Vegetarianism

[emordnilap]

Make plenty and freeze some; when thawing, put them in the fridge the day before, which helps the fridge's efficiency.

Emor I always do this with frozen stuff but never realised it increased my fridges efficiency!

It's simply a matter of using the 'cold' from the frozen stuff to help the fridge keep cold. You were doing the right thing instinctively!

Spinage and chickpeas is hard to beat.

Agreed. Delicious.

The new zealand beet variety of spinage grows great here but chick peas are a bit slow.

What variety of chick peas are you growing? How did you start them off?

Most growing this year is extremely slow. We have plenty of sunshine early in the year but of course daylight hours were short. Then May was a very wet month.

Plus we've had very long periods of cloud cover with no rain - this means no sun, no heat as well as no moisture. When the sun does come out, stuff shoots up!

This time last year I had a couple of varieties of jam in the local agricultural show. No fruit to speak of so far apart from a few plums, everything is way behind. The show is tomorrow and we're not exactly over-burdened with produce.

We're entering in potatoes, lettuce, peas, unusual vegetable (florence fennel), herb display, salad plus a couple of others. Good fun. The winning's not important, it's the getting first prize...

[MrG]

Rue
Dont care about food miles, care about cost.

Then eat weeds.



At least as tasty as the best shop-bought vegetables. No cost, once you've located some.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chenopodium_album

UE have you ever tried to do anything with the seeds? Apparantly they were a staple in this country in neolithic times with bread and gruel being made from the dried seed and fat hen was actually farmed. I collected a load of seed once from a field edge and put out to dry but forgot about it and it pissed down with rain

I tried growing quinoa this year from the real seed company and it says on the packet "don't be alarmed by the resemblance to fat hen when the plants are small"

RESEMBLANCE!! jesus now the plants are big I have either just thinned out the wrong ones and am now growing a weed or the mature plant is virtually identical to fat hen. The only difference really visually is that there is a red ting to the stalk.. and it's hard to say coz there are so many sub varieties of the wild weed.

And your growing it for the seeds which can be used as a 'grain'. The plants are clearly closely related at least.. close enough for me to say its the same bloody thing and its just easier to go out and strip the seeds from some of our own native version rather than grow some poncey health food version of the same thing!

[kenneal - lagger]

I wouldn't have to farm fat hen, it just grows everywhere.

[emordnilap]

The show is tomorrow and we're not exactly over-burdened with produce.

We're entering in potatoes, lettuce, peas, unusual vegetable (florence fennel), herb display, salad plus a couple of others. Good fun. The winning's not important, it's the getting first prize...

Well, out of our eleven entries we got four firsts and three thirds. First in onions, lettuce, salad plate and, of all things, a piece of embroidery made and framed 25 years ago.

I have to admit, the onions are good and we've plenty - I decided we needed to get 366 harvested.

Another show comes up in two weeks. It's all good fun.

[emordnilap]

I was particularly proud of my salad plate:


No, we didn't grow the tortilla chips or the soya and kidney beans...

[Keela]

That looks absolutely beautiful!

I was looking at the picture trying to work out if you'd made some savoury leathers (like fruit leathers but with something else) when I read that they were tortilla chips! Duh.

Last year I harvested quite a few beans from runner beans and have cooked them up as Chilli beans with some success... do you dry beans for your own use? I've found smaller beans a hassle to harvest, but runners are great.

[biffvernon]

Well done EM.

We dry our runner beans as there always seems to be a surplus. They are great in stews and curries.

[UndercoverElephant]

Rue
Dont care about food miles, care about cost.

Then eat weeds.



At least as tasty as the best shop-bought vegetables. No cost, once you've located some.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chenopodium_album

UE have you ever tried to do anything with the seeds?

Not apart from eating them...

Apparantly they were a staple in this country in neolithic times with bread and gruel being made from the dried seed and fat hen was actually farmed. I collected a load of seed once from a field edge and put out to dry but forgot about it and it pissed down with rain

I tried growing quinoa this year from the real seed company and it says on the packet "don't be alarmed by the resemblance to fat hen when the plants are small"

RESEMBLANCE!! jesus now the plants are big I have either just thinned out the wrong ones and am now growing a weed or the mature plant is virtually identical to fat hen. The only difference really visually is that there is a red ting to the stalk.. and it's hard to say coz there are so many sub varieties of the wild weed.

