sparrowgrass

Just the other night I fried an ounce of diced bacon til crisp, sauteed about half a pound of mushrooms in the same pan til almost done, then added a pound of asparagus chopped into 1 inch pieces. Cook until the asparagus is done to your liking, sprinkle with chopped chives. The original recipe called for a tablespoon of butter, but I didn't think it needed it. As a matter of fact, the next time I will probably drain off some of the bacon grease. Last night, I tossed some with olive oil and salt, and grilled it. I threw some pecans in the shell onto the grill to add some nice smoke.

I am dead broke, so keeping the heat (and AC) off is a money-saving effort. It is 55 outside, and 64 in, so I have a fleece sweater on. I spoke too soon, earlier this week. On Facebook, I posted a picture of the blackberries that are blooming all over the place, and said that I thought we had already had 'blackberry winter' this year--apparently I was wrong. Instead of lightly steamed asparagus and a burger on the grill, I am thinking of some cream of asparagus soup with wild rice.

I find that to be true as well--if I stuff it full, I have a lot more pieces that need after-wash washing. I live alone, I put most anything in the dishwasher, and wash every couple of days. If I waited til the dishwasher was fully and efficiently loaded to run it, food would dry on the dishes and the dishwasher would smell bad.

Too dang cold here for naked anything! I am seriously considering turning the heat on. Rain, rain, rain here--we had two days of hot sunshine, but when I went home to run the tiller, it wouldn't start. My buddy came and got it going for me, but now there are puddles in the garden. Good thing I have asparagus to keep me happy. Last night I diced an ounce of bacon, and sliced some cremini mushrooms into the pan. Once they were cooked a little, I added asparagus, cut into bite-sized pieces. Cooked til just tender, sprinkled some fresh chives over the top--perfection!!

Maybe because the 'experts and chefs' had always done it with lots of water and didn't really know how less water would work?

I was married to a control freak--he insisted that I had to hold the latch open on the microwave before shutting it, so the latch wouldn't wear out. Life is too short to worry about things like that.

I think you ARE doing double the work, especially if your dishwasher is not of the 'antique' variety that your wife grew up with. I scrape the plates/pots into the chicken bucket, then they go directly into the DW. Modern DW have grinders that can deal with most anything, and you are wasting water and energy if you prewash the dishes. If something ends up still stuck on the item after washing, it is generally easy to scrape/scrub off--the dishwasher does the hard part. Family harmony, however, over-rules internet advice!

Morels are easy--no other mushroom has that definite honeycomb type top. There are some false morels, but if you google pictures of them, they are just wrinkly, not honeycombed. For other mushrooms there are steps you can take to identify them--some involve scratching the mushroom to see if it stains, using certain chemicals on the spores or making a spore print. Spore prints are neat--find a big mushroom that is fully open. Lay it on a piece of paper, gills down, and leave it overnight. Pick it up carefully, and you will have almost a photographic image of the gills on the bottom of the mushroom. The spores (like seeds) are a fine dust, and can be various colors. I have 5 or 6 mushrooms books, full of pictures and drawings, and I collect several kinds of mushrooms for the table. I am really, really careful when I collect an unknown species--I look it up in all the books, I do a spore print and, sometimes, even when I am 99% sure--I throw it away. I am self-taught, but I have a strong background in botany. For the average amateur, I would suggest a class.

That is a perfectly beautiful morel--no mistake. Pick them quick, before someone else grabs them!!

Piecemeal, with some rearranging if needed. Hate dirty dishes or pans in the sink or on the counter. I put almost everything in the dishwasher, with the exception of cast iron and wooden cutting boards. I don't have 'good' china or crystal, so no worries about that, and if the pans don't get quite clean in the DW, I scrub whatever is left over as I unload. I unload as soon as I make the next dirty dish, or sometimes even sooner. (She says, quite smugly.)

Florida, I brewed beer with my kids when they were little. I had big plastic brew containers, and at first I used a siphon to rack them off the yeast--my younger son liked to suck on the hose to start the siphon! (Yuck!) I always filled one of those little Coke bottles with beer for them for New Years Eve--they didn't usually finish it, but they liked a taste. They are 27 and 32 now, and not alcoholics!! The older one used to brew his own, but he now has a friend who works at a local brewery--the friend gets the mislabeled bottles, so Rob always has beer in the house.

I found one source that said you could bring a plant in for the winter. Sounds like it is a big plant--2-4 feet tall. You could probably cut it back before you bring it in to force some new growth. Seems like it also grows wild everywhere, but it does not look familiar to me. And if you start it in your garden, it reseeds itself.

How long depends on your growing conditions--if they are getting good sun and good heat, they could take off. If they are crowded and in the dark--you have plenty of time. If your cabbage gets root bound, it will not head--it will just bolt. Kouign Aman, start some more from seed--you will have more fresh basil in a couple of weeks, or at least you would here. (How do you pronounce Kouign, anyhow? Worries me every time I read it!)

I don't know anything about Toronto, but some of our big nurseries and garden stores carry an amazing variety of plants--even a big Wal-Mart or Lowes might have at least some of the plants you are looking for. I am thinking Anaheims, serrano and tomatillos, in particular would be easy to find here, anyway. Sometimes health/natural food stores carry some plants in the spring, too. I am worried about this problem--when someone gets the gardening bug, I hate to see it thwarted!!

