FROM SCRATCH CLUB

If you caught my previous post, then you already know I’m trying to start a micro farm this year called Little Sparrow Farm. In mid March I started my seeds with some grow lights in my basement. In late March I went out-of-town for a week and my husband was in charge of the seedlings. […]

Over the past few months, I’ve thought a lot about fear. Dealing with health issues tends to do that to a person. (Especially if the person is a gifted worrier like me.) Some of this pondering happened inside of MRI machines and some in the kitchen while I prepared dinner. And you know what? It […]

I have written a lot about breakfast on this blog.  I’ve realized recently that making breakfast is meaningful to me.  I like eating breakfast foods, but I now recognize that, more importantly, the process of cooking breakfast improves my mental health.  When I feel scattered and disorganized, making breakfast helps me to consolidate and settle […]

I’ve lived a lot of places but grew up mostly in Phoenix. Phoenix is a very interesting place. The things I love about it are pretty much what most tourists would find really stupid, or just plain odd. Since my whole family still lives there (How can they possibly still live there? It’s so hot!!) […]

One of the reasons I think people read and write for this blog is because they want to challenge themselves to cook and eat thoughtfully.  I love the challenge of eating well but not the challenge of finding the ingredients to do so.  I moved to this area several years ago and was immediately aware […]

This week I could finally go out and check on my bees since I buttoned them up in the fall. I went out with some jugs of sugar syrup and the feeder boxes. Some people feed their bees all winter, but where my two hives are located I couldn’t really get to them all winter. […]

It’s hard to make decisions about what to eat these days.  There’s so much information and everyone has advice and opinions.  One thing I feel fairly certain about, when it comes to food, is that sugar is bad for me.  During periods of time when I’m eating sugar regularly, sometimes multiple times a day, I […]

The following is the very basic tale of how I’m starting my own micro-farm in Ballston Spa. It’s called Little Sparrow Farm, and yes, it’s named after Dolly Parton. Last summer I was telling a friend how I was going to be ordering a lot of garlic. The amount I ordered ended up being over […]

My aspiration for 2013 is to go vegetarian. My husband moved to Ohio in October for a job opportunity, and I sort of just settled into a primarily vegetarian lifestyle, mostly by accident. My husband is an avowed and unapologetic carnivore. He is a real meat-and-potatoes-but-hold-the-potatoes kind of guy. I do the cooking in our […]

The start of a new year is a great time to take inventory of the year gone by, and make plans for the year to come.  Some make resolutions, some just reflect. I personally gave up resolutions years ago, after a stint of countless, “This year I WILL exercise…. and eat less cake”. Instead, I now […]

Just before Christmas I went to go visit my dad in Santa Fe. I hadn’t been to “The City Different” in sixteen years, which is now half of my life. When I lived there as a kid I took it for granted. It has a very slow pace, which I appreciate as an adult, but […]

This post is about the powerful impact that allowing yourself to be present in the moment can have on your mental health, and on your family (and how your kitchen can help).  On Saturday morning I had caught myself, for the hundredth time in 24 hours, glancing at my iPhone looking for information about the […]

“I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought; and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.”  ― G.K. Chesterton,  (1874-1936) +++ I asked a few FSC Contributors to share their food-related thanks: I’m thankful for finally having an apartment with a bigger kitchen! I’m thankful for all of the great food inspiration floating around […]

I grew up loving food, so much so that I fluctuated between 180 and almost 200 pounds from the time I was 18 until after marrying my hubs at 33, almost eight years ago (we joke that I was overweight and he was bleach-blond when we got married…must have been true love). Much of what […]

My daughter Abby just turned 7 years old and she’s looking forward to celebrating with her friends at a party this weekend. She has multiple food allergies, some of which are life-threatening. I’m finalizing the snack and dessert menu and I thought I would share a bit about what I’ve learned about serving food at […]