This recipe is handy because it's so quick. It is more like a sweet treat..kind of like a rice crispy treat..but it will do when Noah's begging for a granola bar and ingredients and time are running low!
I'm a firm believer that having a hand in making your own snacks
makes them taste even better!
No-Bake Chocolate Chip Granola Bars
(originally found at LaurensLatest.com)
Ingredients:
1/4 c. butter
1/4 c. honey
1/3 c. packed brown sugar
2 c. quick cooking oats
1 c. crispy rice cereal
1/2 t. vanilla
2 T. mini chocolate chips
In a large bowl, stir oats and rice cereal together. Set aside. In a small pot, melt butter, honey and brown sugar together over medium high heat until it comes to a bubble. Reduce the heat and cook 2 minutes. Pour in vanilla and stir. Pour over dry ingredients and mix well to moisten all ingredients. Pour into lightly greased small jelly roll pan {about 12x8x1} and press out to be about 3/4 inch in thickness. {If your pan isn't small enough, pack the mixture into one side. You really want to press them down so they stick together.} Sprinkle with mini chocolate chips and press down lightly. Cool on a countertop to room temperature for two hours or until the chocolate chips are set before cutting into bars. Wrap in parchment or plastic wrap and store at room temperature.
Recipe Notes: If your granola bars don't seem to be staying together when you cut them, you may have not boiled the mixture long enough...you want it to make it just past the softball stage. OR you made them too thin or you didn't pack them in tight enough. Stick them in the fridge for 20 minutes and that should help keep them together. {Be sure not to keep them in there too long or else they'll become super hard!} The next time you make them, try boiling for an extra 15 seconds or so.
I got a lovely stash of candy and a funny card from my husband (thanks baby), but my favorite Valentine was the one that came in the mailbox--my seed order arrived today!
These are a 'treat' pancake that I only make occasionally. They get devoured! I'm afraid if I make them too often, our other 'plainer' pancake recipes would get revolted against!
Chunky Monkey Pancakes Amy (amylz) All Recipes Servings: 9
1 cup all-purpose flour 2 teaspoons baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda 1/4 teaspoon salt 3/4 cup skim milk 3 tablespoons butter, melted 2 eggs 1 tablespoon white sugar 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 1 large banana, diced 1/2 cup miniature semisweet chocolate chips 1/4 cup chopped pecans cooking spray
Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. Set bowl aside. In a separate bowl, whisk together the skim milk, melted butter, eggs, sugar, and vanilla. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and stir in the wet ingredients, being careful not to over mix the batter. Gently fold in the banana, chocolate chips, and nuts. Heat a large skillet over medium heat, and coat with cooking spray. Pour 1/4 cupfuls of batter onto the skillet, and cook until bubbles appear on the surface. Flip with a spatula, and cook until browned on the other side.
Noah devouring his Chunky Monkey...which is sweet enough that we don't even need syrup!
Students in the Study Garden Club sort and weigh some of their harvest to donate to the local food bank
Winter is firmly here; the sweet memories of warm weather, green grass, and a thriving garden are becoming more distant. Though new excitement comes along with snow (snow angels and subsequent snow ball fights, followed by hot cocoa indoors), the nostalgia of running out to the garden, sans shoes and socks, can hit hard. Especially for kids; a month might as well be a year--a whole winter seems a lifetime!
Will summer ever come back? To keep the memory alive, it's fun to look back at the previous growing season. Not just our own fun pictures (of which we have hundreds), but also pictures of what other people have grown.
I found this series of pictures on Facebook, and was utterly thrilled. The school, Study Elementary, is in our school system. I've driven past Study hundreds of times, but have never visited--though now I'm so fascinated by the work of the Garden Club that I'm pondering: how odd would it be for a stranger to request a visit during the growing-garden months?
The coolest thing about the Study Garden Club is this: The club set a goal to grow and donate 100 pounds of food to our local food bank. When they tallied up their totals, they had surpassed the goal; 114 pounds of fresh produce had made its way to Community Harvest food bank. What an amazing success! I looked and found that a local newspaper noted the donation here, at this link.
Every school should have a garden, and a Garden Club with active membership. Enjoy these pictures of Study Garden Club. My little crew of gardeners and I loved seeing what Study's students grew, and can't wait until it's time to get back out and try some new ideas for ourselves. Perhaps we will even try our hand at growing a cotton plant (as you'll see in the following pics, Study did just that) this upcoming season!
