Author: louisaenright

I am passionate about whole, nutrient-dense foods, developing local markets, and strengthening communities.

Turkey Tracks: Chicken Feed Recipe

Turkey Tracks:  February 9, 2011

Chicken Feed Recipe

Our chickens are very tired of being “cooped up” in their coop and attached cage, both of which are now banked high with snow and which are, therefore, dark.  You will recall that the chicks were venturing out in the snow paths we made, lured by me and sunflower seeds, until a bird (an owl?) killed May May at dusk one day.

The cage, actually, has about 2 feet of snow on its top as well–which probably provides quite a bit of insulation, especially since I layered tarps over it before the first snow fall.  Inside the coop, we have a red 60 watt translucent light, which gives them a bit more heat.  (The temps up here were in the teens last night.)  I plug in the light in the morning when I feed the chicks so they have some light in their coop during the day.  I turn if off about 8 p.m.  They don’t really like the light on all night, so I only leave it on all night when the temps fall into the single digits.  They get quite cross when they go all night with the light on.

Chickens are very social, so I try to visit them several times a day after they have finished laying.  They don’t like to be disturbed when they are laying.  I open the roof, and they come to see me.  Several will fly up to perch on the opened roof edge and like to be petted and rubbed.  All of them talk to you.  I throw a handful of sunflower seeds into the cage, which is now many inches deep with coop bedding that falls out when the cage door gets opened in the morning.  They scratch around looking for the seeds, and it gives them something to do.  They are VERY bored.  (The dogs are too.)  The other day I sacrificed some of my compost worms and took a full bowl out to the coop.  Mercy me!  Those chickens were so excited.

Chickens love greens, and now all the grass is covered with snow.  I give them as many greens as I can–leftover lettuce, cooked greens, the stems from cleaning greens, and so forth.  I’ve even been known to BUY them some lettuce.  But, what the really love are sprouts, so I’ve been sprouting mung beans for them–something I do this time of year anyway to get fresh greens into our diets.  If I leave the sprouts growing longer, they start to grow leaves, and the chicks really like those.  Here are some sprouting in the kitchen window:

 That rock in in the window is a piece of the old, old Bryan mill stone from the mill out on what was once the farm in Reynolds, Georgia.  My Uncle Buddy gave it to me long years ago now.   The mill was gone by the time I was a child, but he remembered it.

I also give the chickens a big bowl of milk, some hamburger, a bit of bread to soak up the milk, kitchen leftovers they like, and whatever greens I can muster up first thing in the morning.  They love cooked oatmeal, like a warm mash, on a cold morning.  Ditto ground corn cooked in a bit of milk.  This food is their second choice, after greens.

I don’t feed my chickens commercial organic feed, which is full of industrial by-products, like spent, rancid oils, SOY, and  synthetic protein, needed because the corn/soy ratio doesn’t supply enough protein.    Chickens fed commercial feed, even organic feed, produce egg yolks with soy isoflavones, which are phytoestrogens that act like hormones and which affect human reproductive and nervous systems.

Here’s what the mixture I make for them looks like–and I’m darn lucky to have access to all of these organic grains.  Looks good enough to grind and cook, right?  I could, if I didn’t put grit into the mixture.  See the tiny rocks–grit–mixed it?  That’s what chickens use to help digest their food inside their crop, or gizzard.   Anyway, I keep all the grains, seeds, and beans separate out in the garage, so I can use them if I like.

I got the master recipe from a farm out west somewhere, called Greener Pastures (www.greenerpasturesfarm.com/ChickenFeed Recipe.html).  Thanks so much for sharing, Greener Pastures!

This recipe uses wheat, which has a fair amount of protein, as the base grain and peas and lentils for proteins.  Everything is organic.  So, here’s what I’m mixing up:

3 parts hard red winter wheat

3 parts soft spring wheat

1 part whole corn (I up this in the winter to almost 3 parts to help the chicks gain and hold fat, and in the summer I throw out a bit of whole corn for scratch feed.)

1 part steel-cut oats

1 part hulled barley

1 part hulled sunflower seeds

1 part green split peas

1 part lentils

Any other seeds/grain I think they’ll like for a change:  millet, sesame seeds, etc.

About two cups of grit per mixture.

Turkey Tracks: Camden Harbor, Winter Schooners

Turkey Tracks:  February 8, 2011

Camden Harbor, Winter Schooners

 

This view of the northeast side of Camden’s inner harbor lies directly below the library.  To the right, the harbor is more bustling, especially in the summer.  The three winter-wrapped windjammers, or schooners, or just “jammers,” are, from right to left, the Mary Day, the Lewis R. French, and the ketch, Angelique.  (Thanks Lewis McGregor for getting the names right–see comment.)

I took this picture a few weeks ago while John ran into the library to return a  book. 

 

 

 

Mainely Tipping Points 25: TAPPED: Bisphenol A

Mainely Tipping Points 25

This essay is the final essay in a series of three essays around the documentary TAPPED.

 

TAPPED:  Bisphenol A

 

In the documentary TAPPED, Dr. Frederick Vom Saal says Bisphenol A, or BPA, is “one of the most toxic chemicals known to man.”  BPA, explains Vom Saal, is “the poster child chemical that is going to dismantle the entire regulatory process and demand a re-analysis of all chemicals.”  “BPA,” says Vom Saal, is “frightening to the regulatory community because of the magnitude of the error they have made.”    

BPA leaches into water from water containers made of hard, polycarbonate plastic, stamped with #7 on the bottom of the product.  Examples of problem water containers are the five-gallon hard plastic water jugs used with water cooler systems, baby bottles, and sports bottles. 

