Would you take this plant? April 11, 2010
Posted by ourfriendben in gardening, wit and wisdom.Tags: blog humor, gardening, homeless houseplants, houseplant passalongs, houseplants, indoor gardening
6 comments
Silence Dogood here. If everybody knows you love houseplants, people tend to give you houseplants. Specifically, they tend to give you their houseplants. Their houseplants that happen not to be doing so well anymore.
This has happened to me twice in the past week. “I wonder if you would like this plant.” “This plant doesn’t look so good, but I thought maybe you could bring it back to life.” “I’ve never been any good with plants.” “I forgot to water this and it died, but I think it’s really still alive.” And so the litany goes on and on.
In fact, I do love houseplants. Hawk’s Haven, the cottage home our friend Ben and I share in the precise middle of nowhere, Pennsylvania, boasts a large collection of begonias, Christmas cacti, and African violets. But, as a fellow plant enthusiast would observe, those are the only kinds of houseplants we keep inside. Now, in our greenhouse, and on the deck during the season, we have a widely varied assortment of cacti and succulents, orchids, amaryllis, cannas, ferns, herbs, pelargoniums, coleus, tropical and frost-tender fruits, a terrarium, plectranthi and tender salvias, and etc.etc. And yes, we are thrilled to receive interesting plants and try them out in both locations, or in whichever one is most appropriate for their culture.
But herein lies our problem. Many houseplants are either not interesting, or too interesting. They’re boring green foliage plants without a single feature of interest, making us wonder why on earth anyone ever decided to bring them indoors to begin with, or they’re wildly, insanely, garishly patterned and colored tropical foliage plants that look like they’ve (barely) survived the paintball wars. And naturally, it’s exactly these plants that people are always offering us.
Last week, I was hit with two large plants of the “boring dark green foliage unrelieved by a single feature of interest” category. I’m really good about speaking up if I inspect a plant like this and see the least sign of disease or pest infestation: “I’m sorry, this plant has —-. You’d better throw it out.” But these plants were perfectly healthy. Neglected, yes, but holding on just fine even so. They fell in the “I don’t want this anymore” category. There they sat, each in the balance of its owner’s lack of interest, poised between me and the trash.
So, okay, I caved. I actually had the perfect place for one of them—a marvelous big, low black iron plant stand I’d had a blacksmith make me years ago. This stand had stood empty since the cats destroyed our Norfolk Island pine—an extremely large, healthy, attractive one, sob—and ever since, I’d been hoping to find another that could take its place. But I’ve never found another one in all this time that wasn’t pest-ridden (scale, mealybugs, gack), and so the stand sat empty. Boring green plant #1 is now occupying that stand beneath a taller stand with a magnificent begonia in our home office. I’m hoping the foliage contrast will at least provide some interest, and as I told OFB, “Hey, at least it will add more oxygen to the room.” But I’m still looking for the perfect, pest-free Norfolk Island pine.
What of boring green plant #2? It’s resting comfortably in the greenhouse. I’m hoping that its large, glossy green foliage might somehow be worked into a grouping of pots on the deck, perhaps with a chartreuse coleus and a red-striped canna. That’s what I tell myself, anyway, and what I tell OFB when he glares at me for taking up precious greenhouse space with such an undistinguished specimen.
Meanwhile, I wish that just once, somebody would offer us, say, a pot of jewel orchids or phalaenopsis or white-flowered rhipsalidopsis or a cinnamon tree or vanilla orchid or maybe a yellow-flowered clivia. “Gee, I’m so bored with this, I can’t imagine why I bought it. Wouldn’t you like it?” Yes, oh yes we would. We really, really would.
So, fellow gardeners, fellow houseplant fanatics, what would you have done in my place? Please vote for options a through f:
a) Tell them to take their ugly plant and stick it where the sun don’t shine.
b) Tell them you’ll take their abused plant if they’ll take your circa-1980 microwave that still even works. Sometimes.
c) Tell them you’ll be happy to take their plant. Your compost bin could use more roughage, and besides, that big terracotta pot must be worth at least $25.
d) Tell them you’ll take their plant, nurse it back to health, and find it a good home.
e) Thank them for their generosity and tell them that you’d love to take the plant, but you can see it has a serious case of chloroplasmosis and you recently read that it could be transferred to humans. Then ask them if they’ve been feeling well lately and announce that an emergency has come up and you really must leave immediately.
f) Thank them and take the plant.
I’ll be eager to hear what you’d do under similar circumstances. Meanwhile, anybody need a couple of boring green houseplants?