Some of the fresh tomatoes donated to Community Harvest
I stumbled on this book at the library while hunting down gardening books. Written in 1998, it describes the history of Fairview Gardens in Goleta, California. It's a quick read with its thick, glossy pages and numerous photos (though maddeningly without captions). It's yet another example of my being late to the party (I'm an overly excited 'noob' about all things gardening and sustainable living—much has been written on the topic over the years). Lucky for me, I found it—it's a fantastic story and a perfect model of how agriculture might survive in tiny bits and pieces among unending suburban sprawl.
Right away the book captures the imagination with google-map style views of Fairview Gardens: one picture taken in 1954 and one in 1998. This 12 acre parcel of land has literally been swallowed by suburban sprawl, highways and development, yet it thrives as an organic farm.
The story of how this land was kept from being turned into development itself is an inspiring tale. Author Michael Ableman takes over as a 'manager' of the land, living in its rickety old farmhouse with his wife and new baby, and tending the small orchards and fields, though he must report to the land's long-time owners, the Chapmans. He has expensive false starts (a whole orchard of green peaches, planted, tended, and harvested with immense care, that never proved sellable) and many tough obstacles (accidentally bursting irrigation pipes and causing a flood), but nothing provides as much frustration and challenge as the neighbors. Many are outright angry and want him—and the farm--gone. They had not purchased an expensive home in a sought-after neighborhood only to learn after the fact that a rotting compost pile lay behind their yard, or that roosters would crow in the early hours. Or that a tractor would make its rounds, quite literally in their backyards.
Never knowing exactly how he would save the land from being sold by the owners to development, Ableman charges forward, working hard and winning over neighbors who learn to love the fresh food the farm produced. Ableman never shies from reaching out to everyone around him, whether to stand up to their demands or to calmly invite them to come see for themselves what was happening on the farm. He exhibits a gutsy determination that I find admirable. There are times it seems it would be much easier to give up on this parcel of land and try his hand at farming somewhere else (at one point his father offers him family land in Deleware--a climate that would in many ways be easier to deal with). However, Ableman perseveres through setbacks and even a divorce. After over a decade of challenges, sweat, and tears, the landowners allow the 13 acres to sell (for a whopping 750k)...but NOT to the developers. Cornelia Chapman allowed Ableman and a group of committed activists in the community—who formed a non-profit organization--to purchase the land and place it in a public trust. In Ableman's words:
“Fairview Gardens was never mine—and not just because someone else held the title. I have known for a long time that its role was to be a public place. It could never be just a private farm, or someone's personal retreat back to the land. Instead, this farm has provided a way for people to reclaim a connection to one of the most important and intimate acts: growing the food that they and their children eat. Over the course of a few generations, most people have given that power away to distant farms. They let this vital process take place out of sight, losing the pleasures and the connections that come with it. ...We cannot all go back to the land, but we can provide something of the land to everyone.”
Ableman's book is succinct, and his words are powerful; none wasted. Although the book is very quick and easy to read, it doesn't lack in humor, insight, and powerful motivation. Models like Fairview Gardens will be more and more necessary as we navigate new ideas for agriculture (namely, small community farms). I was thrilled to have happened upon such a gem, and I plan to look into the present day Fairveiw Gardens at www.fairviewgardens.org.
What is it that makes rosemary and bread go together SO well? I can't believe how amazing this bread tastes. Everyone loved it!
If you have some rosemary hanging around that you snipped from the garden last summer, make a loaf of this...along with a pot of your favorite soup or chili. Your night will be warm, toasty, and tasty!
This is fine made with or without a food processor.
Rosemary Bread (copycat from Romano's Macaroni Grill) Ingredients
1 tablespoon yeast
1 tablespoon sugar
1 cup warm water
2 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons rosemary
2 tablespoons butter
Directions
Place yeast, sugar and water in large bowl or food processor and allow mixture to become bubbly.
Mix in 1 T butter, salt, and 2 cups of flour.
Add one tablespoon of the fresh chopped rosemary.
Knead for about 10 minutes by hand or in food processor about 5 minutes until smooth and elastic.
Add more flour if necessary.
