Pretty lame cooking tactics, I know.
I called Morgan (my personal chef) for a little help, starting with one ingredient: beets.
After asking what other ingredients I had on hand, she made the call: Casserole.
I confess, I'm not very good at making up new recipes. I like eggs, nachos, and leftovers - and if there are no leftovers, I'm likely to fry a single ingredient and simply salt it to edibility. Pretty lame cooking tactics, I know. I called Morgan (my personal chef) for a little help, starting with one ingredient: beets. After asking what other ingredients I had on hand, she made the call: Casserole.
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When I was in the 10th grade, I made an Odd-Couple type of friend. She shopped exclusively designer and aspired to be the first female president. Once, we compared the cost of our outfits.
Hers: easily over $1000. Between her Prada and Victoria's Secret accessories, her $80 jeans, and $100 sunglasses, she was rocking a month's salary (for me, at least). Mine: $5. I wear free and thrift clothing, nearly exclusively. Yes, I buy new underwear. Other than that, my motto is: why buy new when thrift is so awesome? There's something so wonderful about arugula. It tastes like spring and fall at the same time, and pairs perfectly with parmesan cheese...
Though my cold frame experiment went downhill, I salvaged the arugula. Excellent! Fast-forward through a successful container transplant, and I've had windowsill arugula for the last 3 months. I harvest here and there, and stage periodic ladybug (actually, West Asian Beetle) coups to stave off the aphid infestation. Lately, my arugula has begun to flower! This year, I built a bike. I finished it in January, and haven't ridden it since! Snow, early sunsets, knee pain... I come up with a lot of reasons not to commute by bike, though I'm passionate about reducing my carbon footprint.
Today (finally) I woke up and decided to ride my bike to do my errands. I got all bundled up, took my bike out of storage, put on my helmet, and grabbed my handy U-lock... then I tested the key. It didn't fit. Waah waahhh... I don't know where my new bike lock keys went, but they sure aren't on my keychain! Discouraged, I stored my bike back in the garage and started my car. I drove halfway down the hill (I live a mile into the Rocky Mountain foothills), feeling bitter that the lovely cloudy day and brittle wildflower husks were passing by so quickly. Then I remembered a quote from The Urban Homestead, "We're embarrassed to admit that we used to drive to our local ATM, which is only a half mile away... Everything within a mile is an easy walk." Oh, right - the grocery store is only 1 mile from the bottom of the road. So I parked my car, got out, and started walking. I love projects... maybe you noticed? My recycling bin is littered with to-do lists on backs of receipts, motivating me to:
I can think of a few reasons for my lack of motivation: Morgan, my partner, just moved out of the state... I'm in a transition period in work and relationships... and the Sun moved into Pisces. Before each meal, Morgan and I look at each other and say, "Okay, let's talk about this." We go through each ingredient, and think about its source - local, organic, gifted food is ideal! Sometimes we're lucky enough to have an all-local meal, which feels amazing.
Today, my refrigerator was sparse. It's been a week and a half since my last CSA delivery, and I'm running out of ingredients and ideas! Enter IngredientPairings.com. I often need a little help imagining how things will taste together. So, I entered in an ingredient: 'leeks'. From there, I found that leeks go well with pasta - I just happen to have pasta! I added 'pasta' to the search, found that tempeh goes well with leeks & pasta, and the recipe snowballed into a local, organic, gifted, (vegan!) confection. I drink chocolate almond milk with my coffee every morning. It's delicious! Today, I ran out of almond milk - voila! I made my own. And you can too. Making your own almond milk cuts down on packaging (are those Tetrapak cartons really recyclable?), plus you can make it exactly to your tastes! I recently watched "Radically Simple", a short documentary about a man Jim Merkel & his quest towards sustainable living. Merkel teaches and exemplifies a simple lifestyle, one that will allow all Earth's billions of beings the space and resources to live. Ever seen the bumper sticker, "Live Simply So Others May Simply Live"? That's his whole point.
Merkel leads workshop participants through a painstakingly detailed assessment of their Ecological Footprints, an estimate of how many resources you use, versus how many we each can afford to use. Essentially, your ecological footprint is how many pieces of chocolate mousse pie you're taking at the party. Turns out, I'm a little glutton and I'm eating three pieces of pie... but there's only enough for everyone to have one! Dear Earth,
Happy Valentine's Day. I want you to know how much you mean to me, and how blessed I am that you are in my life. Without you, I could not breathe. You fill me with inspiration - with every breath, I am renewed. Without you, I would starve. You nourish me with your endless generosity and abundant love. Without you, I would stumble and fall. You support me, and allow me to go wherever my feet and heart may wander. Your beauty stirs my heart again and again - I've never seen anything so beautiful as you, and you show it in a million ways. Your presence awes and humbles me. You are my home and love and mother and guide. I cannot express how grateful I am for your love. Thank you. Thank you a million times, it will still not be enough. Love. Love, forever, Me Ever since my multiple failures at cold-frame temperature control (read: crispy fried kale plants, and not in the good, tasty way), I've been sprouting my own greens.
Instead of beating my brown-thumb against the wall when my outdoor crops failed (for the 2nd time), I re-evaluated my purpose in nurturing cold-frame greens: having greens throughout the winter. Now, my winter CSA provides leeks and cabbage, but that's about it as far as green veggies go. So, in the interest of year-round veggies, I've begun sprouting my own micro-greens at home. |
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