Come the Revolution

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There this phenomenon going on around here where the basil in the garden, which gets loads of sun and has been kept well weeded (shocking, I know) is fairly small. The ones on the porch, on the other hand, have light only in the afternoon and are trying to turn into bushes. One of these is suceeding at a surprising rate, and I’m hoping that with the relatively little light it seems to need to be happy, we’ll be able to have a basil houseplant come Autumn.

But I digress. Basil is the food of gods, it’s hard to grow and tastes like nothing else does. We use it as a vegetable (often paired with tomato), but it’s also an herb and can be useful as a garnish. If you’re a friend of ours, it may even be part of your wedding bouquet.

There’s one problem with making pesto that I run into every year. It’s pine nuts. They’re very expensive. I suppose I could splurge on pine nuts and buy some for a batch of the stuff, but they’re over $25 per pound at the local co-op, and I make a large recipe of pesto. So I used walnuts.

Now some of you may say that it’s not pesto without pine nuts, but sometimes it’s better to follow the budget than the recipe. Considering I tend to consult a couple of recipes for something and then do something somewhat resembling them both but also somewhat different, I decided to work with walnuts.

Poor Man’s Pesto
4-6 cups gently packed basil leaves
3-5 cloves garlic
2 cups olive oil
1 cup parmesagna
1 cup romano
1/2-1 cup unchopped walnut halves
salt and pepper

Step one: Borrow your friend’s food processor with the feeder/drizzler top. Envy your friend.

Step two: starting with a little oil in the processor, add garlic, nuts, cheeze, and basil all the while blending it into a paste.

Step three: Taste.

Step four: Add some salt and pepper, and more basil.

Step five: Taste.

Step six: Add more basil.

Step seven: Repeat steps five and six until the pesto tastes like creamed basil with cheese.

Step eight: Require those you live with and then all of your coworkers to eat pesto. Feel proud of yourself.

The only thing that could make it better is if we didn’t have to drive home after late nights at the garden. Maybe next year.
I find myself thinking often of the farmer from the first farm I apprenticed at. He’s a vegetable farmer, but truly he’s a tomato farmer. I’m guessing 1/4 of his tilled acreage was devoted to the botanical fruit, and he was damn good at growing them.

This year the Garden of the Revolution has about 200 tomato plants. It’s a risk after last year’s blight, but 8 months of buying tomato sauce that is sub-par and shipped from who knows where is quite enough. If all goes well we’ll have sauce, salsa, stewed, sun dried, and soups soon. In the meanwhile, we have a lot of time to look forward to turning our hands yellow and black from the dust on the tomato plants.

Last night they needed some love. It was past time for suckering for most of them, but they were desperate for the airflow with the heat wave in New England this week. So after a full day of work for each of us, we drove up to the farm and suckered those tomato plants.

It reminded me of how nice it is to work in the garden in the evening. As we got to the last plant, the dusk was giving way to darkness and the haze that had rolled in while we worked had turned the air into a blanket of moisture. Glad to have finished right as the plants started turning wet from the haze, we packed up and headed home.

A co-worker let me know that he was waiting out front for me. I met him and he gave specific instructions, “grab a paper bag, come out to the car, put the jar in the paper bag before you go back inside.”

Only a week before I had become aware of this scraggly looking man who brought contraband here at the same day and time every week. The street goes from being empty to peopled to empty again following the station wagon that brings this contraband. This dangerous, illegal substance that is sold out of the back of an old car?

It’s raw milk.

That’s it. That’s why all the discretion and concerns of who sees me make the exchange and that he parks on the opposite side of the street from the small grocery. The fact that everyone slips him cash as he hands over a nondescript paper bag.

