Spring Cooking

Back from a short vacation... I really appreciate my small simple kitchen. I also want to share with you one of my favorite sites because she just released her new spring e-cookbook. It is one of the best simply in season cookbooks I have happily stumbled upon. Go here to get your copy at nourishingdays.com Why I like this little cookbook so much is I had tried the winter one with wonderful results and I love recipes that use what I have on hand. Shannon and I have some similar goals for the future so I appreciate the simplicity of using food I could grow myself. I am not much for going to the grocery store or shopping at all for that matter. My goal is to go to a grocery store twice a year to stock up on certain things I find essential. Like toilet paper and baking soda... I can't think of anything else at the moment. Enjoy the rest of spring and God's bounty.

Farm chores without the farm....

So I seem to have made the best of the situation it seems. I don't have a farm YET and living in the burbs gives me only so much room to expand my homestead. I don't think that has stopped me from sharing in the bounties elsewhere. I just received my lovely quilted quilt back from Janie at the Wallace Homestead where she used her long arm to make my Around the World quilt look almost professional. Now for me to finish the edge in the midst of finishing planting my garden, starting to plan out my herbal berry jam/jelly preserving, and finding a budget friendly way to prepare my bags of wool so they can be spun into yarn. Also trying to find a local source for elder flowers and nettles in the wild. I think I have found a nice crop of nettles but the elder flowers still allude me. What will I do with nettles you ask? Well, with some fresh spring cream I am making nettle soup(irish recipe) and nettle quiche. Inspiration coming from England in the form of many episodes of River Cottage, we will be learning to do more foraging as we learn our botany this summer. We are doing the Botany in a Day book to learn our plant families as we forage some local areas. One area we visited on Sunday is our well loved farm family at Shepherd Valley. It was a rainy day but we managed to dig up some cattails, look at a property, and meet new lambs Emma and Gavin. My Gavin also helped to feed Nigel the house lamb at the moment.

Emma and Gavin with mom Faye