Posted on 03/23/2008 11:36:40 PM PDT by nw_arizona_granny
Americans finding soaring food prices hard to stomach can battle back by growing their own food. [Click image for a larger version] Dean Fosdick Dean Fosdick
Home vegetable gardens appear to be booming as a result of the twin movements to eat local and pinch pennies.
At the Southeastern Flower Show in Atlanta this winter, D. Landreth Seed Co. of New Freedom, Pa., sold three to four times more seed packets than last year, says Barb Melera, president. "This is the first time I've ever heard people say, 'I can grow this more cheaply than I can buy it in the supermarket.' That's a 180-degree turn from the norm."
Roger Doiron, a gardener and fresh-food advocate from Scarborough, Maine, said he turned $85 worth of seeds into more than six months of vegetables for his family of five.
A year later, he says, the family still had "several quarts of tomato sauce, bags of mixed vegetables and ice-cube trays of pesto in the freezer; 20 heads of garlic, a five-gallon crock of sauerkraut, more homegrown hot-pepper sauce than one family could comfortably eat in a year and three sorts of squash, which we make into soups, stews and bread."
[snipped]
She compares the current period of market uncertainty with that of the early- to mid-20th century when the concept of victory gardens became popular.
"A lot of companies during the world wars and the Great Depression era encouraged vegetable gardening as a way of addressing layoffs, reduced wages and such," she says. "Some companies, like U.S. Steel, made gardens available at the workplace. Railroads provided easements they'd rent to employees and others for gardening."
(Excerpt) Read more at dallasnews.com ...
Thank you for the link, it will be interesting to me and is very different than the answer that hit me.
“Only God is perfect”, is heard many times in the west, so that is my first thought.
The Navajo rug weavers, leave a path or flaw in the rug, to also show that “Only God is perfect.
In the west, I do not recall having seen the fry bread with a hole in it, here it is served with honey or spread with beans and meat and used more like a tortilla.
I freeze my milk all the time. I eat organic, so when I see organic milk on clearance or on sale, I stock up. I do the same with cream, yogurt drinks and egg nog also. They only stay in there a few weeks, so I’m not sure how long they would stay good.
Try eating organic! Nothing is cheap! Not complaining. It’s my choice. I shop constantly for sales and meat, milk, eggs, orange juice, yogurt, etc on clearance.
Over the years, I have tried mixing them with milk and the cats still will not eat them.
When I had breeding cage birds, I boiled them and fed some each day to the birds, do not feed them to birds raw, due to the many diseases and easy spoilage.
There is no mystery to my not liking to cook or eat them.
Try living with a father, who thinks he is going to get rich raising chickens, but also thinks he has to be drunk to survive and makes his own booze, so it happens way too often.
I have been the cook for my family since I was 9 years old.
With no refrigeration, you went out to the hen house and got eggs, for every meal....and if dad was on a toot and I did not get them all gathered, you would break the egg in the frying pan and find a baby chick in various stages of growth.
Still today, every egg is broken in a seperate bowl and inspected and never mind the fact that the store eggs layer, never met a rooster.
I love having a bunch of chickens around. And Ducks and geese and the list covers them all.
I can kill them, outdoors, either by hand or axe, well maybe not today, as I am having a bad arm day and typing is not fun.
But, when we have them all picked and you take them indoors to do the cutting...I am gone.
The smell makes me think that I am in the first stages of morning sickness , before the doctor has even told you a baby is on the way.
The hell of it is, my father was right, in the mid 40’s, he could have made it big in the chicken business, if he had stayed sober.
Spring is here, raise more chickens, plant some milo maize, and buy some of the greens that will grow when it is cold, turnip family can stay in the ground, or so I have heard, some of the snow gardners will know which crops work in the winter.
Sell the eggs, if you have extra.
Laughing at myself, as I have tried that one.
Any time the chicken count went over 100, Bill got the “I am going to pull the plug on your incubator look”, he got really upset, when while he was waiting for the water trough to fill, he counted 150 and missed a few......LOL, that was the year that I bought of the Polish crested stock, they are so beautiful, you just keep setting the eggs, to see what is in there, another gift from God.
