Cookies & Tea & Snow & Me

Posted on February 8, 2021 by Ann Lovejoy
Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Cookies should taste exactly the way you love them best

When Weather Isn’t Welcome

Ah, spring! Bulbs are sprouting and minor bulbs are already showing their colors, from snowdrops and snowflakes to winter aconite (Eranthis) and muscari to species iris and daffodils. Rhododendrons and camellias are bursting from bud to bloom. Hellebores are opening their dangling bells and the long arms of Mahonia Charity are tipped with spikes of fragrant golden blossoms. It’s hopeful and heady and exciting and… Uh oh. One look at my phone’s weather app sent my heart plummeting. Snow? Sleet? Freezing roads? Nooooo!!!!!

It’s a bit disconcerting to be so stricken by the threat of a cold snap (and not a truly awful one at that). Ok, fifteen inches is a lot but that’s the worst-case scenario. We might only get a sprinkle, and it probably won’t even last more than a few days, yet I’m as downcast as if a major snowpocalypse was coming our way. It isn’t that the winter was harsh (it wasn’t) or too long (well, maybe). It’s everything, really. After the past few difficult years, last year was so over-the-top awful in so many ways we ran out of descriptive words, not to mention energy. For me, the only really positive part was getting to have my young grandkids several times a week, after a way-too-long hiatus. Their cheerful matter-of-factness and endless curiosity prods me out of my petulance and digs me out of my doldrums. Ok, that and getting my first vaccinated shot (along with other volunteers and staff at our local Senior Center, now a local vaccination station). Ok, and learning that knitting with friends on Zoom is actually restorative. All that definitely feels both positive and hopeful. Maybe I feel better than I think I do.

Tea Time With Dragons

My granddaughter thinks snow would be awesome, the more the better. She just turned five and is fascinated by many things, including snow, unicorns, flower fairies, and dragons. She thinks it’s so cool that dragons can bake cookies with a single breath (who knew?) and they can also heat up a tea pot in a nanosecond. We just discovered a marvelous graphic novel called The Tea Dragon Society, written and illustrated by Katie O’Neill, author of several charming books with ecological and inclusionary themes. This book features small, cuddly tea dragons that purr and nip and require a great deal of grooming. They have little horns or antlers that produce flavorful leaves and fragrant flowers of various types. Harvested in tiny amounts, the foliage and blossoms make magical teas that offer shared memories the dragons carry for their caregivers (not owners!). This gentle, kind story captured our imaginations, and I’m very glad of that.

Cessa is the only girl in the neighborhood and I’ve watched her be drawn into war and fighting games when she only gets to play with the boys, a situation I remember all too well. Alone with me, both grandkids often play gentler games, snuggling their knitted stuffies and dolls rather than just crashing trucks and bombing space ships. I remember being appalled when my own kids abandoned their stuffed animals for trucks and toy guns once they started preschool and I’m relieved to see these kiddos balance the bold with the gentle. After we read the story this morning, Cessa drew a tea dragon she wants me to knit with roses and mint together. During a sun break, we picked garden herbs to make our morning cup of dragon tea. The pickings were on the slim side; despite my fantasizing, it’s really just the tail end of winter here (just heard we might get 15 inches of snow by this weekend, argh!). Even so, we found lemon balm and lemon thyme, rosemary and lavender, and mint. Lots and lots of mint-I think it’s ineradicable, but at least it smells good and tastes refreshing.

Cookies & Dragon Tea

We also mixed up a batch of cookies together. Cessa wanted to make “very vanilla cookies with just a little cinnamon” but said she doesn’t like Snickerdoodles because they are “too chewy and too sharp.” Alrighty then! We came up with a basic recipe that combines buttery vanilla flavor with a sparkle of sea salt but does not involve cream of tartar (which gives a tangy sharpness that we were trying to avoid). We formed balls with a melon cutter, then rolled each raw cookie in spiced sugar before baking them off. The result is just about perfect; crispy edges, a softer, almost creamy center, and a crunchy dusting of spiced sugar on the outside. What’s not to love?

Note: Whole wheat pastry flour gives baked goods a tender crumb, but you can use all-purpose flour if you prefer.

