Tag: Cooking
Light Yellow Dye
Light Yellow Dye
Plant: Wild celery Harvest time: June and July Material: Fresh flowers, leaves Vessel: Tin or aluminumBoil 1 pound of wild celery in 5 gallons of water for 2 hours. Strain; add 1/4 cup of raw alum and boil for 10 minutes. Add 1 pound of wet yarn and boil 15 minutes before rinsing.
Homemade Dandelion Syrup
Homemade Dandelion Syrup
posted by Melissa Breyer
I am wild about dandelions. Their greens deliver a fleeting sweetness at the first nod of spring (before succumbing to a load of bitterness) and inspired me to write about harvesting and eating them a few weeks ago, followed by a recipe for Cream of Dandelion Soup. So next up, I thought, I just have to make dandelion wine. I’ve tackled homemade paper and found making butter to be effortless, how hard can dandelion wine be?
Well. After reading about secondary fermentation vessels and yeast varieties and fermentation traps, I thought, uhmm, actually, I think it was dandelion syrup that I wanted to make.
Dandelion syrup can be used in many ways, on top of pancakes or plain yogurt, anywhere you use a sweetener, really, you name it. I started imagining dandelion cocktails come summer; homemade dandelion ice cream sweetened with dandelion syrup and speckled with dandelion petals; dandelion this and dandelion that. Dandelion everything.
In this country, dandelions abound–yet go unloved by most. I will spare you my conspiracy theories about the defamation of the dandelion; this rant includes evil-genius chemical companies, the accidental discovery of phenoxy type herbicides in the 1940s and the need to find a public enemy (that would be the dandelion) to ensure a long and profitable demand for the new herbicidal product.
Anyhow, the Roundup parade isn’t marching around my neck of the woods in Brooklyn. Here, the dandelions earnestly shimmy up through sidewalk cracks and inhabit even the most desolate patches of soil, which is really so heartening. This would all seem a great harbinger for my dandelion syrup endeavor. However, urban foraging has its own set of considerations, which include dogs and their lifted legs, roadside exhaust and the possibility of rodent poison. Which all kind of suck the charm right out of it. As chance would have it though, there is a large lawn at a nearby high school that is wonderfully unruly and thankfully untreated with chemicals. It is being organically planted with vegetable beds by the students, and the grass was rampant with dandelions. I asked, they said, “uhmm yeah, sure lady, take ‘em.” And take I did, 100 of them.
Once at home, my daughters and I, hands sticky with bright golden pollen, plucked off the petals and had a bowl of the loveliest plant matter: Soft, downy almost, and redolent with the scent of asparagus and carnations. What an oddly endearing base for a syrup.
So, dandelion syrup. I have long been intrigued by it—it’s at once kind of down-home American as well as cool French granny. It is a basic herbal infusion made into a simple syrup. I felt like I didn’t want to boil the bejeezus out of the blossoms, so I just brought them to a simmer and let them soak overnight. The puzzle for me was what sweetener to use. Traditionally white sugar is used, but white sugar lands last on my list of happy sweeteners. So, I played around with some other alternatives as well, all with quite different results.
• White sugar made a syrup with a faint taste of vanilla and very slightly nutty, it was really just mostly sweet and somewhat plain.
• Sucanat, one of my favorite sweeteners, was, as I expected, too heavy in flavor to let the subtle dandelion taste shine through. That said, it was very interesting; like an herbaceous molasses.
• Honey has that smooth edge that became more pronounced after simmering. I used a mild clover honey and the result was like a somewhat spicy and grassy honey.
• Agave syrup worked beautifully because it is such a clean-tasting sweetener—the syrup made with agave was sweet and clean, with bright green undertones.
So pick your dandelions, pick your sweetener and make some syrup. Many recipes call for lemon, which gives it a little kick of citrus. Suit yourself.
Ingredients
100 dandelion flowers, or 1 and 1/2 cups petals
1 cup sweetener (see above)
3 cups water
Juice of 1/2 lemon (optional)
1. Remove the petals from the sepal (the sepal consists of the small tight leaves that extend from the stem and grasp the flower). This takes a while to get the hang of, but gets much quicker as you go along. Be sure to not allow any green into the petals, it will add bitterness to the syrup.
2. Place the petals in a medium pot and cover with 3 cups water and bring to a simmer. Turn off the heat, cover and let sit overnight.
3. Strain dandelion water into a bowl, pressing on the flowers with the back of a spoon to extract all the liquid.
4. Return water to pot and add sweetener, and lemon juice if using, and simmer over low heat until thickened.
5. Allow to cool, and pour into a clean jar or bottle. Store covered in refrigerator.
Makes about 2 cups
Chicken Soup for the Soul: On Becoming a Grandmother
Chicken Soup for the Soul: On Becoming a Grandmother
Chicken Soup for the Soul: Grandmothers
BY: Terrie Todd
Perfect love sometimes does not come until the first grandchild.
~Welsh Proverb
I thought I was prepared. I was a mother, after all. I already knew what it meant to love someone so much it hurt. I understood the old adage that to be a parent is to walk around forever with your heart outside your body. I had written in my journal, revealing all the emotions I’d discovered tag-teaming in my heart: happiness, melancholy, anxiety, joy, anticipation, worry. I had seen the ultrasound pictures. I’d crocheted a soft, fuzzy blue blanket, patiently undoing all my bungled stitches and doing them over so it would be a perfect square. I had memorized the verses in Psalm 139 that tell how God wonderfully forms us in our mother’s womb. I had prayed for this child and for his parents daily since I learned of his existence. I had written letters to his mom and dad, assuring them how proud I was of them both, how I’d be as supportive as I knew how to be, how they would be excellent parents.
