Quote of the Day: J.R.R. Tolkien
“If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.”
Food – good, healthy, real food, is something that I value above many other things in life. There are a lot of things I would give up if needed in order to afford good food. There are a lot of things I don’t do so that I have the time to cultivate some of my own food in the garden. I’m willing to pay my local farmer’s more for their products because they’re better and healthier than their mass produced counter parts. In my life, food is high on the list of my priorities – maybe that’s one of the reasons our home is such a merry one.
What’s high on your priority list?
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The $5 Challenge at Local Roots
I headed off to Local Roots Wooster yesterday to buy food for the $5 Challenge. There so many options of things to make that would have cost me way below $5 per person. The cabbages are in season and the local butcher had fresh brats, braised cabbage with brats would have been less than $10 for everyone. The zucchini and squash are nearing the end of their season so ratatouille would have made a very inexpensive dish for a crowd. There were tons of fresh eggs begging to made into fresh light pasta with a simple butter sauce. I finally settled on an old classic, something that is make so much better when made with love and care in the Slow Food way with quality ingredients, no boxes or cans and a extra little time to make it flavorful. What did I decide to make? Watch the video and find out. (keep watching, there are a few bloopers at the end of the video)
It’s not too late to join, head off to your local farmer’s market this morning and see what ingredients are available. Cook some something delicious and share it with friends since good food is made better by good company because the $5 challenge isn’t just about food that’s inexpensive, it’s about building your community and sharing good food with others.
Do you have a favorite local market or farm?
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Join Us for the $5 Challenge & win a Prize
As you know, I’m a big advocate for good, healthy local food. I keep up to date on what’s going on in the agricultural world, as well as the local and slow food movement. When Slow Food initiated their $5 Challenge I thought it was a great idea. I’m always trying to tell people that eating local seasonal food is not more expensive and this challenge sets out to prove just that. The goal is to cook healthy meal for less than what you would spend for a meal at a fast food restaurant. They emphasize that the food should fit the Slow Food ideal “food that is good for those who eat it, good for farmers and workers, and good for the planet.”
THE CHALLENGE: This September 17, you’re invited to take back the ‘value meal’ by getting together with family, friends and neighbors for a slow food meal that costs no more than $5 per person. Cook a meal with family and friends, have a potluck, or find a local event.
WHY: Because slow food shouldn’t have to cost more than fast food. If you know how to cook, then teach others. If you want to learn, this is your chance. Together, we’re sending a message that too many people live in communities where it’s harder to buy fruit than Froot Loops. Everybody should be able to eat fresh, healthy food every day.
HOW TO GET INVOLVED: Sign up for the challenge! You can cook a meal with friends and family, find a local event, or host your own event. When you sign up, we’ll send you $5 cooking tips.” Sign up for the challenge! You can cook a meal with friends and family, find a local event, or host your own event.
This isn’t really a “challenge” for me. We’ve been eating local, seasonal, slow food for quite a while. We even try to eat this way when we travel and when we’re on the run.
I’ll be getting together with a few friends tomorrow night and I’m in charge of the meal. Later today, I’m off to Local Roots to see what kinds of meals I could prepare for $5 a person. Of course I could make the entire meal with ingredients from my garden and some of the venison from the freezer and it would cost me only about $2 per person. But I think I’m going to purchase the ingredients for this challenge.
I have a few meal ideas knocking around in my head, like:
- Crispy Sticky Chicken Thighs from Jamie at Home: Cook Your Way to the Good Life
- Braised Beef Sandwiches like those ones I blogged about
- Simple Roasted Chicken with seasonal vegetables
- Pasta Primavera featuring homemade noodles with local eggs topped with seasonal vegetables and local cheese
- Beef Roast with roasted root vegetables
- Homemade pizza with various toppings & local cheese
- Beef Stew with a crusty homemade peasant loaf
- Caramelized Onion Soup topped with crusty bread and local cheese and a side salad
- Ratatouille from seasonal vegetables
- Mushroom Lasagna with local mushrooms and cheese with a fresh salad
Having a small edible garden is a great way to save some cash on your food bill and it’s the ultimate slow food. I have a collection of Botanical Interests seed packs to give away to one lucky reader. All you have to do is comment a great meal idea that would cost less than $5 per person using “food that is good for those who eat it, good for farmers and workers, and good for the planet.”
