Celebrate “culture” in agriculture & share skills like growing, cooking, canning

Cornelia's Blog (93)

The Best of The Whitney Biennial

With their rich but streamlined 2010 Whitney Biennial (cleverly titled 2010) curators Francesco Bonami and Gary Carrion-Murayari were looking to

bring the museum back to its contemporary roots. The pulse-taking show,

which begins today and runs through May 30, remains pleasantly true to

the organizers’ stated mission:…

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Added by Cornelia on February 25, 2010 at 10:12am — No Comments

Cooking Sous Vide cheap and DIY

The article includes a 72-hour short ribs recipe. Check the comments for great ideas, too - including a warning about sous vide-ing bananas (evidently, it's a "don't"). Nuts!

From Popular Mechanics:

The basic elements of a sous vide setup are simple: a way to seal your food in vacuum bags; a water bath to cook the sealed food in; and a way to keep the water at the precise temperature you want for as long as you want. If you… Continue

Added by Cornelia on February 1, 2010 at 11:42am — No Comments

Terrarium Mossarium Pandemonium!!

This ranks right up there with Tiny Houses and mini pies for shrinking the fantastic and beautiful into little packages. Boing Boing and Martha Stewart have excellent how-tos for how to make these green little worlds.…

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Added by Cornelia on January 27, 2010 at 4:45pm — No Comments

All-local Mid-winter dinner party in Lexington, MA

I attended a dinner last week that served ALL local ingredients - sourced from Massachusetts, Maine, Connecticut and Vermont. The dinner was sponsored by the Sustainable Business Network of Boston and Nourish Restaurant. As the chef told us: Not an easy feat in mid-January! The salad dressing contained no vinegar, but a red wine reduction, honey and kombucha from mere… Continue

Added by Cornelia on January 19, 2010 at 6:44pm — No Comments

Remnants of Biosphere 2 - photos!

Thanks to my friend Philip for sharing this. Experimental Utopias are something that fascinate me.

From BLDG BLOG

"The largest sealed environment ever created, constructed at a cost of $200 million, and now falling somewhere… Continue

Added by Cornelia on January 8, 2010 at 2:32pm — No Comments

My next science-fair-at-home project - The indoor hydroponic growing system

This video - and the lack of dirt, sun and space at home - have inspired me to get on Craiglist and Freecycle and get out the power tools. Looks like I'll need:

a 10-gallon fish tank (or a plastic storage tote - cheaper and keeps out the light just as well)

aquarium parts - bubbler motor, hose, something to disburse the air

silicone caulk

water

liquid fertilizer

starter plants

grow light

I'll start some of my new seed… Continue

Added by Cornelia on January 4, 2010 at 4:48pm — 2 Comments

Kale Pesto Recipe

I may be way behind the curve on this, but I had the epiphany recently that I can make pesto out of any green. Yes, I've made oodles of basil and cilantro pesto, but arugula, kale, spinach, leeks...oh my, I'm so excited!

So, here's my kale pesto recipe

You'll need:

One bunch fresh kale (local and organic if you can)

1/2 C. nuts - (note: I'm not a big fan of pine nuts, so I use a mix of roasted salted almonds and cashews. You should feel free to use…

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Added by Cornelia on December 11, 2009 at 1:30pm — 2 Comments

WSJ - "Green Acres Is The Place To Be". The Recession Is Inspiring More Young Families and Singles to Head Back to the Country

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703735004574571742502599748.html

Check out the comments on the article, too. Plenty of rural folks and back-to-the-landers chiming in with their experience as well.

In June, 40-year-old Shane Dawley and his 36-year-old wife, Rhonda, uprooted themselves and their four boys from their suburban Atlanta rental home… Continue

Added by Cornelia on December 7, 2009 at 4:53pm — No Comments

The Teach A Man To Fish Recipe Roundup is posted!!

What is Teach A Man To Fish? It's a blog event that invites folks to devise and share recipes using sustainable seafood. From friend and HOMEGROWNer Jacqueline Church's web site:

A blog event takes place in the blogosphere only. You may participate completely nude if you like, or in chef's whites,… Continue

Added by Cornelia on November 12, 2009 at 1:39pm — No Comments

Girls vs. Boys? Urban Homesteading is about the economy, community, and connecting to the land

GOOD Magazine has a fantastic article with a misleading headline: "Is Urban Homesteading Keeping Women Down?" Puhleez say those interviewed - including Kelly Coyne and Erik Knudsen from Homegrown Evolution - the gold standard of urban homesteaders. In response to the idea that a return to the kitchen is a blow to gender equality, Kelly… Continue

Added by Cornelia on November 3, 2009 at 5:43pm — No Comments

Repurposed shipping container housing project gets big green lights: City Council OK and predevelopment funds

"A visionary project that will turn 93 reused shipping containers into housing units has achieved some important milestones.

