{whole food} :: the first tomato

We were able to harvest our first tomato.

My husband, who doesn't like tomatoes, decided to taste it...

His eyes opened wide, with a look that said..."Whaaat!? THAT'S what they are supposed to taste like?!" So priceless.

He likes them now:)

Yep...no sour water, mealy, orangey-pink tomatoes here, baby:) It's all deep red, tart, tomato-y bliss that makes you just want to slice it up, sprinkle with some kosher salt and fresh cracked pepper, and eat it for a meal! Next stop: Caprese Salad...every single bit of which will be harvested from our yard, or made in our kitchen...Mozz, Tomatoes, and Basil. Oh...well, I guess we aren't cold-pressing our own olive oil, or making our own salt and pepper...so, there's that.

Oh my word, the rest of this society is missing out! I know we would be a much different place if everyone knew what vegetables are actually supposed to taste like! I just know it. What a travesty took place when we handed the care and feeding of our families and ourselves to a giant agri-business that doesn't care at all about us!

We're taking it back, people...taking. it. back.!

I'm going to make as many people taste my beautiful vegetables as possible so that maybe I can reopen the world of beauty, color, and taste to everyone. I want everyone to know what they're missing out on!

God didn't give us this planet in beige and grey! He didn't just send us tasteless manna from the skies. He created things to be pleasurable and wonderful! He made it so the health of our bodies, and joy of our hearts would be so intertwined that to separate the two would be to make the world...you know...what it is.

We are so under-living this life.

We are soooo under-living this beautiful life!

{whole food} :: new life

I posted about our little backyard farm a couple of months ago, and I've taken pictures time and again, with the intent to show the progress as we went. For a while, that was an extremely boring endeavor. But, we kept at it, and with a little help from some rain and temperature pops...WHAMMO...something new happens every day.

It turns out this little farming thing goes way deeper than growing your own food.

I believe that God gave us the duty to work the land with our hands, and to try to be self-sufficient. But, as with every child, the older I get, the more I realize that His instructions to me are not simply face value. As it turns out...this works out heavily in the realm of cultivation. I realize a new metaphor every single day as we do this. In order to bear fruit, we have to be vigilant, consistent, patient, gentle, caring, nurturing...we have to do the physical act of all that it takes to cultivate a spirit, a relationship, a child...a healthy body. We sweat, we ache some, we talk about what's best, we pray, we thank God...it encompasses all the effort it takes to make a life full and real.

I want the best tasting food, from the best possible source, in the best possible way. That takes work...

WORK WORTH DOING.

So, I give you the food...soon to be nourishment to our bodies...currently, the unexpected nourishment for our souls.

{our flamboyant squash blossom}

{the undercover San Marzanos}

{herbs}

{unruly lettuce}

{banana peppers!}

{random prodigal spinach}

{our first color...I can't wait!}

{more tomatoes}

{more lettuces and carrot rows}

{the view from the end}

Thanks, Lord...what will You show me today?

Real Food Wednesday: Roll Up Your Sleeves, Kids

Well, I have decided to stop apologizing for my inconsistency, here. I feel the pull to be in this space, second only to that of laying in bed snuggling with my boys, so trust me when I say...it's nothing personal. I realize that my anxiety over not getting here every day, is just a frustration that comes from not getting to do what I want to do, but having to spend time doing things I "have to do", instead...like school and all the work that comes with that. So here it is...Thursday. Oh well. Just know I miss you more than you miss me.

So, I'm doing Real Food Wednesday, because, well....I want to. We had the most fun this past weekend, while my aunt and her two girls were in town. We spent the weekend laughing a bunch, making good food, and getting the kids involved. The best part was...one of the kids favorite things about the weekend was getting to roll up their sleeves and contribute to the preparation for our real food dinner on Saturday night. We had a wonderful dinner of grilled chicken, baked potatoes, corn on the cob, and sauteed spinach.

It was very yummy...but, the most delicious part was the sounds of the children having the most fun shucking corn.

I think I could listen to that sound all day long:) They just sat on the back porch, exclaiming over and over "I did it! Look at mine!!"

{jaxen felt very strong and accomplished:)}

To top it off, after we cooked it, they were so excited to be eating the corn they had worked so hard to prepare for us!

{jaxen and his cousins hard at work}

What a fun weekend we had! We had good food, good games, good laughs...only drawback was...it made me ache all the more to be on a piece of land, with a big huge table outside under a huge tree, with beautiful lanterns hung from the branches, and tiki torches lining the al fresco dining area, where we will feast on real food and real life with people we love...all the time!

Waiting...it's the thing I'm the least good at.

Real Food Wednesday: A Heart Song

Real Food Wednesday has taken a hit. It's very disappointing, really. In order to do these posts, successfully, I have to actually DO something during the week, that will allow me to write a post. It's hard to write a weekly post on real food, when I'm just throwing a sandwich together and brewing coffee every day. While I am actually spending my day moving us toward our goals, that doesn't mean I am spending much time on food. I hate that.

