Rain- The Best Gift of All

...The plants just love the rain water. I also planted beet, carrot and onion seeds right before the rain. They are now starting to sprout. In the new year one of my projects is going to be upgrading the rainwater harvesting system. In addition to the existing rain barrels, I want to make sure that any excess water is absorbed by the landscape. Currently a lot of water runs down the driveway during a rain. This is made worse by a downspout that feeds...

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The Best Raw Flax Cracker Recipe

...cially flax crackers. My favorite flax cracker recipe is the onion cracker bread you can find here. This easy to make recipe requires no pre-soaking or sprouting. All you do is mix the ingredients (onions, flax seed, sunflower seeds, olive oil and agave syrup) in a bowl and spread it on a tray in your dehydrator. The problem is that these crackers are so tasty they disappear within a day. Do you have a favorite raw recipe? Leave a comment with a l...

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How to Bake a Traditional German Rye Bread

...rye flour 150 grams white bread flour 10 grams sea salt 1 teaspoon caraway seeds 250 grams rye sourdough starter (see step one) 475 grams warm water Building the starter First build: take one tablespoon of mature starter and add it to 50 grams of rye flour and 50 grams of room temperature filtered water. Let sit for between 8 to 12 hours at room temperature. Second build: add 75 grams of rye flour and 75 grams of room temperature filtered water to...

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How To Manage a Compost Pile Using Temperature

...that, with the turn I did at day 14, all of the pile got up to 150°F. Weed seeds are killed above 130°F–another reason to watch temperature. Failing to get high temperatures can be an indication of too much carbon or a lack of water. To correct, add more nitrogen and water and turn. A loss of temperature could indicate that the pile is going anaerobic. The solution is to add more carbon material and turn. Once the pile has had 15 complete days ove...

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Beans 101 (Return of Bean Friday!)

...dry herbs if these weren’t available. I usually end up putting some cumin (seeds or powder) into most of my bean pots. (I’m not salting them now because there is a belief that early salting makes beans tough. I don’t know if it is a myth or not, but I add my salt when they’re almost done. I add some olive oil then, too. I’ll come back to that later.) Stock stuff ready for the pot Note I’m leaving the stock vegetables in big chunks because I intend...

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