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Food For Life Garden Update!

Inspiration "The glory of gardening: hands in the dirt, head in the sun, heart with nature. To nurture a garden is to feed not just the body, but the soul." Alfred Austin

I hope you are enjoying the school's-out and vacation season. Summer is here and with it the heat, bugs, sunburns, and the start of harvesting from the garden. And that's one reason this newsletter comes a bit late with so much going on each day.

In the garden: I've been harvesting a lot of herbs, chard, mustard greens, broccoli, onion greens, peas, carrots, turnips, radishes and a few zucchini so far. I'm putting blanched greens and peas into the freezer, salting kitchen herbs to keep conveniently in the fridge year round, freezing some herbs and fermenting garlic scapes and onion greens.

It's the season to harvest medicinal herbs. My peppermint is taking over my little food forest and I've been drying some for winter, as well as the spearmint, but I also cut a lot fresh for making an iced peppermint tea every day that I keep in the refrigerator. I pour boiling water over the fresh peppermint sprigs and let it steep. When it's cooled, I put the jar in the fridge and drink it whenever I feel overheated. It's super refreshing when ice cold and I don't add any sweetener to it.

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I also harvested mugwort for goat worming, calendula for drying and making a salve, lemon balm for lemon balm tincture and lemon balm salve to help soothe the intense itch from tick and mosquito bites and to help with cold sores if I get too much sun on my lips, which is the most common reason for me to get one.

By the way, if you do get too much sun, did you know that vinegar is one of the best remedies for pain and blistering from sunburn? If you start putting it on your burn as soon as you notice it, it can cool, soothe, and prevent blistering if the burn is not too severe. Try it next time you need relief. I like to use homemade apple cider vingar, but you can use white vinegar or any other. Dilute with a little water if it stings at full strength.

What you can still plant in July: And here is a reminder, if you're going to plant a fall garden, get your seeds now. Kale, broccoli, chard, cabbage and more can be started beginning of July and transplanted in August for a fall harvest or overwintering if your climate allows it. And if you want pumpkins, you can still plant them now. When your garlic, chard, spinach, and peas are done (which is right now here in Missouri), use the space for bush beans, cucumbers, zucchini, sweet corn, okra, black eyed peas, sweet potatoes, and basil, cilantro, calendula and other flowers and herbs for harvesting in a couple of months.

And, speaking of Zucchini: Here is a recipe for a delicious healthy version of Zucchini Bread if you have a few monster zucchinis to process.

Consider pre-ordering your Garlic now for the best selection: Garlic is planted in the fall. Read more about growing garlic and be prepared to plant your own this fall. If you'll be planting from your homegrown garlic, after curing your garlic bulbs, set aside the largest ones for replanting and eat the smaller ones.

Here are my favorite stores that sell seed garlic. They sell beautiful big ones, which is so important. Keene Garlic and Baker Creek. I did not have good luck with other ones I tried in the past. Their garlic cloves were diseased or small. Not what you want for planting. My favorites are hardneck garlic: Music, Pehoski Purple, Chesnok Red, Georgian Fire, and German Extra Hardy. They make big bulbs and store well.

In the Food Forest: Prune your stone fruit trees in the summer, this helps to prevent diseases vs. winter pruning. Cherry, plum, peaches, and nectarines benefit when pruned in the summer. Remove crossing branches, branches that crowd the inside to allow a bit of air flow, but not so much to make the fruits prone to sun scald or wind damage. Leave a few protective branches inside the canopy. Don't prune if the tree has high bug and disease pressure. And make sure to leave a collar when cutting a limb off a trunk. Here is a good illustration for making a correct cut.

Soda Making and Summer Hydration: With the hotter days comes more sweating and staying hydrated and replenishing electrolytes becomes more important. Switchel is a great homemade hydration and sports drink that can be used plain or flavored with fruit juices. I also love some fizzy sodas for refreshment and posted a new, delicious bubbly hibiscus tea soda recipe, more about it below. And I love fizzy lemonade soda and ginger beer, made with a ginger bug or other starter culture.

Cheese Making: I posted a new cheese making recipe, to make Bulgarian feta. Check it out below! And I finally managed to get my German Cheesecake recipe posted, which is made with Homemade Quark, but I also listed alternatives you can purchase. Read more below.

Update On Breeding Chicks: On day 21, exactly, the chicks started to hatch. All of them on the same day. Yay. I did have a bit of a disappointment. While all but 2 eggs of my White American Bresse chickens hatched, none of the Buff Orpington's eggs hatched. I suppose the Buff ladies are getting too old to lay viable eggs. So I'll have to buy some chicks to replace my old ones. When I candled these eggs (shining a light into them to see if there is a chicken in it) I didn't see anything. It was all translucent inside.

