Homemade Living

I've been enjoying the four books in the Homemade Living series by Ashley English. Beautifully designed, the books are both informative and fun. Ashley is a former medical professional-turned homesteader in North Carolina and seems poised to become the Martha Stewart of the modern homesteading movement.

Getting Started

I'm making my way through the Sheep Home Study Course that I'd mentioned a couple weeks ago. It's part of the Pipestone Lamb and Wool Management Program started 39 years ago as a pilot program jointly funded by the National Sheep Industry Development Board and the Minnesota Department of Education. For approximately $170, I received a package of 14 lessons and quizzes. I could have opted for the online version of the course, but I'm an old-fashioned gal at times and prefer the hard copies. (No Kindle or Nook for this cowgirl).

The course is designed for commercial sheep producers. I know this because the first lesson, "Getting Started in the Sheep Business," suggests that I start with 40 to 50 head of three- or four-year-old ewes. Clearly, my instructors are envisioning an operation somewhat larger than my huge flock of two miniature lambs. Nonetheless, I'm getting a lot of out this course so far. I don't think it's possible to be over-prepared for shepherding.

'Shrooms

Tonight at Whole Foods the Wrangler spotted a little mushroom garden kit by a California start up called Back to the Roots. The kit comes in a cardboard box similar to a milk carton. Unlike mushrooms in the typical grow-your-own mushroom kits, these mushrooms grow not on logs but in recycled coffee grounds.

The garden must be kept indoors in an area with good air flow and indirect sunlight. We put ours on the windowsill next to my wheatgrass garden (which is, I might add, growing like a weed. I planted the seeds last Tuesday, and the grass is already six inches tall!). The mushroom kit includes a misting bottle for daily watering.

Apparently, we'll start seeing growth in about seven days, after which the mushrooms double in size each day. A crop yields about a pound of mushrooms, and the little kit should give us two to four crops. We'll know by next week how this turns out.

Back in the Coop

Okay, okay. I know I once proclaimed here that chickens are "so early 2009" before blithely moving on to such things as backyard goats and Babydoll sheep. But what came first, the chicken or the...goat? In my case, it was the urban chicken movement that got me thinking of all the other possibilities.

I've been so caught up with my impending shepherdhood that I've given scant thought to chickens. But while traveling this week I picked up Janice Cole's Chicken and Egg, a simply delightful memoir of suburban homesteading with 125 recipes. Although I'd all but fallen off the chicken bandwagon, I thought the book might be interesting because the author keeps backyard chickens not far from my hometown. I was more than a little curious to see how her chickens fared during the brutal Minnesota winters. What a charming account of learning to raise chickens! Janice, a food writer and former chef, also blogs about her Three Swingin' Chicks.

Because my supernova self often takes things to the extreme, I loaded up on chicken books this weekend. There are many good books for beginners, but I would be remiss if I failed to mention Chick Days, a fun new book by Jenna Woginrich. You might recall that Jenna graciously invited the Wrangler and me to visit her farm when we were in Vermont last fall, and we had a wonderful lesson in beekeeping and spinning wool.

And that is how I've come to be preoccupied with chicks, coops, and delicious fresh eggs all over again.

Unwelcome Knock-off

I spotted this Easter "Welcome" sign for $7.99 at Michaels and thought--rather stupidly, it turns out--that it would be fairly easy to mass-produce facsimiles to give as gifts. Materials needed: unpainted wood letters, including an egg-shaped "letter" as a substitute for the O in "WELCOME"; paint in four country-ish pastel colors; paint brushes; a drill to make holes and jewelry wire to string the letters together; twine to affix to the top letter so that the sign can be hung; ric rac ribbons in a few different patterns; wood buttons; glue gun; and sandpaper (to give the letters a distressed look after painting).

