Sweet Harvest Homestead

For improved health and vitality, add fermented foods to your diet! Fermentation is one of man's oldest attempts at food preservation and preparation.  Fermented foods are consumed in every country throughout the world and have played an important role in our diet for centuries.   When food is fermented, it means that it's left to sit and steep until the sugars and carbs become bacteria-boosting agents. When you make your own fermented foods, you get the added benefit of microflora that you can't get in store bought varieties  Most people think of dairy products when they think of fermented foods.  Our family regularly enjoys drinking goat milk Kefir;  (think thin, drinkable yogurt) and the health benefits that consuming it brings.  There are many other fermented foods that are just as delicious and easy to make, and when consumed often, make you feel and look so healthy! Kombucha is a delicious fermented tea that can be purchased at the grocery store, but it is expensive,&n

 Last week I visited my friend Julie; several years ago she and her family decided to move out of the city and bought some acreage in the country to raise their family. It's so fun to see children flourish out in a rural setting like theirs.  They have goats, chickens, quail and a falcon.  They've also put up an owl box and fashioned a game camera near it so that they can watch the mother owl take care of her young. It's not for everyone, but I think it's a fantastic way to raise children. Their oldest daughter is an enterprising young lady and is already making plans to make and sell goods from their mini farm at the farmers market. Early spring is asparagus season, and we have been eating plenty of it here at Sweet Harvest Homestead. Our favorite way to enjoy this spring delicacy is to lightly sauté the asparagus spears and serve it with a homemade hollandaise sauce.  This is the recipe we use and I believe it came from Julia Child. 3 egg yolks 1/2 lemon, juiced 1 teaspoon cold water 1 t

Good morning and welcome to the sweet harvest homestead podcast. Old fashioned homemaking for the modern woman. This episode is brought to you by the naked pig in downtown Oakboro North Carolina.  You can purchase some of the finest grass fed beef and pasture raised pork around from their store in Oakboro or online at the naked pig.com If you go by, tell em Lindy Sent ya! And by Bohemian Belle and Baby-Handmade aprons and baby quilts.  Free spirited, beautiful, functional and fun.  That's bohemian belle.  You can find more information at sweetharvesthomestead.com   My 13-year-old daughter and I have been busy the past three weeks, sewing aprons and making baby quilts for our shop. We have been using two different machines;  one is 1957, Singer Slant- O -Matic that belonged to my great-grandmother, and the other is a Brother machine that I bought the year my daughter was born.  It has been a great time to bond with her and to teach her a valuable skill that unfortunately isn'

Hello and welcome to the sweet harvest homestead podcast; old fashioned homemaking for the modern woman This episode is brought to you by the Naked pig- suppliers of grass fed beef and pasture raised pork.  You can find more information at their website, the naked pig.com and by Bohemian Belle & Baby.  Handmade aprons and baby quilts.  Are you a bohemian Belle?  Find out this Saturday, March 4th. My father gave me a collection of old magazines dating back to the mid-1940's.  I enjoy looking through them from time to time to see the fashions of the era and reading articles on anything from raising children to growing victory gardens.   Except for the mentions of war, you could be reading articles that are written today.  The subjects that we as humans care about are the same, no matter what century it is.  Clothing and furniture styles may change, but people are the same. In an attempt to save and stretch food rations during WWII, many of the Good Housekeeping a

Hello and welcome to the sweet harvest homestead podcast, old fashioned homemaking for the modern woman. This episode is brought to you byu, the naked pig in Oakboro north Carolina.  Supplier of pasture raised pork and grass fed beef.  For more information, visit their store in Oakboro or their website, the naked pig.com and by Bohemian Belle and Baby.  Handmade aprons and baby quilts the grand opening of their etsy store is in two weeks. My mother was naturally organized.  Despite working full-time and having a family, she kept a pristine home and served us a home cooked meal every night.  I inherited many of my mother's qualities, but her knack for the organization wasn't one of them. When a friend of mine moved into a new home four years ago, she got rid of almost everything from her old house and made a fresh, almost empty start into her new home.  I was intrigued and wanted to do the same for our place.  I've started and stopped many times but never accomplished that ta

This episode is brought to you by, The Naked Pig and Bohemian Belle & Baby.   As we drove down Brief Road this evening, the fields of rye grass seemed almost neon green.   Tiny pink blooms dotted many of the branches of the trees along the road, and delicate, green leaves were lining the long, flowing branches of an ancient willow tree.   I feel lucky to live in a place where springtime starts to show her pretty face in February. The quilt that my daughter and I started last year is finally finished, and we sent it off to the long arm quilt man to sandwich together the top, middle and back of the quilt, and create a beautiful design with his quilting machine.  I hand quilted a quilt- once.  That was a laborious task that I would rather not repeat.  Besides, it's not every day that you get your quilt, quilted by a man who looks like Paul Newman. Our quilt man, Bryan is a former NC state trooper.  After retiring from the NCDOT, he took up long arm quilting, and h

