Categories
Crops & Gardening Recipes

Asparagus-mushroom Lasagna

Ingredients

Vegetable Mixture

  • 2 T. butter
  • 2 large leeks, white part only, thinly sliced (about 2 cups)
  • 1 pound thick asparagus spears, trimmed, cut diagonally into 1-inch pieces
  • 1 cup coarsely chopped shiitake mushrooms
  • 1 tsp. chopped fresh thyme

Sauce

 

  • 4 cups chicken stock or vegetable broth
  • 1½ cups heavy cream
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 2 T. all-purpose flour

Lasagna

  • nonstick vegetable oil spray
    sauce
  • 1 9-ounce package no-cook lasagna noodles
  • vegetable mixture
  • 1½  cups finely grated Parmesan cheese

Preparation

Vegetable Mixture
Melt 1 tablespoon butter in large, heavy skillet over medium heat. Add leeks and cook until translucent, stirring often. Transfer to medium bowl and set aside.

Melt remaining 1 tablespoon butter in same pan and add asparagus. Cook about 2 minutes, then add mushrooms and thyme, and cook about 2 more minutes, stirring often, until asparagus is crisp to tender. Add to bowl with leeks and toss to mix.

Sauce
Using the same skillet, add broth, cream and bay leaf, and bring to a gentle boil over medium-high heat; boil until slightly thickened. Spoon 1/2 cup mixture into small bowl and whisk in flour, mixing well. Slowly add back to the skillet, whisking as you go. Continue boiling gently until sauce thickens, about 1 minute. Remove from heat. Discard bay leaf. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Lasagna
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Coat a 9- by 13-inch baking dish with nonstick spray. Cover the bottom of the dish with a thin layer of sauce. Add a layer of noodles, a layer of asparagus-mushroom mixture (about one-third of it) and a layer of sauce. Top with 1/2 cup cheese. Repeat layers twice more.

Cover dish tightly with foil. Bake until noodles are tender, about 45 minutes. Then uncover and bake until sauce is bubbling and cheese begins to brown, 5 to 6 more minutes. Let stand at room temperature at least 5 minutes before serving.

Serves 6.

Categories
Recipes

Basic Mayonnaise

Mayonnaise

Ingredients

  • 1 tsp. salt
  • 1/2 tsp. dry mustard
  • 1/4 tsp. paprika
  • dash cayenne pepper
  • 2 egg yolks (room temperature), lightly beaten
  • 2 T. white wine vinegar
  • 2 cups salad oil (canola, corn or safflower)
  • 2 T. freshly squeezed lemon juice
  • 1/2 T. hot water

Preparation
Combine dry ingredients; blend in egg yolks thoroughly. Add vinegar, and mix well. Drizzle in salad oil, beating constantly with an electric mixer until 1/4 cup has been added. Alternate the last 1/2 cup of oil with lemon juice. Beat in 1/2 tablespoon of hot water to cut the oily appearance. Store in the refrigerator; use within two weeks.

Vary this recipe by folding three to four cloves of finely chopped garlic and 2 to 3 tablespoons of chopped fresh parsley into the finished mixture. Alternatively, use 2 to 3 tablespoons chopped fresh garlic scapes instead of garlic cloves.

Makes 2 cups.

Note: The USDA advises caution in consuming raw eggs, due to the slight risk of salmonella or other food-borne illnesses. To reduce this risk, be sure to use fresh, clean eggs.

Categories
Animals

Growing Buckeye Chicks

Spraddle-legged chick
Photo by Sue Weaver
Sometimes, you can fix a spraddle-legged chick with a Band-Aid.

Our baby Buckeyes are doing fine and growing up fast! They all have feathered wings, and some have tiny tail feathers, too. Buckeyes are big, active chicks, so ours are already trying to hop out of the brooder. We’ll have to put the screened cover on it soon or we’ll have chicks on the living room floor.

Our chicks got new bedding this week. Now, their brooder floor is covered with shavings. At first, Mom covers the floor of their brooder with thick, low-nap towels. That keeps newly hatched chicks from slipping on a slick surface like newspaper or the bottom of the brooder itself, but it also provides an open surface so they can find food. Chicks that slip when they’re little can get spraddle leg—when their legs shoot out to the sides and they can’t get up. If a chick slips and gets spraddle-legged, you can sometimes help it by hobbling its legs with a Band-Aid, like the chick pictured from another batch of chicks. After a few days, the legs get stronger and you can take off the Band-Aid. Voila: a fixed chick!

Chick feeder
Photo by Sue Weaver
The chicks now eat out of a feeder instead of off the floor.

