Broccoli Romanesco Parmisagna

I have a broccoli romanesco plant that overwintered in my garden and was starting to get ready to harvest last week. I ran into a challenge since I didn't realize it wasn't a "normal" broccoli plant until I was checking it out and saw it's pretty, bright green spikes.

I did some research and found out it is closer in taste to cauliflower than broccoli and needs a little extra love to make sure the texture turns out right. I sauteed it first with some garlic and steamed it before adding some parmesean.  My two year old "helped" me cook and was SO excited to eat it when we were done. The grown ups liked it, too. In fact, I just ate a huge bowl of this (and just this) for dinner.

If you don't have a garden to grow your own, you can also get it at farmer's markets and natural food markets when it's in season, which won't be until the fall in most cases. But that's what Pinterest is for, right?

How to Make Broccoli Romanesco Parmisagna


Ingredients
1 head Broccoli Romanesco
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
2 cloves of garlic
1/2 cup grated parmesean cheese plus extra for garnish is desired.

Cook it up!
1. Wash the broccoli and cut the florets from main stalk

2. Heat some EVOO in a pan. Add two gloves or crushed or minced garlic and sautee for 1-2 minutes.

3. Add the broccoli and saute for approximately 5 minutes. Add 1 cup of water to the bottom of the pan and cover with a lid to allow broccoli to steam for approximately 10 minutes.

4. After 10 minutes, remove the lid and allow to cook uncovered for up to 4 more minutes to allow any remaining water to cook off.

5. Dust broccoli generously with grated parmesean cheese. Cover pan and turn off heat. Allow to sit for 2-3 minutes to allow the cheese to melt.

Serve it up with dinner and enjoy this tasty vegetable. My one head of home grown, organic, broccoli romanesco made enough for 2 generously sized adult sides and some snacking pieces for the toddler. Although I'll admit that I pretty much just ate a large bowl of it for dinner.

Duct Tape Rainboot Rescue

Five years ago I was so excited to get a great pair of purple rainboots with cupcakes all over them from Target online. My boots have served me well through many pacific northwest rainy seasons, muddy corn mazes, and puddle jumping. Recently, though, I realized my beloved rainboots were done in. The rubber was just too old and was starting to crack in a lot of places. When your rainboots are no longer rain proof, that's a problem!

I'd been trying to scope out some new rainboots but due to my feet of very large size in combination with my budget of very small size- it had proven to be a tad difficult to find something that would work for me. I'd considered trying to repair my boots with pretty duct tape but didn't want to spend the money on two rolls of patterned duct tape only to find out that it wouldn't work - then I'd have even less to spend on new rainboots!

I was so excited to be picking some garden things at my local dollar store when I saw that they were carrying small rolls of patterned duct tape. I figured a $3 risk was a risk worth taking! I grabbed 3 rolls of zebra print duct tape and spent about 45 minutes waterproofing and snazzifying my old boots.

These were what my boots looked like before:

This is what they look like now:

Some tips on rescuing your rainboots with duct tape:

• This should go without saying but: Start with clean boots. Tape sticks better to clean boots and will make them more waterproof.
• If you're using patterned duct tape, over estimate how much you'll use and buy accordingly. I ended up needing close to 30 yards for mine (3 dollar store rolls).
• Use the good stuff underneath. Use high quality tape (silver duct tape is fine) you already have on hand to patch holes and reinforce weak areas or seams first. The pretty stuff will cover it up anyway.
• Wear your boots while you tape the foot area. Especially if they are already a bit snug
• If your existing trim is in good shape, don't cover it up. Work around it and use it as your guide (like I did with the purple parts in my photos).
• Work in pieces. Tear off strips and layer them in different directions. Don't try to wrap the tape around in a continuous piece.

In the end, it's kind of like paying $3 for a new pair of boots! Plus now the old ones didn't have to take up space in a land fill.

Love it!

2012 Home Garden Update: May

I got a late start on my seeds this year so I'm not going to be able to grow as much from scratch as I had originally hoped.

This is my 2012 seed starting operation. I'm re-using single serve yogurt and food cups and colored craft sticks from my dollar store.

Two weeks later...

