Happy Thanksgiving

Today we had a very nice Thanksgiving dinner.  Our hosts made the bird, the gravy, stuffing, bread and roasted sweet potatoes.  Others brought salad and appetizers. We brought two kinds of cranberry relish (a fresh one with pomegranate seeds, orange zest and the juice of half and orange and a cooked cranberry sauce that had a fair measure of Dijon mustard added to it after the cranberries and sugar cooked and cooled) as well as celeriac mashed potatoes which also include a parsnip and an entire head of roasted garlic.  While I didn’t do the dairy free one based on one friend’s recipe from which I got the approximate proportions for the vegetables, I did use a little trick I recently learned from another friend which is to melt the butter and warm the milk in the melted butter before adding it to the potatoes and other root vegetables.  D. provided the manpower for mashing.  The leftovers will make an excellent addition to a soup or thicken the sauce for pot pie once I have leftover meat from a roasted chicken this weekend.   I still mean to make the fidgetybudgie version of the potatoes with olive oil instead of butter and with carmelized onions which I think will be fantastic next to fish or a really nice steak, but today with turkey and gravy and with plating delayed a while after cooking, I decided that the onions were not the best idea.  We also brought a nice bottle of chardonnary and a nonalcoholic sparkling apple cider.

Tomorrow we aren’t working.  I don’t know what we’ll do.  We won’t shop (crowds annoy me so I never shop on Black Friday) except for coffee early in the morning since we are out and possibly a little bit online.  It isn’t supposed to rain, so hiking is a good possibility though we’ll be limited as to where we can go with the gun deer season still going on.  That leaves Governor Nelson State Park, a couple of larger city parks including Elver or Cherokee Marsh and maybe Indian Lake County Park.    Perhaps we’ll finish blocking off grass and covering it with black plastic for the native plant garden we will enlarge next year and behind which we will probably plant some onions and leeks.  Short, inconspicuous vegetables that we can grow in the front yard behind the prairie without anyone noticing.  Perhaps the house will also get some of the cleaning it so desperately needs and I will freeze some parsley from the garden before it is too late.  As always, my list of things to do will be longer than what can be accomplished in the available time.

My friends, I hope however you spent your day that it was a good one.

Last 2009 Outdoor Farmers’ Market

Today is the last outdoor farmers’ market of the year for us.  I bought this beautiful yellow oyster mushroom and I have no idea what I am going to do with it yet.  Every indication is that it is going to be a very good weekend.  The sun is shining, we are expecting unseasonably warm temperatures with a high of 68 degrees.

I have also stocked up on meat from both Jordandal and Hawk’s Hill Elk Ranch,some long storing garlic and bought  some green vegetables (broccoli and tatsoi).  I was hoping for spinach, but I really didn’t see anything.  No matter, since I love tatsoi which is similar to bok choi but is a vibrant dark green, milder in flavor and somewhat smaller.  Really great in stir fry or added toward the end in a coconut curry stew.  I’ve made cranberry scones, have some almonds in the oven for tamari almonds and because it is so warm, I think we must grill.  Actually, I think it would be a perfect weekend for one last overnight on the river, but my partner in crime will not cooperate, so the weekend will be filled with yard work today with grilling out and using the fire pit today, tasty breakfast tomorrow and some hiking instead of paddling.  It all sounds good to me.

Friday night was a pretty good start to the weekend as well.  We met an old friend of mine and his partner out for happy hour.  It was nice.  Far too long since I’ve seen them.  Then later at dinner, we ran into an old coworker of mine from the job I quit two years ago.

On to raking, mouse proofing and moving thyme and rosemary indoors.

