Apple press

We've been processing a lot of apples, while they're in season, to make them last one way or another all year. Drying, freezing and juicing.

The apple juice is delicious, but won't last long. We've got three gallons in the freezer and the rest we made into cider. The downside however to juice is that it is a time consuming process when you don't have the right equipment, so Abe made us an apple press. The press is useful for all kinds of things, but apple juice was the motivation we needed to make it. It works a treat and allowed us to press the juice out of the ground apples very quickly.

Next piece of equipment we'll need is a grinder. For now, we used our meat grinder after cutting the apples into small pieces, but it was slow. We have plans for a machine that will grind a bushel of whole apples in five minutes, but we couldn't find the parts we needed in time to make it for this year. We aim to make it for next apple season.

For more photos, click here.

Food systems

I think I have already mentioned this, but now that the house is so comfortable, we are focusing our attention this year on the power, water and food systems.

The power system is now done, at least for now. We will one day add another solar panel and get a freezer, and build a couple more wind generators (even though this site is not great for wind, we have the parts and we love wind power). For the first time, we have free refrigeration - having switched form propane to electric. We run what we want when we want (although we are conservative by nature - force of habit, I guess). We recently put a fence around the solar mount.

The water system will be addressed in a couple of months, so stay tuned.

As for the food, we are really enjoying working on that system. Until we have our big tank, we are taking it slow, not planting the majority of our seeds until the rains come - next year, we will be able to go crazy! For now, we have lettuce, beets, cabbage, collards, tomatoes, onions, carrots, leeks, radish all in the ground in the garden, growing like weeds on compost and worm tea. Inside, in seed blocks, we have turnips, eggplants, arrugala, chard, cherry tomatoes, rhubarb, comfrey, purslene, asparagus. We should be transplanting most of them this week.

Under the trees, we have all kinds of squash, beans, spinach, melons planted and they are getting big. All our trees are doing great and we will even get some fruit this year, which is incredible considering we just planted them.

The trees are on a drip system and they get watered twice a week. Their water comes from a small tank we set up uphill from them. We have a fishtrap in the river and we are trying to stock this tank. So far, we have 4 perch, 1 bass and 1 carp in there. We have a little solar powered pump set up that oxygenates the water. A small system, but Leo loves it. It is his job to feed them worms, which he also loves.

Of course, there's the bees and the chickens, mentioned in previous blogs.

And last, but not least, rabbits. We haven't actually got rabbits yet, but we are starting to work on their house. While I have been making garden paths, Abe has been leveling a 20' x 10' area. We will build a shed for them in this space, and then have pens coming off that. We are going to be keeping the rabbits in a colony setup instead of cages. We'll keep you informed.

Gardens/chickens/worms

This year has mainly been dedicated to building, so we have not had as much time as we would have liked to work on the food systems. Next year we plan to mainly focus on this, with the additions of fish ponds, rabbit tractors, and planting trees, as well as increasing our gardens.

However, we did still plant our garden once the rains started. The soil is so much richer than when we first started – it has grown from clumpy clay to a rich, dark, crumbly soil, all through the addition of compost and mulch. So far we have been eating squash, green beans, collards, cabbage, herbs. We have turnips, beans, corn, beets and various other things growing. (more photos)

We have also started a worm bin. At the moment we are feeding them and letting their population increase. Once we have a lot more, we will start adding them to the garden, the humanure pile and feeding them to the chickens.

We did have some chicks this year, but disaster struck. The mama hen had made her nest outside of the coop, so we did not put her up at night with the other chickens. She hatched her eggs, but was then killed by a predator. We saved two of the chicks. Abe built them a chicken tractor. This is a movable pen, so that they get to graze one area, and then before they do any damage we move the pen. They seem very happy in there and we hope to buy some more chicks to keep them company. (more photos)

South Flower beds

At the base of the huge windows in the living and dining rooms, on the inside, are two flower beds. They take up the whole south wall.

They are made out of ferro-cement – remesh, rebar and lathing that is stuccoed with concrete.

The grey water from the kitchen and bathroom will be routed into these and we will be able to grow year round.

At present, they have coarse gravel in the bottoms, which will help clean the water, as will the plant roots themselves. Once we do plumbing, we will then be able to fill them up with a rich compost soil.

More Photos

Bacon

In December, Abe did some welding for a friend. In exchange, when they butchered their pig, they gave us a 25lb ham and an 8lb bacon. We put them in a brine soak, made up of 5 gallons boiled water, 8 lbs salt and 2 lbs sugar.

The bacon is now cured, so we removed it today. We wrapped it in cheese cloth and buried it in a bag of wood ash that we had saved from our fires this winter. This will dry it out.

We will have to do the ham next month. Cured in this way, a ham can last for years and years. In England, a family would often cure a ham when a baby girl was born and then eat it at her wedding!

At each stage of this process we will post photos here.

Pumpkin

This fall, we harvested, among other smaller squash, two 40 lb pumpkins, one of which we gave to some friends. Today we processed our one.

We cut it into chunks, cleaned the seeds and fibers out, then steamed the chunks. Once they were cooked, we scraped the flesh off the rind.

The seeds were cleaned and dried for next year. The rind and fibers went to the chickens. And the meat was turned into:
Two pumpkin pies
A bunch of squash, banana and honey leather (sun-dried)
Squash salad
Pumpkin bread
The rest I put into ice trays and froze them for our teething nine month old son.

The big, winter squash are great. They last for a long time, so produce a lot of food in winter when your fresh vegetables are at their lowest.