My first batch of kombucha

Well, so far, so good. I have a spicket container so it was easy to taste test. Baby girl loved it. Small boy even liked it. I bottled 2 small bottles with a vanilla bean in it (can you say "cream soda"?), one small bottle plain, a large bottle plain, and then a large bottle with some lemon juice in it in the hopes of replicating the citrus stuff I bought in the store. Ought to be interesting. It had some fizz already but I bottled it and stuck it in the pantry (dark and not cold) so it would continue to ferment and possibly get fizzier.

I then promptly made a batch of tea (a macha & regular green tea mix), cleaned out the container, separated the SCOBYs (Symbiotic Culture Of Bacteria and Yeast) and put it in the old one in the "brewing" container with some of the leftover kombucha from the last batch. I separated it from the new SCOBY (which is currently in a REALLY big, glass measuring cup with some of the leftover kombucha--it should keep for 2 weeks like that). This morning, when the tea was cooled, I put it in the brewing container with the old SCOBY.

I feel like my kitchen needs to be more functional. *sigh* I feel like I don't have enough room for all the stuff I need room for. I really need to buy an island for in there. That would do it. Or maybe I'll bring that table up out of the basement and use that in the middle of my kitchen. Hmmm... wondering if that's possible...

Stay tuned...

I'm seriously considering 4 CSA shares next year

I know what you're thinking. I thought the same thing. Hear me out...

So this year, we had 2 shares--one from each of two different farms/CSAs. It was enough. We managed okay.

But I'm thinking that if we managed with 2 shares, how 'bout we double it and try to PRESERVE the other two shares. Riiiiiiiiiight? Riiiiiiight? I know, right?!?!

The reality is that we live within the confines of a homeowner's association that restricts the amount square footage I can use to grow food and I back to a woman who called us in easily 3 times before we moved in. (of things we CLEARED with the association, tyvm)

That being the case, I know I can't grow enough food for us next year. And finding enough organic stuff to preserve is difficult.

*sigh*

Of course, it is currently about 70* outside and I'm going to send hubby out to till some beds for growing with cold frames that I'm going to overpay for because stupid me didn't get to making our own early enough.

*sigh again*

Raw and fermented... take 1

So, we decided to alter the amount of raw food in our diet such that we are ingesting more raw and less cooked. So far, so good! It's been weird, but not bad. We had raw beets and red cabbage (hubby's idea) with some cooked beef one night and I thought it was going to completely suck--but it was really good! He sliced the beets really thin and shredded the red cabbage. It was pretty good! And I remembered to keep in mind that dressings and condiments were good additions, too. I added raw cacao powder to boy-child's vanilla flavored coconut milk yogurt. He complained it wasn't sweet enough, but a tiny bit of raw honey fixed that! So it's going good! I just have to think REALLY differently.

I did buy 3 raw "cookbooks" (yes, a friend pointed out the irony!) but haven't completely gotten through them yet. Still looking. One thing I found is that they are furthering the case for a dehydrator! :) That being said, they have recipes for stuff I seriously never thought of. Including a mock sour cream (made from nuts--no dairy!).

As for fermenting, I have one word: KOMBUCHA!!! It's fermented tea. In fact, I had a citrus flavored one that tasted a little like wine--it was wonderful. So hubby and small child can have their kefir... I'll take the kombucha. Not sure what camp boy will land in.

Dreading the winter

I seriously am dreading it. The cost of food is going to kill me. The availability of organics is abysmal.

And really, we need to get into eating more locally-and with that, what grows local in the winter. It's not much. We will switch over to meats, stews, squashes, parsnips, carrots, turnips... root vegetables.

I need to find a place to buy rice in bulk other than Whole Foods.

I need to get my cold frames installed. Those are little boxes that trap the sun's heat and heat the ground underneath to make winter growing somewhat possible--at least for a few things! Nothing horribly tall, of course. :/

I need to learn how to make cheese and start thinking about some raw dairy.

I need to look into fermented foods. I hate kefir. There must be something else.

Really, I just need to get my food act together.