I decided to make four signs. Tonight I found most of the supplies at the store, but I struck out on the wood letters. No L to be found, and the C and M were available only in the wrong size or font. But at that point, I wasn't too discouraged. I could find the letters online. The discouragement began to set in at the check-out counter. The paints, brushes, twine, and jewelry wire came to $86 and some change. Thankfully, the Wrangler already has a drill, glue gun, and some sandpaper.

At home I searched for the letters online. The good news is that I found exactly what I wanted--even the egg-shaped O. The bad news is that the grand total for four sets came to $98 plus shipping. The devastating news is that I won't receive the letters for 15 business days. I consider this devastating news because the odds are good that I'll have deserted this project within 15 business days.

But I haven't lost interest yet, so I'll press on to the fabric store tomorrow in search of the wood buttons and ric rac ribbons. I can't guess what I'll end up paying there, but right now these handmade knock-offs of the $7.99 Michaels masterpiece will probably cost about $55 each and look like a third-grader made them...assuming I even make them. Fifteen business days for delivery? What year is it--1860? Are the letters coming by Pony Express?

Lucky Duck

I've been thinking about how nice it would be to have some rescued animals on the ranch. I love animal babies, so I'll probably get a lot of my livestock directly from the breeders. But I'll be sure to keep space for a few older animals in need of a good home. I just saw this beautiful duck available for adoption from the Best Friends animal sanctuary in Kanab, Utah. Timmothea is an adult female Pekin duck that had been dragged from her pond by dogs. Luckily, a good Samaritan chased away the dogs and took her to the vet. Timmothea is very friendly and waddles around with a cheerful hello for everyone. If only I had a pond!

Baker's Delight

This winter has been particularly brutal. After the epic rainfall here in SoCal, the unprecedented ice storms across the south, the weeks of sub-zero temps in the Midwest, and the record-setting blizzards in the east, I need a little reassurance that the ranch will have heat and a method of cooking if nature shows the power grid who's the boss. Thus, I've been researching dual-function wood-fired ovens. If pressed, I'll admit that I'm probably motivated less by the practicality of these charming ovens and more by romantic notions of stoking a fire in the cookstove and baking bread in a cozy cottage while a winter storm howls outside.

I had pretty much decided on the Baker's Oven featured in the Lehman's Non-Electric Catalog. The Baker's Oven can heat a 700 square-foot room while the cooktop accommodates four large saucepans and the bottom oven is used for baking. But I recently saw a post on another blog discussing the Vermont Bun Baker. Aside from having a catchier name, the Vermont Bun Baker comes with an attractive soapstone hearth, side wall, and top.

Not cheap, these ovens. (The Vermont Bun Baker 1500 pictured here will set you back a cool $6950.00.) Why does it cost so much to have a back-up plan?

Tamale Truck

One thing that this urban cowgirl will miss in the (probably) far-off future when she permanently trades city lights for starry nights in the country: street food vans. These are not to be confused with the properly licensed street food vendors selling the food truck equivalent of chain restaurant fare. I'm talking about the mom-and-pop shop run out of a sketchy-looking van parked in an alley. These vans, which have loyal followings, sell homemade delicacies for practically a song. They never hurry, and they never skimp. Germaphobes surely avoid these vans like, well, the plague, but in all my years of partaking in these non- Health Services-sanctioned feasts, I've only gotten seriously ill once. (And it was my own fault. In retrospect, no I shouldn't have eaten gray chicken fried rice sold from an Igloo cooler in a dark corner of a parking garage. Both the rice and the chicken were unequivocally gray--we're not talking just a grayish hue.)

When I lived in Boston, the best sausages with fried peppers and onions were served up in Kenmore Square on Red Sox game days. My favorite sausage van was conveniently parked on my route home from class, so it really was no wonder that I gained the Freshman 15. When I lived in Chicago, my second-story loft had a window that opened into the alley. Every day at noon, a sandwich van would pull into the alley, I'd open the window and toss down a handful of change, and the sandwich guy would throw me a tuna melt. When I lived in DC, my coworker regularly purchased me tasty meat pies or breakfast sandwiches from a guy on her corner (not from one of those bland "commercial" vendors that line Constitution Avenue). Is it any wonder we became such good friends? She is one of the Six-Button Cowgirls. Once in a border town south of Brownsville, Texas, I had the best mini-tacos imaginable, served from a cart in a dimly-lit alley and washed down with an odd-tasting Coca-Cola that was nonetheless refreshing. I still am haunted by those scrumptious street tacos that I am unlikely to ever find again.

