Over at Thrifty And Green August 8, 2011

I’ve been busy writing at Thrifty and Green.  Here are a few highlights:

Thrifty and Green Digital Edition

The very exciting inaugural digital edition of Thrifty & Green is now available for purchase. It’s packed full of premium of content – I’ve contributed a Green Back To School spread, with a Green School Supply List. We’ve also got some great Back to School Lunch Snack Recipes that are better for the earth and for the kids. Other highlights include Rooftop Gardens, Traveling the World on a Shoe String Budget and the Low Down on Wild vs Farmed Salmon. A 20-page Preview of the magazine is available, but really for $2.99, you should probably just buy it!

In Growing Up Green, we’ve gone Berry crazy!

Berries at Growing Up Green

Read about Foraging for Wild Berries, and learn how best to Freeze the Berries you collect. In a moment of bucket dumping frustration, I was inspired to make cute Berry Buckets on String with the kids. This free recycled craft was a huge hit at our house, so I shared it at Crafty Kids.

I’ve also shared our tried and tested 10 Fun Road Trip Games which will come in handy for any summer Camping Trips still on the horizon.

If you like what you read – please help spread the word. It’s a new publication and we appreciate all the support!

LIKE Thrifty & Green on Facebook, follow @thriftyandgreen on twitter and me at @tovahp. But most of all, tell you friends!

Seaweed for the Garden August 6, 2011

Seaweed from the Beach

We spent last weekend camping near a beach covered with washed up seaweed. Seaweed is full of nutrients – reputed to be as good as fresh manure for the earth – so before leaving, we collected a rubbermaid full of seaweed for the garden. The kids collected (and returned) a bucket full of fish from the tidepools.

Chasing Fish in the Tide Pool

We live on the West Coast, so mulching with seaweed seems like a given, but the opportunity hadn’t presented itself until now.

Seaweed can be applied directly to the garden as a layer of mulch or it can be added to the compost. A tonic can also be made by filling a barrel half way with the seaweed and adding water. After sitting three months, this is similar to the commercially available seaweed fertilizer formulas.

Impatience and lack of organization negate the possibility of making tonic right now. And as much as I’d love to mulch, I’m not going to for two reasons:

1. We didn’t rinse the salt from the seaweed with freshwater.  The salt can be harmful to the garden and can kill the worms. In the rainy winter months, the effect is negligible, but during the summer months adding a lot of salt to the garden isn’t a great idea. That said, that’s way too much work for this busy mama!
2. Apparently seaweed is rich in growth hormone and shouldn’t be applied late in the growing season.  We might mulch with seaweed in the early fall, when the winter garden is just starting and the other beds are replenishing.

So the seaweed is going into the compost. I’ll let you know how that turns out…

Collecting Seaweed

Collecting seaweed is as easy as anything. The variety of seaweed is inconsequential and many types varieties can be found on most beaches.  The one and only steadfast rule is respect. Seaweed is an important part of the aquaculture and removing it can be harmful to the natural balance of the environment. So,

• NEVER take live seaweed. ONLY take seaweed from the beach.
• RINSE the seaweed gently in the ocean to release aquatic organisms back into the water.
• LEAVE plenty of seaweed on the beach.  Dried seaweed is a home and harbor to many creatures, if you take it all they are left without cover.

The Best Salad Dressing July 28, 2011

The Best Salad Dressing in the World

We’ve been eating a lot of greens this cool summer.  Which is fine by us, we have the yummiest salad dressing in the “whole-entire world,” courtesy of the magazine Edible Vancouver and the incredible Hollyhock Institute.

Edible printed Hollyhock’s famous dressing in their almost-spring 2011 edition, and it’s been a game changer at our house.  Here it is.  The best salad dressing in the “Whole-Entire World”

Hollyhock Yeast Dressing

As printed in Edible, from Hollyhock Cooks, with Linda Solomon and Moreka Jolar.

Makes 2 1/2 cups.

1/2 cup (125 ml) nutritional yeast flakes

1/3 cup (75 ml) water

1/3 cup (75 ml) soy sauce or tamari

1/3 cup (75 ml) apple cider vinegar

2 Tbsp crushed garlic

1 1/2 cups (375 ml) Sunflower Oil

Combine the first 5 ing unredients in a blender until they are thoroughly mixed. While still mixing on high, pour the oil in a slow, steady stream. Add  all the oil or r when a desired consistency is achieved. (Honestly, we put everything in the glass mason jar we keep the dressing in, and shake. It’s delicious). When refrigerated, this keeps for 2 weeks.

