We’re introducing a new blog category that could be fun (at least for the reader!) Up here at the HUG Resilient Living Campus, we are so fortunate to have a campus chef that creates and plans our lunches made directly from the bounty of our garden. Campus Chef Chris G. is a wizard when it comes to making something delicious out of thin air. So, we wanted to put this to the test. Can Chris make delicious food under strict restrictions? Think “Iron Chef” without the drama and all the yummy food. Without further ado, here’s the main man, himself!
Ok. So, I have been asked to create a meal using no nightshades. Nightshades are a common family of fruit and vegetables that includes tomatoes, potatoes, eggplants, and all sorts of peppers. It isn’t a common food allergy, but you do run into it. Yet, there are a lot of nightshades in some of our favorite foods that we eat on a regular basis.
So what do we do? It is not fair just to never eat spaghetti just because of a silly allergy, right? So, I looked into making a few things that you would find nightshades in, but I found that it’s pretty easy to replace those little guys with something just as filling and delicious.
Here’s what I found:
Tater Tots & Ketchup
Tater tots, minus the taters can be just as tasty as the real deal…or even better!
This one is a little tricky and a harder to do because you’re not using tomatoes. However, if you take the time to do it, you won’t really miss it that much!
That’s the hard part about being a gardener. There is a non-stop list of work to do, so being able to take time off during the peak heat is pretty-much a non-starter. With little rain, extreme heat and the hottest month ahead of us, we thought it would be a good idea to revisit a post we did a few years back that shows what our gardeners do to stay cool during the hot months.
Cover Your Skin
You can see Rochester wearing a wide-brim hat to keep the sun off his neck.
Wearing shirts and long pants that cover your skin is one method they recommend. In the times with high heat, the clothes (if lighter, like white or sky blue) will repel the heat. Cotton is the best fabric to use as it allows perspiration to occur. If you can avoid jeans, you’ll be better off, as well.
Also, if you can cover your face with a sun hat or even a baseball cap, your skin will appreciate it. Since your head is the first thing to receive the suns rays, it will be taking the brunt of the heat. Simply using a hat will minimize your exposure to the heat, allowing you to stay cooler for longer.
Work Earlier in the Day
The crew works early in the morning before the day starts to warm up. As it’s usually cooler earlier in the day, it’s a perfect time to get exerting projects done.
It’s not a particularly unique idea, but working when it’s cooler out is a no-brainer. In fact, I just read that trash collectors in Washington DC are expected to start working during the early morning in this summer to get most of their routes done before it gets too hot.
In the same vein, they take the time to take breaks. Our garden crew takes a few minutes every hour to come inside, have a drink of water, and relax. Staying out of the heat seems like a simple solution, but it works!
Drink Something With Electrolytes
Hay Time Switchel is a drink long used by farmers and harvesters.
If you can’t get out of the heat, then it’s important to combat the effects of the heat. Working in the sun causes your body to sweat. (No kidding!) Sweating is important to stay cool, but the salt (electrolytes) lost in the process is necessary for proper function.
Drinking water is great, but you still need to replenish the lost salt in your system. That’s why “Gatorade” has such a following. But, you don’t need to go out and buy a sports drink. You can make your own. We’ve got a recipe for Hay Time Switchel that will get you back on your feet.
Hay Time Switchel
1 Cup light brown sugar
1 Cup apple cider vinegar
1/2 Cup light molasses
1 tbsp ground ginger
1 quart cold water
Combine all ingredients and stir well. Makes 6 seven ounce glasses. This can be refrigerated, but old timers made it with cold spring water and said nothing quenched a thirst or cooled a dusty throat in haying time as this drink.
Keeping Your Animals Cool
I had a chat with a coworker who fosters lost and injured wild animals, along with normal pets. She’s got a lot of experience involved with the caretaking of animals and she says that animals don’t really need much help from humans.
“They’re smarter than us,” she joked. She says they’ll find a way to cool off, whether that’s removing themselves from the sun, rolling in mud (if they’re pigs), and dunking under water. She even described how squirrels will lay on their belly with their arms and legs stretched out and “heat dump” on the ground.
Squirrels will “heat dump” to cool off during the summer.
But, the one thing she says we can do is just keep their coping mechanisms in mind. If they like shade and water, keep it around for them to decided when to use it. Keeping clean water sources such as shallow bird baths for your feathered friends and even deeper dishes for larger wildlife are accepted and used when needed.