Very Vanilla Cookies With Spiced Sugar 
That Are NOT Snickerdoodles

1 cup plus 2 tablespoons whole wheat pastry flour
3/4 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 stick (1/2 cup) butter, at room temperature
3/4 cup brown sugar, very lightly packed
1 egg
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon each of cinnamon, ginger, cardamom and coriander **
** or use just cinnamon or any spice blend you prefer

Preheat oven to 375 degree F. Sift dry ingredients together, set aside. In a mixing bowl, cream butter with brown sugar. Stir in egg and vanilla thoroughly, then add dry ingredients. Mix sugar and spices in a wide, shallow bowl. Scoop dough by the tablespoon (or use large 2-tablespoon melon baller) into the spiced sugar and roll to coat. Put cookies on baking sheets at least 2 inches apart and bake for 10-12 minutes at 375. Makes about 30 small or 15 large cookies.

Tea Time With Dragons Winter Tea

1/2 cup mint springs (loosely packed)
1 tablespoon lemon balm springs
1 tablespoon lemon thyme sprigs
1 teaspoon lavender foliage
1 teaspoon rosemary foliage
Honey to taste

Put herbs in a tea pot and pour in 3 cups barely boiling water. Cover and let steep for 5-10 minutes. Strain into cups and add honey to taste. Serves 2-3

 

 

Posted in Care & Feeding, fall/winter crops, Gardening With Children, Hardy Herbs, Health & Wellbeing, Recipes, Sustainable Gardening, Sustainable Living, Teaching Gardening | Tagged , , , , | 6 Comments

We Are Woven Into Nature

Posted on February 1, 2021 by Ann Lovejoy
Print Friendly, PDF & Email

When kids look at nature, they see magic

Brown Sugar Banana Bread & Nurturing The Natural

Reading through numerous articles about climate change and “saving nature”, it seems as if many people who are passionate about the natural world unconsciously consider it as something apart from humans. Historically, of course, “civilized” cultures have viewed the natural world as simply a source of raw materials, resources to be stripped away for “higher and better” uses. Those who lived in balance if not harmony with nature were clearly ignorant savages by the definitions of those who grew less in tune with the natural world with every passing generation. Today, while urban cultures are as dependent on nature as everyone else, children and adults alike are divorced from natural realities, buffered by insulating comforts. During the pandemic, it seemed ironic that people seeking respite in nature pack the parks and crowd the woods until they’re as busy as any city street. Joggers and hikers wearing earbuds rock down trails to the beat of music passersby can hear, louder than birdsong or squirrel chitter.

I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when I recently met a group of women who were “forest bathing” together, all chatting loudly as they hustled down the paths toward the car park, ready for a latte. What’s especially fascinating to me is that numerous studies show that people-any people-feel better, have lower blood pressure, and are less anxious when they are around plants. Those hasty forest bathers may have been doing themselves good even as they ignored the setting; a recent German study claims similar benefits for people who walk near urban trees in the heart of a city, even if they aren’t consciously aware of the trees. No matter how tight our bubblewrap is, part of us knows we are as much a part of nature as the trees, and know it or not, we need their company.

Looking Leads To Love

Other studies show that when people who disagree profoundly about politics are able to feel empathy when they look into each other’s eyes and acknowledge common experiences. When we truly see and hear, our hearts open. As a child, I found people baffling but was fascinated by plants. Maybe it was partly because I don’t see well; nobody realized how nearsighted I was (and I didn’t know my eyes were any different). In any case, I found more to appreciate at ground level than in the noisy, active games other kids liked to play. In garden and woods, I found enchantment and fell in love with trees that each seemed to host entire communities woven of lichens and tiny ferns, mosses and fungi, birds and insects. Buds and flowers, brilliant or subtle, leaves of every shape and size, all had incredibly complex forms even the simplest revealed to close examination. (Being nearsighted definitely helps with that part!)

Since looking led to lasting love for me, I want others to have that same delight. Whenever my grandkids are able to visit with me, we always roam the neighborhood, seeing how many kinds of plants and birds and other critters we can find. We carry bags to hold treasures we might find along the way, from pine and fir cones to feathers, interesting stones and whatever else captures our fancy. On a recent nature walk, my grandkids were asking about the long, dangling catkins of our native Western hazelnut, Corylus cornuta. The showy male catkins are softly golden, looking like fluffy strings of chenille, while the tiny, vivid red female florets are tucked into tight little buds at the tips of branches. Once pollinated, the girls swell and form plump little hazelnuts, each wrapped in enveloping husks like little green shawls. Last fall, we noticed that the native red squirrels love to eat hazelnuts, as do quite a few birds, notably the raucous, bossy jays.