School starts on the 30th...about 13 days from now. All my classes are cooking related...save the online English Comp class I have to take. I'm sure I won't be hitting the kitchen right off the bat...but, I'm thrilled to be moving forward on it. I was trying to explain to someone the other day what my love of food...especially real food...is about. It's hard to explain. While I do love to eat...the thing that brings tears to my eyes isn't about eating. It's about people. It's about history. It's about a common thread. It's about an art. It's about culture. It's about communing with our Earth. It's about painting with God's brushes. It's about nourishing more than just bodies...it's about nourishing souls.

I love that God gave us the practical means to create beauty. He gave us all the nutrients, the vitamins, the minerals, the proteins, etc. But, just for our pleasure...He packaged it in the most vibrant colors, textures, flavors, smells...sounds, even. That's why I scoff every time someone says "food is just fuel." If that were true, why wouldn't we just have a pile of goo on our plate, like they eat on The Matrix? While I agree with the allegory of The Matrix, I take exception to the idea that to be enlightened to the tricks played on your life every day, means that one would live in the land of industrial gray and a pile of uninspiring gruel. It's so puzzling. Food is a multi-sensory experience...a concert of God's bounty.

I think that's why I see processed food as such an abomination. To feed your family and yourself solely on the pre-packaged notion of food that's readily available is like putting Ansel Adams to work at Olan Mills, Martin Scorsese in charge of pushing the slide button, putting Monet to applying stickers all over poster board...or Frank Lloyd Wright to setting up a tent. It is to short change the very essence of what makes us, and keeps us, human.

It's no doubt that there is a movement swelling, here. It's no doubt that I am determined to be a part of it. I feel a strong sense of duty to bring as many of you with me, as I can. However, more than anything, I can't wait to have a kitchen full of friends, a big harvest weekend celebration, a warm gathering to feast on the fruits of our labors. I can't wait to help a hurting loved one heal, and create a place where a connection to those who went before, is as palpable as the modern music playing on the iPod. I want to be in a proverbial montage of women standing over a pot of food, and adding flavor until their heart says..."they'll love that." I want to weave the backdrop for the moments when my grandchildren walk into cafe, somewhere in the world, on their travels, and are automatically transported to a moment...when they remember just how I looked when I helped them embrace a beautiful aspect of themselves, or realize something about life and understanding. I want to create the kind of reference that connects life today, to a point in the past...the kind of reference that helps bring about the realization of purpose...even years after the fact. I want the generations that come from me, to hear my voice speaking of their immense worth, as they sit over a bowl of soup, or pass by a beautiful vegetable garden. I want to create a place where people know they can go...and get fed...body and soul....I want to feed people.

Livin' La Vida Locavore

Often, when I tell people in my hometown that my husband and I have this dream to buy a farm, start growing our own food, hand making most of our household products, and to can and preserve all summer so that we can eat in the winter, I get these blank and questioning stares like they have just run into a certifiable masochist. The look is always followed with the inevitable question, "but, WHY would you want to work that hard, when you can just go to the store?!" It makes me giggle:)

To put it lightly, the DFW metroplex is not necessarily a haven for agrarian minded people. I get it...I really do. I'm a city girl. I'm one of those that actually finds it relaxing and wonderful to be in the middle of New York City. I've grown up and lived in one of the largest metropolis areas in the country for the last 20+ years. So, it's a little counter-intuitive that I would actually choose a life of weed pullin' and feather pluckin'. But, there is a reason...LOTS of reasons...and I'm about to give you my Top 5. *Notice I said top five...there are MANY more. {these are not necessarily in order of importance}

5. Quietness

Everywhere, all the time, there is noise. It's funny to me, how everyone always yearns for a better time. They yearn for the time when everything wasn't so scary, and everything wasn't so tense, and everything wasn't so hurried. I have a thought about that. When I sit and listen to all the opinions about every single thing that's going on in the world, it dawns on me that the information age may have a hoodwink buried in it somewhere. Who said it was a good idea for everyone to know everything...at every moment? I get tired of all the noise, all the political BS that comes from everyone knowing how the president reacted when he spilled guacamole on his shirt in the middle of a security briefing, or what happened when Brad Pitt was shaving this morning. Just a bunch of sheep, being told what to think, what to care about, what to buy. Nothing good comes of it...ever. I'm ready to learn the opinions of the ground, as it gives up the fruits of my labor, communing with the bees as we work together to make the garden grow, to feel the sun warm on my back, or the few whispers of rain, letting me know it's time to go in. Job 12:8 says, "speak to the earth, and it shall teach you"...yeah, I intend to hear it.