I really could go on and on, but I will spare you the details of my love affair with street food vans. I must mention, however, how truly fortuitous it is that, on occasion, a guy will come to the back gate of our Laguna Beach cottage and ask if we want any tamales. Today was one of those occasions. It was noon, and I had just about polished off a column of Thin Mints. The pets were playing on the patio and started to bark. Thin Mints in hand, I peeked out the window and saw a dirty, white, windowless van inching slowly down the street (a sight that looks suspicious to mothers but auspicious to me). "Tamales?" called the guy in the passenger seat. I stopped, mid-crunch. "Yes, yes," I hissed at the Wrangler, handing him his wallet and shoving him out the door. Within minutes, the Wrangler returned with hot, homemade pork tamales, chicken tamales, and chile rellenos. It is true that I generally don't like Mexican cuisine, but oh how I adore van food.

Funky Chicken

Third Time Is NOT the Charm

For the the third year in a row, I struck out of the office's annual chili cook-off. I have no idea what I'm doing wrong. My chili is pretty darn good, if I say so myself. It's not a very spicy chili (after all, I am from the Midwest), but it's hearty and tasty. I think I need to acknowledge the possibility that I'm that person who fancies herself a good cook while my poor dinner guests raise their eyebrows at each other and shuffle things around on their plates. This does not bode well for the cookbook on which I've been working for the past three years.

Provisions

Last night we headed to the Bruery Provisions, a specialty beer, wine, cheese, and charcuterie tasting room in Old Town Orange. Provisions is the retail offshoot of The Bruery, a small craft brewery founded by Patrick Rue, the brother of our good friend Casey. Since its opening in 2008, the Bruery has racked up a ton of industry awards and flattering mentions in the New York Times, GQ, Esquire, Playboy, Forbes, Gourmet, and Draft.

Provisions is a charming and welcoming place, from the artful displays to the Rue brothers' beautiful woodwork and hand-crafted touches. Beer flights (samples of five different brews) range from $3 to $10. The top-notch cheese and meat plates took me back to DC and the posh politico hotspot conveniently located in my law firm's building. We young lawyers would drift in after work, feast on proscuitto and fancy cheese, and keep an eye out for Condi. The cheese and meat plates at Provisions, while just as discerning and delicious as those at my old happy hour hangout, are a fraction of the price.

It is truly inspiring to see someone take a passion and, with hard work and talent, turn it into a successful business that hasn't lost any of the original heart and soul. Cheers!

Sheep School

Sheep grazing at 3-Corner Field Farm, a stop on our Great Cheese Farm Tour last fall

When I learned of a spectacular sheep seminar in Minnesota, I couldn't help but think of all the songs and sayings about "going home." How wonderfully circle-of-life to find that a community college in my home state boasts one of the most well-known sheep management programs around. In addition to the four-day "sheep camp," Minnesota West Community and Technical College in Pipestone, MN, offers five online sheep management courses, sheep farm tours, a lambing short course and bus tour, and a 14-lesson home study course.

I'm debating whether to head to Pipestone this summer for sheep camp, which is described as "intense" and a combination of lectures, group discussion, and visits to two outstanding sheep operations. Sheep camp promises to help me define my vision and build a practical plan to achieve my goals. The only problem? It is held in July. I will have had my little lambs for just a month by then, and I suspect that I'll refuse to budge an inch from my babies. And so I'll mull this over for now. In the mean time, that 14-lesson home study course is sounding awfully fun.