Sedona and self-help

Over the last few weeks, the story of the disaster of James Ray’s Spiritual Warrior  program outside of Sedona has been slowly unfolding.  It is bothering me, though I’m not sure why.  I don’t know anyone who has ever attended any of Ray’s events.  In fact I don’t think I was really specifically aware of Mr. Ray though some of his books and key phrases are vaguely familiar as snippets of pop culture.  I don’t watch Oprah or Larry King Live.  Generally, I’m asleep when Larry King is on and I’m at work when Oprah is on and frankly, I wouldn’t watch her show even if I was home with H1N1 and I only had one channel of TV to watch and it was running an Oprah Marathon.  I’d rather watch Rachael Ray on the Food Network and if you know how I feel about Rachael Ray, you know that isn’t a likely scenario either…

My husband and I got married just a few miles from Angel Valley.  We eloped and had the shortest possible ceremony.  Then and now, the marriage was more important than the wedding.  The company with which we arranged our wedding also arranged “Native American” ceremonies with a Native American officiant.  I wasn’t even close to tempted by that possibility since whichever unspecified tribe they had arranged this with is not of my tradition and though I like to learn about traditional stories and the culture of various tribes, I can’t see appropriating those traditions piecemeal, without respect.  The picture above is not from our wedding, it is a picture that I took a couple of weeks after our second anniversary.  However,  what you can see in that picture you could also see in many of our wedding photos.   I have a great affinity for Northern Arizona, particularly the landscape around Sedona and the countryside around Flagstaff.  I’ve spent hours hiking through canyons and up mountains on more than one trip, often alone and sometimes to clear my head.  I believe this land is sacred, just as I believe the Wisconsin River Valley is sacred (as did the Mound Builders and the current day Ojibwe) or that a restored prairie closer to where I grew up is sacred.  This is probably true for any land which is untouched by human development or even land where a slice of nature can be observed like the old oak tree in my yard or the trees and prairie remnant along the path I use when I bike to work.

I think what troubles me most about the recent situation in Sedona is that it drew my attention to the self-help industry where many practitioners seem not qualified to be helping anyone except perhaps themselves to the funds of people who find their lives lacking meaning enough  that they need to look to these “gurus” for meaning and for self betterment and in doing so, it would appear they give up critical thought and subject themselves to sleep deprivation and mind control games.    I would have to think that in the case of the Sedona victims (not limited to the ones who died) that they’d have been better off to invest their time in their family, friends and volunteering for a cause they feel is important, giving part of their $9K to charity and maybe using some of it to take a vacation.  Maybe a vacation that would include something physically challenging like hiking which would also give them plenty of time to think.

Two of my trips to Arizona were pretty specifically focused on taking care of myself, where I was looking to escape from something or to deal with grief.  In one case, I’d met a man who was behaving in a rather controlling manner and exhibiting stalker-like behavior after just a couple of dates.  Rather than watching my friends’ cats while they went to AZ, I tagged along on the train trip, we spent some time in Flagstaff (including my spending one sunny morning after a snow storm hiking and thinking at Red Mountain) and I went down to the Valley to spend some time with a friend and her family.  This all put some time and distance between me and my problem and put me in a good position to deal with it effectively when I returned home.  My most recent trip to AZ was a few months after my father died.  That summer, I went through a number of changes.  I lost my father, my husband and I decided that I could quit a job that had been making me miserable for a couple of years (though I didn’t really skip a beat on employment taking another job right away with only a week or two off between the two) and that I would take a solo trip to Arizona to take in some hiking both up in the San Francisco Peaks and in Sedona as well as again going down to the Valley to enjoy a little slice of family life that is so unlike my own.  Again, I took the train down with plenty of time for reading and just letting my mind wander, hiked up Mt. Humphrey past 11,000 feet the day after I got there though I couldn’t make the summit because there just wasn’t enough air in the air for me.  I made it past this sign, but not by much.

I got tired every day, I pushed my limits, but I didn’t do anything stupid.  I carried plenty of water and I stayed somewhere comfortable every night.  I think though, that the most difficult and challenging thing I’ve done was my four night solo kayaking trip on the Wisconsin River late this summer.  It pushed my limits, but I was beholden to no one but nature and myself.  I always had enough water and I had a good supply of  food though I don’t really think that I was eating enough to keep up with my energy expenditure for the course of those few days.  I certainly didn’t have need to go on some bogus vision quest directed by someone who had no business conducting one,  borrowing from the trappings of a tradition without taking the tradition itself to heart.