‘Til next time,
Silence
The bucket list. April 10, 2010
Posted by ourfriendben in chickens, critters, gardening, homesteading, wit and wisdom.Tags: blog humor, bucket list, garden chores, gardening
4 comments
Spring weekends mean gardening chores here at Hawk’s Haven, the cottage home our friend Ben and Silence Dogood share in the precise middle of nowhere, PA. To some, a bucket list may involve scaling the pyramids or touring the Louvre. Our friend Ben’s bucket list is, shall we say, a bit more down to earth.
Today’s bucket list is as follows:
* 2 buckets of potting soil for repotting potbound house- and greenhouse plants.
* 6 buckets of compost to spread on new raised bed.
* 1 bucket containing water and a coir brick to make new medium for earthworm composter, to be drained and mixed with shredded paper (once coir brick disintegrates) before adding to composter.
* 1/2 bucket of seed potatoes to plant in raised potato bin.
* 2 buckets of compost and 2 of straw to put on top of potatoes in bin.
* 1/2 bucket of mixed onion sets (red, white, and ‘Stuttgarter’, a long-keeping yellow) to plant in allium bed.
* 4 buckets of water to pour over tomato plants (so far, just ‘Sungold’ and ‘Sweet 100′ in containers) and mixed greens, radishes, and ‘Sugar Snap’ peas in raised bed.
* 1 bucket “OFB Special Top Secret” greenhouse watering solution, composed of water, liquid seaweed, Superthrive, and aspirin (our friend Delilah claims it helps plants resist disease, and her plants are the healthiest ever, so I figure can’t hurt, might help), occasionally enlivened with a shake of dried “llama poo” or guano. (We only have one bucket free for this solution, so we make it up daily and rotate watering accordingly.)
* 1 bucket manure pellets for top-dressing plants that won’t be potted up this season. I like the so-called “Energy Buttons” from Gardener’s Supply (www.gardeners.com).
* 1 bucket kitchen scraps to be added to compost bins and/or earthworm composter.
* 1 bucket mixed dandelions, greens, bread, and leftovers for the chickens.
* 1 bucket, frequently emptied and reused, for holding weeds pulled from garden beds and other areas.
* 1 bucket for pick-up sticks, all the fallen twigs and branches that are constantly littering our property, for transport to the firepit.
* 1 bucket for carting wood ashes from said firepit to ring around our fruit trees for natural pest control.
* 1 bucket of margaritas to revive the exhausted OFB after dealing with all the buckets previously mentioned.
So, what’s your bucket list?
Mushrooms and rice rise to new heights. April 10, 2010
Posted by ourfriendben in recipes, Uncategorized, wit and wisdom.Tags: mushroom recipes, mushrooms and rice, mushrooms in wine sauce
2 comments
Silence Dogood here. Our friend Ben and I simply adore mushrooms, pretty much any which way, as long as they’re cooked and served hot. (We can’t take either the slimy, slippery texture of cold cooked mushrooms or the dry, chalky, catch-in-your-throat texture of raw mushrooms. But I digress.) So I wasn’t too surprised last night when I asked OFB what he’d like for supper and he said “Mushrooms and rice!”
I’ve often made a dish of mushrooms and sweet onions, sauteed in butter and Madeira or Marsala wine and served over basmati rice, and both OFB and our friend Rudy consider it a favorite. But frankly, I’ve never been as enchanted with it as they were. So last night, I decided to kick it up a notch, in the words of Emeril.
Before giving you the recipe, let me just say that you’re not too far off if you wonder what I was thinking, wandering into uncharted territory and just throwing things together that I thought might work. But I figured hey, it’s only food. If it turns out that I’m wrong, I can make something else or send OFB out for a pizza. The world isn’t going to end, so why not go for it? Here’s what I did:
Melt 1/2 stick of butter over low heat in a heavy-bottomed pan. Add 1/2 very large sweet onion (Vidalia, WallaWalla, 1015, or similar) or 1 large sweet onion, diced, with a generous sprinkling of salt (we like RealSalt) or, if you can find it, Trocomare (hot herbed salt), stirring to keep the onion from sticking. As the onion cooks down, add 1/2 teaspoon each garam masala and ground fenugreek. (Add a little water or veggie stock as needed to keep the sauce from sticking to the pan.)
Slice and chop a 16-ounce package of button mushrooms and add them to the pot, stirring well to blend. Supplement with washed and sliced crimini, baby ‘bella, oyster, and/or shiitake mushrooms as available.
