About Tricia

I am Tricia. Momma of nine, homeschooler, artist, foodie and maker of all kinds of things. It's a pleasure to share here our family homesteading adventures, the things we make, and what inspires our days. Read more about my family and work here. Thanks for visiting!

Author Archive | Tricia

Weekly farm update

By on March 25, 2012 in Farm and Garden

Oh boy this was a busy week!  We ate the first fruits of our labor this week.  Pea shoots, two weeks from seed to plate.  If you have never tried growing pea shoots, they take only two weeks to grow to edible size, you cut the top portion (about 5 to 6 inches long) once they are about 12 inches tall and then the top grows back.  You can take a second cutting and then I transplant them to rows where they will have the space to grow peas for us.

This is such a great crop, in a salad the shoots are slightly nutty and crispy with a little taste of cucumber.  It is almost instant gratification and great to have in the garden as you wait for everything else to grow.

If you saw my update last week, I posted the peas when they were a week old.   It is super easy to plant these and I do them in a container.  Put some good garden soil (I use compost) in a container, sprinkle dried peas (the kind for sprounting) all over the surface then cover with a thin layer of soil and pat it all down. (I added much more seeds than are shown in the picture)

at one week.  I was not able to take a picture at two weeks but at this point alot of the peas had not popped up through the dirt.  When they did, it was a carpet of peas.
This week I got more salad planted, bell peppers, jalapeno, two beds of onions and a bed of garlic just to eat the tops because garlic does not grow well here.  What I am most excited about is the jerusalem artichokes, also called sunchokes, that I received from a swap with an online gardening friend and I have been busy digging trenches to plant them.  I hope to be done by next week…long before then.
Today I am at a Sustainable Living Conference with Erica (who loves to do this one event with her momma every year)  She is one of my children who actually loves to grow things and the farm is her environment.  It is  our bonding time.  I will post pics as soon as I can.  I hope to learn lots and share lots.

If you enjoyed this post, please consider leaving a comment or follow me by email at the top right hand of the screen to have future posts sent to you. Tricia (Crunchy Catholic Momma)

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Meatless Friday Meal Recipe Linkup: Baba Ganoush

By on March 23, 2012 in Meatless Friday, Recipes

Every week during lent on Friday I will be sharing a meatless meal with you all and I am inviting everyone to link up to a meatless recipe on their own blog.

The only rules are:

1. You must post a link to the actual recipe on your blog and not to your front page.
2. Please place a link in your blog post back here so everyone can find all of our recipes.
3. Only post one recipe per week.

Thats it!

Here is my recipe for this week.

There are two things I would not eat until I was into my 30’s, okra (I like it raw and fried) and eggplant!  In my house eggplant was slimy and yucky and no way was I going to eat it!  As an adult, I would not even consider it even though Poppa loves it.  Then one day I saw a humus recipe that looked amazing.  After reading it I realized that this hummus, baba ganoush, was made from eggplant.  I love hummus, it is something I can eat all the time so I decided to be a big girl and try it.

This is not my recipe, I got it from Saveur.com but I can tell you that it is easy and paired with some flat bread of naan, it is really good.

I also found this awesome youtube from Grow. Cook. Eat that shows you step by step.

so there you have it.  I hope you try it.

Baba Ganoush

SERVES 4
8 cloves garlic, unpeeled
2 medium eggplants
⅓ cup fresh lemon juice
¼ cup plus 2 tbsp. Tahini
2 tbsp. mayonnaise
1 tbsp. finely chopped parsley
1 tsp. ground cumin
1 tsp. paprika
Salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

Place garlic and eggplants on a foil-lined baking sheet, and broil until tender and charred all over, about 10 minutes for garlic, and about 40 minutes for eggplant. Peel and seed eggplants, and mash flesh with peeled garlic, juice, tahini, mayonnaise, 2 tsp. parsley, the cumin, paprika, and salt and pepper in a bowl; sprinkle with remaining parsley.

If you have a meatless meal that you would like to share, just include the link at the bottom.  

If you enjoyed this post, please consider leaving a comment or follow me by email at the top right hand of the screen to have future posts sent to you. Tricia (Crunchy Catholic Momma)

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