Have You Purchased Your Seeds Yet?

Back before I began starting my own seeds at home, I would walk into home improvement stores and big box department stores and roll my eyes at the seed displays prominently displayed before Valentine's Day. "How ridiculous! It won't be planting season for months!". Now, seed catalogs and displays are the highlight of the winter (well, besides Christmas)!

A California Wonder Sweet Pepper seedling.

It does seem awfully early to be buying seeds, especially when the daytime highs have been in the single digits, but this time next month, I'll be starting my peppers and parsley indoors! To know when to start your own plants indoors, you will want to determine which USDA Hardiness Zone you live in. You can find out by entering your Zip Code HERE. Very often the back of the seed packet will tell you how many weeks before last frost it should be started, but if not, there are MANY seed starting charts and resources available around the web. Here's an example: Zone 5 (SE Michigan)

As a kid, my Dad and Grandparents always just purchased already started plants like tomatoes and peppers that couldn't be direct seeded in the garden at our local greenhouse. While it is honestly much more convenient for the average home gardener, it's significantly more expensive if you wish to grow more than maybe 6-8 plants. You're also very limited on available varieties. If we only grew what can be found at major outlets, we'd never know that there are orange, yellow, even black tomatoes! Another concern is that the starts found at big box stores have been treated with chemicals that harm beneficial insects and pollinators.

Seeds can be expensive, depending upon where you decide to purchase and the rarity of seed, but there are low cost brands available. For example, Dollar Tree sells common varieties from like Contender Bush Beans and Little Wonder Peas for $.25 per pack, but the germination rates (how many seeds actually grow) are markedly lower compared to other brands of the same variety I've grown in the past. On the other hand, I paid $3.00 for one packet of 10 seeds of the rare "Hottest Pepper on the Planet" Trinidad Scorpion Pepper I ordered from Baker Creek Seeds. However, everything I have ever purchased from them has had excellent germination rates and grew into strong, healthy plants. Their common varieties run around $2.00/pack. Regardless, a $2.00 packet with 25 seeds is much less expensive than $3 for 4 plants!

From personal experience, I HIGHLY recommend purchasing seed through the mail from a reliable source providing open-pollinated heirloom seed. This means that once you purchase that seed once, you can save seed from your own plants and never have to purchase that same one again! But that's another discussion for another time!

Here are the two catalogs I most often purchase from. You can order online, or request a free printed catalog from their website:

Baker Creek - Purchase 90% of our seeds here each year. I believe they offer somewhere in the neighborhood of 1500 varieties, including herbs and flowers. Excellent germination, less expensive than some of the others,

Richter's Herbs - Specializes in medicinal and culinary herbs. Seeds and plant starts available. Many hard-to-find varieties, Great germination rates, but be mindful of your hardiness zone when purchasing perennials.

These are also reputable, but a little more expensive on the whole:

Seeds of Change - Certified Organic Seed
Seed Savers - Heirloom Seed
Mountain Rose Herbs - Seed as well as dried goods, medicine making and tea accessories

In a few weeks I'll post a tutorial on seed starting as I get my own going! In the meantime, get those seed orders going before the good stuff is sold out! ;)

Seeds Arrived! Hurry, Spring!

Just last Friday eve I entered my Baker Creek, and they were already in my mailbox this afternoon! We've ordered from them for about 5 years or so now. The order is always received quickly! There is a full list of what all we ordered here, but I am especially excited about a few varieties in particular. I'll link to the order page for each if you're interested:

First, I FINALLY got around to ordering Mexican Sour Gherkins Cucumber. Pickled veggies are a staple in my every day diet, and I have been very curious as to how these might taste when pickled in Dad's Dilly Bean brine.

We have never really had good luck with large carrots, so we thought perhaps some of the smaller rooted varieties might be something worth trying instead. I wanted Parisienne, a sort of radish sized and shaped variety, and Brian was eyeing the narrower Little Finger, so we went with both! We were also given a second packet of Parisienne as our free gift! Can never have too many carrots.

Then, there are the grains, Golden Giant Amaranth and White Sonora Wheat. I am not sure exactly how they will fare in Zone 6a here, but I thought it was worth a shot. I'm really interested in grinding flour and making breads and tortillas.

Brian insisted we order the world's hottest pepper, the Trinidad Scorpion Pepper. An old classmate of mine commented that they are "ridiculously hot". In the past we've grown Habaneros, which are great in chili when used sparingly. I guess, we'll have to see!