I'm working on filling in the front of my courtyard with white and purple sweet alyssum. I'm hoping it will fill in nicely and re-seed on its own so that I can have some low maintenance flowers. I'm also seed starting some candytuft, aubrietta and rockcress so that I have some true perennials there, too.

This rose bush came with my house and was cracked out on chemical applications and not very happy when we got here. Three years later, with some love, pruning and compost, it's so beautiful and happy. This is the first bloom of the season. I have lots of buds waiting to burst open, and I'm hoping to make rose petal vinegar and rose petal jelly.

The aphids have arrived a bit early this year. I bought a small package of live ladybugs and released them in my garden overnight. This is the first year I've used ladybugs and was surprised that since releasing them, I haven't found a single ladybug on my rosebush (where aphids tend to congregate) but I can almost always count on finding at least two hanging out on my lavender plant (which as far as I can tell is pretty pest free) at any given time.

My container strawberries are blooming. I followed my own advice on how to increase yield by plucking off the first flowers and berries of the year to get a better yield. They are re-generating large beautiful berries now and hopefully in my June update, I'll have ripe red strawberry pictures to share.

Gardening Quick Tip: Strawberries

Oh, the first strawberry flowers of the season! I get so excited when I see them because sweet fresh berries are just around the corner.

What can you do to help increase your berry yield? It seems anti-intuitive: Pick off the first flowers and small berries.

See these? They seem so sweet. No, friends: they are the enemy.

If you leave these tiny flowers, your plant will make tiny berries. Pick off the first tiny berries and flowers and your plant will think it's under attack and respond by making even more and bigger berries....which means more strawberry shortcake for you. You're welcome.

Documenting Two

I love the idea of taking time each year to document likes along with ages on photos. This is my latest creation with a picture taken at my son's second birthday party at the farm.

How I Did it:
First I uploaded the original to Pixlr-o-matic (PS Love that site! Plus it's an iphone ap as well.)

For this picture I used "Hagrid" color filter, the "Metal" effect and "Flowery" for the border and then saved it to my computer.

Then I opened the picture in Photoshop. I added the text in the French Script MT font in white and added a drop shadow layer effect. I also made painted in a grey cloud behind the text of his likes and set it to 50% opacity. This helps the text stand out from the background a bit more.

Not too hard at all. Pixlr-o-matic really did most of the work and I just had to add some text.

Wouldn't it be fun to have a whole book of these collected from his first 10 years or so? Or even up through graduation?

Farm Birthday Party

Last week my little buddy turned 2 years old. I know every mom says this but it really goes by so quickly. It wasn't too long ago that my little big bundle of baby was learning to roll over.

Here are some pictures from the farm party. Some of them are mine, some are from my friend Niina who blogs at The Niche. Check the watermark to see who did which. I found some great inspiration on Pinterest but wanted to keep things pretty simple.

Ingredients of a Farm Party

Cupcakes:

These were super simple but took a long time to make. I bought a package of pink rolled fondant and used about an eighth of it to make these cupcakes. I rolled it out and cut out some circles for pig and cow noses as well as pig ears. Next I colored some orange for the beaks and combs on the chicks. Then I made some black for cow ears and sheep faces. The sheep were mostly baby marshmallows stuck to white frosting with black fondant heads.

Invitations:

I found cute little farm animal graphics online to make into the invitations.


Food:

I picked up the tablecloth and buckets from my local dollar store. The goal with the food was to keep it simple. Bottled water, pre-sliced cheese, crackers, carrots, celery, dip, pre-made pinwheels, pretzels and 7 layer dip. I also made a large thing of organic lemonade from Frontier Naturals. The label is written on contact paper to make it easily removable.

Farm!
We found a great farm near us that had lots of animals available for visiting. They let us feed a baby cow her bottle, play with some old fashioned water pumps, go down huge slides and plant a row of pumpkins that they labeled so we can some back and pick a pumpkin from that row in the fall. It was a memorable day and was a great way to entertain kids of different ages with minimal work from me. All I had to bring was food!

A huge thanks to my in-laws who sponsored K's party for his birthday present! Thanks also to Niina for letting me borrow her pictures for my blog.

How to Make Yogurt at Home (in your crockpot!)

I've been thinking about making my own yogurt at home for quite some time. When I found a gallon of soon-to-expire organic whole milk on sale for just a little over $2 a few weeks ago, I figured it was a great opportunity to try without the risk or ruining a large quantity of expensive ingredients.

