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  1. K

    Tomato Growing Tips That Actually Work: What I Learned After 6 Years

    If you’ve tried everything to grow great tomatoes but still end up with weak plants, tiny harvests, or no fruit at all—you are not alone.... The post Tomato Growing Tips That Actually Work: What I Learned After 6 Years appeared first on Audrey's Little Farm.
  2. K

    How to Save Cilantro Seeds for Next Season’s Garden

    Saving your own seeds is one of the most rewarding and budget-friendly things you can do in the garden. And cilantro is one of the... The post How to Save Cilantro Seeds for Next Season’s Garden appeared first on Audrey's Little Farm.
  3. K

    Seasonal Seasoning Butters

    At this glorious time of year, perennial edibles are coming up everywhere. Many of them are herbs used as seasoning for generations, and at this time of year I start making seasoning butters to take advantage of them at their best. The butters change throughout the season, according to what is...
  4. K

    A Rant on Green Garlic

    Every few years I permit myself to carry a bit about garden produce that is misunderstood. Judging from what I see at farmers markets, green garlic is misunderstood. Because here’s the important thing: green garlic is green. It is bright vibrant green and not yet yellow-green or beginning to...
  5. K

    For Love of Fermentation

    I have often read that restaurant Noma in Copenhagen is the best restaurant in the world now that El Bulli has closed. These all-time-best commendations always annoy me because I always suspect that the real best restaurant in the world is some Thai or Indonesian street stand that makes...
  6. K

    Fermentation II: Black Garlic and other goodies

    Yesterday’s post was about a truly remarkable cookbook, The Noma Guide to Fermentation. Today I’ll talk about a kind of high-temperature enzymatic reaction, the making of black garlic and other blackened goodies. Properly speaking this is a Maillard reaction and not a fermentation, but let’s not...
  7. K

    Fermentation III: Vinegar

    I first wrote about red wine vinegar in 2009, and while I have made and consumed it steadily since then, there didn’t seem to be much more to say about it. My husband gifted me with a marvelously cool 2 gallon oak barrel to keep it in, but the vinegar was the same. But then came The Noma Guide...
  8. K

    Fermentation IV: The Wine at Your Table.

    For the previous decades of my adulthood I had little or no interest in winemaking because I’m fond of good red wines and suspected that it would cost plenty to make wine at home and not produce a great result because I don’t have the right facilities for aging. But over the last year I’ve...
  9. K

    Fermentation V: Water Kefir

    I am experimenting with kombucha and its culinary uses, but for daily drinking I prefer water kefir. It’s a fermented drink with a mildly yeasty tangy flavor and none of the vinegary overtones of kombucha. It can be flavored in a lot of ways, and it’s quick and fun to make. It’s produced by a...
  10. K

    Fermentation VI: Lacto-fermentation

    I can’t say enough about how The Noma Guide to Fermentation is livening up my kitchen experiments, but I was fairly sure that I wouldn’t care much for ordinary lacto-fermentation. All fermented pickles and sauerkraut are made by this method, and with the exception of kimchi I’ve never really...
  11. K

    Fermentation VII: Umami Sauce

    At the beginning of the year I like to look back on what worked last year and what is still with me. My major category of experiments this fall and winter was fermentation, and this rich dark meaty sauce paste which incorporates multiple fermented ingredients is one of the clear winners. I try...
  12. K

    Fermentation VIII: Kefir Broth

    I love to make soups in the winter, and have often written about the wonders of homemade broth. I’ve never cared much for any vegetable broth that I have tasted, and I like the deep savoriness and the economy and thrift of making meat and chicken broth. But recently, more or less by accident, I...
  13. K

    Nettle Ale, and notes on the Drinkmate

    One of the nicest things about having an active permaculture garden is that you have strange plants around you in all phases of growth and you’re led to read and to experiment. A couple of months ago I found myself eyeing my healthy nettle patch, where the nettles were almost three feet tall and...
  14. K

    Leaf Ales for All Seasons

    I’ve had more inquiries about this post than about any other, so I’m re-upping it with a few subsequent notes: 1. The effect of fermentation on flavors is unpredictable and often wonderful. I am not at all a fan of beets, for instance, but one or two beets gives the brew a beautiful rosé color...
  15. K

    Semi-Permaculture Garlic

    Glorious spring is here. There are no leaves on the trees yet, but the fruit trees are starting to bloom, and the perennials are starting to show up. Green garlic is always the first vegetable of my gardening year, and it’s one of the most welcome. I have seen “green garlic” in stores and...
  16. K

    Early Spring: Collards

    My yard is full of perennial greens ready to harvest, but the first greens I harvest every year are last year’s collards. Kale may be a good winter green in snowier areas, but in my nearly snowless windy desert, kale has desiccated to death by mid-December. My winter stalwart is collards, and...
  17. K

    Passing pleasures: Hops shoots

    I decided to re-up this post on hops shoots without change because this is their brief season and because I still think that this is the best way to cook them. Many years ago I planted hops vines along my fences, planning to use the flowers for brewing. Not long afterwards, I gave up beer...
  18. K

    Leaf Ales for All Seasons

    I’ve had more inquiries about this post than about any other, so I’m re-upping it with a few subsequent notes: 1. The effect of fermentation on flavors is unpredictable and often wonderful. I am not at all a fan of beets, for instance, but one or two beets gives the brew a beautiful rosé color...
  19. K

    Greens: Early Spring Horta

    For gardeners, early spring is a time of great anticipation. This is the season when the growing season to come glows with perfection in your mind, completely removed from hard weather, pests, and general exhaustion. But it is also the time of the very first harvest, if you grow some perennial...
  20. K

    A Variation on Hortapita

    In my last post I wrote about horta made entirely from green alliums, the first greens of spring. Horta is very good all by itself, but it can also be fun to elaborate, and I have written before about hortapitas, the many types of greens pies that are filled with horta. They can be large or...
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