I'm afraid that the goosefoot family are a bit of a nightmare to identify to species. Fortunately, they're pretty much all edible.

And your growing it for the seeds which can be used as a 'grain'. The plants are clearly closely related at least.. close enough for me to say its the same bloody thing and its just easier to go out and strip the seeds from some of our own native version rather than grow some poncey health food version of the same thing!

Indeed.

[emordnilap]

That looks absolutely beautiful!

Ta. I'm just trying to get the pic. into the local paper.

I was looking at the picture trying to work out if you'd made some savoury leathers (like fruit leathers but with something else) when I read that they were tortilla chips! Duh.

Savoury leathers instead of tortilla chips...not that they would have appreciated it but what an excellent idea!

Last year I harvested quite a few beans from runner beans and have cooked them up as Chilli beans with some success... do you dry beans for your own use? I've found smaller beans a hassle to harvest, but runners are great.

They can be a hassle; we usually freeze rather than dry them but I'm hoping to do more drying stuff from now on...I suppose it depends upon freezer space and determination.

We tend to eat stuff fresh; gluts are not that common with us, apart from stuff that we grow a lot of that's easy to store, like spuds and carrots.

So far, we have no spare peas, despite planting loads. They are too good to resist.

[MrG]

I wouldn't have to farm fat hen, it just grows everywhere.

Well exactly! I think I read / heard somewhere that people once kind of 'encouraged' it to grow in nice easy blocks making the seeds easier to harvest... I can't remember where I got this from, probably my friend that is an archeologist

[MrG]

Not apart from eating them...

Just eating the seeds straight off the plant? That doesn't sound too nice. I don't really like fat hen, it leaves a weird dry aftertaste in your mouth and I put it down to the seed... seems to taste better before its seeded (like many things)

I'm afraid that the goosefoot family are a bit of a nightmare to identify to species. Fortunately, they're pretty much all edible.

Oh for sure. I just see 'A' goosefoot, you can see that they are slightly different but you can eat them all (well I just thought you could eat ALL of them.. oops!). It's like Biff said about blackberries.. hundreds of subvarieties but as far as we're concerned all the same thing.

Quinoa is blatantly just 'A' goosefoot... Though to be fair its got some really fat seeds on it now.. more than fat hen. Gonna try processing some fat hen seeds in the same way I do the Quinoa I reckon...

[DominicJ]

I can make moderatly healthy* chips!!!

About a full medicine cup of oil (I've tried veg and ground nut) on a baking tray, a load of potatos thinly sliced, maybe 5mmx10mmxhowever long the potato is and about an hour at 200*, use spatular to poke after 20mins and 40mins.

5kg of market value potatos is under £2
25kg of local indian supermarket potatos is about £6.

Also, without car, I must convince the shrew, and she doesnt think its a good idea yet to buy the big bag.

*Other half makes healthy chips, that are basicaly roast potatos sprayed with a bit of fry lite, not as good as mine.


*****
Hmm, aparently you need roughly 3.2kg of potatos a day to get your 2500 calories.
Thats a lot of potato, you only need 1kg of rice.
Potato yields must be impressive, or perhaps rice yields are just really bad, maize is only 86kg per 100g.
*****

[featherstick]

I can make moderatly healthy* chips!!!

About a full medicine cup of oil (I've tried veg and ground nut) on a baking tray, a load of potatos thinly sliced, maybe 5mmx10mmxhowever long the potato is and about


*****
Hmm, aparently you need roughly 3.2kg of potatos a day to get your 2500 calories.
Thats a lot of potato, you only need 1kg of rice.
Potato yields must be impressive, or perhaps rice yields are just really bad, maize is only 86kg per 100g.
*****

Pre-famine accounts of peasant Irish life relate how up to 8 lbs of potatoes per day, sometimes with a little butter, milk, and very occasional fish or meat (VERY occasional), made up the daily diet of the rural labourer. Imagine eating over half a stone of spuds each and every day...

[DominicJ]

8lbs is roughly 3.6kg
Wow
I just assumed I screwed up the numbers somewhere.

[Keela]

Dominic

The rice value you gave is dry weight (as this is the way rice is stored) it absorbs water on cooking and bulks up.

Potatoes on the other hand are stored in as they are and contain quite a bit of water. They do not absorb much more on cooking (if any).

So if you were to compare the cooked weights of rice and potatoes I think the value would be more similar.