Our Goose was Cooked…..

Saturday night I finally roasted the 10 pound goose that we’d picked up on “after Christmas clearance”.  I think it was intimidating me, but the last Saturday of Spring vacation seemed like a good time to try.  I rinsed it, patted it dry, pierced the skin and salted it it really well to help crisp…

Oregon Blue-Foot Bresse

Our new flock.The original stock, inspired by the Poulet de Bresse of France, was developed by Canadian chicken breeder, Peter Thiessen in the 1980’s.  Thiessen hybridized birds, selecting the best characteristics from seventeen different types of birds in a process that required  11 years. The result was a chicken with a bright red comb, white plumage…

Sourdough Starter

I purchased a packet of San Fransisco Sourdough starter from Cultures for Health and am working through their instructions on rehydrating and activating it…… Combine the dehydrated starter with 1 T flour and 1 T water in a quart-size glass jar and stir thoroughly with a non-metal spoon. Cover the jar with a coffee filter…

Getting Ready for the new Chickens….

We went down to the old red hen house yesterday to give it a good sweep-out and put up some fencing.  We’re traveling down to Corvallis on Friday to pick up a roo and two hens to add to our small flock of red, white and blue Poulet de Bresse.  The hope is to start…

Herb Boxes on the Back Patio

This morning I planted the first of two wine barrel planters.  This one gets fairly full sun and is an easy walk from the kitchen so I put in culinary herbs.  It also has a sunken, unglazed pottery vessel which should help with water needs.  The Sweet Bay  and sage had wintered over so I…

Chitting the Yukon Golds

Another vegetable gardening job for the weekend is to start to chit the Yukon Gold potatoes. Chitting means sprouting the potatoes in a light, cool, frost-free area. I put mine in the living room.  It that seems too warm, I’ll move them to the counter in the garage. I put the potato tubers in a…

Soda Bread for March

I made a batch of Soda Bread yesterday for St. Patrick’s Day supper.  I forgot to take a photo of the loaf, but I have one of the leftovers and the butter I made from fresh, raw cream to go along with it. Recipe 1 pound white flour 1 t salt 1 t baking soda…

Filling in with Lettuce

I’ve been doing some research in biointensive garden/farming practices.  I like the idea of crowding the plants just enough to shade out the weed starts while holding in the moisture and helping to prevent soil erosion.  I’d planted six Romaine Lettuce starts a few days ago, spacing them in my regular fashion.  Yesterday I found…

Sowing Peas

These are in a little late, but with the late snow I think we’ll be fine. I’ve purchased two varieties of organic seeds, Blue Pod Shelling & Taiwan Sugar Snow Pea. I started with 20 of each variety, which I’ll follow with successive plantings every 5-7 days until I run out. The seeds, because of…

Broccoli and Cabbage

We picked up some ‘Premium Crop’ Broccoli and ‘Ruby Ball’ Red Cabbage starts yesterday.  They were on clearance because, with our cold snap, they’ve gotten leggy.  I removed the seed leaves when I planted them and put them in almost up to the first set of regular leaves, spacing them about 18″ apart.    We…