Jenmenke

Road Warrior

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It’s Still 40 and it’s Still Raining

I need a garden fix. I want to weed. I want to escape this stupid computer and stupid soccer and get the Hell out of my office. My dog is ready to implode. I have chicks in my laundry room. The cats are sitting in the trees with the bird feeders. It’s raining. It’s cold. And I never went looking for more Morel mushrooms. My asparagus has stopped growing. I want to take a bath. I want to take a bath and go back to bed. I want to eat banana bread in the bath and then go to bed.

Waa waa wahh.

How’s that for a pity party? I’m good at those. Oh. I forgot one thing. I have a headache. I had two meager glasses of wine last night after a long day and today I have a headache. So stupid.

With plenty of work-work to do today (work-work is my made up word meaning ‘real work’ for ‘real clients’), I put on my  ugly hood (shown on model with the face I use to scare my kids with):

And went out to feed the chickens, the birds, empty the compost bucket and take some garden pictures. Come along for the ride…

First stop: Let the chickens out. You think that’s a scary face in the photo above? How about this one? Especially when he flies at your face. I have a big stick I use to keep him in his place.

Sadly, I lost one of my two hens — on MOTHER’S DAY of all days. She must have flown out of the 7′ high fence. We are blaming Lola.

Next stop: Empty the compost and check out the garden.

That’s looking back toward the house. You can see that not much has happened in the last three weeks.

Lettuce, spinach, kale, arugula and cilantro are all just eeking along.

One big surprise are the strawberry plants. They were new last year. I struggled with bugs and this year I have removed the straw mulch, having read it makes the bug problem worse. My *plan* is to keep the refuse under the plants very clean. We’ll see how that goes…

Look at all the blooms!

Here is the garlic, planted last Fall. It is huge compared to other years. The heavy snowfall protected the bulbs and I didn’t lose even one. I predict a June harvest instead of last year’s August harvest. That is both good and bad. Good because I’ll have garlic sooner, bad because it is much harder to store through the hot months.

Here are those scary red potatoes I planted in early March. They are doing well, except for the frost damage from last weekend.

It got down to 28 here in Watertown. See the damage?

And they were even covered with a heavy blanket:

In fact, I tried to cover EVERYTHING with blankets, which was actually quite funny:

So glad I did. Not sure what the apples will do, but you can tell which blossoms were covered and which weren’t.

Here are those shallot plants I was so worried wouldn’t fill in. I should have planted the bulbs last Fall with the garlic, but I forgot. They went into the ground in late March. Most came up and and I am excited. I haven’t had shallots in several years.

I have a bunch more pictures to share, but my ‘work-work’ awaits. After the garden/compost stop, I filled the bird feeders. Thanks to Red-Winged Blackbirds, my gallon-sized feeders have to be filled daily if I want to sustain my little Chickadees, Nuthatches, Red-Bellied Woodpeckers and so on. On the way, I pass my very favorite shrub, the Snowball Viburnum:


I hack about six feet off this thing every year. (I have no idea how large it would eventually get.) I’m trying to prune it so that the left side sort of arches over the path. Yeah. Good luck on that one. I’m a spaz with a pruning saw…

That’s the flower close-up. It is the most gorgeous chartreuse green at this time of year. No scent to the flower, unfortunately, but man are they pretty in a vase.

Then it’s back into my God-Forsaken house with my God-Forsaken animals and the new God-Forsaken chicks.

Are You There God? It’s Me, Jennie. Please send Sunshine. And a personal assistant. I promise to try to be a nicer person.

The Elusive Morel Mushroom

Morels!

I started this post as the Meatless Monday Eighteen post, but by the end of my breathless tirade, I realized I had about 3 pages written with nary a word about Meatless Monday, So, I turned it into its own entry. I will post the Meatless Monday recipe tomorrow.  I’m not going to change anything for this post, so don’t be confused. And don’t expect a recipe at the end. This is just your chance to peer into my addled brain. (And to further understand why sometimes, when telling a story, I completely forget what I was talking about.)

Morel Mushroom and Asparagus Risotto

Prep time: 8 years, 3 months, 18 days, 6 hours and 9 minutes.

That’s how long I’ve spent looking for stupid morels since moving to this God-Forsaken wind-plagued tract of land fifteen years ago. It is day three of sustained winds over 35 miles per hour. (I hate the wind.) You would think strolling through the woods on spring afternoons would be a tranquil time for regenerating the spirit. But you’d be wrong.

