After Months of Preparation

I thought the biggest difference in growing our food would be the growing.  But in fact, the biggest difference has been the cooking.  We don't fill up a grocery list with any old thing that comes to mind anymore.  We eat what we have, unless it's something special and then our planning begins way in advance.  That's how it's been with my husband's favorite thing — jambalaya. 

Last summer we planted okra for the sole purpose of jambalaya.  They've been sitting in the freezer waiting for this day.  Okra is native to the humid subtropics of the gulf coast, so it was kind of a funny joke growing it in desert Idaho.  But it grew and it did fine.

Those chorizo's he worked on last week went in the pot, along with some black beans we grew.

We crock-potted two of the chickens we raised last summer.  They made the whole kitchen smell like hearty dinner.  Our daughter stripped the meat off the bones.  The fat and skin went to the chickens, but we tell them it's pork.  That seems OK, don't you think?

It was a long day of cooking.  At the same time I was working on a parmesan.  We had to negotiate for stove space.

Although my husband and kids love it, I've never liked jambalaya.  It's too hot and the sausage is gross.  I usually just eat oatmeal on jambalaya days.  But I must admit, this stuff was actually good.  It was still hot but had good flavor.  The sausage was flavorful and not too fatty.  Everyone agrees that of all the jambalaya's he's made, this was the best.  Which is good because he made enough to last for days.

All of this cooking got me to thinking about our next batch of meat chickens.  I think I'd prefer to raise one large of batch rather than two smaller ones.  So we'll plan on getting baby chicks in late March which would give us a butcher date of early June.  My nine-year-olds want to raise some chickens for themselves too.

Right now in the dead of winter with the land silent, it is an exercise to think forward to warm days and the growth of spring.  But it will come.  Just as those silent times of our spiritual life always give way to warmth and growth.