How I Spent My Staycation

Earlier this month, my body started trying to get my attention. At first it was just plain ole’ garden variety stress. Then I felt achey, like my body was fighting something off. This was followed by a feeling of tiredness that goes beyond what most parents often feel at the end of the day. During an attempt to meditate one morning the message came:  You need some real rest, a mad little voice said. If you don’t chill out, I’m going to force you to get some rest by getting sick! My own body had resorted to threats against me!

We all know we need times of rest and refreshing. Research confirms that rest will help your body rejuvenate and may even prolong your life, and even God Himself rested on the seventh day. The thing is, life can be so busy sometimes and the ‘To Do’ list can get so long that a person (let’s not name any names) can feel counterproductive and guilty for putting the brakes on. As proof of my commitment to Get My Important Things Done, I had three (3) gift certificates for spa treatements that my family and friends had given me languishing in my desk drawer. Friends, can we agree that if a person has numerous unusued spa gift certificates in her possession something is terribly out of balance?

There was too much on the calendar to take a beach vacation, but I knew I needed relief NOW.  So I X’d out two precious weekdays on my calendar for the following week and let my clients know that I’d be out of the office. Just knowing that I had the time off ahead made me more relaxed during the following days. I also called the spa and booked an appointment.

Here’s what I did over my two days off and the weekend that followed:

* Just as if I was going on a real vacation, I turned on the autoresponder the night before my Staycation so I could take a break from e-mails and the computer.

* I imposed a ban on

Simplify Your Holidays in Minutes with One Easy Step

If you do just one thing this holiday season to make your holidays simpler and merrier, try this. With Christmas just 7 weeks away, now is the perfect time to help your family create an online holiday gift wish list. Our extended family has used Christmas Wish List since 2002, and we love it. 

Here’s how it works: you create an online group for your family, and then each family member logs on and creates a wish list of things they could really use and enjoy for holiday gifts. Group members can note when an item is purchased, but you can’t see the status of your own list. It feels a little funny at first, being so transparent about  The Stuff You Want. However, I predict that if you try it for one year you’ll be hooked.

The advantages are many.  You’ll save hours of shopping time because you’ll know exactly what your hard-to-buy-for father wants. You’ll save time after the holidays, too, because you won’t be returning the light-up Rudolph sweater (size XS Petite), that Grandma bought you. You’ll save storage space, because you won’t be tucking away the fishing lure toilet seat your brother-in-law bought so that you can bring it out the next time he visits. And you’ll probably save money, because you can comparison shop online for the best prices.

Meanwhile, you can ask for something you could really use and enjoy — perhaps a gift certificate to a nursery to buy vegetable seeds next spring. Or something to support your green lifestyle, like a solar-powered battery charger or a rain barrel. Perhaps you have all the stuff you need, and you’d love to direct givers to support your favorite charitable organization in lieu of a gift.

What steps are you taking this year to simplify and ‘green’ your holidays? I’d love to hear your ideas and share them with our readers.

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Make Your Own Artisan Ricotta Cheese – It’s Easy!

I’ve always wanted to try cheesemaking, and I recently found a recipe for homemade ricotta cheese that was originally published in the now-shuttered Gourmet magazine. Creative Director Richard Ferretti’s recipe was so simple, it gave me the courage to make a batch — no rennet or thermometers needed! Since then I’ve made several pounds of this creamy cheese, and EVERYONE (everyone, I tell you) begs for the recipe. (Everyone.) So here we go.

First, line a sieve with a double layer of cheesecloth and place it in a bowl like this: 

Next,  bring 1 quart of milk, 1/2 cup of heavy cream and 1/4 teaspoon of salt to a rolling boil in a heavy saucepan. (By the way, I only make half of Ferretti’s recipe at a time because I am trying, trying to keep my butt from getting as big as a barn.)

Now, you add 1 1/2 tablespoons of fresh lemon juice, reduce the heat to low, and simmer — stirring constantly — until the mixture curdles, about 2 minutes. It looks sort of gross at this point, but stay with me.

