Ulla Bisgaard

gardener
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since Jul 11, 2022
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Biography
People call me a jack of all trades, but master of non. I know a little and dabble a little in many things, but there are very few things I am an expert in,
I believe in a holistic approach to life and what surrounds us. I believe in finding happiness in small things, or those that looks small but still have a big impact of your life, I live with my husband on a 1/2 acre homestead, where we practice permaculture. We have a 3300 square foot food forest garden, and a 20 raised bed garden, where we grow about 2200 pounds of fruit, vegetables, berries, herbs, spices and grains. We keep chickens, ducks and rabbits for livestock. Both the rabbits and chickens was on the endangered livestock list, when we started out. Now they are all off that list. While we can’t produce everything we eat, we try to produce as much as we can,
I love and engage in reading, gardening, herbalism, food preservation, sewing and alchemy.
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Grow zone 10b. Southern California,close to the Mexican border
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Recent posts by Ulla Bisgaard

Anne Miller wrote:Did the hydrogen peroxide work?

Since it is fat related, I would try rubbing with bar soap and working that into fabric with fingers.

If the garment has been wash there might not be anything that will work except sewing an patch over the stain.  May6be something like the border around the neck.


It didn’t, but I decided to use it for gardening. I don’t need nice clean clothes doing that, and it’s light and comfortable to work in.
1 day ago

Carla Burke wrote:How would you feel about turmeric dying the whole thing? It's a lovely shade of yellow, and dyes well on almost anything. Unfortunately, it tends to be permanent, even when you don't want it to be, and even without a mordant.


It’s a good suggestion, but the stain also contains fat from the sauce. I have considered dying the whole thing back though.
2 days ago

Joylynn Hardesty wrote:I've gotten difficult stains out with hydrogen peroxide. Let it sit till it stops bubbling, then work some more. I have not tried it on rayon though.try a test patch first.


Thank you, I will try that.
2 days ago

Nancy Reading wrote:From wikipedia:

Rayon, also called viscose, is a semi-synthetic fiber made from natural sources of regenerated cellulose, such as wood and related agricultural products. It has the same molecular structure as cellulose



It sounds like it is likely to stain easily... Most of the online advice seems to be to repeat the spot treatment and laundry again (eg wikilaundry). What was the food stuff involved?



A meatball covered in a homemade curry sauce containing turmeric, dropped when I was carrying a plate and my hand gave out (do to my neuropathy).
2 days ago
This shirt has been washed and I spot cleaned it first, but I can’t get the stain off. My hands shake sometimes, so I dropped my food. I haven’t worn it very much and I love this one. So, does anyone have any idea of what to do? The material is rayon.
2 days ago
It depends on so many things. Your climate, you micro climates, age of and how many people you are growing food for, if food production is  important to you.
I live in a warm climate, where I can grow food all year round. Because of that one of my criteria, is that all of my fruits and berries. Can’t be ready at the same time, because it creates bottlenecks in food preservation. Mine are paced out over the whole year. This means that we have fresh fruits and vegetables year round. The advantage of that, is also that your family will eat more fresh. Fresh makes for a healthier diet, and you don’t end up burned out, because you have preserved food until 4am.
I also look at growing conditions and how large and fast, their canopy develops. Some trees also have special needs, so that you have to start developing the ecosystem before you plant them. So you have to add these things into your design.
I am growing raspberries in a microclimate, in the corner of my food forest garden. I grow gooseberries and currants underneath a large pecan tree we have. That tree creates one of the largest micro climate zones in the garden. The soils and air temperature are 17F degrees lower, underneath that tree, which creates conditions where I can grow things we normally would not be able to.
The last thing I recommend is, that if you are growing fruit, you have your family taste it, before you buy the trees producing it. You don’t want to end up with a tree, that no one likes.
I have been playing around this “diagram”. It’s not completely ready yet, but it might give you something to help you decide.
3 weeks ago

Kara Ann wrote:Ditto on David's comment that this thread of post reads so well!

THANK YOU Ulla for sharing this method for preserving egg yolks - this is great to have and I have saved it so I can try it.
When you are using these salted egg yolks (sliced or grated), are you adding them as a final garnish to items being served (no further cooking)? Or also as an ingredient into food that is going to be cooked?



Since the salt kills off any bacteria, you can use it as you would cheese. Just to be on the save side, make sure to keep it dry.
I grind most of mine up. To use, I will add it to a white sauce for lasagna, or sprinkle it on top of my pasta or scrambled eggs. So you can both cook with it, or use it as is. You can also change the flavors, by mixing the salt with herbs, spices or things like mirin. It’s an ingredient often used in Asian cooking,
3 weeks ago

Kara Ann wrote:

I had completely forgotten about posting in this thread. When I reread the post I made, it made me laugh, because I am still preserving eggs.



Ulla - what you are doing is really impressive!!! As a newbie who has never heard of salted egg yolks before, would you share what you do to preserve them, and also the ways that you use them? They looked like little gems in the picture you posted earlier!