Salad Greens July 25, 2011

Salad Greens (and peas, dill & strawberries)

The salad is doing well this year. That’s because it’s late July and yesterday was the first day of “summer” here on the wet wet coast.  Now that it’s hot – and assuming the heat is planning to stick around, the salad will now bolt.  Which means it’s time to eat it all up. Fast.

Until this year, I’ve never had much luck producing sweet lettuce. The heat and dry of summer have always got the better of us and the spring lettuce has consistently bolted early in the year, quickly become woody and bitter. So for the long spring lettuce season, I give thanks.  The peas, brocolli and cabbage are also doing remarkably well with this odd season. To extend the growing of these spring crops in the summer heat, we need to get on top of watering now.  Until this week, we’ve been leaving the watering to the elements. Luckily, the rain barrels are full after a wet spring so we should be able to ward off bitter bolting greens a little bit longer.

It’s also time to sow another round of greens. We’ll plant in the partial shade of some of the bushier veggies to keep these a little cooler and eat them young and fresh during the hot summer, um, weeks.  Strangely, it’s almost time to sow winter greens too – more kale, spinach and crests to go into what will be a covered winter garden in a couple months.

Foraging: Huckleberries & Pie July 22, 2011

Huckleberries

We’ve spent the last couple of days foraging for huckleberries.  It’s so important to take advantage of the beautiful fruits that nature provides.  They’re there for the picking.  Pick them! PICK THEM! Admittedly, I take this to an obsessive sort of level – my poor husband has nearly had a heart attack on a number of occasions when I scream “STOP THE CAR” at the sight of a particularly good patch of blackberries.  But this early in the season, the whole family shares my unbridled enthusiasm.

Those long-awaited fruits have arrived.  In the forest near our home Salmonberries and Huckleberries are ripe.

This has been the first year that our son, now 6, has understood the benefit of putting the berries in the bucket to bring home. Like his mother, his passion for berry picking is absolute. But until this year, his impatience got the best of him every time and he ate every last berry he picked. Nothing wrong with that really. Fresh. Delicious. Healthy.  It’s what our 3-year old daughter did this year. But  neat to see our son able to exercise self-restraint – to pick berries, bring berries home, dutifully hand over the berries and patiently wait for them to turn into something even better.

And they did!

Huckleberry Pie

With the exception of our 3-year old daughter, who doesn’t like pie, we all agree that Huckleberry pie – with it’s  perfect combination of tart and sweet – is the true sign of summer.  Luckily, the summer heat is refusing to make an appearance this year, so baking it was not only easy, but also enjoyable! Coming up next, huckleberry jam and huckleberry muffins. Yum.

Huckleberry Pie

Ingredients

• 1 recipe pastry for a 9 inch double crust pie
• 4 cups huckleberries
• 3/4 cup cane sugar
• 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 tablespoons soya milk or cream
• 2 teaspoons white sugar

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C).
2. Gently coat  huckleberries in flour, then place in a pastry-lined pan. Spoon sugar evenly over berries. Sprinkle lemon rind and lemon juice over top. Dot with butter. Cover with top crust. Seal edges and cut steam vents in top. Brush surface with soya milk or cream, avoiding fluted edges of crust. Sprinkle with 2 teaspoons sugar.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 15 minutes. Reduce heat to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) and bake an additional 20 to 25 minutes, until crust is golden brown.

Rainy Day Tea Party July 18, 2011

Rainy Day Tea Party

Rain rain go away…  We’ve been trying hard not to sing the mantra. There is no point whining about things that are completely out of our control and since we live in a veritable rain forest, we’ve spent the past six years instilling in our family an embrace-the-rain attitude. Or at least a don’t-let-it-stop-us attitude. We splash in puddles.  We make mud pies. We ride bikes in rain pants. But this summer is trying everyone’s patience – it’s mid-July, we’d really love to see the sun!

The garden is sad. And wet. And muddy. The early crops are coming along nicely.  Pig Peas. Crisp Lettuce. Sweet strawberries. But it’s mid-July! MID-JULY.

This afternoon we took a break from the wet, muddy garden and tried to enjoy the cool home.  When the kids appeared with the porcelain tea set in hand and hope written all over their faces we decided to stage a tea party. Which meant that cookies needed baking. Which meant the oven needed to be turned on. I have a rule that if the oven is heated, we use it plentifully.  So it turned into a roast making, cook and baking, garden fore-saking sort of day.

