lauradi7dw

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I have a compost bin in the back yard. Often I shovel a path to it when it snows, but I decided against that when faced with two feet of snow. In the meantime, I've had compost piling up in a bucket in the fridge. I decided it was time to stomp through the snow in my big boots. Then serious (but productive) mission creep occurred. I decided to generate some more compost before taking it all out. Last apple from November? Chopped, core into the bucket. Last squash? Roasted and eaten. Last daikon? Quick pickled. Squishy sweet potatoes? into the bucket. Art object that was lettuce but is now desiccated to paper texture by being in a mesh bag in the back of the fridge?

Also into the bucket.

I was going to claim that I have finally used up last year's stored harvest, but then I looked at the photo from November and realized I still have a few of the onions.
https://lauradi7dw.dreamwidth.org/1006683.html

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

ysabetwordsmith

It's awesome to have your harvest last so long.

From:

lauradi7dw

It's all from the local farmer's market. I try to stock up some, so that I can keep eating locally for as long as possible, but it really is clear that it would require a radical lifestyle change to depend on local. Aside from quick pickling occasionally, I don't have any preserving skills. I have made jelly maybe twice in my life. I used up the last of the cabbage earlier this week and white potatoes a couple of weeks ago. Many vegetables and fruits get mushy or rot within a relatively short time. How would I manage, with the only produce being soft apples and cabbage and potatoes and onions for half the year? Like lots of people in lots of places for millennia, I guess. The outdoor growing season here is what, five months at best?
I eat a banana and a clementine almost every day, things that may never grow here. (I say may because who knows about the climate of the future). I'm glad I can walk ten minutes to the supermarket and buy things that grow somewhere else or don't grow at all (ie are made for me by people in factories).

Probably a longer weirder answer than you would have expected. I think about food a lot but I don't do much about it.

From:

ysabetwordsmith

>>It's all from the local farmer's market.<<

That's awesome.

Around here, in recent years there have emerged afternoon and evening farmer's markets that we can visit. \o/

>> I try to stock up some, so that I can keep eating locally for as long as possible, but it really is clear that it would require a radical lifestyle change to depend on local. <<

Some is better than none.

>>Aside from quick pickling occasionally, I don't have any preserving skills.<<

I usually freeze things.

>> I have made jelly maybe twice in my life.<<

I haven't made jelly or anything else canned since I was a wee little hippie. However, I have toyed with the idea of making fridge jam using chia seeds, which we like.

>>Many vegetables and fruits get mushy or rot within a relatively short time. How would I manage, with the only produce being soft apples and cabbage and potatoes and onions for half the year?<<

Then they're probably not keeper varieties. Those are different varieties than say dessert apples. There are apples that are no good right off the tree, they need to be stored a while. Root vegetables have keeper varieties too. All the winter squashes are keepers, although the length varies; the summer squashes are only for fresh eating or preserving. And some things have different storage methods, like how root vegetables tend to store well in cool damp sand in a dark basket or tub.

>> I eat a banana and a clementine almost every day, things that may never grow here. <<

Me too. My part of central Illinois was Zone 5b when I was little, went to 6a around 30 years ago (which was long before even the Arbor Day Foundation admitted it, let alone the government), and is now probably 6b. :/ There are hardy bananas that grow in the area now. Bizarre.

>> Probably a longer weirder answer than you would have expected. I think about food a lot but I don't do much about it. <<

Totally fine. I like thinking and talking about food. I like experimenting with what I can grow, cook, and save. I like exploring farmer's markets. It's all good.

From:

lauradi7dw

I do some in my regular freezer, mostly berries. My grandmother had a chest freezer in her garage. When she died, one of the clearing out tasks was to empty it. There were vegetables in there that she had grown herself, which meant they were at least ten years old or maybe older. Out of sight, out of mind, I guess.

From:

ysabetwordsmith

A chest freezer or other storage freezer does make it easy to lose things. We defrost our chest freezer every other year or so, whenever the weather gets cold enough that we can stash food in the car while the freezer defrosts. This gives us a chance to toss things that are too old.