“Femivore” is such an unfortunate term…

…because, as FeministPhilosophers points out, doesn’t it technically mean “someone who eats women”? Hmm.

I was poking around on EcoYogini’s blog yesterday, and followed her to VeganBurnout, who made me laugh and also think…and followed her to the New York Times op ed piece that started the whole thing: The Femivore’s Dilemma. (For those who don’t feel like following the link, it’s essentially about all these back-to-the-land chicken-raising stay-at-home women, and it has a disturbing edge of implying that while just staying at home taking care of a house and kids may not be feminist enough, staying at home building chicken coops and hoeing veggies and canning tomatoes is not only feminist enough but maybe even more feminist than, say, having a job and a paycheck and benefits and all.) (For the record, IMNSHO: feminism isn’t about a list of things women can or can’t do. Feminism is about equality and partnership and being able to choose what’s best for one and one’s family based on one’s character, skills, talents, and choices, rather than on whether one has a penis.)

I find the article disturbing on many levels. Mostly because I’ve never heard an article paint my own brand of feminism in such an unfeminist light. And because it assumes that any person doing these things is probably a woman–it feels like someone’s trying to redefine what is “women’s work” as opposed to letting whatever work gets done be done by whoever will do it best.

Contrast the Times’ approach with the one taken by Globe And Mail in their article Meet the Radical Homemaker: Good-Bye Rat Race, Hello Vegetable Garden. For starters, the first line refers to a “new breed of stay-at-home men and women” who’ve made the choice to create more and more of their own resources rather than making more money to buy them from someone else.  It interviews men and women who take this role in the family, and it’s a much more well-rounded article in general.  Put it this way: here’s the photo heading up the article in the Times:

And here’s the one for the GlobeAndMail:

A little contrast, no? (I mean, a calico dress and shawl? Come on…I mean, it’s very pretty and all, but it’s so Laura Ingalls…)

Which brings us to Shannon Hayes’ book Radical Homemakers, about this very topic. Anyone read it? Anyone have any reviews or advice to offer?  I’m about to order it for my Kindle…

Afternoon of domesticity (crockpot rice pudding risotto)

This is my busiest work week of the year.  It’s insane.  Way too much to do, and way more organization than my brain can deal with.  (I’m just not a linear thinker, I tend to jump around–and this week I not only have to be linear and cover a lot of big-picture and small-detail bases, but I have to do it in several linear streams at once. Oy.)

Yesterday afternoon I had a little respite, though, and in my usual vein, rather than doing something intelligent like, oh, taking a nap, I went into this burst of homey activity.  None of it was difficult, but it was all the kind of thing that I hope will yield long-lasting (through the week, at least) rewards.

Risotto Rice Pudding in the Crockpot–This is one of my favorite comfort foods, right after baked egg custard (which I now know how to make in the microwave).  I previously posted a recipe for making this rice pudding in the oven, which was absolutely delicious, but tonight I tried it in the crock instead.  Lower maintenance, and easier to make more of.   It was yummy, and much easier than any of my previous incarnations–I put 8 cups of milk, 1 cup arborio rice, and 8 tbs. sugar into the crockpot, added a few generous shakes of nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger, and ground cloves (very generous with the cinnamon; not as generous with the cloves), maybe a tsp. of vanilla extract, and cooked it all on low for about 3-4 hours. I was lifting the lid and stirring a lot during the last hour, too.  In the meantime, I soaked 2/3 of a cup or so of currants in maybe half a cup of frangelico liqueur–you could use brandy or any other liqueur if you wanted, or cream sherry would be nice too–or you could use juice if you don’t want any alcohol–for the duration.  At the end of the 3-4 hours when the rice was all soft and the whole thing had a sort of creamy texture (it thickens up a good bit when it cools), I dumped the currants and liqueur into the pudding. (Most recipes say to drain the currants; I say the hell with that.) Stir it up good–since the pudding is still steaming hot, I figure most of the alcohol cooks off, right?  I added a lot more spices at this point too, to sort of freshen them. This is a lovely, yummy, comforting pudding with no fat in it beyond whatever was in your milk to begin with, and not an excessive amount of sugar either. (Verdict from later that night…okay, this is beyond lovely and yummy, this is flipping AMBROSIA.)