As I’ve been reading about the Sedona tragedy, about James Ray, Rhonda Byrne and people of their ilk, I’ve been bumping into phrases like “negative energy”, “the universe” (and not in relation to physics or astronomy) which have always kind of rubbed me the wrong way.  Now I think I know why.  I don’t think enlightenment should cost much (if any money).  I think solitude and observation of nature rather than Large Group Awareness Training will provide clarity.  Of course it probably won’t make you rich.  And thinking this and sharing it with anyone who cares to read my thoughts won’t make me rich, but then that’s not what I’m looking for.   I think if people appreciated what they have in their lives and didn’t think, “I deserve a little more” which is what many of the charlatans who come to us under the guise of self-help would have us believe and that they can get us there by taking us down some crazy path which serves mostly to line their own pockets.  Some areas of my life could use some improvement, but life always comes with challenges.  When I take stock of what I appreciate, my marriage with D. is a great partnership, I have good friends, a reasonable job, everything I need and some things that I just enjoy.

Today kind of blew

Actually, the wind blew really hard.  I biked to work as usual.  Work was o.k.  I don’t love my job, but I’m glad I have it.  The problem came when it was time to go home.  I put my panniers on my bike and in less than a block found that some of the hardware  that hooks the bag to the bike rack had failed.  This one also has a should strap, but I couldn’t make it short enough to get it close enough to my body for me to think that it wouldn’t unbalance me in the wind if I tried to ride like that.    I stopped and tried to call D.  No luck, his phone just vibrated in his pocket and he didn’t notice.  I left a message and said I was going to start walking.  I suppose I could have put my bike on the front of a bus and then ridden the bus most of the way home, but I was annoyed and I didn’t feel like going somewhere and waiting for a bus and then trying to figure out which number 6 I would be on which would determine where it would be by the time I got over this way.    I walked for close to an hour  which is far more annoying and slower with a bike than it is just walking and then called the home phone once I got to a quieter street.  That time I was successful and I told him where I was and estimated where I would be by the time he drove over that way and where I would be easy to find.

Grrr.  It just wasn’t the kind of trip home for which I was hoping.

I think I’m done whining now.

Odds and Ends

It seems like there is never enough time.  Just 4 weeks ago, I started out on an 80+ mile kayak trip that took 4 days, mostly on 80+ degree days.  4 really glorious days.  Although I posted my pictures on Picasa with captions, I still want to finish the blog entry I started on it if only to record it better for myself.  I have my hand written notes.  Last week I had a pretty cold afternoon of kayaking.

Oak Tree on the Yahara River above Lake Kegonsa, Sunday October 4th

 

Yahara River Tree Reflections, 10/04/2009

The Beavers have been Busy

Yesterday, the water in our birdbath was frozen.  In the afternoon, we went hiking to the Ferry Bluff Natural area.  I passed this area in the first couple of hours of my trip.  We went up to the top of two bluffs in the area.  Cactus Bluff which rises 200 ft above the river and Ferry Bluff itself which rises 300 ft above the river.

View of Ferry Bluff from river level, 10/11/2009

View up river from Ferry Bluff, 10/11/2009

View down river from Ferry Bluff

than a couple of miles trails there, we then went over to Natural Bridge State Park.  I think the “bridge” is technically an arch because it doesn’t span any sort of canyon or water, but it is a

Natural Bridge State Park

rather singular feature in the SW Wisconsin landscape.

I’ve been cooking a lot.  Sunday, we finished the last of the mushroom.  Saturday at the farmers’ market, they had the hen of the woods for sale again.  $12/pound.  That means we blew through close to $40 worth of mushroom in four meals in the past week.  I never would have bought that much mushroom.  Omelette, pizzas with home made whole wheat crust, stroganoff with bison meat and another omelette.  Of course our mushroom was actually free.  I sure hope we get another one next year. 

This week, an  online friend whom I’ve never met in real life posted a recipe for jalapeño pesto after I recommended she make pesto from her crazy jalapeño harvest.  I’m planning to try her recipe with my abundance of Joe Parker hot peppers later this week.

