Building a Greenhouse – ups and… downs

January 23, 2012 – 9:35 am

Certainly when the girls and Jon gifted me with a greenhouse for Mother’s Day last year, this is not what I was hoping for when I walked to the back of the house one recent blustery day!

The winds blow so hard on our property that securing this house to the ground somehow becomes a bigger priority than we thought.  Luckily, it wasn’t that difficult to straighten and we didn’t loose the kale or the Swiss chard growing inside.  Jon drove rebar stakes to which he affixed the base and then reinforced the sides with long 2 x 8′s.  This should do the trick, but a winter of Maine weather will tell us for sure.

All of the other season extenders – cold frames and mini-greenhouses – are producing as well.  The leeks and carrots are completely covered and insulated with straw and it was only last week that I harvested the last of the Brussels sprouts and broccoli from the beds.  The hens were so excited to still be getting greens this late in the season.

Traveling back in time to when it was constructed in the spring…

ella helping to build a greenhouse

The girls got into the act, donning drills and hammers.  The base is made of 3 – 2x12x12′s, the frame of electrical conduit piping with dry fit 45 and 90 degree corners at the ‘roof edge’ and topline.  The whole is encased in 6 mil. plastic which we may find isn’t strong enough to withstand our property’s micro-climate.

Chloe working on strapping while Ella works on the framing.

Jon and Ella getting the last piece fitted for the base.

Rebecca used the greenhouse all summer long to grow veggies for the Riggin.  I can’t wait to use it as we go into spring!

Annie
Why is chard ‘Swiss’ and sprouts ‘Brussels?’

By Annie Mahle | Posted in Eco-Friendly & Sustainability, Garden, My Favorite Things, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , | Comments (0)

Scratch Baking Co. Bagels

January 16, 2012 – 9:44 am

Up until I discovered Scratch Baking Co.’s bagel recipe in their new and really cool journal, Baker’s Notes, I’d been using Julia Child’s/Dorie Greenspan‘s in Baking with Julia Child.  Fear not Julia and Dorie, you both remain Goddesses to me.  Both recipes are good and because the descriptions are so detailed, I was able to pick up small hints from both to make my bagels even better.  I did find a few techniques in Scratch’s version that may make it possible for me to do bagels on the boat.

There was one special group of guests who were blessed with bagels last summer, pre-Scratch recipe.  One.  Bagels at home or in a bakery space are one thing, but on the Riggin in my galley?  We are talking quite another, my friends.  However, as I’ve been making them fairly regularly at home, I can now see the possibility of shiny, chewy, crispy bagels slathered with flavored cream cheese on the boat.  I mean Scratch does 1,200 in a day and is only able to boil 12 at a time.  If they can do that, I surely can make 60!  We’ll see!

Annie
In bagel heaven

By Annie Mahle | Posted in Breads, Breakfast, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | Comments (2)

Homemade Chicken Nuggets – Latest Column

January 15, 2012 – 12:03 pm

Recently Ella asked what a chicken nugget was and in one of those parenting moments when you realize so many things all at once, I thought about how sheltered she is, how lucky she is, how proud I am of the choices we are able to make and also, how sad that she doesn’t get that “fun” food.  Isn’t it interesting that I equated “chicken nuggets” with “fun” food.  But what I really meant was the the fun that comes from the very clever marketing of a Happy Meal.  And then I thought, “Wait a minute!  I can make my own nuggets.  We can still have ‘fun’ food!”  and that is how the recipes for this column were born.

We all pitched in and helped, the girls now FAR more adept at working with dough and rolling out the rolls than they used to be when much of their time was spent seeing if they could submerse their arms into the big bag of flour all the way up to their shoulder.  They’d start by just putting their hands into the flour, to which I didn’t usually object, because, hey, who can resist the silky feel of flour in your hands.  Usually in a moment when my back was turned, the temptation would become irresistible, and my next snap shot would be of the bag of flour swallowing my child.  Happy child, messy kitchen.  Bread is never a clean event on the best of days, although much more so now than it used to be.