Nothing makes me more, angry, bitter and venomous than wasting precious time looking for mushrooms that aren’t there. Afterward, I march into the house with a furrowed brow, into a kitchen that has been destroyed in the hour since leaving, and HEADS ROLL! “What’s all this?! Who left the milk out?! Clean up your dishes!…”

“Mom’s been looking for mushrooms again,” I heard one of the heathens mutter not long ago, after one of these tirades…

Making matters worse, I have to read about the all morels that everyone ELSE are finding in my twitter and facebook streams. Or, from my own brother-in-law, who — in my estimation — must wear a miner’s hat and look for them in the dark, he has so many damned morels. Where does he find the time?

It makes me crazy. I’ve been shut out for the past two years. Haven’t found even one.

So, like I do every early May, I went looking. I looked for about an hour and a half. And I found one!

Yes, one.

This isn't the ONE I found though

My brother-in-law has been itching to come stalk the woods around my house for years, claiming that there just MUST be bounties of unfound morels. Since he usually he has to trespass, he’s probably had as many morels confiscated as he has consumed. OK, I’m exaggerating, but you get my point. He’s a cagey bastard. I like to encourage him, though. Because he shares his bounty with me. I have a well-timed birthday and if I play my cards right, I get a bag full of dried morels around the end of May…

Anyway, the planets finally aligned and we had them over for dinner last Friday for Pad Thai and Panang Curry (*recipe sure to come soon, and also from Rouxbe.com) and the much-anticipated mushroom hunt. Oh Lord, the food was good, but that’s fodder for another post. The main event was the mushroom hunt.

And I’ll be honest here. As much as I love morels, and as much as I really, really wanted to find morels in my woods again after two straight years of nuthin’, there was a not-so-small part of my being that was also hoping we wouldn’t find any. Why? Because then — and, come on you guys, you should know this by now — I would be RIGHT. It would mean that I haven’t been missing them, as they accuse me of. “They have to be there.” Or do they? Wouldn’t I be vindicated if the famous mushroom hunter himself got skunked in my woods?

You see what I mean?

So we set off, heading into the neighboring woods. They, meandering toward every dead elm, and me, trying not to look too obvious, beelining for the place I had found the ONE, four days before. If I was lucky, I thought, I would find another.

And I did. I found one.

Yes, one.

As I was reaching over to pick the lone marauder, I heard…

“Where there is one there are two, and where there are two, there are four…,”  (It was my niece in a little sing song voice. Encouraging me? Patronizing me?)

I spun around and screamed in her little face,“That’s a bunch of CRAP! There’s only ONE! One stinking morel! TEMPTING ME WITH IT’S EARTHY DELIGHT!” (Then I pushed her down.)

No. I didn’t really push her down. I might have said “that’s a bunch of crap.” I don’t really remember, but it sounds like somthing I might say to a sweet pre-teen.

At any rate. I was right, there was only one. And that’s what’s important here.

The bounty

Dave, of all people, went on to find the bounty (above) that we used for our Meatless Monday Eighteen meal. I was thrilled! Because contrary to my family’s opinion, I’m not really all that bad of a person.

World’s Best Dandelion Digger

That is not an attention grabbing headline, guys. I’m serious. This thing is insane.

But, I suppose I should qualify that statement by telling you that my previous tool had been the same one my mom handed to me when I was 10 and sent me out the front door. You know the one — a 14″ long single handle fork. You had to bend over or sit on the ground, dig it into concrete-like clay soil, swear, curse and complain, only to have the dandelion break at the top of the stem? Yeah, that one.

So, when I say “World’s Best”, the competition wasn’t all that impressive.

Still. This is one amazing tool, if only for the fact that you can use it standing up. Many times, it gets the whole dang root. If that isn’t the most exciting, satisfying high, I don’t know what is.

And here is where I waiver a bit…

How important is it, really, to eradicate dandelions? Especially where I live, out in the country:

That field above is ‘prairie grass.’ Actually that field is weeds. I have no idea why the prairie grass didn’t take there, but we still treat it like prairie grass. And the weeds are definitely winning. So you’ve got this meadow of dandelions. And then you’ve got this manicured lawn butting up to it. And I waiver…

Cuz I’m a fairly organic kind of girl, and getting more so as I get older. I just don’t like the idea of rolling around in a sea of poison. But that’s what you’ve gotta do to keep the dandelions away unless you dig them out. And frankly, that seems down right impossible — though I’m going to try. Because Weed-B-Gone is about the worst of the worst when it comes to toxicity and longevity in the soil. I. Hate. Weed-B-Gone.

