NOREASTER BRINGS CRAP WEATHER TO MAINE; BUT FEAR NOT IT IS SOUP TIME

We have a three day storm system with winds coming in from the northeast.

 

I never mind when these storms bring in snow, even though we often end up with well over a foot within a few hours.   But, this system is starting as snow, changing to sleet, changing to rain, changing to sleet, changing to snow, changing… and it is supposed to continue into Friday, with day time temperatures at or above freezing (worst case scenario.)

This morning I got up, my wife had fed the new cats and had oatmeal cooking.

Baby Toula - age four months

Bella with the beautiful eyes - age four years

 I ate breakfast, then relaxed with a cup of tea before going out to fill the bird feeders and bring in two days of firewood before the storm arrives.    

Snow started about two pm.   We will likely lose electricity during this storm, as wet snow and sleet will stick to power lines, or at the very least bring down tree limbs on the lines.

 

We have LP gas lamps installed in the living room and kitchen, a kerosene lamp that we can move from room to room, also a battery lantern and flashlights. 

This is an earlier picture from Solstice 2010, but note the gas lamp in the upper left 

We can heat with wood and cook on the gas stove top (though the oven will not work without electricity.)  

As a bear once told me, “You’ll be alright.

Winter time is the time for homemade soups.

I do the majority of cooking at the house – because I like it.  For some reason my wife doesn't complain.  The thing I do not like is making salads: it always seems so boring and repetitious.

So, today was a soup day for lunch.  One of my favorite recipe books is Twelve Months of Monastery Soups

 (I also have the Twelve Months of Monastery Salads book but don’t use it often.) 

 

Today was just a simple cream of tomato soup:

I diced one medium onion; put a chunk of butter and enough olive oil in the bottom of the soup pan to sautéed  the onions until tender, then added a tablespoon of dried parsley, a teaspoon of thyme and a couple of teaspoons of dried basil – cooked for a couple of more minutes before adding a 28 ounce can of diced tomatoes (unseasoned.)   Let it simmer about ten minutes, added two teaspoons of sugar and puréed  it with the hand blender.   Once the mixture was uniform I added about twelve ounces of half and half cream (look at it and taste it until it seems right.)  

I keep a small container with a couple of ounces of olive oil and a crushed garlic clove soaking (I use it for cooking or as a dip for my bread instead of butter,) I slices a baguette and coated the inside with the garlic oil and browned it in a skillet.  

A nice tomato soup and garlic bread – it doesn't  get much better.  

Tonight for supper: a salad, grilled salmon fillets cooked on the George Forman  (if we still have electricity,) rice and canned green peas.

  

Tomorrow I will probably be snow blowing the driveway and digging out the front and back doors.  

Just a note; if you are considering buying a snow blower look for one with a round snow chute (the tube where the snow comes out.)  I have a Sears snow blower and it works fine except with wet snow.   The snow chute is rectangular and prone to clogging up.   My friend has one with a round chute and doesn't have this problem.

Need to feed the wood stove…

the Ol’Buzzard

  

COUNTRY FRIED BUZZARD #1

COOKING WITH GEORGE

I just left a comment on a blog that posted about the George Foreman grill. I do a lot of cooking at the Buzzards nest because I enjoy it – I don’t like making salads so my wife handles that job. I also must acknowledge that I cook under supervision – my wife doesn’t abide me cooking the greasy good tasty foods I grew up with (when the adult male life expectancy was sixty.)


Anyway, I thought I might post some Ol’Buzzard cooking tips from time to time, and title them COUNTRY FRIED BUZZARD.

I love the George Forman Grill. The trick to good tender meat is thin cuts (I don’t mean lean) no more than an inch thick. Most meats cook in five minutes and fish in four. It is easy to over cook with George. There is no use buying lean meat when cooking with George as the fat runs off into the catch pan. To me lean meat cooks tough and tasteless: a nice marbled steak or chop with some fat on it adds the flavor I like - and the fat cooks off



I don’t cook with salt. I make up an all purpose substitute (or rub if you like.) I use it on all meats and it is especially good on salmon. I make up enough to keep on hand in a salt shaker.


• 1 tbsp granulated garlic

• 1 tbsp granulated onion

• 1 tbsp ground lemon peal

• 1 tbsp dill

• 2 tsp course ground pepper

If you buy the ingredients in bulk packages at a health food store they are a hell of a lot cheaper than buying them in little bottles from the super market.

This mixture is great on baked potatoes and most vegetables

As a disclaimer: I still use salt, pepper and a dollop of mayonnaise on fresh tomatoes (everything goes better with mayonnaise – put mayonnaise on it and I will probably eat it.)

the Ol’Buzzard

A RECIPE FOR BREAD

A LOAF OF BREAD, A JUG OF WINE, A JAR OF MAYONNAISE, AND YOU LYING NAKED BESIDE ME IN THE WILDERNESS.  

My beautiful young wife and I have lived ‘off the grid’ for most of our married life.  We were married after I retired from the military, and moved into a 200 year old farmhouse without electricity, water or sewerage.  We carried our water from the stream behind the house,  read by lamp light, heated with wood, and supplemented our food with our garden; all while attending college for four years.

  

After our graduation we moved to Alaska and taught school in the remote Indian and Eskimo villages of the sub-arctic, arctic and south-west interior.    We now live in a small post-and-beam cabin (about 800 square feet) in north-western Maine.  We still heat with firewood and have gas lamps installed in the living room and kitchen as a back up for when we lose electricity – which often happens during winter snow storms.

During much of the time we have lived together we have made our own bread.  We now use a commercial bread machine (the Breadman Ultimate) and are completely pleased with it.     I was raised eating white bread (Wonder Bread) but I also ate spam, vienna sausage, lots of gravy and bought Old Crow whiskey by the gallon.   Wives tend to change a man’s habits.

To get on with it, our bread of choice is now a multi-grain.   I am including the recipe here for anyone that would like to try it.

Most of the ingredients for this bread will be available at a health food store 

THE OL’BUZZARD’S MULTIGRAIN BREAD RECIPE.

• 1 ½ Cups of water at room temperature
• 2 tbsp of molasses: stirred in until dissolved
• 1 1/3  Cups of wheat flour
•  ¾ Cups of Rye flour
• ¾ Cups of white bread flour
• 1 ¾ Cups of six grain flour
• 4 tbsp of six grain cereal
• 2 tbsp powdered milk
• 1 ½ tsp salt
• 1 tbsp gluten
• 1 tsp dried yeast

Select the two pound wheat bread setting on the bread machine.

There is a secret to making good bread in a bread machine.   First of all you must measure ingredients carefully.   Second, after the mixing begins you should open the top and check the consistency of the mixture:  if you see flour in the bottom of the pan that is not combining you should add one tablespoon of water (one tablespoon is usually good - the tendency is to add too much water at this point.)   If you see the dough is wet and sticking to the side of the bread pan you should sprinkle one or two tablespoons of flour until the dough is spinning free off the sides of the bread pan. 

The cycle for most bread machines is: kneed – rise, kneed – rise, kneed rise, and then bake.  Check the time of the last kneed cycle and at that time remove the dough from the bread pan, extract the paddle, kneed the bread on a lightly floured surface for about fifteen seconds in order to close up the cavity left by removal of the paddle.  Then reshape the dough and place it back in the bread pan and put the pan back in the bread machine for the last rise cycle and bake cycle. 

You should get a good loaf.   Bread machines vary so some tweaking of the recipe will improve your bread.  

Bread should sit for cooling on a rack for about an hour before cutting – usually I can’t wait that long.  Hot bread slathered with butter is difficult to cut, but taste great.

The Ol’Buzzard