When the mushrooms have cooked down, add a generous splash of Madeira, a moderate splash of bourbon, and about a tablespoon of Triple Sec. (It may sound like I’m practicing alchemy instead of cooking, but bear with me. It worked.) Continue to cook on low heat, stirring frequently, until the sauce thickens, but not until the liquid has completely been absorbed; you want enough to flavor the rice without sogging down your plate. While it cooks, taste and adjust seasonings as needed.
Serve over basmati rice with a side of asparagus or broccoli (or a mix of broccoli and broccoflower) with melted butter and fresh-squeezed lemon juice, or green beans with butter and a squeeze of orange juice. (Meat-eaters, try this as a topping for baked chicken breasts or pork roast served over the rice.) And don’t forget a huge, crunchy salad!
Are you muttering to yourself, “I wish she’d explain what on earth she was thinking, tossing such an ill-assorted bunch of ingredients together!” And yes, there was method to my madness. Let’s start with a look at the basic ingredients: mushrooms, sweet onion, butter, sweet white wine, and salt. You have the caramelizing effect of the butter and sweet onion, the rich meatiness and depth of the mushrooms and their juices, the wine adding sweetness and complexity, and the salt balancing the sweetness and bringing out the other flavors.
Now let’s look at what I added, starting with the garam masala and powdered fenugreek. I thought that mushrooms, with their full-bodied flavor, could stand up to the aromatic warmth that garam masala gives to any dish, but I wanted the garam masala to accent, not dominate, the dish. I didn’t want someone tasting my mushrooms in wine sauce to even know they were eating garam masala, but rather to revel in the warm flavor of the dish as a whole. As a result, I curbed my usual lavish hand with the spicing and limited myself to 1/2 teaspoon. (And agh, was that hard!)
I thought that fenugreek, with its warm maple-syrup flavor and fragrance, would emphasize the caramel note of the sauteed onions and contribute warmth to the dish as a whole. But again, I wanted to use it as a grace-note, not a dominant chord, so I once again controlled myself and only used 1/2 teaspoon.
Moving on to the alcohol, the basic dish calls for Madeira or Marsala, both sweet wines. Madeira is the lighter of the two, while Marsala is more the color of old sherry and has more body. I happened to have Madeira, so that’s what I used. I’ve observed in the past that if a dish cooked with Madeira is a bit bland, adding a shot of bourbon can add much-needed depth, an undertone of fire and charred oak barrels that anchors the dish and makes it unforgettable. (Obviously, we’re talking about savory dishes here, not desserts.) And the Triple Sec? Just the lightest citrus accent and a finishing touch of sweetness.
I should add a reassurance here: If you’re thinking that you’d eat three forkfuls and drop face-first into your plate, bear in mind that alcohol evaporates out during cooking, leaving only its flavor behind. You and your guests will remain lively and upright, as long as you haven’t overindulged in bourbon during cocktail hour beforehand!
Anyway, returning to the dish, it was delicious. Everything came together exactly as I’d hoped. The dish was rich and warming and full-bodied, but the only flavor that stood out was that of the mushrooms themselves, which is as it should be.
‘Til next time,
Silence
Breaking news for JABO lovers! April 8, 2010
Posted by ourfriendben in wit and wisdom.Tags: Dave McCullough, David McCullough, JABO, JABO marbles, marble collecting, marbles, Steve Sturtz
6 comments
Attention, marble lovers and collectors everywhere: Here’s a scoop on today’s hottest machine-made marbles, JABOs. Remember, you read it here first!
Around midnight last night, a shadowy figure who, in keeping with our blog’s Colonial tone, prefers to be known only as Paul Revere,* rode up to Hawk’s Haven, our friend Ben’s and Silence Dogood’s cottage home, swinging his lantern and shouting “The JABOs are coming! The JABOs are coming!!!”
Lurching groggily to the door, our friend Ben opened it to be hit with a faceful of dust from the rapidly advancing hooves of the noted silversmith’s horse as he reined to a halt and swung off his steed. Once sight was restored, OFB, still coughing slightly, invited Paul inside.
“Silence! It’s Paul Revere! Would you bring us some ale, please? I’ll be starting up the fire in the living room.” No slouch, Silence was at the living room door with two brimming mugs of ale before you could say “Lexington and Concord.”
“Paul, what’s going on? Don’t tell me the British are at it again!”
Turns out, it was even more momentous news, at least as far as marble-lovers are concerned. Here’s what Paul told us:
“While I was resting over a tankard in Marietta, I overheard Joe, the postal worker from Wells Fargo, tell a wonderfully exciting story of a JABO marble run that is about to take place. The story was told to him by a generally unreliable old cur of a hound, but for once he had some of the facts.
