• Illness, Archaeology, and the Garden: an update

    Query: Is it an homage to the 18th century humeral notions of medicine (puke, purge, and scare the hell out of the illness) that liquid medicines are still being formulated to taste like rotten fruit mixed with pigeon shit and…

  • Compost maintenance ideas

    For keeping pests (crows, coons, opossums, cats, dogs) out of your compost pile I have two suggestions; A length of chicken wire on top of the pile – weigh it down with a brick or cinderblock – will keep critters…

  • Apples on a wonderful late winter rainy day

    This is what I do when it rains; cook, of course!  I converted the remaining half bushel of November 2010’s pie apples left in our spring house into pie slices in bags in the freezer. We had a mixture of…

  • In honor of Chef Edna Lewis

    In the cozy and warm dining room of Okra’s Restaurant in Manassas Chef Carla Hall and I got to share our skills in honor of the memory of Chef Edna Lewis (1914-2006), the author of The Taste of Country Cooking.…