I am attempting to make milk kefir. This photo may mean something… or nothing to you. At this point in time, its sole purpose is to provide a visual for Wardeh, the teacher of my Cultured Dairy and Cheesemaking e-Course, and my classmates in that course. If you are in the "this means nothing to me" category, join…

Opening the mailbox to discover the season's first seed catalog has been a ritual for decades… a mainstay to count on as much as the approach of the season itself. The wood carving on the left, titled The New Seed Catalog, and the farmer on the right, are two of several carvings by Harley Refsal that were featured in a February 1988 issue of Midwest…

I'm devoting a second post to whole grain teff as a hot breakfast cereal because I am so impressed with it and I also want to share a bit about its preparation. My intent was to snap a photo of my bowl of teff hot cereal this morning before I dug in, but in my haste to enjoy…

Look at the lovely, fresh, multi-colored, pastel eggs that a neighbor placed in my eager, grateful hands a couple days ago. They're almost too pretty to crack open… but I did. Two of them found their way into egg salad spread atop slices of Flax Irish Soda Bread for Dick's and my fishing outing yesterday.      Since eggs shouldn't be boiled because it…

It's the beginning of a new work/school week tomorrow. Are you stuck in a rut packing the same foods in your lunch day after day? Laptop Lunches, a business started by two women who are making a difference one lunch at a time, sells Bento Lunchboxes with four compartments that encourage you to fill each one with a different…

Day 2 of party prep for my granddaughter's 9th birthday celebration… For party guest goody bags, Heather ordered striped paper bags from my daughter Jessie's fortandfield on Etsy Shop that are the perfect size for tucking in a few little take-home "thank you for coming to my party" trinkets. The bags' stripes and bright colors, that…

Oh, yes. I must explain. I can hear your, "Huh?" I began with a vision of a bunny, but as Bruce Springsteen's Hungry Heart lyrics go… "I took a wrong turn and I just kept going."   I have two spiral notebooks that hold recipes… magazine clippings and some handwritten that I have collected since 1974. My recipe collection has…

Earlier this spring, I shared a photo I took of blossoms on my pear tree. So very pretty… but it never bore any fruit. Twenty years since I planted my pair of Minnesota-hardy Harbin Pear trees… never any fruit.    Until about a month ago… To my amazement, the tree was heavily-laden with the most beautiful pears. Small… barely 2 inches across…

On Saturday, June 20th, while Dick attended the "Back to the Fifties" vintage car event at the Minnesota State Fairgrounds in St. Paul, I drove over to the Mill City Farmers Market in Minneapolis. This colorful skirt beckoned me into a clothing vendor's booth set up at the farthest corner from the market's street entrance. The…

This is how I did it… It began with my doctor telling me in September 2008 that I must go on cholesterol-lowering medication. He was concerned with my numbers. (See yesterday's post.) I'm always up for a good challenge and this was no exception. I told him, "Just give me 6 months to try some…