May 2016 – Peacock Orchard

Sainfoin as a Dry land Forage

Last year when we planted sainfoin I thought we’d have four foot tall greenery in no time. That didn’t happen. Still, I’m finding sainfoin to be a fascinating plant. We heavily planted on 4 acres but I threw seeds everywhere. They are in the Kraters, berms, cider orchard and randomly about.

The interesting thing about this random tossing of seeds is that they have grown a bit differently depending on their location. The sainfoin planted in the field has not grown terribly tall (dealing with extreme compaction). It has branched out more though.

The sainfoin on the berm has grown quite tall and thick (very loose soil).

I’m going to continue to enjoy watching these plants grow.

Eggtastic Tuesday- Crustless Asiago, Parmesan and Asparagus Quiche

This recipe is simple, easy and delicious. It is also amazingly healthful. The Asparagus was picked moments before from the garden. The eggs were from our chicken flock and scarce hours old. Exactly what the Dr. ordered. Dr. Mark Nyman I mean.

I have a secret, I’m fat, kind of. I consider not being able to fit in my pants close to the end of the world. So, time to get healthier. I’ve always figured we ate well. I cook almost all of our meals from scratch. We do eat a lot of grain products though. From Meuseli in the morning to home made pasta and bread. We are a grain loving family. Vegetable loving, not so much. I love them but no one else does. It makes cooking them a trial.

Back to what I was saying, we are modifying our diet. No more gluten. No processed foods (how the kids will live without peanut butter and nutella sandwiches I don’t know). No dairy. No refined sugars. No alcohol. I keep telling my husband we are on a veggie and meat diet. He’s ok with the meat part, the veggie part might kill him. His body will go into complete shock and I could see him keeling straight over. So, 20lbs is my goal and meals like this are what will get us there. Simple, delicious and free of our long list of don’ts.

For those on the Paleo diet or those who cannot consume gluten or dairy, this is amazing!

Crustless Asiago, Parmesan and Asparagus Quiche

Ingredients:

5 eggs
5-6 Asparagus spears- chopped
¼ cup Asiago Cheese- shredded
¼ cup parmesan cheese- shredded
½ tsp paprika
Salt and Pepper (to taste)

Directions:

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Mix all ingredients but asparagus in a bowl with a whisk and pour into a pie pan. Add the chopped asparagus spears. Cook for 20 minutes. Enjoy.

Varieties in the Orchard

I thought some might be interested in what varieties we currently have growing and my opinions of some of them. It is a long list. I’m somewhat eclectic. I do enjoy buying everything and seeing what flourishes. So prepare yourself some coffee as this is going to be a long one.

Apple Trees

Stark® Lodi Apple Stark®– This apple has done the best by far in the orchard. It is our oldest apple variety and the tree is beautiful all around.
Starkspur® UltraMac™ Apple
Honeycrisp™ Apple
WineCrisp™ Apple Co-op 31
McIntosh Apple
Pound Sweet Apple– Alive and well in a Krater. I am excited to see this fruit!
Stark® Golden Delicious Apple– I have quite a few of these (they had a good sale) and they are hit and miss. Some are doing quite well but others are not. They also haven’t branched out at all. They are still stick looking with leaves. It’s a little odd.
Macoun Apple
Freedom Apple
Snow Apple
Hidden Rose– I was over the moon to be getting this variety but sadly neither apple survived. I bought them as whip grafts and I had some issues with both planting and protecting them. The rabbits got to a lot of my whip grafts. I hope to try this variety again.
Dabinette– Cider apple
Jonathon
Fuji
Dr. Matthews
Grimes Golden– I had a few of these and have one survivor. They were also whip grafts. They are said to be top of the bushel as far as taste and cider making ability. We shall see on that. It is still only a few feet tall.
Melrose
Caville Blanc D’Hiver– I keep trying to acquire this variety but it has been a difficult one. I finally bought a single whip graft which sadly did not survive.
Kingston Black– Cider apple
Sops of Wine
Golden Russet– Cider apple
Northern Spy

Cherry Trees

Blackgold® Sweet Cherry– This cherry is proving to be an easy keeper. Both trees survived and have flowered in their second year.
Hansen’s Bush Cherry
Stark® Montmorency Pie Cherry– These trees keep dying on me. I’m not sure why, but they do.
Stella– Bought a single tree from a home improvement store. This is our first year with it but so far it has survived Wyoming winds.