Other examples in the general food system include containers for liquid baby formula and the linings of beverage and food cans.  Elaine Shannon of the Environmental Working Group (EWG) reports that because plastics made with BPA “break down easily when heated, microwaved, washed with strong detergents, or wrapped around acidic foods like tomatoes, trace amounts of the potent hormone leach into food from epoxy lacquer can linings, polycarbonate bottles and other plastic food packaging” (Shannon, “What the Chemical Industry Doesn’t Want You to Know,” September 2008, http://www.ewg.org/report/what-chemical-industry-doesnt-want-you-know).  Wikipedia notes that as of April 2010, General Mills had developed a BPA-free alternative can liner that works even with tomatoes.  But, writes Wikipedia, General Mills is only planning on using this new liner with their organic food subsidiary, Muir Glen (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bispjhenol_A).   

Polycarbonate plastics are ubiquitous today.  BPA, explains Wikipedia, is used in “sports equipment, medical and dental devices, dental fillings and sealants, eyeglass lenses, CDs and DVDs, and household electronics”—like, notes, computers and cell phones.  BPA, details Wikipedia, is used to make other plastics; it’s a “precursor to the flame retardant tetrabromobisphenol A”; it was “formerly used as a fungicide”; it’s the “preferred developer in carbonless copy paper and thermal paper,” including sale receipt paper; it’s used in foundry castings and to line water pipes”   

BPA mimics estrogen in the body, which is something scientists have known since 1930.  Regulatory bodies have determined what they believe to be safe levels for humans by using an idea, explains Vom Saal, dating from the sixteenth century:  “the dose makes the poison.” 

However, Vom Saal says this premise is false for any hormone and explains that  recent studies are showing that even minute levels of BPA are unsafe. 

Vom Saal says in TAPPED that 700 peer-reviewed, published studies show BPA to be dangerous.  He explains that the 38 internationally recognized scientists who served on a 2006 National Institutes of Health panel (Chapel Hill) determined that current levels of BPA pose risks for humans.  Shannon notes in “What the Chemical Industry Doesn’t Want You to Know,” that The National Toxicology Program accepted much of the Chapel Hill panel’s thinking and wrote that low doses of BPA may affect development of the prostate gland and brain and may cause behavioral effects in fetuses, infants, and children.

Shannon notes that Vom Saal, working with Wade Welshons at the University of Missouri-Columbia, “turned up the first hard evidence that miniscule amounts” of BPA “caused irreversible changes in the prostates of fetal mice” in 1997, or 14 years ago.  By 2008, writes Shannon, the global chemical industry was producing 6 billion pounds of BPA annually, which generated “at least $6 billion in sales” 

In order to protect its BPA turf, the chemical industry has followed the very successful tobacco industry model, which Devra Davis details in THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE WAR ON CANCER (2007).  The tobacco industry spent astonishing amounts of money to advertise tobacco use, to delay negative decisions, to hide negative science, to craft favorable legal decisions, to obfuscate science with problematic studies from paycheck scientists, and to fire or discredit anyone saying tobacco use was unhealthy.  The chemical industry is currently running what Shannon calls a “scorched earth” campaign that includes such actions as an “industry email to food banks charging that a BPA ban would mean the end of distributions of canned goods for the poor.”  

Vom Saal describes in TAPPED how a representative from Dow Chemical Company showed up in his and Welshons’ Missouri lab to dispute the data and to declare “`we want you to know how distressed we are by your research.’”  Vom Saal revealed that Dow tried to stop papers critical of BPA from being published.  Shannon describes how the American Chemistry Council attempted to prevent Vom Saal from speaking at a convocation at Stanford University because his work was “`very controversial, and not everybody believes what he’s saying.’”  Shannon quotes Welshons as saying that chemical industry officials made “` blatantly false statements about our research’” and “`they were skilled at creating doubt when none existed.’ “

TAPPED shows footage from a Senate hearing investigating the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) use of biased studies produced by the chemical industry’s paycheck scientists.  Senator John Kerry castigates FDA’s Dr. Norris E. Alderson for not asking for independent studies.  Senator Kerry concludes that the FDA is not protecting citizens, and TAPPED concludes that industry has captured the FDA and other regulatory agencies. 

Lyndsey Layton of “The Washington Post” reported that as of 2009, 93 percent of the U.S. population had detectable levels of BPA in their urine (“High BPA levels linked to male sexual problems,” November 11, 2009, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/10/AR2009111017411).  Layton’s article discusses a November 2009 study of 634 male workers from four factories in China showed that exposure to high levels of BPA caused erectile dysfunction and other sexual problems after a few months on the job. 

Vom Saal, in TAPPED, links the following health problems to BPA:  childhood diabetes, obesity, prostate and breast cancers, brain disorders like ADHD, liver disease, ovarian cancer, uterus disease, and low sperm count in men.  Layton lists infertility in general and early-onset puberty. 

Shannon discusses some of the dozens of other scientists who are also studying BPA and who concur with Vom Saal and Welshons.  Patricia Hunt, a reproductive scientist (molecular biologist) from Washington State University, was stunned by what she saw under her microscope after a caustic floor detergent used to clean her lab released BPA into her animals’ food and water.  Hunt said “`Like most Americans, I thought, my government protects me from this kind of stuff.”  She began studying BPA, and, after a decade, determined that “exposure to low levels of BPA—levels that we think are in the realm of current human exposure—can profoundly affect both developing eggs and sperm.” 

A Yale University medical school research team led by Csaba Leranth discovered that BPA affects the neurological system in African green monkeys.  In humans, reported team member Tibor Hajszan, the devastating effect on synapses in the monkey brain could translate to memory and learning problems and depression.      

In September 2010, Canada banned BPA as a toxic substance.  Eight states have banned BPA in children’s’ products:  California, Connecticut, Maryland, Minnesota, New York, Vermont, Washington, and Wisconsin.  In October 2010 the Maine Board of Environmental Protection held hearings on a ban on BPA in baby bottles and sippy cups.  The Board postponed any decision until it studied expanding the ban.