I had mentioned maybe a week ago that I'd like to expand my herb garden and begin market selling at some point. Baker Creek has many herb seeds to choose from, although they don't specialize in them. I ordered 9 different varieties to add this year! At some point, I may put in an order to Richter's Herbs, who specialize in herb seeds and plants as well. I have a little research to do regarding the planting conditions of a few of them yet.

I was honestly in a pretty grumpy, cabin feverish mood this afternoon, but as soon as I saw that envelope in my mailbox, it was all good LOL Are you planting anything new this year? Have any advice concerning these I mentioned? Comment below!

You may order a FREE Baker Creek Seed catalog HERE.

DEHYDRATING: Frozen Fruits and Veggies

Dehydrating frozen produce is an extremely simple way to take advantage of sales, or to make room in your freezer. Very handy for soups and stews.

I posted a photo of some frozen mixed vege with a brief explanation of how easy it is to dehydrate frozen produce yesterday, but I wanted to expand on that a little more. Today, I'm doing the rest of the mixed vege, a bag of corn, and a bag of broccoli florets!

What makes frozen produce so convenient for dehydrating is that items needing to be blanched before dehydration have already been done so before freezing. Also, in some cases, like the mixed vege or potatoes, the produce has already been peeled and diced into small pieces. Depending on the size of your batch, you could be saving hours of prep time!

Small items like corn, peas, blueberries, potato dices or chopped mixed fruits and vege can be put into the dehydrator as is in a single layer. However, rough chopped things like broccoli and cauliflower florets or halved strawberries should be cut into smaller bite sized pieces for shorter and  more even drying.

In general, frozen fruits and vegetables take about 10-12 hours to dry in a 135 degree dehydrator. Some a little shorter, some a little longer, depending on the wattage of your machine and what temperature you have them set on. Around the 8 hour mark, start checking for doneness. They will be "crispy". Small dices will be hard like plastic beads.

Store your dehydrated goods in a clean, completely dry glass jar in a cool, dry, dark place. If you wish to store them long-term, put an oxygen absorber in the jar, or vacuum seal it. Without an oxygen absorber or seal they should last a minimum of one year. I've got green peppers, jalapenos and mixed vege over a year old now that are still good,

Well, that's all I have for now. With these subzero temps, I've been busy running outside to change out frozen waterers several times a day. Spring can't come fast enough!!!

Planning the 2015 Garden

Some of last year's seed starts.

Sitting here working on the 2015 Garden Plan... Turning out to be a little more challenging than I thought! So many great new varieties I'd love to try... That and Brian has only gotten halfway through the catalog with the holidays and long work hours the past couple weeks.

Each of us takes a turn going through the catalogs and highlighting anything that sounds of interest. If we both highlight the same ones, good to go. If we chose different varieties, we will look for more info online and make a compromise of some sort.

Part of the problem is knowing exactly how big of an area we will have to plant in this year! We got an ATV, but don't have a disc/tiller just yet. That's a whole other issue in itself- can we get away with just the pull behind disc, or do we really need to invest in the powered pull behind tiller? There is about a $900 difference in price there! (If anyone reading this has advice, please comment below. We're tearing up horse pasture.)

We're definitely giving a few grains a try this year, and I'm finally getting around to giving those "Mexican Sour Gherkins" I've been eyeing for 3 years now a try! Also going with smaller carrot varieties, hoping to have some better luck than we have had in the past with Nantes and Danvers. I'll post the list of seeds we ordered when it's finalized. If we wait too long, popular varieties and rares will be sold out!

If you haven't ordered your seed catalogs yet, you can order your free copies online. Vast majority of our seeds are ordered from Baker Creek, however I do order herb seed from Richters. The others carry heirloom, organic and rare varieties:

Baker Creek - Open pollinated, heirloom variety seed. Huge variety, great quality.
Seed Saver's Exchange - Organic, Heirloom seeds. Carries organic Seed Potatoes.
Richters Herbs - Huge selection of medicinal and culinary herbs. Great quality.
Kitazawa Seed Co. - Asian vegetables and greens, some difficult to find in USA. Non-GMO.

RECIPE: Crock Pot Chicken Stew

This is a cold day favorite I've been making for years! It can be put together the night before, refrigerated, and put on in the morning. There are several variations and substitutions to suit individual tastes as well!