Peach Trees

Contender Peach– Has survived another winter. I thought keeping these peach trees alive would be an issue but they are hardier than I had expected.
Intrepid Peach
Reliance Peach>Both of these peach varieties were dead upon planting last year. One has come up from the rootstock but that is it. They were replaced and we shall see how they do this year.

Pear Trees

Starking® Delicious™ Pear– I am not sure I will plant any more pears. Not a single one survives the winter. I’ll stop thinking about poached pears and move on to something that can handle our conditions.
Starking® Hardy Giant™ Asian Pear
Colette Everbearing Pear
Forelle- I’ve grown this tree and the following trees from seed. They are tiny but doing well so far. Time will tell.
Colette
Seckel

Plum Trees

Bubblegum Plum®
Superior Plum– I bought two of these plums my first year from Stark Bros. They are both still alive, some of the only survivors on the berms (Which I have decided are not a good place for planting in dry Wyoming). They both flowered profusely this year, though very early. I believe that is also due to being on the berms. We had many snows during their bloom and I doubt we get anything from them.
Starking® Delicious™ Plum
Ozark Premier Plum
Methley Plum
Shiro Plum– We have quite a few of these and they are all doing well. This is their second year. Their branching out is much slower than the Superior Plum but they are sturdy and growing so what else can a girl ask for.
Oullins Plum– We bought 4 of these trees this spring. I expected them to be whip grafts. I was quite surprised when they came in the mail and were a good 4 feet tall. The root mass on them was also impressive. I have never received trees in quite this condition before. One Green World is where I got the Oullins, Nichols and Italian plums. I’ll be purchasing from them again. The price is a bit larger than Stark’s but they carry different varieties. They are a few dollars cheaper than South Meadow Fruit Gardens but South Meadow simply delivers whip grafts. So, for the price these trees can not be beat.
Nichols Plum
Italian plum

Other Fruit Trees

Mango Paw Paw– Had a tough time of it last year. I had a single survivor which daughter quickly broke in half right after I took the picture and rejoiced after it. I suppose the lesson here is that two year olds should not be released upon unsuspecting trees.
Briana Apricot– These things were teeny tiny when I bought them. Scarcely a few inches tall. Not much has changed BUT they are still alive, so success.
Cathay Quince– I just bought one of these, not figuring I’d require much more than that. It’s alive and well in the Krater farthest from the house. That krater gets the least amount of water so I’d say these trees must be quite hardy.
American Persimmon– These were also tiny trees upon purchase. I have no idea if they’ve survived their first winter yet. I will say they must taste awful as the rabbits didn’t eat them.
Osage Orange- Planted in a dry, desolate part of the property they have thrived in total neglect. They were small trees though, and some of them snapped under the weight of our last heavy snow fall.

Nut Trees

Black Walnut– A few survivors the first winter only to be completely consumed by ground animals.
Hazelnut– Rabbits love them.
White Oak– They don’t like getting hit by trucks.
Timbur Chestnut– Also tasty to rabbits.
Michigan Pecan– Perhaps the tastiest.
Russian Almond– Eaten but coming up from the root. A nut that is hard to crack (making a joke).

