My Tomato Garden
It’s almost time to plant my tomato garden, if this Minnesota weather ever cooperates. (Today it’s trying to snow.) In Minneapolis I like to plant around Memorial Day weekend, just so the ground is nice and warm. Read more ›
Gardening, Farming & Urban Agriculture Archive
Lemon Basil Gin and Tonic Cocktail
I’m not gonna lie. I need a gin and tonic, stat! It’s been pretty hot this summer in Minneapolis. 90+ degrees Read more ›
Sugar Snap Pea Salad with Mint
Summer just turned up the heat, hitting 90+ a few days ago. After a torrential-downpour storm, I rushed to the garden to harvest the last of my sugar snap peas before the heat turned them all that sugar to starch. This salad is a last hurrah to Spring-like weather and a big hello to hot hot summer. Read more ›
Garden Confetti Salad
Summer is a time when dinner is simple, salads are plentiful and the stove remains off. Summer veggies just roll out of the garden one right after another. It’s time to eat the bounty till your full. And my garden has exploded! Read more ›
Cultured Butter
My mother got me a classic butter churn for Christmas. Whoopie! Only problem? I need a cow. (Not to be confused with “having a cow,” as my daughter likes to say.) Every time I make a cultured milk product like yogurt or cheese, I wish for a cow of my own, though I’m not sure the City of Minneapolis will go that far for urban agriculture. Read more ›
Fresh Herb Bacon
When we got our half hog from Snake River Farm Minnesota, it came with the largest pork belly I’ve yet seen from our own pig. This baby was 10 plus pounds, enough for two batches of bacon. Yahoo! I let the belly languish in my freezer for almost a year before finally hauling it out to defrost. I tend to delay making bacon until the fall because there’s bacon, we eat it immediately. Read more ›
Fermented Corn Relish
Last Sunday I had the pleasure of presenting and cooking at our local Linden Hills Farmer’s Market as part of their Chef Guru series, produced by Kitchen in the Market. The topic was what to do with the season’s abundance of corn, tomatoes and zucchini. My immediate thought was lacto-fermented vegetables which require no cooking at all. Read more ›
Savory Kale Scones
Oh kale, such a healthful, nutritious, easy to grow green. It’s good for me. It ups the nutrient quality of my diet. It’s versatile in cooking and good raw. Bla bla bla. Frankly, I’m bored with kale, the poster-child hipster vegetable. Naturally, I have loads of it in my garden. I’ve packed it into eggs, sautés, salads, etc. What’s a bored girl to do? Read more ›
New Chicks in Town
If you’ve been following me on Mother Earth News or social media, you already know my big family news for the year. We have chickens. Bock bock!! It was an epic journey building the coop, getting the Minneapolis chicken license and finding our chicks. Now they are well into their teens months and should start laying eggs in September. Read more ›
How to Freeze Strawberries
My strawberry patch at Dowling Community Garden in Minneapolis has been under construction for years. Wrong location, wrong variety, wrong soil, not enough water, it was soooo frustrating! This year all that hard work finally paid off. Loads of compost and manure combined with heavy spring rains made my strawberry patch go BOOM. I had strawberries coming out of our ears! Read more ›
Rhubarb Plum Fruit Leather
Our summer rains have made my rhubarb patch something out of Jurassic Park. The stalks are big and heavy things, mostly dripping with rain or dew. While I am a huge rhubarb pie fan, my daughter is rather luke warm on the whole “pie plant” idea. It’s not that I’m trying to get my kid to eat her vegetables – she’s is a fantastic eater. I just don’t want this great seasonal veggie to go to waste. Enter, fruit leather. Read more ›