Black Beans–now that my husband is allowed to reintroduce some of his potentially allergic foods one at a time, we’re starting with the black beans.  I did the quick-soak method (bring to a boil for about 5 minutes, turn off the heat, let sit covered for at least an hour), then drained and rinsed them and simmered them slowly for a couple of hours with a little salt and thyme in the water. (I would have used a bay leaf, but I discovered too late that I’m out.) These will go into chili, burritos, quesadillas, soups, heck, all over the place!  And I will freeze a bunch of them by putting half a cup into each muffin tin and freezing them, so when I need to thaw smaller quantities they’ll be there and ready to go.  They’re also really easy in the crockpot, but my crockpot was busy and my counter too messy to allow for two going at once. Sigh.

Brown Rice–again, cooked in quantity, it’s something I can pull out all week for breakfasts, snacks, dinners, to throw under chili, whatever.  Two parts water to one cup rice, simmer half an hour or so till done.  I make 6-8 cups at a time and they last the week.

Chili–okay, I haven’t finished it yet, but it’s what the rice and beans were in preparation for…and The Man has been Craving Meat.  So I bought a measly pound of organic ground beef (which I know is still not sustainable for all its organic-ness–but if doing this once every 4 months or so can keep the “why don’t we eat more meat” pleas at bay, it’s worth it), and into the crock this morning I threw the beef, a bag of frozen bell peppers, a chopped up onion, and a few cups of beans.  Threw a few tablespoons of chili powder on top of that and added some extra ground chilis and garlic, a pinch of unsweetened cocoa powder, and a good shake of cinnamon, and threw a can or two of diced tomatoes on top of that.  When I come home from work I’ll futz with it and check out the seasonings, make sure they’re what I want them to be, and doubtless add a bunch  more chili powder and other seasonings.  This chili is not particularly sexy, no one’s famous secret family recipe, nothing to go “ohmigodwow” over–but it’s a good solid filling healthy (except for that beef) dinner that is easy to freeze portions of for later, or save for other nights this week when I know I won’t have energy or time to cook.  (Now my crockpot green chicken chili recipe is something to wow over a bit, but I’m not making that this week.)  Served over brown rice, it’s a Real Dinner.

And then the Man and I watched 24 (if the world recycled its goods the way that show recycles plots, we’d be in good shape!) while munching on homemade multigrain fresh artisan-baked bread with olive oil and grated parmesan. I guess as fattening vices go this is as good a one as any, and better than ice cream or chips.  It’s our weekly (whenever I’m home and have time to make bread–which is to say maybe monthly if we’re lucky) ritual, and it wasn’t a bad way to spend the only evening I’ll have at home this week…

[UPDATE: I made the rice pudding again yesterday with 2/3 cups arborio rice and 8 cups of milk; it's an even nicer texture, IMO...depends whether you want more of the rice or more of the creamy part...]

Almond Joy and Twinkies, oh my…

Okay, someone’s stealing my internet niche–and doing a better job at it.

I may have come up with a quick “imitation quickie Nutella,” but these are recipes for DIY Almond Joy candy bars, and Twinkies.

Now the Twinkies I could easily live without; they aren’t my thing. (Why waste calories on something with no chocolate at all? Though I might use their Vanilla Cream recipe to create organic Ho-Ho’s or something…) But Almond Joy candy bars…yummmmm….

It’ll be a while before I have time to try this, but if anyone else does, please let me know…

Green as status symbol?

This article on Eco-Salon was intriguing…“Sustainable Status: Are you Going Green to Be Seen?”

After reading this, I started poking around to see who else has been visiting the topic…Earth911 poses a similar question: Is Buying “Green” All About  Status?” Peter Howard in “Green as a Status Symbol” makes some fairly incisive points, and Smart Planet in their article about the swiftly growing “green toddler toys” market asks the pointed question of whether it’s greener to go out and buy “green” toys or to simply buy fewer better ones that are then handed down from child to child or generation to generation.

Sustainable Business deliberately capitalizes on the phenomenon, inviting companies to “associate their name” with sustainable energy rather than stadiums or theaters.  Businesses seem to be realizing there’s a lot of money to be made in this whole green thing.

Despite some who think green was sort of last year, that it’s no longer the new black, I’m not sure I have a problem with it either way…for whatever reason people do it, if people are making the greener choices, it’s a good thing as far as I’m concerned.

Gesundheit! (thank you)

We are sick.  Nothing dramatic, just the Common Painintheass Cold.  The whole household. My husband and I have it the worst.  And he’s horribly busy at work, and I’m entering the toughest week of the year with the longest hours, so “sick days” aren’t really an option. (Besides, we have kids. No sick days for parents.)