Natural Art

A little later, a neighbor stopped me to ask a question and we got into a conversation. The kids moved a little way away and knelt down side by side by a large flat rock. When I rejoined them, they happily showed me their artwork, made from the bits and pieces in their collection bags. When we got home, they made a bottle of potion so their kitty could come to life and play with the extremely well fed neighborhood squirrels. They planted some of the chunky camellia seeds they’d found, and thought about where they might plant the bushes if any sprouted and grew (they already know that not every seed makes it to the finish line). They made mint tea from the sprigs they picked, and transplanted a baby lemon balm to take home for their mom. They are so comfortable in the woods and in the garden, watching plants change, harvesting a little and leaving a lot for critters and to keep new generations of plants coming. My dearest wish is that these kids, and others like them, will continue to love the natural world, to admire and protect and support nature all their lives. I pray they will work to protect our planet as adults and that this deep relationship will be an abiding one that brings them refreshment and joy their whole lives long.

Brown Sugar Banana Bread

We also made the most delicious banana bread yet. Actually, they decided that it’s banana cake, because cake is fancier and bread sounds boring. Be ready to get it in the oven fast, as the mixture is very bubbly.

Best Ever Brown Sugar Banana Cake/Bread

1 cup whole wheat pastry flour (or any)
1 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup coconut milk powder (optional)
1 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon each coriander, cardamom and ginger

3 very ripe bananas
3 large eggs
2/3 cup avocado or vegetable oil
1/3 cup plain whole milk yogurt
1 cup lightly packed brown sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla

1 cup pecans (optional)
1/2 cup chocolate chips (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Butter a baking dish (ours is a glass 11 x 7.5” one). Sift dry ingredients together, set aside. In a large bowl, mash bananas, stir in eggs, oil, yogurt, brown sugar and vanilla until well blended. Stir in dry ingredients, adding nuts and chocolate chips if using. Quickly spoon into the baking dish and bake at 350 until golden brown and well set and a toothpick comes out clean (about 45 minutes). Serves at least three.

 

Posted in Care & Feeding, Gardening With Children, Health & Wellbeing, Native Plants, Recipes, Sustainable Gardening, Sustainable Living, Teaching Gardening | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Sourdough In Recovery

Posted on January 25, 2021 by Ann Lovejoy
Print Friendly, PDF & Email

A sourdough elder and a youngster gaining strength together

We Love What We Love

With all that’s been going on lately, I‘ve been so anxious and distracted that I made a terrible mistake; I forgot to set aside some sourdough starter before adding other ingredients for bread (lots of garlic as well as basil salt and gluten flour). Those ingredients change the texture, the color and the smell, and I wasn’t at all sure that I could salvage my beloved starter. I dumped a few cupfuls into another bowl, added water and flour, and hoped for the best. Weirdly, I found myself blinking back tears. Really? Crying over my bread starter? Well, yes; I’m very fond of my starter. Ok, I love it. It smells exciting and makes fantastic bread. Just having it quietly bubbling away on my counter feels companionable, friendly, something I can count on. It’s humble, but it’s alive, it even responds with enthusiastic bubbling when I feed it. Its loss was one more on top of so many others; so many griefs, so many horrors, so many distresses, and it felt like one loss too many.

Part of me felt ridiculous for grieving over a bowl of flour and water and yeast, but of course there was a lot more going on. After the Inauguration, I unconsciously assumed that everything would be moving forward again and my battered spirits would recover. Clearly there is a long road ahead, but it leads ahead, not behind. All good, right? Well, not really. Not yet. Recovery from trauma takes time, not to mention accumulating enough benign experiences to balance out the past. Despite the positive changes already taking place, I can’t forget that almost everything that gives me delight is in trouble. As John Muir so famously observed, everything in this world is connected to everything else, and pretty much everything is in a mess right now. If I meditate on the ocean, I know it’s fuller of plastic and pollution that we suspected. If I think about forests, I know the trees are stressed and under attack from pests and diseases. So are frogs, birds, insects, plants, you name it. Climate change is shifting weather patterns and pushing plants and creatures to adapt faster every year. In the middle of the night, I find myself wondering sadly what kind of future my grandkids will find in twenty years, or ten.

