Growing Up

The coop and pen (to the right of the canoe).

In their new digs (10 days old)

Mama and one of her baby boys.

Out in their play yard (Al is jealous that his little brothers stole his pool - 2 days old)

Me and all my chicks (1 day old). They've grown out of this box.

Home.

The pictures are in reverse chronological order, but you get the idea. They're growing up so fast.

Over the weekend, we got the fence up, and almost chicken proof (still need to run a roll of chicken wire along the south side of the yard, and patch the gate). The boys moved from their first brooding box into an area that runs the width of the coop. They've graduated from liter waterers to a 5 gallon waterer. They seem to like running in and out of the holes in the cinder blocks. We're even starting to see their wattles. It's getting fun. We're probably two weeks away from letting them roam.

That's all for now.

Chicken Wings

An update is due.

The chicks have been home for a week now. As it turned out, we only got 50 chicks - we're missing the "exotic" chick that was supposed to be free with our order. In reality, we're down to 48 birds. One was lost to a tragic accident involving one of the gallon waterers; the other to the course of nature - he was just too weak.

Even with these minor setbacks, it's been great having the little peepers around. We've adjusted some things to make them happier and more comfortable, and they've been thriving. Their wing feathers are making an appearance (they're just learning how to flap them), and a few tail feathers have begun sprouting on a few of the birds.

Some wisdom we've acquired this week:

• Place the waterers on a small wooden slab, resting on top of the bedding. The chicks were kicking enough shavings into the water that it was basically impossible for them to drink. All it took was some scrap wood to raise up the water source a bit, and it's been more manageable.
• Don't put the feeders along the back of the brooding box if you can't walk around it. Instead, keep one edge near the front of the box so that it's easy to reach in and fill them up.
• Always remind yourself that these little guys are food for the winter. It would be easy to get attached to them at this point. They really are adorable, and very entertaining.

We're excited about the prospect of having laying hens next spring. We've been tossing the occasional grasshopper into the brooding box, and the ensuing action is hilarious. They all rush the bug, and tear it apart. Then, they run around the box with their little piece, while the others all try to steal it. Our garden will have fantastic protection next year.

This weekend, we'll be cleaning the box out, putting down fresh shavings. The big project will be erecting a fence out of an old dog run and sections of a pig fence, and then running chicken wire around the bottom.

Pictures to follow.

51 Little Chicken Nuggets

They're here, finally.

I got a call yesterday at 7:34 am from the Mission Post Office. The chicks are here. On my lunch break, I drove over to the PO and collected a cardboard box containing 51 chicks. I brought them back to school (much to my students' delight) and gave them some food and water.

They're so freaking cute.

After school, I loaded them into the car and drove down to the ranch store for some last minute supplies. Katey and I cleaned out the coop a few days ago, and we found a waterer, but one isn't enough (those chicks drink a gallon and a half in 12 hours). I picked up another heat lamp, a waterer, two feeders, and 3 cubic feet of pine shavings.

When I got home, we set up their pen (a 3x4 enclosure with rounded corners) inside the coop, laid down 2 inches of shaving, filled the waterers, hung the lamps, and put some feed in and around the feeders.

We dipped each chick's beak into the water as we set them into the pen to make sure they knew how and where to get water. I think I checked on them 6 or 7 times last night before going to bed.

When I stepped outside this morning, I wasn't prepared for the cold. I had a moment of panic - what if they all died in the night because of the cold? What if some rodent or snake was drawn to the heat lamps and devoured them all? They're so helpless...

Not to worry. All 51 alive and well this morning.

As I came back inside, I noticed that our garden is starting to fade. I picked 5 zucchini, and observed that I should probably harvest the butternut squash this weekend. I'll cut the rest of the basil and make a batch of pesto this afternoon. There are only a handful of tomatoes left. We may get a few more, but it's September. We'll have our first frost soon.

For all of our panicking, the garden did well this summer. We have winter squash put up. Several quarts of pesto, and several gallons of tomato sauce are in the freezer. Katey will be freezing some of her famous chocolate zucchini bread before we go back to school on Tuesday. I'm proud that we were able to reduce our dependence on the industrial food complex, if even just a little bit.

And come October 23rd, we'll have chickens in the freezer, too.

A Pot of Gold...Peeled and Seeded

When we were in Sioux Falls I picked up a new cookbook, Alice Waters's In the Green Kitchen. It's a collection of techniques shared by a number of different chefs rather than a collection of recipes, but there are also a few recipes that go along with each technique.

Our garden is starting to kick into overdrive. In the last ten days, we've harvested around 20 pounds of tomatoes. Last night, we started doing something with all of that glorious red fruit.