Now here’s where things really get hypocritical: I just fertilized the grass and the fertilizer had crab grass preventer. Dave bought it, not me, because he thinks my organic bend is silly and stupid. Yes, we probably need to keep the crab grass at bay. But has anyone read the bag? It’s SCAREY! That stuff sits on the surface of the soil, doing its thing for SIX WEEKS! So there I am with the dog, rolling around on little poison pellets. Isn’t that crazy? For a manicured lawn? Still, I’m the one who spread the stuff. I am surely a hypocrite or organic philosophy.

Now don’t be going all namby-pamby in the comment section. Yes, I have tried corn gluten meal, and other various organic weed control and fertilizer products. For years. And I don’t buy it. I think contractors use crappy soil, I think sod is crappy and thatch-ridden and you live with it and deal with it forever after. I have wild grass that has escaped the ‘lawn’ into the adjoining prairie, where the dirt is natural and isn’t part of the sod and it is so healthy! Too bad I don’t WANT the grass there…

Anyway. That’s my dilemma for the day. It is my debate for the duration. It is my anguish come August.

…And it is my life for the next week while I listen to The Seamstress on my iPhone and dig dandelions with the World’s Best Dandelion Digger.

Make Your Own Peanut Suet

For the Birds, of Course.

[This is so not what I want to post today, but I already have it written, and so up it goes! Suet is hardly what I want to be thinking about on our first nice day in weeks. I want to write about dandelions and asparagus and seedlings and spring-type stuff! But I can’t. Why? Because I have to work on soccer. Stupid soccer. Endless soccer. Thankless soccer. No, that’s not true. People thank me. They really do. So I’ll stop complaining now. And you can’t complain about this stupid, seasonally inappropriate suet post, Deal?]

*******

Am I the only one who seems to invest hundreds of dollars a year feeding the birds? Suet is the worst. Honest to Pete. A buck and change for one block and it’s gone in about three days — less than one if I’ve got a raccoon lurking about, which I do right now. Or, just one Pileated Woodpecker visit (so cool and fun) and the whole thing is about gone in minutes!

This winter a friend who I am doing some work for paid me with bird feeders from her online store, feathersdelivers.com, and suddenly I’ve got these new suet feeders to fill. Circular holes need special suet plugs and guess what? They cost more! So maddening. But since I absolutely love the suet feeder and don’t want to part with it, I decided to make my own. Pretty easy, really.

I bought a big bag of beef suet, some cheap peanut butter and peanuts, and about three pounds of cornmeal.

I read online that the beef suet can be so strong smelling that you’d want to melt it outside. I didn’t. I piled it into my crock pot and turned it on high. When I lifted the lid of the crock pot the first time a few hours later, it was with some trepidation that I took my first sniff…

Strong? It smelled DELICIOUS! Like a nice, big, fatty steak! It was all I could do not to reach into the bubbling cauldron of fat and snag a gelatanous piece for myself. The birds be damned.

What? You think I’m kidding? I love fat. Love it. And I’m not ashamed to say it. Well, not anymore I’m not. I figure, who cares? Fatty loves fat. And that pot of pure fat bubbling away for hours was a lesson in restraint. [Yuck. It even sounds gross to me as I write this, but it’s the truth.]

I expected the beef suet to melt completely, but it didn’t. I suspect what you get from the butcher or grocery store contains some small bits of muscle or tendon. I don’t know. I let it cook for hours. Then I strained it and pressed it and poured it back into the pot. I stirred in the peanut butter, the chopped peanuts and almost all of the cornmeal.

I’m lying. My dad took over. He stirred it all together because he’s done it before and because he loves to do that kind of stuff. He gets all bossy and opinionated. We yell at each other and throw our hands in the air. It’s fun. He also did it because I was busy making the Peruvian Pleasures meal for later that night.

We let it cool enough to roll it into logs. We’d certainly like to tweak that process for next time, as it was messy and we kept thinking of ideas that might make it easier. My dad’s ideas, always complicated and intricate — like having molds made (?) and to pour the hot suet in to… Mine simpler and more ‘make-shift’, like “let’s just let them cool more” or “let’s just use the Silpat mat”.