Lessons learned:

So I had to abandon my second batch and am feeding the eggs to the dogs. Which makes them happy, but I'm pretty bummed about it. I'll start earlier in the year next year. Well, some lessons learned.

And, just as a reminder, and if you got my previous newsletters, you already know this, but...

Don't forget to make compost to nourish your soil and plants throughout the year! You can make great compost in just 3 weeks, and use it for side- and top-dressing your planted garden thoughout the season. And if making a huge compost pile isn't your thing, there are lots of other ways to compost!

Don't miss my guide for starting a medicinal herb garden! Not only will you have herbs to use for your herbal home apothecary, but many are great for seasoning your foods, to attract pollinators, and deter pests.

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​GET YOUR SEEDS HERE! True Leaf Market has many vegetable varieties, as well as a big selection on herbs! Plus, they offer Free Shipping over $75.-. So get your seeds before they sell out or it's too late to plant!

​Herb Seed Collection! Here is a great deal I found for a herb seed starter pack from Amazon. A collection of 36 herbs for just over a dollar a packet. I got one for myself and had good success with germination. This contains most of the seeds to grow the herbs I mention in my medicinal herb garden post.

Your source for information about gardening, planting a food forest, permaculture, farming with animals, growing meat, and milking goats. Learn about making cheese and sourdough bread, preserving your harvest, traditional homestead recipes, off-grid living and more! Visit foodforlifegarden.com​

New On The Blog

Lemon Tahini Cookies Surprise With A Fantastic Spicy Kick

These spicy lemon tahini cookies are radical, especially if you love bold, complex flavors and healthy treats. Or tame them down if you like.

Leaning on Middle eastern tahini recipes but with my own delicious spin to it. You might know by now that I’m not a friend of bland foods. I prefer bold flavors and love spices for both, their exciting kick and their health benefits.

I developed this recipe, because I had a hankering for some cookies and a jar of tahini to use up. So I put together these lemon tahini cookies and incorporate some traditional German spices, such as we Germans use in traditional gingerbread recipes, and a couple of other ingredients I thought would work well.

In the end, I ended up with something that reminds me of fall with earthy undertones and Christmas with its vibrant pungency, but it has a bit of summer in it too with bright lemony highlights. Hmm, I’m missing spring here! In any case, these cookies are awesome and incredibly flavorful, and you must try them to appreciate them! So head on over to the blog and get the recipe!

Make Brine-Aged Sirene Cheese, A Bulgarian 'Feta'

Do you love feta cheese? It is so versatile and has that awesome tangy, salty flavor. Learn to make Sirene cheese, a feta-like cheese, in your kitchen! Sirene is a Bulgarian white cheese, salt brined and aged for fantastic flavor. In Bulgaria it is called brine-aged white cheese or Sirene (which simply means ‘cheese’).
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Sirene is easy to make without a cheese press and it results in a delicious, flavorful cheese that can be made with any dairy milk. The cheese gets aged in a salted brine and can be ready to enjoy in about a month.

Visit the blog to learn how to make a fabulous brine-aged Sirene Cheese.

How To Make Naturally Carbonated Probiotic Hibiscus Soda

Home-brewed hibiscus soda is a delicious, refreshing, tangy, fizzy, and healthy summer drink that’s naturally carbonated and full of probiotics.

Fermented hibiscus tea soda is easy to make, tastes phenomenal and has great health benefits too! Use your choice of four starter cultures, some of which you can make from scratch, to make this exciting soda at home. The starter culture will create carbonation, enhance the nutrients in the hibiscus tea and add probiotics for a gut-healthy bonus. Hey, this is so awesome, you’ll just love it! So let’s go make some fantastic probiotic hibiscus soda!

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The Best German Cheesecake (Käsekuchen) With Or Without Quark

​German Cheesecake is a classic German favorite that tastes fabulous! Traditionally, Käsekuchen is made with Quark.

If you got my last newsletters, you'll have seen that I posted a Recipe For Making Quark, the famous German cheese that is used in countless recipes, but for some reason is very hard to find here in America. However, it's super easy to make, and once you make quark there are just so many things to do with it.

If you’re new to German cheesecake, get ready for a treat and let me warn you, you’ll not want to live without it thereafter. If you can’t get quark in a store, it’s easy to make your own for an authentic Käsekuchen. However, we’ll explore substitutions in the blog post. This way anyone can make it. So let’s make some awesome, delicious classic German Käsekuchen!