“I edged closer to hear the full scoop. It appears that the JABO Tributes were given the chance to do a 1″ run at JABO.** He said that this will be the first and maybe the only 1″ run in 3 years. Everyone at his table shouted ‘No!’ and ‘Impossible!’, so I didn’t hear what he said next, but as the table quieted down, I heard him say something about how huge the costs would be. The base glass will be custom-batched, with some extra glass added for another group to run smaller marbles.
“The whole table was in an uproar by this time, so I left the inn with the idea that even though Joe had some of the specifics, there was more to this story… “
“Speaking of leaving the inn, Paul, I see that your mug is empty. Care for a refill?”
“Thank’ee, Silence, don’t mind if I do. Riding these dusty backroads every midnight shouting the news is mighty thirsty work. Now, where was I? Oh, yes…
“I walked around the town and talked to the usual supporters in the area. Still, the information was sketchy at best, so I decided to go straight to the horse’s mouth, so to speak. Did you say something, Ben?”
“Me? Not a word, Paul. Please go on!”
“Hmpf. Well, I raced to the blacksmith shop where my horse was tethered for the night and I galloped the 7 miles to Reno, Ohio. My steed was tired and I, excited. I spoke with David McCullough himself,*** and he completed the story.
“According to David, the amount of base glass per marble will be 2 1/2 times that used to make a 3/4″ marble, because the surface area of a 1″ marble is 2 1/4 times that of a 3/4″ marble.”
“Then why won’t the amount of base glass be 2 1/4 times as much instead of 2 1/2 times?”
“Ben, I’m a silversmith, not a marble-maker! You’ll have to ask David that question yourself. But if he said it, I’m sure it’s true.”
“I agree with you there, Paul! David is as great a marble-maker as you were, ah, are a silversmith, for sure. Maybe there’s some evaporation involved or something.”
“Slept through chemistry class, eh, Ben?”
“Shut up, Silence. Paul, you were saying?”
“According to David, the gold aventurine will cost about $15,000—”
“WHAT?!!!”
“Ben, did you think making premium marbles was cheap? Think about it: Between the cost of materials, the cost of buying, maintaining, and running the equipment, and the priceless expertise involved in creating these masterworks, maybe you can see why collectors invest thousands of dollars in their collections. It’s not like we’re talking about, say, scribbling away on a computer.”
“GRRRRRR… “
“Ben!!!”
“Uh, sorry, Silence, Paul. Just clearing a little road dust out of my throat. Paul, you were saying?”
“Right. The gold aventurine will cost about $15,000, and then the gold Lutz rod will be about $500 per kilo, and many kilos will be used. The total cost of this run will be 2 to 3 times more than any 3/4″ run to date. Apparently, the Tributes have gathered most of the money and are planning on a mid- to late-May run. The name they have chosen for this unique run is ‘What a Tribute!’ It sure looks like David McCullough will have all the materials he wants to set still another standard of excellence in marble-making.”
“So what does David think about the run, Paul?”
“The rumor is that David is very excited about this run and was overheard to say with a huge smile and a wink, ‘We’ll make you some real pretty marbles.’
“Will JABO collectors like us be able to watch the marbles being made, Paul?”
“You betcha, Ben. Tributes from the four corners of the continent will assemble at the JABO factory in Reno, Ohio, to watch these beautiful marbles being made. It’s a great opportunity to be a part of marble history, just like I became part of American history.
“So, Ben and Silence, I hope you’re as excited about this development as I am. I will keep watch over the proceedings and inform you of any new developments. So au revoir for now! I must take to horse and return to Marietta to keep an eye on things.”
Leaping onto his long-suffering—I mean, trusty—steed, the last we saw of Paul Revere was his retreating form, trailed by a cloud of dust and the echo of “The JABOs are coming!”
* The modest personage wishing to be known simply as Paul Revere, and bearing no resemblance whatever to the “generally unreliable old cur of a hound” of his story, might nonetheless be known to the cognoscenti by his alter-ego, JABO’s principal historian, aka Dr. JABO.
** For those new to the wide and wild world of marble collecting, three explanations are due here. First, marbles are made in numerous sizes, but machine-made marbles are typically made in 1/2, 3/4, and 1-inch sizes. Second, marble production typically occurs in “runs,” so-called because the machines are fired up, the glass and other materials are shoveled in, and the marbles are produced in a single stretch of time and at full tilt, with everyone running to complete that batch of marbles until the raw materials run out. And third, if you’re wondering why these particular collectors are referred to by Paul Revere as “Tributes,” it’s because they collect and finance the Tribute runs that David McCullough has produced for JABO.