Fall is really here.  We’ve emptied the rain barrels and disconnected them from the downspout.   Leaves will need to be raked soon.  I collected seeds from some of the prairie plants so that I can start them inside in February.  I also cut all the tops off the purple prairie coneflower.  It seeds itself easily and if I am to maintain any diversity in my prairie garden, I’ve got to put the brakes on that.   Of course I saved the seed heads.  I wondered aloud if the nearby golf course would like some purple prairie coneflower in their prairie remnant that they don’t mow next to the woods in the middle of the course.  D shook his head and asked if I was taking up guerrilla gardening.  Perhaps.

I finished one book and started another.  Right now, it is Terry Tempest Williams book, “Pieces of White Shell:  A Journey to Navajoland”.  I’ve not read it before.  I was too young to appreciate it when it was first published.  I read things like this whenever I start missing the Southwest.  It’s a powerful book.  Ms. Williams’ grasp of science and her appreciation of Navajo mythology and it’s easy relationship to the natural world are all conveyed in her graceful prose.  Right now I have it from the library, but I might have to own this gem of a book if I can find one.

Pizza con Funghi

After the harvest of the great mushroom yesterday, I wanted to make pizza to use with some of the other great late summer/early fall ingredients that are available now. Carmen peppers, plum tomatoes, pesto (I harvested 4 cups of basil leaves yesterday which seems like a lot, but it is actually just a few snack size bags of pesto, most of which I froze, but I saved one for the pizza.) I also bought some prosciutto and grated some mozzarella and parmesan cheese. I hadn’t made pizza dough in a while, but it turned out great with half whole wheat flour and half white whole wheat. I’ve really been loving the white whole wheat flour and the whole wheat pastry flour. Almost eliminates the need for all-purpose flour all together.

Mushroom Pizza #1, no tomato sauce

For the first pizza, I just drizzled the crust with olive oil, distributed the pesto around in dabs, added the sauteed mushroom, carmen pepper, red onion, plum tomato, prosciutto, the cheeses and finished it with a light drizzle of balsamic vinegar.  Sauteeing the mushrooms is really important because of the water content.  This was pretty tasty, but I knew that I was going to get some static from D. about pizza needing to have tomato sauce.

That resulted in pizza number two which was roughly the same minus pesto, but with tomato sauce and a slightly higher ratio of prosciutto to vegetables:

Pizza Number 2, and yep, this one didn't exactly turn out round.

Mushrooming

If you know me, you know I’m a pretty big fan of food. Real food. Not packaged, processed food. This also means I am a pretty big fan of wild food. In the Spring, we lucked into morels a couple of times. Two years ago, under our oak tree, we had a mushroom the size of a football. It was a hen of the woods mushroom, also known as a maitake mushroom. This mushroom is considered one heck of a delicacy and commands a good price at farmers’ markets. Some of the fancier restaurants in town like to get a hold of them when they are in season. Which is now. Unfortunately, two years ago, we weren’t able to confidently identify the thing until it was past being edible.

Earlier this week, I went out to put the vegetable trimmings and eggshells in the compost. Under the oak tree, I found this:

I was pretty excited about this.

That is a picture of it on September 29th. Yesterday, October 2nd, I went out again to get rid of vegetable trimmings. The mushroom, well, it had mushroomed in the course of two days.

Mushroom, Morning of October 2nd

Today, I went out to pick it since I could take it to the guy at the farmers’ market, who my meat vendor tells me is a mycologist. That’s great, but I already had confidence that he knew his mushrooms and we had bought some of this from him a couple of weeks ago. From what I knew, everything was right. The mushroom was growing at the base of an oak tree, the season is right, the mushroom looked right, but I wanted the expert to weigh in. I was also hoping to buy some chicken of the woods mushroom, which is more colorful and has a different flavor to have with it. I picked the mushroom and we put it in a big paper grocery sack. Then I weighed it. It was over 3 pounds of mushroom.