What’s funny is that in Vermont, raw milk is legal to buy directly from the farmer. It’s never allowed to be just purchased at a farmer’s market (or out of a car trunk), though- pre-purchased deliveries and on-farm direct sales are legal if the farmer registers with the state and follows the regulations set by the state. The thing that he does that’s illegal is direct sales out of his trunk, likely because he can’t afford to build a new barn to the specifications required for certification. They likely require, among other things, that the hand-washing sink is not in the same room as the milk processing, so that you can clean your hands before and after sanitizing the processing room… outside of the room.

If we were in New Hampshire, raw milk sales would be legal on the farm, through home delivery, from a milk pasteurization plant (I really don’t understand this one), or at a boarding house if the milk is produced on premises and there is a sign announcing that the milk served is raw. That sounds like outdated legislation to me.

In New York it’s legal to sell raw milk if the sales are done on-farm and the farm is registered as a raw milk dairy with the state. In Massachusetts individual towns get to decide whether or not raw milk sales are legal. In Washington DC and some 17 or so states, raw milk sales are illegal under all circumstances. Five more states allow raw milk to be sold as pet food, but not for human consumption. Some other states require “cow shares,” which mean that the people are not purchasing milk, but accepting the portion of the milk that is fair based on their partial ownership of the cow.

More organizations are being vocal about how raw milk sales can be an integral part of small farms- allowing the farms to become more viable and more sustainable. It’s also considered a health food- many lactose intolerant adults (myself included) can tolerate raw milk, likely because it contains the killed-by-pasteurization microbes that help the body break down lactose.

The main argument against raw milk sales is that raw milk is risky due to it’s microbial activity. With healthy cows and clean equipment, the risk of infection due to raw milk consumption is very low. For anyone unhappy with the risk- the corner store will continue to offer industrial farms’ homogenized, pasteurized milk, even if it becomes legal in New Jersey, Delaware, Hawaii, and Iowa (among other states) to put raw milk for sale alongside.

Recent news on raw milk: USA Today

I’m not just of Irish heritage, I’m of Irish Catholic heritage. Also Italian Catholic heritage. That means that even though I haven’t been a practicing Catholic in over a decade, I still think about Lent. And Lent, as anyone reading will likely not know, started last Wednesday after a night of meat eating for most and debauchery for a few. It continues until after the Easter vigil on April 3rd if you’re anxious to get back to what you’ve given up, or when you wake up on April 4th if you’re like my family (“No, you are not allowed to eat a creme egg. You have to wait until tomorrow!”).

For what would now be considered a traditional Lenten Fast is also a simplified meal plan started and ended with a day of true fasting. What is usually done is to have a small breakfast, a small lunch, and a sensible dinner, with no snacks between. There were at least some years where my father drank only water during Lent.

What I’m encouraging my family and friends to engage this year is not just to eat less food, but also to eat better food. Give up high fructose corn syrup (especially if you’re already giving up soda). Give up canned goods if you can afford to do so. Bake your own bread for the 7 weeks or eat whole wheat. Use the time you spend in the kitchen contemplating history, contemplating simplicity, contemplating the body and soul that you have and are choosing to nurture by filling it with natural foods.

And then after what, at least within my family, will be a ridiculous amount of chocolate and cursing (the two big things they abstain from) on Easter Sunday, this diet, or some semblance thereof, will likely no longer feel like abstention. It might just feel like good, real food.

In college the first big snowfall was when I decided to put my bicycle into hibernation. It’s not that I didn’t want to ride, but having tried to ride the bike across campus (to an indoor, caged location) was a comedic event. The tires just couldn’t cut through the snow and find any asphalt. Besides, I thought, no one else was out on their bicycles anymore.

After college I lived in a city, a real city, where it didn’t snow too much too often and the asphalt held the sun’s warmth for weeks of cloudy weather. Where it was safer, or at least it seemed so, to bike in the winter than to walk. The first time it snowed I realized how safe it was for me to be able to feel the control the tires had through my feet. If I started slipping, I could feel it.

