Chicken before the Egg

Eggs! We finally have our own eggs!

Months of waiting paid off today when we stumbled upon a hidden nest of lovely brown chicken eggs in an incredibly hidden and hard to reach area of our yard. We were rescuing ducklings (again) from our neighbor's yard and found seven eggs in a pile back by where a bunch of ferns grow in between our house and our neighbor's fence. Eric has been suspecting for some time that they might try and lay there, but we have been neglecting to go on regular egg hunts.

After a tedious time of herding the rather brainless ducklings back into the coop (where they will remain locked up for the next few days while we come up with a better solution of keeping them from escaping from all the cracks in the fencing), I climbed back into the fern area and gathered all the eggs in the bottom of my shirt and brought them inside.

I did a float test to make sure all the eggs are still fresh and good to eat (Lyla did the lick test for me, as you can see), and then scoured the yard for other possible nests. I didn't find any, but will be on the look out. For now, I closed off the area to the back where they had laid the eggs and put some false eggs in the nest boxes inside the coop to help trick them into laying there instead. Luckily we had some Christmas ornaments in the attic that ended up looking pretty great with a light brown paint job. ;-)

It should be noted that when we rescued the ducklings the first time this morning I was unable to get them all back into the coop and had to leave the door open. Confident that I had closed off the area pretty well where they were escaping from, I proceeded to go about my day. Little did I know that I would have to herd them back into the yard FOUR MORE TIMES later in the day before I was finally able to get them all back into the coop without getting brutally attacked by the mother ducks. And good golly, are they vicious Moms or what?! There were ducklings EVERYWHERE. In the front yard, under the front porch, in the alley, in the neighbor's yard, behind the rain barrel, etc. Neighbors continued to ring my doorbell just to inform me of the antics of my ill behaved ducklings.

I finally, FINALLY got them all in the coop. Unfortunately, a chicken was in there as well, who I couldn't get OUT of the coop. Note that all this time I am also trying to parent two wild children who are climbing to scary heights on stacked lawn chairs and drinking dirty water out of the duck pool while Sami the dog is running around crazy trying to bite chickens. No joke. So the chicken in the coop won. I gave up, shut the door, and left them in the coop all afternoon while I did life and tried my best to keep us all alive. Apparently I failed a little since when I returned to check on them earlier this evening, we had a duckling fatality, most likely due to the chicken. Lexi happened to be with me when we discovered the duckling had, very noticeably, died. She has horrified, as was I, and we had a brief talk about life while I ushered her back into the house and made a teary call to Eric, who by the way, is out on business all week (of course).

In conclusion, I DID finally get the chicken out of there. I also took care of the duckling that had died and put up the partition in the coop, along with adequate provisions, which will keep the ducks safely in the coop for the next few days, and away from faulty fences and mean chickens.

To celebrate that I survived (and not without my sister's help with the kids this evening), I cooked up the most delicious free range scrambled eggs for dinner (after the kids were in bed of course), with sauteed garden tomatoes covered in fresh herbs on the side, a slice of fresh whole grain bread topped with cheddar made with raw milk, and a glass of cold, fizzy, home brewed Kombucha to fill out the meal.

To eggs, to chickens, to the survivors. 

To life. 

Swimming in Kale

It's July. And my Kale just keeps on growing and growing and growing and growing.

We are eating it in salads, drinking it in smoothies, sneaking it into anything cooked, and packing the freezer with pureed cubes for the off season. My freezer is so stuffed with bagged green cubes and homemade granola, there is not much room left for anything else.

My friend shared this recipe with me for Kale burgers - which happen to be both vegetarian and vegan. I made them last night and they not only fit the bill perfectly for real food, but they were also surprisingly delicious!!!

Kale Burgers

INGREDIENTS

1 large bunch kale, well-washed and mostly dried

sea salt

1 large tomato, chopped

1 tablespoon almond butter or tahini

1/2 teaspoon garlic or 1 clove garlic

1/2 teaspoon coriander

cayenne to taste (if you like)

heaping 1/4 cup almond meal (I ground my own and ended up using much more than they said here)

heaping 1/4 cup flour

olive oil (I used coconut oil instead)

[1] Remove stems and chop kale into very thin ribbons; sprinkle with sea salt and gently massage; let rest 15 minutes. The kale will turn a bright green and soften. Meanwhile in a food processor or blender combine the tomato, tahini or almond butter, garlic and coriander. If your tomato is not super juicy, add a tablespoon or two of water.

[2] In a large saucepan heat a little oil. Add the kale and sauté for a minute; then add 1/2 cup or so of water and cover loosely. Let cook 5 to 8 minutes (the fresher the kale the shorter the cook time) until it’s just wilting but not totally limp. Transfer kale (leave behind any remaining water in the pan) to large bowl. Meanwhile mix the almond meal and flour in a small bowl. If desired, you could add a little cayenne to this mix too.

[3] After it cools enough to handle, add 2/3 of the kale to the blender with the tomato mixture and blend. You don’t want it to get too smooth; maybe pulse on and off for a minute or two. Transfer this blended mix back into the large bowl with the reserved kale and mix it all together, adding a couple of tablespoons of the flour/almond meal mix too. You should be able to make patties from this mix that hold together fairly well. If too wet, add more flour/almond meal; if too dry, drizzle in some olive oil or water. Form six burgers and coat each burger in the remaining flour/almond meal.