The first two days we had the Buckeyes, Mom and Dad fed the chicks by sprinkling chick starter directly on the floor. It’s messy and you have to change the towels a lot, but it teaches chicks to peck on the ground for food. After that, you can use an inch or two of absorbent bedding, like rice hulls, ground corncobs or shavings, on the floor. But don’t use cedar shavings! They give off fumes that are toxic to chicks. Sawdust is a bad thing, too, because chicks peck it up and it clogs their digestive tracts.

Mom likes the kind of pine shavings bagged for little beasts like gerbils, but she had to settle for horse bedding this time. The shavings big and they kept plugging the chicks’ water fount, so she raised it with a paperback book she’s already read twice. It’s a mystery by a lady named Sue Grafton, and her picture is on the back of the book. Uzzi and I shook our heads when we saw what the chicks are doing on poor Ms. Grafton’s face.

Buckeye chicks
Photo by Sue Weaver
Our Buckeye chicks are getting bigger every day.

When Mom added the shavings, she removed the pebbles from the chicks’ drinking fount (by then they were smart enough not to drown), and they graduated to a feeder instead of the floor. She changes their water and washes their fount several times a day because even with Ms. Grafton’s help, some shavings still get in the base. (And the chicks sometimes poop in their water, too.) Shavings are absorbent, so she only has to change their bedding and wipe out their brooder every few days. When she does, she puts the chicks in a separate box and works quickly, so they aren’t away from their heat lamp very long.

Chicks are fun! And they sure grow up faster than us goats. Stick around. I’ll tell you more about them in a few weeks. 

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Categories
Urban Farming

Foiled Again

Chicken eggs

Photo by Audrey Pavia

My hens like to lay their eggs where I can’t reach them.

Sometimes I feel like there is a conspiracy going on in my barnyard. At the risk of sounding paranoid, I occasionally sense that my critters get together behind my back and try to figure out ways to make my chores more difficult.

Take my chickens. They have a 1/2 acre to poop wherever they want, but they do most of it on the walkway between my patio and the horse area. If I’m carrying hay or am otherwise distracted, I step in it. If it’s fresh, my foot slides out from under me and I almost go down. After cursing to myself, I have to stop what I’m doing to hose down the walkway.

Another favorite pastime of my hens is to lay their eggs outside of the nest box at the back of the coop where I can’t reach them. After contorting myself into all kinds of positions and failing miserably to get my hands on the eggs, I end up having to get a bamboo rake and carefully roll them toward me where I can reach them. 

While the chickens are good at making my life difficult, no one can top Rio. He has turned making my chores harder than they have to be into an art.

His favorite way to drive me crazy is to poop in his water trough. It’s no accident that at least once a week, I find a shovel full of floaters bobbing in his water. I know it’s not an accident because the other days of the week, I find piles of poop right next to his water trough, evidence that he tried and missed.

When I let him out of his stall to wander around the back area while I’m cleaning it, Rio is at his finest. The other day, he went on a destruction spree that had me pulling my hair out. 

First, he went to the garden hose I use to fill up the water troughs. He grabbed the nozzle in his mouth and began to chomp on it. “Rio!” I screeched at him from his stall, a load of manure on my rake. He turned and looked at me and continued to chomp. It wasn’t until I dropped the rake and started to walk toward him that he dropped it and took off running. 

His next mission was to tip over the manure bin I was in the process of filling. No matter how many times I yelled at him to stop, he would just eyeball me as he held onto the edge and pulled back on the bin. Again, I had to drop my manure rake and go after him to get him to stop.

I finally decided he needed to go back to his stall when I let Red out to wander, and Rio made a beeline for him. He tried to climb onto Red’s back, which prompted Red to fire off a kick at him. That’s when I knew it was time for Mr. Obnoxious to go back into solitary confinement.

With all these shenanigans going on, I’m never bored while doing my chores. I guess that’s a good thing.

Read more of City Stock »

Categories
News

Emission Standards Toughen for Diesels

Subcompact tractor
Courtesy Massey Ferguson
Diesel engines under 25 horsepower, like the one in Massey Ferguson’s GC2400 subcompact tractor, already meet Tier 4 emission standards. All engines will have to follow the standeard by 2014.

If you like clean air, you have to like Tiers 1, 2, 3 and now 4 emissions standards. Since the 1990 Clean Air Act was passed, the Environmental Protection Agency and the diesel-engine industry have been progressively clearing the air and exhaust pipes of on-road and off-road diesel engines. With each step in the process, engines have burned cleaner with fewer and fewer emissions. Now with Tier 4, off-road diesel engines are poised to take a huge leap forward.

Tier 4 standards were introduced as part of the Clean Air Nonroad Diesel Rule signed by President Bush in 2004. This same rule required the removal of sulfur from diesel fuel by 2010. Full implementation of the rule was projected to prevent 12,000 premature deaths, 15,000 heart attacks and 6,000 children’s asthma-related emergency room visits. Implementation has varied in stringency by engine size and by timing within engine-size groups. Interim standards require current particulate matter (PM) levels be reduced by more than 90 percent and nitrogen oxides (NOx) levels by 50 percent. Under full Tier 4 compliance, NOx levels will ultimately reach the 90-percent reduction level. 