No one has time to cook, no one wants to cook.  Or shop.  And we’re both fairly alt-med and aren’t big on most of the over-the-counter meds, since they don’t seem to work anyway. So we are going into our default mode:

Traditional Medicinal Teas: Throat Coat and Cold Care PM.  The Traditional Medicinal line of teas is awesome, and we have about seven different boxes in our drawers–but these are the two we come back to again and again.  The Throat Coat has licorice, slippery elm, marsh-mallow, wild cherry, and fennel–with some cinnamon and orange peel for flavor.  I actually really like it, and it’s the absolute best ever for healing a trashed voice.  (I had to sing a church service this morning, and between the Throat Coat and Dr. Thayers Slippery Elm Lozenges, I did not disgrace myself.)  The Cold Care has elder, linden, chamomile, yarrow, eucalyptus, and more licorice, with a few other things–good for relaxing, decongesting a bit, building up the immune system, and such.  When both of us are sick, it’s easy–we just brew a pot at a time, sometimes with two tea bags of each of the two teas, and just slurp them down. (Key is brewing them as instructed–15-20 minutes, and keep the tea covered while it’s brewing!)

I’m also a fan of liquid echinacea, a few drops in some juice or water several times a day.  I’ve taken to making my own tinctures, and have an “immune booster” tincture of echinacea root, lemon balm, yarrow, lavender, chamomile, and a few other goodies…but you can easily buy it or something like it at Whole Foods or other natural stores.

At night we spray our pillows with a eucalyptus essential oil spray.  I used to actually use a diffuser more often, to keep the essential oils in the air–they are actually one of the best “room sanitizers” you’re ever going to find, if you put the right blend of oils in there. Nature’s Gift has some really good anti-germ blends that are great diffused through the house or office.  I haven’t been doing it lately for the deep philosophical reason that I never found the box with my diffuser in it after we moved a year and a half ago.  Coincidentally, I’ve been sick a lot during that year and a half. Hmm. But the eucalyptus is good for clearing our sinuses out a good bit a night and helps us sleep.

We are also huge hot soup fans, even if the kids won’t eat it.  So tomorrow, since no one will feel like cooking, it’ll be crockpot mushroom and barley soup:

• Chop up an onion and some celery and a few carrots and throw them into the crockpot
• Quarter a few small golden potatoes, toss ‘em in too.
• Chop up half a pound of mushrooms, any kind
• Add a cup or so of barley
• Over it all pour 6 cups mushroom broth, or a little more, or a little less, whatever
  
• Cook on low all day, maybe 8 hours.  Season if needed with garlic, tarragon, salt, pepper…
• 20 minutes before serving, if desired, toss in some chopped frozen spinach
  

Hard to beat this.  And it’s one of many soup possible variations–the crockpot was invented for soup, as far as I’m concerned.  And we’ll eat this stuff for days–you can add new things to the leftovers, add more broth, add more veggies, and it’s like The Soup That Never Dies. (As long as there’s no meat in it, it keeps quite well for several days.)

The best cure for the common cold  is prevention, of course, and the best prevention I’ve ever found is staying rested and avoiding stress, something I’ve failed at miserably these past couple of weeks.   But with any luck, some good rest now can help kick it quickly enough that I can get through my next week…

I so heart Michelle Obama…

Check this out over at Food Politics: Michelle Obama addressed the Grocery Manufacturers Association about her plan to check the childhood obesity epidemic we’ve got going.  Good article, good speech, I love the First Lady!

Michelle Obama to Grocery Manufacturers: Let’s Move!

Ready to sew spring dresses (if I had time!)

I am the laziest seamstress ever.  Seriously.  And I’m easily intimidated by anything I have never tried before.  Like zippers and buttonholes. (They honestly don’t look that difficult, I just have never quite learned to do it and thus it is intimidating to me.)  Fashioning garments without zippers and buttonholes, as you can imagine, rules out a lot.

Fortunately, it doesn’t rule out a lot of the spring and summer kinds of clothes I love to wear. I’m big on the loose-comfy-dresses-and-skirts thing, and my sewing repertoire reflects that in spades. I’m very gypsy-bohemian-unstructured in my preferred clothing styles, something I don’t get to indulge during the winter when it’s all slacks and sweaters and earth tones…if I learned to sew better maybe I could, but for the moment I’m a bit limited.

I also really dislike using paper patterns–they slip and slide everywhere, and I hate trying to keep track of “match dot A to notch B” kinds of things, and nothing ever matches up right when I try to do it.  (Well, that’s not quite true–I can get them to work, but I don’t have any fun doing it, and if I hate doing it, what’s the point? Making my own clothes isn’t that green that it’s worth making myself miserable over it.)

