Category Archives: random thoughts

Necessity is the mother of invention, and this 100-yard challenge has spawned some serious necessity. These days when I’m hit with a craving for something unobtainable, say, a big plate of pasta, I pick some squash blossoms, dip them in egg batter, fry them until golden and eat them with a sprinkle of preserved lemon juice. Or, for breakfast I handmill the corn kernels down (thank god I saved those cobs from last year), pour a little boiling water over the grain, then add a handful of shredded beets and an egg–and viola! beet cornmeal pancakes. I eat them with stewed plums and honey. It’s really brilliant. There are rough spots though, like a totally gross (almost) inedible fava bean stew. The horror. I wonder if the original reason recipes were written down and followed was not so much for taste, but to ensure food wasn’t wasted. I’m seriously thinking about all those survival books I read as a kid–My Island Summer, Little House on the Prarie, Call of the Wild, Julie of the Wolves, Sacajawea. I’ve been fascinated with the idea of living off your own inventions and skills.
Not that I’m not using modern technology. The other day I microwaved my peppermint/verbena tea. And a duck caught a chill (I’ve relocated them in a grassy area in the lot) from a long swim in the galvanized tub (he couldn’t get out) so I rushed him upstairs and used a blow dryer (it’s Bill’s, I swear) to dry him off and stop the shivering. He loved it! He moved his head around so the warm breeze would ruffle the feathers on top of his head. His down feathers had gotten wet, so he could’v died! Later, I spotted him from the window, puffed up, positively whiter than the others, and for the first time in my life, I thanked the person who invented the blow dryer.

Oh lord. It feels like day 17. You know when that yoga lady tells you that you should give up coffee because it’s poisoning your temple, etc? And you want to tell her she should maybe saw off her legs? Well. After day five of the 100 yard farm feast, the searing headache and weird body aches, induced from caffeine withdrawals–have mostly cleared up. Yesterday, I felt kind of floaty and healthy. I’ve been eating a lot of apples, kale, potatoes, chicken, and salad. Still, I feel like there’s something lacking. And that is: butter. And pizza. And flour. Okay, I’ll stop.

July 1 was all rabbit rabbit and excitement about the beginning of my month-long farm eating experiment. The rules are, I only get to eat things that I’ve grown, raised, or made myself. So that includes everything growing the garden, the garlic drying in the pantry, the preserved lemons and jam and olives I made many months ago. And of course the almost ready ducklings and rabbits. It’s a way to prove that one person can live off a little piece of land, and a way to really get connected to my garden. Instead of viewing the garden as a supplement, it’s now lifeblood. Of course this is only for a month and it seemed like it would be fun and challenging. Then I got the caffeine headaches.
It’s hard to get excited about picking salad and greens for lunch when your head is pounding. I thawed out a chicken I killed a few months ago, and baked it last night, but had such a bad headache I just went to bed instead. So I had breakfast roast chicken: Oh my god, it’s so good. Juicy and crispy on the outside. I’ll be eating it again tonight for dinner with some stewed Santa Rosa plums that are so tasty–bright and saucy, my mouth waters just thinking about them.

It’s that time again–red juice dripping down the chin, sticky fingers, jam-making inspiring-plum season. This year William and I head to our friend Linton’s house where we picked a bucket of Santa Rosa, yellow, and red plums. It only took 20 minutes to fill the bucket. It was a lovely scene, with Linton’s chickens clucking around us and a top bar beehive in his neighbor’s yard to keep us company. When we got home, I cooked the plums with some water until they boiled down. Then I removed the pits (harder than it sounds, next year I’m going to pit them first) and cooked the jam with some pectin and honey. The jam is very sour, but William insisted on no sugar. I cooked some of it some more and added brown sugar but then promptly burned it. Shit. The good news? Once again, the pigs love burnt plum jam. We have about 20 jars of the unburnt but sour jam. Next up will be apricots….

This was William’s chore list. It’s what I do every day, but suddenly, seeing it written down, makes it seem like a back-breaking slog. I cooked 8 buckets of slop for the pigs before I left, but still William was busy giving the chicks and poults and bunnies water and food.
The tragic news is, all of the lovely baby chicks were killed. We put them out in a secure chicken tractor, but some predator came along on Thursday night and literally pried the chicken wire off the chicken tractor and just killed everything in sight. Very very sad. We were lucky that 10 of the chicks had been placed in homes before the carnage-filled night. Those are the breaks. I ordered replacements, and Willow and I are looking at a local source for chicks and pullets.

Sorry I haven’t written for a week! I went to NYC to check out the city slickers and eat good food. Of course, many things went down on the farm while I was gone. But I thought first I’d share the story of my departure day.
As I fed the animals at dawn the day of my flight (I had to be at the airport at 7:30am) I went out to the chicken house and discovered a very flat, very cold turkey poult. Those are the breaks on the farm. If you think about it, a baby animal, especially poultry, are fragile beings. I mean, they just hatched out of an egg. I contemplated feeding the little guy to the pigs…then I saw the turkey move its wing. Oh man. Putting my tardy flight anxieties aside, I picked up the turkey, nestled it on my chest and blew warm air on it. While I did my other farm chores, the turkey began to stir, and weakly opened its mouth. Dr. Doolittle would’ve given him about a 20/80 chance of pulling through. The poult’s feathers were matted, and the little guy, well, he smelled. After about 20 minutes of puttering and wondering if I should call a cab, I brought the rest of the turkey babies up to our house and set up a brooder light in a box with hay. I stuck sicky under the light and noticed he seemed a little better. Once I landed in New York and settled in my hotel, William called.
“So, is there a dead turkey in the box?” I asked, grimly.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” William said. “All I see are a bunch of turkeys in our living room.”
He survived. And that, that, is a miracle.