7 Quick Takes Friday

As part of my effort to participate in more link ups, I’m connecting with Jennifer at Conversion Diary, for her very popular weekly link up known as 7 Quick Takes.  Welcome to those who have hopped over for a visit.  I hope you will explore a little, and I hope you like what you find here.

Jennifer encourages her readers not to worry about having a theme for their takes, so here goes my effort.

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We are very happy with our new sprinkler hose watering system for the garden.  We have tried soaker hoses before, but the last one did not distribute the water everywhere it needed to go.  This new one does the job, and it is so easy to turn on and then forget to turn off that our plants may be in danger of drowning!  Also, the newspaper weed control worked well enough that I am trying it again on the open areas of the garden, using rocks and sticks to keep it from blowing away this time.  Here is a picture of the sprinkler hose and newspapers surrounding one of our blueberry bushes.

 

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We are harvesting!  So far, we have picked a few blueberries, some cherry tomatoes, green onions, and peaches.  

I will be busy for a week or more “putting up” our peach harvest, so look for a future post with the new recipes I’m planning to try.  You can read about the nutritional benefits of peaches and the recipes I made last year here.  Also, we are cutting herbs regularly: oregano, rosemary, parsley, and cilantro.

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My almost-eight-year-old learned how to ride her bike this week!  She has been trying to do it off and on for a while now and two days ago she wanted to try again immediately after school, since there was no homework this week.  After a few minutes, she was gliding along.  She is still rather wobbly and stops often, but she is so excited that she can pedal and balance at the same time.  I think our summer is going to be full of bike rides.

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In between watering, harvesting, and bike riding, we are making a large 550 piece puzzle together, bit by bit.  My daughters have always liked puzzles, and when my in-laws gave us a puzzle they no longer wanted, my girls decided to tackle it.  Even my three year old contributes; we give her all the pieces of a fish, animal, or flower and she puts them together.  The image is of the prehistoric Amazon, so there are plenty of colors and lines to try to match up.  Now I’m wondering if the easy kid puzzles we have will continue to entertain them.  However, I now know how to keep us all busy when it becomes too hot to go outside or it rains.

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Summer has not yet officially started at our house.  Our school district may be the only one in the country to finish next week instead of last week or this week.  We are looking forward to a busy summer schedule of swimming lessons, nature camp, gymnastics, library programs, and activities with our Catholic Moms group.  While we are very busy Monday – Wednesday, especially in June while dance classes are still in session, I have kept most Thursdays and Fridays unscheduled so we can relax, clean house, and use our imaginations.  Check back to see the art projects and other activities we come up with.

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Our back porch is getting a facelift with a new coat of paint.  My father-in-law and nephew (he finished school yesterday) cleaned and primed the ceiling, trim, and poles today.  Tomorrow, my husband will join them to repair a few boards, seal some cracks, and paint everything Antique Cream.  Then we will sort and purge the toys, gardening implements, and empty pots that have accumulated back there so we can reorganize.  Our porch can feel comfortably cool even on hot days, so we are looking forward to enjoying some family time together in that space.

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I’m hosting my first linkup, for The Most Holy Trinity!  

There are fifteen links so far; please visit them.  Also, can you add your posts about the Trinity to help me get to twenty or twenty five links?  The link up will be open through Wednesday.  I look forward to your contributions.

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

This post is also linked to the Catholic Bloggers Network Round up.  Remember to go visit the other links there and vote with your mouse for this month’s Big Clicks Award.

Grow Green Onions on Your Windowsill

Yes, you can grow green onions on your windowsill in a jar!  No dirt or special pot needed.  Use a mason jar or jelly jar, or even a drinking glass.  Check out what is on our windowsill right now.

This is the easiest growing project ever, even if you can’t grow or take care of plants.  Kids love it, and they even like to perform the minimal care required.  Just change out the water every four or five days, and your green onion roots will grow new stems in a couple of weeks.

My children enjoy checking the windowsill each morning to see how much the onions have grown, especially when we start a new batch; they grow quickly at the beginning.

