It surprised me the other day to realize that there are 24 of us living on the farmette full time right now. Mike and I, Jake the dog, Sterling and George the cats, Cody and Whiskey the horses and 17 hens of various breeds. No wonder it seems like you’re never alone around here…
No sooner do I appear outside than this gaggle appears to harass me for treats. They come from every direction, at the walk, the run and on the wing. It’s freakin’ hilarious and overwhelming at the same time. Once they’ve found me, they either get bored, or they torment me - completely dependent on whether I’m walking towards the hen shack or not.
If the horses are outside and it’s anywhere a meal time, you can pretty much guarantee that Cody has his head over the fence by the barn door looking to see if you know he’s there.
Sterling is an omnipresent force in the garage these days. He took up residence on top of the chest freezer in October and with the addition of a heated bed is usually there or on the front porch. He’s so much happier outside with the freedom to come and go as he chooses.
Always happy to see either of us, Jake greets us with kisses and joyful leaping when we get home from work. His world is not right until you’ve either thrown the ball for him or found a fresh egg as a treat. He’s just about the sweetest dog I’ve ever known, a good thing considering he’s pushing 120 pounds these days.
And then there’s George. He’s the soul of the barn. So fat he can barely get in and out his personal entrance (although the hens don’t have the same problem), George is king of his domain. When people ask how he got to be so rotund (he used to be skinny), I just laugh and tell them that we no longer have a mouse problem in the barn and that now our mole population is suffering too… He’s got a purr and presence that are even larger than he is.
You really can’t be lonely around here. Even when you think you’re enjoying a moment of solitude, there’s probably another heartbeat within spitting distance. And it’s a wonderful warm feeling.
The seeds that I ordered have arrived and I’ve been sorting and organizing them into a new box with the seeds from 2008 and 2009. But the biggest part of planning the garden every year is actually figuring out what is going where. I actually do this before I order seeds so that I have some idea of what I want I need - or, um, justify to myself… 
I’d like to maintain at least a 3 year rotation for crop families and this is the third year. It’s harder than I think it will be to make the rotation happen - some of the big blocks of crops are probably in the last place I have to put them without throwing my whole system on it’s head!
So here it is, the working draft of the 2010 garden plan (click to enlarge). For reference, each square is a square foot.
The color coding doesn’t mean much to anyone but me, but generally it’s by family and/or nutrition needs. It just helps me see at a glance where I’ve got certain types of vegetables.
Now I just need to work through the seed starting schedule. Of course, that has more urgency than I realized as I need to start lettuce and early brassicas as soon as this weekend! Wow, where’d the down season go?
How’s your garden planning going?
The West
 Almostina is submitting her frittata for this week’s challenge - but what a frittata! The sweet beet greens and red and yellow chard came from 20 feet away - her own backyard! That is such a wonderful accomplishment! Eggs, potatoes and mushrooms from the farmer’s market and cheese and bacon from the pantry made this a wonderful meal that even little Max enjoyed! Yum!
Arugulove feels that her Dark Days meal this week did not live up to her high standards, but it’s all local - which is what matters! She made a butternut squash pancake with smoked cheddar cheese on top with braised dandelion greens on the side. I’ve never had dandelion greens, and Arugulove didn’t love them much, but I still think that a 100% local meal deserved a round of applause! Good job!
 From Dirt to Dinner served her husband “the perfect vegetable soup” this week - and she teaches us some great tomato tricks while describing how she prepared it. I love her descriptions of choosing her vegetables from her garden, and what a garden! Broccoli shoots, snow peas and snap peas, beets, rutabagas, turnips and yellow carrots (yum!) were snipped fresh and added to other foods from the kitchen that needed to be used up. I am going to try this soup this week - and try the wine trick with the tomatoes!
Married with Dinner had a sick wife this week and cooked up the most scrumptious sounding chicken soup with dumplings. Every single yummy ingredient except baking powder (where does that come from, anyway?) was local - such a huge accomplishment. Visit the site for a wonderful tutorial on making chicken soup quickly and easily. And now I know how to make dumplings! I hope your wife is on the mend and enjoyed her soup!