Here’s what you can do:  don’t wait for our government to protect you.  Don’t buy canned foods or beverages unless the container says “BPA free,” avoid the combination of plastic and foods, don’t heat plastic, and don’t reuse plastic containers.  Do buy, cook, and preserve locally grown, organic, nutrient-dense whole foods available in your region.

Turkey Tracks: I Feel Rich: 5 Pounds of Processed Pecans

Turkey Tracks:  February 1, 2011

I Feel Rich:  5 Pounds of Processed Pecans

 

We’re almost out of the pecans my first cousin Teeny Bryan Epton and her partner brought to us last September.  (Thanks Teeny and Lori!)

With our friends Margaret and Ronald, we order many household items in bulk from Associated Buyers, located in New Hampshire.  AB delivers, also, to all our local coops, or cooperatively owned stores.  I ordered 5 pounds of organic pecans in this last order.  

 I soak the nuts over night, dry them gently in the dehydrator, and store them in Mason jars.  Five pounds lasts for months and months.  I keep pumpkin seeds, walnuts, pecans, almonds, and, lately, hazelnuts.  Crispy nuts are delicious! 

ALL nuts, seeds, legumes, and tubers need to be processed in some way to remove the phytates that can prevent your body from absorbing nutrients it needs from many foods.  One prepares most nuts by soaking them in salted water over night and drying then in a dehydrator or an oven on very low heat.  Drying can take, sometimes, well over 24 hours.  I found this information and the recipes in Sally Fallon and Dr. Mary Enig’s treasure trove of a book, NOURISHING TRADITIONS.  Fallon and Enig are part of the Weston A. Price Foundation (www.westonapricefoundation.org).  (Be sure to use .org and NOT .com, which is a scam site.)  I trust the WAPF folks because they have the scientific credentials to understand the chemistry of food and human bodies and because they are not affiliated with industry in any way.

Here are the pecans in the four-tray dehydrator:

And, here they are all jarred up.  The big jar is a half-gallon size with which I’ve recently fallen in love.  Now I’m a rich woman!  I have food assets.

Turkey Tracks: May May Chicken Is Gone

Turkey Tracks:  February 1, 2011

May May Chicken Is Gone

Yesterday, May May Chicken was killed at dusk and partially eaten by a large bird.

Here’s a picture of her from last spring around the time we first got our chickens in March.  The grass is just greening up.  At that time, the Marans were about 18 months old.  And, maybe even a bit more.  She had a fancier name that I can’t for the life of me remember.  She became May May over the summer.

Yesterday afternoon I was happily engrossed in making Karen Johnson’s purse, and I did not hear a thing.  Neither did John, whose office windows, though closed with blinds to keep out the cold, are no more than 10 feet away.

Anyway, I went out at deep dusk or a bit later–the chickens have been slow to roost as they’ve been enjoying being outside.  Mostly, they’ve been hanging out under the porch, right next to one of John’s office windows.   They have scratched out the rocks and pulled out the black weed cloth and have been trying to take dirt baths.  One night this week I had to climb up the slope back of the birdfood storage bench, pick up two of the Maran hens, and put them into the coop.  Had they had been scared to cross the snow to their coop?  So,  while May May was being killed, I was both occupied with my project and giving the hens plenty of time to go into the coop.

I went out the kitchen door, flashlight in hand, and around the snow path to the coop.  (We have more than 2 feet of snow on the ground and have dug paths to get around the house.)  When I lifted the roof lid to make sure the chickens were all inside, I only saw three Maran hens.  The other hens and the rooster were uncharacteristically subdued I realized later.  I started down the path to where the chickens had spent the day and begin to see black feathers.  At first, it didn’t register.  Then, I saw her body, a dark heap atop the snow.  Crimson, bright blood soaked the little hollow where she lay.   Her neck had obviously been broken, and part of her breast had been torn away so that her flesh was exposed.  I stepped into the bank, went up to my knee in the snow as my boot sought firm ground, and picked her up.  She was surprisingly heavy.  Oh, I thought, I am feeding them right.

For some reason, I put her back down and went to tell John.  I knew he would want to know, would want to see for himself.  He pulled on boots and coat and came immediately.   Together we took in the information left for us to witness.  There were no signs of an epic struggle.  We hoped that meant she had died instantly.  There was a small patch of scratch marks in the snow.  Hers?  Made by her feet as she died?  Either an animal or a bird who walked on the snow would have left prints.  No, it was a bird that got her and then sat on her body to eat her, which is why the soft snow was so hollowed out underneath her.  She was too heavy for the bird to lift.  So, the bird ate until disturbed in some way.  Perhaps, by the dogs who had gone out several times while I had been sewing.  At one point, Reynolds came to see me, as if to tell me something.  But I had ignored her, intent on my project.

I picked up May May’s body again and was again surprised at how heavy she was.  I took her to the garage and put her into a trash can.  What else could I do with her?  Leaving her lying in the snow to at least feed something in this winter of heavy snow was unthinkable.  We do not want to tempt  foxes, weasels (the dreaded weasels), coyotes, or racoons into the chicken area.   Nor did we want to tempt our dogs. In the end, her flesh was wasted, trashed, but for a few mouthfuls.

It’s such a strange thing to contemplate death.  In the early afternoon, I had stroked May May while she sat on the nest in the corner of the coop where the hens have been laying.  She had been sitting on two brown eggs, one of which may have been hers.  She had stayed when I reached beneath her and took out the eggs.  She had allowed me to stroke her back a time or two more before I closed the roof lid.  Perhaps one of the eggs I collected before locking in the remaining chickens for the night had been hers, laid after I had left her.  May May had been warm, alive, interested.  And now, there was the lump of her body.  The life had gone; her spirit had departed.  But, to where?

John’s protective mode went into full gear.  He wanted to “get the sucker,” and he got up early to peer out of the windows to see if he could spot the bird, who might return to try to eat from its prey once more.  He thought he saw an eagle in our trees.  He said the bird had a huge wing span, bigger than a hawk’s.  I do not know if an owl is large enough to take down a hen of May May’s size.  Probably.  And I do think she was killed at dusk because she wasn’t really cold when I picked her up.  Anyway, May May’s death is a reminder that nature is not kind, that nature is rapacious and filled with creatures who must eat to live, including man himself.