Recovery Takes Time

After the last few years and especially 2020, it’s no surprise that some of life’s joys are harder to appreciate. It may take time before we feel secure enough to allow ourselves to relax into happiness. Sourdough, too takes time to rebuild. In case my attempt to resuscitate my original starter failed, I made a brand new batch. I mixed a little water and flour in a small bowl and set it on the counter where my sourdough starter always sits. Every day, I added a little more flour and water, figuring that the natural wild yeasts in my kitchen would repopulate the new starter. Sure enough, in three days, the new starter was starting to bubble as it fermented. It already smells good, but lacks the deeper tang of the mature starter. However, the rescued starter does indeed seem to be recovering; it resembles the original more every day. As it reawakens, so does my hope. My heart lifts when the smell of baking bread fills the house and I, too, feel that recovery is on the way. It just takes time.

Original Sourdough Starter

Sourdough is prehistoric, what our ancestors around the world used to make bread in one form or another. All it needs is flour, water, wild yeasts, and time. It takes a few days for a starter to develop, and the longer it matures, the better your bread will taste. If you’ve tried making sourdough and been unhappy with the result, try this “wet” technique, which is both forgiving and delicious.

Basic Sourdough Starter

1/2 cup water
1/2 cup unbleached flour

In a glass or ceramic bowl, vigorously combine flour and water and let stand at room temperature. Add 1/4 cup water and flour each morning and evening, and stir vigorously several times a day for 3-4 days until bubbly. Now feed it 3-4 times a day, stirring vigorously to incorporate plenty of air, until you have more than enough for a loaf of bread (2-3 cups). It’s better to feed a little several times than to dump in a lot of flour and expect a young starter to be able to digest it quickly. Always feed starter last thing at night and first thing in the morning. When it’s ready to use, starter will be a little soupy and slightly spongy. Before you start baking, pour about 2 cups into a glass jar, cover and refrigerate for up to a week.

Refresh refrigerated starter by pouring it into a glass or ceramic bowl; if there’s tan liquid on top of the starter, pour it off. Add 1/4 cup water and 1/4 cup flour now and every few hours, stirring vigorously. It’s best to give starter a day or so of feeding to fully activate. If you have more than you need, make extra bread for neighbors (generosity is good for the soul).

For Better Texture

If you love the chewy tenderness of bakery bread, the secret ingredient is gluten flour (vital gluten). It’s very high in protein, and a couple of tablespoons will turn an average loaf into a splendid one. Wet sourdough tends to spread wide rather than rise high, so for the best rise and texture, bake it off in a standard loaf pan or round casserole dish. Experiment with making rolls from extra starter so you get a feel for how much of a given added ingredient you prefer. I usually add about 1 tablespoon fresh minced garlic, 1/4 cup of chopped herbs or grated cheese to each 4 cup batch of dough. Form quarter-cups of dough into balls and put them into an oiled muffin pan or baking dish. Let rise until doubled (an hour or more), then bake at 400 degrees F for 15-20 minutes.

Classic Sourdough Loaves or Rounds (makes 2)

4 cups recently fed, wet sourdough starter
4-5 cups bread flour
4 tablespoons gluten flour
3 teaspoons kosher or sea salt

Stir a few cups of bread flour, the gluten flour and the salt into the wet starter, then add just enough flour to make a soft dough (if it’s sticky, keep wetting your hands rather than adding more flour). Turn on the oven light (this heats the oven to the right rising temperature) and place a bowl of boiling water on the middle rack. Set dough to rise next to the water. Let dough rise for an hour, divide in half and knead each piece by hand (100 turns) until smooth and elastic. Place each kneaded loaf into an oiled pan or dish and slash the tops three or four times to assist rise. Return loaves to the unheated oven (leave light on) to rise for an hour or so. Take them out of the oven, preheat oven to 400 degrees and bake the loaves for 20 minutes. Reduce oven to 350 and bake for another 20 minutes or until internal temperature reaches 180 degrees. Let cool a bit on a rack before slicing. Makes 2 loaves.

Posted in Care & Feeding, Nutrition, Recipes, Sustainable Living, Vegan Recipes | Tagged , , | 4 Comments

Stay Strong, Eat Real Honey

Posted on January 18, 2021 by Ann Lovejoy
Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Avoid adulterated honey; buy local!