I learned how to do this from foodie blogger Dorothy at Shockingly Delicious.  As soon as I saw her pictures, I knew I had to try it myself.  Go see her post for the simple directions and you can get started on your own windowsill garden.  By the way, according to some of Dorothy’s readers who wrote in the post comments, you can do this with lemongrass too.

Here are the photos of our windowsill garden.  In the photo above, the glass on the far right is growing a second crop from the same onion cuttings.  In the photo below, you see the first stems growing.

Next, you will see the first crop right before harvest with another group started in a smaller jar.  You know they are ready for harvest when some of the tips are pointy instead of the blunt cut leftover from the beginning.

Below are the two sets a little further along in growth.  Keep in mind that the set on the right is growing a second crop from the same roots.  It has been slower the second time around, so I may put these roots in the ground after this harvest.

If you need ideas for what to do with your new crop, try making Grilled Wild Alaskan Salmon Burgers.  And, look for future posts of recipes featuring green onions, so you will have plenty of dishes to make with your new crop!  I’ll be posting soon about South Texas Savory Bread Pudding (Capirotada), and Fire and Ice Watermelon Salad (part of the MyPlate recipe reviews).  

In the meantime, enjoy your green onions on baked potatoes, salads, soups, and anywhere a milder onion is needed.

In 2013 I am linking with: Backyard Barbecue Bloghop, The Better Mom, Motivational Monday, After School Party, Welcome Home, Healthy 2day Wednesday, We Made That, Shoe Lace, Weekly Kids Co-op, Food on Fridays, For the Kids Friday, Hobbies and Handicrafts

In 2012 I linked with:  Fantastic Ideas for Summer Fun

The Garden is Planted

Last week, the girls and I started clearing out the weeds from our garden plot so we could plant for the season.  In the process, we discovered that some of our crops from last year had sprouted from seed, including two romaine lettuces, a lot of parsley, and some mint.  

romaine lettuce

mint crowded by parsley

Our oregano and rosemary survived the winter, as they usually do, and we even found a tiny bell pepper on one of last year’s plants!  Also, the eggplant is still green; I actually harvested an eggplant from it last month!  Even our grape vine has come back unexpectedly (it looked quite sad over the winter).

eggplant

In fact, most of our produce trees are fruiting, including the peach, fig, and lemon trees.  

peaches

fig

lemons

One of the blueberry bushes is flowering, as is the orange tree and the citronella (just in time for mosquito season).

blueberry

citronella

Saturday, we spent the entire day prepping our garden plot and planting.  We began with a trip to the farmer’s market, where I conversed with the tomato farmer and bought two of his heirloom seedlings: a cherry tomato and a stripe variety.  I was pleasantly surprised to meet someone who farms tomatoes exclusively, and enjoyed hearing his methods for nurturing tomato plants.  

We then headed over to our local home improvement store where we picked up more heirloom and cherry tomatoes, bell peppers, and hot peppers, all as seedlings.  After a final stop at my in-laws for a lemongrass seedling, we headed home to complete the clean up and plant our seedlings as well as the seeds we saved from last year and some we have bought the last few weeks.

In addition to the seedlings, we planted the following seeds: basil and more romaine (from seeds harvested last fall), salad bowl lettuce, kale, broccoli and carrots.  Some of these are cold weather crops, but we wanted to try them anyway.  Our weekend weather was crispy cool in the mornings and warm in the afternoons; perfect spring weather for planting.

We garden organically, so we usually spend time throughout the season weeding the plot.  This year, we are trying some preventative measures.  After planting the seedlings, we laid down newspaper and topped it with dried leaves.  You can barely see some of the tomato seedlings poking out above all that in the picture below. 

 

Here’s hoping for a bountiful season!  What are you planting this year?

Neighbors, if you want to start an herb garden, I have parsley, oregano, and rosemary seedlings.  If the basil comes up, I should have plenty of that, too.  Come on by to get some!

