Erik’s 2012 New Year’s Resolutions in Review

December 31, 2012

.... Improve writin’ skills. Celebrate the wonderful awesomeness that is Mrs. Homegrown each and every day. I’ve got the book but not the license. Fail: Get HAM technician’s license. Learn Morse code Attend CERT (Community Emergency Response Team) classes. Organize messy office so it doesn’t look like an episode of Hoarders. Organize supplies in garage into labeled boxes: still messy. Turn the garage into the ultimate man cave. Increase running dista...

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My Favorite Lettuce Mix

Mr. Homegrown

January 18, 2013

Gardening, Seeds, Vegetable Gardening

7 Comments

...We grow lettuce mixes almost every year and we’ve never been disappointed. Homegrown salad greens are much better than store bought. Plus, at least where we live, they are easy to grow. We just sow the seed directly and water them in. We thin by eating the seedlings. Judging from the crowding in the photo above, we need to eat some more salads soon. There’s never been pest problems save for the edible, and aggressive, fennel seedlings you can see...

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Nasturtium Powder

Mr. Homegrown

January 29, 2013

Food, Food Preservation, Foraging

20 Comments

...Just don’t let them get so dry they lose color. (Important note from Mrs. Homegrown: Careful with this microwave trick! It’s a new one for us. It worked perfectly for Erik when he dried a whole bunch of leaves, but today I tried to dry just one leaf, a celery leaf, as an experiment and it burst into flame after about 30 seconds. Scary!!!!! We think it success has to do with mass and moisture: lots of leaves, not just one.) Put the dried leaves in...

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Citified Parched Corn

Mrs. Homegrown

March 18, 2013

Food, Food Preservation, How-to, Recipes

8 Comments

...the corn. So maybe the claim are real and–geek alert!– parched corn is our homegrown Lembas bread.) Parched corn, being tasty and useful, was widely adopted by the Europeans who arrived here. So it was turned out to be the Official Snack Food of wagon trains and trappers and the like. I went looking for a recipe and found my idea was hardly original. Preppers and outdoorstypes love their parched corn and there are plenty of recipes and tips out th...

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The tale of the worm bin celery

Mrs. Homegrown

July 3, 2013

Food, Gardening, Miscellaneous, Vermiculture

23 Comments

...er grown it intentionally. The celery in this post looks very much like my homegrown “cutting celery.” Perhaps commercial celery wants to revert to this? Months later, the hot weather arrived, the celery started to bolt (that is, send up flower stalks). When a plant bolts, it puts all its energy into flowering. At that point, its not much use to us as food. I was sad to lose my bottomless celery supply, but I was excited about the flowers. Pollina...

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