Our Life in the Country invented a casserole of scalloped potatoes with chard and bacon with what she had on hand during a busy week updating the carpeting in her home! Leftovers with more chard proved that this invention is a keeper!
 Prepping 4 28 enjoyed a yummy complete meal salad of market cabbage, kale, snap peas, radishes, green garlic and garbanzo beans over brown rice with hard boiled eggs sliced on top and a dressing of red onion, garlic and balsamic vinegar cooked in olive oil. That sounds so delicious! She enjoyed this meal while catching up on Dark Days posts, after having her wisdom teeth out - glad you are on the mend!
Jen over at Dark Days Challenge tells us the journey of the duck that eventually made its way to a dark days meal of roasted duck with sauteed brussels sprouts on the side, and another of roasted duck with a side of wheat berries salad. She also made stock and rendered the fat. She mused that while some relationships are fleeting, our relationships with our local farmers are “lasting, important and steady.” Well said!
The Middle
 Aagaard Farms enjoyed their dark days meals from Baja! They ate locally the entire time and even managed to cook locally when not eating out. Dark days meals from this lovely locale included pan-seared fresh scallops with tiny limes accompanied by a salad of local market veggies, a veggie roast in tin foil with local potatoes and squash, and a friend brought by some freshly caught wahoo fish that was delicious! What a scrumptious week! Let’s all go to Baja for our next week’s challenge, shall we? Mmm…
Fast Grow the Weeds enjoyed another bean-filled week, cooked by her husband! (Yes, I did see a pig fly by just now!) He prepared so many beans that many meals ensued. Their menu of Cuban Black Beans, baked beans, biscuits and greenhouse salad, all from local sources, are enough to inspire us all to cook up some beans and join her!
Green Leanings is growing tired of potatoes, and so turned her attention to the beans as well. She cooked then “low and slow” and blended them with cauliflower to make a mashed potato-esque side dish. She served it alongside pork chops and green beans. What a creative side dish!
 Midwest Green had a meat and potatoes meal this week. Some from the pantry, some from the basement and some from the Farmer’s Market combined into a comforting meal of pork chops, roasted potatoes, salad and green tomato relish. Even the drinks at dinner were local! Homemade seltzer sounds intriguing!
Notes from a Country Girl also had pork on the menu: pork tenderloin with rosemary garlic roasted potatoes and homemade bread and butter. She makes it sound so easy, just tossing things from pan to pan - love the cast iron! This is a great reminder that our local meals don’t have to be fancy; simple and quick, this meal is a great one to look to when creating another dark days meal seems overwhelming.
 put your shovel where your mouth is made chili this week after inventorying her freezer. Homemade black beans combined with market onions, homegrown garlic, summer-frozen sweet corn and sweet peppers and home-canned homegrown tomatoes with a wedge of Wisconsin cheddar and homemade yogurt on top. Yum! She also made up a tangine earlier in the week, using up the green beans, zucchini and eggplant from the freezer. Well done!
Simply Me prepared Oven Barbecued Chicken for her Dark Days Challenge meal, following the Simply in Season recipe for her own barbecue sauce. Steamed collards and kale were on the side, and the meal was wholesome and delicious. She comments that cooking through the Simply in Season cookbook has made her very aware that, when making homemade sauces and the like, it is possible to create quite a variety of meals with just a few simple ingredients. I’ll have to see if my library has that book - it sounds perfect for our challenge!
 Two straight weeks of bronchitis isn’t slowing Annette down (even though she says it is). She managed yet another impressive array of Sustainable Eats this week, including omelettes, chile con carne with corn muffins, whole-wheat pizzas with homemade sausage, plus homemade English muffins and a potato-y breakfast scramble.
Amy rejoins the challenge this week with a two-fer over at Amy’s Flock: Beef and more beef. Alongside some spaghetti squash and beets, Paul barbecued a rib eye and a chuck steak, turning Amy into a believer: Chuck isn’t just for pot roast anymore. Later in the week, they enjoyed ground-beef tacos from another local ranch’s meat.