INGREDIENTS:

4 Chicken Breasts

6 Medium Potatoes, sliced

1 c. Frozen or Dehydrated Mixed Vegetables*

2 Cans Cream of Chicken Soup, undiluted**

1 Small Onion, chopped

1/2 tsp. Garlic Powder

1/4 tsp. Basil

1/4 tsp. Parsley

1/4 tsp. Rosemary

1/4 tsp. Sage

Salt and Pepper to taste

*Can be substituted for Broccoli, use Cream of Broccoli Soup.

*Can be substituted for Mushrooms, use Cream of Mushroom Soup.

**DIY Preservative Free Cream of Soup Recipe: HERE

PREPARATION:

Mix potatoes, veggies, onions in bottom of crock. Place chicken on top of potatoes, pour soup over chicken and add spices. Cover and cook on LOW for 6-8 hours or until potatoes are tender and chicken is cooked through. Serves 4.

RECIPE: Rainy Day Vegetable Soup

We've had one heck of a windy, rainy day here at Lil Raisin Acres. Here's a quick, simple soup recipe for those cool, rainy autumn days ahead. Utilize your home canned, frozen,and dehydrated harvest!

INGREDIENTS:

8 c. (2 qt.) Broth (Chicken, Beef or Veggie)
4 c. (1 qt.) Tomato Juice
1 can Tomato Paste
2 1/2 c. Egg Noodles
Vegetables*
1 Tbsp. Minced Onion
1/2 tsp. Garlic Powder
1/2 tsp. Basil
1/2 tsp. Parsley
1/4 tsp. Rosemary
1 Bay Leaf
Salt and Pepper to taste

*Vegetables: 2 Cans Mixed Veggies (1 qt. homecanned), OR 2 c. Frozen Mixed Veggies, OR 1 1/2 c. Dehydrated Mixed Veggies

PREPARATION:


Combine broth, juice, paste and spices (if your are using DEHYDRATED veggies, add them now as well). Bring to a boil, add noodles and frozen/canned veggies. Simmer for 10 minutes or until noodles are cooked. Remove bay leaf and serve. May be served with crackers or bread.

BOOKSHELF: The Dehydrator Bible

There's a lot more to do with a dehydrator than dry herbs and make jerky! Preserve your harvest economically and create your own dry mix meals with the simple and hearty recipes contained in this tome of dehydrating knowledge!

Click to view/purchase book on Amazon.com

THE DEHYDRATOR BIBLE: Includes Over 400 Recipes

By Jennifer MacKenzie, Jay Nutt and Don Mercer

Although dehydration is an ages old method of food preservation, it's become a lost art for the most part with modern technology like refrigerators and freezers. But, what if we want to preserve more than will fit in our electric units, or we are travelling and won't have any access to electricity? This book will give you all the answers!

The book opens with a discussion concerning the history and advantages of  dry food preservation, the basic equipment you will need to get started, drying techniques, and storage of your products.

Perhaps the most important portion of the book comes next, where you will find a detailed manual as to how to properly dry each individual herb, vegetable and fruit, as well as different types of meat. Proper drying method and time is essential in creating a viable final product that will store and reconstitute well. I've referred to this section of the book several times since I've had it.

The book goes on to offer recipes for everyday meals, various types of jerky, portable dry mix camp meals, and other crafts and gifts like dried flowers. You can even use the dehydrator to make pet treats! It's actually quite convenient to use dehydrated vegetables in place of frozen in soups and stews. We store them in the pantry in glass jars, rather than taking up valuable freezer space, and there is no "freezer burn" to be concerned with for long-term storage!

I found the dry mix trail meals to be of particular interest. They can be mixed and carried in a backpack in ziplock baggies, or put together ahead of time and stored in mylar bags or mason jars with oxygen absorbers. Just add boiling water, and you're ready to eat!

BOTTOM LINE: 5 of 5 Stars. From beginner to expert, this book has a little something for everyone. It's an invaluable go-to reference book! Highly recommended for anyone interested in using dehydration for food preservation.

BOOKSHELF: The Backyard Homestead

Click to view book on Amazon.com

THE BACKYARD HOMESTEAD: Produce All the Food You Need on Just a Quarter Acre

Edited By Carleen Madigan

*Eat from the garden year-round with fresh veggies and homemade preserves.
*Make omelets from eggs laid by your own chickens.
*Pick fruits and berries from your back door.




The Backyard Homestead is a good resource for beginner and intermediate level homesteaders, or those contemplating a move to the country and starting a simpler lifestyle. Within it's 367 pages is basic information concerning growing vegetables, herbs, and fruits, as well as caring for your own livestock for meat, milk, and eggs. Everything you'd need to know to eat your own homegrown food year-round!