Berry Plants

Autumn Magic Aronia Berry– Both aronias survived but only as they are coming up from the root now.
Viking Aronia Berry
Illini Hardy Blackberry– By far the best berry I have as far as survivability. Takes an eating and keeps on kicking.
American Cranberry– I fell in love with these at first sight. So dainty. So unexpected. So dead. Dang it!
Black Consort Currants– I have three. Two survived. One could even be said to have flourished.
Adams Elderberry– A single survivor and only then as it came up from the root.
Johns Elderberry
Vermilion Sunset™ Goji– So easy to grow. I didn’t expect that and only bought one. It was eaten to the ground but is coming back just fine.
Borealis Honeyberry– Honeyberries are supposed to be native to my area. If they are they just hate me.
Cinderella Honeyberry
Issai Hardy Kiwi– Not sure I’ll bother trying these stupid vines again.
Fall Red Everbearing Raspberry– Yet another berry that should be native but won’t grow.
Latham Red Raspberry
Leikora Seaberry– Doing great in a moderate krater though it’s pollinating buddy bit the big one.
Seaberry Pollinator
Red Mulberry– Unknown. Not sure if any survived yet. Probably not but I like to give them a try.
Apple Rose

Nitrogen Fixing– Nothing more be said about these I think.

Black Locust
Caragana

Eggtastic Tuesday- The Perfect Buttermilk Omelet

Piggybacking on my last egg-periment we made delicious omelets for breakfast. I have a preference for more Mexican flavors, hence the onions, olives and such. Any omelet filling could be used though.

The Perfect Buttermilk Omelet

Ingredients:

4 eggs
¼ large onion
2 garlic cloves
1 green onion
1 Tablespoon buttermilk
Olives
Salt and Pepper (to taste)

Directions:

Preheat your skillet until smoking hot. Add all of the ingredients to a chopper/blender and blend until bubbles form on the top. Add all at once to the skillet and cook until the edges are firm. Flip the omelet and cook to desired consistency. Add salsa and enjoy.

I do love our Ninja. It does everything. Very multi-purpose. I just add everything in and voila!

Of course when the children help things get a little….messy.

They are so thrilled about it though, makes all the mess worth it.

Eggtastic Tuesday- The Fluffiest Scrambled Eggs

The key to fluffy scrambled eggs is a simple one, air. The more air you can get in your eggs the fluffier they will be.

Now, I do not claim to be an expert whisker but I’ve whisked plenty of things in my life. I whisked and whisked the eggs but I can’t beat the blender for adding air.

30 seconds in the blender and the eggs are airy and light.

These are hand scrambled eggs. Now, it should be known the eggs got a bit overcooked as we were having photo problems. Thankfully our first two eggs were equally over cooked so the experiment was still good.

Eggs in the blender. Noticeably fluffier.

Once I picked which method made the airiest eggs, I then tried adding a teaspoon of water and a teaspoon of milk to see which would would assist in further fluffing.

This is eggs poured into a hot and oiled pan after being blended with water.

Eggs blended with milk.

There wasn’t a very noticeable difference between the milk blended and water blended eggs. I do not believe it affected taste either. So I suppose that’s a personal preference thing. I will say that adding water or milk to thin down the eggs did produce lighter eggs.

So get out your blender and blend some eggs.

Oh, as an added note all of the eggs were laid that day so they were all the same age.

Gleying a pond with pigs

What is “gley” exactly? According to Merriam-Webster gley means:

a sticky clay soil or soil layer formed under the surface of some waterlogged soils.

In essence I am using my pigs to seal a pond for me. Their manure and weight will tamp and coat the soil to keep the water in. It hasn’t been warm enough for them to be doing it long. We’ve had about a months worth of weather where they left the barn freely.

There was a few inches of water in the bottom of the pond that the pigs were enjoying. I wanted to fill the pond for the ducks though, and to see what the pigs would do. So a month ago I filled the pond to capacity. The pond is 14x20x3. I dug it years ago. It has a deep end and a shallow end I intended to use as a biological filter for the duck mess. It never worked out, unfortunately. The cement I had used to seal the pond cracked and it hasn’t been usable for years. We pounded out the cement when we got the pigs and now it’s their turn to work.

Or play, depends on your perspective. B.L.T. has brought a toy into the pond and he splashes around with abandon. In these pictures I’d turned a sprinkler on for them because it was SOOOO hot out, at least for Wyoming.

The pond isn’t completely sealed yet, but it has a good start. A month without intervention and it still has a fair bit of water in it. It was unexpected. I hope they are able to finish the gley soon. They are eating weight now.