California Dreaming

...o fall into the gloomy, apocalyptic trap of some of the other folks in the urban homesteading movement. After a enjoyable evening last night at a fundraiser for the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition, my dark mood lifted as I was reminded that good things are happening out there. Change comes slowly, one step at a time, requiring great patience. Like gardening, bread baking and home brewing there will be mistakes and setbacks. But there will als...

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Beans 101 (Return of Bean Friday!)

...k to that later.) Stock stuff ready for the pot Note I’m leaving the stock vegetables in big chunks because I intend to take them out later. I want my final product to be plain beans, not vegetable bean soup. Leaving the pieces big makes them easy to fish out at the end. The herbs are tied in a bundle with a piece of string for the same reason. The added benefit of this is that you don’t have to chop or peel to getting this together. Note I didn’t...

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The Jerusalem Cookbook

...enty of salad, vegetable, bean and grain recipes, so it’s friendly to both vegetarians and meat eaters. We’re mostly vegetarian, and we feel like we’ve only scratched the surface of the meatless offerings so far. Though there are a lot of veg recipes which use eggs, yogurt and cheese, there are also good vegan-friendly offerings. To give you a feel for the book, these are the recipes we’ve enjoyed so far. All are excellent: Swiss chard fritters (w...

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Saturday Tweets: Sheds, Roots and Odd Pie Shapes

...8, 2015 The real story behind the demise of America’s once-mighty streetcars http://t.co/lTZWUjdk3g via @voxdotcom — Root Simple (@rootsimple) May 8, 2015 Odd pie shapes of the 17th century: http://t.co/4Zhy9HZOaO — Root Simple (@rootsimple) May 7, 2015 An indoor garden built of veg scraps–looks like a fun thing for kids (and maybe some adults): http://t.co/n3h6pZqgwU — Root Simple (@rootsimple) May 6, 2015 A better way to live with bees: http://t...

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Moonshine

...preferably from a source that will lend itself to a pretty picture on the label — bottle it, and you’re in the vodka business.” As it turns out there is an art to good homemade moonshine — a far cry from the soulless mouthwash Archer-Daniels-Midlands turns out. Here’s some excerpts from an interview of ex-moonshiner John Bowman conducted by the Coal River Folklife Project from “Tending the Commons: Folklife and Landscape in Southern West Virginia...

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