Friday, September 30, 2011

Oy... I have TOO. MANY. GREEN. THINGS. in my fridge right now. Seriously. I don't really know how this happened, but we will be eating green things all week.

Today we started off with eggs and Daiya pepperjack cheese. Lunch was leftover battered cod with a salad (salad being lettuce and salad dressing) and then dinner we went to Outback because they'll cook around allergies (and because mommy can get a Tropical Relief martini).

Then we came home and I made red lentil chili--which is the first of two batches this weekend since we'll be going to a block party tomorrow and a potluck Sunday. I'll need a batch for each. Husband made this Mabon moon cider. I had bought a case of organic Fuji apples today (40 lbs.) and we'd already had about 15 lbs. of organic white grapes that needed to get used. So he juiced them. Then he threw them in a pot with the appropriate mulling spices and voila... my cup is sitting here too hot to drink.

We are awaiting delivery (on 10/15) of a half-cow of beef. I'm also ordering 5 pasture-raised chickens to try out a new farm. Looking to get some raw dairy to make some yogurt and cheese for the house. And I'm fired up to do some preserving. I'm even going to try to use my pressure canner. :O

But it all the more makes me want to be growing our own. *sigh*

State of the Union, September 21, 2011

I'm now going to allow you to follow my weight-loss journey. From November of last year through early August, I lost roughly 25 lbs. through portion control and nothing else. No exercise, no change in WHAT I ate or quality of what I ate. Just eating less. Yup... true story.

Of course, from about mid-August through now, I have gained 7 lbs. thanks to 1) 9 days without husband and boy, which was doubly damning because husband has done ALL of the cooking in the house for at least 8 years and I have NEVER liked to eat alone (and 3yo doesn't really eat solids yet--long story)... so I spent a full-on week eating absolute crap. In true Depression-era style (I was raised by my Depression-era grandmother) I proced to eat everything I bought on the premise that "I paid for it". :/ I had this same problem at Disney in March. *sigh* But hubby came back and another 10 days later we went to the Minnesota State Fair for Labor Day weekend--staying with friends. Well, that's just a food-fest right there.

So I'm up 7 lbs. Actually, I WAS up 9 lbs. and I'm already back down two just for returning to normal for a week. Yeah... just a week. Because you see: when you start eating crap and expanding your stomach, it's a vicious cycle downward. The stuff that you thought tasted like crap at the beginning of it all now starts tasting kind of good, and mildly addicting. It's a scary thing. I finally snapped out of it when my cravings crept back and I thought "Wow--I'm in a bad place."

On Tuesday, September 20, 2011, I weighed in at 177.6 lbs. I had started trying to take a 20-minute walk each day starting on the prior Thursday, but took the weekend off.

Husband and I got a juicer and are studying up to do a few cleanses--the first being a "colon cleanse". It's a lot of work and requires a solid 10-12 days where we know we won't be completely tempted to eat meat (we are SERIOUS carnivores). We have a party on Oct. 1 that will blow us out of the water, but that will be the last of it. After that, we will do a week of "weaning" off of cooked food and animal products before doing a full week of juice-almost-fasting (there is some solid, albeit raw, food in there). Then we'll take a week to get back to what we're changing to. We will not be vegetarians, but we will be trying to change the balance of raw foods to cooked foods. Juicing will definitely help with this. I knew about the enzymatic benefits of raw foods for many years (the result of research about enzyme therapies for children in the autism spectrum) but I had never really been driven to do anything about it. We could TAKE enzymes (and we have on and off for several years). But I'm now looking into some research about how when the balance of raw to cooked is tilted in the "cooked" direction, it causes an immune system response that can ultimately lead to autoimmune disorders. This is something I want to find more information on. My son has an immune deficiency and we have a lot of autoimmune disorders in my family. I'm sure I'm not really articulating it fully enough to make sense to YOU, but the 90+ minute lecture I heard was enough to send me looking for data. I have enough data already to know that raw food gives us enzymes our body desperately needs.

