Search Results for: label/food/page/40/2010/06/the-urban-homestead

677 results

Two Vegetable Gardening Commandments

Mr. Homegrown
Gardening, Vegetable Gardening
9 Comments
Two of our vegetable beds looking kinda shabby. I spent the Thanksgiving weekend up on the vegetable gardening equivalent of Mount Sinai receiving a set of revelations. Someday I’ll have Mrs. Homegrown transcribe the complete stone tablets (urbanite rather than stone, technically) I received in their entirety. In the meantime, I’ll share two of the commandments: 1. Thou shalt not have more vegetable beds than thou canst ma...

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Citron

Mr. Homegrown
Food, Gardening
5 Comments
The Citron (Etrog) and its anatomy. I just attended a fascinating lecture by fruit expert David Karp on the history of the citron (Citrus medica) or etrog in Aramaic. I’ve only encountered citron in a candied form buried deep within a fruit cake. I’ve also seen the bizarre Buddha’s Hand, another kind of citron popular in Asia as both food and medicine. What I did not know is the significance of citron in Jewish history...

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An open letter to Trader Joes

Mr. Homegrown
Animals, Chickens
15 Comments
Dear Trader Joes, First off we’re not an animal rights activists, nor are we even vegetarians. We’re just people who like honesty in packaging. So let’s take a look at the carton for your Grade AA Cage Free eggs and assess the truthfulness of the illustration on its cover. Now conventional wisdom says that you are to be congratulated for selling only cage free eggs in contrast to many other food retailers who continue to sell e...

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Changing Egg Habits

Mr. Homegrown
Animals, Chickens, Thoughtstylings
1 Comment
photo by Buzz Carter Got the last word in an Associated Press article on the egg recall: Egg recall has some changing buying, eating habits. Basically, I said small is beautiful–better to have lots of  people with four hens each rather than a few people with hundreds of thousands. Too bad food safety laws winding their way through Washington are being crafted to favor the big guys who caused this recent outbreak. More on that anon...

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The Whip: A Homemade Moisturizer How-To from Making It

Mrs. Homegrown
Calendula series, Domesticus, Herbs
98 Comments
A quick little project: lavender infused moisturizer, two Calendula/plantain salves and a chamomile infused lip balm. Enough unguents to see me through Christmas. Note 3/16/13: When I posted this I never expected this to become one of our most popular posts.  Since so many people are looking at this recipe, I feel like I should let you know a couple of things about it before you try it. 1) The first is that it is not perfect. I love it...

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Saturday Linkages: Makers, Haters and Beekeeping Donkeys

Mr. Homegrown
Saturday Linkages
1 Comment
...m/2012/11/step-by-step-tiny-home-design.html#.UKbP0iPHQeI.twitter … Open Source Ecology’s “Build Yourself”: http://boingboing.net/2012/11/14/open-source-ecologys-build.html … Popular Mechanics Magazines from the 1930s http://lloydkahn-ongoing.blogspot.com/2012/11/popular-mechanics-magazines-from-1930s.html#.UKbP-zJtCxE.twitter … People Are Suspicious About This Pee-Powered Generator http://motherboard.vice.com/2012/11/8/people-a...

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Feral Tomatoes on the Bayou

Mr. Homegrown
Food, Foraging
5 Comments
While walking along Houston’s Buffalo Bayou, just next to a concrete plant and under a bridge we stumbled on some feral tomatoes. We theorized that some fast food meal pitched in the gutter found it’s way into this meandering, heavily industrialized waterway. The tomatoes separated from the cheeseburger, floated to the surface of the water and were deposited on the muddy banks of the bayou. Houston’s hot and humid climate sprou...

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You’ve probably never met a soup like this

Mrs. Homegrown
Food, Recipes
5 Comments
Mushroom and Fruit Soup. Yep. I don’t know if you’re going to like this recipe. I did. Erik made it, which shocked me, because he has a general prejudice against savory fruit preparations. In fact, he has a general prejudice against soup, seeing it somehow as being a substandard food form. Nonetheless, he cooked this soup.  I smelled it first, as it was cooking, and it smelled really good. Then I saw it in the pot, and said, “...

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Saturday Linkages: Mules, Turfgrass, Foraging and the End of Backyard Citrus

Mr. Homegrown
Saturday Linkages
6 Comments
Emily Ho, a fellow Master Food Preserver trainee, foraged a Silver Lake salad. (Photo by Emily Ho) A Silver Lake Salad http://sustainablefoodworks.com/2012/04/09/a-silver-lake-salad/ via @ misschiffonade   Mule-based bookmobiles for remote Venezuelan communities: http://boingboing.net/2012/04/20/mule-based-bookmobiles-for-rem.html   Dismiss Cyclists At Your Own Peril: The Jackson Huang Lesson – Eagle Rock, CA Patch http://eagleroc...

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More Cargo Bike Porn

Mr. Homegrown
Bikes
4 Comments
In honor of bike to work week another round of cargo bikes, this time with photos courtesy of comrade Colin Bogart, former board president of the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition. These bikes were part of this February’s North American Handmade Bicycle Show in Portland. Get our your wallet, because these wheels are spendy. Here’s a very heavy looking bike for carrying your apples around with. It’s by Black Sheep Bikes of Fo...

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