Oil a bowl, put dough in it and cover with a towel.
Let dough rise in a warm place for one hour until doubled.
Punch down dough and divide in half.
Let dough rest about 5 minutes.
Spray baking pan or cookie sheet with cooking spray.
Shape the dough into 2 small rounded oval loaves.
Sprinkle remaining 1 Tablespoon of rosemary over the loaves and press lightly into the surface.
Let loaves rise again until doubled, about 45 minutes.
Preheat oven to 375.
Bake for 15 to 20 minutes, until lightly browned.
Carefully remove from oven, brush with remaining butter (and salt if desired.).
Want a sweet and tasty snack that your kids might even choose over their dwindling bag of Halloween candy? Dry some apples! You will end up with chewy, unbelievably sweet morsels of happiness. You will put a lot of work into them and they will disappear shockingly quickly. But really, the work is well worth it!
Follow along with me as I dry up a big batch myself!
1). Borrow a food dehydrator. You could always buy one if you have cash laying around, but maybe you have a really nice family member like I do who buys lots of food gadgets, and then lets you use them, sometimes for months on end. ;) If the weather is perfect (i.e. it's still mid-summer) and you want to get really rustic, try drying your apples outside on a warm day. Two ideas that intrigue me (and that I may be crazy enough to try with the kids next summer):
*put the fruit on trays on and put them in your car
*lay the fruit out on your trampoline on a hot day, covering it with mesh
Let's say that you have a food dehydrator handy, though, and electricity. Here's the one I borrowed:
2). Get your apples ready. I found the most efficient way to get somewhat-uniform apples was this step by step process:
*Cut a big old mess of apples up, using an apple corer-slicer. Put a dark colored towel under your workspace; the sticky juice that oozes every time you use the slicer will stain the towel if it's white. Trust me, I know. Make a mountian of apples, and don't worry that some of the apples will have bad spots or mushy yucky parts--you will sort them out as you peel them in the next step. Just keep going, shoving that slicer through the apples like you are on a slicing marathon. Beware: you will get juice everywhere, your hands will get very sticky, and juice will spray into your eyes on multiple occasions.
*Wash your hands of all the stickiness so that you are clean and fresh for the next step. Peel each apple segment with your favorite knife. Depending on the size of the apple it came from, you may need to slice the segment in half. Throw all the segments into a big bowl as you go along. You want all the pieces to be somewhat similar in size, but it's not even close to rocket science--they will all dry eventually.
*Dump the segments onto the trays of the food dehydrator and spread them around so that no edges are not touching. No need to be perfect. Though if I do say so myself...mine look spread out pretty perfectly. It was my third batch of apples--what can I say, I'm becoming a natural.
*Dry the apples for the time recommended on the dehydrator. I didn't have a manual to refer to, so I did an internet search, which gave me the very precise time of anywhere between 7 to 24 hours. Since I don't believe in specific times for anything anyway, I just opened the lid and checked the apples every hour or so. After about 8 hours, my apples had a perfect chew to them. You want to avoid getting them so dry they are brittle, but you definitely want all the moisture out of them so that they will keep on your shelf for months.
*Open the finished product right up on the table around a gaggle of children. For some reason leaving the apples in the dehydrator is more appealing than ever. They will dive in on it, peeling each dried apple off the trays to put right in their mouth, and think you are amazing.
If there are some dried apples left, pack them up in airtight containers.
If not devoured, they will stay good through the winter.
Ahh, Thanksgiving. Family, friends, pie, buttons on the pants becoming unbearably tight. It's a harvest celebration, when all the summer crops have been picked, stored, and preserved, and we make a humble attempt to be truly thankful to all that earth has provided us.
Some have the day off, some have to work, some choose to volunteer on Thanksgiving. Some will have to rely on the kindness of others to receive any semblance of that beloved bountiful meal that epitomizes the day. No matter what the personal situation, as a culture, our attention is turned to the idea of a table filled with food that we will share with people we care about and love.
Of course, a side dish of guilt goes along with the meal. While it's a very real representation of family get-togethers and homecomings, Thanksgiving is also a day when moral issues can tug at that precarious inner sense of peace. Beyond all the current heartache unfolding in all corners of our planet--which we can insulate ourselves from for at least a day--are the bigger truths behind the heart of Thanksgiving.