If you look at the "Pottenger's Cats" study, it's disturbing. So the idea of altering the balance of raw food and cooked food in my family's diet isn't really difficult. We're not "going raw". We're not becoming vegetarian. We are just changing the balance of things. That will include continuing to eat more chicken than red meat--something we were really doing more because of cost and availability of antibiotic-free meat; but the information linking red meat to colon cancer is mildly overwhelming. :/ We won't NOT eat it, we're just going to change the balance. I say with a standing order for half a cow from a grassfed, antibiotic-free farm arriving on October 15th... should last us a year under these conditions. :/

So far, I love the juicer. It is VERY easy to use and really easy to clean. Score.

This week, I have re-introduced probiotics to our diets. We slipped off of a number of things for a while and this was one of them. So everyone now takes one daily as of Monday.

The week before this, we started our annual "cold season" regimen of daily Sambucus (black elderberry extract). While in Minnesota, my friend exposed me to these wonderful little tasteless Vitamin D drops where each drop is 2,000 IUs of Vitamin D. Holy. score. I HATE the chewables my kids have (I cringe for what it must do to their teeth) and I doubly hate having to get them to eat 4 of them to get 2,000 IUs of D/day. Now, I just put 1 drop in their Sambucus. YAY! Hubby and I still take pills because we take 5,000 IUs/day.

After the week of introducing probiotics, we will increase Vitamin C (again, dropped off the wagon). All of this time, I am trying to find good "raw" meals. I actually ordered a cookbook and I hope it won't disappoint. I really need this more for the week going into our cleanse and coming out of it; but I could incorporate a dish here and there when I'm changing our balance of things.

The kids WILL eat raw the weeks that we're doing it. There is nothing unhealthy about it in a way I need to worry about them--especially since these are not long-term changes. And really, once hubby and I remove the animal proteins, we are likely to continue making some for the kids if only to get them to eat at all while we transition everyone over to a different way of eating. Thankfully, my kids allergies have fostered a love (by necessity) of salad and broccoli. Well, actually, the little one is inconsistent with what she loves and we bring plenty of foods into the house that nobody else can eat just for the sake of finding something she'll love. So far, black olives are the only consistent "yes".

I think that's all the changin' we're doing right now. I also think that may be ENOUGH.

Oh, and for whatever reason, my 8+ year absolute aversion (bordering on phobia--but it didn't scare me, I just couldn't bring myself to doing it) of cooking appears to be over. I have no idea why. I'm thankful. A few years ago, I almost saw a therapist for it because it was just... WEIRD. Sometimes I didn't even want my husband to cook (although I think that was more because it was a reminder to me that I wasn't cooking). My husband actually never complained about it. In truth, he enjoys cooking and experimenting. I just felt that it was my "job"--especially when I was staying home all day. But, it's over now... Just like that. Equally weird.

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Of course, breakfast was the rice pudding, warmed up on the stove with some pureed organic pumpkin stirred in and a shake of pumpkin pie spice on top. Believe it or not, this took some convincing to get the kids to eat. :/

Lunch was leftover red lentil chili over brown rice that I hadn't soaked--so it took easily 45 minutes to cook if not an hour. :/ Easily made minus the peppers but it did have tomatoes so it is NOT Feingold-safe. We're now in "testing" mode to see which veggies we react to strongly. I always make this chili in bulk and stick it in the freezer.

Dinner was home made chicken soup. I made a stock/broth from the prior night's roast chicken, some turnip greens I was going to juice, a bulb of fennel that would've probably gone bad if not used for this, some red onions (with the peels on), crushed cloves of garlic and a few organic carrots that were scrubbed but not peeled. When the broth was done (maybe an hour? two?) I set two coffee mugs full into a freezer container for when we might be sick & in need of straight broth.. Then I took all of that stuff out and threw in the rest of "what was going to go bad if not used" from the fridge. So... tomatoes, beets, celery, a small head of cabbage, some carrots and the rest of the chicken that we hadn't eaten (which was quite a bit). Some oregano, rosemary, basil, salt, pepper and more garlic... voila--soup. Enough for tonight and two or three other nights (or lunches) for the fridge. It was delicious, if not beautiful. :)




And... dessert was more leftover rice pudding. Cold and not really as creamy and delightful as when first made (or when warmed up this morning). But still pretty good. :)