Baked Fries

Potatoes are abundant in my neck of the woods. In the fall I can buy 50lbs for $15 from a local farmer, as opposed to $3.99 for 7lbs this time of year in the grocery store. Potatoes are local, cheap and store well over winter.

I never understood why people would buy potatoes in a can. Or mashed potatoes from a plastic bag (heat & serve). Or frozen potatoes in the form of french fries, hash browns and any other number of potato fare. Don't even get me started on potato flakes.

There's a commercial that airs here that shows a business woman cutting potatoes all day at her desk, in a business meeting and at various work situations. An annoucer says "why slave away all day to make a meal? Buy such and such potatoes..." you get the picture. It takes me less than ten minutes to prepare potatoes. It's interesting how as a society we have convinced ourselves that these things are hard. That they take too much time and we deserve to be pampered.

I like real food, with real flavours and real vitamins. In stead of fries I make homemade baked fries. Here's my super easy recipe.



Baked Fries Or Potato Wedges

3 to 4 lbs of potatoes, peeled and cut in wedges

2 to 3 tbsp of olive oil
1 minced garlic clove
tsp of parsley dried
salt
pepper

Take your poatoes, wash them and let them soak in cold water for 20 minutes. Drain. Preheat over to 375 degrees.

Sprinkle on all other ingredients on potatoes and toss until they are evenly coated. Place on a baking tray and put in the oven. Bake until potatoes are soft and browning on the edges.



I like crispy potatoes wedges. Serve with homemade chicken fingers, fish or burgers. Easy, cheap and good. It's simple but you'd be surprised at the number of shocked faces when I admit to making our food from scratch. "Oh I would do that but sometimes I just want some fries."

"I make those."

It's not rocket science but mass media, marketing and manufacturing has made it seem that way.

Earth Hour Flop

I had every intention of participating this year. Instead I powered up in a big way and felt like crud while doing it. It all started with my son's birthday cake. I figured I could bake it before Earth Hour began and let it cool over night so I could ice it in the morning prior to having 22 people over for a party. Good plan.

That was until the cake decided to stick to the pan, fall out in bits and pieces before crumbling onto the serving tray. Looking at the mess, I wondered if any could be salvaged. We munched on it a bit and made the conclusion that I needed a "do over".

In an attempt to cover all my bases I made a 9 x 13 white cake AND 24 chocolate cupcakes. The cupcakes were my back up in case the cake Round 2 flopped too. So there I was when all other environmentally conscious and earth-minded people were playing cards and board games by candle light, I was power baking two rounds of sugary goodness... with the kitchen light on.

Cake Round 2 threatened to fall apart as well, and even split down the middle after I placed it on the tray. Nothing a bit of icing couldn't cover but I figure it was a way for the cake gods to remind me just who was in charge.

So Far So Good

A week and a half ago, I planted some lettuce and radish seeds with plans to keep them indoors until maturity. I used large compostable pots, potting soil and compost. So far so good. I water every other day as needed. And keep them tucked away in a portable greenhouse which is currently in my living room. Within another week or so I should have a few radishes and lettuce leaves to munch on.

I will need to add some fertilizer or compost tea to keep the soil nutrient level up.



I am currently looking for a book on exclusive greenhouse growing, My plan is to attempt to grow lettuce and other plants that require little sunlight in the house throughout winter, without the aid of hydroponics.



So far my little experiment is going well though time will tell if these adorable baby plants actually deliver the goods.

Almost 50

I need one more follower to make my number a clean 50 people, who read regularly, enjoy my articles and perhaps feel the way I do about living life.

I started this blog at the tail end of 2008 and wondered exactly who would give a crud about what I write and share. Followers are a nice reminder that people are interested. Comments let me know that people are reading.

There have been over 7,000 page views since Blogger started tracking stats for me.

One person told me that blogs are merely brag-fests with pictures. Perhaps they are right. But perhaps not. I write because I have so much to say and I think there might be others trying the same things, attacking the same problems or enjoying the same simple life.

I don't mean to brag. I know I lead a pretty blessed life. Perhaps this blog is less about bragging and more about sharing. What I plant, how I bake, the short cuts I have found. I read other blogs for those reasons, not to hit myself in the head because someone has it better than me or comes up with better ideas.

I almost ended this blog recently. After the move, I wasn't feeling it anymore. My life has changed so dramatically from the vision I had set out to achieve (in 2008)when I started. Part of me felt I wasn't being truthful. That I was hiding something. The truth is, I have evolved. Slowly but surely. Little by little. Day by day. I have changed. My goals, dreams and aspirations change, like everyone else and the blog is a mere reflection of those evolving projects and ideas.

I am glad I didn't do away with this blog. I am glad I can continue to share my journey with you all.

Now...how do I go about getting one more follower?