*** David McCullough is not only the presiding genius responsible for the creation of JABO marbles, arguably the hottest collectibles in the marble field today, but is almost certainly the greatest creator of machine-made marbles who ever lived.
Kaffir lime: another extravagance. April 7, 2010
Posted by ourfriendben in gardening, homesteading, recipes, wit and wisdom.Tags: container-grown citrus, Kaffir lime, Thai cuisine, White Flower Farm
14 comments
Our friend Ben and Silence Dogood don’t get many gift certificates, probably because it takes us so long to decide what to buy with them. But our friend Ben’s brother has been very good about continuing to bear with us and give us gift certificates to White Flower Farm every year.
This, of course, presents us with too many choices: Should we buy more bulbs in the fall? Amaryllis at Christmas? Perennials in spring? Or maybe take advantage of White Flower Farm’s selection of edible plants?
Fall and winter had passed, and spring is hurtling towards summer as temperatures rise into the high 80s in early April (and people say there’s no such thing as global warming?!), and still we hadn’t made up our minds. Until about a minute ago when we received an e-mail from White Flower Farm listing its top 10 edible plants.
Scanning the selections, we saw plenty of tempting choices, with a Key lime heading the list. Until, that is, Silence saw a plant WFF called a “lime leaf.” Neither of us had ever heard of a lime leaf, but it sounded intriguing, so we checked it out. Turns out, it’s Kaffir lime, Citrus hystrix, and its leaves are an essential ingredient in Thai, Indonesian, Vietnamese, and Malaysian cuisine. (They’re used like bay leaves, long-cooked in a dish, then removed before serving.)
“Ben! They have Kaffir lime! I’ve always wanted a Kaffir lime!”
Thoughts of luscious Key lime pies and margaritas receded as our friend Ben bowed to the inevitable. The call was made, and the plant will be heading our way later this month. I’ll just have to console myself with thoughts of all the yummy Thai and etc. food Silence will soon be making us. (But, ahem, if we’re lucky enough to get another gift certificate this year, it’s earmarked for the Key lime.)
What is a Kaffir lime? As you can see from the botanical name, it is indeed in the citrus family, though unlike all other citrus, its fresh leaves rather than its fruits are its main claims to fame, lending a distinctive citrusy flavor and fragrance to dishes. It does of course produce fruits, and the WFF website informs us that the fruits’ knobby rinds are zested and used to flavor curries and soups, giving them the same flavor as the leaves. (The pulp and juice is not used, though they didn’t say why.)
In USDA Plant Hardiness Zones 10 and 11, you can plant Kaffir limes in the ground and they’ll reach about 6 feet. Farther north, you’ll need to grow them in containers. You’re still looking at a 4- to 5-foot tree, though, so you’ll need to think about ultimately providing a big container. And they like plenty of sun, outdoors in the summer and in a greenhouse or sunroom in winter.
We live in Zone 6, but we happen to have a greenhouse and routinely bring our plants out to the deck for the summer, so we thought we could manage. (After all, we’re already growing figs, a lemon, a regular lime, a banana, and an olive tree in containers; what’s one more big fruit-bearing plant?)
In case you’re intrigued and/or have access to Kaffir lime leaves, we found a wonderfully helpful review on the WFF site from someone who identified herself simply as A Bluestocking and now lives, as we do, in scenic PA. Since she was willing to post her comments publicly, we think she’d be willing for us to share some of them here. And thanks, A Bluestocking, what marvelous ideas!
“Once you have had Thai food made with these leaves… you never want to go back! My favorite, and oh so easy soup, is to take a can of cream of tomato soup, a small can of coconut milk [I'm assuming this is unsweetened coconut milk---Silence] and heat with bruised Keffir [sic] lime leaves… Much brighter flavor than the more commonly used lemon grass. Thai Kitchen makes curry pastes (I’m partial to the green) which simmered with coconut milk and steeped with [Kaffir lime] leaves makes an outrageous sauce over mixed steamed veggies, grilled chicken or shrimp on a bed of basmati rice!”
A Bluestocking adds this final caution: “It’s not a particularly attractive plant with its irregular growth pattern and large spikes… but a must for gourmands.” And, Silence thinks, for us as well.
Would we really have rushed out to plunk down money on something as tangential as a Kaffir lime tree? Of course not. But, in our view, that’s the whole point of gift certificates: They let you splurge on something you wouldn’t otherwise allow yourself. (A Christmas gift is also how we acquired our olive and banana trees.) And that’s the best gift of all.