Birthday Rain

I am writing this on my birthday, and it has been raining and raining and raining most of the day.  I could not have asked for a better birthday present.  In our neighborhood, we have not had an all day rain in about a year.  Seriously.  While other parts of Houston have rained to the point of flooding several times this year, our neighborhood has not had more than a quick rain shower now and again.  The windows and doors are open, so I’m listening to the rain pouring off the roof, and I am content.

Fall has always been my favorite season, because fresher cooler air puts me in a good mood and gives me energy.  I welcome cool breezes after the long hot season, and I really enjoy seeing the leaves bursting with color if we’ve had enough rain that year.  I like to hear the crunch fallen leaves make when you walk on them, and I enjoy sunny days that are less humid.  Even though the days get shorter, in my opinion, the better weather makes up for that.

Here’s hoping the fall will bring us more rain; even with today’s drenching, we are still in a rain deficit.  Recently, I was talking with my friend Sylvia about how much the climate of Houston has changed since we were children.  We lived in a rainy city growing up, but now we don’t.  That is more than enough proof for me that global warming has caused climate change.  I keep hoping that we have seen all the change we will get, but I also know that predictions say we may get even less rain for the next decade.  Instead of the Bayou City, we may be a city of dry ditches.  I remember seeing green everywhere in this city; now everything is brown.  The occasional green patch or flowering field is an attention getter.  When my husband waters the lawn, birds come over from the barely trickling bayou to get wet.  If the drought continues, my children will know this city in a different way than I did.  Hopefully, they will learn to appreciate the rain, whether it is abundant or rare.

October is also a month of remembering for me.  I have miscarried two babies, and they both would have been born this month if they had survived.  They would have been five and four this year; I share the birthday greetings I have received and today’s gift of rain with them.  I blow my birthday candles and eat chocolate cake with them in mind.  My maternal grandfather’s birthday was also this month.  I have been thinking about my grandparents often lately, perhaps because I have been thinking of generational turnover: my parents and in-laws are reaching the advanced years, my husband and I are middle aged (our friends, too), and my children are no longer babies.  I see and feel new signs of time passing in others and myself every day; I don’t need a birthday to remind me that I am getting older!  Age also brings many forms of wisdom, and I look forward to being wiser.

In my wisdom, I have decided to put in a fall garden after all, but have not yet had the time to do it.  I may try some cooler weather veggies, like more spinach, cilantro, carrots, onions, maybe kale or swiss chard, possibly potatoes.  Since I have never planted this late before, I may need to rely on your gardening wisdom.  Any suggestions?

Reminder: I will be participating in a reading for the Smithsonian Latino Virtual Museum this Friday, October 14, 7:30 – 9:30 p.m. CDT live inworld for the museum’s Second Life virtual environment.  More details on my Upcoming Events page.  I just completed the sound check for this event, and I’m excited about reading in a new venue.

Gardening During a Drought

A few days ago, I took advantage of the cool morning weather to weed the garden.  We haven’t watered in several weeks because the tomatoes are finished and the squash dried up.  Now that the heat has let up a little, I’m trying to decide if I should plant a fall garden.  I usually don’t plant one because the yields are uncertain.  Tomatoes may or may not get enough sun and an early cold season could stunt everything else.

Our winters are mild, so the herbs and peppers thrive and produce year round.  We have several types of chili peppers, oregano, mint, and rosemary.  The eggplant is flowering again.  Basil seedlings are popping up and if I water, I’m sure the parsley seeds will sprout too.  I’m wondering, though, is it ethical to plant a garden for my own exclusive use when I already know the drought will persist through November?  Our area of Houston is not on water restrictions, but the rest of the city is.  Should I use up water with a garden that may not yield?  The peppers and some of the herbs will survive with minimal watering, but anything else will require weekly water, at the least.

Barbara Kingsolver lists this dilemma as one of the reasons her family moved from Tucson to the Midwest.  In her book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, she outlines her concerns about gardening using water that her desert community has to transport long distances.  As she increased the size of her garden each year, and finally made the decision to subsist only on what she and her neighbors could grow locally, she saw the use of water for growing food impractical in a desert climate, especially given zoning laws calling for natural landscaping.

