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  1. M

    Pizza is now a veggie...

    What do you think about Congress voting to call pizza a veggie for the purpose of the food pyramid and school lunches?
  2. M

    Do any of you go WITHOUT health insurance? By choice?

    My husband and I have been made an offer for the family farm. As we look into the future and try to figure a way to make it work financially, health insurance is one of our largest bills. I am fantasizing more and more about going without. Even with a very reasonable plan, we would save anywhere...
  3. M

    Grinding your own chicken feed

    Hi everyone--I wasn't sure which category to put this under, so I hope this fits. We have 150 meat bird chicks in our garage right now. I had thought, living on a corn and soybean farm, we could surely grind and mix our own feed much more cheaply than buying it from our local Farm and Fleet...
  4. M

    Free for you! Thelma Sander's Sweet Potato Squash seeds

    Hi all--Farmfresh recently generously sent me some of her squash seeds. I dried down seeds from one of my TSSPS for her. Turns out each squash has about 100+ seeds! Here's the deal: I cannot guarantee the squash will stay true. I grew many varieties last year and they could be cross-pollinated...
  5. M

    How do a person's political views relate to self sufficiency?

    First off, and most importantly, this is NOT a thread to start a fight. I have noticed this question come up repeatedly over the course of the year and a half that I have been a member of this forum. In the most recent instance, the thread was locked before I had a chance to respond. So, I...
  6. M

    Harvest 2009

    I'm not sure where I want to go with this post, but I'm very disturbed by the corn and soybean harvest here this year. The projection is a record crop, but the reality is a lot of grain being turned away because of mold and immaturity, and that's if it is gotten off the fields at all. A...
  7. M

    Bath and body

    Hi y'all! I don't own a single piece of makeup and haven't for years. I've always figured myself to be a person lacking in vanity. Turns out I was just young enough to not need stuff on my face. :D So, now that 35 has rolled around and I'm starting to notice wrinkles that don't go away during...
  8. M

    Organic versus Conventional

    As I am married to a conventional farmer, this debate rages in my house all the time :) I have a bunch of questions that regularly get debated between my husband and I that I would like to toss out to you. First, I will state that I try to get more and more organic food into our diet all the...
  9. M

    Your Favorite Pumpkin and Squash Recipes!

    Hi everyone--Rather than bogging down the "What's for dinner" thread with my enthusiasm for pumpkins and squash, let's put all our favorites here. I'll start with: Easy, Raw Rainbow Salad: Chopped cabbage, green and purple Crinkle-cut raw carrots Thinly sliced leeks or red onion Finely...
  10. M

    Soap Making 101

    Hi all you amazing soap makers, or wannabees like me :D I've sorted through all the old threads on soapmaking but wonder if I might just start another one anyway to put it all in one spot. What are your absolute must-have books? I have heard of The Soapmaker's Companion and The Everything...
  11. M

    What do you know about ADD?

    After hours of conversation with my son's 4th grade teacher yesterday, lots of chats with my kids' teachers over the years and our own challenges at home, I really suspect my kids may have ADD and ADHD. Let me also add that I did not even used to believe in these diagnoses. I used to believe...
  12. M

    Do you adore beans? :D

    This time of year I am bound to have a kettle or 2 on the stove soaking beans any given day of the week. What's not to love about beans? They are SO healthy, so cheap, so delicious, so versatile, and they give my young children endless short moments for amusement. Here are a couple of my...
  13. M

    How do you use sauerkraut?

    Well, thanks to all of your inspiration, I have my large crockpot full of kraut, 5 quart jars full of more and plans to start a lactofermented batch tomorrow. This will yield more sauerkraut than my family has eaten in the last 14 years combined!! We use it in Reuben sandwiches, meat or...
  14. M

    What are you Freezing Today?

    I think we have one more food method not being represented here :) Today, I froze 1 gallon of blackberries. I spread them on cookie sheets, froze them solid, then broke up the trays and dumped them into 1-gallon freezer pails, all the berries separate and not clumped together. Can't wait to mix...
  15. M

    Homemade Dishsoap

    So, now I'm set for the dishwasher and clothes washer. How about general-use dishsoap? I use it for cleaning eggs and too-big-for-the-dishwasher dishes every night. Any great recipes out there? me&thegals
  16. M

    Canning classes

    I had this idea, and then Farmerlor posted about it on BYC. With the economy stinky and people getting back to the basics, I thought I would offer canning classes to my CSA customers. They are already in touch with me, already receiving loads of veggies for about 28 weeks and are fairly likely...
  17. M

    Probiotic recipes

    Hi everybody! All this talk about cheese has gotten me thinking. How many of you make foods using probiotics? How many would like to learn how to do this? In our house, I make buttermilk, yogurt, occasionally kefir and now I'm brewing my first batch of kombucha. Looking forward to making apple...
  18. M

    Great broiler deal on BYC

    Jeff from Brunty Farms on BYC is offering Cornish x chicks for $.55 each, plus shipping. Great deal! I've ordered 200 to split with a friend, so the price starts to look pretty great. Here's the link if you're interested: http://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=151659
  19. M

    Why do you store food?

    I feel dumb having to ask this, but I keep reading about people storing enormous quantities of food in buckets with gamma-ray lids. I guess I really don't know why. Are you worried about shortages? Money becoming worthless? Crop failures? It didn't really make me think too much about it all...
  20. M

    Economic Recovery Bill

    I am NOT interested in starting a heated debate, please. I would like to share this website, which is a place to read the entire bill, see the categories and amount of money allocated for each and track the milestones towards economic recovery. http://www.recovery.gov/ I understand some will...
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