A new batch of silly blog searches. April 6, 2010
Posted by ourfriendben in wit and wisdom.Tags: blog humor, wacky blog searches
4 comments
Here at Poor Richard’s Almanac, more wacky and wonderful blog searches have been finding their way over the virtual transom. It’s time once again to share some of them with you. As always, search phrase in bold, our response following:
how to make easter baskets like a chicken: We had no idea chickens could make Easter baskets. We plan to put ours to work on this next year. Just think, they could make the baskets, then lay eggs in them. One-stop shopping!
poor richards almanac greed and money: The abuse we take around here!
ward off lucky charms: And here we thought people liked lucky charms.
list of fictional geniuses: We liked this one, fans of Sherlock Holmes as we are. Anyone have other fictional geniuses to list? Oh, wait… isn’t Sherlock Holmes real?!*
great depression toilet paper: We really don’t want to know.
did george washington die poor? Interesting question, and no, he was very wealthy when he died. It was Thomas Jefferson who died deeply in debt, forcing his family to sell his treasured Monticello to repay his creditors.
frugal cottage meals: This brings fairy tales featuring stone soup and Hansel and Gretel’s breadcrumbs to our friend Ben’s mind. But Silence Dogood is convinced there’s a great cookbook idea in here somewhere!
trash talk cooking: And this search arrived at our blog because… ?!
cream whitener almanac sensitive: We’re changing our blog name to Poor Richard’s Sensitive Almanac immediately, but you’re on your own for the cream whitener.
ben franklin’s dress: He must have worn it at a costume party in France.
what are the blue bugs on my arugula plants: Those aren’t bugs, they’re scouts from the planet Plecostomus plotting to take over your garden. Oh, and they get much, much bigger after they’ve lurked around a while. Be afraid. Be very afraid! (Or, say, contact your local County Extension Office or Master Gardeners program and ask someone who knows about arugula-eating “blue bugs” in your area.)
how car fittonia in aquarium: Not even a Smart car would fit in our aquariums, but we’d love to see an environmental awareness display in a large public aquarium with a sunken car and a bunch of other junk competing for space with the fish and plants!
Well, that’s it for now. Stay tuned! And please share your favorite wacky blog searches with us. We could all use a good laugh!
* Just kidding. But much like Santa Claus, he still receives bags of mail there at Baker Street!
Why does Google hate us?! April 5, 2010
Posted by ourfriendben in Ben Franklin, wit and wisdom.Tags: blog humor, Blogger, Blotanical, Google
8 comments
Google has betrayed us.
Here at Poor Richard’s Almanac, we’re accustomed to thinking of Google as one of our closest friends. Curious types that we are, we all turn to Google a dozen or more times a day to relieve our collective ignorance. Whether we’re looking for the latest theories on why Henry VIII became such a rotten person or the name of the latest actor to portray Henry VIII, whether we’re seeking quotes from our hero and blog mentor Benjamin Franklin or trying to find the name of a specific daffodil, we rely on Google as our trusted research assistant. And now it’s turned against us.
We enjoy reading and commenting on posts from a wide variety of blogs, many of which are part of Blotanical (www.blotanical.com), that compendium of garden-themed blogs created and maintained by Stuart Robinson. (Thanks, Stuart!) But for the past week, commenting on any blogs hosted by Blogger/Blogspot*, the Google blog host, has been impossible.
Basically, we hate reading a post without leaving a comment. In fact, some of us (not to mention our friend Ben by name) are constitutionally incapable of reading a post without commenting, usually at interminable length. (OFB would like to point out that the previous comment comes from a highly biased source, not to mention Silence Dogood by name, and that vengeance will be enacted for same. Come here, little stinkbug…)
So here we are, merrily typing our comments, and then we try to send them. Our own beloved blog host is WordPress, which we find far easier to use—a definitive advantage for tech-illiterate Luddites like us—so obviously we can’t use the first sending option provided by Google, Google Account. So we try to send our comments by Open ID. The comment simply stays in the comment box. Moving on, we try sending it via the third option, Name/URL. The comment again just stays there in the box. In desperation, we try to send it as Anonymous, the fourth option, hastily typing in an identifier in the comment box. No luck.
This has happened again and again over the past week, and we don’t know why. To all bloggers who use Blogger and are used to having us visit, we haven’t abandoned you. We still love you and read you. We keep trying to leave comments. But so far, we just can’t.
Google, we trusted you. Now we feel like yesterday’s celebrity BFF, or, say, someone who’s been blocked from a so-called friend’s Facebook page. (We like to think of this as being defaced.) Is it something we said?! Really, we didn’t mean it. (Well, probably we did.) Have we somehow offended the great Google god? How can we make reparation for our unwitting offense?! If it doesn’t cost money and doesn’t involve switching from WordPress to Blogger, we’ll at least consider it.