I garden for several reasons: to provide healthy organic food for my family, to teach my children about food production, to eat more local food, and to show my children how to care for the planet.  As food prices continue to increase, I hope to grow more of what we need for budgetary reasons.  While cost is not the only factor, I’m sure our water bills will increase significantly if this drought continues. 

What do you think?  Should I nurture the basil seedlings, plant cilantro and romaine lettuce seeds, and look for other seedlings at the home improvement store?  Or, should I save my gardening efforts for the spring, when the rain will hopefully return?

Local Food in School Cafeterias

The Houston Independent School District has just announced plans to buy more local produce for use in school cafeterias.  According to their press release, reprinted in The West University Examiner, they hope to buy up to 25% of the produce they use locally (up from 11%).  Their intention is “to promote healthful eating.”

Buying locally means the produce will be very fresh.  Lettuce could find itself in the new HISD salad bars within 1 day of being picked.  Fresh picked produce tastes better and has more nutrients than produce that has to travel from other parts of the state or country.  Better taste could encourage students to make healthier choices in the lunch line more often.

Using fresh produce gives HISD the option to offer more raw food choices.  Salad bars are a great start, but what about offering fresh fruit in season?  This would be a better nutritional option than the standard processed fruits that contain added sugar and often artificial color.  Fresh fruit can be blended into smoothies with yogurt for breakfast.  Fruit salad can be eaten as is or mixed with yogurt for a luncheon side.  Whole fruits make a great side dish or dessert, such as locally grown peaches, pears, and bananas.

Other raw food options: chopped onions and tomatoes, sliced or cubed avocado, and chopped fresh herbs.  These make great toppings for soups, stews, meat dishes, baked potatoes, tacos, burritos, enchiladas, etc.  Offering these to students would increase the nutritional content of their meals.  Using fresh herbs in cold pasta dishes would add both flavor and nutrition.

I would like to see the figures for fresh produce offered as a percentage of the overall menu.  I’m guessing most of the foods in the cafeteria are cooked, processed, or both.  While this may be no different than what most children eat in their homes or bring for lunch, I think we can all agree that school lunches could use a taste and nutritional overhaul.  HISD’s interest in local produce is a step in that direction.

I also like the idea that the relationships with local farmers could lead to farm field trips and farmer guest speakers.  Children should learn more about how food is grown, where it is grown, and the people who grow it.  Urban children especially need to see food production as something tangible and important.  Too often, children have little understanding of where their food comes from and what role they can play as adults in providing for their own food needs.  As the conflict between conventional and organic farming becomes more prominent, and the role of nutrition in disease is better understood, all of us will need to be more active in protecting, promoting, and preserving our food supply and the farmers who grow it.  There is a potential need for many types of activism on this front, and children who understand how food grows will influence our future food supply, through their food choices, their gardening efforts, and their activism around food.  It is also possible that the fossil fuels we currently use to fertilize crops, to move food around, and to process foods may no longer be as practical or available for these uses in the future.  Children need food knowledge to resolve these issues and to provide for their own futures.

We live out in the suburbs, so I contacted our school district to ask how much local produce they buy.  I’m waiting for a response.  I urge you to make a call yourself.  I have read about a school vegetable garden in our district, and I have seen what looks like a possible vegetable garden at another school, so I also plan to ask about these efforts.  Maybe I’ll convince my daughter’s school to plant a garden this year.

Children can learn quite a bit from gardening, including how much work goes into food production.  I briefly list the benefits of this particular type of active learning in my post Growing Your Own.  Another benefit is an appreciation for plant foods that may change many children from vegetable dislikers to vegetable eaters.  A great book that shows children how to plant, grow, and cook food is Grow It, Cook It by Jill Bloomfield.  We made the Lemonade ice-pops yesterday.  Two other children’s books that show the process of growing food from seed to preparing what you’ve grown and eating it are: The Tortilla Factory by Gary Paulsen and by Growing Vegetable Soup by Lois Ehlert.  My children love these books, but of course, we read them in Spanish: La Tortillería y A sembrar sopa de verduras.  We actually have the first edition of Erlert’s book, Cultivamos sopa de verduras, with a slightly different translation.  However, the new edition includes a soup recipe on the back cover!