Now, simply dump the whole mess into that nice cheesecloth-lined sieve, like this:

Errrgh!  Let it drain for about an hour, and you’ll have a nice batch of ricotta that looks something like this:

Transfer the ricotta to a tightly lidded container and refrigerate it. For a crazy good snack, spread it on lightly toasted slices of French bread, sprinkle with salt and pepper and top with sliced fresh tomatoes or roasted red peppers. It’s also wonderful spread on crackers and topped with a drizzle of olive oil and Balsamic vinegar. Or spread it on hot buttered toast and drizzle with honey or sprinkle with a little cinnamon sugar for a completely decadent breakfast. Ferretti says to eat it within 2 days, which shouldn’t be difficult to do.

Have you tried making your own cheese? If so, I’d love to hear about your experiences.

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Organic Mint Pesto from the Garden’s Final Basil Crop

A dusting of snow covers the mint plants in the garden

It’s snowing here in Colorado today, and in anticipation of last night’s hard freeze I picked all the basil. I’ll use it to prepare a fresh variation on pesto sauce enlivened with fresh mint. The pesto freezes well and I portion it into 1/3 cup servings so that we can easily thaw a little to toss with hot linguine, whisk into salad dressing, or spread on a pizza when summertime is a distant memory. Here’s the simple recipe:

Fresh Minted Pesto Sauce

1 1/2 cups loosely packed fresh basil leaves (no stems)

1/4 cup loosely packed mint leaves, no stems

1/4 cup fresh parsley

2 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed

1/4 cup blanched almonds

4 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese

4 to 6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Put the basil, mint, parsley, garlic and almonds in a food processor. Blend at low speed for a few moments until the ingredients are coarsely chopped. Add the cheese and half of the olive oil and blend again. Scrape the mixture down from the side of the container. Turn the speed to low and trickle in the remaining olive oil while blending. By hand, stir in salt and pepper to taste. Makes 1 cup.

Make Your Own Peach Preserves

The peaches this year have been more delicious than any I can ever remember — heavy, fragrant, juicy and sweet from the sunshine of late summer.

A display of Colorado peaches at Whole Foods

Before they’re gone, you can easily preserve fresh peaches’ fleeting, nectared essance by making a batch of homemade jam.  Perfect for holiday gift giving, I also love opening a jar of homemade jam on a snowy winter morning, slathering it on a hot, buttery biscuit and being transported back to sweet memories of the previous summer.

I used to make jam the old-fashioned way, standing at the stove for hours boiling and stirring the mixture and trying to keep it from scorching.  Recently I made a batch

Be Green, Recycle Less ? Here’s How …

There’s a little convenience store not far from our house called “Farm Crest Milk Store” that I’ve driven by many times. A few weeks ago I happened to remember that we needed milk right as I was approaching the store, so I pulled in the parking lot.  I was curious about a whole store devoted to milk but discovered that it’s a lot like a 7-11, with a few gas pumps outside and the usual impulse buy items inside. What was different, however, was

Cool Off with Homemade Naturally Sweet Tea

 

     Most store-bought sweetened iced teas are full of it — high fructose corn syrup, that is — and the ‘light’ versions are loaded with artificial sweeteners. Instead, make your own cool, delicious sweetened tea with natural ingredients and you’ll reap all of the antioxidant health benefits while keeping unnessary bottles out of the landfill; you’ll also save money! 

You’ll Dig This – Build Your Own Eco-Friendly Raised Garden for Less

In our efforts to convert more of our yard to gardening space, I wanted to add a raised garden for planting vegetables. I briefly lusted after one of these kits from Plow & Hearth, made from recycled plastic:

…but the $149.95 price tag (+ $17.99 for shipping) seemed to defeat the idea of growing food to save money. Fortunately, my Pop came to the rescue with the offer of four free reclaimed angle irons that had originally supported some decorative beams at a friend’s condo. His garage is full of treasures like this, and it’s amazing how he can go in there and rummage around and emerge with just the right tool or hardware for just about any job. He proposed that we use the angle irons to secure four pieces of lumber to make a frame for the garden, and he even created

Spend 20 Minutes Adapting Your Toilet, Save 3000 Gallons of Water a Year

   You might have once read that you could save water by putting a brick in your toilet tank. That is no longer recommended, as bricks break down over time and the residue can lead to plumbing damage. Instead, you can recycle a used soda pop bottle and use it to displace water, saving you 2 liters of water with every flush. The average person flushes 4 times a day at home (you really do learn something new every day), so a family of four can easily save 3000 gallons of water a year just by following these easy steps.

