The Pauley Principle: July 2011

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.

Saturday, July 23, 2011

Heirloom Chicks

These Speckled Sussex chicks love being on the grass. At night they still sleep in their brooder but by day they enjoy the fresh greens, insects and sunshine that they can only get in the great outdoors.

In order to keep out predators, Chris has their run secured with two different sizes of wire mesh. Outside that is an electric fence so that Pauley's Pampered Poultry remains safe and secure.

Then, before long, they'll be ready to move into the Chicken Condo where they will have even more room and a larger outside run. The free range chickens will continue to be secure from predators, the greatest threat to their health.

Known for being an heirloom breed, the Speckled Sussex numbers are limited. That may change as people begin to recognize their ability to withstand heat and pathogens, something newer hybrids don't handle so well.

Making egg-laying pets of these little chicks should be fun. Varied markings and already distinctive, but friendly, personalities will make it easier to name them. They're fun little chicks. Maybe we'll decide to raise a brood hen so that we can raise and perhaps sell more of these delightful little cuties!

(If our suspicions prove true,

there's one daring little rooster in among the fifty little hen-chicks!)

Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Vitis Grapes!

Just as the season for planting was coming to an end, WOW! A surprising find! After searching locally, online and in catalogs, and after asking several people, Chris finally found our vitis grapes, supposedly good for our soil type and climate. This variety is the Edelweiss grape, yellow-green when ripe, a mild, sweet grape.

Vitis grapes are specially cultivated for wine. The flavor they hold depends heavily on the soil the grapes are grown in as well as climate and rainfall. Since rainfall is an uncontrolled variable, harvests will be different from year to year. Another experiment in winemaking!

In 90 degree heat, Chris prepared the new bed for planting and added a 40-foot arbor to the vineyard. Then, to beat the oncoming storm, he planted at night by truck light. Funny, he enjoys a good glass of wine about once or twice a week. Grapevines require months of growing in good conditions then harvesting at just the right time for winemaking, which adds a few more months. This is a fine example of delayed gratification. All gardening and farming is! If it all falls into place, we hope to share a bottle with friends and family--in about a year--and then I think Chris will feel that it was worth the hard work! Hmmm!

Sunday, July 10, 2011

The Mystery Beans

This jar stayed in the basement for only God knows how long. Mystery Beans is what I called them. They had belonged to Chris's dad, so I knew they were his seed crop. They had to be good. We'd heard of seeds from a pyramid that still germinated and these seeds weren't THAT old so we gave them a try in our garden. Then I scouted out similar seeds at bulk seed suppliers and was able to identify them as the Kentucky Wonders, a pole bean! OOPS! We planted them wrong.

Just to be sure they were worth the extra work, I made venison chili using some beans from the mystery jar. YUM! They ARE worth the effort! Full of flavor, they're similar to a kidney bean and produce their own rich brown broth.

We were already experimenting this year with Bush's Blue Lake Pole Beans. Since we'd never grown pole beans before, Chris, being the resourceful person he is, supplied our garden with poles by thinning out the young maple sapplings from our maple grove. If nothing else, it brings back the nostalgia of our trips south and the way things used to be done. Especially, it brought back memories of his dad's huge garden. Sure, it's going to be more work but, without this extra work, it's hard to experience the goodness of the flavors and textures of the way it was, of times gone by.


Bean Poles ready for Action

Saturday, July 2, 2011

The Water Hydrant

An ancient dug well has been our water supply for the pampered poultry. After the ducks discovered their wading pools, packing water became a time-consuming chore! Now, with baby chicks in the brooder, Chris did the necessary thing. He spent a large portion of one day installing a water hydrant near the chicken condo (still in progress).

Life is good for the Pampered Poultry

There's always something to do if you're trying to raise much of your own food. Since Chris isn't running back and forth to the well, he has more time for gardening. He'll be glad to have the hydrant for that too!

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!