Rhubarb, is something I know nothing about.
My mom grew it in San Diego, but all I remember are her pies.
Someone will know.
Marigolds did not work for the big green hornworm.
I think the chemical they secrete into the soils, is for the things like root nemotode..
My mother had them all over the garden, and I thought she liked them......When I was grown and she was gone, I found out she had used the old ways, that we are searching for now.
We cook [Mom and I] a little different than the rest of the family, and I thought that it was due to lack of money and maybe education.
One of the first sites that I found on the internet, was a Cherokee cookbook, and in it were almost all of my mothers recipes.
she was a full blooded Cherokee and my dad a half blood, when we moved to California, in the 1930’s, we became Spanish -Irish. I guess they thought they would be accepted better that way.
My brother and I laugh, as we are “Indian” and knew it before we knew we were or what tribe we should be in.
I suspect that my mom used the old ways for her garden.
“One thing I miss in Florida is fresh rhubarb. Anyone know a way to grow it in Florida?”
I am a Michigan transplant and also miss rhubarb, fall color, large deer etc etc. However, I DO NOT miss the cold.
I am in north Florida and rhubard doesn’t do well here. I tried it and it just gradually died out without ever producing anything but a few pencil thin sprigs.
It doesn’t get cold enough for it to go dormant and then put up the new growth in the spring. I googled it and got this unfortunate confirming information -
“CULTURE
Rhubarb, the “pie plant,” is a very successfully grown and popular perennial vegetable in many parts of the country, but is not well adapted to Florida. It does not thrive and is rarely grown where the summer mean temperature is much above 75°F and the winter mean is much above 40°F. Thus, Florida gardeners should not expect much luck with this crop as a perennial, as both our summers and winters are warmer than this.
In Florida, we have no periods cool enough to send the crowns into rest period; therefore, the plant continues to grow through the winter to a certain extent. Upon the arrival of spring when we would expect an abundant flourish of leafstalks, we find only a continuance of the old growth.
Seeds are easier to obtain then crowns, but plants arising from seeds show a great deal of variation in color and form. However, it is possible to sow seeds in a seedbed or seed flat and select the most uniform and desirable plants to set in the garden. It is questionable whether or not sufficient growth can be obtained in 1 year following planting for this method to be practical.
Rhubarb should be grown in Florida as an annual, either from seed or from crowns. If from crowns, three methods are possible:
crowns may be purchased from northern seed companies as early in the spring as is possible to obtain crowns whose rest periods have been broken;
crowns may be obtained from the north in late summer, placed in cold storage (freeze them solid for 6 weeks) to fulfill rest requirements, and planted in the fall or early winter; and
winter forcing is another method using crowns. This method is a common commercial practice in the north, and may be of some value to home gardeners in Florida.
Come the first week in January, I am ready to play in the dirt, but it is too cold so figured ot how to do it indoors.
We had our only real snow 10 days ago, snowed like crazy all morning and an inch of it stuck.
The old timers told me to always expect a freeze in Arizona, the month that Easter falls in and 38 years of life here, has proven them right.
It also rains on July 4th week.
See if you can find this book on greenhouses, it is for poor people to grow food in, not the fancy ones we used in California to grow Orchids in, of course they would grow in it.
It is the only thing that President Carter did right, there was a fund in the beginning to build the greenhouses for people, but my husband built mine.
The food and heat producing Solar Greenhouse
Design construction operation
By:
Rick Fisher and Bill Yanda
ISBN 0-912528-12-5
1976 & 1977
Published by:
John Muir Publications
PO Box 613
Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501
And it is still for sale, and resale: [you may be able to read it on line.]
Thank you for the thoughts on the eggs, they are dry, but have been warm, as I didn’t have a cooler a couple summers ago.
Thank you for joining us, your knowledge will be a help.
This type of thread/group needs everyones minds, working full tilt, to keep up with all we should learn.
Welcome.
Very chubby, clean-smelling, high-bounding deer.<<<
OK, you now qualify for the title of a “Game Refuge” [one ‘e’ or two?], Hang some signs on the fences and take the whole works off you taxes..........laughing.
There was a company that made the signs, and I always thought that I should order a few.
