Doing it Yourself Changes You

This week I've been off work and have had more time to experiment with something I've wanted to try ever since I got a book for my birthday, Back to Basics. This is a "complete guide to traditional skills" and covers everything from buying ranch land, and building windmills, to canning, braiding rugs, and canoeing. The project that seemed most immediately within my grasp was cheese making. If you've been following my tweets this week, you've see the blow-by-blow. If not, you can check out the photos.

Anyway, messing around with the curds and whey has been a great experience. I like this kind of thing a lot. I find myself in the middle of something just beyond what I know, and yet I realize that only a generation or so ago, many women and men knew how to do this very thing. It was second nature, like operating a word-processing or spreadsheet program is to me, perhaps. And, almost always, something about an ordinary food or other part of my life, makes a new kind of sense. Now, for instance, I know that cheddaring is a process, and I know how much milk it takes to make a certain amount of cheese.

This sounds like a small thing, and I guess in one way it is. But I look at it also in this way: by following a practice from a time before everything came pre-packaged, I open myself up to all of this:

• understanding the steps built into the finished products I do buy;
• appreciating the labor of the people who perform those steps;
• joy in being able to perform new skills;
• delight in producing high quality, fresh products (when I'm lucky!); and
  
• gaining new information about the stuff of everyday life. 

In short, it changes me a little, which is cool.

Santa's got a green elf riding in his sleigh

Was Ed Begley Jr riding side-saddle with Santa this year? I'm wondering, because our stockings had some interesting new (to me, anyway) products this year, and even under the tree, there was a definite green tint to things. Here are a few of the notables:

• EcoTowl Bamboo Compostable Cloth "paper" towels. The package comes with 4 washable cloths.
  
• Post-It Recycled Notes. 3M has a small number of products with a higher degree of recycled content, but they state that all their post-its now have 30% post-consumer content.
• Pilot V-Ball BG 05. Pilot is now making several series of pens with an amazing 81 % recycled content! I'm thinking that leaves out the ink.
• Intriguing reading material: Farm City, The Education of an Urban Farmer, by Novella Carpenter.
  
• And then, Santa's biggest offering, my new shiny red wagon. This isn't a new product, but one I'd been wanting in anticipation of the Trader Joe's that is going in this coming year at the very busy corner of Martin Luther King Jr. Drive and University Avenue in Berkeley. We expect traffic and parking to be a problem, and because we are walking distance from the location, my plan is to use a shopping cart. Thanks Santa!

Some thoughts on Christmas trees

I really like having a (formerly) live Christmas tree. We're going out to get ours later today. It's the 19th of December, and so it's a little later that usual for us. We've waited so that our graduate student son, Nathan, could join us in this activity.

Anyway, as I said, I like having a real tree: the smell of the pine, the feel of the needles, even the slight mess on the floor. Yes, even the chore of it. This year, though, I did stop to wonder if this desire of mine came with an unjustifiable footprint price tag. After all, this is basically cutting down trees. Aren't I supposed to be all about planting trees?

And this week in the NY Times, I read an odd story about a Southern California nurseryman who will rent you a potted live tree for about the same price I'll be paying for my cut tree. You can even ask him to tag it so you get the same tree next year. This is because, between holiday seasons, these potted trees live in a parking lot, essentially. I'm hearing, "They took all the trees and put 'em in a tree museum."

My solution for this year came when I read from my favorite tree provider, Delancey Street, "Delancey Street Trees are certified sustainably farmed. Our trees are good for the environment. Sustainable practices promote the best care of land, water, air and nature. Renewable recyclable crops are the key to the future. A new tree is planted for every tree cut. Sites are selected with organic content and best practices of soil and water conservation, proper nutrition, wetland management, IPM, and biodiversity. After the holidays, please leaver your tree curbside without lights or stands and Sunset or Golden Gate with pick up for free and recycle."

It's hard to argue with that!

It's a wrap: gift bags

This is an idea I got from my sister Ann: using cloth remnants to make gift bags. I sew as a hobby, so I do have remnants, but you could also have fun perusing the remnants table at your favorite fabric store. (My fave is Stone Mountain & Daughter.)

You'll also need ribbon or cord for the draw strings. I tend to save up the ribbons from other packages and even floral displays throughout the year. (They may need ironing to restore their utility.) Here's a box I packed this week for shipping.

Gift bags have all kinds of advantages over paper wrapping:

• Ease of wrapping. Kids love wrapping packages with gift bags!
• When the holiday or birthday is over, you have almost no clean-up.
• This is pre-cycling: You are re-using ribbon and fabric and adding zero paper to landfill.
• And, lastly, the look of cloth-wrapped packages is charming.

 The steps are simple. (Read them through before you start.)

1. If the item you want to wrap needs to be boxed, box it. 
2. Consider its size and then cut a piece of fabric double that size, allowing a 1/2 inch seam allowance on 3 sides. At this time also, cut two pieces of ribbon or cord about 5 inches long for the ties. (Select something that goes with the color of your fabric.)
   