At the market, I did a double take when we got to the stand because the guy had a few mushrooms, but none of these and no chicken of the woods either. A man was taking pictures of some of the mushrooms he did have. I approached furtively with my sack and said I had something that I’d like him to have a look at. He confirmed that it was what I thought it was and that it was still good. While we were talking about the mushroom, another couple of guys came up to the stand. One of them said to the vendor, “Do you have what I need?” He said, “I don’t, but she does.” I was willing to show them my mushroom, but said it wasn’t for sale. He asked where I found it, I think hoping to go there and have some luck himself, but since it came from my yard, regrettably that won’t work for him. I had the impulse to share some, but since I hadn’t actually eaten any of the mushroom yet and and was reticent about being responsible for someone else consuming it.

We then found ourselves in line at the meat stand behind the same couple. They asked what we were going to do with the mushroom. I said some of it was going in an omelette with kale, a carmen sweet pepper, onion, bacon and white cheddar cheese. One of them said I should buy some cream and make a reduction sauce and serve it over just about anything. I think we’ll be doing that tomorrow. Today, I am also thinking about putting it on pizza.

We finished our shopping and got home. I sliced off a big hunk of mushroom, much bigger than I would have it I had paid for it and started cleaning it up. Then I sliced off a tiny piece and tried it raw. It didn’t taste that impressive. I prepped all the other stuff and D. got to cooking. I then snared a small piece of the cooked mushroom. Definitely improved by cooking, but probably needed some salt. Some more time elapsed and then we had this:

This omelette is positively bursting with fresh vegetables, all from Primrose Community Farm with the exception of the mushroom. I don’t think I’ll need to eat anything else for a while.

I did leave a little of the mushroom growing under the tree. I also put a chunk around the other side of the tree. Hopefully the spores and the growing conditions will be such that we’ll get another one of these some subsequent year.

I leave tomorrow!

Native Wild Rye and Switchgrass on a sandbar in August

This picture is from the 37 mile, two night trip that D. and I did together a month ago. Tomorrow I leave on my 80+ mile solo trip and I have lots to do before I go. Laundry, packing for my trip, packing a bag for D. to bring with him so that I can go out to dinner in Iowa on Thursday night once I get clean and of course clean clothes for hiking at Effigy Mounds on Friday. As of now, the forecast is perfect, mostly sunny, highs in the 70’s and 80’s, lows in the 50’s. Seems that after the coldest July on record, we are getting some perfect Wisconsin summer in mid-September. There’s a 20% chance of light rain on Thursday. I’ll take that. I’d probably even like it. Right now I have to head off to the library and pick up Barry Holstun Lopez’s book, “River Notes: The Dance of the Herons”. It’s been on my library list for a while. I haven’t read any Lopez before, but it seemed like it might be about perfect for this trip. I’m also really looking forward to playing with my new Canon PowerShot D10. Finally, I have a waterproof camera so that I can have the camera ready and not miss the good shots. Finally, I sort of wish D. was going with me, but in a way it seems important to do this on my own.

Recipes on Request, Granola and Tamari Almonds

I like my granola with lots of stuff in it.

The granola at Macy’s (www.macyscoffee.net) in Flagstaff is really something. If you ever find yourself in Flagstaff at breakfast time, I highly recommend that you wander down Beaver Street and eat something there. My usual weekday breakfast is a pretty good approximation of their yogurt with fruit and granola. I don’t remember exactly what is in their granola, though I remember peanuts or almonds or both. I also checked their website today and it says that their granola is wheat free. Mine is not as you will see below. But it could be.

I never set out to make my own granola. I had actually found granola that I liked a lot at a store here in Madison. It was ungodly expensive. Then I did some digging around to see if I could buy it directly from their supplier and while I couldn’t, I did find out what the wholesale prices were for it. At that point, I put my mind to making really good granola. While I’m sure I’m saving money on this, I’ve never really tallied up my savings per batch. I found a recipe to start with in the “Baking with Kids” section of a pretty comprehensive baking cookbook that I have. I’ve tweaked it a lot, from cutting the butter in half to changing the sweeteners. (The original recipe used brown sugar and while honey and maple syrup are mostly sugar, at least they aren’t so refined.) Here is what I came up with. You can do what you want based on what you like and what is available.

