March flew.....





This month just flew for us! The weekends are beginning to 'blur' along with the week -that's when you know a new season on the farm has begun! Woke up this morning to a picture-worthy scene: winter wonderland...blaaaa. Burn furnance oil, burn! I've been a sickly farm hand humming about the couch for the last two days with a massive 'cold'. I pride myself in "never getting sick" and I practice 'prevention' with how I eat and take care of myself in the first place. I blame my mother-in-law, aka 'Babca' or 'Sophie'. She had it first over Easter. I have to make time to enter a blog about just her, as she is a really good woman that needs some attention. Ok, back to whinning about being sick: Entering and Exiting the warm greenhouse environment never assists with these ailments either I may say! For me, it's how you 'deal with it' that will help you in the long run. For us around here is lots of my mother's 'horehound' tea with garlic! Lots of garlic, and REST! Our immune systems around here get a big workout! My mom's been very 'herbal' my entire life and has grown some nasty tasting stuff that has always 'soothed' and 'WORKED' without hitting the pharmacy! My dad is sick too this week, so I know I'm not the only one backing down this 'horehound' cure! I can tell when a 'sickness' is 'breaking' and my energy returns and I'm ready to go! I transplanted 73 varieties of my heirloom tomatoes yesterday! I have approx. 30 -100 plants for each variety, so Ben was already freaking as I did my work, as I used 50 cell trays and he was soon adding up a tiny bit of acreage for my heirlooms!! I'm exicited, even though my sister told me she 'heard' it's going to be a 'cold wet' summer, which means 'tomato blight' to me!!! I cannot start worrying this early! April begins on Tuesday, and I am wishing and hoping for a SUNNY month! This makes or breaks my transplants I swear! Even though we are a doing the 'every/other' market bit this time of year, know that when we do arrive weekly and on a timely basis, we will be packed and loaded to bear with all the hard work and planning that happens now! Get ready to eat well this spring, summer and fall! In the meantime, yet another recipe:
Roasted Garlic Spinach Soup
Cut tops off of 4 Garlic Bulbs (oh hell, make it 6!!). Wrap in greased foil loosely and roast in oven at 375 for close to an hour until soft. Squeeze out roasted garlic, set aside.
Cook 2 cups of chopped onions in a couple tsp. of olive oil until soft. 10 mins or so. Add 1/2 cup flour. Stir and cook flour for a couple minutes. Slowly add 4 cups of chicken stock (homemade or prepared). Bring this to a boil, stirring constantly until thickened. Add 2 cups of water, 1-2 tsp. fresh ground pepper and another 4 cups of chicken stock. Stir. Add your roasted garlic. Bring to a boil again and whisk it. Add 12 cups of fresh spinach leaves. (If your smart, this time of year you have your own equivilant frozen!) AND also add about 4 tbs. of Basil pesto. (I'm lucky, as my mother came and harvested our field basil and made beautiful pesto last summer and froze it for me!) Cook this down for 5 mins until spinach is soft. I then use my handy 'hand blender' to process it until smooth. NOW add 1 cup of grated Parmesan Cheese and 1 cup of Whipping Cream. Heat through. This will render about 14 cups or so. Each person will mow down 3 cups or so and your pot will be empty fast! Enjoy.

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