A Guide to Nutrient Deficiencies

I saw this on Facebook, but it had tiny writing, so I dropped it into Photoshop and added some larger text to it. Please note, if I am infringing on anyone's copyright, please let me know and I'll take it down asap.
Note, this will look awkward once I publish it, as it will bleed over into my avatar, but I want the pic large enough to read, so just ignore that, I did it on purpose.

Here ya go folks:

Healthy: Leaves shine with a rich dark
green color when adequately fed.

Phosphate: Shortage marks leaves with
reddish-purple, particularly on young plants.

Potash: deficiency appears as a firing or
drying along the tips and edges of lowest leaves.

Nitrogen: hunger sign is yellowing that starts at
the tip and moves along middle of leaf.

Magnesium: deficiency causes whitish strips
along the veins and often a purplish color on the
undersides of the lower leaves.

Drought: causes the corn to have a grayish-green
color and the leaves roll up nearly to the size of
a pencil.

Disease: heminthospoium blight, starts in small
spots, gradually spreads across leaf.

Chemicals: may sometimes burn tips, edges of leaves
and at other contacts. Tissue dies, becomes whitecap.

A Ramp to the Past

With one brief blog post, a friend took me back in time to my childhood today. She's a foodie, a writer, and television host, and she put up a post about ramps, an amazing leek-like vegetable that grows wild in the woods of western KY and WV and southeastern OH. As a child I often went on walks with my grandfather in the woods around the family farm.

My grandfather was, among other things, a naturalist, a botanist, and a conservationist before there even was such a word.

Some of my best childhood memories are of time spent with him. He taught me to ride at a very early age. I spent countless hours on the trails with him, and each one was a lesson. He knew every tree, every flower, every bird and animal we came across.

On some of our walks, we hunted the elusive morel mushroom. And ramps, oh just the word brings back that smell! The deep dark soil, the earthy oniony smell, the pungent taste. And today my friend gave me a source for ramp seeds and bulbs, and in doing so turned back the wheel of time and I was that child once more, tagging along behind my grandpa, holding the canvas bag as he foraged. And now I can grow them here on our own farm, and I know my grandpa would love that. Thanks Joyce, I owe you one.

Laura and her grandfather, circa the 1960s.

Avian Haiku

Wren sings full-throated

Hawk sits silent in the tree
Jay screams a warning

Short, but not very sweet

I am creating this post mostly to link to another blogger's blog post. She says it the best, I am just hitching a ride on her wonderful words, and basically linking to it so I won't lose it. 

See this great post by Sarah, The Healthy Home Economist titled:

 "The Four Steps Required to Keep Monsanto OUT of Your Garden"

Read it. Bookmark it. Pin it. Digest it. Don't lose it. Absorb what she's saying here. And when it's time to buy seeds for your own garden (and it's almost time!) use the links she provides to ensure you're buying seeds from The Good Guys. 

Too Many Eggs

This is for E & S, who have too many eggs. Normally I post these recipes in the spring, when my poultry peeps have hens who are laying like mad, and who are overwhelmed with eggs. But E knows why she might need these. So here they are. Hope you're feeling better soon.

Egg Recipes for Spring,
when the chickens are laying up a storm!

(or for other circumstances, when you find yourself with
three dozen eggs you don't know what to do with.)

These two recipes will use up a dozen eggs, whites for the angel food, yolks for the sponge cake:

Golden Sponge Cake

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Ingredients:

12 egg yolks
3 cups cake flour
2 ½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
2 cups sugar
1 tsp vanilla
½ tsp lemon extract
1 cup cold water

- Sift cake flour and sugar (separately) once before measuring.
- Sift together three times: flour, baking powder, and salt.
- In mixing bowl, beat egg yolks on No. 8 speed until very fluffy and thick.
- Gradually beat in sugar.
- Beat 2 more minutes on #8 speed (high) and scrape bowl.
- Turn to #2 speed (low) and add vanilla, lemon extract, and cold water.
- Then gradually, but quickly add sifted flour mixture while beating on #2 speed, scrape bowl. Beat only enough to blend, about 2 minutes.
- Pour batter into an ungreased 10 inch tube pan.
- Bake 1 hour or until golden brown.
- Invert cake to cool.
- Loosen sides with spatula or knife and remove from pan.