I’d prayed for myself, too. I’d wrestled with the idea that I was going to be a grandmother. Shouldn’t I be wiser first? Or sweeter? Or at the very least, a better cook? How exactly did one cram for this event? I had even admitted to myself that I would soon be sleeping with someone’s grandfather. That idea took a little getting used to, let me tell you!
I had bragged to my friends. I had celebrated with my mother. I had gifted my daughter-in-law with maternity clothes and bought the most irresistible little stuffed puppy for the baby.
I had done all of that. I thought I was prepared.
The day he was born, I rode along with his other grandparents to the hospital to meet our mutual little descendant for the first time. We were told to wait in the hallway while the nurses finished up whatever they were doing with him and his mother in the room. While I waited, I studied the instructional posters on the walls, filled with advice for new parents. I remembered how challenging those first few days could be. Given the hospital rules, I fully expected that my first sight of my little grandson would be in his plastic baby bed and I was prepared. But when I turned around, I instantly knew that no amount of groundwork could have prepared me for that moment. Instead of the expected baby bed, I was beholding my own firstborn carrying his firstborn in his arms.
I came unglued. Part of me was carried back twenty-six years to the day I first laid eyes on my son. But those twenty-six years had passed in an instant, and here I was looking at the next generation, with the same dark skin and the same head full of thick, dark hair. He was beautiful and I was smitten. I didn’t even try to check the tears running down my cheeks as I held him in my arms and hugged his dad as tight as I could with the baby between us. What a cherished moment!
This little boy is about to turn three years old and now has a baby brother. Every day brings new adventures, new things to learn, new memories to make, and new opportunities to wonder at the marvelous work of our Creator. These little guys have taught me that sometimes stopping to watch ducks is more important than getting in out of the rain. They’ve uncovered my own impatient ways, the ones I thought I had overcome. They’ve reminded me that time spent cuddling a sleeping baby in a rocking chair trumps pretty much anything.
Most of all, I’ve come to realize that no matter how hard I tried, I could not have prepared to love someone so profusely, or to learn so much from someone so small.
Lady A’s Spell of the Day for 4/5: ANGER BANISHMENT SPELL
ANGER BANISHMENT SPELL
The following ingredients are needed
One onion |
This is the banish anger from yourself.
Take your onion and wash it in fresh spring water (purchased also from the witches’ friend, the local supermarket). This spell is best performed during a waxing moon. Wear earth colors to ground you and, if you wish, burn some sandalwood oil or incense. By the light of a black candle (black absorbs negativity, remember!) peel your onion at midnight. As the tears_come, take away a layer of the pain you are feeling with each layer of the onion that you peel away. Onions represent Mars, which represents war and feelings of angst and anger at our enemies, so peeling through the onion will open the heart chakra, allowing you to experience the feelings you have been hanging on to, and layer by layer, release them. This spell is all about not wishing to get even, or to obsess any longer over those who have harmed you. After you have peeled your onion, place the peels on a plate (stainless steel or silver) and put on a window ledge in the kitchen where overnight the moon’s energy will draw away the negativity banishing it from your environment for good._complete this simple spell with a long, languid bath into which you have emptied three handfuls of sea salt. This will purify, protect, and strengthen you further. As you lie there, think of how much better you feel now that the desire to get back at someone has dissipated.
Herbal Tips for Your Kitchen
Now that Spring is here, we will be having fresh vegetables and herbs shortly. Knowing how to use the herbs properly will give a new taste sensation to your meals. You can use tried and true recipes or make-up your own. Either way when you cook with herbs, you will have a fantastic meal the whole family will enjoy.
Hints for Using Herbs
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Serving Rule: Two teaspoons of minced, fresh herbs will flavor four servings One teaspoon dried herbs or seeds serves four. Delicately flavored herbs, like marjoram can be use more liberally.
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For soups and stews, add fresh herbs during the last twenty minutes.
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To develop the flavor of freshly dried herbs, soak them for ten minutes in lemon juice, stock or oil before cooking.
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Before cooking rub fresh herbs between clean hands to release their unique flavor in the volatile oils. This will accelerate flavoring as your entrée cooks.
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Firmly press herbs into the flesh of meats, fish, or poultry before cooking to enhance aroma and taste. No sauce or further preparation will be necessary.
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Flavor salad dressing by soaking herbs in it for thirty minutes to an hour before serving. Use one teaspoon of herbs to one cup of dressing.
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Microwave: Whenever possible, saute herbal blends in a small amount of liquid, stock, butter or oil before adding to a microwave dish to assure flavor.
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Sugar can be flavored by layering twelve to fifteen rose geranium or lemon rose geranium leaves on top of one pound of sugar. Any flavor of geranium leaves will do. Keep it covered until ready to use. Flavored sugar adds a delicate flavor to biscuits, cookies and muffins,
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A substitute for lemon peel in baked goods is finely chopped lemon balm, lemon thyme or lemon vervain.
The Witchcraft Chronicles 
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