This episode is brought to you by www.thenakedpig.com and by the Soap Making e course at Sweet Harvest Homestead. http://sweetharvesthomestead.typepad.com/sweet_harvest_homestead/soapmaking-e-book.html   Last year, I posted a picture on my blog of the Hydrangeas that I grew and asked if anyone knew how to preserve them. The suggestions ranged from keeping them in a hot trunk for a few days to using silica gel. I opted to use the silica gel because it was supposed to do the best job of preserving, but it was complicated and expensive and after thinking it through- way too long, the Hydrangeas were no longer pretty enough to preserve, so I gave up on that project. Fast forward to a few days ago, I was cleaning out my daughter's bathroom cabinet and came across the prettiest, perfectly preserved hydrangea that I have ever seen! I remembered her picking a few of them last summer, saying that she was going to dry them, but with the business of life, I forgot that she was even doing it. You know what she did?

This episode is brought to you in part by The Naked Pig.com and by my book From Farm to Market, Stories of Farmers & Artisans in the Carolina Piedmont

As a young girl, my great Aunt Rosemary was the one woman who I wanted to emulate the most.  She had a well-kept home, a huge garden, lots of land, honey bees, fruit trees, a pond stocked full of catfish, berry bushes, and was a great cook.  We loved the Sunday afternoons after church spent at Aunt Rosemary & Uncle Alton's house, eating one of her delicious meals that came mostly from their land.  She was famous for her creamed corn and cole slaw.  A few years ago, she gave me a corn cutter and showed me how to make her recipe for creamed corn.  Try as I might, I can't get mine to taste quite as good as hers.   There is something about eating in her kitchen and knowing it was made by the corn that grew in her garden, that made hers taste extra special. She canned most of the produce from they grew and froze the rest.  I learned how to can like her but never had a freezer until a few years ago.  I am so glad we bought it as it has come in handy more times than I

As much as I hate to admit it, I'm a lazy gardener.

It happens every year; usually right after Halloween.  The colder temperatures make me want to bundle up and eat something sugary and comforting.  Unfortunately, I don't ever stop at just one treat.  I spend the next two months acting like a gluttonous heathen, enjoying all of the sweets and treats that the holiday season has to offer.  I won't apologize for it, no sir.  After all, it wouldn't be Christmas time without eating rum cake, buckeye candies, cookies and coconut pie.   I do love me some sweetnin. [sic] However come January 1st, I am ready to chuck it all out the door and do anything to make myself feel better.  Eating all of that sugar has adverse effects on your body, and  I didn't truly realize that until last year. While working at the Farmers Market last summer, I overheard one of the farmers talk about something called the Whole 30.   She talked about it enough to other people that it intrigued me, and one day I asked her about it. &nb

A brand new calendar holds so much promise; In my hands, I hold a whole new year to plan, dream and set goals for.  It is such fun to think that in two more months the daffodils will be blooming.  In four months, I will plant the tiny seeds that will grow into vegetables to feed my family, and five months from now; I will once again smell the roses that bloom so lovely in my garden. When I was a teenager, I never liked the winter months.  To me, they signaled a let down after the highs of the holiday season.  Three months of dreary, cold and dark weather and a bit of melancholy was all the first of the new year meant to me.  Now, that I am wiser,  I relish this peaceful season of reflection and (some) rest.  The boisterous holidays and craft show that I take part in are over, and I have more time to sit and think.  Writing out goals for the new year is something I enjoy.  I suppose it is the same as making resolutions, except to me, resolutions seem negative. ( I'm

Christmas time magic and the continuation of reading my book, From Farm to Market Brought to you by www.thenakedpig.com in Oakboro, NC.

  www.sweetharvesthomestead.com

This podcast is brought to you by The Naked Pig in Oakboro, NC If you've followed my blog or read my column for any amount of time, you know the story of how we bought our little white farmhouse in Stanfield.  For those of you who don't know the story, I'll give you the short version.  It was 2006, and after looking for the perfect place for a year, we finally found 12 acres with a little white farmhouse.  The house was built in 1915, and the instant I saw it, I knew it was the one.   While my husband and realtor were indoors looking around, I stole quietly outside to check out the land and outbuildings.  The woods were full of persimmon and hickory trees, and there was even a lilac bush (something I'd always wanted).   I made my way to the unattached garage, and when I opened the door, I saw one of the most beautiful paintings in progress that I have ever seen!  There were numerous painted canvases in that small space and to me; they were all works of art.  M