i hope you eat good food, grow beautiful things, and have more love than you know what to do with.
If the thought of slimy, gooey, pungent, fermented soy beans make you run the other way, this post is not for you. If however, like myself, my daughters, and a large population of Asia, the thought of you makes your mouth water and stomach grumble, …
My sister (follow her on Instagram), who is a chef working at an upscale Italian restaurant in Brooklyn, gave me three hamachi kama (yellowtail collars) the other day when I went to visit her and my parents where they live in Queens. I was daunted …
I was so excited when I saw a goji (Lycium chinense or Lycium barbarum) plant for sale at my local nursery, ladened with fruit. The first time I tried it, after the initial burst of sweetness, it became so bitter I spat it out, and I was a little hesitant in purchasing it.
I really shouldn’t have been, because it’s a ridiculously easy plant to grow, thriving in full sun or partial shade, and giving volunteer baby plants here or there. I got a total of 5 in the two years I’ve had it, although the first few times I pulled them thinking they were weeds. Now I know better and wait a little longer before pulling anything out near them. They are a hardy perennial down to Zone 5, and drought tolerant, but can’t deal with having wet feet. I found that where I am, the sandy soil actually suits it very well. It’s a heavy producer so it’s often great for food forests.
Goji berry is traditionally used to treat Yin deficiencies in Traditional Chinese Medicine, sometimes paired with chrysanthemum as a tea to help treat issues such as dry eye or dry skin. It’s often put into stews and herbal hotpots, and you’ll definitely find it among the ingredients in Mongolian hotpot broths.
I like it even if I don’t eat much of it, and my parents love it when I bring some over, since they use it often in their cooking.
This is the story of how I started out with one horseradish plant (Armoracia rusticana) and ended up with over 20. Horseradish is one of the few condiments that I can’t do without when eating raw clams or oysters. It’s also a delicious compliment to …
I had been wondering what to do with the sundried tomato in olive oil I had prepared some days ago, knowing that I will have to use it up soon or risk botulism (no matter how small) when I came across fresh mozzarella pearls in …
Lemon Balm (Melissa Officionalis) is a perennial herb part of the mint family with very similar growth habits. It’s hardy and invasive if left to its own devices, so like my mint, it’s been relegated to the invasive herb box where it holds its own against its voracious cousins. It’s hardy down to Zone 4 (with some protection) but here in Zone 7, it spreads readily by runners and by seed. Even though I moved a small portion of them to the box and pulled and destroyed the rest from where they originally were, there are still volunteers popping up on my lawn and between the bricks near the front door. It does well in both sun and shade, frequent watering or non frequent watering, good soil or bad soil (or even very little soil if the ones in the cracks concrete and asphalt of my driveway are any indication), what have you.
Bees love it, as its flowers are abundant and provide lots of nectar.
I like to put it in tea with honey during the summer–it has a very cool and refreshing lemony flavor, and the smell actually reminds me of those lemon cough drops. To be honest though, I really don’t use it often to justify cultivating it too much, so I just pull and compost the volunteers or crush it and use as an insect repellent while working in the garden.
If you’ve never used mint (or mint jelly) on a sandwich, you really should start. Seriously, you won’t be disappointed. I don’t know how to describe the deliciously fresh taste that using mint imparts, but it’s what I think of when I think of Summer. …
Mint, of the genus mentha, is one of the herbs that I always have on hand. Several different species exist, although I usually only keep one or two (currently, I have peppermint and chocolate mint.) It’s probably the least picky herb I have had the …
I’ve been wanting to do this DIY for a while, but could not, for the life of me, find the bar of beeswax I had used to seal my mason bee house. I wanted to be as close to plastic free as possible, not only because of environmental reasons (although that is a perfectly good reason) but because I was tired of having warped plastic covers for my glass tupperware. I don’t actually understand why I can’t have glass top tupperware (non-leak proof, for obvious reasons) but I haven’t been able to find them for a decent price anyway.
This wrap is actually far better for things such as cheese, since, left in an anaerobic environment such as within cling wrap, the bacteria in cheese will start producing ammonia–it’s why the best cheese shops seal cheese in wax or wax paper for long term storage. This not only cuts down on waste, but it also saves money too, since you could actually use old T-shirts or sheets cut to the size and shape.
Some recipes call for jojoba oil and pine resin, and I was worried it wouldn’t hold without them, but it was actually sufficiently sticky enough that when you held it in your hands and rubbed a bit, it would stick to itself from your body heat alone. Whether or not jojoba oil and pine resin are necessary… well, I don’t think so, but it can’t hurt to use them either if you really want to.
This DIY, however, does not contain those ingredients. Only good old fashion square pieces of cotton cloth (I had a bunch leftover from making furoshiki–but that’s for another post) and beeswax.
Some other DIY sites will tell you to either do it bain-marie style, in the oven, with a paintbrush, but I found an easier way that did not destroy your cheese grater, paintbrush, or pots since melted beeswax is notoriously difficult to get off of things.
You can run this under cold water and wash with light detergent to clean. Each will last through many uses (some people say up to a year if taken care of properly.) That’s a year’s worth of cling wrap I’m not contributing to!
You Will Need:
DIY Bees Wax Wrap
I had to put “sundried” in quotations because I didn’t actually dry them in the sun, but what would you call dehydrated tomatoes? Dried tomatoes… dehydrated tomatoes… desiccated tomatoes… they don’t sound too appetizing that way and the supermarkets sell them as “sundried” anyway, even …