CSA week #3

The Fun of Homesteading

Nowadays you may hear people talk about living green. You may call it sustainable living, but we like to call it homesteading. This means living ecologically sound and trying to be more self-sufficient.
We implement organic farming methods to ensure that we are giving back to the earth what it has given us. We love composting, which means our kitchen scraps do not get thrown into the trash, but rather our compost pile. Then, after they have decomposed, it will be added back into the soil, forming a full cycle.
Also, we plant cover crops in the winter to make sure that nutrients don’t leach out of the soil. Then in the spring when the cover crop is tilled in, it will give back all those nutrients that took from the soil. We also try to invite beneficial insects. So, we go out and collect praying mantis egg cases, along with planting other plants that invite such things as butterflies.
Along with butterflies and ladybugs, we also invite bees to our property by having a beekeeper tend bees on our property. It benefits both of us. For him it allows him to tend more hives and get more honey. And, for us it allows our products to be better pollinated, bringing us more produce per plant.
Having chickens at the farm, we produce our own eggs. Right now, we get just enough for us to eat but hopefully some day we will expand to provide eggs to others. The chickens also help us because they eat all the perennial weeds that are impossible to get rid of otherwise. Things like thistle and blackberry vines, they will eat right up. They are a lot like goats, only they don’t clear things out quite as fast!
When the weather gets colder, we will also heat our house with a wood burning stove. This allows us to not depend on the gas company for our comfort during the winter. Although it is a lot of work, it is definitely worth it! And, it is usually warmer in our house than it would have been with the heat on low enough to afford it.
All in all, it does take more labor for us to live our lives this way, but it is so much more rewarding. We feel that people these days, especially ones our age, are much too reliant on others for services. We pride ourselves in that if grocery stores ceased to exist tomorrow that we would still be able to survive! So, ask yourself what can you do to be more self-sufficient?

What’s included this week?

½ dozen eggs fresh from our hens at the farm
Spinach- just enough for the recipe below
Onions- eat these fresh, do not try to store them please
Baby Swiss chard
Romaine lettuce
Dill- great for cooking fish with a little bit of lemon
Sunflowers- cut them down every other day and change the water for optimum freshness

Recipe of the Week

Quiche pronounced key-sh
(It’s French, just try it!)

3-4 slices bacon
1 frozen pie crust (or you can make your own if you are a baker)
½ cup spinach, chopped*
½ cup onion, chopped*
½ cup shredded cheese
3 eggs
2 cups cream, milk will do
*other veggies may be substituted, or you can make it without veggies too! You can even make it vegetarian sans bacon.

Preheat oven to 375 F. Cook bacon in skillet until just cooked. Do not crisp it for it will continue cooking later. Drain oil from bacon and blot until not greasy. Chop up just like veggies. If you want to chop finer (or you want it done faster), you can use a food processor. Sprinkle bacon, veggies and cheese into pie shell. Scramble the eggs with the cream and then pour into shell. Place pie shell onto baking sheet to minimize dripping into the bottom of your stove. Bake 35-40 minutes or until the top is golden. Let cool for 5-10 minutes before slicing so that it may solidify. Enjoy!

Thank you for your support,
Gretel and Steve