Calming And Decluttering

Like so many people, I’ve been feeling overwhelmed and battered by the news lately. If breaking news is breaking your spirit, take a break and focus on something positive. While reading through articles and interviews for Martin Luther King Day, I was reminded of something Dr. King once said: “Life’s most persistent and urgent question is ‘what are you doing for others?’” Even in our various states of shutdown/lockdown, there are dozens if not hundreds of actions we can take from home to push for positive change and social justice. If you can’t think of any offhand, I sympathize warmly; if I didn’t have a couple of helpful tools to keep me focussed, I wouldn’t be able to think at all. Some of my favorite tools offer prompts and reminders that make it, if not easy, at least a lot simpler to keep contributing with thoughts, words and deeds. Here are a few:

Americans Of Conscience
Jen Hofmann’s website says: “If you believe that diversity is our greatest strength, that respect, truth, and compassion matter, and that we are called to love our neighbor, you are an American of conscience.” Visit here to learn more and sign up for notifications:

Home

5 Calls
https://5calls.org/about/
This site helps us target issues we care most about and offer constructive comments to those who can act for us.

Calming Meditation Practices

While walking this morning I met a neighbor who’d just had a heart attack scare; thankfully, it turned out to be acid reflux but she and I agreed that our anxiety is at an all time high, for ourselves, for family and community, and for our country. She said she was looking for some new guided meditations to try, hoping they would help her find her balance. My own favorite meditation guides include wildlife sounds and temple bells as well as the sound of waves on sandy beaches. There are zillions of wave video loops to watch and listen to but they vary greatly in intensity and types. I had to search through dozens to find the one I now use a great deal. (See below for links.)

Support Local Bees & Beekeepers

Seeking a little sweetness? I sure am, but was horrified by an article detailing the way adulterated Chinese honey is crashing the market and putting small scale beekeepers out of business around the world. Clearly, we can help by not buying any honey that isn’t local and/or Fair Trade, starting with local farmer’s market vendors. We can ask local stores to only carry unadulterated honey from trusted sources. As gardeners, we can go a step farther and devote as much space as possible to plants that nurture and support bees and other pollinators, many of which are in dire decline. Native wildflowersare a great place to start, from Nemophila and Clarkia to Eschscholzia and Limnanthes and many more.

We can also plant all sorts of season extenders, since research shows that when native pollinator plants are supplemented with long bloomers of many kinds, a wider range of pollinators will flourish. In one four year study, beds with the most flowers at any given time got the most pollinator visits. Beds with native and near-native (related species) mixes were the most popular with the greatest number and variety of pollinators overall. However, as the flowering season wore on, pollinator attention shifted to exotic plants that extended the floral displays. The final recommendation was to plant mixtures of native, near-native, and exotic plants with the aim of having bloom for as long as possible. What gardener can resist such a delicious challenge? We can even learn to identify at least some of the pollinators as well, a fascinating study in its own right. North America is home to over 4,000 kinds of bees, many of which admittedly look pretty similar. Others, however, are quite distinctive and it’s well worth spending some time with an insect guide to learn to recognize our tiny neighbors. Good resources include bugguide.net and the USDA/Forest Service online guide called Bee Basics.

A Sweet Soother

The more we learn about our companion pollinators, the more we want to nurture and support them. Happily, simply offering a broad palette of pesticide-free plants will take us a long way toward that goal. While European honeybees are social creatures that share a hive, most of our natives are solitary bees that nest in the ground, in fallen logs and old stumps, or even in clumps of wild grasses. Like organic farmers, we can establish untended ‘bug bank’ areas where beneficial insect nests won’t be disturbed. Another great reason to be less tidy!

In the meantime, here’s a lovely way to enjoy real local honey, especially if you have a seasonal scratchy throat.

Honey Lemon Ginger Soother

4 cups water
1/4 cup chopped organic ginger root
1 organic lemon, juiced, rind grated
1/4 cup raw local honey

Bring water to boil in a saucepan, add ginger, grated lemon zest and honey and bring back to a simmer. Simmer, partly covered, for 15 minutes, then strain into a glass jar. Add lemon juice and stir well. Drink hot; refrigerate extra in a glass jar for up to 3 days, reheat before serving. Makes about 4 cups.

The story behind fake honey:
https://www.wired.co.uk/article/honey-fraud-detection?utm_source=Nature+Briefing&utm_campaign=64539fc790-briefingdy-20210118&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c9dfd39373-64539fc790-43629625

Zen Ocean Waves (no music)

Guided Meditation: Clear The Clutter

 

 

Posted in Annual Color, Butterfly Gardens, Care & Feeding, Garden Prep, Gardening With Children, Health & Wellbeing, Nutrition, pests and pesticides, Plant Diversity, Pollination Gardens, Pollinators, Recipes, Social Justice, Sustainable Gardening, Sustainable Living | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment