Farm Bill and eating local barter

Now this is what I like to see;

FOR Americans who have been looking to Congress to reform the food system, these past few weeks have been, well, the best of times and the worst of times. A new politics has sprouted up around the farm bill, traditionally a parochial piece of legislation thrashed out in private between the various agricultural interests (wheat growers versus corn growers; meatpackers versus ranchers) without a whole lot of input or attention from mere eaters.

Not this year. The eaters have spoken, much to the consternation of farm-state legislators who have fought hard — and at least so far with success — to preserve the status quo.

Americans have begun to ask why the farm bill is subsidizing high-fructose corn syrup and hydrogenated oils at a time when rates of diabetes and obesity among children are soaring, or why the farm bill is underwriting factory farming (with subsidized grain) when feedlot wastes are polluting the countryside and, all too often, the meat supply. For the first time, the public health community has raised its voice in support of overturning farm policies that subsidize precisely the wrong kind of calories (added fat and added sugar), helping to make Twinkies cheaper than carrots and Coca-Cola competitive with water. Also for the first time, the international development community has weighed in on the debate, arguing that subsidized American exports are hobbling cotton farmers in Nigeria and corn farmers in Mexico. I highly encourage you to read the rest of it here>>>>>>

We need to keep the pressure up until it is no longer in our hands, click here to find out how to contact your state senators, not just about NAIS which these major food corps love, but the other BS that puts more money into their pockets.

People have already begun to talk about eating local for their Thanksgiving meal. You can find the original 100 mile diet here.

It can be difficult to make a typical traditional meal with only local ingredients. You have to get inventive. But you also need to do a little searching. Most your ingredients can be found locally. And then again, who says you have to have a turkey for Thanksgiving? As those of you that have read my article know, some people do ham, or even fish.

The biggest problem I have seen, or at least the one I get the most emails about, is local flour. Where and how do I find it? A web search can usually yield a result or two, and sometimes nothing at all. Basic rolls and desserts are hard to make without flour. So I am willing to make you a deal. We are going to barter. Those of you determined to make a local dinner but are unable to find flour, leave me a comment telling me what it is. I will do 1 of 2 things. First try to find you an alternative to your flour needs, failing that I will barter 1 of your abundant local food items for wheat. {this of course is purely imaginary barter} What will happen is that for every person I trade with, I will make one dish from that persons local food item. If you live in Washington State, and you need flour and are willing to trade me apples, I will make apple pie {see how this works, plus there are no local apples now because of the late hard freeze we had this year, so I need apples!} If I end up making 100 dishes, so be it, we like leftovers here.

And if it isn't flour you need, I have honey, sunflower seeds and oil as well as pecan. Think of this as emission credit trading.

So whose game? Of course I have a feeling that no one will. ~wry grin~

Oops, before I forget, Natures' Wheat and King Aurthur are made with Kansas wheat.

One Local Summer

Yesterday was the first day of One Local Summer hosted by Liz over at the Pocket Farm. This challenge will last 10 weeks. The point of this challenge is to understand where you food is coming from, and to support your local farmers. If you are unsure about where a product is from, ask, chances are most the things you eat are not local. This is also an opportunity to eat fresher and experiment with in season produce. I missed the sign-up last year, I am glad to be sharing this year.

Last night we ate our first completely local dinner of the challenge. We had KC Strip Steaks, medium rare, cooked over apple wood fire, small baking potatoes from our garden, topped with local butter and salt. We had a fresh salad of Simpson lettuce and cherry tomatoes from our garden, and homemade biscuits made with local wheat.

I do have a picture for you. But I must warn you that it is a horrible picture. Why? you ask, because my 3-year-old peed on my camera. Yes, you heard me correctly, peed on the camera. I was working outside, and when I walked onto the deck, I saw my camera sitting in front of the door, wet. I asked what happened, he looked at me and said, I peed on it, then he walked into the house. WHAT!?! ugh. . .
I tried to edit the picture, but it didn't help too much. Looks like I need to buy a new one. ~sigh~

The day after

We slept in until 8 am this morning. Hope the rest of you did the same. I realize that black Friday is a frugal person's dream, but sometimes your frugal needs should come with some principles. end any type of lecture.

Thanksgiving was good here. The turkey fit into the oven, barely. The legs scraped up against the side of the oven. He wasn't as flexible as the store bought birds, and we couldn't tuck his legs under him. {need to figure that out for next year} I soaked him in homemade apple cider {remember all those apples?} and ice in an ice chest for a few hours. I did this not to brine really, but to have a little more room in my fridge for other things. I put him into the oven, breast down, at 4 am at 400F {204 C}for 1 hour, then reduced the temp to 250F {121 C}. After 4 hours I stuffed him, with chopped apples, onions, celery, roasted pecans, celery carrots, brown sugar and white wine, after flipping him breast side up. From there he slowly baked for 4 more hours before I returned the temp to 400F {204 C} for the last hour. He turned out very moist and delicious.

While I was cooking a friend of ours that we haven't seen in a while showed up. Wonderful guy, incredible musician. He is the lead singer of a band called Ol' Musky. If you get a chance check them out {no worries not a death metal band, more rock/blues/bluegrass}. It was nice seeing him. We all chatted, while he picked at the table spread.

I managed to keep our dinner ingredients local. Only thing that wasn't was the sugars and marshmellows. I needed brown sugar for a couple things and granulated sugar for the whip cream. {you can't make whipped cream with honey}

I only made 3 types of pie because of the local challenge, pecan, pumpkin and apple. As you can see the crust of the apple floated a bit, but it is still readable.

I gave the recipe for the pumpkin pie to my 9 year old. He put too much milk into it and my husband added some more pumpkin. It turned out pretty good. A little more custardy than what I make, still good though.

How was your Thursday?