I make the sponge cake first since the yolks don't have to be room temp.

Angel Food Cake

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Ingredients:

1 ½ cups egg whites brought to room temp
1 ½ cups sifted powdered sugar
1 cup sifted cake flour
1 cup sugar
1 ½ tsp cream of tartar
1 ½ tsp vanilla
¼ tsp salt
¼ tsp almond extract

- Sift powdered sugar and cake flour separately once, measure for correct amount and sift together four more times.
- Place egg whites in a large bowl, add salt, cream of tartar, vanilla, and almond extract.
- Beat on medium speed until soft peaks form.
- Gradually add sugar 2 Tbsp at a time.
- Beat on #8 (high) speed until stiff peaks form, but not dry peaks.
- On lowest speed add powdered sugar and flour.
- Take off of mixer and finish mixing by hand with a rubber spatula folding over easy.
- Pour (spoon) into an ungreased 10 inch tube pan.
- With a knife or spatula, carefully cut through batter in circular motion 6 times to release large air bubbles.
- Bake at, on lowest rack in oven, for 35-40 minutes or until golden brown.
- Invert pan until cool. Loosen with spatula and remove from pan.

Christmas Molasses Crinkles

It's the day before Christmas, and I'm finally done with the baking, and almost with the wrapping (still waiting on the UPS guy to bring the final batch of goodies from Amazon, thank goodness for Prime!) The last bunch of cookies has been dropped off, the last pie delivered, to the dear 94 year-old clan patriarch up the road, who I adore.

And happily, I am left with a few of these tasty cookies to keep for just us. They're Molasses Crinkles, from the book Sweet, Sweet Sorghum, by my friend Rona Roberts, and you can find her recipe for them on her blog Savoring Kentucky.

The recipe is actually derived from an old one by Betty Crocker, but if you make it with sorghum instead of the usual cane molasses, the cookies come out with a more earthy, subtle flavor, rather than the smack-you-in-the-face thing that normal molasses does.

And the best part, at least as far as I am concerned, is that they remind me of my mom, who loved a good molasses cookie. So here's to moms everywhere, and Christmas, and cookies. And may God bless us, every one.

Molasses Crinkles made with Sorghum

Sorghum Caramel Sauce

Sorghum Caramel Sauce

I know, enough with the sorghum already, right? But when I posted about the sorghum caramels on Facebook, my friend J asked if she could thin the recipe down to use it as a caramel sauce on ice cream.

I suppose you could. But hey, when have I ever turned down an opportunity to work with sugar and butter and cream? So here it is J, a sorghum caramel sauce for you! I thought I had one in a book I just got, but nope. So I whipped one up for you:

Ingredients:

1 Cup white Sugar
1/2 Cup sorghum
3 Tablespoons unsalted butter
2 Pinches of good quality sea salt*
1/3 Cup heavy cream

Things you can whisk in at the end:
1 tsp vanilla or
2 tsp. bourbon or
Some other thing of that nature.

Directions

Place the sugar, sorghum, and butter in a large, heavy saucepan under a medium high heat. Stir constantly as butter and sugar melt. Let mixture bubble in pan for a couple of minutes or so, getting nice and frothy and bubbly, stirring regularly. Turn the heat down to medium lowish, and slowly whisk in the cream. The caramel sauce will be, as they say, to die for. Serve over goat milk ice cream, or whatever else your heart desires, storing it in the fridge. If it hardens up, warm the jar in a bowl of warm water to thin it out before serving.

* I love the Fleur de Sel from Le Tresor at The Saltworks, just lovely stuff.