Homemade Chicken Nuggets
Blue Cheese Dipping Sauce
Simple Romaine Salad
Buttermilk Dinner Rolls

Annie
Remembering the little people when their cheeks were big and rosy all the time…. sigh.

By Annie Mahle | Posted in Breads, Columns, Eco-Friendly & Sustainability, Kids Food, Main Dishes, Salad, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | Comments (0)

My Grandma in My Garden

January 13, 2012 – 9:33 am

Each year when we visited my grandparents for three summer weeks in their rural home in New York, we’d spend our time doing essentially nothing.  It wasn’t exciting, it wasn’t exhilarating and it wasn’t elucidating.  Sometimes it was boring.  The funny thing is, however, that now I look back on those days with a rosy, idyllic sense of dreamy time where the hours passed without incident from one card game to the next, to another trip out to the garden and back, to another game of fetch with Bridgett, their collie.

My grandma worried that we would get so bored that one year we would eventually resist coming.  I’m not sure why we worry as adults so much about the children in our lives being bored.  I know as I look back on my childhood memories, the softer, less thrilling moments are the ones I cherish most.  As I watch my own children, move in and out of boredom, what comes after bored is so interesting to observe.

“Mama, I’m bored.”

“Oh, excellent!  I can’t wait to see what comes after ‘bored.’  Whatever you discover, I know it will be terrific!”

I’m certain that this is one of the phrases that I give to my children which they promise to themselves they will NEVER repeat to their offspring.  We’ll see.

During one of my many childhood periods of boredom spend with my grandparents, we would don my grandpa’s old oxfords with the tails down to our knees and the sleeves rolled up to our wrists, armed with pails and some sort of muck boot.  We’d then tromp through the bushes to my grandma’s favorite haunts looking for whichever berry was in season – usually raspberries, blackberries, or my favorite, elderberries.  We would then trounce home, tired and sunburned and mouths watering for my grandma’s famous elderberry pie.

For the longest time I tried to recreate it with other berries, but eventually gave up the effort, resigning myself to reliving elderberry pie in my mind only.

Until this summer!  When the elderberry patch went into my garden!  It’s American Elderberry, Sambucus canadensis, and I should see my first pie next year.  My mom has always said that gardening skipped a generation and that my grandmother passed her green thumb on to me.  Thank you, Grandma, for the memories.  I’m so glad you are with me again in the garden.

Annie
Thinking of Cecile Hunt

By Annie Mahle | Posted in Close to Home, Desserts & Sweet Endings, Fruit, Garden, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments (0)

No Knead Bread – Roasted Pear and Oatmeal Bread

January 9, 2012 – 2:42 pm

No knead sourdough bread is super easy on the arms and the Kitchen Aid.  All it takes is time.  After the dust of the holiday festivities had settled, I still had a refrigerator full of food needing immediate use.  This bread began with a little bit of leftover oatmeal from the morning’s breakfast and became something special with the addition of roasted pears that I’d used for a cheese plate a week earlier.

Do I have a recipe to share?  Nope.  Who wants to actually roast pears before making this bread?  As much as I love cooking, not even I would say yes.  The trick is to make creative interesting meals with what you already have on hand.

As a guide, rather than a recipe I use 2 cups of wet or liquid ingredients including some sourdough starter.  In this case the pears and the oatmeal.  I then use the ratio of 5 cups flour: 1 tablespoon yeast: 1 tablespoon salt to the 2 cups of wet for each loaf of bread.  Here’s where it gets tricky – the moisture content is never the same when you are using leftovers.  You want your dough to be the consistency of sticky biscuit dough.  If you are a traditional bread maker who is used to kneading, you know that this is a mess waiting to cover your arms to the elbows.  Don’t fret though, it doesn’t hurt anything to add a bit more flour or water depending on which way you need to go.   In this case time will be your friend.

With these loaves you can see from the photo that I also pressed them flat, sprinkled them with cinnamon and demerera sugar and then rolled them into loaves for the loaf pans.

For more detailed process see my post on no knead sourdough bread.