First, remove the label and wash an empty plastic 2-liter soda pop bottle.

Fill the bottle almost to the top with water and add a handful of marbles or pebbles. Don’t skip this step or the bottle will  float in the toilet tank and could interfere with the flushing mechanism.

Make Your Own Tender, Perfectly Puffed Pita Breads – for Pennies!

After reading about homemade pita bread on the King Arthur Flour blog, I was obsessed with making a batch from scratch. I love pita bread, but I was spoiled years ago by warm, fresh-from-the-oven pitas in Athens and have never found anything close here in Colorado. Even at one of Denver’s largest Middle Eastern grocery stores, the pitas are chewy and a bit cardboardy.

Using the King Arthur recipe as a guideline (and based on research that recommended a mix of no more than 33% whole wheat flour for reliable rising), I substituted 1/2 cup of whole wheat flour and 1/2 cup of spelt flour for one cup of the all-purpose flour. I didn’t have any King Arthur’s Dough Improver so I added a pinch of baking powder. Once the dough was ready to bake, I divided it into 8 portions and flattened the first ball slightly with my fingers like this:

Make Your Own Granola – Delicious, Healthy and Inexpensive!

Here’s a simple recipe that you can use to make your own healthy breakfast cereal. You can use organic and/or vegetarian ingredients if you wish, and substitute other goodies to suit your taste. Plus — with the cost of organic rolled oats at about $1 a pound — you can save tons of money by making your own!

 

Here’s the basic recipe for my favorite granola blend. I call it Oatmeal Cookie Granola and your kitchen will smell just like homemade oatmeal raisin cookies while you’re baking it!

Culinary Glory During a Recession

I was perusing our cookbooks this morning hoping for some culinary inspiration, when I came across this volume gathering dust at the back of the very top shelf:

Gourmet Cooking on a Shoestring, circa 1970

Although it was published almost 40 years ago, the theme of this book is certainly relevant today. “It is true that the price of absolutely everything is on the rise…” it begins, and the author goes on to offer a host of recipes “to take the sting out of the high cost of eating while covering you with culinary glory.”

Culinary glory — now that’s what I’m talking about! Of course, we had a somewhat different definition

Battening Down the Hatches for Winter

Last winter, we had an energy audit performed by About Saving Heat of Denver. The technician had a neat gizmo that automatically measures the air temperature, similar to the instant read thermometer you use to make sure your chicken is cooked properly. Anyway, when he held the machine to the ceiling and passed it over the air conditioning vents - closed for the winter, of course - the temperature was two to three degrees cooler, meaning that cold air was still leaking through the vents. He recommended a simple and inexpensive fix, magnetic vent covers:

Homemade Hooch at the Urban Homestead

We’ve been harvesting currants here, and even the ripest berries are intensely, mouth-puckeringly tart. After scratching my head about how to best utilize the little red berries, I found a recipe for homemade cassis and knew we were in business. I love kir (a drink made with cassis and white wine) and its cousin kir royale (cassis and champagne). While crème de cassis is traditionally made with black currants, I learned that red currants can also be used.

This is a two-part recipe, and you can easily double this if you have a bounty of fresh currants.

Homemade Cassis

• 3 to 4 cups ripe currants
• 2 ½ to 3 cups vodka (or enough to cover the currants in the jar)
• 1 pound sugar (more or less may be needed) 
• 1 cup vodka (more or less may be needed)

Wash the currants, remove any stems and gently pour them in a one-quart Mason jar. Pour the vodka in the jar, almost to the top. Here’s how it looks at this stage:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Farewell, My Punch Bowl

     A long, long time ago, I bought a punch bowl. Or maybe someone gave me a punch bowl; I don’t remember. My trusty punch bowl has been with me that long; it’s followed me to six different houses now, patiently waiting on basement shelves and stacked among boxes in the garage for the right opportunity.