Book Club

Even though it's been sunny and 80 for the past week, and it looks like it will continue to be so for the foreseeable future, it is January. And where I come from, January means curling up with a good book and cup of hot chocolate. Some habits are hard to break. I've read a lot this month--and not just sheep books. A few books worth a glance:

Peace at Heart: An Oregon Country Life, by Barbara Drake. This is a collection of short, charming, and interesting essays about life on a small sheep farm. The author and her husband moved to the country after living most of their lives in the city.

Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness, by Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein. This Malcolm Gladwell-esque book sheds light on how we make choices and, thus, how to prevent making mistakes (financial, social, and health-related).

Still Life with Chickens: Starting Over in a House by the Sea, by Catherine Goldhammer. This memoir traces the author's move from a manicured suburb to a ramshackle New England town with her teenaged daughter and their six chickens.

Growing a Farmer: How I Learned To Live Off the Land, by Kurt Timmermeister. The author owned several cafes in Seattle before moving an hour outside the city and starting a small dairy farm on 13-acres.

Tidepool Tidings

Last weekend we walked down to the beach with our little nieces and checked out the tidepools, which are the pools of water left behind when the ocean waters recede at low tide. The pools are in the hollows of rocks or between rock piles, and in them we often see hermit crabs, snails, sea anemones, mussels, and sea urchins. Our tidepool guidebook puts sea creatures in six categories based on how easy it is to find the critters. While hermit crabs are in the first category (easy to find), octopuses and sea stars are in the sixth category (hardest to find). How lucky we were to find an enormous sea star. I'm not one for lounging on the beach or playing in the water, but I do love the tidepools.

Counting Sheep

The sheep breeder sent me some wool samples from five different Babydoll Southdown sheep, including one sample of unprocessed wool. It's so soft and fluffy. I can't wait to hug my little lambs.

If you've been wondering where I've been these past two weeks, I'll tell you: immersed in sheep books. I've read about a book a day and now am faintly familiar with--but not well-versed in--the subjects of sheep breeding, gestation, lambing, nutrition, pasture management, housing, diseases, parasites, predators, fencing, behavior, and breeds. There are so many things that can go wrong, but I reason that: (1) although I don't have human kids, most people have them, (2) raising a cute little babydoll sheep can't be any scarier than raising a human, and so (3) if most people can raise a few humans, I should be able to raise a few sheep without an inordinate amount of freaking out about them getting loose, sick, or eaten by a coyote.

I just Netflixed a documentary, Sweetgrass, about a large sheep ranch in Montana. I found it fascinating. The Wrangler did fall asleep about midway through, but I will attribute this to the soothing sheep sounds and beautiful Montana scenery rather than to a lack of interest. Truth be told, Sweetgrass probably will appeal only to those among us who really like sheep.

I've found a dangerous number of adorable sheep-related things on etsy.com. I must exercise restraint. We're still tripping over boxes of lavender-themed stuff.

Orchard in Bloom

Our tangerine, orange, and lemon trees are bearing fruit. Last year we had only lemons, so this is a nice surprise. No word yet from our avocado tree.

Holy Cow!

I know women who hide certain purchases from their husbands--the kinds of purchases that guys sometimes don't understand, like expensive handbags. Unfortunately for me, the Wrangler doesn't mind when I buy handbags but takes a very conservative approach to stuff that would be impossible to hide. Like, say, cows.

I had not given a lot of thought to keeping a cow on the ranch but, as of late, I'm seriously considering a nice Jersey cow (or two, as I think it is nice for animals to have a familiar companion). Averaging just 900 pounds, a Jersey is quite small...for a cow, at least. They are known for their delicious milk, which is high in butterfat. They also are known for their pretty faces and relatively docile (although somewhat nervous) dispositions.

A typical Jersey gives about five gallons of milk a day. There are miniature Jerseys, but I'm not going to go there. I'm not building a hobby farm of miniature animals; miniature sheep and goats will suffice. Plus, I'm confident that I won't be overwhelmed by a standard Jersey. They are sort of a "starter cow," in that novice cattlemen with small pastures can do well with Jerseys.