Off-road diesel engines 25 horsepower and under, such as Massey Ferguson’s GC2400 or Kubota BX 2360 subcompact tractors, already meet Tier 4 standards. Starting with the 2012 model year, all intermediate engines from 26 horsepower to 175 horsepower will have to meet interim Tier 4 standards, progressing to full compliance by 2014. Engines 175 horsepower and more being sold in 2011 meet interim Tier 4 standards, with full compliance required by model year 2014.

These improvements have been made possible through new technologies and a tremendous amount of engine fine tuning, including getting fuel and air exactly where and when they are needed, says Mike Osenga, publisher of Diesel Progress, the leading diesel-industry publication.

“The manufacturers have changed every aspect of the diesel engine to reach Tier 4 interim standards,” Osenga explains. “They are manufacturing to the highest possible tolerances. Basically, everything about the engine is more precise.”

While most changes to engines may individually reduce emissions by as little as half a percent,  says Osenga, others will have more of an impact. These include enhanced filtering of particulates, cooled exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) and selective catalytic reduction (SCR) technologies to reduce NOx. Cooled EGR re-circulates exhaust gasses back through the combustion chamber, while SCR requires the addition of a liquid-urea-based, diesel exhaust fluid (DEF) in the catalytic converter-equipped exhaust system, which results in further reduced emissions.

Both EGR and SCR effectively reduce total emissions, Osenga explains and every effort is being made to make compliance as operator-transparent as possible. The big difference for the operator is the need for on-farm DEF storage for periodic refill on SCR-equipped tractors.

He reports that most tractor brands are utilizing cooled EGR to meet interim Tier 4 standards. Sisu engines used in AGCO brands, such as Massey Ferguson, utilize SCR technology in engines more than 100 horsepower and cooled EGR in 75- to 100-horsepower tractors. John Deere will announce interim Tier 4 engine solutions as the new tractors are introduced. They will not be using a second fluid for any of these solutions. Case New Holland is using both EGR and SCR technologies, depending on engine design.

Expectations are that most brands will have to go to SCR to achieve the tougher final Tier 4 compliance on larger engines. If that is the case on engines more than 75 horsepower (standards are less stringent for those under 75 horsepower), it could have a significant impact on pricing.

“Smaller engines have the same emissions-control challenge, but the cost has to be spread over a smaller engine cost,” Osenga points out. “Pricing for smaller tractors will likely go through the roof.”

Categories
Urban Farming

Blue Flowers

Iris

Photo by Rick Gush

Evansia irises are blooming big time in the garden right now. These flowers with a bluish hint know no limits when it comes to expansion.

Pre-spring in the garden brings out some of my favorite blue-colored flowers. In addition to the regular irises and two kinds of bluebells (Scilla), the garden is currently loaded with volunteer borage plants (Borago officinalis) and the two big patches of evansia irises (Iris japonica).

Lots of stuff is starting to flower, but it seems that most of the blue flowers come on strong before the heat hits. We’ll have agapanthus and plumbago flowering later on, and the forget-me-nots will in the shade bloom into summer, but the blue-flower show is particularly strong right now.

Borage

Photo by Rick Gush

The cloud-like bunches of borage are gracing the garden.

The evansia irises are particularly striking. Also called crested irises, these plants originated in China but are now planted all around the world in temperate and subtropical areas. This iris grows as an attractive weed in many areas of Italy. The plants growing in constantly expanding clumps are so aggressive they smother everything in their expansion path. The non-stiff, bright-green leaves look nice growing on a slope because all the leaves hang down like a green waterfall. The stems of the irises rise above the leaves, with six or more flowers on each stem as if clouds of pale-blue mist rising from the cascade. The individual flowers are nicely exotic, with a bunch of colorful purple and yellow spots on the petals. The irises in my garden now number in the hundreds, and they are all from a few plants I took from a friend’s yard 10 years ago. I like remembering my friend every time I see how well the irises are growing here.

The evansia iris’s co-star, wild borage, is usually wild. Borage seems to be an early colonizer of any cultivated ground. This means I have the sad task every year of eliminating a lot of beautiful borage plants as I prepare the spring planting areas. The good news, though, is that borage is delicious, and we get to eat all the borage I’m forced to remove.