Granola

2 1/2 cups rolled oats (I like the ones from Bob’s Red Mill)
1 cup unsweetened shredded coconut
1/3 cup sunflower seeds
1/2 cup slivered almonds
1/2 cup peanuts
2 tablespoons butter
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup maple syrup (if I was making these in the Sonoran Desert, I might try agave syrup. I might anyway now that I’ve thought of it.)
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 cup wheat germ
cinnamon to taste
1/2 cup golden raisins
1/4 cup dried cherries
1/4 cup dried blueberries

Use the 2 tablespoons of butter to lightly grease the bottom of a large roasting pan. Even better if you have a silicon baking sheet liner that you can use since this will make your cleanup MUCH easier. Place the oats, coconut, seeds and nuts in the roasting pan and spread evenly. Bake at 300 degrees stirring several times. Meanwhile, in a small sauce pan, melt what is left of the butter and mix with the maple syrup and honey. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Remove the roasting pan from the oven and increase the oven temperature to 350 degrees. Add the wheat germ to the mixture in the pan, as well as the cinnamon. Pour the butter and syrup/honey mixture over everything in the roasting pan and stir the mixture to get everything well coated. Bake 5 minutes more. Stir the dried fruit in to the mixture and bake 5 minutes more.

Tamari Almonds

We always have these on hand for quick snacks and for taking on hiking, biking or paddling trips. I used to take them to work (just a very small container) so that I could have them in the afternoon if I was hungry. Problem was, I like them so much I would eat them right after lunch and then have nothing available later in the afternoon if I got hungry. They are addictive. Make and eat at your own risk.

8-12 ounces almonds
tamari (I use Eden Tamari, but any good quality soy sauce will do)

Spread the almonds thinly in a backing pan or on a cookie sheet with sides and bake at 200-250 degrees for 10-15 minutes, stirring several time to prevent scorching. The nuts should begin to release some of their natural oils. Take the pan out of the oven and sprinkle with tamari. Mix well with a wooden spoon until all of the nuts are coated and all tamari is soaked into the nuts. Start out with just a little, you can alway add more if they aren’t all coated or you want the nuts to be saltier. Bake for another 10 minutes stirring once or twice.

Note: I often make these with just the residual heat after I have turned off the oven after using it for something else.

Food for the trip

Next Sunday I leave for a 4 day river trip. Sometimes we cook on coals for a meal, but on this trip, I’ll be doing all of my cooking in a pot in a short amount of time using a very tiny camp stove. Breakfast will include coffee which is in tea-like bags, Emergen-C (because I worry about getting enough fluids on these trips when I spend all my time outside) and while I don’t care about cold water, lukewarm water is not that appetizing. I also hate the texture of hot cereal, but I think I can handle quick cooking oatmeal if I mix it with my really great home made granola. I’ll take small cans of salmon so that I can eat protein in the middle of the day. My dinners will be mixed. One will be a Knorr rice and vegetable mix with a can of chicken meat added to it. One will be a Lipton Noodles mix with extra dried mushrooms added to it and two will be based on a Sierra Club cookbook, “Simple Foods for the Pack”. One will be a black bean chili and the other will be pesto pasta. I look forward to these two meals because they have considerably less sodium and actually less ingredients that I object to, but portability pushes the limits, so I’ll just take the extra sodium and drink a bunch of water.

I usually eat a lot of fresh vegetables and fruit. The Knorr side dish claims to have 2 full servings of vegetables. We’ll see what I think about that. I’ll also take some durable vegetables like carrots and fruit like apples. (Thank goodness we’re on the early end of the season for local apples.) I’ll also bring fresh garlic and onions to cut up at camp and put in the dinners that I put together at home and put in the prepackaged dinners as well. Besides that, I’ll have some tamari almonds (I make these regularly because they taste good and have less sodium than commercial snacks), dried fruit, some sort of organic breakfast bar in case of morning rain, a bunch of the excellent home made granola. On the river, I’ve learned I like to eat often, though not very much at a time unlike the regular meals and rare snacks that I favor in a regular home and work day. I also plan to freeze yogurt and fruit for my first two mornings. It won’t be frozen by the time I get to it, but it won’t be spoiled either. Much different standards for kitchen hygiene and food safety on the river. If you’ve never been there, I can’t begin to explain it to you…