A Brilliant Meal for Fall!

This lovely is stuffed with Mexican ingredients--tortillas, sour cream, roasted chiles, tomatillo sauce, roasted chicken, cheese, and generous seasoning--and roasted for 2 hours. Scraping down the cooked insides of this Baby Blue Hubbard yielded a delicious dish!

Get Ready to Garden!

So you don't have to, I've linked pages of catalogs I'm ordering from this year:

Scheepers Kitchen Garden Seeds Good herb & Asian greens selections; no photos

Seed Savers Exchange Great pics, lots of organics

Baker Creek Heirloom Heirloom, huge selections (8 pages of tomatoes), not much growing info, not all depicted

Johnny's Organized by category, good growing info

Stokes Commercial catalog has a ton of growing info and mostly hybrids

Seeds of Change I'm ticked because they increased packet prices 50 cents--nearly a 20% increase; NM farm that grows organics

The Chile Woman My friend Susan ships transplants of chiles, peppers, tomatoes & tomatillos, $3 per plant

And if you want to see my veggie wishlist, it's growing & posted at my new garden produce wiki.

Fix the Food Economy

If you only read one piece on food or of this week's news, make it Michael Pollan's Farmer in Chief.

Already a rabid Pollan fan, I'll read anything of his that's put in front of me. But this is a smart article that has very little to do with food and everything to do with why the economy and the energy crisis won't be dealt with until the food economy is addressed by the next administration. Users of 19% of our fossil fuel, and contributors of 37% of greenhouse gas emissions, the agricultural industry has strayed way, way away from its roots. It now takes 10 calories to produce 1 supermarket food calorie, and the average American eats a half-pound of meat a day.

And I've only read about a third of the article--just had to share it!

Thinking of ???

How timely that our Southern transplant has arrived, for I've just run across this magazine.

I think this speaks for itself.

Putting the Beds to Bed

Denver Water offers a mailed packet on xeriscape info to customers (ironically at the same time they are encouraging us to go paperless on billing.) It's not to early to begin planning for next year's garden chores and water reduction.

Speaking of which, toilets, rain sensors and washing machines are still eligible for rebates.

RIP

Oh god, I killed it. The only living thing in my house that is older than the cat or myself. This damned plant has survived 9 years (maybe more ... I think I had it in Fort Collins before I moved to DC and HotPants01 cared for it in my absence) and more moves than I can count. It was always there for me. It came back, time after time, after weeks of not being watered. And today I killed it. I put it under the sink to douse it in water after weeks of not watering it. It looked sad. All saggy and brown. I left it sitting in the sink for like 12 hours. Then, I went to pull all the brown leafs off, and the whole thing came out in my hands. Sad roots and all. It committed suicide right in my own hands. I think I'm going to pull it out of the trash and try to re-plant it in the yard ... see if it can survive in the wild. I'm a bad, bad person. I'll miss you dead plant.

Coastal Fields Free Classes

June 9 at 4pm: Nutrition...Learn how to feed yourself and those you love healthier, tastier, and cheaper! You are never to young or old to learn how to eat well. We'll send you home with plenty of tips, ideas, and recipes to try out! Location: 12441 West 75th Avenue, Arvada

June 23 at 4pm: Identifying and Collecting Wild (and not so wild) Plants... Did you know that many of the "weeds" in your garden and yard are actually edible, tasty and nutritious? Come to this series to learn how to identify which plants are safe to eat and delicious too! Many of the native species are even healthier than their domesticated cousins. We will teach you about the culinary history of the plants, what nutritional value they have, and how to prepare them in your kitchen. Tasting is encouraged! Location: 12441 West 75th Avenue, Arvada

June 24 at 4pm (ages 2-7) and 5pm (ages 8 through adult): What Can I Do? Climate change, poverty, endangered species, and other problems facing our world today affect everyone, and there is so much that anyone, young and old, can do to help! Come learn and discuss with Coastalfields as we develop solutions that every person can do with minimal effort. Location: 4965 Eldridge St, Golden

More information about these and future events can be found at http://www.coastalfields.com/scheduleofeducating.html

Toilet Talk

Has anyone gone to the bathroom at Mercury Cafe lately? They have installed these toilet tank sinks. We have run into Colorado grey water laws in our past water related eco ideas but JB thinks this one is kosher.

And since we are on the subject, last weekend we installed a DIY Doggie Dooley.

I don't think it's out on DVD yet for the cable-less, but for the cable'd check out Living With Ed for all the eco things we could do- if we lived in California and had Ed Begley Jr kinda bank.

Cooking Classes...and more

Today's surprise knowledge is that the City of Aurora offers quite a compliment of cooking classes that are easy on the wallet and inspiring to the palate.

Here's the summer sched; click on Cooking in the left menu bar.

They're also offering, in what used to be Denver Water's star presence in town but has now been relinquished to DBG's fee-for-service innovation to start charging, free xeriscape classes on a variety of subjects.