Do you have any ways to keep your pets and animals cool during the hot stretches? Let us hear ’em in the comments below.
Happy Dancing Turtle will be the home for fifty chickens for the summer. We plan on keeping these beauties on campus for around through August, when they’ll be collected and butchered. (It was explained to me that they’ll live a really good life and then have one bad day.)
You may not know that baby chicks can be shipped right through the mail. We got a neat call from the Pine River Post Office last week. Just listen to the happy little ones!
You’ll never guess what we got in the mail!Meet one of our “chicken tenders.” Avery will be making sure the chicks are well taken care of during their stay at HDT.Look how happy the little chirps are!
Our chicken coop is something a little different. It used to be a car park where we stored our garden and maintenance equipment. With an upgraded storage space on campus, we reused the space for a coop.
Eco Camp registration is now open! If you’d like to learn more about a specific camp, visit our website for more details. You can even register and pay online.
Right now, we all need something to look forward to, especially our kids. What better time to sign them up for Eco Camp! This year, our theme is “‘Log In’ At Eco Camp” with a focus on the forest and trees, specifically maples, oaks, birches, and pines.
Kids will get outside and be up close with nature.
Here are the dates:
Grades 1-2 (Mighty Maples), June 22-26 Grades 3-4 (Outstanding Oaks), July 6-10 Grades 5-6 (Brilliant Birches) July 20-24 Prek-K: Ages 4-5 (Powerful Pines) August 3-7.
Who doesn’t love to occasionally look back and see from where they’ve come, and reflect on where they’re going? 2019 was a year we tackled new topics and connected with new partners, yet, we also wrote about things near and dear to our hearts. So, we thought it would be fun to look back at our most read posts written in 2019.
Every summer we love to encourage kids to get outside. So, for the last few summers, we’ve hosted camping trips to local and state parks throughout Minnesota. Michelle writes about the fun had on these trips in the most read article of the year.
Just posted a few weeks ago, Nora’s article on using your skills and time to make gifts seemed to resonate. (Plus, it’s not too late for some last minute gifts before the holidays are over for this year). 🙂
The garden in all its splendor. Photo taken in early August.
The last CSA shares were distributed out last week, (nothing but rave reviews in terms of quantity and quality!) Dave and the garden crew are spending this week and the next few to finally put the garden to bed. An annual tradition of pulling irrigation hoses and planting garlic (for overwinter germination) have been completed, and now the time to look back is on us.
The variety and flavor of the garden was out of this world.
Dave gave me an amount the garden produced this summer. Counting all the lettuces, garlics, tomatoes (cherry and sliceable), onions, zucchinis, squash, and (of course) all of carrots, we came up with 5,472 lbs out of the garden. Here’s the funny thing, the garden isn’t done giving it’s best. We’ve got a full hoop house that has full raised beds of lettuce, cherry tomatoes, and peppers. We’ll add to the almost 3 tons of food for a couple more weeks.
Last week, we were able to pull University of Minnesota researcher Lois Braun into the recording studio. She opened up her world of hazelnut plantings and cross-country experiments for us all to learn.
This special episode of Turtle Talks is a Q&A session with Lois and her technical assistant, Connor. On this day, they came up to the HDT gardens to plant over fifty hybrid hazelnut plants. (You can check out pics from the planting here!)
Last week, over 50 hazelnut plants were installed in our south field. As part of the Shady Chicken Project, Lois Braun has chosen HDT to be one of the test sites.
Lois’s important work as part of the Forever Green initiative promotes improving natural resources and economic opportunities for farmers. Diversified income streams and perennials on the landscape are both things HDT can get behind! Find out more about Forever Green here:https://www.forevergreen.umn.edu/
We designed the experiment to have spacing of five feet between each plant and 12 feet between each row.
We welcomed Lois Braun from the University of Minnesota. She is running her hybrid hazelnut experiment at several different locations through MN and WI.
We love taking the time from planting, harvesting, weeding, and maintaining our garden and grounds to talk on camera. Sometimes, it’s a well-planned and methodical back and forth between speakers. Other times, like this episode, it’s a loosey-goosey and chaotic back and forth between speakers.
We discuss the current CSA shares, Colin gives parsley a try, we talk about the winter cover crops, and what we do with rabbits in our “rabbit-proof” garden. A real fun episode to make. Hope you enjoy.
Happy Dancing Turtle Blog 