Scene in Alburgh: UVM Crops and Soils Field Day

We received an invitation to this event held last Thursday at Borderview Farm, and were interested in viewing the oil extraction operation.

Chicken on the Grill

 My invite didn't include information about a chicken barbecue, but they had that, too!  (Grill envy)

Hop Fields

As the tour began, I looked through my binder and read that in addition to hops, corn, and forages, they were running wheat trials.  I am allergic to wheat, and never exposed myself to either pollen or plants, and immediately lost interest in moving closer to that end of the field (near the sunflower plots).

Beer Hops

Ah well, Dan and I left after about 1/2 an hour, having seen most of what we came for, and needing to begin pre-farmer's market duties back home.

Weekend Cook: Chine Pork Roast

Pork Roast

 We fired up the Traeger pig smoker at 225f to 250f for this cook, which took about two hours for the roast to reach 144f internal.

This was a new cut for me, which the butcher said is mostly sirloin, bone-in - and the top round (pale color), I think. I coated it in turbinado sugar and the house rub of mostly paprika, onion powder and garlic powder.

I also made up a foil packet of previously boiled potatoes, thinly sliced raw carrots, onions, and kolrabi (plus, salt, pepper and 2 thin pats of butter).  The roast would not take long to cook, so the potatoes could not be raw to start with.

The probe with the lead is 10 degrees off, so I had to keep checking with the Thermapen.  140f is fine for pork, just remove from the heat, cover with foil and a heavy towel for about 20 minutes while it rests and finishes cooking.

Burlington Farmers' Market # 13: 71 and Pleasant

(Dan is setting up another tent for folks and kids of folks friends in the background.)

Finally, a perfect market day after thirteen weeks - 71 degrees, a cool breeze, lots of shoppers, and lots of things to buy.


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Hot sauce, chubby cukes, ground cherries, peppers, eggs, scarves, and living color everywhere!

It the Festival of Fools this week, and you might already know how I feel about that - see you at market.

Project Sunflower: The Plan Comes Together

We have a door on the oil press room, though the sides are still a bit rough.  That's me in the reflection!

Seeds will fall from the auger connected to the grain bin outside, into the press hopper...and the rest is not set up yet, but there is a filter press, storage bin, and bottling area.

Frugal to the last, Dan bought a clock with a cracked face (at a steep discount), because we all need to be reminded of how we tried to keep our costs down whenever we check the time.

Life on The Farm: Very Repairy

Don't look directly into the light!

This week on the farm, my laptop was ailing and worsening by the minute – as evidenced by the appearance of the spinning beach ball of death (on the computer screen, not a hallucination, or evil portent rolling across the lawn). 

There had been a whirring, grinding noise from the left side of the board under the “AZX” keys for two weeks. I was in denial, hoping that I could cure the affliction after running fixit programs: many, many fixit programs. 

I got a bare minimum of work accomplished by using it for 20 – 30 minutes at a time, and then shutting it down before it blacked out.  Is 170f high for a computer fever?

I was delaying the inevitable repair bill as long as possible – I always do.

At the point where the situation escalated to “emergency”, I drove it to the ‘Mac Hospital’ in South Burlington (Small Dog Electronics). 

I held my cold, dead computer tight to my chest and queued up in an optimistically short line of similarly quiet, desperate, hopeful people, only to be told that it would be 15 days before evaluation, plus the time it would take to repair.

Sixty ailing computers lay under lock and key in the back room, well and fairly ahead of me. 

I can’t wait twenty days!  I have a business to run. 

No invoices, no marketing, no e-mail orders.  I slid fast in a downward spiral, riding a nightmarish Alpine Slide, slick with poo, sans brakes.

I took a deep breath – and sighed while looking down at my lifeless laptop - that trusty silvery workhorse with little dimples where someone had dropped a glass on it, and the barely visible dots of spray where the cat had ‘chooed a sneeze.

Would it be possible to garner a little ‘old-lady-sympathy’? 

After all, most of the workers in the store were of the age to be my college kid.

(A bigger sigh, a sniffle, a little welling up in the eyes.)

“Look”, said the technician in a low whisper, “if you just want to replace the fan, the computer goes directly to the repair bench, and it could be fixed in 24 hours”. 

Score one for this old lady! 

In two days, the computer was comfortably resting back at home  – but I’d spent far too much time marveling at the super-fast sharp-screened laptops that still had that new car smell in spite of hundreds of people touching the keys.

I violated my rule about germs and touched the shiny black magic that is a 17-inch MacBook Pro.  It cost as much as a roof shingling, and was as impressively fast with the clicking keystrokes as it was unapologetic about the massive amount of space it commanded.

(Had I seen a notice about in-store financing?  I might have enough value left in the car to scrounge up a downpayment.)

Best not to even entertain the thought.  The air conditioner has started randomly flashing sixes, refuses to heed the “off” command, and smells like burning water.  This could be a very repairy summer.

Project Sunflower: First Flower

Okay, so eight acres of sunflowers and one - one - flower is in bloom.  And they are all short.  Are they supposed to be that short?  And it looks like it is dying.

Wheatless: Conte's Gnocchi

Gnocchi 

The last time I had gnocchi was from a batch I made 12 years ago.  I was very excited to have a gluten-free version from the freezer section.

Made even more convenient by "doctoring up" a can of sauce to go with it.

(Sorry, these photos all need small tweeks, I'm crashing the new editing software with my ineptitude.)

To the contents of the can add: 2 TB butter, 6 or 7 chopped sage leaves, 4 cloves of minced garlic.  Bring to a simmer and set aside while the pasta cooks.

All done and beautifully, plus some goat's milk feta - no salt, just stir together for 3 portions.  Yummy pillows of potato goodness and a surprisingly tangy fresh tasting sauce.

But, not gluten-free as the front of the package claims.  The last line of the small print says "Good manufacturing practices are used to segregate ingredients in a facility that also process wheat."  If you need to be gluten-free and can tolerate some contamination, I recommend these because they are really good.  However, this will be the last time for me.