Books!

 

Notable for the number of recipes and the fact that the author takes the subject seriously while not taking himself too seriously.

Pretty much every culture has some form of meat loaf: Ground or chopped meat, extenders like bread crumbs, bulger or rice, oatmeal or vegetables and eggs to bind. Additional flavorings were whatever herbs/tomatoes/fruit that grew well locally.

It is a bit of an art to balance the moisture/fat/filler and baking time. The author recommends about 15% fat as a starting point.

Notable for the author's humility and ability to learn from the people he hired to pull weeds.

At first, the author was anal about weeds setting seeds. He saw weeds the way the Sourcerer's Apprentice saw brooms (his analogy).

His workers had a different view. If a garden plant "volunteered" but was in the wrong bed, they left it. He had tomatoes, tomatillos and squash popping up in his corn that his workers neglected to weed.

They did, however weed the amaranth, lambsquarters and a host of other edible weeds. They collected them in baskets, took the home and ate them. I suspect they cut the stems at ground level to minimize the amount of dirt.

"Wow!" you are thinking. "That is a huge amount of greens"

It would be if they didn't process them at home by breaking off the tenderest, least fibrous tips, toss the tough parts and cooking only the prime portions.

Incidentally, the book on meatloaf includes many recipes that include spinach. Those tender tips could certainly be substituted for spinach in those recipes.

Incidentally, both books were gifts and I have been reading them when Mom is sleeping. A heart-felt "Thank-you!" to the gift-givers.

In the garden

I was not very productive. I got a few rows planted: kale, onions-from-multiplier onions, rutabagas and the last flight of Super Sugar Snap peas.

The multiplier onions are red, which I think is unusual. They were found growing beside a dirt road and a few of them followed me home.

Multiplier onions (sometimes called "Walking Onions") produce bulblets or corms at the top of their leaves. Every corm has the potential to become another onion plant.

I never really paid much attention to them in terms of the size of the bulbs they produce. Mostly we kept them around for an easy, reliable source of green onions.

In mid-afternoon, I sallied forth to cut some grapevines that were smothering some apple trees in my most casual fruit planting. One of our neighbors is on a short vacation and we were asked to care for her livestock. I noticed that apple trees closest to her barn were inundated by wild grape vines.

I cut the vines near the ground and again at 5' to make it a bit more difficult for them to climb back up.

There was a very large "Fairie Ring" of mushrooms where I cut the grape vines.

Hand included for scale.

Exercise

I started the weekend with the best of intentions but only managed a two-mile run. I stopped every half-mile and did a set of push-ups.

I ran on a paved road because of the mosquitoes. One place on that road has cattails (marsh) on both sides. The road was covered with hundreds and hundreds of snails. Many were moving. Many were crushed. I wonder if they were looking-for-love-in-all-the-wrong-places.

I have to keep reminding myself that I lapped everybody who never got off the couch.