3. Finish the side you want to be the top with pinking shears. If you don't have pinking shears, then you should allow a 1/2 seam allowance on that side too.*
4. Fold the fabric in half with the patterned ("good") sides facing inside. You now have one side with a fold and two sides that require a seam. The top should be finished with a zigzag (from the pinking shears).
5. Pin one of the sides. On the other side about 1 inch down from the top, secure the ribbon on the inside between the two pieces of the fabric. Pin the second side of the fabric, anchoring the area where the ribbon is well.
6. Sew together the two sides, back stitching where the ribbon is located. 
7. Clip the bottom two corners at a diagonal to reduce bulk. Turn the bag inside out.

*If you do not have pinking shears, before Step 4, turn down the edges of the two ends and finish the tops with a simple edge.

2009 Solar production at our place

We just got the "Net Energy Metering Electric Statement" for the past year from Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E). We've gotten the statements on a monthly basis ever the since we put up the panels in 2005. When you work with PG&E on this type of arrangement, you actually become a California Energy Supplier! We have a bi-directional meter, so that on months when we make more electricity that we use, we enrich the mix. When we use more that we make, we pull from the grid.

The grid is our energy bank, in other words.

Here is our energy statement:

Last month, for example, we "made" 198 kilowatts more than we used. By way of comparison, for the same period in 2008, we "made" 186 kilowatts more than we used, and in 2007, the figure was 164. (The year before that, PG&E reported the production in such a weird way, I can't understand it.) You don't have to be a rocket scientist to notice that this represents a trend of more days of sunshine.

People have often asked me if PG&E pays us for the energy we send back to the grid. In a word: No. We were early adopters, and the deal we made was for a $9000.00 grant in exchange for not getting any payback on the excess energy. This is just about an even deal, when you do the math. We put up as many collectors as our roof could hold (18) with the idea that we will replace gas appliances as they age, so we will, over time, be producing less excess energy. So, this means that the financial deal will come out in our favor over the long run, in any case.

Here's what the house looks like from the street, in case you're wondering:

The panels alter the roofline of the upper story, but not tremendously. I think the main effect is that we have less squirrel scampering on that part of the roof. Bummer!

A new Serenity Prayer?

This morning as I was walking the dog, I found myself remembering (and slightly rewording) a prayer I heard a pastor of First Congregational Church of Oakland say a number of years ago. My version goes something like this:

Relieve me from wanting more than I have, as I have more than I need.

If I could truly embrace this, what serenity I'd feel.

Wreath Wraiths

At our house, we have something of a tradition for the weekend after Thanksgiving. We often go up into the Berkeley hills and look around for greens and fallen stuff. By stuff, I mean just about anything that strikes our fancy--eucalyptus buds, pine cones, dried pods, anything that has survived the first rains and looks interesting.

Back at the house, we take this material and work the greens onto a wreath frame. This year, we got the frames at an art supply store, and we also had one we'd saved from a previous year's purchased wreath.

You can see in this photograph that we attach the twigs with short lengths of wire to the frame.

It takes a fair amount of material to make it around a 12-inch wreath frame. With my once-a-year level of practice, it takes me about 45 minutes to an hour to do this task.

Once you have the greens completed, the fun begins, and you get to do the real decorating. We have two different techniques for attaching the decorations: wire and (most often) glue gun. Wire is hard to work with for the decorations, but if the wreath is intended for kitchen use, it is preferred, because it is non-toxic. One of the wreaths I made this year is composed of California Bay (the greens), cinnamon sticks and red peppers. I kept the use of the glue gun to the absolute minimum.

To glue on the decorations, you put a dot of glue onto a stem of the underlying greens and then hold the decoration in place until the glue dries.

In this way, you work your way around the entire wreath until you have the whole thing anchored.

Below is one of the wreaths we made this year.

Catnip Cigars

I had a bumper crop of catnip this year. The plants were watered more than in previous years, because I had moved them up onto a new raised bed we had put into the back yard. Take a look at those big, lush leaves!

These are the cuttings from two plants one week. After another three weeks, I would get another harvest like that.


I have to grow the catnip in a cage to protect the plants from neighborhood cats who are drawn to its delights. The first year I tried growing it in pots set out on the ground, I'd come out to find them mauled out of all recognition.

I grow catnip so that I can make catnip cigars from my sister Ann's 3 cats for Christmas.  Ann makes homemade dog biscuits for our little doggie, so all the family animals are well gifted on Christmas morning.

This year's stogies are jam-packed with "product." As I was sitting down with a big pile of the dried leafy stuff in front of me, portioning it into three smaller piles, I couldn't help but think back a few decades to another time... I swear: you just never know which skills will turn out to be transferable!

Garbage Day

It's garbage day in my neighborhood. When I look at the castoffs from my neighbor's lives, and also how they cast things off, I can see a little bit about where they are in their lives, what they value, and, especially,  what kind of care they take of the environment.

My town is a town of well-meaning people. Pretty much everybody you meet says they care about the environment. After all, it's Berkeley.

 
But when you look at the garbage they put out on the curb on garbage day, you sometimes get a different story.

This can, for instance, has corrugated cardboard and paper peaking out of the top. I've also seen aluminum cans and glass in the garbage. What's the deal?


