Back To School! Independence Days Challenge, Juven For Foot/Skin Healing

Dave's photo from a couple of years ago- I'm ready for Fall!

Back To School!
I went back to work last week, so my posts will start to thin out a bit. I hate going back to work in the high 90's, it's just too hot. In an aging school, with no A/C in the gym and halls, the kids and adults all suffer. We had an open house with some of us in the gym last night, and I thought I'd pass out. Bring on some cooler weather PLEASE! Normal weather in late August should be mid 80's not 90's. This may be the "new normal". The fires have finally subsided, at least as far as the smoke goes. The Rim Fire in California isn't sending anymore smoke this way either. We were hit hard about a week or so ago from that. Smoke and heat, never a good combination. Blue skies this morning and 60! Cooler today....

Independence Days Challenge-

1. Plant Something- 

Nope, we're done. When it's 90+ you can't really plant a cool, fall garden sadly.

2. Harvest Something-

Good steady supply of tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, herbs, squash, collard greens, kale, eggs, and my first lemon cuke! Dave picked all the apples last weekend and I canned 10 Qts. of applesauce. Great flavor! I opted not to use the canning food processor, since it takes a lot longer, but creates more apple product. While it wasted some of the apple I could have used, time was of the essence. The chickens got lots of scraps! I basically just cooked the apples til soft, drained off most of the water, then reserved it. I started mashing, adding water, then switched to an immersion blender. I left the skins on.  I added some lemon juice, pinch of salt, a little sugar, fresh nutmeg and lots of cinnamon. Nectarines will be ready in another week or 2. Those will probably all be frozen. Time allowing, I may can some. Weekends are always crammed with everyday chores once work starts.

Home grown organic pippins

3. Preserve/Store Something-

 Canned 10 qts. of applesauce, bought breads to freeze. My organic Pippins (I think) had wonderful flavor! I made a big cobbler with crumb topping, with fresh orange juice and took it to a dinner potluck for staff. Everyone raved about it!  I gave away one 5 gallon bucket to a friend who lost all their fruit to an early frost.

4. Manage Reserves- Get a Good Deal/Barter/Stock Up/Prep-
Gourmet french breads and protein bars (helps my foot heal) from the grocery outlet, dress shirt for the wedding that Dave got at a thrift store. Froze homemade pesto.  Froze about 8 Qt. bags of rhubarb, free from a neighbor. Found some nice things at a local discount store for my daughter's bridal shower, here, on Monday. Getting car ready for fall- new wipers blades all around.

5. Eat the Food- Try New Foods/Recipe-
Eating lots of fresh basil and tomatoes.

I made a Patricia Wells recipe of a traditional French-style fried fish (I used pollock), with a flat leaf parsley salad and sauce Remoulade- capers, mayo, diced pickles, fresh herbs and cayenne pepper. Delish! Think French tartar sauce. From a library book I got, called Salad as a Meal The fish recipe is below, minus the directions, since I know how to dredge fish and fry it. Basically beat the eggs and then dip the fish, dredge in the flour, breadcrumbs, cheese and cayenne pepper. I cute the fish into squares, and used a frying skillet on medium high with about 2" of canola oil. Gorgeous, and golden brown!Use a simple vinaigrette on the parsley and toss. Add a wedge of lemon and it's dinner. Next time I will do lettuce with the parsley mixed it, as it a bit tough.

Sauce Remoulade recipe-
2/3 cup mayo
1 TBL. capers
I TBL. diced dill pickles  In France they use Cornichons, a tarragon-based pickle. Didn't have those but I know of a European grocery store so I might buy some next time I'm near there. I found this recipe on Pintsized Pioneering  I may try that too, with bigger cukes.

2 TBL. minced parsley, tarragon, chives.
pinch cayenne pepper
Mix and chill.

6. Build Community Food Systems-
Sold my first eggs at work yesterday. I charge $3.50 a dozen, and it off-sets the feed. I gave away one 5 gallon bucket of apples to a friend who lost all their fruit to an early frost. Will do that with some of the nectarines too.

7. Recycle/Re-Use-
I used my yard sale Kerr jars for canning that we got really cheap. Our neighbor had canned once and lost interest. I just ran them thru the dish washer and wala! Composting is going well! The chickens got lots of wormy apple scraps :) MAde donations to local thrift store. 