I am feeling more than a little guilty today because the chickens did not really want to come out in the snow.  They knew it was dangerous.  They knew they were prime targets against the white snow.  That’s why they had hunkered down under the porch.  They knew they could be killed out on the snow paths.  And, May May was.  But, they came out in the first place because I told them it was ok, because they had followed me down the path as I scattered a bit of seed for them, seed they could not resist.  I am shamed that I listened to anyone say how dumb chickens are because they won’t go out into the snow unless you make them.  What hubris!  What a mistake.  What a lack of understanding about chickens and predators.  Chickens almost always stay beneath plants and trees and porches and buildings.  In the winter, they are so at risk.

Here’s a picture of our original six chickens, taken in the fall before Chickie Annie joined then.  May May is the middle black hen.  She was the “head” hen, and she was fiesty and full of life and altogether wonderful.  We will all miss her and the very large brown eggs she laid.

Turkey Tracks: Wynken, Blynken, and Nod quilt

Turkey Tracks:  January 31, 2011

Wynken, Blynken, and Nod Quilt

Here’s a very bad picture of the “Wynken, Blynken, and Nod” quilt sent to my great nephew Judah Benjamin Gardner about a week ago.  Judah was born a week before our Ailey. 

This picture is fuzzy and, also, distorted a the bottom.  I’m learning that if I don’t hold my little camera level with the center of something, the bottom gets narrowed.  Oh well.  You can still see it’s a very cute quilt. 

 

Here’s a close-up of the center panel:

 

 And here’s a sense of what the back looks like.  I had to piece the back as the quilt turned out larger than I had expected. 

 

Children’s quilt fabrics are really fun these days!

This quilt is meant to be used and used and washed and used.

Turkey Tracks: Sunday Cooking–French Onion Soup Dinner

Turkey Tracks:  January 25, 2011

Sunday Cooking: 

French Onion Soup Dinner

 

We have some friends here in Maine who LOVE French Onion Soup.   Jack and Barbara Moore own the schooner Surprise, which takes people out of our Camden harbor for day sails during the summer.  They went to Tufts with John, and we did not know they lived here when we first began to get serious about moving to Camden.   We attempted to rent a cottage from them in January 2004 for the summer of 2004, and John realized who they were.  We all met at Boyton McKay for lunch (Phil had cooked vegetarian French Onion Soup), and the three old friends reconnected.   (Boynton McKay has the best pancakes in America–seriously, it does.) 

A week or so ago, Jack and Barbara invited us to dinner at the newly renovated cottage we once rented–it will now be their home–and it is beautiful–and I promised to make them French Onion soup.   Traditional French Onion Soup begins with a sturdy beef stock, but many French soups just use vegetables and water (leek and potato soup, for instance), though Julia Child always has a variant for a good bone broth stock.  In the winter, especially, bone broths are more prevalent because people are eating hearty meats for warmth.   And, if you know me at all, you  know I’m a passionate advocate for good bone broths.  They are nutrient dense and provide minerals we do not easily get elsewhere.  Besides, they allow the use of all parts of an animal.  Nothing gets wasted and it’s healthy to boot.  How can you go wrong?  Also, onions are storage vegetables, so we have a lot of them in the winter.  What a French Onion soup is, in the end, is a way to use what is prevalent in the winter season, and use ingredients in the most delightful way.

However, Barbara is mostly a vegetarian, so I promised her I’d make a vegetarian French Onion Soup.  And we invited them for Monday night, so I started by making a really good vegetable stock on Sunday afternoon:  2 celery stalks (you don’t want too much celery), some celeriac  I had from Hope’s Edge which is mild, 2 big onions, 3 spring onions greens and all, chard stalks, a small turnip, a parsnip, a few potatoes hanging around the potato basket, 4 carrots, three or four garlic cloves smashed, some of the parsley I froze, some dried lemon thyme, a bay leaf, and some good unrefined sea salt (which is full of minerals like magnesium and good for you,  unlike the fake salt in the grocery store which I never buy).  I would have used 2 leeks and 1 onion if I had had leeks.  Once assembled and brought to a boil, lower the heat, and simmer for about an hour.  You will have gotten all you need from the vegetables by then.  Let the stock cool and strain it through a colendar.   In this household, the dogs get the carrots the next morning mixed into their raw meat, and the chickens get some carrots, the chard stalks, the turnip, parsnip, and a few of the spent potatoes.   If  you can’t part with the vegetables,  pull off a bit of the stock and puree the vegetables in it, reheat,  pour in some heavy REAL cream or put a few tablespoons of butter on top, and you have another lovely soup.  If you don’t have animals, you could compost the spent vegetables.  If you don’t have a composter, put them outside under a shrub.   They don’t have any fat in them, so they won’t attract vermin, and you won’t be adding, mindlessly, to the waste stream.  The shrub will thank you. 

Anyway, here’s what the broth looked like on the stove.  Isn’t it pretty?

  

Roughly speaking, here’s what you need for the soup  ingredients:

2 quarts of stock minimum–I probably use 2 1/2 quarts–and at least  1/2 cup dry white wine (red isn’t bad if you’re using a beef stock)

8 or 9 medium to large onions cut pole to pole and sliced into 1/4-inch slices  (I use more than Julia who calls for 5 cups I think)

1 tsp. salt, a pinch of sugar, 3 Tablespoons of butter, and 2 Tablespoons of other fat (olive oil, coconut oil, tallow, lard)

Grated swiss cheese–good swiss which is sweet, not bitter, is usually European in origin.  And, if you like, the following enrichments:  3 Tablespoons of Cognac, egg yolks ( 1 to 4)

Really good French Bread Baguette

While the stock was cooking, I sliced up the onions, put them into a HEAVY pan with the butter, oil/fat, and salt, and on medium heat, began caramelize them.  When they have all melted down, add the bit of sugar which will help caramelize the onions.  Hang around the kitchen and stir them up every couple of minutes.  Keep the heat from being too hot.  You don’t want to burn them. 