Meanwhile, blogging friends, bear with us, please. We’ll be back with comments as soon as we can**, and meanwhile, we’ll keep reading.
* What’s the deal with this, anyway? Why both Blogger and Blogspot for the same blog host? Those who use it, please enlighten us.
** Not sure if this will be regarded as a promise or a threat.
Eating better. April 5, 2010
Posted by ourfriendben in gardening, homesteading, recipes, wit and wisdom.Tags: bean salad recipe, healthy foods, superfoods
6 comments
Silence Dogood here. Yesterday, I turned on my computer and found a feature on msn.com showcasing ”12 Foods with Super-Healing Powers.” Food enthusiast that I am, I clicked on the link immediately to see how many of these “superfoods” our friend Ben and I were already eating, and what foods we might want to add to our menus.
Fortunately, the news was pretty good. The 12 superfoods included three fruits (kiwis, cherries, and guavas) and eight vegetables (beans, watercress, spinach, onions, carrots, cabbage, broccoli, kale, and dandelion greens). Yum!
Our friend Ben and I didn’t do as well in the fruit section as I’d like. We both love cherries—fresh sweet and dried tart and sweet to eat out of hand, fresh tart to use in fruit soups and to add to savory rice dishes like pilaf and biryani—but we tend to buy them fresh only in season, and dried only as an occasional extravagance. (Mind you, we’re still trying to grow our own dwarf cherry, and will plant another one—our fourth attempt so far—later this spring. Sigh.)
The article suggested trying frozen cherries, and I’ll look for them. But then I have to try to figure out how to use them. Muffins, pound cake, pie, and ice-cream toppings seem obvious, but pretty much defeat the “healthy” part of eating them. Our friend Ben and I prefer eating yogurt plain as a cooling side dish to savory, spicy-hot dishes rather than gunking it up with fruit. But hmmm, maybe a chilled yogurt soup with frozen cherries, bananas, and mango?! Perhaps experiments are in order.
Rubes that we are, neither of us has ever even eaten a guava. I’ve always thought of guavas as part of the tropical trinity that includes mangoes and papayas. I love mangoes and hate papayas. (That starchy texture, ugh, that’s not a fruit! But maybe it’s a vegetable, and I should look into it further in savory recipes, sort of like plantains.) I’d certainly love to try guavas if we could just find some.
As for kiwis, I confess that they’ve never impressed me and OFB. We don’t dislike them, but between the gelatinous texture and lack of flavor, we just never saw the point, especially with so much really delicious fruit on the market. After seeing all the health benefits that rank them as the #1 superfood, though, I’m willing to reconsider. It’s not like we hate them.
I’d be happy to add kiwi slices to a salad of arugula, spring mix, strawberries, mandarin orange slices, slivered almonds, and shaved Parmesan or crumbled blue cheese. Or to a fruit salad. I could see it in a glaze for chicken or one of the “secret ingredients” in a barbecue sauce. And I’m sure it would make a lovely topping for cheesecake or Key lime pie or fruit tart, though again, I fear the health benefits would be rather counteracted. If anyone has any good kiwi recipes they’d like to share, I’d love to see them!
We did much better in the veggie department. OFB and I have never tried dandelion greens—we pull our dandelions and give them, greens, roots, and all, to our chickens as a spring tonic and vitamin boost—but we enjoy all the other veggies on the list. (Kale and cabbage haters, try them raw in salads. Shredded cabbage adds much-needed crunch, and kale leaves, torn like romaine, add body and flavor. You’ll be a convert, promise!) But, I thought, there’s always room for improvement, as long as flavor isn’t sacrificed in the interest of health.
This brought to mind a recipe I’d seen a couple of weeks ago online that I’d thought looked promising enough to write down. It was called Cannelini Bean Salad, looked easy to make, and included all kinds of healthy ingredients, including beans, onions and garlic, herbs, tomatoes (tomatoes didn’t make that list of 12, but their high lycopene content was mentioned often), extra-virgin olive oil, lemon juice, and mixed greens. I frankly couldn’t see why it was called a bean salad, when the can of beans called for was just one ingredient among many, but it certainly looked worth trying. After giving the recipe the once-over and subjecting it to the “Silence Treatment,” here’s my version. OFB agrees that it’s as delicious as it is easy to make.