It took us about 30 minutes to roll them. I let them cool a bit more then cut them and put them on a sheet in the freezer. After they were hard we put them into zipper bags for storage. I’ve used them already and they work great.

The best part? We made about 75 plugs for $13.  The plugs you buy in the store go for anywhere from $1 to $1.75 each ($3-$5 a package). That’s a savings of about 85%!

Someone should probably check my math. I skipped 8th grade math and percentages have always escaped me. That and absolute values, though I find lack of absolute value skills to be less crippling in real-life.

I don’t think the raccoons have figured out how to devour the suet plugs yet, but I’m sure it’s coming. I might try to trap the big momma tonight. If I do, I’ll post a picture. Raccoons are so cute from afar and like Satan’s evil twin up close. A video might be better.

Watch Out For This Garden Nuisance

And Harden Your Hearts.

Yes, I am talking about a flower: Violets. Johnny Jump-Ups. Small pansies. Whatever.

Do not be deterred. Do not be swayed by their innocent demeanor. These plants will ruin your garden.

Oh yes, they will charm you in the process, but be charmed and you have already lost the battle.

Trust me. This much, I know.

Here’s how it happens:

1) You walk into your garden on an early spring afternoon, shortly after the snow has melted and notice a single purple flower in a corner of a bed. It is breath-taking. Its tenacity stunning.

2) Each day that you are in your stark spring garden, poking around and getting the sterile gray dirt ready, or spreading the brown compost, you smile at the purple flower. It gives you hope. It is a look into the future of your garden. It makes you happy.

3) Weeks later, it is still blooming. It is sort of in the way as you plant seeds, but you have come to love this flower. Pulling it out would be wrong. It would feel like ripping your own heart out. So, you plant around it.

4) You eventually forget about your purple flower. It gets taken over by the lettuce, or the swiss chard or the beans. It disappears.

5) Or does it?

6) Fast forward 10 months. It is another first of many strolls through the garden on a warm-ish March morning: a purple flower! Where did it come from? So pretty!

7) They are more! Oh so fun! In the paths, in the dirt, in the grass!

8 ) Wait a minute… They. Are. Everywhere.

9) And you realize that something must be done. You need to take them out.

10) They are so pretty, so you dig them out and give them as gifts for birthdays of friends…

11) For your coffee table…

12) For your screen porch…

13) And maybe…. maybe…. you can leave just one to make you smile in the garden…

One of my Favorite Things

My Mukka Express!

Every single day — well almost every single day — I drive the kids to school, then come home and make myself a Latte. Oh, I know. I should work out first. I should march straight outside for a run or walk. Or head up to do yoga before I have my coffee.

But I don’t.

And I won’t.

And therefore, there are many days I never actually do go out for a run or a walk.

And I never head upstairs to do yoga. I don’t even know what made me write that.

It’s not because I don’t like yoga. I do. I just can’t do it at home. I’ve tried. There is no “relaxing into the breath” with two dogs whining outside the door, the phone ringing far away, knowing a client is going to read about me doing yoga instead of doing their logo on Twitter an hour later.

Ok, I suppose I could refrain from blabbing about it on Twitter.

No, actually I couldn’t. I blab about everything. Not necessarily on Twitter, because I really don’t like Twitter all that much…

Where was I…? My latte.

I. Love. My. Mukka. It has become a horoscope of sorts. Because every day the milk froth is a little bit different. And trust me: I’ve tried running experiments. It’s not the milk. And what else could it be? Some days the froth is sort of lame. And other days all fluffy and puffy. Fluffy and puffy is good.

But when I get a huge froth and my cupeth *almost* runneth over?

Well, then I know it’ll be a good day.

It takes just minutes. I add the water to the line on the inside:

Add finely ground coffee:

Screw the top on and add the milk to the line inside the top part:

Wait about 2 minutes till the steam thing pops and starts bringing the espresso into the milk

Then it gets quiet for another minute or two until all the rest of the water and steam starts making noise again and finishes frothing the milk

Sometimes there is so much froth is comes up to the top rim. Sadly, not today.

Mmmmm….

As you can see above. My cup does not runneth over today. It is a lame froth day. But it doesn’t matter. It still tastes the same. So was my day bad? Actually, it sort of was…

Anyway, another great thing is the Mukka dollars it saves me. [get it?] If you spend $3 or more on coffee three times a week or more, well, You Do the Math.

(I think I’ll end every post with “you do the math” from now on. It has a certain punch to it, no?)