 Eugenia is so dedicated to the challenge, she made her Dark Days meal even though she wouldn’t be home to enjoy it! Mr. Culinaria Eugenius dug into a saucy pot roast of lamb and root vegetables in a wine/tomato sauce while Eugenia was away at a conference, leaving enough leftovers for the cook’s lunch upon her return.
Laura wishes she had a more-exotic recipe to share each week, but I think all of us secretly envy her regular batches of homemade pasta made with (not so) Urban Hennery eggs, of course. This week she tops silky fettuccine with an Italian-sausage red sauce. Pretty much everything but the pork and the wheat came from her farmette.
 Over at the Herald, Sarah the Eco Geek discovers the magic and wonder of scalloped potatoes — her first-ever foray into the not-from-a-box kind! Her new mandoline makes short work of some German Butterball spuds, which get combined with all sorts of local dairy to make a delicious winter side dish for leftover ham.
Alison at Acorn Cottage Artisanry reminds us we’re halfway there — this is week 11 of 20! Her planned Dark Days meal this week — spaghetti squash with mushroom/sausage sauce — had issues: The squash was sprouted and bitter. She falls back on a forgotten sweet potato as the base for her delicious-sounding sauce.
The East
At the Farmer’s Market made the all time comfort food Macaroni and Cheese. The ingredients for the cheese sauce came from local sources (including the flour - who knew wheat was grown in NY?) and it was served with garlicky kale. Nothing like Mac and Cheese to make everything right in the world.
 Macaroni and Cheese
Jennie at Daftly Smitten made a rib sticking cabbage soup with leftover cabbage and kale. The raisin bread was homemade and doesn’t any slice of bread taste better with melted swiss cheese on top?
Stacey at Fessenden Farmstead tried her hand at homemade pasta and made gnocchi with winter squash. The squash came from the freezer and the gnocchi were served with a white sauce, baked with a topping of parmesan cheese. Her local farmer’s market is still going strong so collard greens were available for the week. They were sauteed in bacon grease (saved from a heritage hog) and then simmered in chicken broth.
 greens and frittata Marissa at Food in Jars spent a car trip thinking up her meal for the week. The blue potatoes were a little wrinkly but roasted up nicely. The rest of the simple local meal consisted of still fresh greens for salad and a yummy frittata with eggs, ham, hard goat cheese, onions and chard.
Sophie at Late Bloomer’s Farm went a step further and used a local recipe! She lives nearby toTaunton Press, publisher of Fine Cooking. The delicious Red Wine Braised Short Ribs were made with everything from the meat to the vegetables to the wine and even the bay leaf from local sources. All of that put together makes for a hearty meal.
Mangochild at Living in the Local Zone was in the mood for soup this week. A warm potato soup with red onions fit the bill. No dairy was used so it was a little bit of challenge to puree the potatoes in order to give the soup the correct consistency. Chopped carrots were added at the end to give the soup some texture and it was served with sauteed kale and more onions.
Local Kitchen couldn’t believe the last bag of kale was used! It seemed like there would be enough to last forever. The good news was the stash of frozen green beans was discovered. This week’s meal was a simple roasted green bean with potatoes and bacon. Roasting vegetables fills the house with warmth and the addition of the potatoes made it a filling main meal.
 Roasted Green Beans with Potatoes and Bacon Fresh vegetables are becoming scarce up in the Northeast Kingdom but Annika was up to the challenge. She made a crustless quiche with baked delicata squash and steamed beets. Living in Vermont has the advantage of having your local cheese come from Cabot Creamery!
Peg at Palmyra Silver used her infamous homemade pancake mix to whip up some blueberry pancakes for breakfast. Lucky for her, King Arthur Flour is local enough (I have King Arthur flour too but I don’t think DC is anywhere near VT!). Toss in some summer picked blueberries and homemade vanilla extract and that makes for a delicious healthy meal. Please share your recipe for homemade vanilla!!