Here are the onions getting close to being done:

The onions are now a soft golden color.  You can get onions to caramelize to a much deeper color, but the taste changes as the process continues.  Since I was using a vegetable stock, I didn’t want the onions to be as strong as I would for a beef stock.  This picture is showing the onions to be a bit light, but they were actually a lovely golden color.  When you think your onions are dark enough, stir in about 1/4 cup of flour and cook, stirring constantly, for about 3 minutes.  Add your stock and stir up all the bits in the bottom of the pan.

At this point, I let the mixture cool and refrigerated it.   All I needed to do on Monday was to heat the soup gently, let it simmer for about 30 to 40 minutes, and taste it for salt when it got warm.  My soup was very sweet.  Onions are sweet, but remember I had also used carrots and a parsnip in the broth.  Chard stalks are sweetish too.  

Here’s the soup on Monday cooking gently for 40 minutes: 

I thought it needed some zip, so just before serving, I added a good 3 Tablespoons of cognac.  (A plain brandy would work too.)  And, I enriched it with 4 egg yolks, which made it silky smooth and gave it some lovely body, not to mention protein the body can use easily. 

To add egg yolks, drizzle a ladle of soup into the eggs while you whisk them.  For safety,  as I had used 4 eggs, I added a second ladle slowly while whisking.  (This is called tempering the eggs.)  Then, with the soup OFF THE HEAT, stir the eggs into the soup and stir the soup until it thickens–just a minute or so.

I put grated swiss cheese (a GOOD swiss) into the bottom of each deep bowl and ladled soup over it.  My gratinee soup bowls are small, and we wanted big bowls of soup for dinner–not a smaller size for a first course.  And, as we had really fresh baguettes, we just quartered them and put a hunk at each person’s plate.  I can get lovely raw butter, so we had that for the bread too.  (We didn’t want to toast sliced bread and put it into our soup this time and put the cheese over it and put everything into the oven to melt the cheese.)

While the stock made and the onions caramelized, I made a three-layer cake–a recipe I had put away to try years ago.  It’s a caramel cake, but not a southern style.  Instead, the batter and the icing are flavored with mocha syrup, Bailey’s cream liquor, a coffee liquor, and vanilla.  I didn’t have a mocha syrup, so I put the other ingredients in a pan and threw in about a tablespoon of chocolate bits and a tablespoon of some caramel syrup I had and let it all sit on the oven shelf to warm and melt the chocolate.  The cake is spectacular and lovely, so that innovation was fine.  Here it is, though the camera distorts the bottoms of things (making them look smaller) if you don’t have it level with the photographed object:

Here it is cut:

 

It is yummo!  I got it from “Better Homes and Gardens” Dec. 2005, “Secret to a Great Cake:  Cream Caramel Cake,” page 220.  The only downer is that the icing has EIGHT CUPS of confectioner’s sugar in it.  That’s more sugar than I eat in two years!!!! 

So, you remember those chard stalks I used in the soup stock?  Here are the leaves–with some green onions–all ready to be sauteed for dinner on Sunday night.  Dinner was roasted sweet potato and a seared sirloin steak and some of my sauerkraut.  Aren’t chard leaves pretty?  Chard is in the beet family, you know.  I usually grow a variety called “rainbow” chard that comes in all sorts of electric colors.  It’s quite amazing in the garden.  It’s great sauteed with some coconut oil and when it begins to melt down, a splash of fruity vinegar and a drizzle of honey.  Sometimes I also add some raisins or some sliced apple, peel and all. 

So, on Monday, I only had to make a salad and grate some cheese.  Here’s the salad:

I wanted something citrusy.  Lettuce greens are not in season now, so this salad is from “away.”  It has some water cress, some leaf lettuce, some romaine, a naval orange, some fennel sliced thin on the mandolin cutter, some hearts of palm (I grabbed a CAN thinking I was buying asparagus hearts–bad, bad as can linings leach BPA–I should have NOT used anything else), some green onions, some toasted pine nuts, and a fruity dressing of lemon and olive oil.  It was delicious!

So, Bon Appetit! to all and mega thanks to the incomparable Julia!

PS:  For a good beef stock, put a selection of bones in a roasting pan, add some celery (2 stalks only), carrots, onion, and garlic (I slice the whole bulb in half after seeing son Bryan do that) and roast until brown at high heat–400 degrees–turning and stirring after about 40 minutes.  Usually everything is brown in no more than an hour.   Drop the heat if you think things are moving too fast.  Put everything into a large stock pot.  Put water in the roasting pan and scrape up the goodies and pour all into the stock pot too.  Add more onion, carrots, garlic, fresh or dried herbs (thyme, rosemary, bay leaf, parsley) and GOOD SEA SALT THAT IS DAMP AND GREY and cook for at least 5 to 6 hours and up to 12 hours.  Strain and discard bones and spent veggies.   Freeze extra in Mason quart jars.

Turkey Tracks: Green Hive Honey Farm

Turkey Tracks:  January 24, 2011

Green Hive Honey Farm

“Raw Honey From A Thousand Flowers”

 Isn’t this the prettiest jar of honey you ever saw?

From the moment I saw it I fell in love!

 

For the past five years or so, I’ve made a right hand turn onto Wiley Road from Barnstown Road and, in doing so, passed a house where the most amazing flower garden begin to appear.  Last year some time, a friend told me that the occupants of this house, Clay and Mary King, had put in hives and were going to sell honey.  I’m always looking for local, NONHEATED honey, and that’s what the King’s have.  They have hives located in other places besides their yard, each site carefully chosen to support bees.  Last year, the honey bottles were plain.  This year, when Clay brought us a case of honey, here’s the jar that emerged from the box.  I’ll never be able to throw away a single one of these bottles.  That’s for sure.