No Knead Sourdough Bread

Annie
Usin’ what I got

By Annie Mahle | Posted in Breads, Breakfast, Close to Home, Cooking | Tagged , , , | Comments (1)

Upcycled Project – Where Have You Seen This Fabric?

January 6, 2012 – 2:28 pm

My sewing machine whirred away for a while this Christmas season in an attempt to give small, meaningful gifts from the heart rather than the pocket book.  These coasters were one such gift and I’ll be posting about others over the next few months.  For those who have sailed on the Riggin already, the striped fabric may look familiar.  I’m not going to tell you where it came from, you have to guess!  I will say that the fabric is upcycled.  And just as it jazzes me to create dinner out of what looks like “nothing to eat” in the fridge, it was just as fun to create something out of fabric I may have otherwise thrown away like last week’s leftovers.

sew your own coasters

To Make:

Fabric remnants in 1, 2 or 3 different matching fabric.
Thin quilt batting or ugly fabric that you don’t want to see.

Cut 4, 5 inch squares from fabric 1 (the back.)
Cut 4, 4 1/2 inch squares from batting or ugly fabric.
If you’d like for the front and back to be the same fabric, cut 8, 5 inch squares of the same fabric.
Cut 4, 2 3/4 x 5 inch rectangles the back fabric.
Cut 4, 2 3/4 x 2 3/4 inch rectangles of fabric 2.
Cut 4, 2 3/4 x 2 3/4 inch rectangles of fabric 3.

sew your own coasters

Sew the small squares of fabric 2 and 3 together first with a 1/4 inch seam allowance for all.
Sew the two squares to the 2 3/4 x 5 rectangles and press.
With wrong sides facing, leave a 2 inch opening, and sew the front and back pieces together around the outer edge.  Snip the corners.
Invert as you would to make a pillow and then insert the batting material.  This took some patience to smooth out the batting and not have wrinkles.
Fold the opened seam closed and top stitch at both a 1/4 inch and right on the edge.  I also added an x, but you could easily do circles or another free form design.

Annie
Frugal gifting – gotta love it!

By Annie Mahle | Posted in Crafts, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments (11)

Cook the Book: Meatloaf

December 30, 2011 – 1:34 pm

Meatloaf

This is my mom’s recipe.  As a little girl I loved the leftover meatloaf sandwiches more than the meal itself.

2 pounds ground beef
1 cup oatmeal or breadcrumbs
1 cup tomato juice or 2/3 cup milk
1 large egg
3 tablespoons ketchup
1 tablespoon dried onion
1 tablespoon dried parsley
Salt and pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 350°. Mix it all up, pat it into a greased loaf pan and pop it into the oven. Bake for 1 hour.  Let it cool at least 15 minutes before serving.

Serves 6-8

By anniemahle | Posted in Cook the Book, Main Dishes, Uncategorized | Comments (3)

Peanut Butter Banana Waffle – Family Favorite

December 28, 2011 – 8:00 am

When I was testing waffle recipes for the column, Jon and I had an assembly line going.  Me making batter, him cooking the waffles.  Click over to the Portland Press Herald to find recipes for Potato Cilantro, Chili Chocolate, Mocha or Coconut Orange Chocolate Waffles.

Peanut Butter Banana Waffles
1 ripe banana, mashed
1/2 cup crunchy peanut butter
2 cups buttermilk
2 cups flour
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
3 eggs, separated
1/2 cup butter (1 stick), melted

Mash the banana and the peanut butter together and then add 1/2 cup of the buttermilk so that the peanut butter doesn’t stay in big chunks.  Add the rest of the buttermilk.

Preheat the waffle iron.  In a large mixing bowl, sift all dry ingredients.  Mix the egg yolks, butter and  buttermilk mixture in a medium bowl.  Combine with the dry ingredients.  In a separate bowl, whisk the egg whites until they form stiff peaks.  Fold into the batter.

Follow the directions for your waffle iron.

Makes 10 to 12 waffles

sweet and savory waffle recipes

This stack is of a bunch of the waffles we were testing.  You can see that the Lemon Poppy Seed ones are on top.