Simple Life in France connected her dark days meal with her interest in global change. She writes about food as a need but does everyone really need kiwi and pineapple that come from half way around the world. Oh to live in a an area where olive oil is local! Another gratin was made this week, this time with leeks, fennel, rice, bread crumbs, walnuts and olive oil all from local sources. The gratin was eaten before a final picture was taken!
What Did She Do Today is a fellow knitter as well as cook (how do we find time to do all these things). She and her hubby cooked up some meatloaf, fingerling potatoes and asparagus frozen from last summer. The list of local ingredients in the meatloaf is impressive. Earlier in the week, Amy made a local dessert, maple custard. Custard has to be one of my all time favorite desserts, it’s so soothing and comforting.
 Maple Custard Thrift at Home tried her hand at growing bean sprouts. The mung beans sprouted successfully and were used to make Egg Foo Young. Her sister showed up just in time to help eat the main dish that was served with rice, roasted apples and homemade yogurt.
Amber at Unstuffed had her local meal for breakfast. Pumpkin pudding was made with frozen pumpkin from the previous autumn, homemade brown sugar (wow!) and soy milk (double wow!). Served with bread and jam. What a tasty meal.
The South
Jennell at Delicious Potager has overcome her childhood hatred of lasagna enough to want to make it for a Dark Days meal. Homemade noodles layered with sauce canned from summer tomatoes, add in local ground venison and you have a delicious meal.
Hippychick is already harvesting broccoli! My broccoli plants are still a gleam in my eye. This week she ate buck naked broccoli along with tenders from homegrown chickens and fresh noodles tossed with homemade pesto. Stay tuned for how broccoli is used next week!
 Naked Broccoli My friend at mommy porch loves pork as much as I do! Brunch is always better with pork sausage. Brunch consisted of the pork patties, sauteed apples, cheese grits (I LOVE grits), scrambled eggs and biscuits. I think that meal would have lasted me for several days. mommy porch had never made biscuits and they came out pretty good. To make even easier biscuits, add a little more liquid so that the dough is moist and drop them on the baking pan with a spoon. That way, you don’t have to worry about kneading them too much.
Windycityvegan is better late than never with her meals for weeks 10 and 11. Tomato soup made with tomatoes from a friend’s garden, bread from local flour (you NC folks are lucky with that flour) and hummus made with local chickpeas (again, where can I get local dried beans in DC? I think I need a road trip south) make for a comforting meal. Her next meal was a lot of work but worth it. Pasta does not need eggs to be made as windycity and her daughter discovered. The best part was watching her 3 year old roll out the sheets of pasta. The noodles were dressed with a homemade spinach and mint pesto and served with homemade vegan meatballs. Yum!
I’d love to be that person that has some fabulous and exotic meal to post every week, but sometimes (well often) we have wholly local meals that aren’t that exciting.
We rarely eat pasta that isn’t homemade anymore, the pasta machine that I bought last year has become a weekly feature around here. I use Shepherd’s Grain flour from Stone-Buhr and eggs from our hens. The dough is a simple 1 cup of flour and 2 eggs recipe from Michael Ruhlman. Since our eggs are less than standard, that ratio gets adjusted depending on how big the eggs are. 
While the pasta dough rests in plastic wrap, I make sauce. Some nights it’s a cream sauce, others pesto from last summer or simple butter and parmesan or red sauce. I won’t claim that my red sauce recipe is any kind of traditional, but it certainly is good.
A bit of Italian sausage from our 1/2 pig, homegrown onion and garlic, thyme and sage from the herb garden, a spoonful of last summer’s pesto, dried oregano and parsley, homegrown/canned tomatoes and tomato sauce and a bit of kosher salt. It’s actually better the second day when it’s had a bit of time to mellow and thicken, but we never plan that far ahead.
While the sauce simmers for as long as it gets on a week night, I roll pasta dough into sheets and then cut it into either fettucini or linguini (limited option around here) and drop it into salted boiling water.
It’s always a nice end to a busy day. And this week was no different.