8. Skill Up-
Learn to make French fried fish and how many different kinds of  Sauce Remoulades there are. I know more about wound care than I will probably ever need! Read about amino acids and what they can do.

9. Regenerate What is Lost/Salvage Something-
My foot! 

Juven For Foot/Skin Healing-
I posting about this because I had never heard about it. Right before I started going to a "wound center", I stumbled onto this. Part of my foot surgery incision was healing really slow. I'm not diabetic, and am healthy, but the incision is on the outer curved part of my heel. A bad spot. After I found out about this stuff, I read up on it. It's an over the counter supplement made by the folks who make Ensure. It basically supports tissue growth and protein absorption. It had rave reviews all over the Internet. I tried it, then I mentioned it at the wound center. They recommend it and the flavor's not bad. It actually works as a bit of a stimulant too! I may have to have my other foot worked on next summer (oh joy), so this is a good tool to have. I read that many hospitals recommend this pre-op as well. If you know anyone with surgery coming up this might be useful! You can also buy the amino acids thru a health food store, use the same dosage and make you own much cheaper. Mine was 8 packages for $17.00, using 2 packs a day. I should add- the wound center I'm going to has a lot of great things they use, and my foot is healing up much faster! Never any infection, just slow. Hopefully in about another month or so, I'll be back in normal shoes and have intact skin! I'm sure the Juven is helping.

Smoky sunset from the fires

Homemade Elderberry Syrup, Henny The Poo, "Making Home" Book

Homemade Elderberry Syrup-
In the scheme of wanting to make more homemade supplements, etc, I found this post- Everything You Want to Know About Elderberry Syrup, courtesy of Frippery Farm. I LOVE Pure Cajun Sunshine's blog, looks like she stopped posting after a horrible snakebite. I hope she's ok, cause there's lot of fun stuff there! Anyway, after going thru two rounds of bronchitis and a cold with 2 weeks in  between where I thought I was ok, it's time to make elderberry syrup. It will be good to have on hand. I went thru a doctor visit, 2 rounds of back-to-back antibiotics just to finally get rid of it. My doc says it's the worst flu season she's seen, with a lot of other people going thru the same thing, back-to-back infections. I found some dried berries online here Herbalcom.com I've ordered some and am going to follow the recipe list on the first link. I'll post photos when I'm done. It's so MUCH cheaper, and fresher, to do this yourself. The sugar-based syrup sounds like it has a pretty good shelf life. I can see using this during flu season to boost the immune system in general, and sounds like it would be good for other types of infections. Great on pancakes too!!!

Rosie

The Adventures of Henny The Poo-
Sorry, I couldn't resist. If you raise chickens you have to clean them up once in a while. If you don't know how to do this yet, it's actually very easy and may save you a lot of grief with a very sick, or dead, chicken. Thus was the case with Rosie, no photos, so don't worry about hurling! Last week I saw a big (like an egg almost) round poo ball hanging off her little feathered butt. So.............. off for a bucket of warm soapy (a little dish soap) and an old washcloth. It was mild outside. In the winter I would have done this inside and sanitized everything afterwards. So..................... you get the chicken in place, I held her under my left arm facing away from me, since I'm right handed. Grab very sopping/dripping washcloth and get it very wet. Bend over a little so you don't get the mes on YOUR shoes :)  Then start very gently massaging. After about one minute or less, chunks started coming off. Keep dipping rag. All gone! Now I have a clean chicken with a very wet end. I set her down and went in to get some paper towels. Rosie kept trying to look back like "what the heck just happened to me? My butt is wet!". I dried her off very gently, as her poor rear end looked a bit irritated. She dried off nicely fairly fast. Next day she looked perfect. A good reminder- check your chickens. This can actually kill your bird, I'm not kidding. Next time I'll take pictures, maybe. I will add- the girls have lots of fresh, clean water and good quality food. Shit just happens. Sorry, I couldn't resist.
                            


Making Home Book-
When I saw Sharon Astyk had written a new book Making Home- Adapting Our Homes And Our Lives to Settle in Place I knew I had to buy it. I took Sharon's food preservation online class last spring, and she's awesome! I'm just getting into it, but it has great ideas for people like me who want to grow and store their own foods, etc. It also talks about learning new skills, security and all kinds of useful stuff.