[4] Heat a couple of tablespoons of olive oil over medium heat in a non-stick frying pan. Cook each burger for 4 minutes on each side, adding more oil if need be. They will get a nice crunchy outside with a hot, tasty middle. Serve and enjoy. (http://veggiegrettie.com/2011/03/18/kale-burger-guest-post/)

Here's how mine turned out, topped with goat cheese, real mustard, a tomato, avocado, and grilled onions and red pepper on a whole wheat bun. 

 Our vegan friends skipped the goat cheese, but they loved the burgers anyway!

 More kale burger love (and other kinds of love) going on at this side of the table...

I am loving finding new ways to prepare the food that we are growing. It makes cooking good food a lot more fun! 

Next up in the garden is zucchini and squash. Can't wait!

Truth from the Pantry

Remember the comment that my husband made the other day about wanting to eat food without all the added preservatives?

He wasn't kidding.

Rather than brushing him off by saying, "That's too hard," or "We already eat healthy enough already," I decided to take it very seriously (once I got over my bad attitude, that is, and really thought about it). I have so much information at my fingertips, including plenty of blogs, websites, ebooks full of real food recipes (that I already purchased a few weeks ago), and the desire to eat and live well.

Instead of continuing to convince myself that buying items without High fructose corn syrup was enough, I decided to actually take a walk through my pantry, freezer, and refrigerator to see what I already and regularly buy that has unhealthy added preservatives.

The result wasn't as bad as I thought, but it wasn't very good either.

Here's a disclosure and breakdown on what I found in our house that has ingredients (as preservatives) that we are not ok with eating. (Keep in mind that this is our personal decision - we in no way think less of you for eating deliciously moist and yummy brownies from a box! But in case you are interested in our journey, or just want to laugh at our pain, here ya go.)

Refrigerator:

Ketchup, French style salad dressing, Dijon mustard, Sweet Baby Rays BBQ sauce, Hoisin Sauce, soy sauce, light Mayo (disclaimer: Eric and I hate mayo with a passion...my parents left theirs in my fridge. I read the ingredients label and turns out this low fat processed stuff is packed with ingredients that your body doesn't know how to handle.)

The processed meats we have all contain Sodium nitrites: Smoked polish sausages, Processed turkey meat (any lunch meats, really), pepperoni.

Flour tortillas, vanilla yogurt, chocolate frosting, can of whipped cream (love this on cake and pies, but the preservatives list is sooooo looooong!) all have preservatives that are intended to give the food a longer shelf and fridge life, while compromising your health at the same time.

Freezer:

Hamburger buns. Holy smokes. I am kind of in shock. Same goes for the long potato rolls (buns for the polish sausages). I don't know if I can ever buy those again with a clear conscious. You know something is wrong when the ingredients list is still going at item 20.

A really old store bought pecan pie was packed way back in there. I think this was left at our house and got stuffed into the freezer for later use. Let's not go into all the ingredients and preservatives in that one...I disposed of it anyway.

More flour tortillas, whole wheat bread (no high fructose corn syrup, but this bread has so many other preservatives to give it a longer shelf life, which is very unnatural for bread in the first place...).

I was very very happy to discover that my Ghiradelli dark chocolate chips made the cut, as well as my homemade chicken stock, frozen veggies, chicken breasts, ground turkey, and venison (my sister brought it back with her from Alabama).

Pantry:

This is where I have the most of my problems...

Cheerios, chips, can of iced tea powder (used for summer cook outs), tomato soup, dehydrated potato gnocchi, Pasta (still not completely sure about this, but am looking into it), sweetened coconut flakes (for baking), angel food cake mix, brownie mix, Wyler's instant beef bouillon granules, gel food colorings, sprinkles.

And then I started finding my archived food stuffs...real treasures here.
Mole, with a best by Oct 2009 date.
Thai curry simmer sauce, best by Aug 2010
Ranch dressing mix packet, best by June 2007. 2007!!! Really, Beth??!? 2007? sheesh. You would think that after five moves that thing would be long gone by now, but nope! Saving it for the zombies.
Old easter candy (which promptly went into the garbage)
Gravy packets (which I have never used, since I always make my own, but they have still definitely taken up residence in my pantry...)
Onion soup mix. The American girl's best friend. Not this girl. This packet also went promptly into the garbage can after reading ingredient number two.
Whole wheat bread (As you can see, we keep a lot of bread on hand). Looks like it's time to bake my own. I am currently scouring Craig's List for a machine to make it a little easier on myself.

In order to make this work for our family, we have to take it gradually. My plan is to eat what we already have in our home (minus the old stuff...and a few of the items that made it on my "from the devil" list) and then gradually introduce the healthy alternative when the supplies are diminished. For example, the packaged breads will be replaced with homemade breads, or with the fresh pita that comes from our local Middle Eastern bakery (and contains only the four essential ingredients, no preservatives or syrups). The lunch meat will be replaced with natural peanut butter (which we already eat regularly) or freshly cooked chicken. Salad dressings can be easily home made (and taste better too), and I already have a yogurt culture to begin making my own yogurt with. Breakfast cereals can be replaced with my granola (that I simply need to be more consistent about making) and other snack foods can be replaced with fresh fruits and vegetables.

I will be writing about the changes that we make as we go, but this will definitely not be something that happens overnight. You know what I am really looking forward to (more than giving up processed, preservative packed food)?

Getting fresh eggs from this chicken.