So, who’s in? Any great ideas for inexpensive, delicious meals?
Here’s a great Q&A with Josh Veirtel about the $5 Challenge and how it came about.
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When Do I Take Down My Hummingbird Feeder in the Fall?
If you put up a hummingbird feeder in the summer you may wonder when you need to take it down. It has been rumored that if you leave it up the little birds will stick around delaying their migration, but this is not the case. There is no need to worry that you’re keeping them around. It’s actually a good idea to keep the feeder up well into fall for the opposite reason. Even though the hummingbirds that frequented your feeder all summer may have left already, migrating birds from farther north may use your feeder for a quick pit stop on their way south.
Here at Chiot’s Run we leave the hummingbird feeders up until mid to late October (I wait 2 weeks after seeing the last hummingbird). They get taken down and washed in a non-toxic soap every 3 days and then they’re filled with homemade organic nectar. Making your own hummingbird nectar is quick and easy.
Simply mix 1/4 cup organic sugar with 1 cup of filtered water in a cup or bottle. Mix until combined, fill feeders, store any extra in the fridge (although I make just enough to fill the feeders each time). Contrary to popular theories, you don’t need to boil the water or use hot water. The nectar does not last longer if it is boiled since bacteria is introduced the first time a bird drinks. It is also not necessary to add red food coloring either. In fact the red coloring can be detrimental for the little birds. I make sure I use organic sugar and filtered water because birds are more sensitive to toxins (read through your oven manual and they say to never clean your oven with a bird in the house and think about the canary in the coal mine).
To give the little hummingbirds a helping hand you can also make sure you have some late blooming flowering in the garden. Nicotiana, or flowering tobacco does very well at seeding down and blooming through frost here at Chiot’s Run. I also have Cardinal Climber vines and a few other nectar rich flowers for them.
Keep those feeders up and have some late blooming flowers in your garden for the little birds traveling the LONG way down for the winter!
Do you feed the hummingbirds in your garden? When do you take down your feeder?
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And Just Like That….It’s Fall
Monday I spent the day cleaning out the closets, pantry, the floors and doing some general cleaning. It was quite nice outside, warm and sunny in the morning with thunderstorms in the afternoon, but I needed to get a few chores finished inside. By early evening, it was quite breezy while we were out on our evening walk. It felt like a beautiful late summer evening. Tuesday morning we woke up to a cool crisp morning and leaves scattered around the lawn. It no longer felt like late summer, it felt like fall.
It’s funny how that is, one day feels like one season and overnight it changes. There comes that day in spring, when you walk outside and you can smell the earth, winter is gone. A few months later you wake up one morning and it no longer feels like a damp cool spring day, it’s hot and humid, summer has arrived. Summer is replaced with the refreshing coolness of autumn and the winding down of the garden. Winter replaces the musty smell of fall on that day you notice there is no longer any distinguishable scent in the frosty air that burns when you take a breath.
It’s usually a feeling or a smell that triggers the change of seasons for me. It certainly feels like fall here at Chiot’s Run. The mornings are cool, the days are bright and sunny, the dying plants make a very specific rustling sound in the breeze, the air is filling with the smell of damp decay, signaling a time of rest and renewal. The coming of fall is filled with satisfying garden chores: clearing out the gardens, building compost piles, mulching, wrapping hydrangeas, planting cover crops and maybe a few last winter vegetables. I’m happy that it’s fall, even if it’s not “official” yet.
What things signal a change in the season for you?