My only regret?  That I didn't do this sooner!

It was soooo easy! It's a great way to save money, too. A gallon of [non-clearance] organic milk makes about a gallon of yogurt and costs around $5. A quart of organic yogurt costs about $4. If your family loves yogurt like mine does, that's a huge savings! The savings is even greater if you normally eat Greek yogurt which is frequently sold for about $1 (or more) for 8 ounces!

Ingredients / Equipment Needed

• Slow cooker
• Food thermometer
• Milk (whichever kind you prefer. I even hear this works with milk alternatives)
• About 1/2 cup yogurt
• Cheesecloth and strainer (if you want Greek style yogurt)
• Fruit or sweetener of your choice (optional)

That's it!

A note about your starter yogurt:

Any kind of yogurt can be used to make homemade yogurt. Pick a yogurt you like the taste of. Keep in mind, though, that plain yogurt makes pain yogurt. Strawberry yogurt also makes plain yogurt (the yogurt cultures are what multiply. Strawberries, sadly do not.).

Instructions

Step 1: Prep the Milk

Pour your milk (use at least 2 quarts but up to about a gallon) into a clean slow cooker. Put the lid on and set to low for about 2 hours until the milk reaches 180 degrees F. Keep an eye on it so the milk doesn't get so hot that it starts boiling or scalds. If this happens you will need to start over.

Step 2: Cool down

Turn your crockpot off and allow the yogurt to cool about an hour until it reaches 120 degrees F. If your crockpot is well insulated like mine is, you may need to crack the lid to help it cool.

Step 3: Add the yogurt

Take about a cup of warm milk from the crockpot and stir it together with 4-6 ounces of yogurt in a bowl. Keep stirring until the mixture is the same consistency throughout without any lumps (though "lumps" from any fruit that may have been in your starter yogurt are okay). Pour the milk/yogurt mixture back into the crockpot and give it a stir to distribute it evenly.

Step 4: Bundle up

The goal is to keep the milk in the 110 - 120 degree range for 6-12 hours. To do this, I placed my crockpot on top of a folded beach towel, then draped another double beach towel over the top and left the crockpot turned off. I did give it a 15 min blast on low right before I went to bed for the night to make sure the yogurt cultures stayed nice and toasty. The longer it sets, the more tart and more set up the yogurt will be. I found 10 hours to be perfect for me, personally.

Step 5: Drain (optional)

Once your yogurt is done, you may see some little pools of watery stuff in there with it. This is whey. You can save it to use in baked goods or lacto-fermented veggies. Or you can stir it back into the yogurt. Up to you. If you like "Greek" style yogurt, you can set up a colander lined with damp cheese cloth over a bowl to strain the yogurt.  Keep in mind that once refrigerated, your yogurt will thicken even more. I over strained my first attempt at Greek yogurt and ended up with something of a soft cheese consistency once it got cold. If you're making a full gallon of yogurt and you get more than 16 ounces of whey, you probably want to stop.

Step 6: Store
I stored my yogurt in clean glass jars. If you are re-using jars that once housed food from the store I do not recommend using jars (or at least the lids) that used to store tomato sauce or pickled products. The scent is hard to get out of the lid and may ruin your tasty new yogurt.

I also made some personal size yogurts by added chopped frozen fruit to the bottom of 8 ounce glass jars, adding a squirt of agave and filled the rest with yogurt. Then when you want a snack, just stir and eat! Yum!

A note about canning jars: If you actually use your canning jars for canning, I do not recommend using them for storing things that metal serving or eating utensils will enter in order to remove the contents. Why? The tiny abrasions they leave in the glass can weaken your jars over time and create messy canning accidents. Keep your canning jars for canning and re-use store bought jars or use your retired jars for food storage/serving.

I hope I've inspired you to branch out and try something new that will help you save money, too!

Footprint Towels

Mother's day is not quite a month away and I thought it would be fun to show you a project a made a while ago as a gift for one of my son's grandmothers. I think projects like this are perfect for grandparents of little ones and what better occasion than Mother's Day to make it?

I did not write a tutorial for it because it is so simple, it really isn't necessary. Also, wrangling a toddler to make footprints and taking pictures at the same time? Ha!