Charlie Trotter's contribution to the book is peeling and seeding tomatoes. We took his simple tomato sauce recipe and converted it into a soup. Now that school is starting, we're trying to get back into the routine, and a few quarts of soup in the freezer is a step in that direction.

This weekend, marinara sauce.

Garden Renaissance

The garden survived! The grasshoppers did their damage, and we haven't gotten rid of them, but so far (fingers crossed) they haven't developed a taste for tomatoes, zucchini, or our ripening winter squash. They're even leaving the basil alone!

Katey and I spent a week traveling to Michigan to have our second reception. Along the way, we saw some beautiful things: we made stops in Duluth, Amnicon Falls State Park, Camp Baldy, Palms Book State Park (home of the largest natural spring in Michigan), Petoskey, and Sleeping Bear National Lakeshore. It was a fantastic trip.

We ate out at almost every meal - and we're feeling it now. Getting back to our simple, garden-based diet is a welcome change. When we got home, we were greeted with about 40 ripe tomatoes, several LARGE zucchinis, and a couple of ripe potimarron squash. We also harvested our potatoes and onions.

Last night, we had a vegetarian meal with a few friends. We had white beans with garlic, pureed and served on a crispy flatbread, fried zucchini pancakes with diced tomatoes, peppers, and onions on top, spaghetti alla carbonara (minus the pancetta), and a salad with homemade buttermilk ranch dressing. All in all, pretty good.

On a side note, we're now making our own butter. If we only had a cow...

A Plague of Locusts

First things first: the wedding was amazing. Katey and I were so pleased to be surrounded by friends and family on our big day. The outpouring of support and love was humbling, and it is truly a day that we'll never forget.

Now, on to other news: the garden is in trouble, and I don't think there's much we can do about it. We knew we had a grasshopper problem, but we thought we had it under control.

We were SO wrong.

We pulled into the driveway and, before unloading a thing, went straight out to the garden, expecting to see zucchini and winter squash growing like wildfire, lettuce ready to be cut, onions and peppers progressing nicely towards a fall breakfast, and big, ripe tomatoes. Instead, we found what amounts to an agricultural slaughter: onions consumed right down to the dirt, no potato plants at all, barren butternut squash stalks devoid of all leaves, half-eaten green peppers, no lettuce to speak of, and evidence that the six-legged culprits were starting in on the tomatoes. Miraculously, it seems they've tired of our basil.

We don't know what to do. We're about 3 weeks away from harvesting the potimarron squash (lets hope they make it) and a month from the butternut squash - we might still get 3 or 4 if we're lucky.

I'll be frantically searching for organic cures (so far, chickens seem to be the best option - alas, we are two weeks away from 50 to 75 chicks arriving here at the homestead).

Updates about the rescue effort will be forthcoming.

Game Changer

Every now and then something comes into your life that completely alters your perception of the world. You look forward to the getting up in the morning--the promise of a what the day might bring is overwhelming.

You might think that, with nine days to go until the wedding, I'm referring to Katey.

I'm not.

I'm talking about our new KitchenAid stand mixer.

We received this as a wedding gift, and it has really changed our eating habits. Prior to getting the mixer, we bought our pasta from the store, and usually fretted about whether or not get the organic pasta at three times the price of the regular stuff. Now, nothing but fresh pasta. Katey has taken up cookie baking, and we also make pizza dough to freeze.

Also, our garden is finally producing for us this year. We've got six quarts of pesto in the freezer, a couple quarts of swiss chard (blanched and frozen), lettuce, spinach, and kale. A few zucchini have been harvested with many more on the way, I'm sure.

The onions and tomatoes seem to be doing well, as are all of the winter squash. Our pepper plants are slowly developing, but I'm afraid our potato crop is being destroyed by grasshoppers. We have a solution for the bugs next summer, but I'll save that for another post.

Tonight, we had a few friends over to do some wedding planning. We made fresh pasta dough, and Katey hand cut and shaped enough farfalle (bowties) for the six of us to eat well. We tossed the pasta with fresh basil pesto, prepared only a few minutes before serving. We also had a salad with greens from the garden, and some store-bought radishes, cucumber, and carrots. We dressed it with a home-made ranch dressing. To drink, Katey brewed a pitcher of iced tea, and we had fresh squeezed lemonade as well. A great summer meal.

An Update

Katey and I haven't posted in over two months, but it doesn't mean we haven't been eating! Over the last two months we've eaten the majority of what remains of this year's venison. We're down to about 2lbs of ground venison and one roast. Pheasant season is long since over, and it was pretty unproductive, so we have no birds in the freezer this year. We do have two rabbits, and we're holding out for a spring turkey. We've made the decision to get a three-doe tag next year (and Katey might get a tag as well). We really want to break our dependence on supermarket protein. So, more venison, (hopefully) more pheasants and rabbits, and we might try raising meat chickens.