For those of you who are local and who are reading my blog, this honey is amazing!  You can reach Clay and Mary at greenhivenoney@gmail.com.  Or, 207-542-3399.  The web site is www.greenhivehoney.com.  Clay and Mary, by the way, have a therapeutic massage practice.

For those of you who are not local, I urge you to find a local source of unheated raw honey.  It’s full of things that are good for you that come from your own region, and you’d be supporting someone who is trying to make a difference. 

Raw honey, combined with raw butter, has been used traditionally as a healing compound and for immune support.  I try to eat some every day.   

Strangely, in the way that things come together all at once some times, Paul Tukey of Safe Lawns sent out a posting listed on his blog this week that shares the fact that the lead researcher for the USDA has definitely connected the use of the class of insectsicides called neonicotinoids, which are synthetic nicotines, with the colony collapse of bees–and at, writes Tukey, “doses so low they cannot even be detected by normal scientific procedures.”   Apparently, Jeffrey Pettis (the lead USDA researcher), has known for two years about the neonicotinoids, but said that official publication of his findings has been stalled.  What a surprise!  This story is as old as industry use of chemicals.  Some names of these synthetic nicotines are imidacloprid and clothiandin.  Pettis, writes Tukey, broke his story to a documentary filmmaker rather than to a government source.  That’s interesting…   That’s one way to get around the “stalling.”

Neonicotinoids act on the central nervous system of insects and are thought to have a lower toxicity to mammals because they block a specific neural pathway that is, according to Wikipedia, “more abundant in insects than warm-blooded animals.”   More abundant…  My first thought is that, as with BPA, they don’t really know how dangerous to us these chemicals are.  And, no one is looking since we operate within the notion that harm has to be proved before our government even begins to look–which translates into having enough dead or harmed bodies.   Imidacloprid is systemic.  It amazes me that people can watch chemicals drop bugs and not connect the dots that those same chemicals can have an impact on their systems as well.  Again and again, the history of chemical use demonstrates that “they don’t know.”  Or, if they do and it’s dangerous, they hide it.  So, I have no confidence in our government’s ability to protect us any more.     

Imidacloprid is widely used as an insecticide worldwide–except in France and Germany where folks seem to have started questioning impact.  Imidacloprid is used, says Wikipedia, against “soil, seed, timber, and animal pests” and is used as “foliar treatments for crops including:  cereals, cotton, grain, legumes, potatoes, pome fruits, rice, turf and vegetables.”  That’s a LOT of poison.

Feral honey bee populations in America, writes Wikipedia about pollinator decline, have declined by 90 percent.   And, two-thirds of managed honey bee colonies have disappeared.  Two thirds.  The economic and human hardship potential for disaster if this scenario continues is enormous.  About one-third of human nutrition depends on bee pollination.  Think about it.  We’re talking about the majority of fruits, nuts, vegetables, and crops we feed to animals, like alfalfa and clover. 

Most bees right now are moved around the country to service crops, which stresses them.  Often, they only have access to one crop, like, say, almonds, which also stresses them since they need more variety.  Often, they’re fed in winter with high fructose corn syrup because we’ve taken all their honey.  No wonder, often, they die.

So, my hat’s off to Clay and Mary.  The honey is beautiful, the bottle’s beautiful, the label’s beautiful, and I will support you.      

Mainely Tipping Points 24: Tapped: The 8 X 8 Glasses of Water Myth

Mainely Tipping Points 24

Note:  This essay is the second in a series of 3 essays on water, which started with viewing the documentary TAPPED and reading Elizabeth Royte’s BOTTLEMANIA.

 

TAPPED:  The 8 x 8 Glasses of Water Myth

The documentary TAPPED traces the history of how the bottled water industry successfully encouraged people to drink a whole lot of water every day, which translated into people buying easily transportable single-serve bottles of water.  The prevailing dictate insuring daily hydration for the average person is 64 ounces, or eight, eight-ounce glasses of water a day, or 8 X 8.    

But, this recommendation, which is repeated by even such an august mainstream medical organization as the Mayo Clinic, not only has no scientific backing whatsoever, it could be dangerous for some people (http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/water/NU00283).  Mayo notes the lack of science, but includes the 8 X 8 recommendation without qualifying until near the end of its posting the fact that much of the 64 ounces can come from ingested food.  Other liquid sources, like coffee, tea, fruit drinks, and, even, soda, also contribute.   

Elizabeth Royte, in BOTTLEMANIA (2008), surfaces the work of Heinz Valtin, a retired professor of physiology from Dartmouth Medical School who specialized in kidney research (35).  Karen Bellenir discusses Valtin’s work also in a “Scientific American” article that appeared on 4 June 2009:  “Fact or Fiction?  You Must Drink 8 glasses of Water Daily” (www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=eight-glasses-water-per-day.com).  Bellenir notes that Valtin “spent 45 years studying the biological system that keeps the water in our bodies in balance” and that Valtin can find “no scientific evidence supporting the notion that healthy individuals need to consume large quantities of water”—though Valtin acknowledges that for people with specific health concerns, like kidney stones or chronic urinary tract infections, drinking more “can be beneficial.”

Bellenir reports that in 2004 a panel of the Food and Nutrition Board “revisited the question of water consumption” and concluded that “ `the vast majority of healthy people adequately meet their daily hydration needs by letting thirst be their guide.’ ”  In 2008, Bellenir writes, Dan Negoianu and Stanley Goldfarb reviewed the evidence about water intake for the “Journal of the American Society of Nephrology” and determined that there “ `is no clear evidence of benefit from drinking increased amounts of water.’ ” 

Royte and Bellenir both write that the 8 X 8 myth likely started in 1945 with a recommendation from the Food and Nutrition Board of the National Research Council, which now functions under the auspices of the National Academy of Science’s Institute of Medicine.  This board recommended about 64 ounces of water for the average person, but noted that much of the daily need for water is met with the water content in ingested food.  How did the back end of this statement get so thoroughly lost and how did the resulting unscientific and, even, dangerous, 8 X 8 get so thoroughly embedded in our culture? 

