!!!! SEPP to Boot: Stephen's Experience (BEL)

Just a heads up about sweet potato greens. I was taught by a Chinese friend many years ago how to use them and have done so ever since, the Chinese make use of the whole plant not just the tubers so the leaves are highly valued as a good source of plant protein.

Leaves - if using part of the vine stem use only the end part as the thicker parts are a bit tough to chew or just strip off  large amount of leaves as they steam down like spinach. Great steamed, serve with vegan soy sauce or butter and black pepper.

Lovely thrown into soups and stews as they have a slight thickening effect making them taste richer.

If you like you can also quickly pan fry on medium to high heat stirring constantly until the leaves are really crispy. Serve over rice or other meals of choice for a bit of crunchy texture.

Hope you enjoy your first cook-up.

While collecting temperature data at the Truly Passive Greenhouse, I had to take a moment to check in on the plants there. Things are looking good. We can likely harvest those daikon in a little bit. The sweet potato vines are likely just that, but I hear they're not unpalatable. We'll see in a week or two if some harvesting can be done.

My thought is that if the vines are able to continue to grow slowly all winter that is proof of the concept and provides the inhabitant a small amount of greens  all winter to use as in the above post.

BEL #708

I've returned from my fetch quest...! Massive thanks to Bill Kearns for his gift of a kick wheel for throwing pottery (kick...throw...?). He and his daughter Dawn helped load it into the back of Roy, our daily hauler pickup truck, and I then spent the next two days driving through the snow and sleet back to Basecamp. I saw the Pacific Ocean with my own eyes for the first time ever on that trip. Good times.

This may not look like much right now (it's packed sideways on a pallet, and I've removed the seat and some additional hardware), but I'm looking forward to finding a place to set it up and then make some bowls and mugs and stuff with clay harvested over at the Lab. This will be very cool.



Speaking of precipitation, I've learned that the best time to dig drainage ditches is when it's actually raining. So today I did a little triage and then some digging behind the Classroom today.



Also tried out the RMH at the Red Cabin today, to troubleshoot some problems. It just doesn't fire up like I think it ought to. One of the many things I attempted today was to directly heat the exhaust in an effort to encourage the thermal siphon to start sucking CO2 and water vapor out the exhaust.



When that had limited success, I started looking elsewhere for potential issues. Seems like there's a leak somewhere between the barrel and the mass. Maybe this could be called the manifold? It's the short section of stovepipe between the barrel assembly and the beginning of the main portion of the exhaust pipe, which is run through the mass at the foot of the bed. I think I'll plug this up with cob and/or heat tape tomorrow.



That's all for now. Thanks for reading, and enjoy your day...!

The summer I worked as a landscape labourer (1995), on a job for an assisted living residence, we had a downpour and that was a great time to figure out where we may not have had the levels right before laying sod, so I agree when precipitation is coming down is a good time to examine / remediate drainage issues.

No snow here yet, but there was a storm that dumped quite a bit just to the west of us.  Winter is coming.

Stephen B. Thomas wrote:This may not look like much right now (it's packed sideways on a pallet, and I've removed the seat and some additional hardware), but I'm looking forward to finding a place to set it up and then make some bowls and mugs and stuff with clay harvested over at the Lab. This will be very cool.

I am totally looking forward to your Ghost-style homage to Demi Moore with this thing...