The book opens with "The Home Vegetable Garden". Starting from planning your garden, to starting seeds, to DIY plant supports, to harvesting, and finally seed-saving and preserving, the entire life cycle of the plants are touched upon. A good basic foundation is presented, including a "Vegetables A to Z" section giving specifics for various common vegetables. The information presented is more than enough to get a new gardener headed down the right path to success.

As far as preserving, hot bath canning is touched upon briefly, with no mention of dehydration. If you're looking for books specifically concerning food preservation, I'd recommend The Dehydrator Bible: Includes over 400 Recipes for dehydration information, and Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving concerning pressure canning.

The second section, "Backyard Fruits and Nuts", gives basic information about several different types of fruits including strawberries and which to choose for your climate, choosing and caring for various berry bushes, choosing and raising grapes for wine and preserves making, and suggestions for deciding what varieties of fruit and nut trees will work best for your orchard. Proper pruning of all bushes, vines and trees is covered. There are even wine and cider making directions!

The "Easy Fragrant Herbs" section covers very basic cultivation of 32 common culinary and medicinal herbs, and although includes some tea and vinegar recipes, doesn't touch much on the medicinal applications of those herbs. I've found The Complete Book of Herbs: A Practical Guide to Growing and Using Herbs and The New Healing Herbs: The Essential Guide to More Than 125 of Nature's Most Potent Herbal Remedies to be valuable reference guides if you're looking for in-depth information about specific plants, both cultivated and wild. Rosemary Gladstar's Medicinal Herbs: A Beginner's Guide: 33 Healing Herbs to Know, Grow, and Use provides an excellent introduction and overview to beginner herbalists on how to administer various forms of treatments, as well as information on 24 common herbs. It includes 124 medicinal recipes, too!

"Homegrown Grains" was of particular interest to us. We are currently purchasing corn and hay for our animal feed. It would be nice to supplement some of that with homegrown product! We've never attempted to grow grains ourselves, other than a few stalks of corn (with little success). There is a planting chart, which will certainly come in handy. The chapter focuses on corn and wheat, and covers properly drying corn, threshing wheat, using a grinder and bread and pasta making. Many of the questions I've had regarding wheat growing were answered. Growing hops and barley for home brewed beer was a welcome surprise at the end of the chapter!

After the plants presentations came "Poultry for Meat and Eggs". It's important to select breeds suited to your purpose. Meat breeds are larger, and often produce less eggs than laying breeds. This section does a fairly good job at covering the common chicken breeds in the US, although there is no mention of climate hardiness. Raising turkeys, ducks and geese are also referenced here. Collecting and preserving eggs is thoroughly discussed, but home butchery of meat birds is left out. Collection of feathers for down is touched upon, though. There are plans included for building a small portable suburban-type chicken coop that will house 2 or 3 birds, but would recommend doing a thorough web-search before settling on a design.

"Meat and Dairy" section is what you'd expect- Goats, Sheep, Cows, Rabbits and Hogs. Interestingly enough, there were no plans presented for building a basic shelter or fencing for the animals. Breed selection for meat or milk is covered, as well as proper milking technique and safe milk handling etiquette. Making various cheeses and butter is touched upon.  If you're interested in specific cheese making recipes, Home Cheese Making: Recipes for 75 Homemade Cheeses is a great guide.

Again, home butchery is vastly under-represented, simply covering how to cut the meat and package it for freezing or for smoking after you pick it up from the slaughter house. There are plans for a simple smoke house, and recipes for sausage and jerky.  If you're looking for an in-depth guide to livestock, I'd look elsewhere. There are many very specific books available out there for the type of animal you're interested in raising. For the stouthearted, there is the Home Butchering Handbook: A Living Free Guide (Living Free Guides).

The final chapter, "Food from the Wild" lightly touches on beekeeping, foraging for wild edibles, and gathering maple syrup. Very basic information is presented. Again, I'd look for specific reference guides for these particular subjects. Especially concerning wild edibles. A good reference guide with color photos that is tailored to your specific area is the best choice. There are indeed plants out there than can make you very sick if you make an identification mistake!

In the appendix, there are several web resources given, as well as further reading suggestions (some of which I have already mentioned!) on various specific subjects. As of writing, I have not reviewed them all yet!

Over-all, I would HIGHLY recommend this book to BEGINNERS, and to intermediate gardeners looking to expand from a simple vegetable or herb garden to a larger scale, self-sufficient homestead. It's a good starting point. People who've been homesteading for a while will probably already be familiar with much of the information presented here. However, it'd be a great book to have on hand to lend should a visitor become interesting in what you're doing, too!

