Well, this had to happen too, though we did not expect it for at least another couple of weeks. We’ve got hens now – pullets to be sure (the technical term for what might pass as a chicken in the 8th grade, hanging around the lockers in the hallways, flirting with the boys), but definitely coming into her own. She can lay eggs, but they are really quite small. And if you read Joel Salatin’s book on raising pastured poultry, Pastured Poultry
you don’t want to hatch those eggs or buy chicks that have been hatched from them – any chick hatched out from a pullet egg is going to be, by definition, much smaller than an egg laid by a mature hen and prone to physical problems, weakness and disease.
Small? On the scale of “Small, Medium, Large, Extra Large, Jumbo and OOOOO, That Hurts”, this particular egg did not even register as a Pee Wee. Pee Wee Eggs need to be 1.25 ounces. This one weighed 1 ounce. Flat. (more…)
Although I’m really someone who likes to have food put by, I’m not into just freezing or canning just to freeze or can. The point really is to produce something that you and your family are going to want to eat later on. For the longest time, I made the big mistake with freezing veggies of blanching them far too long and then when we reheated them from the frozen state, they turned to mush. Made it hard to get the Little Siberians to eat their home grown veggies in January. 
If you are (ahem) old enough to recall the Ed Sullivan Show, then if I mention the words “Italian acrobats with spinning plates”, you will know exactly what I’m talking about. For the less ‘elderly’ among Aunt Toby’s readers, suffice it to say that this family group had a hilarious act whereby they set up poles with plates spinning at the tops and they ran about the stage, back and forth, making sure the plates were spinning and not falling to smash on the floor. The big finale was their all picking up the poles and catching the plates. Voila!!
So much to tell you, my greedy little buggers and so little time. 
Strawberries. Until Clarence Birdseye popularized frozen foods, strawberries meant ‘fresh in the spring and early summer or on your toast and waffles as jam and preserves the rest of the year. Now, you can get frozen strawberries anytime, and at Chez Siberia, we do our part to pick and freeze a whole lot. But we also take the opportunity to eat them as soon as we can get them home, rinsed and into a bowl. 
Well, I lied. Or, I think I did. I think I said, or at least intimated that I’d delved into farmers markets and wouldn’t darken that door again. 
And…we’re BACK!! And we are circling around again, on the subject of farmers’ markets because – I say so. A reader of the last piece told me that she does not go to ‘her’ farmers market because they only had two vendors and all the vendors had were greens and green onions. 
This blogging thing does get out of hand. The first thing you know, you get an idea and then it sprouts other ideas, which breed and make other ideas and pretty soon the whole post gets out of hand and you are looking for a book deal. So, I am going to go with one idea and tell you what the next one is and hold myself to it.
lokywoky in a thread asked: What I would like to know is what all of us lowly apartment and other rental unit dwellers who don’t have yards for gardens and no control over the kind of heating/cooling equipment etc are supposed to do. Info is all over the place for stuff for home OWNERS but there doesn’t seem to be much for those of us who don’t own a home.