Are people unaware of what can be recycled? Have people been too "busy" to build new habits?

The City of Berkeley has a Zero Waste Commission (formerly known as the Solid Waste Commission) and a target of reaching the goal of complete recycling by the year 2020. That's 10 years from now.

We've got a serious disconnect going on and not a lot of time to close it.

Why I eat fish

1. I am an omnivore, and I fit into a food chain.
2. I work full time, and I don't want to spend my weekend time seeking out the good livestock farmers who treat their animals humanely.
3. I like fishing, and I have killed fish to eat them. (Yes, of course, I've also caught and released fish.)

One day, when I am retired, I may revisit this. I will have more time to meet farmers and also to see firsthand what deepsea fishing is all about. I'm sure it is a world away from fresh water stream fishing.

But, this is where my eating choice comes from.

Let me also say that the fish I am eating is environmentally sustainable. I have found a fishmonger (Monterey Fish Market) who follows these practices--indeed the owner wrote the book on it: Fish Forever.

About the bread, and grains generally

I meant to mention the bread when wrote that post. I use Mark Bittman's Fast No-Knead Whole Wheat Bread recipe. In my experience, it doesn't make an incredibly high loaf, but I'm using it for stuffing, so I don't care terribly for looks. It has good flavor, is moist, and doubles well.

This is a picture of the bread slices drying so I can make them into crumbs for the dressing.

Now, about grains. The first year I tried the 100-mile challenge, I didn't have a source of local grain other than rice. I had to use nuts for the pie crusts, and we had a rice-based dressing. Not the end of the world, but also not the family favorite. At a Christmas party that year, I was talking about the search I'd done for local grain and a friend and work colleague mentioned a CSA she knew about that was strictly for grains! This sounded perfect for me.

The CSA supported Windborne Farm, and the farmer Jennifer Greene, in Covelo, CA. I signed up in January 2008. Roughly once a month, we got a bag of various whole grains, including wheat, rye, barley, and corn meal. Greene would also send blends like pancake mix and hot cereal mix, as well as unusual grains like teff and millet. The assortment varied from month to month.

Unfortunately (for me), the business model has ceased to work for Greene, and earlier this year, she wrote to all of us that she needed to diversify into a more general farming operation and focus her distribution closer to her immediate area.

When I got her message, I thought of my Thanksgiving meal and saved the wheat and rye flours and corn meal I had.

So, now I have a year to find another local source or get used to the idea of that rice dressing.

100-Mile Thanksgiving

Since 2007, we've been having a 100-mile Thanksgiving at our house, an idea I got after reading Plenty. Basically, you design the menu around foods that are available from farmers, fishermen, beekeepers, and so on, within 100 miles of where you live. If you are having out-of-town guests at your table, you can invite them to bring some ingredients from their area, which extends your possibilities.

It's a fun challenge, and because I live in Northern California, where we have a vibrant farmers' market year round, I figured I had no excuse not to try it.

You end up being able to give thanks for the bounty of your own land, so to speak. I have to think this is the real spirit of Thanksgiving.

So, here's my menu for this year. It reflects another change we made this year, away from meat (other than fish), which came after reading Omnivore's Dilemma.

Pre-Dinner Tastings:
Corn and Black Pepper Crackers (I substitute local honey for the sugar.)
Spring Hill Garlic Cheddar
Spring Hill Smoked Yellow Cheddar

Dinner:
Rock Fish, caught off Fort Bragg, stuffed (stuffing recipe below)
Crab and Cornmeal Stew (I froze local red peppers and tomatoes in July when they were in season.)
Ginger Orange Pomegranate RelishThis is in our stand-in for cranberries. Yum!
Sweet Potatoes and Orange Juice from Joy of Cooking I can't get oranges, but I can get Satsuma tangerines.
French fingerling potatoes baked in parchment with fresh rosemary
Green salad--I'm not sure of the details on this, because a guest is bringing it.
Green vegetable--same story.

Dessert:
Pumpkin pie, from pumpkin I grew in my front yard!
Honey Walnut-Fruit Tart I'm using an ordinary pie crust, not a matzo meal crust.
I'll have whipped cream and also Three Twins Vanilla Ice Cream for toppings.

Beverages:
Another guest is bringing local wine.
I have on hand Calestoga spring water and also some excellent local Gravenstein apple cider.

I promised the recipe for stuffing, and I can actually point to my pumpkin pie and pie crust recipes as well, which recently got published by a French site. The recipes are on page 5 of the issue.

Savory Stuffing

1 egg, beaten
1/4 t. thyme
1/2 t. dill seed
2 T. parsley
1/4 t. salt
dash pepper
1/2 c. butter, melted
3 T. finely chopped onion
2 T. hot water
3 c. bread crumbs
(my mom's recipe calls for white bread, but I'm now making this with whole grain, because I have to bake it from local wheat.)

Combine egg, thyme, dill, parsley, salt, pepper in large bowl. Mix well. In hot butter, saute onion until golden, about 5 minutes. To seasoning, add onion-butter mixture, hot water, and crumbs, tossing lightly to mix well. Stuff the fish (or turkey) and cook according to instructions.