Lovely Lunch Salad
1 can cannellini (“white kidney”) beans, 15.5-16 ounces
1 red onion, peeled and diced
2 large garlic cloves, smashed and minced
4 ripe paste tomatoes, chopped
juice from 1 lemon or generous splash lemon juice
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
generous shakes of dried basil, thyme, and oregano
kalamata olives, seeded and sliced
artichoke hearts, minced
Oil from kalamata olives and artichoke hearts
1/2 cup crumbled Gorgonzola, blue, or feta cheese
salt (we like Trocomare or RealSalt) and pepper (I suggest lemon pepper) to taste
salad greens, such as a mix of arugula, watercress, romaine, radicchio, curly endive (frisee), kale, spinach, and mustard greens
Drain and rinse beans. Add all other ingredients except greens, stir well, cover, and allow to rest for 1/2 hour to several hours to let flavors marry. Serve on a generous bed of mixed greens as a stand-alone lunch. Savor the delicious taste and enjoy the thought that you’re doing something good for yourself. You can mix and refrigerate the bean-tomato marinade and take it to work, with greens packed separately, several days a week. (You can also save any leftover dressing and use it as stand-alone salad dressing or pour it over the next batch of bean-tomato salad.) Serves 4 if served as the salad course before dinner.
OFB and I didn’t grow up with the concept of cold bean salads (such as the famous three-bean salad). Beans were hot foods that you served as baked beans or refried beans or black bean soup or chili or sides of lima beans or green and yellow wax beans. Their leguminous relatives, lentils, were essential in dals and lentil stew and vegetarian moussaka and lentil-rice pilaf and casseroles. But cold beans on a salad? Eeewww.
Eeewww, nothing, it turns out. You can’t imagine how good this cannellini-tomato salad really is. I insisted that OFB try a spoonful while the flavors were marinating, then had to exile him from the house before supper so he wouldn’t forget about the salad part and simply wolf down the entire bowl of marinating beans, tomatoes, etc. I had to keep reminding him that this would make a great one-dish lunch but we were trying to use it as a first course for supper.
You, however, are free to use this recipe, and all the other “superfoods,” whenever and however you like. I have to say, the idea of putting the marinated ingredients on hot pasta and serving the greens as a side salad certainly occurred to me. Yum!!!
Please feel free to send me your own favorite healthy recipes. OFB and I would certainly appreciate it!
‘Til next time,
Silence
Best of the week at PRA, March 29-April 4. April 4, 2010
Posted by ourfriendben in pets, recipes, wit and wisdom.Tags: best of blog posts, our friend Ben, Poor Richard's Almanac
2 comments
Our friend Ben, Silence Dogood, and Richard Saunders pick our favorite posts from the past week at Poor Richard’s Almanac. If you’ve missed any, scroll down to read them or type the title into the search bar at upper right. We hope you enjoy reading them as much as we enjoyed writing them!
Shiloh does her share: Our beloved black German shepherd, Shiloh, signs up to participate in a contest to benefit human and canine cancer.
Figs and blue cheese: A local PA resident makes the finals at the Pillsbury Bake-Off with an amazing appetizer. Find the easy recipe here!
Why eggs for Easter? Our friend Ben delves into the history and mystery of the ancient association.
Through a green haze. April 4, 2010
Posted by ourfriendben in wit and wisdom.Tags: Easter, Gerard Manley Hopkins, God's Grandeur, Robert Frost
4 comments
Our friend Ben was admiring the sunrise on this Easter morning, enjoying the way the light seemed to shimmer through a green haze.
Then it hit me. A green haze?! That could only mean one thing: Our shrubs had started to leaf out. Rushing back to the window, our friend Ben confirmed this latest sign of spring’s arrival.
Since I look out those windows every morning, you’d think I might have noticed it before. But the truth is that, this time of year, my eyes are firmly fixed on the ground, on the sea of blue Siberian squill and purple glory-of-the-snow and white and yellow daffodils and white bloodroot that fills our huge front-yard island bed. My vision is so dazzled that events happening higher up, even just at shrub height, don’t really register.
But I was grateful that they did today, that I was able to see the first unfurling, the new, the chartreuse of first opening filtering the light like green lace. It of course reminded me of Robert Frost’s lines, “Nature’s first green is gold/Her hardest hue to hold.”
But it also reminded me of “God’s Grandeur,” that glorious paean of hope that our earth can survive the desecrations of man. After lamenting the atrocities we have committed against our own home land, and our insensitivity not just to the consequences of our acts but to the land itself, the 19th-century priest and poet Gerard Manley Hopkins continues:
“And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last light off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.”
Our friend Ben, Silence Dogood, and Richard Saunders wish all of you a blessed Easter and a joyful spring.