Have you read this book? What did you think of it? Comment below!

UPDATE: The Three Sisters

As I previously mentioned on our Facebook page,  this is our first year growing corn. We opted for the traditional Native American "Three Sisters" method. For a more detailed description and history, click here to visit Wikipedia.

For our "experiment", we planted:

*Peaches and Cream Hybrid Bi-Color Sweet Corn

* Self-Saved Greasy Pole Beans

*American Seed Dark Green Zucchini

We planted the corn in groups of 4 seeds in each mound roughly 18" apart in late May.Within about a week, little grass-like stalks popped up after a good, soaking rain. I wish I could find the original packaging for the brand-name, every last kernel we planted germinated! (We purchased the seed at Rural King.) 

After our corn stalks were about 5-6" tall, we then planted 3 beans and 3 zucchini around each group of 4 stalks, about 6" from the stalks in a circular pattern. (Although the traditional method calls for Yellow Crookneck Squash specifically, we opted for Zucchini, since we prefer it.). And then, we waited... Then waited some more...

Two weeks had went by when we finally got a few days of steady rain and seedlings began to appear. We've had a fairly dry, cool summer thus far, so I figured that was part of the delay. But in the end, our self-saved beans, who have never given me a problem in the past, germinated at a less than 85% rate. Granted, we used some leftover 2012 stock, but it shouldn't have been an issue.

I made a very big mistake with the Dollar Tree American Seed packets. A less than 50% germination rate occurred for the zucchini. Of an entire packet of White Lisbon Bunching Onions I planted in my herb garden, not a single seed germinated! I wouldn't recommend them and won't purchase them again. I figured I'd give them a whirl. While you really can't beat $.25 per packet, you really do get what you pay for...

Anyhow, as you can see by the photo, the drier than usual conditions haven't been helpful. We don't have an irrigation system, nor a hose that can reach from the house to the garden, so it's been hoofing gallon jugs full of water from the end of the hose to the garden. Interestingly enough, however, the neighbor's field corn seems relatively unaffected and I really haven't seen their sprinklers operating at all.

Since we don't use any chemical pesticides, there have been a few insects (probably grasshoppers) feasting on the bean leaves a little here and there, but nothing of major concern. Since our garden was previously a horse pasture just 2 summers ago, we're still fighting a war against weeds. But, all in all, the plants that did germinate, while perhaps a bit stunted, are growing along steadily.

So far, other than the poor germination, we're pleased and plan to employ this method again next year, assuming the harvest will be average or better for the number of plants we do have. I'll keep everyone posted!

P.S. Be sure to keep your goat away from the corn, they find it delicious!

RECIPE: Leftovers Stir-Fry

A quick, easy, flexible and inexpensive meal composed of leftovers and ingredients on hand. 

Just about any type of meat can be used along with frozen, canned, fresh, or dehydrated vegetables to create a delicious meal tailored to your family's personal tastes. Don't let those leftovers go to waste!

INGREDIENTS:

Recommended Meats (2 c. Cubed/Sliced. Choose 1, ground meats and fish not recommended):

Beef, Venison, Pork, Chicken, Turkey, Shrimp

Vegetable Suggestions (As many as you like, total 4 c. volume chopped. Fresh, frozen, canned or re-hydrated):

Bean Sprouts, Bamboo Shoots, Broccoli, Carrots, Celery, Corn, Mushrooms, Onion, Red Pepper, Water Chesnuts

Sauces:

1 tbsp. Olive Oil

1 pkg Gravy Mix, prepared or 1 can Gravy. (Brown for Beef and Venison, Chickien for others)

2 tbsp. Soy Sauce

Spices to Taste:

Garlic (fresh or powdered)

Ginger (fresh or powdered)

Parsley (fresh or powdered)

Salt and Pepper

Cayenne (optional)

Onion Powder (if not using fresh)

PREPARATION:

In a large frying pan or wok, heat the olive oil over medium-high heat. Place fresh vegetables in hot oil and stir-fry for about 2-3 minutes until slightly softened, but still al dente. At this time, add any canned, frozen or re-hydrated vegetables, along with 1 tbsp. of the soy and the spices. Continue stir-frying for an additional 1-2 minutes until frozen veggies are thawed. (If only using fresh, stir-fry veggies for 4-5 minutes total).

Add meat to pan  along with reserved soy sauce and prepared gravy. Stir frequently until heated through. Serve over white rice or Asian style noodles. Serves 4.