The season for borage is pretty long, too, and we’ll have new plants sprouting until the hot months of summer. If left alone, borage will survive well into the summer, though the tender new shoots are best for eating in the spring. We eat borage leaves and flower clusters, sometimes cooked into vegetable pies in combination with other greens, like spinach and wild beet greens, and in soups. When I’m lucky, my female Italian relatives will make a few batches of ravioli with a borage-and-cheese filling. I like to leave a lot of borage in the garden because I’ve heard that it’s a good companion plant, and I do know that tomato hornworms can get confused and lay their eggs on borage plants instead of the tomatoes.

Read more of Rick’s Favorite Crops »

Categories
Urban Farming

Green Zoo Builds Urban Solar Canopy

Cincinnati Zoo solar array

Courtesy Dave Jenike

The Cincinnati Zoo’s solar canopy, dubbed the largest urban solar array, will begin reducing the zoo’s carbon footprint beginning in April.

Taking a trip to the Cincinnati Zoo this year is going to be a lot cooler for visitors. Up to 800 cars at a time will be able to park in the shade under the Ohio facility’s new solar canopy. Scheduled for completion in April, the 1.56 megawatt system with 6,400 solar panels is called the largest publicly accessible urban solar array in the country. The best part? The zoo worked with local companies to source the solar panels.

Approximately 20 percent of the zoo’s energy needs will be met by the solar panels. According to Mark Fisher, senior director of facilities, planning and sustainability at the Cincinnati Zoo, on bright, sunny days, the zoo will be able to sell back to the grid and reduce its carbon footprint by 15 percent.

Another highlight of this project is the opportunity for educational outreach.

“This is a monster-sized array in an ultra-urban environment, and it’s publicly accessible,” Fisher says.
With more than 1 million people per year parking under the structure, the zoo has the unique opportunity to teach its visitors about the importance of reducing dependency on fossil fuels in a hands-on way.

“This part of the country has a general ignorance about solar power,” he says. This is the zoo’s opportunity to educate and motivate. “If we can do it, you can, too.”

Conservatively speaking, the solar array will save the zoo $6 million in energy over the next 16 years.
“It’s a financial grand slam for the zoo,” Fisher says.

The $11 million project wasn’t effortless, though. It took stamina and initiative by all parties involved. As a nonprofit organization, the Cincinnati Zoo wasn’t able to receive government tax credits to complete the project.

That’s where Melink Corporation stepped in. The local company is the developer, designer, owner and operator of the project. To make it work financially, Melink owns the system and will sell the energy back to the zoo at a set rate for the next seven years. After that, the zoo has the option to buy the system.

Melink is a provider of energy-efficiency and renewable-energy solutions for the commercial and institutional building industry. From compost to solar energy to the on-site windmill, the company atmosphere reflects sustainability, according to Coleen Hines, Melink marketing director. It also promotes education on energy conservation, energy efficiency and renewable energy as much as possible. Melink designed the zoo’s clean-energy solar array to inspire the community.

“The goal is to revitalize the area and encourage people to work on renewable energy,” Hines says.

“If we can motivate other facilities, and not just zoos, to take similar actions, this has the potential to move the needle,” Fisher says. “We hope to help spur projects elsewhere and let it take on a life of its own. This is our chance to open the floodgates.”

The solar panels are made in the United States, and all the people working to build the project are local to Cincinnati, helping to create local jobs. In addition, the project will fund 10 scholarships at Cincinnati State Technical and Community College in its green workforce development program. To be certified in solar installation in Ohio, you need real-life experience, Fisher says. All scholarship recipients will have that opportunity by working on the system at the zoo, Hines says.

Categories
Equipment

Put Your Framing Square to Work

Framing square
Photo by Jim Ruen
Higher-quality framing squares have more tables and finer gradiations, which make them more useful tools.

To put your framing square to work, you need to know the parts. A typical square has a face (the side with the manufacturer’s logo), a tongue (the shorter and narrower 16- by 1½ -inch arm) and a blade (the longer and wider 24- by 2-inch arm). The heel is where the two arms meet.

Before you buy your square, look at the different tables offered on different brands. The better the square, the more tables and the finer the gradations on the straight edge. I expect to make good use of the rise per foot/degree conversion table as I do future work on my garden slopes.

It may also come in handy drawing circles and ellipses as well as finding centers of circles. To make a circle, draw a line equal to the diameter. Place the heel at the halfway point of the line and rotate the arm, marking the circle outline as you go. To find the center of a circle, set the square with the outside heel on the circumference and mark where the outside edges of the arms touch the circumference. Draw a line between the two marks for the diameter, move the square to a new spot and repeat. The center is where the lines cross. Ellipses are more complicated than can be explained here. However, there are a number of excellent descriptions on the web.

If your framing square doesn’t come with instructions, consider picking up a reference book. A great reference I found at a used books store is Tools, Steel Square and Joinery by John Ball (2005, Wiley Publishing). It is part of the Carpenters and Builders Library. As is the case with any tool, the more you know and understand it, the more value it has for you.

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