Recycle Food – Special Double Feature!

Here’s a couple ideas for recycling your food.  It’s thrifty and tastes great!

Yogurt

Whenever I buy milk, I always buy a little more than I need.  After having it open in the fridge for about 8 days, I’ll turn it into home-made yogurt.  Not only does it taste better than anything store bought, but it doubles the life of your milk.

How to make yogurt:

Slowly heat your milk up to about 180 degrees F.  A candy thermometer helps through the process.  Stir frequently and don’t let it scald or form a skin.

Once you’ve heated up your milk (essentially pasteurizing it), let it cool to somewhere between 120 and 115 degrees.  Or cool enough that you can hold a finger in it for 3 seconds, but don’t let it get too cool!

Poor your warm milk into an air tight container and mix in a few tablespoons of starter.  Your starter could be a store bought container with live active cultures or you could start with some of your last batch.  Make sure the starter is about room temperature before adding it to the warm milk though.

Seal your container and cover it with a towel or blanket to keep it warm.  I stick it in a cooler box too to help insulate.  Leave it undisturbed for 10-12 hours.  Presto chango, yogurt!

If you don’t like the taste of plain yogurt mix in some honey, maple syrup, blueberries, peaches, or strawberries.  Any clear liquid on the top is whey which you could either pour off or mix in.

Croutons

Have some stale home made bread?  Cut it into small squares and fry in a little olive oil.  Add some ground black pepper, parsley flakes, and a little powdered garlic to make croutons.  Best served warm.

Planning the Fall Vegetable Garden

Urban Harvest will have two classes coming up on planning the fall vegetable garden:

http://www.urbanharvest.org/classesevents/calendar/fallveggarden.html

I understand the class on 7/26 is full but there are still openings for 8/2.  Bob Randall, who is probably the leading expert on permaculture in the Houston area, will be teaching the class.

Flat Tires

I was about 15 minutes into riding the trails at Memorial Park this afternoon when a piece of glass pierced my tire.  It took about ten seconds to lose all the air.  I thought I was prepared with a spare tube, a patch kit, and a pump all in my camelback.  What I didn’t realize though was that I had the wrong sized tube and pump, and the patch didn’t stick because the hole was in the side wall.

So let this be a lesson, whether you’re riding for fun or for transportation, make some room in your pack for a small pump and a spare tube.  O, and make sure they’re the right size!!  It can be a long walk with out them.

Thanks by the way to all the riders at MP that offered to help!

Cutting Back Tomato Plant

I read somewhere that you can cut back tomato plants in the summer to prepare them for a late summer/early fall harvest.  I chopped both the slicer (on the right) and the roma back on 7/13.  Let’s see what happens!

You know I have to say it was deeply satisfying to cut these back.  I had one good harvest from each which I tried to eat all in one week.  It gave me an ulcer and neither plant produced another tomato.  I felt I was extracting my revenge.  I don’t think this was a good year for tomatoes though.  I’ve heard that from a number of friends that are more experienced than me.  What was your experience?

Eggplant Problem – Updated

The advice I got was that I left it on plant too long, should have harvested earlier.  Also the three new ones have doubled in size this last week.  Can’t wait!

Can anyone help me identify what is wrong with this eggplant:

Why am I so yellow?

I harvested it on 7/13.  It seemed to be getting less purple.  Plus there were two new fruit forming, so wanted to give them a chance.  I’ve had this curing in a paper bag since then, will let you know if it was just unripe.

Here are the other two on the same day:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have this plant in a raised bed I made with cinder blocks.  As you can see I planted marigolds in the holes of the cinderblocks.  They’ve made the bed more aesthetically pleasing since this faces the street and my neighbor’s house.  More importantly though it has hugely reduced the amount of insect damage done to my garden this year.

Welcome to the Houston Heights Homesteader

Jumping on the band-wagon of Inspired by the intersection of recent mainstream interest in home gardening, frugality, and enviromental conservation, I’ve recently started gardening again, am seeking to reduce my dependence on the mainstream economy, and am hoping to reduce my environmental impact.  In short, I joyfully embrace the concept of modern urban homesteading.

As much as I beleive that concentious individuals have a responsibility to reduce their impact, I like the challenge of getting more for less and the simple satisfaction that comes from DIY.

I haven’t found a ton of online resources for the particular challenges of homesteading in urban Houston.  I’m hoping this site will be a forum for similarly minded people to share ideas and experiences so we can create that kind of resource.

Thanks for reading and contributing!