If the tax dept comes to visit, you can claim you need a grant for a higher fence to keep them in.
Or start charging the neighbors for fattening the deer that they are putting in the freezer.
It pleases me that you are enjoying this thread, you have no idea how pleased I am.
After a bad winter, to suddenly start using the brain, wellll, it feels so good.
Come often and I had hoped you would join in, as you know so many of the things that I do not.
Like what can you substitute for salt that tastes salty?
It took me all day to find the information on the different flours, and I am still not sure what the difference [when in the cup] is between traditional ww flour and ww flour.
I understand the grinding stone, versus the steel cut, but will te traditional have more bran and wheat germ in it? will it be better for you?
I want to add, that when you get your refuge signs up and are collecting money to feed the poor starving deer, I would be happy to act as your treasurer, as in bank the donations......
That will be a fantastic meal.
And it will be good for you.
These stack the tortilla dishes remind me of my moms tacos, ours were pretty normal, but the one she fixed for herself, would be piled 4 or so inches high, beans and all went on top....
When I was in my 40’s, I landed a job as a waitress in a real Mexican Restaurant.....and learned that mom had been making tostados.
Or if you fry the flour tortilla and shape it into a bowl, the same ingredients will cause it to be named a taco salad.
Keep in mind that you could use cornbread batter or even the left over cornbread to make the layers and then it is a ‘tamale pie’...
In the old days, I thought a pot of beans could only be served with fried potatoes and cornbread, also a mess of turnip greens.
One night there were small amounts left over, I knew that there
would be a different meal to fix the next night, so figured that I would scrape them all in one dish for myself.
Aunt Bess came to visit the next day and of course stayed for dinner.
She took a serving of my left overs, started eating.....stopped and said “I don’t think that I have ever seen beans served like this, but it is good”. The dish was empty, when she got through with tasting it.
Hurry back, we miss you.
Do you soak your okra seed in warm water for 3 or 4 hours, before you plant them?
They seemed to sprout quicker when I did.
Something that i read about doing, some place and found it worked.
I love okra any way it comes.
Just make the dough round very thin in the middle, with more thickness toward the outer edges. This way, when dropped into the hot oil, it cooks very evenly.<<<
Good idea, then my honey won’t be dripping out of the hole.
Above this post is mine on how it struck me.
I am about 7 miles from the old Kingman, near Hwy 68 turn off from Hwy 93 to Vegas.
Warm should be ok. The can does NOT say to refrigerate after opening. I just do it as a “to be sure” kinda thing.
Get some tubs and grow greens and veg in a sunny window.
A friend of mine always started his seeds in wet paper towels, he wanted to plant them as sprouted seeds, so he knew how many to put in a pot.
It is also used, to test seeds.
I do not recall the details of it all, something about rolling them up in a wet paper towel, what happened next, I have forgotten.
I like putting them in soil, so was not paying as much attention as I should have.
A search testing vegetable seeds might work.
LOL, I should always ask google, before speaking out loud:
Pawpaw chopped a chickens head off once in front of me and it must have traumatized me(i don't remember the axe)because after that he would only wring their necks in front of me.
But, when we have them all picked and you take them indoors to do the cutting...I am gone.
The cutting doesn't phase me but it freaks my daughters out, they always leave too.
http://www.castbullet.com/cooking/fbread.htm
Your link is very interesting.
Lard, tastes better than ‘oil’ to me.
Aunt Moselle says to make crisp peanut butter cookies, use lard.
Looking at the chart, reminds me that Dr. Bill Wattenberg, wants to have Spam and Peanut butter and oatmeal bars in his emergency foods.
He says that one quarter can of spam will give enough strength to keep going for one day....the fat, I assume.
So the lard fried fry bread, would be in a class with the spam.
Add the peanut butter and you should be able to run all day.
Thanks for the link.
http://www.eng.uci.edu/rangel/disclaim.html
That one is going to be difficult to top.
I saw the rangel and almost did not check it, ugh, politics, or so I thought and come to think of it, it does sound a bit like him.
Thanks, I like smiling.
You’re right about the cornbread. It works great for layering.
I’ve been known to get pretty inventive with leftovers too. Ha.
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