This summer, I hope to finally become a fisherman. There are enough places to go to catch walleye, bass, and other panfish around here that I don't have a good excuse to not put a meal on the table once a week. If I can get out to the Hills at all, maybe we'll get some trout.

The garden is still waiting to be planted. We're going to grow tomatoes, potatoes, peppers, lettuce, basil, and a variety of squash. Hopefully, it will be productive enough to put up some food for the winter. I'm already envisioning a garden expansion next year, depending on where we live.

We're also trying to have more meals where protein isn't the star. We seem to build our meals around meat, with very little thought to what vegetables we'll have with it, or how to prepare them. So we're doing a "meatless Monday" type of thing now, where at least once a week, veggies take center stage. Last night, it was a black bean and avocado salad with diced tomatoes, onion, and fresh corn. We lightly dressed it with a honey-chili-lime concoction, and it was outstanding. It was satisfying on its own, but we both automatically went to thinking that it would be really good on top of fish or chicken. It may take awhile to break out of the meat first mentality.

Comfort Food

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Shepherd's Pie in Lakeview

Comfort food is one of my favorite things to cook. Mac and cheese. Meatloaf and mashed potatoes. Chicken soup. All of these meals give me that warm, happy feeling; all of these meals also usually leave me stuffed.

This week, we decided to get back into the swing of cooking game. Later this week, we're having venison chops and venison burgers. Last night, though, we had shepherd's pie with venison. The meal was inspired by our friend Juliet's blog. I've been craving that meal ever since.

We made our shepherd pie with ground venison instead of beef, and more peas than the recipe called for. The mashed potato topping was also loaded with cheddar cheese. I thought it turned out well, but if I were to make it again, I think I'd thicken up the gravy (ours was a little loose), and I might broil it for a few minutes to get a better, more golden crust on top.

Fish Tacos, and Mac and Cheese

This past weekend was not good. Horrible, in fact. Katey and I were in a car accident while driving to Rapid City. We hit an icy patch outside of Wall, SD, and spun around, crashing into a rock-hard snow bank before flipping over. We were so lucky not to be injured. The car, however, didn't fare so well. Katey's beloved C-RV was totaled.

So what do you do after a traumatic event of that magnitude? You eat comfort food. That meant Belgian waffles for breakfast, a burger with onion rings and fried pickle spears on it, fish and chips for dinner. Ah, the joys of eating out in a city.

When we got home, I made a big batch of mac and cheese from scratch. It had a custardy filling, not as cheesy as I like it, but still good. Tonight, we had fish tacos. Flounder fillets seasoned with Old Bay, baked with broccoli. Fresh salsa from the Bullet, and corn tortillas softened in a skillet. Topped with shredded lettuce and sour cream--yum!

No idea what to make tomorrow--we might be in Sioux Falls picking up our new car!

Fish

I've always liked fish. It's good for you, it (usually) tastes good, and it's quick to cook. Living in South Dakota, it's tough to get good fresh fish unless you catch it yourself. Seeing as I have no ice fishing equipment, that's not likely to happen right now. Usually, we buy our fish frozen from Sam's Club. On our last trip to Rapid, we picked up a bag of tilapia, and a bag of flounder. I would have loved to get some salmon, but it has really increased in price lately. Oh well, maybe next time.

This week, we've had fish three times. On Monday, it was baked tilapia with lemon, dill, and garlic. Tuesday, we had a spicy flounder, sauteed with spinach and garlic. Last night, parmesan crusted tilapia baked in the oven, and roasted broccoli (roasted broccoli is one of our favorite sides). Katey's favorite was the flounder.

While I'm glad we're eating more fish (again, it's healthy, tastes good, and quick), I tend to get into culinary ruts. I think next week, we'll limit the consumption of any one type of protein to twice a week. And that should go for our sides, too. We probably need to diversify our vegetable intake, although that is admittedly harder to do in the winter.

One little note. I said at the beginning of this post that I've always loved fish. That isn't really true. When I was little, maybe five years old, I went fishing with my dad at Portage Point Inn in Michigan, near Lake Michigan. I managed to catch a sunfish using canned corn kernels as bait. The hotel had a deal where they would clean and cook your fish for you.

When they brought that fish out to me, I started balling. My dad enjoyed that particular fish. I think it took me a little while to accept that our food was, at one point, alive. I'm glad I still have that respect for the animals I eat now that I hunt them myself. I think I'll enjoy tonight's venison meatballs that much more.