Royte notes that Valtin says he’s “tired of trying to prove a negative.”  He believes that the “burden of proof that everyone needs eight by eight should fall on those who persist in advocating the high fluid intake without, apparently, citing any scientific support” (35-36).  Royte notes also that Valtin analyzed “published surveys of healthy populations and found that most people weren’t drinking that much” (35).  Valtin, writes Royte, said “ `The body can’t store water.  If you have more than you need, you just pee it away.”

Drinking too much water leads to all sorts of problems, the most serious being death.  Drinking large amounts of water in a short period of time can lead to hyponatremia, or “water intoxication,” where the kidneys cannot excrete enough excess water and where the electrolyte (mineral) content of the blood is diluted, which results in low sodium levels in the blood (Royte, 36; Mayo Clinic).  Royte notes that hyponatremia can lead to “brain swelling, seizures, coma, and then death” (36).

Dr. Ben Kim, in “Why Drinking Too Much Water Is Dangerous,” notes that consistently imbibing too much water can damage the kidneys.  Further, excess water increases blood volume within a closed system, which places an unnecessary burden on your heart and blood vessels.  Kim is a chiropractor, but he has a wonderfully succinct analysis of this issue   (http://drbenkim.com/drink-too-much-water-dangerous.html). 

Dr. Thomas S. Cowan, an MD who is also a homeopath, in THE FOURFOLD PATH TO HEALING (2004), has an extended, excellent explanation of how the heart and the blood system interrelate (137-147).  Cowan, like Kim, writes that “increasing total volume in the system makes it harder to move the blood because the excess water volume makes it heavier.”  What you eat, combined with the presence of oxygen in the blood, helps the body release the water it needs.  Specifically, the metabolism of healthy fats, especially saturated fats, liberates more water than either protein or carbohydrates.  Thus, people who exercise and eat a diet “consisting plentifully of healthy fats and low in carbohydrates” have “the healthiest hearts and circulatory systems” (145).  Fat deficiency, writes Cowan, cannot be solved by drinking more water; this practice “only makes the circulation more sluggish” (146).    

Kathryne Pirtle, in “Acid Reflux:  A Red Flag,” “Wise Traditions,” Summer 2010, 35-43), writes that too much water dilutes stomach acid, which leads to acid reflux.  (Yes, low acid, not high acid causes problems, so, if needed, take hydrochloric acid with pepsin to increase acid in the stomach.)  Pirtle says that in addition to mineral depletion and imbalances, too much water intake “can contribute to digestive disorders, as well as kidney disease, degenerative bone disease, muscular disorders and even cardiac arrest from electrical dysfunction.”  She also notes, that “paradoxically, over-consumption of water may cause constipation” because “when too much water is added to a high-fiber diet, the fibrous foods swell and ferment in the intestinal track, leading to gas, bloating and other uncomfortable digestive symptoms” (39).

Pirtle notes that “traditional peoples did not drink large quantities of water.”  Rather, “they stayed hydrated with raw milk, fermented beverages and bone broth soups, which have incredible nutrient qualities and do not upset the body’s homeostasis.”  And, like Cowan, she notes that traditional people “also consumed plenty of traditional fats like butter, cream, lard and coconut oil” as “fats render much more water during metabolism than proteins or carbohydrates” (39). 

The efficacy of thirst with regard to adequate hydration is a hotly debated topic.  Both Royte and Bellenir note that some elderly have trouble experiencing thirst some time.  Bellenir notes that “some drugs can cause problems with thirst regulation.”  Processed foods, with their heavy loads of salt, sugar, bad fats, and chemical brews, create thirst.  And, thirst is the body’s way of  trying to cleanse itself.  But, such cleansing can form a vicious cycle if constantly repeated because nutrients are flushed out as well.

TAPPED and Royte both trace the growth of bottled water as an industry.  Real growth starts in the late 1970s when the French company Perrier began creating an American niche market for its distinctive dark green bottles of spring water.  Perrier’s $6 million advertising budget targeted urban professionals.  In 1978, sales were $20 million; in 1979, after an Orson Wells television ad, sales were $60 million (Royte 30).

In 1989, Coke and Pepsi got into the game.  They put water into lightweight, clear plastic bottles and spent, TAPPED reports, “hundreds of millions of dollars telling us to `drink more water.’ “  They associated bottled water with celebrities, told us drinking water would make us thinner, and told us bottled water is “purer” and, thus, “safer,” than tap water.  And, we did “drink it up.”  By 2007, bottled water was an $11.5 billion business.

Bellenir writes that Dr. Barbara Rolls, professor of nutrition sciences at Pennsylvania State Unversity, argues that “ `drinking water and waiting for pounds to melt away does not work.”  Further, “ `hunger and thirst are controlled by separate systems in the body.’ “  So, people do not confuse hunger for thirst. 

Barbara Lippert, an Adweek Media critic, observed in TAPPED:  “We’ve become like big toddlers.  We’ve got the nipple to our lips constantly.  We constantly need to know there’s something there just for us and that we can just throw away.  We want everything individualized, personalized.  We don’t want to wash it or take care of it.  And we want it immediately available.”  TAPPED punctuates Lippert’s comments with pictures of grown people walking with and regularly swigging from water bottles.  

 “Tapped” punctuates Lippert’s analysis with film of grown people on urban streets carrying and regularly swigging from water bottles.  These people are metaphors for how industry advertising reduces us to individualized infants—a reduction that reduces also the power of community.

