Dark Days 11: Lamb Bone with White Beans and Rosemary

There are local dried beans at my market!  I've been searching and begging for these for several years.  Farmers told me beans aren't hard to grow, but I never got a satisfactory answer as to why local farmers were not growing and selling dried beans.

Finally, last week, one of the farmers I have gotten to know pulled out a little paper bag of dried beans that he had saved for me.  I didn't ask him to do that, but he was excited that I was excited. 

See, when you buy directly from the producer, most of the time you become acquainted and sometimes end up friends.  Friends look out for each other.  They take checks from you because you don't have cash.  They track you down when you left behind your bag of produce.  They greet your children and save treats for them.  Like most relationships, there are awkward spots, like where you buy carrots at another stand and another market seller sees them sticking out of your bag.  Or when you ask your farmer how much canning tomatoes will cost and it's more than you want to pay.

I love my farmers' market.  I do also like the trade routes that bring me coffee, cinnamon, chocolate, tea, and olive oil.  But I strongly dislike imported dried beans when we have the capability to produce our own right here.

Well.  On to the Dark Days' supper. We loved this soup I made up.  I cooked the meaty lamb bone with water and a splash of vinegar for a few hours, being careful to shake the rich marrow out of the bone into the broth.  Added the soaked beans and a few garlic cloves.  At the end, added some chopped onion, home-canned tomatoes, rosemary, fennel, and salt and pepper.

I made tortillas using this recipe - I have tried at least 4 recipes for tortillas and this is the one I kept and love.  It's become our all-purpose flatbread.

We also had a gorgeous green salad with watercress, shredded turnips and honey mustard dressing (local honey, local horseradish).

International Ice Cream for Breakfast Day

This was supposed to be a quirky little mid-winter holiday.  I borrowed two waffle makers from my in-laws because I don't own any, and I've never made waffles before.  The newer waffle iron worked great and I felt like a pro.  The other one was the classic waffle issue: digging out tiny bits of sticking waffle with a chopstick.  Not fun.

But the ice cream!  The star of the morning:  it just didn't freeze in time, nor did the children eat any.  I knew they were struggling with colds, but now I know how puny-sick they are.  Genevieve informed me that she doesn't like vanilla.  Ok. . . what?!

It was still fun, and we'll try again next year.  First Saturday in February - mark your calendars!

My Christmas Gift from Mr. Thrift

Under-cabinet lights in the kitchen!  I'm so pleased.  Ours is the third kitchen my father in law has installed under-cabinet lights in.  He and my husband planned this, but my father in law did the work.

I am so thrilled.  Light!  in midwinter!

And, a startling side effect:  obvious smudges and fingerprints everywhere my pretty new lights shine.  There's a spiritual metaphor there.

Anise Rusks

I made our favorite rusks first.  Then yesterday I made a batch of anise rusks - they're only okay in my opinion, and I still love the almond, vanilla and cinnamon ones best. 

But rusks themselves are fabulous and so perfect with a hot cup of something.  Don't we need a hot cuppa every day in winter?

I was happily scrabbling in my fabric and patterns the other day, thinking of summer dresses.  Summer!  I love the thought.

On the Trail of the Quarter-Sheet

I was ripping up paper into quarter-sheets for scrap paper the other day and thought I would tell you about it.  I adore tiny little housekeeping details.
 

We use nice one-side-blank scrap paper in our computer printer. But if it's wrinkly or stapled, I tear it into quarter sheets to use as scrap paper. 

Recently, doing zone cleaning, I redded out a stash of old curricula that had been copied on one side only - hundreds of holepunched sheets.  I stacked them on the dining room buffet and every time I had a few minutes as I waited for a child to tell me a story or finish lunch or put on shoes or the million little scheduling gaps in a day, I would rip paper into scrap paper. 

My children try to do the ripping too, and it takes me back to my childhood to recally my envy of my tall mother and her skillful hands.

I keep scrap paper, pencils, and scissors at five locations in our house. I love having those tools at hand - we use them quite frequently.

Tell me about the trail of scrap paper at your house, please.

Sunday Dinner and Dark Days 10: Leg of Lamb

The thing about buying a whole animal for meat is that you must figure out how to cook its various parts.  I handled lamb chops and lamb stew easily, but leg of lamb intimidated me for over a year.

So I studied up.

I rubbed on herbs and poked in garlic slivers, mostly following Simply in Season.

When we came home from church, the house smelled wonderful. . . but the lamb was rather rare for my liking.  It was, thankfully, tender and flavorful.

I served it with mint jelly made specifically for this purpose; I was not a fan of the flavors together, but my husband and kids really liked it.  In fact, I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do with the rest of that mint jelly.  Can't face it on toast in the morning or with peanut butter. . .

Menu:
roast leg of lamb
mint jelly
baked potatoes with butter
steamed spinach with butter and lemon

Friday:put lamb in fridge to thaw
bring mint jelly up from basement - so pretty

Sunday morning:
rub lamb, set on timed bake
wash potatoes, place in oven as well

Sunday noon:
wash and steam spinach
set table
light candles because these are the dark days (I love that phrase, "dark days")

I divided the leftovers for the freezer in three ways: one bag of meat chunks, another bag of meat chunks plus a little bag of pan drippings (I'm thinking shepherd's pie), and the meaty bone for soup.

Specifically, dark days ingredients, all local and where noted, organic:  organic leg of lamb, organic garlic, organic potatoes, homemade mint jelly, spinach, butter

Sorting the Canning Paraphernalia

My husband has collected several sets of cast-off kitchen cupboards for to use as basement canning storage.  This is great, but I just kept avoiding the organizing task because our basement is kind of a pit.

Today, finally, I sorted the marked, used lids from the new lids.  Each kind got its own drawer after I wiped out the grime.  I separated the canning rings and put them in their own box because there were too many for a drawer. 

I put all the empty jars together (broke the obligatory jar, too). Discovered a forgotten flat of canned salsa after I told my family last week that we had eaten the last jar. 

A very satisfying little sorting task to cross off my list. 

The sheets are almost dry on the line - just need to make beds, finish the sticky buns for breakfast, and then after a church event tonight, I should have time to sew.  Lovely