All about local food finding in the Twin Cities
It is so empowering to be able to make something like homemade mayonnaise in your own kitchen you thought you had to buy from a store!
This is such an easy staple to be able to swap out, and so much healthier for you and your family too- with all real ingredients and it tastes so much better than anything you can buy in the store!
With a stick blender and some simple ingredients; oil + egg + acid you’ll be amazed at how quickly this comes together!
Continue readingAs an avid gardener and garden writer I’ve listened to a lot of garden podcasts- and some are better than others. I’ve also had the joy of being interviewed by a dozen podcast hosts (you’ll see some of their names below).
There’s something soothing about listening to others who have been there and done that. I love listening as I work with my hands or out on walks. If you’re not a podcast listener, I have to say (even as a writer) you are missing out!
Continue readingOne of my all-time favorite condiments has always been the slightly sweet, slightly vinegary and always crunchy pickled daikon + carrot ‘salad’. This is typical in Vietnamese dishes like Banh Mi and rice noodle salads. I’m also known to just eat this straight out of the jar.
I feel so lucky to have grown up around the Twin Cities where I’ve been able to savor all the flavors of the metro area. Growing up more on the east side of the metro, on the outskirts of St. Paul, I always had ample Vietnamese options. My dad used to work at the state capitol, and I would beg him to bring me to lunch at The Lagoon, an old school Vietnamese restaurant that used to be tucked in right there on University Avenue.
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Seeds and centuries of gardening knowledge feed a community at Dream of Wild Health farm.
Inspired by the people it serves and centuries of gardening knowledge, Dream of Wild Health embodies working with nature. One of the oldest, continually operating Native American nonprofits in the Twin Cities, Dream of Wild Health’s intertribal working and teaching farm brings together the best of seed saving, Earth-focused farming practices and youth development. In short, this farm is flourishing.
Continue readingZucchini Fritters are a healthy ‘fast food favorite’ in our home every summer! We all know how fast those zucchini can grow… so if you want a healthy + savory take on the good old pancake (and use up cups of shredded zucchini all at once)- Zucchini Fritters are for you!
I love the two different versions of this recipe equally, it just depends on what flavors I’m craving more, and if I happen to have some potatoes around as to which I make.
You can use a variety of zucchini in this recipe, and even summer squash too, just be aware of the different moisture content in each variety. Patty Pan are one of the ‘meatiest’ and dense/driest types, while Fordhook + Golden varieties tend to be wetter. If you shred the zucchini and can see extra water in the bowl, squeeze some out so you don’t have too thin of fritters.
More information on Growing Zucchini + More Ways to enjoy them on another post A Zillion Ways to Zucchini.
Continue readingHarvesting from your garden is the moment we’ve all been waiting for!
You’ve probably heard it’s best to harvest from your garden in the morning. Maybe you’ve also heard not to harvest from your garden when wet… These can seem contradictory especially on damp, dewy mornings. But there’s more behind the ‘not wet and not wilted’ reasoning.
I’m sharing some best practices to harvest lots of delicious and nutritious food to make your garden healthier and more productive.
We should generally hold off harvesting from our gardens until plants are dried off because when we open a wound on a plant from harvesting by cutting or breaking off we’re leaving an entrance on the plant for diseases.
Fungal and bacterial diseases (blight, powdery mildew, rust, etc.) multiply while the leaves are wet. So, the chance of them getting directly into a wound is greater with a wet plant as well. This timing also makes it harder for the plant to fend off the diseases in general.
Continue readingLet’s get you growing Joi Choi! This is the Pak Choi (aka Bak Choy) everyone can (and should) grow.
There are few veggies that bring me as much JOI in the garden and on my plate as this veggie, so I’m declaring myself a founding member of the Joi Choi Fan Club! She’s as delicious as she is beautiful!
This has consistently been one of the easiest veggies to grow. It is ready also one of the fastest maturing early spring veggies, ready to harvest within 30 days of transplanting in all but the coldest spring weather. This means I can usually get at least three successions of Joi Choi in each season in my zone 4 gardens.
Read more about Succession Planting HERE
It is way more heat tolerant than other Pak Choi I’ve tried. Meaning it keeps growing a lot longer, and therefore bigger before it bolts. I mean look at those Thick stalks! All that stem equals weights of close to 2 lbs. per average plant if harvested all at once. Last fall I harvested a single Joi Choi that was over 4 lbs heavy and still tender and crisp in October!
Continue readingNothing ushers in summer like fresh picked strawberries and red stained fingers, shirts, faces… so let’s get you growing strawberries too!
To save that fleeting, sweet taste of summer we’ve got tips and tricks and the reasons why growing homegrown or grabbing all the local berries you can is worth it. I promise, your winter self will thank your summer self.
Strawberries are one of our little homestead’s most anticipated foods- by every member of our family. So, we spend some time prepping and loving on the gardens so they produce to their fullest.
Growing strawberries is as close to instant gratification as you can get with a perennial fruit. I recommend planting bare root plants, as you have more option for variety, the cost a fraction of potted plants and the plants do seem to do better in the long run. The catch is you want to plant them in late May, before the heat of summer comes on too strong. You’ll soak the roots for an hour or two before planting. The first growing season plan to pinch off the first few buds that form, but let the next rounds of flowers mature to pick fruit later in the season.
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This soup is such a perfect blend of sweet corn nostalgia and winter comfort that I can get a craving for this soup just about any season… but it feels especially fitting during that ‘hungry gap’ when many of the frozen veggies are gone and we’re down to sprouting potatoes and mason jars from the pantry.
This recipe can skew simple or a little more involved depending on how you’re feeling, but on way or another, make this while it is still soup season!
My latest version included the last of a batch of ‘corn and vegetable stock’ from the summer. This simple seeming stock is rather magical in my opinion. You make it from the leftover cobs after canning the sweet corn this past summer. This just pulls all the deliciousness out of every cob of corn.
After you cut off the corn kernels off the cob, just toss cobs, and onion peelings, celery leaves, carrots (or just their peelings), garlic and a bay leaf into a pot and simmer for at least 4 hours, strain off the stock and either freeze (leaving a good inch of headroom in the jar) or pressure can with the cans of corn.
Like all my recipes, especially soups, there is a lot of leeway to use up veggies and ingredients that you have on hand. If you have zucchini but not celery, go for it- or parsnips instead of carrots- OK! Make this recipe yours, you are in control in hte kitchen!
Continue readingThere’s so much information in the pages of our book, Small-Scale Homesteading we know it will both inspire and educate you!
Stephanie and my collective knowledge has been distilled down to what we wished we’d known when we started down this homesteading road.
…And I know that’s said about a lot of books by a lot of authors, and I understand why- we write what we know. We end up knowing a lot about what we love.
And we love homesteading, in all it’s beautiful forms.
The twist with this book is that these pages hold BOTH of our combined experiences and the different ways we’ve settled into doing different homesteading skills. We’re obviously big believers in there being more than one way to do just about everything.
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Special Homesteading Bundle
Original price was: $59.97.$39.99Current price is: $39.99.
Special Homesteading Bundle
Original price was: $59.97.$39.99Current price is: $39.99.
Class: Vertical Gardening
$14.99
Vegetable Garden Design Class *Free*
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