I'm not going to get into depth about our confused sense of history, even if the traditions and false fairy tales beg to be debunked. Much has been written in attempts to analyze our complicated history, and the information has been more readily available to us than ever before. Each of us is responsible for recognizing the wounds of our past if we ever hope to reconcile and improve our present. Though it's crucial, this post is not an analysis of the Thanksgiving Story--this post is about the TURKEY.
The controversy may not be as obvious as our historical struggles; most families, most people, do not give the turkey a second thought. It's just there, purchased from the grocery store and prepared in any number of traditional ways that have been passed down for generations. Who wants to harbor even more guilty feelings about our lovely holiday--isn't it enough to solemnly remember that history isn't as clean and simple as we would love to believe? Who wants to debate what is on the table, and how it got there? Not to mention that in a very real sense, the cooking of the turkey ties us to our past. We can bite into a slice of turkey and realize that our great-great-grandmother probably did the very same thing, and we get a true sense of belonging, continuance. A Thanksgiving meal without a turkey would be unthinkable to a good majority of American homes.
But that centerpiece, the perfectly roasted bird, is a glaring symbol of some of our current ethical dilemmas, all history aside. The industrial production of food has been more closely examined in recent years than ever before, and the negative effects of factory farms in particular are astounding. Our environment suffers, our society suffers as we compound our reliance on a completely unsustainable system, and the birds themselves suffer. When raised and processed conventionally, turkey production is another of those uncomfortable truths that I think everyone needs to take a peek at. One of the most trusted names for Thanksgiving turkeys, Butterball, has had criminal convictions in the past for its treatment of animals, and as this undercover video shows, they continue to callously hurt the birds they raise.
I am not a vegetarian, though I respect the lifestyle. I admit, that even if I think meat has played a part in the human diet for many thousands of years, in today's world meat eating has become insanely excessive and completely unnatural. I would love for those of us who are not vegetarians to seek out a better choice for our Thanksgiving turkeys. Factory farm birds are mistreated, abused, and frankly, just not natural. They have been bred to develop such large bodies in such a short amount of time that they cannot hold themselves up on their own feet. They lead miserable short lives, with no sunlight or fresh air.
Seeking out a humane turkey is a step in the right direction. www.Eatwild.com is a great resource that will help those who want to find humane, natural, sustainable meat year-round, including the Thanksgiving feast bird. CLICK HERE to find a farm that will provide meat from animals who have lived a good, clean life. If meat stays in your diet, seeking out local, sustainable, and ethical farms is a favor you can do for yourself AND your environment.
The controversy gets even deeper if you look at some of the claims made by PETA and die-hard vegans. Many animal-rights activists claim that even on farms on which a turkey is allowed a natural, more pleasant life, the slaughter of the animals is never done in a humane way. The cone method of killing chickens and turkeys is widely used on small sustainable farms, and deemed humane by many--however, there are those who have seen it firsthand and don't agree. I have not watched poultry slaughter, and I think that I really should, to make my own informed choice, as should everyone. Looking death in the eye is one of the most important aspects of eating meat, though very few of us actually do. I have a sneaking suspicion that if meat was considered in its true form--from birth, through life, to death--and not just available in a neat and tidy package in the grocery store, that many would deeply rethink the animals in their diet. If you are vegan or vegetarian and are not going to be eating any meat, period, CLICK HERE for a list of options to replace the turkey with.
If you do one thing differently this Thanksgiving, rethink the turkey on your table. Butterball and other factory farms see a huge boost in sales every Thanksgiving as millions of families prepare their feasts. We can all help lessen the downward spiral of the industrial food system by seeking sustainable, humane meat, or foregoing the bird entirely.
The story of Barnes, Schoen, and their remarkable corn is not unusual. For millennia, people have elegantly interacted with the plants that sustain them through careful selection and seed saving. This process, repeated year after year, changes and adapts the plants to take on any number of desirable characteristics, from enhanced color and flavor to disease resistance and hardiness.
Many people have contacted us looking to obtain Glass Gem seed. We are currently sold out of the small quantity we had in stock, but there are plans to grow out a substantial amount this summer. Fresh seed should be available by October 2012. In the meantime, we have set up a waiting list for all who wish to purchase Glass Gem. 
