Spotted at a Local Shop
I stopped by Brambles in Belfast two weeks ago to purchase a few items and spotted these lovely cedar planters out front.
Naturally, I took some photos in hopes of being able to make my own. Having a few planters like this to create dividers in the garden would be really nice. I’m thinking of a spot in my garden in particular where I’d love to have a hedge of sorts, but snowfall and plowing won’t allow it. Lavender or boxwood in containers like this would be a fantastic option. They could easily be moved in during the summer and be tucked away in the garage or a shed during the winter.
Have you spotted any items recently you want to try to make for your garden?
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Friday Favorite: Meeting Farmers
The best part about sourcing your food locally is meeting the farmers who grow it. The community of people who love animals and love to garden is a great one to infuse yourself into. Yesterday I met Joss at Over the Moon farm to pick up a tom turkey for my poor lonely turkey hen.
She gave me a tour of her small farm. One of her goats had just kidded an hour before I arrived, the cow and many other goats were due any day now. There was a beautiful blind cow named Candy that she told me all about. She’s the companion cow for her dairy cow. She had wonderful stories to tell of how the sighted cow calls for the blind cow when she gets too far away and doesn’t know her surroundings.
There were muscovy ducks, guinea fowl, turkeys, geese, chickens, sheep, goats, cows, and a horse on her farm. Along with dogs and cats of course. We chatted for over and hour about all kinds of things.
Are you familiar with any farmers in your area?
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Maine Maple Sunday
Yesterday was Maine Maple Sunday, a day of sweetness all around Maine. People flock to the local sugarhouses and eat all sort of sweet maple goodness. My neighbor and I went to four different places, some large, some small, each unique.
We ate waffles with maple cream, pancakes with maple syrup, maple bread, maple cookies, maple donuts and the kids had ice cream with maple syrup on top. Even though it was bitterly cold and there were gale force winds it was a lovely way to celebrate the arrival of spring.
Do you have any local spring festivals that you like to attend?
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Freezing Avocados
A few weeks ago I ordered another box of avocados from Freckleman Farm. It’s a small farm, they only have 16 avocado trees. The variety is ‘Fuerte’ and they’re FANTASTIC!!!!!
I was really amazed at the quality of fruit. They were perfectly ripe and flavorful about 5 days after I received my box. They stayed fresh in my cool pantry for a week and a half. After eating them fresh on salads for the past 10 days, I decided it was time to freeze the rest of them so they wouldn’t go bad.
So I whipped them up with lime zest and juice (1/2 lime per avocado). Into small jars they went and I’ll enjoy the guacamole when I during the seasons when I can’t get fresh avocados.
I’m ordering another big box of these avocados because they’re so good. It’s difficult to find good avocados at the local stores around here, it seems they’re always bruised up and they go bad so quickly. It’s so nice to live in a time when you can order directly from small farms and get great produce!
Do you like avocados? What’s your favorite way to eat them?
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Did Somebody Say Bacon?
I finally got all the bacon in the freezer this week. It certainly is a lot of work to cure and smoke so much bacon. I figured we ended up with around 40 pounds of bacon per pig. I smoked it in two batches using clippings from our apple tree out front. I used the recipe from The River Cottage Meat Book because it was our favorite last year.
This year our pigs were a different breed. Mary breeds for specific characteristics in the meat and you can really tell. She did a great job. Our bacon was much meatier than it was last year. Looks like we won’t be running out of bacon any time soon! One of my favorite ways to enjoy bacon is on a salad, with avocados and eggs – mmmm.
What’s your favorite thing to enjoy with bacon: eggs, pancakes, french toast, burgers?