Annie
Stackin’ it up

By Annie Mahle | Posted in Cooking, Main Dishes, Uncategorized, Vegetarian | Tagged , , , | Comments (1)

A Perfect Snowy Day Dinner – Mashed Potato, Portobello Mushrooms & Swiss Chard w/Goat Cheese

December 27, 2011 – 11:30 am

The word “casserole” conjures up images of canned cream of-fill-in-the-blank soup from my childhood.  I grew up in the Midwest, in a household that watched the price of milk and bought in bulk when it went on sale, which meant that we were no stranger to casseroles of the tuna variety and others.   While my food tastes have changed and so have my parents’ tastes, right along with their income, I still occasionally call home for a childhood recipe when I’m looking for a one-pot meal to satisfy my children and the child who still lives in me.

Simply put, while the name is old-fashioned, a casserole is just a one-pot meal with the protein starch and vegetable all in one dish.  Preferably with a crispy topping, please.  Casseroles from our past don’t have to include canned soup to be hearty, one-pot meals.  And they don’t have to be something only served for a weeknight dinner.  Served in individual bowls or large ramekins and topped with a garnish, you quickly turn an everyday meal into a simple meal fit for entertaining.

This is a wonderful comfort meal for a snowy, winter evening, with friends or just family.

Casserole of Mashed Potato, Portobello Mushrooms and Swiss Chard with Goat Cheese

For the mushrooms and Swiss chard:

2 tablespoons olive oil
4 Portobello mushrooms
1 bunch Swiss chard, coarsely chopped and cleaned well
1/2 teaspoon salt
several grinds of freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar

For the potatoes:
8 medium red potatoes, peeled and whole
3 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup milk
1/2 teaspoon salt, plus more for the water

4 oz. goat cheese

For the mushrooms and Swiss chard:
Preheat oven to 400°.  Place the mushrooms and Swiss chard on a roasting pan and sprinkle with oil, salt and pepper.  Roast for 40-45 minutes.  The Swiss chard may be done before the mushrooms at about 30 minutes.  It’s done when it’s wilted and the stems are tender.  Remove the Swiss chard with tongs and transfer to a medium sized bowl.  Toss with balsamic vinegar.  Continue to cook the mushrooms until they begin to get darker on the edges.  When the mushrooms are done, let them cool briefly and then slice thinly into long strips.

For the potatoes:
Place the potatoes in a medium stockpot and cover with salted water.  Bring to a boil and reduce to a simmer.  Simmer for 30-40 minutes or until the potatoes are tender when poked with a fork.  Drain the water; add the butter, milk and salt and whip with a hand mixer.

Reduce oven heat to 350°.  In four 2-cup oven proof bowls, layer the potatoes, mushrooms and Swiss chard, beginning and ending with the potatoes.  Sprinkle with goat cheese and bake for 15-20 minutes or until the edges of the potatoes begin to brown.

Serves 4 (or 6 if you use smaller bowls)

By Annie Mahle | Posted in Cheese, Garden, Main Dishes, Vegetables | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments (2)

Cook the Book: Newfi Bread

December 23, 2011 – 12:25 pm

Newfi Bread

This recipe is a favorite on many vessels in the windjammer fleet.
2 tablespoons (2 packages) dry yeast
1/2 tablespoon salt
8 cups white all-purpose flour
3 cups warm water
2 tablespoons soft butter
1 cup molasses

Combine the yeast, salt, and flour in a large bowl. Stir in all the remaining ingredients, reserving 1/4 cup water. Add more water if needed. Knead for 10-15 minutes. Oil the bowl and the top of the dough, cover, and place in a warm place to rise for 30-45 minutes, until doubled. Preheat oven to 375°. Grease 3 loaf pans. Punch down the dough, form three loaves and place them in the loaf pans. Cover and allow to rise again until nearly doubled. Place the pans in the oven, throw a cup of water over hot stones set in a pan in the bottom of the oven (or toss 3 to 4 ice cubes into a pan in the bottom of the oven) to generate steam and quickly close the oven door. Bake until deep brown (around 45 minutes).

By anniemahle | Posted in Breads, Cook the Book, Uncategorized | Tagged , , | Comments (0)
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