In our house tea parties are all about sweet manners and sweet treats. In true form, the kids were lovely – using their best pleases and thank yous; and always serving the other first. It’s such a fun way to practice manners – I don’t think the kids have ever had a disagreement during a tea party. The peppermint tea was store bought, but I have big plans for our own mint this year and hope to build on the herbs next year, so hopefully we’ll be making our own tea soon! The cookies were Almond Thumbprints, from Double Delicious, a recipe we’ve never tried before but will definitely repeat.

New Post at ThriftyandGreen.com: Frogs and Polliwogs July 14, 2011

"Frogs and Polliwogs" at Growing Up Green for www.thriftandgreen.com

We’re out of town this week on a family vacation.  The garden is well mulched and a neighbour will water if it get really dry.  My fingers are crossed and I’m trying not to envision the worst.

So while I’ve nothing new to report here, there is a new post about Frogs and Polliwogs up in my Growing Up Green series on www.thriftyandgreen.com.  The kids and I spent a fabulous afternoon catching frogs and tadpoles and learning about the marsh.  It was a super way to reinforce primary lessons about the concepts of habitat conservation, species preservation and ecosystems as a whole.

Check it out: https://thriftyandgreen.com/content/growing-green-frogs-and-polliwogs

Kid-Painted Herb Pots for Housewarming June 30, 2011

kid painted herb potters

Friends recently bought a house and took possession – in late June.  It’s a great place with established flowers, but no vegetable garden, no herb garden and no time to plant annuals. So for a housewarming, we brought them two terra cotta planters full of herbs. 

A few of the herbs were transplants from our garden, others were purchased from a local nursery where “compact” versions of some of our favorites were available.

The kids painted the potters.  When they were dry we filled them with a layer of gravel, then potting soil and finally herbs and marigolds.

Ta-da!

For more on natural family living, check out my series Growing Up Green at http://www.thriftyandgreen.com/content/growing-up-green.

Peas and Patience June 27, 2011

Peas in the Garden

It’s exciting when the radishes are ready to be eaten – but only because they are first.  I appreciate their bite, colour and above all else, their early arrival, but I don’t love the radishes. And I’m happy when the greens are ready for early harvest. It’s so nice to bring in an assortment of leaves of dinner. Put it’s the appearance of peas that truly marks summer on my calendar.  This year on the wet west coast, summer seems to be stalling in its arrival, so it’s with a sense of utter delight that I announce that the peas have arrived.

They are growing – tall, strong and beautiful . The vines are covered in flowers and the early pods are thickening. I’m oh so tempted to break into the fresh treat, but they are not ready.  I know they are not ready.  The kids know, because they are constantly told, that they are not ready.  And yet, it doesn’t seem to make it any easier to wait.

Peas prefer mild climates and can be planted very early in the spring. We started ours inside in March and planted them into the beds in April. Because we’ve got the space for tall varieties, the peas are near the back of the garden bed where they won’t cast too much shade on other plants.  If you have a particularly hot plot, you could use the peas to create partial shade for plants that bolt in extreme heat – like many leafy greens.

Because peas like the cool weather, if you missed planting some early in the spring, there is still a chance to sow in August for a fall harvest.

Peas tolerate crowding and even produce well in container.  Plant them thick and enjoy lots of peas. They are  a great choice for small space gardens, biodynamic gardeners, folks with an eye towards freezing for the winter or just about anybody!

A few tips for good peas:

• water close to the ground, avoiding the plant. They do fine with minimal watering in spring weather, assuming the soil holds the moisture well.
• pick the peas often – the more you pick, the more the plant rewards you
• support with a strong trellis
• perfect pH is btw 6 – 6.5

Peas are about the easiest possible vegetable for seed saving.  They self fertilize, so as long as you have non-gmo seeds, mature seeds can be dried and used for the next crop.

Peas are perfect little orbs of green goodness, and ours are ALMOST ready. So today I give gratefulness to the garden not only for the bounty and the beauty, but for the practice of patience.  Now grow peas. My patience is running thin!

Growing Up Green June 25, 2011

Growing Up Green at http://www.thriftyandgreen.com/content/growing-up-green

I’ve been busy launching a new series called Growing Up Green over at www.thriftyandgreen.com.  Every Thursday I post about our family’s adventures raising three young kids with sustainable practices and values.  Follow the fun at http://www.thriftyandgreen.com/content/growing-up-green.

Posts here at Gumboot Adventures will resume per normal shortly.  Despite an incredibly cool spring, the garden is growing and I’m keen to share the stories with you soon!