfortable. But, I have been trying to be more accepting of contradiction after hearing author John O’Donohue’s opinion of it: “We should allow the different sides of what is contradictory inside of us to come close and meet each other. There is a secret life in contradiction… it’s always a place of fecund energy. And where there’s energy, there’s life. The force of energy within your own contradictions can actually bring you to a new level of growth and possibility.”  Permaculture principle 11 does ask us to Use Edges and Value the Marginal for that same reason: “The interface between things is where the most interesting events take place. These are often the most valuable, diverse and productive elements in the system.”

Goats love to climb – it’s just who they are!

As I think about it, the goats are good at teaching me the difference between control and appropriate action. First of all, accepting that our land was not suited for the Jersey cow I had dreamed of was a way of listening to reality rather than imposing my will. Then, we heard so many distressing stories about the bad behavior of goats when we first started keeping them. Everyone wanted to tell us about how they escape, eat your garden or poisonous plants that kill them, violently butt people, scream all day, etc. We did have a few escape incidents early on.  But we studied goat behavior, talked to others, and through trial and error we created systems that properly channeled their normal goat tendencies in ways that help rather than hurt them and our homestead. It was a practice of observe, interact, accept feedback, self-regulate and respond to change (more permaculture principles). We learned how to channel the flow instead of fight against it.

So… what has kept us busy this year?

Our spring planting season was manageable, although we did have an extensive tree order arrive during April. At least it was raining back then.

It was when the drought settled in that we began to struggle to keep up.

Serious rain collection for a changing climate

That started in mid-June, adding daily (sometimes 2x a day) watering to our list of tasks. In what we used to think of as a “normal” year, we did almost no watering after plants were established in the spring. In the new climate of droughts here in New England, this becomes a necessity. We were grateful to have installed a robust rainwater collection system last year, able to hold over 1,000 gallons. We got towards the bottom of the supply a few times, but it rained enough to have continuous use of them through the summer.

Harvest time!

Being able to keep up with watering did lead to a prolific harvest for most of our crops. I had an especially good season for summer squash, snap beans, cucumbers, leeks and basil. Nearly every day I put something up for winter, which led to my next round of excess activity. I dehydrated peaches, apples, pears, grapes (raisins), kale,

Peaches! Not as many but super sweet in the drought.

summer squash, and winecap mushrooms. I froze beans, eggplant, summer squash, cheese, and pesto. I canned peaches and froze a lot of other smaller fruit that I will can now that it’s not so hot: strawberries, blueberries, grapes, currants, and elderberries.

 

As autumn settles in we fill our cold storage – garlic actually comes in earlier, then apples and pears, with the winter squash curing in the greenhouse first, and the roots are packed up for the root cellar.

Rotational Goat Grazing

There is always animal care to be on top of. Happily, that went smoothly for the most part. The goats had a good birthing season and our rotational grazing system is working well. I kept up with the heavy summer milk production by making (and freezing) mozzarella along with my usual yogurt and soft cheese. We had solid planned poultry hatches, and a surprise batch of 14 that one of our hens orchestrated out in the field without our noticing. We are now in poultry harvest and processing season, which is a lot of work, physically and emotionally. I took the year off from the bees which did free up some time for me.

The well-mulched annual garden needs very little weeding

There was weeding to do in the orchard and pasture areas, which is not a job I love and is always needed at the hottest time of year. Our annual garden system with my heavy mulching needs almost no weeding and that’s how I like it. But in other larger areas I am encouraging a mix of plants, mostly groundcovers or animal forage and still need to be on top of pulling out the plants that I don’t want there.

It’s really not until mid-October that I notice the pace slowing – and have time to start catching up on writing, reading and rest!

This year I had the added complication of deciding to continue extra off-farm work. Most years I suspend a lot of activities – True Tales Live takes a summer break, my drumming classes stop, Seacoast Permaculture offerings slow down, and I step back from activist work. However, this season I felt called to stay more connected to my work with NH Peace Action and the Friends Committee on National Legislation as it was an important moment in the struggle to end US involvement in the Yemen War – a war causing a terrible famine. So, I’m a little more behind than usual, but I am glad I did it. Underpinning all of our work here is the desire for a more peaceful and just world, and growing a little less of our own food to help others get any food at all was the right choice.

Packing carrots for the root cellar

Long Pie winter squash curing. We eat year-round from our garden with long-lasting crops and food preservation.

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