Salt cured eggs, is my goto substitute for Parmesan cheese, or cheese in general. I am allergic to dairy, and salt cured eggs are way cheaper, than buying dairy free cheese.
Here is how you make them:
Fill a container half way up, with fine salt. Use the bottom of an egg to make little indent in the salt.
Next you separate the eggs to remove the egg white. Then gently place the egg yolk in one of the indents you made. Continue doing this egg by egg, until the container is full. If an egg yolk breaks, either before or after you place it in the salt, it has to be tossed. If it’s right after placing the egg in the salt, remove all of the broken yolk with a spoon. Then add a bit of extra salt and create a new indent.
Once you container is full, with 1 and only 1 layer of egg yolks, you top up the container with salt, until the yolks are fully covered. Next they need to spend 5 to 12 days covered in the fridge to cure. The curing time, depends on how firm the egg is, and how salty you like your eggs, I leave mine for a week.
Once they are ready, take the yolk out, and either brush off the salt, or gently rinse and towel dry them. Now they can be hung on a string, by poking a needle with the string, through the egg yolk. Hand them in a cool space to finish drying completely. You can also use ann oven on its lowest setting, a dehydrator set on its lowest setting or a freeze dryer to finish drying any leftover moisture on the contact surface of the egg yolk.
Now the egg yolks are fully cured and ready to use. They can be sliced, or shredded before use. To get a bit more cheese flavor, you can add a little nutritional yeast to enhance the flavor.
You can reuse the salt up until the salt starts to liquefy, from the water drawn out of the yolks. I made around 50 this year.
The picture shared, was how they looked right after I cleaned off the salt.
3 weeks ago
I had completely forgotten about posting in this thread. When I reread the post I made, it made me laugh, because I am still preserving eggs. Because the temperatures outside have gone up, I can’t use my freeze dryer very much, this time of year because it doesn’t function very well in temperatures over 80F.
Instead I am making meals, and those are also great snacks. So far I have made a lot of egg muffins, scrambled eggs, Dutch babies, Japanese rolled omelets, frittatas and quiche. I will add a screen shot of my egg preservation.
We are getting green beans with almost every meal. Sugar snap peas, carrots and cucumbers directly from the garden is also a great snack.
Egg season is also finally over. Our chickens take a break once the hot season starts, and while they usually still lay a few eggs, we mostly depend on preserved eggs until February arrives.
We won’t run out of egg though, since we get between 2400 and 3000 eggs in a year.
3 weeks ago
Here we relay a lot of homemade convenience foods. Because of my neuropathy, I never know if I will be able to cook or not, so I do a lot of prep-work on good days.
Here is a list of what I do.
- leftovers are always portioned out and frozen
- dehydrated or freeze dried soup cubes or powders makes for a fast snack that feels like a hug from home, and they are so easy to make.
- during the season I can, dehydrate and freeze dry fruits and berries
- freeze dried mixes for dips and homemade chips is something we all love
- gluten free baking mixes, makes fast and easy cookies, muffins, brownies, rolls and so much more
- homemade pudding mixes makes for a fast and easy snack
- homemade hot cocoa mix and homemade  instant lemonade are always a hit with the kids
- canned, frozen, dehydrated meals or meal ingredients helps too
- fermented vegetables also makes for a nice snack.

There are more, but these are what I remember as of now. We are also privileged in that our climate enables us to grow food year round, so often a snack is just a short walk away.
I did do one important thing, when I planned the food forest. We didn’t just pick fruit trees based on our preferences, but also on when they are ready for harvest. There are several reasons for that. I wanted us to have access to fresh fruit and or berries all year round. Right now only November and December isn’t covered, and those will be once my sapote trees starts to produce. I grow 4 types of raspberries,  8 different kinds of strawberries, 2 types of blueberries, Boisen berries and mulberries, which gives us access to berries most of the year. By doing this, more than half of what we produce gets eaten fresh, so I have a lot less food preservation work to do. It also prevent seasonal bottlenecks in food preservation, where you rush and work against the clock to get everything preserved before it goes bad.
Canned desserts like lemon curd, pie fillings and homemade candy are also stables in my pantries. Homemade granola bars and hot cereal mixes are also a stable.
In a way, our food production is centered around eating fresh and what’s in season, while minimizing the amount of work needed. I keep my root vegetables fresh by leaving them in the ground until I need them, and just adding more seeds so we don’t run out.
We did do a lot more preservation while the kids lived at home, but we don’t need that as much anymore.
I am running low on broth right now, so this weekend I am starting a large batch of that. We are also in the main egg production season, so I have pickled eggs in the fridge and egg muffins in the freezer. I freeze dry whole eggs, yolks and whites, and I salt cure egg yolks to use as a cheese substitute. Egg heavy breakfast dishes freezes very well, so those I am also making a lot of.
1 month ago