Pasta Sausage Casserole

This is a nice, quick, healthy casserole that uses fresh veggies, pasta and sausage.

300 grams cooked macaroni noodles

2lbs of cooked and sliced sausage
1 tbsp of olive oil
2 cloves of garlic minced
1 bell pepper chopped
6 tomatoes chopped or 1 can of tomato sauce (or both)
1 medium onion chopped
1/4 cup of Parmesan cheese

Cook sausage in a skillet and slice. Add garlic with a splash of olive oil and simmer a bit. Add 1/2 cup of water and toss in pepper and onion. Add tomatoes last.

Let simmer. Add some chopped fresh parsely (or dried), salt and pepper.

Place macaroni in a 9 x 13 baking pan. Pour sausage and tomato sauce mixture over top and stir. Top with Parmesan and bake in the oven at 375 degrees for 20 minutes.

Serve with a side salad. De-lish!

Let'tuce Grow

I started an experiment a few weeks ago to see if I can grow lettuce and radishes in the house during winter. I bought a small greenhouse to protect my plants from curious cats. I have not invested in a hydroponics apparatus. I'm waiting to see if it is necessary. So far so good. We'll see what a few weeks brings.

Playing House

My kids are in day camp this week learning about theatre productions, acting, set design, script writing and I get some much needed time to run errands and look for things for the new house. On Monday I went straight to the fabric store to find some fabric for swag curtains for the living room. I also found some discounted fabric that would make perfect pillows and table runners. For $5 a meter regularly $18 per meter, I think I did pretty good.



On the weekend we went out antiquing for a bit. There's this one place, The Antique Mall near our house and I love browsing. I haven't bought anything until this weekend when I found this lovely table. I placed it in our foyer and it's simply perfect in this spot.

Egg Your House

Easter is a-comin'! I saw something like this Easter Egg Display in a design magazine and I knew I could make my own.




You need:

1 large pot base
1 small pot base
1 small pot

Arcylic paints
Crackle Paint effect stuff
Brushes
A bit of Patience



I painted the pot and base with a base coat of the colour I wanted to see through the cracks. Then I painted the crackle stuff (available at craft stores). Between each coat I waited a few hours to make sure it was dry and then I applied the final coat.



When dry, simply invert the pot onto the base, and then lay your small base on the top. Decorate with paper grass or more real looking stuff. As you decorate you eggs, put them on display. These eggs are paper mache with acrylic paint.

I Heart the Library

Look what I found at my local library!



I know my review of Homestead Blessings was scathing. Because for the price I paid I felt bamboozled, taken in by the growing phenomenon that is homesteading. The two videos I bought (Dairy Delights and Quilting) were very primary, novice and far too basic for me and I regretted buying them.

But now I don't have to buy them and if they do not satisfy my needs it is no matter because I did not pay $20 a pop of them. Yea!

Slumber Party

This is what my life is like with four cats...everyday is an opportunity to have a good laugh! This is our cat Augustus who is unable to fit his large frame in the cat condo but he seems to have worked out a good compromise.

Book: Thrifty by Majorie Harris

I just finished this book called Thrifty by Majorie Harris. It's written by a Canadian author who apparently is rather well known as a gardening writer (I've never heard of her). At first I was intrigued. I am always on the look out for refreshing material that keeps me on the frugal track and helps me reassessed my priorities. I am a very frugal person by nature but I find reading and re-reading certain books on frugality to be a good recharge for my batteries. The Tightwad Gazette complete series is one I often return to again and again.

This book started off with the author praising Margaret Atwood for her frugalness. I am not an Atwood fan but I didn't want to judge the book off of that and continued reading. There are the standard tips and hints on finding the best deals, doing research before purchasing a high ticket item and how to attack garage sales. All in all, they were the usual comments that anyone with a slim wallet would inherently know only this writer presented them as if they were the greatest secret this century.

She warned against second hand stores but promoted higher priced consignment shops. She bragged about buying artwork and only ever purchasing organic. As much as she wanted to be thrifty and imagined her self to be thrifty I could tell she was just a normal consumer doing a few things to save some bucks. She believes she is more thrifty than she is, that much was obvious. Her way of promoting thrift with style is a stark contrast to Amy Dacyzyn's how-to's on dumpster diving and making meals for pennies.

It's all about perspective. If you have money saving money becomes less important. Everyone wants to save money but if you are truly hard up for cash, truly one paycheck away from ruin organic vegetables would be too much of a luxury to contemplate. However if you have money, and have a comfortable living then thrift takes on a whole new meaning.

The English language should invent two separate words for thrift with money and thrift because you have to make ends meet...but then if we did that one would take on a derogatory meaning and no one would admit to being in that circumstance. No matter. In the end, thrift is thrift and there is no true way to be thrifty, only degrees therein and who are we to judge?