The Wrangler is very supportive of the beekeeping and chicken coop plans. He's moderately on board with the sheep and llama/alpaca, meaning that he isn't necessarily eagerly awaiting their arrival, but he isn't protesting. He has said no to donkeys and the verdict is still out on pigs. Once in a while he will mention randomly that "goats are the worst," and I'm not entirely sure what that's all about.

He speaks well of bison, so who knows where cows will fall on his spectrum. But think of all the lovely fresh butter, cream, milk, yogurt, cheese, and ice cream that our bovine pets would provide. Thankfully, the idea practically sells itself. Because I can't think of a way to sneak a cow into the backyard.

Some Light Reading

Keep It Simple, Sweetie

After seeing Food Inc. and reading a couple Michael Pollan books, I jumped on the bandwagon and began making a greater effort to eat organic and locally-produced food when possible. But the funny thing is that, despite these efforts, I hadn't been paying much attention to food labels. I mean, I knew that homecooked meals usually are better for you than buying packaged convenience food or eating out. But I still wasn't paying very close attention to ingredient lists.

A couple weeks ago, the Wrangler picked up a bag of store-bought bread and read aloud the ingredient list:

enriched bleached flour, water, skim milk, high fructose corn syrup, vegetable oil, yeast, salt, wheat gluten, corn starch, mono- and diglycerides, ethoxylated mono- and diglycerides, sodium and calcium stearoyl-2-lactylate, datem, calcium peroxide, ascorbic acid, azodicarbonamide, enzymes, yellow corn flour, natural flavor, paprika extract, calcium propionate, monocalcium phosphate, calcium sulfate, ammonium sulfate, calcium carbonate, ammonium chloride, distilled vinegar, soy lecithin, soy flour

That is the actual ingredient list for the store-bought bread! In stark contrast, let me list the ingredients in my homemade bread:

organic unbleached flour, water, yeast, kosher salt

Yep, that's it. And, as I've written before, the artisan bread recipe I use allows me to bake a fresh loaf each day in about an hour. (And only five minutes of that hour is "active" prep--the rest of the time the dough is rising or baking.) I don't need high fructose corn syrup, corn starch, vinegar, paprika extract, and at least 15 unpronounceable chemicals in my bread, so I'm going to pay attention to labels and no longer buy bread with this kind of stuff in it.

Similarly, I've been making homemade ice cream lately instead of buying it. My recipe has three ingredients: organic half-and-half, sugar, and pure vanilla extract. Sure, my ice cream tastes a lot better than store-bought ice cream, but I'd never noticed that a premium brand's "homemade vanilla" contains: milk, cream, sugar, corn syrup, egg yolks, natural flavor, guar gum, salt, carob bean gum, annato. What the heck is annato, why are there two kinds of gum on this list, and what is corn syrup doing in my ice cream?

Feeling like we were onto something, the Wrangler and I read the labels on our canned goods. What you've heard about the ubiquitousness of corn syrup is true! I suppose that whether it's really bad for you is debatable, but I don't see why it's in everything--even canned tomatoes.

Chalk up two points for this cowgirl tonight. I have a batch of my freshly mixed bread dough in the fridge, and the Wrangler and I have just helped ourselves to two heaping bowls of homemade ice cream. (Clearly, simpler food is not necessarily synonymous with diet food.)

New Year

Happy New Year! 2011 is off to an auspicious start--my orthopedic surgeon officially discharged me from his care today, which also means that I can quit physical therapy. It has been six months to the day since I fell off Moto. Things still are creaky and hurt now and then, but I really can't complain. I've also got a full line-up of activities this season: yoga, ballet, piano, and horseback riding lessons. As one of the Six-Button Cowgirls points out, swap soccer for yoga and mine is the schedule of a 12-year-old girl. Ah, but there is little danger of illusions of youth here. Especially now that my once-broken bone throbs when it rains--certainly, the hallmark of the aged.