Ummm . . . What he said

UKBOB asked if we would be able to get the turkey into the oven. I am sitting here staring at my stove thinking the same thing. We will have to do a dry run once my husband gets home. I fear that it might be too large. If that is indeed the case, we will have to spend a few hours on building a spit. Tomorrow is forecasted to be a glorious day, so cooking the bird outside shouldn't be a problem. What will be a problem is if we want to eat mid-afternoon, that means I have to start cooking the bird at 4 am! I could always cut him up, and not roast a whole bird. We shall see.

I won't be around tomorrow as I have lots of cooking to do and will have family about. I don't think they would like it if I was online ignoring them. So until Friday. . .

Happy Thanksgiving or Have A Great Thursday!

Back to normal

Thanksgiving prep starts today {here}. Things are back to their normal laid back speed.

Someone asked what I fed our turkey. He ate the same organically grown grains and seeds that our chickens ate. He had lots of access to grass and loved apples. He was never injected with anything, nor caponized nor confined {well he was in a ½ acre fenced in area with our other poultry}

Mother hen and her chick are just scratching away next to me. I think we made the right decision to bring them in. They seem very content.

List

I finally brought myself to work on my Thanksgiving menu for this year. I thought I had better do it soon, because I would only be able to get to Yoder Saturday morning. Now why is it I have to go to Yoder for my Thanksgiving needs? Yoder is in my 100 mile range for this years local Thanksgiving Challenge. Another is that I love the bread that comes from there. And one more reason, so many local, organic shops in one area.

Now for the list of item that I did not grow/raise on the homestead, and that I know I can get locally;

Milk
Heavy Whipping cream
unsalted butter
buttermilk
Flour
Salt
{no flour} breads
Pecans
Cheese
Hard Sausages
Cranberries
crackers
Carrots {Out of season, but there is a vegetable green house nearby}
Honey
Marshmallows {lacking that I will make them myself ggrrr..}
Almonds
Edited: I forgot to add Sunflower oil and Bacon

I think that is all. I will be up-front and say, that if one of these locally own stores sells sugar, I will buy it. There is only so much I can do with honey.

I also need to head to Wyldewood Cellars and pick up some wine. I'll have to do that Monday.

Are you ready for Thanksgiving?

Overslept

I hate to say it, but we might need to light the furnace. The cool temperatures pushed me back under my warm quilt this morning, and I fell back to sleep. As much as I don't want it to be officially fall quite yet, the low temperatures do help the apples to keep longer.

I have signed up for the One hundred Mile Thanksgiving Challenge. This venture comes to you from Alisa Smith and James McKinnon that started the One Hundred Mile Diet. They ate only foods grown within one hundred miles of their home for one year. I have heard about the diet, as many of my homesteading friends have taken the challenge {between us, homesteaders have a slight advantage}. Their year of eating only locally grown foods has gained world wide attention. But none of these reasons are why I decided to join, except for one. Saving the small farm. And here is where I run into a problem, the small town grocer. Rural towns are disappearing, mainly because the children grow-up and move away where there are more opportunities, i.e. the city. I adore the small town, it's unique history, the way you can walk into the only gas station or bar, and there is a small group of elderly gentlemen just itching to tell you all the gossip since 1945. I understand that my small amount of spending in locally owned stores, doesn't amount to much, but with Wal-mart invading 200 acres of farmland just a few miles down the road, the local businesses need all the support they can find. That ,and I can not live without my coffee and sugar. Dandelion root and honey just isn't the same.

If you decide to join me and the other's that have signed up for the One Hundred Mile Thanksgiving, let me know. Maybe we can help each other out on dinner plans.

On to the apples;

Julie over on Flip This Body, is scaring me. She's a mind reader I tell you. She has suggested that I make apple dumplings, And I just happened to have one of my cookbooks open to 'Apple Dumplings' I will need to go into town this weekend to buy containers to keep things in the freezer. Right now I have nothing.

Alrescate suggested apple chips and baked apples. She did have concerns about canning baked apples, but they can be frozen.

Kf_in_georgia shared some family history with me, a relative of hers developed the Hoss {Haas} Apple. {you will have to scroll down} Very Cool.

My camera has disappeared. I am sure I will find it somewhere today with a bunch of 2-year-old's view of the world, photos on it. So bear with me.

11 lbs down! {4.9 Kg}

Yesterday I made apple crisp. {insert photo here}

After baking the dish, I realized I had nothing to store it in {see above about freezing apple dumplings} We ended up eating it. The serving size says it serve 6. My children will disagree with that. I have been instructed to double the recipe next time. Apple Crisp receives two sticky thumbs up. {insert cute little photo here}

Apple Crisp;

2 lbs cooking apples {5 ½ cups sliced} peeled, cored and sliced
1/4 cup water
4 tbl lemon juice
½ cup granulated sugar
½ cup firmly packed light brown sugar
½ tsp ground nutmeg
½ tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 cup flour
½ cup unsalted butter

preheat oven to 350F {176c}

Place the apple slices into a 2 quart baking dish. Stir with the lemon/water. Make sure you do this as soon as you slice up your apples to keep them from turning brown. In a mixing bowl, combine the sugars, nutmeg, cinnamon, salt and flour. Cut the butter into the flour mix until it resembles wet bread crumbs. Spoon out evenly over the apples. Cover and bake for 30 minutes. Uncover and bake an additional 30 minutes.

Serve warm, or if you want the crisp crispier, allow to cool completely before serving at room temp.

Apple facts to amaze {annoy} your friends with: Americans eat about 19.6 pounds {8.8 Kg} of fresh apples annually, compared to about 46 pounds {20.8 Kg} consumed annually by residents of European countries.

Is there such a thing as an apple recipe that doesn't involve cinnamon? If you have one, please tell me about it.