Food Rules

Venison provided by Mr. John Lee

Today's post is inspired by two sources. First, by Michael Pollan, author of The Omnivore's Dilemma, In Defense of Food, and most recently, Food Rules: An Eater's Manual; and by our friend, Juliet Summers, who has taken it upon herself to follow and document her experiences eating whole foods. Essentially, she's following the Pollan mantra: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.

Over the weekend, we took a trip out to Rapid City. Katey had a conference about her National Board Certification, and TIE put us up in a hotel for the night. While we were there, I used my Borders Gift Card, also courtesy of TIE, to pick up the three Pollan books mentioned above. I've been thumbing through Food Rules, and I have to say, eating that way is appealing. But is it possible in rural South Dakota to find the variety of foods we really like? I realize that the fact that we live in a rural area and can't find good, wholesome, fresh food is a paradox of sorts, but the reality is that processed foods have become staples, even in the country.

We didn't plan it this way, but tomorrow's dinner would pass all of Pollan's tests. We're having venison stew with carrots, celery, and onions. Toss in a few spices, a splash of red wine, and water, set the crockpot to low, and let it simmer for 8-10 hours. No additives or preservatives, no HFCS, no unpronouncable ingredients. I think we can be happy about this meal, and if we really try, I think it can become a way of life for us.

Rabbit Food

We're raising our wedding diet plan to a whole new level this week. Nothing but salads for dinner. But in order to make it tolerable, there were rules.

Rule Number One: Never eat the same salad twice.

That meant salmon caesar salad on Tuesday; spicy chicken and spinach on Wednesday; chickpeas with romaine, spinach, and chopped peppers with a homemade vinaigrette on Thursday (ok, technically we're having split pea soup, too, but it's still all green!).

Rule Number Two: Ok, so there was really only one rule, but we figured out that having a more filling breakfast was critical for success. That's oatmeal with walnuts and dried cranberries, a hard-boiled egg, and a banana. Sounds like a lot, but it definitely makes a difference in my energy level throughout the day.

We'll do some game cooking this weekend after we get back from Rapid City.

Catchin' Up

Katey liked this meal. Steaks, marinated cumin and ancho chili powder; guacamole, prepared in the Magic Bullet; refried beans and cheddar cheese. I know, it isn't wild game, but it was pretty good anyway.

Speaking of game, we did an inventory of the deep freeze, and I figure we've got enough in there to get us through until March. After that, well, I'm not sure. We'd like to at least eat local meat. We can get grass-fed buffalo from Sinte Gleska University, and we can buy beef from the locker down in Valentine. I'd like to go ice fishing soon and supplement our diet with some fresh fish, but sadly I don't have the gear for that. If anyone's going, feel free to invite me.

Some Scrumptious Selections

So I was told to write a blog entry. I'm compiling some photos of some delicious meals we've made in the last week.

Can you really take this guy seriously?


So we both cooked last week on this one:




I made some green bean casserole.
-Fresh mushrooms
-Canned (unfortunately) green beans
-Cream of mushroom soup
-Croutons

Dave used the electric skillet for the venison chops. We didn't have any bourbon on hand for the sauce so we used some Crown whiskey - classy I know. It comes in a purple velvet bag!

Tonight we worked together again. Of course I was in charge of the simple things: salad and sauteing peppers and onions. Dave took on venison burgers filled with cheddar cheese sans buns.

In the end, I'm convinced that I'll stick to easy stuff :)

Bourbon Venison Chops

I really look forward to trying out new recipes for game, and Katey's parents got us an electric skillet for Christmas, which I love using. Thursday evening's meal allowed us to use both. I've never made venison chops before, but the recipe I found in the A Taste of Something Wild cook book looked pretty good, and we happened to have all of the ingredients on hand. Katey made a green bean hot dish to go with the venison, and we threw together a spinach salad with dried cranberries and walnuts. The sauce for the venison was really rich, but when paired with the casserole, it was great. We made enough for the next day's lunch.

Here's how we did it:

Brown 4 venison chops in a little oil (350 degrees in the skillet). Add a chopped onion and a cup (or more) of sliced mushrooms when you turn the chops. Reduce the heat and add a cup of water, beef bouillon, 1/4 cup of bourbon, and salt and pepper. Let it simmer for 20 minutes.

Remove the meat to a plate, and then stir a 1/2 cup of sour cream into the sauce and simmer for 5 minutes. Spoon the sauce over the chops, and dig in.

The Dogs

Clementine

Zero, Queen of the Mountain

Katey and Al

These are our three babies. Our lives pretty much center around them. And we wouldn't have it any other way.

