Collard Greens

So I have these great ham hocks and wondered what to make with them next when Im at the Kroger staring at some collard greens. Okay.

I chose this recipe due to its simplicity of preparation as well as ingredients:

http://www.simplyrecipes.com/recipes/southern_style_collard_greens/

The only changes I made were using water only, no broth and adding salt.

Oil, onion, garlic, smoked ham hock.

Six cups of water added and simmered for an hour.

Add your greens and let simmer for another ~45 minutes.

Fish out the greens and other good stuff with a slotted spoon. As the recipe states, get the meat back in from the ham hock. With a large spoon add the juice to a jar for later use. Its kind of like a broth, but Im not really sure what to use it in.

I also added a touch of distilled white vinegar and a dash of hot sauce. I have to say I really like tgis recipe and plan on making it again. I really enjoy the simplicity of ingredients and how they comoliment eachother in this dish. The smoked ham hock really is featured in thus dish.

Back to Basil

Hydroponics failed. The scientists are still figuring out why. I was down, but capital_prototype and RyDub inspired me to get back to basics (I mean basil lol)....here is where they were last weekend:

And under the lights:

Not bad right? They were on sale for $2 a piece. I have all the good nutirents and fertilizer from the hydro experiment and I thought I would be able to succeed here. And here is what one week of progress looks like:

You can see the growth right? I cannot wait to enjoy purple basil pesto pizza.

This is what its like when worlds collide (Supernova!)

Dont buy canned beans. Just dont. Buy dried beans. They are better in every single facet. Cost? Better. Taste? Better. Health? Better.

So why do people buy canned beans? Who knows.

When cooking with dried beans you are supposed to rinse them and sort them. Occasionally you might find a pebble in your beans or something. Maybe a piece a metal. Who knows? I usually throw out any little cracked guys too.

Next, let them soak overnight. I like to just drop them in a bowl or Tupperware container and cover it in the fridge overnight. Give it at least 8 hours to soak.

When you're ready to cook the next day rinse tge beans in a colander. Sift again.

Usually sifting is a formality, but check it out.

This bean here appears to have germinated. Might as well pop it in the seed starting kit with the others. Lets see what happens.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lsV500W4BHU

Ham Hocks

Everyone knows that ham hocks are the tastiest bits of the hog. Everyone knows this. But why settle for industrially smoked old ham?

Enough jibber jabber, lets smoke some hocks!

Step 1: Procure some fresh un-smoked ham hocks from your local butcher. Ask them to cut them down to a workable size, they showed me some behemoth hocks that needed to to be sliced down with the band saw.

Hocks procured.

Step 2: Make sure you already own an electric smoker. Have you ever smoked pork like without an electric smoker? When I have its been an all day activity. With an eletric smoker the heating element is electrical so youll get a constant temp all day. With this model it has a meat probe so you never need to open it. It has a timer so it can turn itself off. All you have to do is load it with a handful of wood chips every hour or so to give your slow cooked meat a touch of that smokey flavor.

Next, load your hocks. Shut the door and turn the temp up to 225 degrees. Set the time to 8 hours. Now go till a garden or watch the cubs or both, just add about a small handful of wood chips about everyy hour. 

Remove the hocks after 6 hours.

And now you have world class hocks.

Gardens

Got seedling's? Good, well where they gonna go?

Nice garden, but lets clear it out.

Free and clear. Let's loosen up those buttons babe. I mean topsoil.

Now thats some good looking drummir silty clay loam! Just used a shovel and hoe to loosen up the soil. 

Potting Up

I was hoping to plant the tomatoes directly from the starter kit cells to the garden, but they started to get too big for the cells and could be competing for sunlight. As such, I decided to pot these plants up.

Tomatoes

Fairly simple process. Fill your pot with a little potting soil and water.  I used a plastic knife and spoon to just scoop the seedling out of the cell. 

Place the seedling and root/mud mass in the center of the pot. Then pour your potting soil around it. Ive read that this is best done with wet soil. I also read that with tomatoes, uou can bury them up to there first leaves as roots can grow from the stems.

Tada

Now water it of course.

Current plant situation.

RyDub's turn at plants

One of the bets things about moving out of the apartment and into a house is the addition of a backyard all to myself. The mowing will get annoying but the chance to finally grow my own veggies, fruits, and other assorted plants far outweighs the annoyance of yard upkeep. Thankfully, the previous tenants had started a compost heap. I've already added a decent amount to it and hopefully it will only get stronger.

With the help of Ashleigh, I plan on doing some pretty hefty gardening. See below for the spread of our hopeful bounty.

We bought two Jiffy 72 plot indoor greenhouse starter kits. (But don't buy it on Amazon. These can be found at Lowes and even Walmart for around $5). Just add water and the little peat pellets swell up and are ready for you to drop in some seeds.

Just drop the seeds in, cover, and set aside for now. Here's the finished product.

Now we just place the plastic dome on top and set them to get a bit of sun for a couple weeks. I'll post some progress pics. Can't wait to move these guys and gals to the yard!

Black Gold - Compost Tea: Part 1

The day has finally arrived. I am now making probiotics for plants. Remember when my plants almost died several times? Yeah that was bad bacteria...it go an infection. It's time to improve the plants' immune systems: enter compost tea.

First here is some of the recent progress my roots have made.

Now that is a healthy leaf. They have gotten bigger, but aren't super amazing yet. This guy has been through a lot. Let's start out healing campaign.

Acquire a fermentation vessel, air stone, earth worm castings, and amazing mycorrhizal bacterial and fungi culture. Also molasses for food!

Add some earthworm castings to the pitcher and add water. Now add the miracle powder.

Endomycorrhizal fungi: Glomus intraradices, Glomus mosseae, Glomus aggregatum, Glomus monosporum, Glomus clarum, Glomus deserticola, Gigaspora margarita, Gigaspora etunicatum, Paraglomus brasilianum

Ectomycorrhizal fungi: Laccaria bicolor, Laccaria laccata, Pisolithus tinctorius, Rhizopogon villosullus, Rhizopogon luteolus, Rhizopogon amylopogon, Rhizopogon fulvigleba, Scleroderma cepa, Scleroderma citrinum, Suillus granulatus

Biological Disease Control Organisms: Trichoderma harzianum, Trichoderma konigii

Beneficial Bacteria: Azotobacter chroococcum, Bacillus azotoformans, Bacillus coagulans, Bacillus licheniformis, Bacillus megaterium, Bacillus pumilis, Bacillus thuringiensis, Paenibacillus durum, Paenibacillus polymyxa, Pseudomonas aureofaceans, Pseudomonas fluorescense

Specially Formulated Amendments: Kelp, Humic Acid, Vitamins

These little bacteria need food. They like molasses...dilute some in water and add it!

Now add your air stone. They need to breathe!

Now set aside for 2 days and let it brew. Can't wait for part 2. And yes, I put the lid back on it you curious George's.

Day 7

Per online research, at some point we need to thin out the plants to give the remaining plants the best chance of surviving and thriving. Im not certain of the ideal timing of this but there's no time like the present.

Photograph of the seedlings progress. I will choose just one seedling to survive per cell.

winners

Fallen soldiers. These little guys had to be sacrificed for the greater good.

Day 5 Progress Pic