Turkey Tracks: Cutting the Waste Stream and Detoxing the Kitchen

Turkey Tracks:  January 19, 2012

Cutting the Waste Stream and Detoxing the Kitchen

When we first moved to Maine, I was clueless about how many paper products we were using.  And, how much of each.  I could go through a whole roll of paper towels while cleaning the kitchen by the time I mopped up the stove, hood, sink, counters, and cabinets.   And, I didn’t think twice about it either.

Our first hint that Mainers don’t use paper like I had done for forever came when we were invited to a potluck.  I made a really nice dish, and off we went.  Only, when we arrived, we discovered that everyone was supposed to bring their own plate, utensils, and drinking cup.  Wow.  It was a revelation.  Fortunately, another couple lent us one of their sets of everything and each couple ate from one plate.   Our journey toward stopping the paper habit started that night.

Except for paper napkins, I’ve not bought any household paper eating supplies in about 6 years.  And, paper napkins get used very little since we use cloth napkins–which we wash when they get dirty, not after every meal.  (I grew up with this practice, actually, in my grandmother’s home.)  Mostly, paper napkins get used to blow our noses since they are sturdier than kleenex!  And that’s going to stop because I lucked into a box of handkerchiefs a while back, and I, at least, have been carrying one of those in a pocket.   But, they are delicate for the most part.  I wonder if sturdy cloth handkerchiefs are on the market anywhere? 

Last fall I bought a stack of white wash cloths at our local Penny’s–about a dozen for $10.  (Along with some GREAT cotton sheets at 1/2 the price of other places.)  I put them in a bowl on the kitchen counter, and I grab one when I need to clean anything in the kitchen, wipe my hands, wipe…anything.  They get thrown in the washer with the cloth kitchen towels, and all get bleached when they really need it–though the sun does a great job in the summer.  And, of course, I have lots of rags from old t-shirts, towels, and the like. 

Next, I need to figure out how to store clean rags in the bathroom instead of using paper towels to wipe out a sink, polish a mirror, or swish out the toilet (with gloves on, of course).  Now that I’ve focused on the problem, it shouldn’t be hard to solve.

When our quilt group meets, we each bring our own coffee/tea cup.  That’s worked well for many years now.  We hardly ever have to buy disposable cups anymore.  Plates and napkins, though, we do still buy.  And, plastic forks and spoons.   Hmmmmm.  This might be worth discussing at the group.   The Lion’s Club where we meet has plates, utensils, etc., but we’d have to wash them afterwards…  That’s the big problem, isn’t it?  We don’t want to expend energy in that way…   We’ve noticed that people from away who visit use napkins like plates, without giving a thought to the trade-off:  wash a plate or trash more trees. 

It’s always a shock when someone from an urban area comes because our trash fills up quickly with all the disposable coffee cups they…”trash.”  Maine has a good bottle law.  It could be better if they upped the tax a bit more.  Studies have shown that the higher the tax, the better the return, which means less goes into the environment.  Anyway, we take our trash to our local dump and pay $1 for the big yellow bags we use.  There are great recycling bins for paper, cardboard, cans, and bottles.  Obviously, the less trash we put into those yellow bags, the less we pay.  We compost all our plant wastes, and the chickens and dogs eat all the kitchen “slop.”    

Packaging creates a huge amount of trash.  In Britain, I read not long ago, shoppers were stripping their produce out of all the packaging and leaving it for the store to manage.  I don’t know how that came out.  I do know many of us in Maine are using our own bags when we shop, and I’ve stopped putting a lot of produce into plastic bags to carry them home.  Lettuce, maybe.  Apples, no.  I shop mostly at a co-op anyway, and they don’t supply shopping bags or pack your groceries for you.   And, they ask you to pay for any bags you use when gathering food.  But, when I do go to a local supermarket, which is not very often, I’ve stopped going blindly along with all the plastic packaging.  I haven’t quite had the nerve to strip off packaging from organic produce I might buy in a supermarket, but that day is coming soon.  Mostly I try to buy local, organic food, and that’s not often in the supermarket anyway.

I stopped buying and using aluminum foil a few years back.  It’s toxic.  It’s metal, so it doesn’t break down in a land fill.  It was a little disconcerting at first because I had all these food habits that made me reach for the foil to cover a pan or wrap something to heat or transport.  But, I’ve learned to cope.  A bit of wax or parchment paper laid over a hot dish, covered with a thick towel transports food really well.  And, I’ve figured out how to use other lids or pans to cover an open dish in the oven. 

I haven’t yet stopped buying plastic wrap.  But, that’s next.  And, for heaven’s sake, don’t heat plastic wrap in a microwave and give that food to anyone!  (Actually, we took the microwave to the garage three years ago, and we haven’t missed it.  The microwave issue is a whole thing on its own, but every holistic or energy person I know does not use one.)  I already use plates to cover most bowls I put in the refrigerator.  That works fine.  The plate even makes a hard place where you can set another dish. 

I got rid of all plastic storage containers years ago.  I do have some glass containers with glass lids, but they are hard to find.  I have some glass or metal containers with plastic lids, but I wash those lids by hand.  I use Mason Jars a lot.  And,  glass food jars get washed and saved. 

So, I’m down to ziplock bags.  And I still use those.  I wash and reuse them, so I feel a bit better.  But, in the end, I don’t want plastic touching my food any more.  I’ve just read too much about how little we know about what’s going on inside a plastic anything.  And, what we do know is scary.  And, I do know that manufacturing plastic is toxic in so many ways.   Plus, it’s all made from oil, which is a limited resource.  Plastic just isn’t something I want to have in my life or to support.  So, I’ll start thinking about exactly how I use plastic bags and trying to figure out how not to. 

 I have discovered that you can hold lettuce or other salad ingredients really well wrapped in a kitchen towel.  I put cut tomatoes cut side down on a plate on the counter.  I don’t like tomatoes refrigerated anyway.  Ditto for an onion.  Both get eaten or used quickly anyway.