G Freden

Unless I'm making a "spiced" stew like curry or chili, I really like adding a sheet of kombu (dried kelp) to my stew, whether beef, chicken, whatever.  The kombu in the stew gets taken out just before serving, julienned, and put back in--unorthodox I know, but I like to eat it as well as season with it.  

Jay Angler wrote:Have you considered giving smaller people smaller plates?

This is good.  If they have a small portion and are still hungry they can have seconds, rather than their first portion being wasted.  I'm inclined to think the fridge door being open is a small thing, but the A/C and heating is definitely not.  Maybe make some consequences for wasting it (Mean Dad: "If I find the windows open again with the A/C on, I'm disconnecting it for the rest of the day/week/forever!").  I guess I'm lucky that the rest of my family is on board with me about energy wasting (my teenage son even tells me off if I leave the light on for 60 seconds to go pee).

Another low-waste suggestion in general:  get everything secondhand, and pass it on when it's done with.  My kids almost exclusively wear, read, and play with secondhand things;  my husband and I do too.  Exception:  undies, socks and the occasional Lego set.  We donate outgrown toys and clothes--even our local nursery will take outgrown undies and socks up to a certain age.  Though sometimes we are the end of the line for clothes, being too worn out to donate;  but we take pride it knowing they went through their full potential if we do throw them out.

I took the train from Portland to Pittsburgh once, very scenic till we got to Denver, then it was all just flat...Also changed train from a "long haul" to a commuter at Chicago which was not as comfortable/fun from there to Pittsburgh.  More like the Greyhound (which I have also done cross country trips on, but hope never to again!).  I rode the Amtrak a few times in my 20s when I was backpacking around the US (20 years ago) and enjoyed it;  I would have ridden it more if I could have afforded it.

Here in Britain I much prefer the train to driving where possible.  There's a station in the next village over to me, a bike or bus ride (or an hour walk) away which travels to two major cities and another large town, trains running once an hour.  When we want to go to either of the cities, we definitely take the train.  I don't have to fight traffic, I don't have to find (and pay for) parking.  The large town is worth visiting too, but cheaper to ride on the bus and the bus station is in the town center, where the train station oddly isn't.  Plus I have a little girl for whom a bus ride is still exciting.  And at heart, I still find them both a bit exciting too :)

In my opinion (feel free to ignore), focusing on the method rather than lots of recipes would be more helpful.  However, if you have sourdough recipes for different baked goods like cookies, cakes, muffins, etc--the kind of baked goods people wouldn't normally associate with sourdough--I think these would be good with individual recipes.

Maybe a good detailed section on how to make a starter, preferably with more than one method:  aka, here's a really simple/foolproof/cheat's way to get started, here's how they do it in these cultures, here's a good method if you're wheat-free, etc.  

Also I like your idea of how to use up sourdough discard;  I don't like the word discard though, it's such a waste!  How to use up extra starter, how not to have any more than you need in the first place too.  This I think would be very helpful.

The cookbooks that I really enjoy are a bit chatty;  they are also older cookbooks--I don't know if some newer ones still employ this style as I only really buy secondhand these days.  I do have some newer ones (still secondhand) that I refer to for specific recipes (mainly "ethnic" cookbooks) but there's a couple I will never part with because they are so much fun to read!  Examples of the kind of chat I mean are menu suggestions (for example, an eclectic list of sandwiches, or what to pack for a picnic on the beach), anecdotes or little bits of history.  I find it interesting and engaging to have this kind of extra content sprinkled throughout the book, though not interfering with the recipe layout.  It might be distracting in an ebook though;  I've only read your writing here on permies, not your books so maybe you have a different writing style (and go with your own style of course!).

I'm not particularly drawn to photos in cookbooks, but that's just me.  Unless illustrating something very specific, I find them distracting;  like the author/publisher needed to fill some pages to make the book worth printing.  Other people may not agree with this.

I think you've got a lot covered and it sounds like a great project.

I prefer them before they start crowing, or just as they begin;  in my experience, they get tougher and stringier--not meatier--after this point.  Usually between 8-12 weeks, depending on breed.  We had some Australorps that we got tired of waiting for them to crow and killed them at about 6 months;  they were still lovely and tender.  

We haven't had any meat birds/cockerels for several years now but we very rarely buy supermarket chicken as it just doesn't compare with home raised.

Nancy Reading wrote:my writing now though is sometimes illegible to the point that even I can't read it if I don't remember what I wrote!

This is it, what I dislike about cursive and learning handwriting (my four year old is currently learning handwriting at school, her first letters with the little tails ready to join up).  Rhetorical question (not directed at Nancy or anyone else specifically): why waste the effort of writing something at all, if it cannot be read?  Both my husband and son admit they have nearly indecipherable handwriting, and while it is sometimes very entertaining trying to decipher what one of them has written on the calendar or the shopping list;  really, I don't see the point in writing it down in the first place.  Either write legibly or don't bother, as I say in my head when I'm at the grocery store with a paper full of "chuzcy," "isnttenr,"* etc.

*Taken from an actual list written by my husband

If it helps, I started mine (going strong for years and years now, though it does hibernate in the freezer from time to time) by mixing flour, water and commercial yeast:  active dry yeast.  

I just treated it like a starter from then on, and fed it a little every day;  it didn't get very sour for a week or two I guess, but as I fed it and used it it got more sour.  

Several times I've even rescued it from going moldy when I've forgotten to feed it:  even when it was going a bad color with an off smell.  I just feed it a good amount for a few days with a good stir;  the good cultures in it have always been able to get going and kill off the bad yeast and make it the right color and smell again, usually by the next day.

Like some others here, I generally only eat one or two meals a day;  I start the day with some unsweetened tea, and when I do break my fast (sometimes at 10 am, or sometimes as late as 4 pm) I like to eat protein and vegetables, preferably some/all of them fermented.  Today it was a 4pm "breakfast" (aka dinner) with parsnip/cabbage/turnip greens/carrot/pumpkin, chicken strips and fermented chow chow.  Yesterday it was closer to 11 am and I had eggs, bacon and kimchi.  

Eggs and kimchi is a match made in heaven, in my opinion.  Bacon is simply gilding the lily.

Judith Browning wrote:Rachel,
I wrote in cursive and they could not read it

I find it very hard to read cursive too, despite having learned it back in school (I'm 44 now).  Both my husband and son can only write in cursive, or joined-up writing as they call it here and I really can't read either of their handwriting.  What's worse, they don't know how to write in block script like me, except capital letters:  they were never taught it at school here in the UK.  I learned handwriting in the US, both ways (block script first);  and because I find it so hard to read, I abandoned cursive as soon as it was no longer required at school.

So I guess what I'm saying is, cursive is all well and good, but teach/learn block script too!

r ranson wrote:
So I take it and use it to create the kind of thing I want to see more of on the internet.

If I did something/made something cool (which doesn't happen often, definitely no influencer here), I'd rather post it on permies than on my blog;  I only have a tiny following on my blog but there are potentially millions of people here.  Not to brag--mostly--but to be the change I want to see.