The Pauley Principle: What? Me, Make Wine? Why NOT!?

Welcome to The Pauley Principle!

The Pauli Principle, named for Wolfgang Pauli, deals with atoms and electron-sharing that results in new, stronger bonds. Think 2 parts hydrogen and 1 part oxygen, a shared delectable (!) electron and VOILA! Water!

Similarly, when you prepare whole food to share with family and friends, especially foods you've grown, something amazing happens. Meals become tastier and healthier. Your soul, not just your stomach, becomes fulfilled. You live life more abundantly as a result. During a shared meal, the bonds that people create grow stronger and become something new: GREATER than the sum of the parts! I give you The Pauley Principle.

Sunday, January 16, 2011

What? Me, Make Wine? Why NOT!?

According to the King James Bible, winemaking was the first miracle that Jesus performed. It's easy and doesn't require a miracle at all unless, of course, you're at the wedding when the wine runs out. What's more, home winemaking is a legal adult pastime here in the USA. Not only that, it is the most fun I've ever had with a hobby! You can produce and store a rather significant quantity for your own use. You can give it to friends for gifts. But, if you're a home winemaker, you are prohibited from selling the wines you make, a fact that friends don't really mind at all when they receive gifts of wine!
For a reasonable cost, wine-making suppliers can see that you have everything you need to make a great-tasting wine for your own table.
Plan ahead before you begin. Talk to people who make wine--the numbers are growing--or find a good resource to guide you through the process. This blogsite will help you. When I make wine, I take copious notes so that, if I do it right I can help others. If I mess up, I'll try to pass that along too so that others will benefit by my successes as well as my mistakes. After you decide you're going to make wine, gather your supplies to one convenient spot. This could be a basement corner, a spare bathroom, or even right in your own kitchen! The process smells wonderful! Then, just wait for the ripening of the fruits you want to use in making your wine. If you just can't wait or don't have a suitable fresh source, try one of the kits made especially for winemaking, available from winemaking suppliers such a E. C. Kraus.
I hope this has planted the little grape seed that has you thinking about making some wine. And although I enjoy grapes for wine, there are many other fruits that seem to want to be wine. Tonight, I'll work with one and enjoy another! In some following blogs I'll will share some of the resources that I've learned from and a little overview of my experiences with winemaking. In the meantime, let that seed of thought grow and someday you, too, may live life more abundantly with your own delicious table or dessert wine!

2 comments:

UnknownJanuary 20, 2011 at 1:32 PM
A very good community for learning more about Wine making, along with brewing beer, cheese making, and more; is Homebrewtalk.com. I've been a member there a little over 2 years and aside from the vast amount of knowledge, it is a community of great people.
Rhonda, if you feel this forum would be in competition with your blog, please feel free to remove my link or ask me to do so.
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UnknownJanuary 25, 2011 at 12:02 AM
Brad, that's a great suggestion It's no competition at all, just more good food and drink, since I'm not doing beer or cheesemaking. Enjoy them both, though! And I'll check out their site. Thanks for the tip!
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Give Yourself the Fast Food Alternative: 1, 2, 3 makes 4 and More

For many people, late night ballgames, church, work and other events make fast food too convenient to resist, but what's in that stuff? I can't begin to answer. Big franchises such as Taco Bell say the 63% or so that isn't beef is made up of "the secret ingredient". If we consume their food, don't we have a right to know what that secret is? And more importantly, what's it doing to our bodies? My plan is worth the effort since meals eaten at home with the family benefit our physical and mental health.

Here's an alternative and my answer to Rachael Ray's A Week in a Day. I call it 1,2, 3 Makes 4 and More. On the fifth day, Friday, make a quick and easy pizza.
In one day, you can make a roast, a hearty soup, and a one-dish casserole to get you through most of the work week.
Meal 1: the roast with salad and a veggie.
Meal 2: the soup served with warm bread or in a bread bowl.
Meal 3: the casserole with a salad.
Meal 4: soup from Meal 2 served with sandwiches using the roast, Meal 1.
Meal 5: homemade pizza.

Plan meals and shop for it. Then take a few hours to prepare the entrees ahead. Start with a roast seasoned to taste. I'm talking real meat. While that's slow cooking, start chopping veggies and meat for a good, hearty soup, one that will be a meal in itself. Get it started and simmering away and then begin a one-pot meal that takes a little more attention.

This week my plan is Day 1, a slow roasted ham with salad and mashed potatoes; Day 2, minestrone; and Day 3, shepherd's pie. I'm making mashed potatoes for two days (meals 1 and 3) at one time on my cooking day. The fourth meal will be ham sandwiches with minestrone. Salads and breads round out the meals for the week. Fruits with cheese make a quick and good-for-you dessert. A truly delicious recipe for shepherd's pie is in my blog.

Be good to you. Be good to others. On days 6 and 7, change it up by going out, having a pot luck with friends and family or grilling out. Remember, live your life abundantly.

About Venison

Venison should taste really delicious! No kidding. It is my favorite meat, except for crab.

Some things to consider though:
*If you wouldn't think of eating a bull, then don't eat a deer that had huge antlers or was in rut. I don't. It affects the flavor and tenderness of the meat.
*Replace the deer fat with beef fat for your ground meat for an 80/20 ratio. Deer fat tends to be slightly bitter and leaves that thick coating in your mouth that, although edible, is not palatable.
*For roasts, sear with butter and olive oil. These impart a wonderful flavor.
*For sausage, use pork shoulder, at a ration of about 3 parts ground venison with 1 part ground pork shoulder.
*Venison by nature is a lean red meat. A good young deer processed properly will give you many delicious meals.
*Anything you would do with beef, except ribs, you can do with venison. Look for my recipe for Shepherd's Pie. Use either beef or venison. Enjoy, share, and live abundantly.

Plan Now for Maple Syrup

Maple syrup is cooked down from sap that you gather from sugar maple trees. There are no other ingredients, not even water. And it's incredibly good. On the market, maple syrups will often have corn syrup, gluten, color and other additives which can stretch profitability and decrease the steaming time required. Since it takes 35-45 gallons of the thin slightly sweet sap to make a gallon of pure maple syrup, doing it the old-fashioned way takes time but the result is pure YUM!

If you have the opportunity to tap into maple trees and decide you'd like to give this a try, plan ahead. If you steam off the sap inside your kitchen, it can strip your wall-paper! Been there, done that, at our old farmhouse. If you cook it down outside with a gas turkey fryer, the cost can end up being around $8 a pint. We began cooking over a wood fire a few years ago, using a tripod and kettle. Oh, and a large firewood supply. Whatever method you choose, proceed slowly and with caution.

Gather your supplies. We use food safe plastic jugs, buckets, and little water line spouts. Maple syrup production houses will collect into stainless steel vats using long water lines but we simply gather the jugs, pour into buckets and bring it to the kettle twice daily. I buy little pint jugs to store it in. Very fresh, very pure. Start tapping the trees when daytime temperatures are going to be above freezing but nights are still very cold. In Ohio, the sap will be running fast sometime in February.

Try my cousin Stephanie Krupla's recipe for Sticky Bun Tea Ring and you'll want to search for maple trees you can tap into yourself!