Now I’m in a town that is not particularly bike friendly, where the snow doesn’t disappear the day after it falls. And I’ve decided to stay on the bicycle during the winter. The difference is that here, where the windchill on the way home from work can dip below 0°F, I need to be wearing a facemask and goggles.

There are a few important things to remember about winter biking, aside from the proper attire. Believe me, if you don’t wear enough clothes, you’ll know it. The other things have to do with caring for your bike. The salt and grime that end up on the underside of your car also end up on your bike. It’s important to frequently clean off your bike. A damp cloth is usually enough. Also, it’s important to have the right kind of lubricant- one that can handle cold and wet conditions- and to use it liberally and frequently. That salt and grime? Yeah, definitely not something that you want mucking up your gears.

If it’s icy or you’re concerned about traction, it’s ok to let a little air out of your treaded mountain bike tires. This will give you more surface contact, which is better for icy conditions. If you’re in an area that’s always got ice during the winter months, invest in one (for your front tire) or two studded tires.

If you have a road bike, the thin tires may help you more during snow than my mountain bike tires do. They can cut through, rather than floating on top of, the white fluffy stuff. This will likely work to your benefit provided there isn’t an ice skating rink below the layer of powder. So if you’re riding on 700c’s be careful in spring as the thawing and freezing often leaves a layer of ice behind.

You’ll end up going pretty slow in fresh snow, but being able to experience the snowfall and the crunching beneath your wheels will more than make up for the extended commute. Biking is the most beautiful way to experience a snowy night.

Current circumstances lead me to spend hours every week standing in the produce section of a grocery. Namely because I work there, but that’s only relevant because of the questions I am asked. Here is one of my favorites:

“Are these local?”

It’s hard to describe the chasm between what people perceive should be local and what it’s possible to get locally in Vermont in January. The way the seasons work is by warm weather slowly climbing up the coast and then inland in Spring, then in the Autumn it retreats in the opposite way it came. That means that in the landlocked mountains (Lake Champlain doesn’t count), there are often frosts all the way to the beginning of June and starting again in September. Depending on how far down the mercury drops in a night, crops can be completely wiped out, either in Spring or Autumn. An early frost means that there’s a lot less grocery stores can count on in January from the local farmers.

In January around here, the only way to grow vegetables is to have them in heated greenhouses. State of the art, well heated greenhouses. Very expensive, double or triple paned glass greenhouses. Most of the vegetable farmers around here (who are admittedly few as compared to the dairy farmers and meat farmers, and even those are dwindling) can’t afford a greenhouse like that, let alone a monstrously sized one to be able to house all the greens that would sell in one (let alone multiple) grocery stores over the course of a winter that can range from November through May.

And while I’m explaining what we can’t have local in January, I want to specify that “winter squash” is a bit of a misnomer. Winter squash is called that because it lasts into the Winter, not through it. Having winter squash in the grocery store in January means likely having at least some of it shipped from the Southern states or Mexico.

So what’s local in New England in January? Or at least, what can be?
- potatoes
- sweet potatoes
- leeks
- onions and shallots
- apples that have been in good storage
- root vegetables: parsnips, carrots, turnip, rutabega, and beets
- celeriac
- kohlrabi
- cabbage
- garlic

That sounds like a lot of onion, starch, and earthy flavors, but there are really good recipes where you can locally source all of your ingredients in the middle of winter, even in Vermont. Here’s a good one:

Celeriac Soup
- makes 4 servings -

Ingredients

4 tablespoons butter
1-2 celeriac (about 2 pounds), peeled and roughly chopped
1 large leek, sliced (about 3/4 pound)
1 smallish potato, diced (about 1/4 pound)
2 cloves of garlic, peeled and chopped
1 large onion, peeled and chopped
3 cups chicken or vegetable stock
7 tablespoons (3.5 ounces) heavy cream
Salt and pepper
3 slices good thick bacon, cut into 1/2 inch strips
Procedure

1. In a heavy saucepan, melt the butter over medium-low heat. Add the celeriac, potato, garlic, and onion, and a pinch of salt and pepper. Cook the vegetables gentle until they soften, about 10 minutes.