For adult reading about local food, growing your own, and preserving your harvest, I recommend Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver.  She writes about how her family lived for an entire year on food grown only by themselves or their neighbors.  Their story is informative, inspiring, and admirable.

Source:

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver

Fresh Cut Herbs for Lunch

As I look at the stats for this blog, I’ve noticed that readers seem most interested in the entries labeled “healthy living” and “food,” so I’m going to write a couple in a row for you.  I appreciate your comments, and I hope you’ll leave more, especially if you like something, or have suggestions.

Earlier this week, I cut some herbs from the garden and made lunch.  This is a great way to benefit from the nutrients in raw herbs, to incorporate raw foods into your meal, and to make something to eat with very little cooking (who wants to cook something on a stove when it’s nearly 100° outside).  Here’s what we ate, decidedly influenced by Italian cuisine.

First course: Chopped rosemary, oregano, and parsley mixed on a plate with extra virgin olive oil.  A great dip for bread!  My six year old said this is her favorite recipe.  Probably because once I’ve cut the herbs, she can make it herself!

Second course: Basil leaves, fresh chopped tomatoes, and chunks of fresh cheese.  Mozzarella is great, but we used Queso Fresco, a soft white Mexican cheese that is less costly at our local supermarket.  Wrap the cheese and tomato pieces in basil leaves to eat them, like taquitos (small tacos), or “a larvae inside a leaf”, according to my six year old.

Third course: Small farfalle (bowties) pasta dressed with extra virgin olive oil or garlic flavored olive oil, chopped basil, oregano, and parsley.  Use as many or few herbs as you like.  If have extra tomatoes, add them too.  If you have time, make a pesto from basil, parsley, or even cilantro.  (Leftover pesto?  Freeze it for later!  Got some in the freezer?  Use it for this!)  Always serve pesto at room temperature to preserve the raw enzymes in the herbs, garlic, and olive oil.

Enzymes from raw plant foods aid in the digestion of cooked foods, thus preserving the body’s supply of enzymes for other uses, such as immune system fights against cancer causing agents and cancer cells themselves.  More about how to incorporate raw foods into meals (not just as salads) in future posts (Read part 1 here and part 2 here).

Raw parsley contains high levels of the anti-oxidant glutathione, an important fighter against cancer-causing agents (free radicals) that also protects the lenses of the eyes from ultraviolet light and that neutralizes rancid oxidized fats (from cooking foods at high temperatures) that contribute to clogged arteries.  Glutathione also boosts the immune system, detoxes pollutants, reduces inflammation, and repairs damaged DNA.  Our bodies can make glutathione, but our ability to do so diminishes around age 40, so it is an important part of a healthy diet, especially as we age.  Another great way to use raw parsley: make tabouli.

Broccoli and spinach are also good sources of glutathione.  Much of it is lost during cooking, so it’s important to eat these foods both raw and cooked.  For example, cooking makes the calcium and beta-carotene in spinach more absorbable even though glutathione is depleted.

See my post Growing Your Own for information on the medicinal benefits of raw oregano and rosemary.  

My next post will be about the recently announced replacement for the food pyramid: Myplate.gov.

Sources:
Nourishing Traditions: The Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats by Sally Fallon with Mary G. Enig

SuperFoods Rx: Fourteen Foods That Will Change Your Life by Steven Pratt, M.D.

Ann Kroeker hosts a weekly Food on Fridays Linkup, so I have connected there, where you will find many links somehow (either casually or directly) related to food and recipes.  Go see her GFCF veggie pizza recipe.

I have also added this post to this week’s Ultimate Recipe Swap hosted by Jessica at life as mom.  This week’s theme is Chef’s Choice; she is sharing a pasta dish with ingredients made from leftovers.