Black and White Pheasant Chili

We had two pheasants available for consumption this week. We've been wanting to eat more beans lately, so chili seemed like a good choice.

I boned out the two birds and cut up the meat into roughly 1" chunks. I chopped an onion and a rib of celery. I sauteed the veggies for a few minutes with garlic powder, salt, and a few pepper flakes. Tossed in the birds and added some chili powder and a little more salt and browned it up. Then, in went a can of diced tomatoes with green chiles.

Now, we had to decide what we were going to do for beans. Some chili purists assert that beans don't belong in chili, but we like 'em for the fiber and the flavor. Katey likes black beans, but I was thinking more along the lines of navy beans, based on some chicken chilis I've had in the past. The compromise was to add a can of each to the pot, along with a little more seasoning.

End result? Katey thought it looked "wierd." But it ended up tasting pretty good. I was happy with it.

A quick note about the dogs: They clearly miss Mom and Dad being at home. Al completely spazzed out on us when we got home today, and the other dogs were pretty excited, too.

Venison Meatballs and Tomato Sauce

Last night, we had venison meatballs for dinner, simmered in tomato sauce. As part of our wedding diet plan, we're limiting our refined carbohydrate intake, so that means no pasta (or at least not very often).

The venison came from my first deer, shot within the first half hour of deer hunting season in November of 2009. We had quite a bit of ground meat from the deer, so we haven't had to buy any ground beef in quite some time. We've actually found that beef tastes a little weird now that we've been eating so much venison.

Anyway, we made the meatballs with venison, onion powder, garlic powder, and some "Miracle Blend" (a spice mixture from Northern Michigan). These were browned on all sides with a little olive oil.

While the meatballs were browning, I started the sauce. While I prefer to use fresh tomatoes, it just isn't the season for that. Usually, I would use canned whole tomatoes and seed them myself, but my mom sent a few cans of ground tomatoes home with us after Christmas. She said they were sweeter than she liked, but since I wanted to have dinner ready when Katey got home from town, I figured that would work in my favor. I only planned to simmer the sauce for about 30-45 minutes. So, I used two cans of the ground tomatoes, and one small can of diced Italian-style tomatoes, and seasoned it with onion powder, garlic powder, two bay leaves, a dash of pepper flakes, and basil.

Once the sauce was simmering, I dropped the browned meatballs into the sauce to finish cooking. We topped the meatballs with a little shredded mozzarella and some grated pecorino romano cheese, and served it alongside a spinach salad with dried cranberries and walnuts, dressed with homemade balsamic vinaigrette.

It was a decent meal. I think Katey missed the pasta a little more than I did, but it wasn't too bad. We both agreed that the meatballs might have benefited from the addition of some Italian sausage mixed into the venison.

We have some sauce left over, but no more meatballs. We might saute' some chicken and top it with the sauce at some point next week.

"They're going to have THREE DOGS!"

When we got engaged this summer, our lives changed pretty dramatically. We had to figure out how to merge our two families. This blog is the story of that process.

When Katey moved out to Rosebud in 2006, she adopted Al, our little American Eskimo Dog. As an "only dog," he was the king of the house. "Big Boy" loves other dogs, but isn't so crazy about new people. Once you win him over, though, he'll love you forever. He's a little snippy, and maybe a little spoiled (it's not his fault; he's tiny).

Dave adopted Zero, an American Bulldog, 5 years ago. She's our athlete. She's pushy, and likes to get her way. Dave thinks she's an excellent judge of character--she's only growled at a few people, and they're usually pretty shady characters. Katey calls her "Big Booty Z."

Clem, a purebred Rez dog, wandered into Dave's classroom in March of 2009, and quickly cemented her place in our hearts. She's content to lay on the couch all day long, and will contort herself into any position, as long as you pet her. She often has a vacant look in her eyes, which has earned her the nickname, "Special Chicken."

Clem and Zero sorted out their differences awhile ago, but Al and Zero are still working on it. They've had a few scraps, but right now, they're laying together on the floor sleeping.

In addition to teaching three dogs of varying dispositions how to get along, we started taking advantage of Dave's hunting hobby. We rarely buy meat anymore; instead we get by on pheasant, grouse, and venison. It's nice to know not only where our food comes from, but we also know pretty much how it lived.

Since we're getting married this summer, we thought it would be fun to document the merging of our lives, and also to catalog our culinary adventures cooking and eating wild game. Expect to see lots of pictures and stories involving our dogs, as well as recipes we've tried. Sometimes we'll post individually, sometimes together. Feel free to comment, offer advice, or share ideas for the kitchen.