2. Add the stock, bring to a boil, then simmer over low heat for about 20 minutes until the celeriac is completely tender.

3. Meanwhile, fry the bacon in a skillet until just crispy, then drain on paper towels. (Or try some of these other garnishing options.)

4. Transfer to a blender and puree until smooth (or use an immersion blender). Return to medium heat, and season to taste. Whisk in the cream and serve immediately, topped with the bacon.

recipe is from seriouseats.com

In that I might explain our long absence from this blog, I would like to say that farming is a full time job and a half, even for apprentices with short hours. We also made the decision to make a mad dash to the altar (or river, through a field, as it were). I tell folks it was to keep as many of our relatives in attendance as possible, Amanda says it was so that I could do her taxes this year. Either way, you will now be able to read a couple of wedding-related posts over the course of the next few months. First thing’s first, the ring.

Amanda asked me to write a little bit about finding an engagement ring that can be ethically and ecologically responsible. I don’t have a lot of history dealing with jewelry, but I’ve recently spent some time in local jewelry stores and learned a bit from the kind folks who helped me out.

I think the best thing I did for myself was to know what I wanted ahead of time. I got some nice hints from Amanda and started looking at websites to see what all of those hints added up to. Things to be considered: stone material, size, and cut; ring material, size, style, and the stone will be held. Have a price in mind, and tell the jeweler. The woman I ultimately went with told me that if I said $250 she could get me something I would be happy with for that much, If I said $25′000 she could do that, too.

I knew from the outset I didn’t want a diamond for both ethical and environmental reasons. The only diamonds that are conflict-free are lab-made. They’re beautiful but expensive, so they weren’t a viable option. I knew I wanted a sapphire, and once I’d secured that there weren’t any of the right size/shape available from within my family, I wanted an estate one if possible. I lucked into an estate stone that was perfect. If you don’t see a stone that you want in the store, ask about having a few in your price range brought in for you to look at- you can even specify country of origin if you’d like (for new stones, anyway) so you know more of what went on in the mining of your stones. Otherwise getting tips from the jewelers and then going antique shopping can be a great way to find a stone. I know at least one person with a beautiful sapphire ring that was found at an antique store by chance.

Ideally the gold would have been recycled, but the jewelers voiced concerns about recycled gold. One told me it wouldn’t work because I wanted white gold and once recycled it doesn’t retain the color as well. I don’t know how true that is. The argument against it that won me over was that it would work for an in-set stone, but for a traditional looking ring that holds the stone externally, the brittleness of recycled gold could risk the tines breaking and the stone getting lost. This, to me, is the best argument against recycled gold for a traditional-engagement-style solitaire. I want the ring to be able to handle being worn in real life (although not during farm work) and not have to worry about it.

With this, as with most things, I compromised on what I considered important points for ecological reasons in order to have a ring that will likely last at least a few lifetimes. I ended up with a ring from a local store, with an estate stone, which Amanda was happy with. So happy, in fact, that she married me.

For your own responsible indulgences, here are a few incredible online retailers:
Green Karat
Brilliant Earth
Simply Wood Rings
Simply Wood Rings

To let us concentrate on gardening/farming, we’re going to take a summer vacation. Somewhat like the kind you have as a student, except this one involves more work.

In a few months we will return, we hope with awesome farmer tans (I will try and convince Amanda to share them with you), a lot of posts pre-written in our heads, and a better feeling for where we’re going.

I’m about up to my ears in educational debt. The current statistic (or at least the last one I’ve heard) is that the average newly-graduated bachelor of the arts or sciences has racked up $20′000 in debt. I’ll put it lightly and say I’m above average in this regard. With educational debt looming above our heads, this generation has two very different looks on graduate school. One is ‘I’d better go now or I’ll have to start paying back that debt,” and the other is, “I’ll never be able to afford to go with all this debt.” I’m of the latter camp, but that doesn’t mean I want to learn any less than my peers who ran up the stairs in the ivory tower. I just want to do that learning for free.