I always cut my morels in half, since the time I found a small, but very crunchy, snail in the middle of one. I usually wash them in hot water--the little springtail bugs that inhabit morels do not appeal to me. Then I dry them well--a salad spinner works. Lay them out on the counter for a day or so to 'concentrate the flavor' if you like. Most types of morels are very amenable to drying, but the really early ones tend to rot instead of dry. (My sister calls that type 'peckerheads' but I am much too refined to resort to such language. )

Asparagus!! A pound or so every other day, with no waste--if you pick it out of the garden, you just snap it off at the 'tender point'. My tomato 'corral' is up, and the tomatoes are mulched with cardboard and straw. The cardboard is to keep the weeds at bay, and the straw is so that my garden does not look like a recycling area. The straw also breaks the force of the wind a little, so the cardboard does not take off for parts unknown. (I am a lazy, lazy gardener--cardboard for mulch makes my life so easy. Almost no weeding--and the few weeds that manage to find a way to the surface are easy to pull up. It has been extraordinarily wet here this spring--20+ inches of rain in April, and another 4 or 5 in May. I am up in the Ozarks, so we don't have standing water like the bootheel, but my garden is very wet. I usually have most of the garden planted by now, but it has been impossible to work the soil. I did manage to get some lettuce and kohlrabi into the ground last weekend, and they are coming up. Kitchensqueen, don't leave your plants crowded for too long--the roots will tangle, and it will set them back when you separate them.

I am in zone 5b/6a (warmer than you), and it is way too late in the year for growing chiles or tomatillos from seeds here--you should have started them indoors 6 weeks ago. Chiles especially take a long time to mature--I don't think you have a chance with seeds this year. If you have already ordered them, no worries--they will be good next year. But for this year, buy some plants. I have never grown epazote, but cilantro is a snap, comes up and matures quickly. Plant some every couple of weeks til the end of summer to keep a fresh supply. You can indeed buy a bag of dried beans and plant them. If they are from a a place with good turnover, they will be fresh and will grow just fine. I am a Master Gardener--sometimes I know what I am talking about.

Found a picture from years ago--hadn't started the cardboard mulch yet.

I put out 44 plants yesterday--my favorite varieties are Ananas Noir, a green/purple/yellow streaked variety that is ugly on the outside but very pretty (and tasty) on the inside, and Golden Sunray, a yellow orange. I also planted Mortgage Lifter, Cherokee Purple, Riesentraube, Great White, Moonglow (all new to me this year) and a small red that I grew last year and saved the seeds from. I don't remember the variety, but it produces zillions of ping-pong ball sized red tomatoes that taste great. It also produces all the way up til frost, long after the other tomatoes have hung it up for the year. I cage my tomatoes with cattle panels, which are 16 feet long and 4.5 feet tall, made of heavy wire. I hang them on T posts, and put them in pairs, about a foot or so apart. The tomatoes go in the middle, and all I have to do is walk the row every couple of days and poke errant branches back in. The spaces between the wires are large, so picking is easy. I mulch with cardboard and straw, so no weeds, and I can walk on the cardboard without getting my feet muddy. By the end of the season, the cardboard is pretty much gone, and I can till it into the soil. I usually plant some hybrids, because the older varieties generally don't have the hybrids high yields, but this year, I forgot to buy some. Too late now--my tomato row is all planted. I can salsa and roasted tomato sauce and I freeze some whole. But mostly I eat them fresh--every day.

In some states, kids under drinking age are not allowed in liquor stores. When my boys were little, we lived in Kentucky, and they LOVED the liquor store--for the same reasons they loved the bank. As far as my kids were concerned, that was where you went for candy! If you enjoy liquor responsibly at home, I don't see any reason to hide it from the kids.

If the first round of 409 doesn't work, rinse and repeat!!

Is it covered with kitchen grease and dust? Spray it thoroughly with 409 or Fantastic cleaner, let it sit for 15 minutes or so, then spray it off. Don't worry about getting the basket parts wet--it won't hurt them. I have handmade baskets on top of my kitchen cupboards, and this is the method I use to clean them. When you make a basket, you soak the reeds in water--more water will not damage them.

My name is Sparrow, and I am a carboholic. Good bread and good pasta are my downfalls. The doc says QUIT THAT--my blood sugar is a bit high. So I am learning restraint.

We have 2 stores from a local chain in this town--they are dirty, food is out of date, the selection is awful and the staff is surly.(Other than that , they are really nice. ) The other store is Sav-a-lot, which sells pretty much only generics, and has a 10 foot produce section. Walmart is 25 miles away--the next closest option is about 80 miles away. I shop mainly at the Sav-a-lot, but I pretty much have to hit the WalMart for anything except the most basic items. Lucky me--I have a big garden, local beef in the freezer, and my own eggs.

Oh, dear. If you pop a watermelon Jolly Rancher into your mouth when you are in my vehicle, you WILL be walking home. Cannot bear the smell. I would rather that you lit up a cigarette! I guess I am pretty much anti-anything fruit-flavored. Or artificial butter-flavored.