Everybody Loves Cake

Today is my daughter's 11th Birthday. She is having a few friends over tonight for a sleepover. It's fairly low key but should be lots of fun. Anybody who knows me knows that I ALWAYS do my kids cakes. It started years ago when they were little and we had no money. Every kid deserves a special cake and so I started to get creative by making cakes that would match whatever theme we were doing for the party.

After years of doing it out of necessity, I feel like it's something I could never give up. I love doing it. I get a thrill out of planning out what I am going to do and how. I love baking but I also love creating edible artwork.



My daughter is into fairies and so her cake is a fairy house. I started with a gingerbread bundt pan I bought at 50 per cent off before Christmas (we don't eat gingerbread but we do eat cake and love decorating them with candies so I fell in love with it the minute I saw it). I used paste food colouring I had on hand as well as piping bags and Wilton tips I have from previous years.



All I had to buy was lots of icing and a small bag of chocolate rocks I found at the bulk food store. The base is my big wood cutting board covered in tin foil.



All in all I think it came together well and probably only cost $4 or $5 including hydro to bake the cake. Whoo!




And now for the clean up... hop to it Birthday Girl!! I don't think she's impressed!

Thrifty Finds

I enjoy the treasure hunt of second hand stores. I haven't been to any second hand stores since before Christmas and I think the withdrawl was getting to me. Today my fix was acquired and here's some of my best finds.



A pair of sparkly sandals for me and a fairly practical pair for my son. Both look practically brand new.




My daughter spotted this cute St. Patrick's Day Angel for 99 cents and I snagged a box of three Thomas Kincade puzzles for $4. My husband and kids love board games but me... I like a good puzzle. This style of puzzle is my favourite but are so expensive in stores. A single puzzle can be $15. For $4, I figure I could live with it if there were a few pieces missing. With adult puzzles though that is rarely the case. If you do puzzles as an adult you are fairly careful about putting everything away.

Have you found anything lately?

Seed-sational!

I have been eying seed packages for a while now and just today put in my first order. I am trying something new this year and deciding to use only local, certified organic, heirloom seeds.

Heirloom varieties are plants and seeds that are original, traditional and unmodified. They have not been genetically engineered or altered like hydrid seeds, the standard seed found in garden stores. Those commonly found hybrid seeds are the result of years of engineering by seed companies to produce a mono-cultured plant. These plants do not produce viable seeds. You simply eat the resulting fruit/veg and buy more seeds next year. This keeps gardeners coming back year after year.

Heirloom seeds are varieties that were used by our ancestors centuries ago. There is far greater variety in colours and flavours of the resulting fruit. They tend to be hardier, better suited for natural gardens. By planting heirloom seeds we are encouraging genetic diversity and protecting our seed resources for generations to come. If we only ever planted one variety of corn and then a disease developed targeting that variety we as a nation would be in a hard place to produce enough food for the hungry. By planting a genetic variety we are diversifying our success.

The genetic diversity of the world's food crops is eroding at an unprecedented and accelerating rate. The vegetables and fruits currently being lost are the result of thousands of years of adaptation and selection in diverse ecological niches around the world. Each variety is genetically unique and has developed resistance to the diseases and pests with which it evolved.

-Seed Savers Exhange

I found an Ontario-based heirloom seed company called The Cottage Gardener. They have such an array of choices it was truly hard to choose. For my first foray into heirloom seeds I decided to keep to the basics.

Broccoli
Carrots
Melon
Peas
Pumpkin
Paste Tomato
Tomato
Parsnip

I also will be getting lettuces, corn, cucumber, radish, spinach, beans, onions and peppers from another local source.

A Duvet Cover

After a few weeks of searching for the perfect duvet cover for our bed I finally gave up. Everything I saw was ultra modern and simply not my style. I wanted a solid colour, not stripes or florals. I wanted to reserve my patterning for the throw pillows and room accents. I also wanted something with a soft tone to create a feeling of calm relaxation. I found nothing to satisfy me so I decided to make my own.

In my search I found a 3 sheet set. In all there were 6 sheets, 2 fitted and 2 flat for each colour and 6 pillow shams. I don't use the flat sheets on our beds, just the fitted ones so the flat sheets were the perfect size.

Here's how I made my duvet cover. I made an extra wide hem on the bottom of each sheet where I could fasten snaps or ties to slip the duvet in and out. Then placing the sheets right side in, I sewed all around the outside of the sheets being careful to leave an opening on the bottom hem. This opening is about a third of the total width, so I can fold the duvet lengthwise in thirds and feed it in and unfold it in the cover.

Then you add your snaps, and make it right side out.




I gave it a quick wash and dry to get rid of the wrinkles and voila! a duvet cover for under $20.

I plan to use the flat cream sheet to create accent pillows with ties, ribbon, buttons and all manner of fun sewing. I will update with pictures as my bedroom takes shape.