4. It's Biblical

I have been in church my entire life, and I never knew this part. We are called to a sustainable, manual life in the Bible. I Thessalonians 4:11-12 "11Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, to mind your own business and to work with your hands, just as we have told you, 12so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody." Now...I don't think that God expects everyone to be a farmer. However, I do believe that it's important for people to at least know HOW. I believe we need to live in community with one another, and to be able to contribute our skills into the lives of those around us. However, at this point, the closest thing we know to having a relationship with those who produce our food, is saying hi to the checkout person at the grocery, or thanking a waiter for their service. We need to go deeper.

3. It's the Opposite of Consuming

Our daily lives consist of a long series of acts of consuming, interspersed with moments of expending. Here's what I mean...(and this is a general look at the American lifestyle...not every person)...we eat, we buy, we type, we gas up, we burn that gas, we listen to radio, we watch TV, we read, we watch the news, we read emails, we read tickers, we workout, we bathe, we eat some more, we work at a job where we push buttons a bunch, we turn on lights, we dry our hair, we sit, we grocery shop, we stop in for a latte...it just goes on and on. There is so much that we do to consume all kinds of energy. Producing your own food is a practice in creating fuel, expending physical energy, putting life into the earth, putting nutrients into the soil, creating health benefits, creating environmental benefits, and living with purpose...for a noble cause. It's a life that is spent giving forth, with highly valued times of reaping harvest, consuming truth, and sharing with those you love. See the difference? It's intended life...not life happening to us.

2. Real Health

Man, this one's loaded. Ok...in order for me to fit this paragraph into this post, I'm going to have to completely leave out the issue of our fake food debaucle. Chances are, if you're reading this, you are looking for answers to the "how the heck do I get off this crazy thing" question regarding what has been allowed to pass as food, in our country. So, I think I'll just address the integrity of our supply of "normal" food, and leave the Frankenfood discussion for a time when I'm blogging with a glass of red wine in hand. So...in order for food, namely produce, to be transported 1500 miles, and still look nice when it gets to the grocery, things have to go a certain way. First of all, if it were to be harvested when ripe, it would be a soupy mush by the time it traveled in the back of a semi all the way across the country or up from Chile. So, they pick it green (unready), load into the truck, and throw an ethylene cartridge in, shut the door, and PRESTO...it LOOKS ripe when they get it at the store. What's the problem? Well, the ripening process as God designed it, is the part where are the good stuff happens...you know, like flavor, nutrients, color, phyto-chemicals, disease healing properties, disease preventing properties, and the like. When that thing is picked "green" all that stuff that we think is in there....well, it ain't. It's just made to LOOK good, so that when we go to the grocery store, and "stick to the outer perimeter" in order to ensure that we're making the best health choices, well, it's really just a smoke and mirrors game where they all laugh while we buy a very colorful array of, let's be honest...sour water. Then we wonder WTF is going on, when we go to the doctor, and despite our best efforts, have some horrendous disease, for which we will take a little pill for the rest of our lives, and actually die of the affects of THAT, quicker than we ever would have died of the disease, itself. Cue weepy loved ones at the edge of the grave....Aaaaand, SCENE! Man, they're clever.

1. Sustainability.
I'm becoming less and less inhibited about telling people that I am somewhat of a conspiracy theorist. Now...I'm not carrying around copies of The Catcher in the Rye, and I don't think there are government agents following me (yet;). The kind of thing I'm talking about is the kind of thing that we are dealing with right now. I believe that greed and convenience addiction are literally killing us; that how we have come to depend solely on those philosophies to run every facet of our lives is dangerous...and a ticking time bomb. And friends...that timer is winding down...AND HOW! The BP oil spill is really just like seeing the flashlight in the Watergate. It's just the warning shot. There's always going to be that guy...the one who's phone rings in church, that reminds everyone else that they need to turn theirs off...BP is that guy. We have a problem, here, folks...and, it's not going to get any better as long as our very livelihoods are completely dependent on a giant, oil-guzzling infrastructure to bring our food to us from an average of 1500 miles away. That is INSANITY! All it's going to take is for some sleeper cell somewhere to fully understand the fact that if they screw up our ability to get oil...the whole country folds. Seriously...the grocery stores are empty, the stores go bare...and then what's a consumption-addicted, push-button country to do for food? At this point it would be laughable to think we'd just pick up a hoe, and get to work. Kids don't even know that their food came out of the dirt, much less how to get it there and get it out! That is a problem...a serious one. The system that we all adhere to, every single day, is really just a giant sinkhole under the freeway...one day soon, the whole thing is going to open up, and take us all down with it. So...yeah, not sustainable. I don't want to be a part of it, anymore...This sheep's jumping the fence.

* I realize that there is a very irreverent tone to this post, and I apologize. But, that's where I am...I'm sick of it. It's like life is a joke, and it's not getting any better until we start taking a hard look at taking back the reigns. There shouldn't be a single person left in this country that believes that "they" have our best interest at heart. They don't.

Check out this post in Fight Back Fridays at

http://www.foodrenegade.com/fight-back-friday-july-9th/