Fortunately I’ve found a few patterns I can make over and over again, and they are really easy to do and have sort of become wardrobe staples.  I blogged over the winter about my Easy Flannel Nightgown pattern (not really mine, actually),which is basically a Renaissance-faire-type chemise made out of cozy flannel–make it out of lightweight cotton or linen, shorten the sleeves, and bingo, there’s a spring nightgown.  Reduce the amount of fabric in the bodice–maybe only 10-15 inches around larger than your own bust; you’ll still want a little poofiness–and shorten it to waist-length and it’s a very nice non-bulky peasant-type blouse. (Or you could leave it longer, a la chemise, and have a built-in slip for whatever skirt you’re wearing it under!)

And speaking of skirts–full summer skirts are almost no-brainers.  Find cute fabric, sew a tube, put some elastic in the top, hem the bottom, and that’s about it.  If you want one that’s really full, you may want to look for a circle skirt pattern or try a three-tiered skirt. (These are fun to wear but sort of a pain to make, IMO. For the circle you have to hem on a curve, and the three-tier involves a lot of gathering, which I hate. )  Or you can look here for all kinds of skirt–and other clothing–patterns.  Most pretty easy, most without a pinnable paper pattern really needed.

My absolute favorite purchased pattern actually came from my maternity dress days, when I also lived in that optomistic dreamland wherein I thought I’d have time to sew myself some lovely nursing clothes.  That never happened. (At some point I did convert a couple nursing t-shirts, which served very well, but that’s as far as it got.) But during that time I bought the Elizabeth Lee Patterns #302–which is a FANTASTIC and versatile easy dress pattern.  So far I think I’ve made about 7 of them, all different in some way.  I had three maternity dresses from this pattern (angled the front piece out a good bit from the belly), my black “formal” is matte jersey with a wide sash, and I have 3 more just for basic summertime “need to look decent” wear. Plus I was able to easily alter two of the maternity ones back for normal wear. (The third was the one I was wearing when I actually went into labor, and I discovered that I had no desire to ever wear that dress again in any form, because it always threw me back to a fairly uncomfortable afternoon and evening! Besides, it was really really huge, month 8 sized, and would have needed serious alteration.)

This is a fabulous pattern.  If you make it out of a knit, you don’t even have to face the sleeves and neck, you just turn under and do a little hem.  Two seams up the sides, back ties.  Incredibly forgiving to almost any figure shape or size, can be casual or formal completely depending on what fabric you use. I balked at first at the idea of spending $14 on a pattern when Simplicity ones go on sale for $1.99 every couple of months, but I have about 20 conventional $1.99 patterns I’ve never actually even used, and I’ve used the Elizabeth Lee 7 times.  You do the math.

Then there’s this one, which I just discovered: the One Hour Dress.  It’s available from a whole bunch of places as a downloadable e-book kind of thing, but as far as I’m concerned there’s absolutely no purpose to spend upwards of $15 on it from most of the sites that come up first in the Google searches when you can get it for $5 at Emailed Vintage Patterns. (Cute site! I wish they had more patterns, though…) It’s sort of a simple twenties-style dress, with drop-waist, and almost infinitely variable, and it looks like it’ll be very cute and easy to make. And fairly figure-forgiving, especially if I put a wide sash in exactly the place where my belly would otherwise want to bulge a bit.   And my daughter, who actually is tall and thin (as opposed to me, since I’m tall and not-so-thin), would look adorable in one of these…

I honestly have no idea if I’ll have time for any of this…but I really want to try.  I’m so sick of winter, and I’m sick of shuffling my fabric hoard around, and I want to make something!

Another night with no time to cook

Sometimes it’s nice to know I Still Got It.

Okay, so there was some pre-prepared and/or processed-ness going on here, but still it was a good meal that was largely from good fresh ingredients and turned out pretty darned healthy.

Last night I went, for the first time in a while, to my old “Chicken+jar of sauce+vegetables in crockptot=dinner” method of cooking.  I threw some frozen boneless chicken pieces (not organic or free range, unfortunately) into the crockpot–maybe 3 thighs and two breasts?–a bag of frozen peppers and onions, about 6 smallish yukon potatoes, and a jar of Trader Joe Thai Red Curry sauce went on top of that.

On low for 6-7  hours.  Dinner done.  If I’d remembered I would have thrown a bag of spinach in there too over the last twenty minutes or so.  Served over brown rice I made in quantity a few days ago.  This will probably feed us for three nights.

