A friend of mine recently reminded me that, back in October, I announced a new type of post – an end-of-the-week roundup of random stuff I’ve been thinking about. He gently pointed out that one post does not a series make. Fair point. This week: seed catalogs, minding your own business, Alan Watts, the pleasure of…
Recent Posts
White Bean, Sausage and Cavolo Nero Kale Soup
Yesterday afternoon my son was doing his best impression of a barnacle, stuck to me in an emotional rebound reaction to going back to school from Winter Break. Getting anything done was challenging. My husband walked in, back from his daily round of corporate servitude, our pre-teen daughter trailing in behind him. “How was school?” I asked her. “Is…
Embracing Less In 2016
My son came bounding into my room this morning and gave me his customary giant good morning hug. He’s typically extra adorable right after he wakes me up by jumping on my bed 4 inches from my face. “Happy New Years!” I said, “It’s a brand new year!” After sufficient snuggling, my son resumed his…
Lacto Fermented Curtido Cabbage Salsa
As regular readers know, I love a good taco. In fact, I even have a formula for delicious homemade tacos. One of the essential components of a great taco is something crispy and crunchy. The Central American, lightly fermented cabbage slaw called curtido fits the bill perfectly, and has all the benefits of other fermented cabbage condiments like sauerkraut…
On Standing Together
I’ve called three countries home in my lifetime: the United States, France and the United Kingdom. All three have had struggles with terrorism. In different ways, and for different reasons, but we have struggled nonetheless. France’s friends and allies in Britain and the US stand with her now, as she and the US stood with…
DIY Whipped Peppermint Foot Cream
At the risk of oversharing someone else’s podiatry problems, by husband has some janked up heels. They’re super dry and they get these deep cracks in them, especially in winter. (Sorry, sweetie.) This Whipped Peppermint Foot Cream was developed for super dry feet like my husband’s. The addition of peppermint essential oil gives the cream a…
5 Things Friday: 10/16/15
I’m going to try a new thing here – an end-of-the-week bullet point recap of all the things occupying my time and brain. Like every other blogger in the entire world, I’m calling this Five Things Friday. It’s where, once a week or as I remember, I just throw out things I love, things I…
When And How To Use Dried Herbs – Kitchen Tips Everyone Should Know
Look, I’m pro-fresh-herb. I love giant huge bunches of cilantro, I consider it a crime that parsley isn’t used as a vegetable, I’ll drink chimichurri sauce by the shot glass. Who has two thumbs and loves fresh herbs? This girl. And yet – there is a place for dried herbs. Usually, that place involves a big…
The Fig Old Fashioned
I have a fig tree, and this fig tree has my heart. What this fig tree does not have, unfortunately, is a reliable second crop of figs in our cool-summer climate. So, after the breba crop ripens, that’s usually it. This year, I dried all the breba figs I could, to try to extend our enjoyment…
7 Questions Corporate America Has About Homesteading
So I have a bit of a reputation at the office. I’m the guy with the chickens. In fact, I run a whole informal and probably utterly HR-policy-violating side hustle of bringing some of our excess eggs into the office and selling them. Given that my manager and my manager’s manager are among my customers,…
Egg Rice: Good, Fast, Cheap Food
Last fall, while I was deep in the trenches of recipe testing for my book, I found myself frequently confounded by dinner. Now you might think that, after 12 hours of recipe testing, dinner would be totally easy because I’d just serve the recipe tested food to my family, right? It rarely worked out so conveniently. Oh, sure,…
Help! Why Do My Canning Jars Keep Breaking? – Reader Question
It’s time for a reader question! Bay emailed to ask, “Help! My jars keep breaking when I put the wire basket in the boiling water. What am I doing wrong?” Thanks for the question, Bay. Let me guess – pickles? It’s almost always pickles. I’ve heard from several readers with this same jar breakage problem, and…