Monday, November 23, 2009

swiss chard recipe

ok, i know adding bacon to any dish is like cheating. tabitha's father has stumbled across an elegant simple meal where the sum is greater than it's parts.

fry up some bacon we like ours a little on the crispy side. while the pan is still hot dump in a bunch of coarsely chopped swiss chard, stems and all. cook it until the chard stems are fairly soft.

toast some bread, tabitha has been making the best bread since i motorized her grain mill. spread a bit of mayonnaise on two slices. cover one with bacon and then pile about 1/2" of cooked chard and cover with the other piece of toast.

even you chard skeptics will probably like this dish. we added a soft poached egg on top of that and the result was pure magic.

motorized grain-mill = good

we went over to our friends yesterday. they have a jersey bull and jocelyn needed a boyfriend. it has been a while since we visited and their homesteading progress is amazing. lance has a huge complex of rainwater catchment to water his cows. it is a wonderful sight.


they also built an enviable outdoor bread oven. tabitha brought over two loaves of challah to test it out. it was amazing our bread oven construction queue has just moved up a few notches and might get incorporated into our milking barn.

their small jersey herd looked very healthy and they had the most wonderful giant-black (breed) pig. she free ranges around their farmstead. she comes when you call just to get a little back-scratch. we might get one of her offspring. she is registered and looks perfect.

we are so happy for them it is exciting to see such progress and thoughtful additions to their homestead.

they have a little house on 30 acres for sale. it would be the perfect homestead the house is quite nice. a large garden plot, wood heat, an old root cellar and plenty of land for pasture and a wood lot. i don't think they are offering it to just anyone but i'd sure be tempted if we weren't so happily entrenched here. the main enticing factor over our slice of heaven is that it is secluded. high-speed-internet might come at a very high price there. but, to be able to realize our crazy ideals without the multitude of onlookers and let us not forget two-stroke-man. two-stroke-man has a two-stroke powered implement for every menial task. daylight hours are half filled with the whirring buzz of his oil and gas mix powered engines. nary an autumn leaf is able to hit the ground without feeling the smoky waft of a leaf blower immediately.

fall is the season of realizing how close our neighbors actually are. all the leaves fall and they seem to move right on top of us. it takes until the first snow before we get accustomed to it. we love our little place and would never willingly leave. privacy fence and some strategically planted evergreens would make this time of year not so traumatic.

3 comments:

Kristin said...

Pictures of the said wood oven would be nice. My husband says your are the enemy of all overworked husbands. :-) I want him to build a greenhouse and a wood bake oven. Of course, there's all the other homestead tasks he has to do like fence building and the pile of sheep skins I've asked him to turn into beautiful things for me.

Ed said...

When's dinner!?

My mom has a grain mill and I agree with your assessment. Nothing is better.

Homesteading Mommy said...

i envy your solitude... don't give it up. while its nice to be biking distance from a library, i hate having to think about roosters bothering neighbors, people freaking out over honey bees, or the neighborhood grump complaining about seeing livestock as he drives by. and i hate knowing he's just dumped gallons of poisons into our groundwater by seeing weeds in his lawn one day and none the next. keep secluded as long as you can because you can't pick your neighbors!

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