Friday fun
Happy Friday from the Daddy-less* clan, where
Jah Rosie-fari has been playing the bongos with Polar-I.
I’ve been making pesto with bacon grease.
And large batches of this tomato sauce (glad to hear many of you have been trying it out too!).
And enjoying the natural plant-dye prayer flags (acorn hulls, chokecherries, rabbitbrush and mint):
And observing Dan’s new bedtime technique with the kids.
It consists of dual back rubs while chanting “om” for like 20 minutes. Seriously. While the kids expect me to follow the precise institution of The Bedtime Routine, Dan gets carte blanche for whatever whenever. The other night Dan made the kids this bedtime snack with tremendous secretive fanfare and it turned out to be the morning’s oatmeal heated up with chocolate chips.
“Is this oatmeal?” Col asked.
“Oh no, this is dessert meal.”
Also, I’ve been fermenting foodstuffs like crazy in preparation for the fermentation class I’m teaching on Sept 27th at Durango Natural Foods Co-op. Be careful what you leave at our house, you may return to find it bubbling with wild yeasts. Currently there is ginger brew, kimchi, fermented tomato salsa and kefir all burping out CO2 and ethanol endearingly into the house. The lovely thing about fermenting is that the proportions and ingredients are loose – it’s the unschooling of the kitchen world!
*Peeps, can you believe Dan is out hunting again? This is the big stretch, the stretch in which if there is no elk brought home, then there is no elk meat this winter (unless the roadkill gods are smiling on us). And you know how Dan is all superstitious about finishing up last year’s elk before going out hunting again? Well, we found one rogue package way back in the freezer, a very large roast, which I accidentally burned. And Dan, being Dan, felt compelled to gnaw away at it anyway, out of respect and vigilance and principle. (Dan’s dad once accidentally put cayenne instead of cinnamon in a batch of granola, and is reported to have eaten the whole thing).
And, thank you so much for your comments about siblings. It’s such a complex soup, isn’t it? I do feel lucky to be stirring the pot, even if it does get so hot I need to blow on it occasionally.
Finally, I’m participating in Tour de Coops tomorrow, which is a self-guided chicken coop tour in Durango. I’ll be at the homestead Saturday from 10-2, if you want to come by and see the clucky ladies, the bees, the garden, etc…Maps can be picked up at DNF or Durango Coffee Co.
Have a lovely weekend!
Rachel
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pesto with bacon grease….sounds perfect! so does everything, of course!
i refuse to try your tomato sauce, i have no room left in my freezer. :P i need it to go in canning jars, so i have to add the olive oil later… alas! it sounds a lot like mine anyway…
but i do not refuse to try ginger beer, and can’t wait to hear how that goes. i had katz’s book in my hands for about 3 minutes once, and that one stuck out to me. i think i must wait until after the tomatoes are in their jars for one more project. over here i made some fermented peach salsa that is killer (and yes i love the looseness of the proportions! it’s such a relief to this mad scientist, though i will often push the envelope with canning in spite of all the dire warnings.)
beautiful picture of the tomato goddess (you) and i love your spiral necklace, i wear spirals as often as i can. love them. speaking of tomatoes, did dan’s-dad’s-really-old-seed-tomato variety work out?
xoxo have a great weekend!
Thanks for asking about those tomato seeds: they worked! Lots of small, sweet plum tomatoes ripening! So of course I will have to learn how to save these seeds to keep the heritage going.
Doesn’t it bug you (in a I-love-my-husband kind of way) that daddy can do whatever at bedtime and it works?? It’s the same in our house. Drives. Me. Crazy. I try his tactics and usually end up calling him upstairs to help me.
I am wishing I had some ginger beer right now… I’ve two kids with tummy bugs. I’ve got ginger in the fridge…… I’m going to peek in my copy of wild fermentation to get some bubbling up.
*love* the prayer flags girl!
ooohhh!!! I have that fermentation book! Autographed from a pickle festival in the lower east side NYC! =)
A pickle festival! I wonder if that would fly in Durango? Rachel, the book is a great read, even if you don’t make any of the recipes. Sandor Katz is a gem.
You had me at pesto with bacon grease.
I love the image of Dan gnawing on the principle final bite of elk.
pesto with bacon fat? please tell me more!
Just replace the olive oil with bacon grease, keep everything else the same. Yeah!
Rachel
bacon pesto! you and the tomatoes! fermentation! cayenne granola! good stuff.
I so wish I was there to take your class. All this cabbage hanging out waiting for a bubbly crock. I am getting that book.
what i wouldn’t give to visit your coop and take your yeasty class! i love sneak peeks into your life, but sometimes i just want to leap right through the screen!