Monday, May 4, 2009

Independence Day Challenge Year 2, The first week.

Well, this has been a busy week! The sun has shined. The weather is warm and my hands are dirty;) The categories are a little different this year.

Plant Something: red onions, broccoli, kale,  lettuce, wormwood, chamomile, rutabaga.

Harvest Something: chives, spinach, dandelion greens

Preserve something: dehydrated dandelion greens for tea.

Eat something: chives and spinach and dandelion salad.
 
Reduce waste/ manage reserves: I cleaned out the bathroom linen closet/ medicine cabinet. Took stock of cold and flu remedies that were depleted over the winter.  Thinned out the crazy amount of pillow cases that were in there and sent them to the thrift store.   Switch winter clothes for spring and summer clothes and sent any outgrown clothes to the thrift store.  Used compost from a bin on some Huglekulture and the spot where I plan to plant tomatoes. Mucked out sheep stall in barn to use on Potato patch and pumpkin patch.

This is the third week of hardcore menu planning and grocery list diligence.  Now that we our reserves are down on many of the foods we preserved last year, this becomes important for us to do. The eternal question" What's for dinner?" is the last question I want to answer when I have been working all day in the garden. So I make a menu plan for the week, with meals that will provide leftovers for lunch the next day.  I tailor the menu plan to what we have in store here and any good deals in the grocery sales flyers  or veggies in season in the garden/farmers market.  This keeps the grocery bill from creeping higher, keeps food waste at home down, and empties the freezer by June when I unplug it and clan it out before berry season.

Preparation/ storage: I found an awesome metal chair for the yard in the garbage this past week. I am going to sand it and spray paint it. Stocked up on TP and Qtips. I found some nice fabric at a yard sale and I plan to make new curtains for the bathroom with it.  We went to the Fedco Tree sale this past weekend and  found some horseradish  root, seed potatoes,  cranberry and elderberry.  Hubby found Willamette Hops.

Build community food systems: Fedco tree sale.  Fedco is a local seed Co-op  in Clifton, Maine.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Boy are you ever a busy bee.. makes me feel lazy :)
I love dandelion greens but I've never had any tea made from them.. care to share the recipe? Just dry and store then brew like other tea? how does the taste compare? and can you make ice tea with it?

Fleecenik Farm said...

They can be a little bitter. I dehydrate them. Then whenever anyone has a cold in the house ( especially chest congestion) I put a little in with some peppermint.

Anonymous said...

This is a great start on the challenge, looks to be another good year.

Thanks for the info on the dandelion greens, I was going to ask the same question....

Have a wonderful evening.

Karyn