The project, called Exceptional Green Living, will be located at the southeast corner of Rosa Parks and Warren in Woodbridge. The much buzzed about development is moving ahead, having just received unanimous approval to proceed from Detroit City Council and secured initial predevelopment funding."…

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Added by Cornelia on October 28, 2009 at 10:16am — No Comments

140 lbs of honey has been harvested from the White House garden beehives - wow!

From Obama Foodorama

Charlie Brandts is the Official White House Beekeeper. Chef (Cristeta) Comerford (pictured above) noted that this current batch of honey tastes different than the last batch from the White House Beehive.

"You could see the Salvia strands in the last batch," Comerford said.… Continue

Added by Cornelia on October 23, 2009 at 10:56am — No Comments

OH YES! Peanut Butter Bacon Cookies

The weather has turned cold. I haven't slept through the night in several weeks. It's time to start working on growing my pot belly. I can't think of a better way to do that than with cookies. From Joy The Baker

Peanut Butter Bacon Cookies

adapted from The Gourmet Cookbook

makes 15 cookies about the size of your palm

1 cup all-natural… Continue

Added by Cornelia on October 1, 2009 at 9:05am — 1 Comment

NYT: The Next Cultural War

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/29/opinion/29brooks.html

"If there is to be a movement to restore economic values, it will have to cut across the current taxonomies. Its goal will be to make the U.S. again a producer economy, not a consumer economy. It will champion a return to financial self-restraint, large and small."

Added by Cornelia on September 29, 2009 at 11:23am — 2 Comments

Park(ing) Day is today!

Park(ing) Day is a one-day, global event where citizens, artists and activists collaborate to temporarily transform metered parking spaces into “PARK(ing)” spaces: temporary public places. The Project began in 2005 when Rebar, a San Francisco art and design studio, converted a single metered parking space into a temporary public park in an area of San Francisco that is… Continue

Added by Cornelia on September 18, 2009 at 11:14am — No Comments

Grants for converting Brownfields into urban farms - deadline for applications is 10/17

Go to: www.epa.gov/brownfields and check out the grants and funding section of the website.

EPA's Brownfields Program provides direct funding for brownfields assessment, cleanup, revolving loans, and environmental job training. To facilitate the leveraging of public resources, EPA's Brownfields Program collaborates with other EPA programs, other federal partners, and state… Continue

Added by Cornelia on September 10, 2009 at 4:02pm — No Comments

DJ Steve Porter featuring Vince Offer - "Slap Chop Rap"

My apologies to the 5.2 million of you who have already seen this. I just discovered it and it's… Continue

Added by Cornelia on September 4, 2009 at 10:59am — No Comments

Call for a demonstration urban vertical farm in the NYT

"A vertical farm would behave like a functional ecosystem, in which waste was recycled and the water used in hydroponics and aeroponics was recaptured by dehumidification and used over and over again. The technologies needed to create a vertical farm are currently being used in controlled-environment agriculture facilities but have not been integrated into a seamless source of food production in urban high-rise buildings."…

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Added by Cornelia on August 25, 2009 at 6:06am — 1 Comment

%$&*# Bureaucrats! My gutter garden must come down.

**Sob** I just got a call from my landlord who said that Cambridge Inspectional Services has deemed my ghetto gutter garden a public safety hazard. What will happen to my little green tomatoes that have fought drought, late blight and car exhaust to be with me?? There is no other spot of direct sun on the property - shall I find foster homes for them? Shall I bring them into the living room and try… Continue

Added by Cornelia on August 13, 2009 at 4:31pm — 7 Comments

A week without plastic - an experiment at Ready Made

http://readymadeblogs.mydevstaging.com/blogs/readymade//2009/08/03/a-week-without-plastic/

Intrepid blogger Katherine Sharpe writes:

A little while back, I was talking to ReadyMade editor Andrew Wagner about story ideas and blog ideas, and I mentioned how I’d been thinking it would be an interesting experiment to try to live without plastic for a while… Continue

Added by Cornelia on August 5, 2009 at 10:57am — No Comments