That is, of course, what I’ve been doing with apprenticeships on organic farms, but that’s not the best move financially-speaking. A far better move is to find online resources where you can learn for free. I’ve put together a few lists from the far corners of the internet to get you started, or to keep you procrastinating on those finals.

Universities:
MIT Open Courseware
The Open University Learning Space
Carnegie Mellon Open Learning Initiative
Tufts Open Courseware
Utah Valley University Open
Gresham College Free Public Lectures
Berklee College of Music Online Courses
NYU Mathematics Lectures
Johns Hopkins School of Public Health
Stanford To Go (downloadable mp4 lectures)
UCBerkeley webcast courses
Utah State University Open Courseware
Kutztown University of Pennsylvania Online Learning Programs
University of Southern Queensland Open Courseware
UCIrvine Open Courseware
Whatcom Community College Online Math Center
Open Yale Courses
Notre Dame Open Courseware
University of Washington OpenUW
Princeton Archived Lectures
Intro Probability from Dartmouth

Languages:
UMich ASL Browser
ASL Pro
ASL from Dr. Bill This one actually has lessons!
Sweedish via PSU
Hungarian via PSU
Italian via Oggi E Domani
Conversational Mandarin via CSULB
Turkish via University of Arizona
One Minute Languages
Mango Languages
Before You Know It

Other Stuff:
Library of Congress American Memory
Learner.org resources for teachers and professional development
ERI Distance Learning Center
TED“Inspired talks by the world’s leading thinkers and doers”

A few months back I read an amazing book. It’s called Larding the Lean Earth by Steven Stoll. The reading is relatively dense, but it’s filled with history and an expert analysis of the conversations of the earlier half of the 19th Century with regard to improving soils through on-farm natural means versus taking what one could from a plot. Essentially the entire book is about manure either directly or indirectly. I realize this won’t excite so many people (and of those it would, Freud or Kraft-Ebbing would have had quite a bit of fun with you).

Since the time of Washington, if not before, there have been serious, voiced concerns of the lessening fertility of American soils. Without fertile soil, tilled in perpetuity, argued many men of that time through today, civilization loses its footing. Many farmers of the time “prefer[ed] to rethink agriculture rather than remake their world on the frontier” where the soils were more fertile.

“At the center of these concerns stood a pile of dung. Unattractive and strange to the uninitialized but a stern monument to those who knew its ways, dung held great power. If improvement and all that it stood for had a single symbol, it was this—the steaming excrement that completed a circle in the land large enough to enclose the riches of rural life, strong enough to make the farm equal in strength to the changes taking place in the upstart sectors of the post-1812 economy. If the farm would stand with manufacturing or against it, one thing was certain: it would have to make manure. And to those who claimed that the glory of the United States lay in the West and that the unceasing exploitation of soil would result in a prosperous nation, the dunghill argued otherwise. Onto this single hot and aromatic structure improvers heaped all their hopes and goals: a permanent rural society, the leadership of responsible elites, a countryside distinguished for its beauty and neatness, the application of reason to artifice, and various desires for integration or isolation from the wider world all of it seemed possible when dung got mixed up with soil. The dunghill seemed to offer a way out of the paradox of a declining environment that would provide the raw material for an economic revival. At the moment they realized that agriculture had resulted in widespread degradation, farmers all over Atlantic America came to believe that the same soil could bear a great deal of economic and political weight.”

How could you argue with that?

Larding the Lean Earth has led to a few more books on my bookshelf (albeit mostly temporarily from the public library) about manure and humanure or night soil (the polite names for human feces when it becomes productive waste). They have all been interesting, but none as historically significant and humbling as Larding the Lean Earth. In the hopes that I will write about all of them, consider this Poop Post 1.