Those Trader Joe jarred sauces are really very good–almost without exception.  This one I might also try next time without the meat–a few more potatoes or sweet potatoes and some additional veggies like cauliflower, carrots, broccoli, peas, and so forth–and it’d probably be really yummy.  Admittedly the chicken cooking in it gave the sauce a nice brothy flavor, but I bet it’d still be good.

And now we have leftovers for tomorrow…whew, good, because I won’t have any time to cook then either.

The Breakfast Mission: Yogurt Smoothies

My breakfast mission has sort of fallen by the wayside.  I’m just not hungry at 7:30 in the morning.  And regardless of whether or how much I eat at 7:30, I’m always hungry at 9:30.  So if I can just wait and eat breakfast then, it’s much easier for me…but I’m still trying. So I wondered, can I drink my breakfast?

One of the staples I’ve learned to make myself has been yogurt–another of those labor-light, time-heavy processes that nonetheless can save one a lot of money!

Unfortunately, it’s still an uneven process for me.  I haven’t figured out exactly why sometimes the yogurt is nice and thick and other times it’s very runny. (Still tastes really nice, but is runny nonetheless!)  Part of it probably has to do with the heating/cooling process, part of it probably has to do with the temperature of the milk when you innoculate it with the yogurt cultures (too hot or too cold and it doesn’t work right…)

So this time I have a lot of runny yogurt.  Not as good for kids’ lunches, but very good for smoothies–a great breakfast or snack.  I lived on these things when I was preggers, both times–the blender was our most oft-used appliance for those collective 16 months. (Yes, I was one of those women who only incubated each kid for about 8 months, had  spontaneous and complication-free 6  hour labors, and popped ‘em out.  Don’t hate me–the pregnancies were fairly rough, and I got slammed with a really nasty case of PPD each time; I’d gladly have added 20+ hours  to each labor if it had meant I could skip the hellish 7 months that followed, not that there’s any causality there…but I digress.)

There are at least as many smoothie recipes as there are oatmeal recipes–or more.  It’s not even worth it to call it a “recipe,” really–just toss into the blender whatever you want.  Half a cup of yogurt, a banana, and some frozen strawberries. (Frozen fresh fruit with no sugar added is easy to find anywhere these days, and it’s wonderful!)  A cup of yogurt and a handful of blueberries.  Skip the yogurt and do just fruit with a little juice to make it all runny enough.  If it’s your thing, you can throw stuff like bee pollen or spirulina or protein powder in it. (Umm…ick. But whatever.) If you’re dealing with less sweet fruits, add a little honey or maple syrup.  Cinnamon is a nice addition to almost anything. And save those brown bananas–just peel them and break them into chunks, toss them into a ziploc, and throw them in the freezer for smoothie time. (Any smoothie with a banana is less likely to need added sweetener.)

When I’m to lazy to get out the blender, I just do yogurt with a little orange juice, honey, and cinnamon; really easy and tasty.

In addition to being a great breakfast, these things are a great snack or dessert for kids–Mom gets to be a hero for allowing seconds of something that’s essentially nonfat milk, healthy probiotics, and fresh fruit!

Soda Bread revisited…with humility.

Okay, after sort of dissing soda bread the other day, I need to go back and do a little retracting.

I did a bit of internet research on it yesterday to figure out what “real” soda bread actually was–and it was sort of surprising.

Real Irish Soda Bread does not have eggs.  It does not have butter cut into the flour.  It does not even have raisins. (With raisins it’s called “Spotted Dog.”) It absolutely doesn’t have yeast. It has only four ingredients: flour, baking soda, salt, and buttermilk.  (Here’s a really good page with a lot of info.)

Last night for St. Paddy’s Day dinner I made soda bread–or, actually, Spotted Dog–for the family as sort of a side dish since I knew the kids would eat it. This is what I did:

• In a large bowl, mix 1 cup wheat flour, 1 cup white flour, 1/2 tsp baking soda, 1/2 tsp salt, and about 2/3 cup currants. (Okay, and 2 tbs sugar.)
• Make a well in the center and pour in 2/3 cup yogurt (I didn’t have buttermilk, but I made yogurt the other day and it was much runnier than it was supposed to be, so we’ll be drinking a lot of smoothies…)
• Mix well, just till it forms a soft dough. Press dough into a round or square cake pan.
• Bake at 375 for half an hour or so or until golden brown on top

This was really good!  And look at the ingredients–there is almost nothing even remotely unhealthy in there, let alone processed…no wonder the Irish survived on this stuff!  I’ll be making this again and again…