 Aunts Betsy, Susie & me with Peanuts the Pony As far back as I can remember there were ponies. First there was Peanuts our shetland pony. He lived in the barn with crazy white Qeony and her spotted sons Travis, Blaze and Shane.
At age 7, after what I can only assume was much asking, I got a pony of my own. A spoiled yard ornament named Velvet - I assume after National Velvet, but I’m honestly not sure if we gave her that name or if she came with it (Mom, Susie?). Susie tried to teach her some manners, and I suppose that for a Welsh pony cross she was pretty well behaved. I remember riding her down the road to the Luce Line with Susie and Betsy and always being far behind. Then we’d trot to catch up with Susie encouraging me to “give her a kick”. She always went faster on the way back to the barn than she did on the way out 
I rode her with friends and was dumped off more times that I can possibly count. She had that pony move of tucking her head down by her knees at a trot or lope and flinging you directly over her head. That said, Velvet and I gave pony rides to a lot of thrilled little kids over the years.
 Me, brother Sam & Velvet (who let me dress like that!) When I was nine, along came Velvet’s daughter Carmel, a pretty little palomino pony / quarter horse cross. My aunt Susie trained her for me, but I never rode her nearly as much as I should have.
Horses were part of growing up on the family farm, something I took for granted my entire life, until it was gone. I sold Carmel when I was finishing high school, when it was obvious that my interest in riding was minimal. Velvet went on to be a pony to Susie’s children and other families after that - she just passed away last year at what we think was age 31 or 32.
There were summer weeks at sleep-away horse camp (Little Elk Ranch) and lessons here and there from Susie, but I was really taught to ride. It wasn’t a formal thing and I don’t remember ever wishing that it was. I had friends that were into showing horses and I know they had fun doing so, but I only really ever wanted to trail ride and do the occasional hour of practice in the arena or pasture. My friends and I went for rides around the pasture, a swim here and there in the pond, and “trail” rides down a mile of blacktop to the Luce Line.
 Age 10 maybe? On Billy at Little Elk Ranch As a young adult I had the occasional longing for a horse again, but the cost and logistics of boarding a horse in the city always deterred me from following through. When Mike and I moved here to the farmette almost two years ago, I did it with a vague hope (and dread) that we could have horses again.
Before we jumped in this spring by buying Cody and Whiskey we looked hard at the costs and the time commitment and then I closed my eyes, crossed my fingers and hoped we were doing the right thing. Mike followed my lead, trusting that I knew more than I did and with dreams of finally becoming a cowboy. Luckily for both of us, getting horses has turned out to be an excellent decision in many ways.
 Mike and Whiskey at Pilchuck Tree Farm Some of my best memories of this past year are watching my husband choose a horse and learn to ride him. Of the first time Mike grinned after convincing Whiskey to go somewhere he didn’t want to go.
Of seeing parts of the Cascades that I never would have from the seat of a mountain bike. Of the smell of horse breath and hay early in the morning and sweat and dirt at the end of the trail. Of the first time I (with help from Todd) got Cody to load into that old straight-load trailer after two hours of trying.
Even when this is the sight that greets us when we go out to get ready to ride - horse or swamp creature? - they bring a smile to our faces more often than not.
 Cody is his natural state, really. Cody and I started lessons last week with a great trainer at a barn down the road. I haven’t suddenly decided that I want to be a rodeo queen or a reining champion. I just want to learn to ride in ways that I never did as a kid. I want to know as much as Cody, who has someone in his past that taught him a lot, so that we communicate better. Doing so can only make us better partners on the trail and around the farm.
Plus, getting to trot and lope in an indoor arena one night a week during the dark rainy days of Seattle winter? Not a bad thing at all.
Mike has also been taking lessons from our honorary nephew Kyle, a local horse trainer. He’s learning a lot, and I’m delighted when he comes home and excitedly tells me all about what he learned and how great his horse is. I’m proud of him and thrilled that he’s turning out to be even more horse obsessed than I am
And really, if you’re going to go see the wilderness, is there any better way to do it than from the back of a horse looking through those cute little ears?
 Cody in the hills above Chewack River Ranch
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