I used Flour Sack Dish Towels and Tulip Soft Fabric Paint.  I made the foot prints first and then painted in the details in black.  Here are some closer pictures of each one:

How to Make the Best Homemade Sandwich Bread. Ever.

I have been on the hunt for the best homemade sandwich bread for a while. Buying your own flour and baking your own bread saves money over the storebought stuff...even if you buy bargain basement bread. Plus there is something super satisfying about knowing that you baked the bread your family loves the most.

Problem: Most homemade breads I've made have been very tasty but the texture just isn't right for making sandwiches. Something as close to the texture of storebought bread is really what I'm looking for.

Answer: This.

This is the by far the best textured sandwich bread I've ever made. Period. It's not super dense like a lot of homemade breads.  Plus it's easy. I use my bread machine to do the initial mixing for me and then let it spend some time rising. Overall, it's about 20-30 minutes of "work" and a few hours of resting and hanging out.

Recipe modfied from Peter Reinhart's, The Bread Baker's Apprentice


Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour
2 1/2 cups unbleached bread flour
1 Tbsp Vital Gluten
1 1/2 Tbsp granulated sugar
1 1/2 tsp sea salt
3 Tbsp powdered milk
1 1/2 tsp "quick rise" or instant yeast
3 Tbsp soft unsalted butter, divided
2 Tbsp honey (optional)
2 cups slightly warm water
Organic canola cooking spray

Instructions
In a large bowl (glass preferred), mix together the flours, gluten, sugar, salt, powdered milk and yeast. Set aside.

In the mixing bowl of your bread machine, add 1 1/2 cups of water (just slightly warmer than room temperature), 2 Tbsp butter and honey. Add about 2 cups of the flour mixture on top of the water and turn on the bread machine to the dough only setting.

Allow your machine to mix the ingredients, adding about 1/2 cup of flour mixture at a time once the flour in the bowl has begun to be incorporated. If the mix is looking too dry and the flour is having a hard time being incorporated, drizzle a couple tablespoons of warm water at a time in the corners until all flour is incorporated. Allow the machine to knead the dough for about 3 minutes beyond when all flour has been mixed in. The dough should be soft and hold together in a ball. (Pic 1 and 2)

While the machine is kneading, rinse out the large bowl you mixed the flour in. Dry it and spray with organic canola oil. Prepare microwave to serve as a rising place by microwaving a small jar or bowl of water on high for approximately 2 minutes to create a warm, slightly steamy environment.

After the 3 minute knead time has passed, turn the dough out of the bread machine into your oiled bowl. If the dough is very sticky, lightly sprinkle your countertop with about 1/2 cup flour and gently knead the dough over it. Otherwise, place the doughball in your bowl and spray the top of the dough ball with cooking spray as well. Lightly cover with plastic wrap and place in your prepared microwave.

Allow the dough to sit in the microwave for approximately 60-90 minutes (or longer if needed) until doubled in size.

Turn the dough out of the bowl and gently press it into a rectangle the width of your bread pan and 8-10 inches long. Form the loaf by gently rolling the dough starting at the short end. Pinch the seam to help seal. Place your loaf in a lightly oiled bread pan (make sure that the ends of the roll are touching the ends of your pan so that it rises properly). (pic 3)

Prepare your microwave as a rising spot once more by microwaving a small jar or bowl of water on high for approximately 2 minutes.

Lightly spray the top of the loaf with cooking spray and loosely place a piece of plastic wrap over the top. Place loaf pan in the prepared microwave to rise about 60 minutes (or longer if needed) until the dough crests above the lip of the pan.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F with the rack in the middle. Bake bread in oven for 30 - 45 minutes or until the top is a golden brown color. If using a thermometer, the internal temp should register at 190 degrees (but I just go based on a visual check). (pic 4)

Remove the bread from the oven and turn out of the bread pan immediately (using a towel or large oven mitt so as not to burn yourself!). Lightly thump the bottom of the bread. It should sound hollow. If not, you may need to return it to the oven to bake a bit longer. Spread the top of the finished bread with the remaining 1 Tbsp of softened butter. Allow to sit on a cooling rack for approx 2 hours before slicing, serving or storing.