Birthday cakes, wedding cakes, just-because-you’re-craving-it cakes. Who doesnโt love cake? In most households, cake is a food of celebration that brings family and friends together. But when one thinks of the foods featured in a healthy diet, cakes are seldom mentioned. Cakes are burdened with a bad reputation because they typically lack nutritional value and
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5 Easy Egg Substitutes For When The Chickens Have Stopped Laying
As happens on many homesteads, our chickens have stopped laying with the shorter winter days. We decided to let them follow their natural rhythms with the seasons and haven’t put a light in their coop to keep the eggs coming. We figure, if they naturally take a break for the season, we’ll let them follow
25 Delicious Sourdough Recipes For Your Home Starter
Sourdough starters used for baking have been around since the cultivation of edible grasses began thousands of years ago. People have been creating healthful and delicious breads of an astounding variety for millennia. It was only after the advent of large-scale industrial baking that instant yeasts (with their quickness and ease of use) asserted themselves as
12 DIY Lip Balm Recipes
If you love lip balm, you know the dread when you’re down to the last few uses. Make DIY lip balm with just a few simple ingredients to save on buying it new. Lip balm is essential for facial health and looking and feeling your best. Rather than purchase a ready-made lip balm, have a
Mushroom Hunting: A Helpful Guide For Beginners
Hunting or foraging for wild mushrooms can be a very rewarding experience, but knowing which mushrooms are edible is a key skill to have before heading out into the woods. In this guide, we’ll share the best tips and tricks for edible mushroom hunting, discuss the best mushrooms available for foraging in different regions of
17 Homemade Laundry Detergent Recipes To Save You Money
It wasnโt until I began my journey toward a more eco-friendly lifestyle, that I found out there are many things you can make yourself. Many common household items that you can make, will save you money and are good for the planet. If you take a look at the ingredients in major brands of laundry
Best Canning Recipes
Canning is a fun project that gets your hands dirty, keeps your food fresh, and gives you a last-minute gift option when the holidays roll around. The key to successful canning is starting with a recipe you can trust. We pulled these gems from our favorite homesteading and farming blogs. We also recommended the best
The Many Varieties Of Mint
The little, red squirrel was determined, Iโll say that much. He, I assume it was a he because he couldnโt take a hint and go away, kept jumping on the patio door window and trying to climb inside. He wanted to join me while I watched the evening news. I donโt know why; there was
Foraging for Brambleberries
This is an open letter to the brambleberries of the world, particularly those blackberries growing along the edge of my ravine. Dearest Brambleberries: It is with great perplexity that I write to you. There is an understanding between berrykind and humankind that has endured for thousands of years. You produce delicious, sweet fruit. We eat
Companion Plants For Tomatoes
Tomatoes are a staple of the American diet. You can grow many varieties of tomatoesโpick the ones that make the most sense for your garden based on your preferred texture, appearance, and flavor. You can grow dozens of different varieties from miniature grape tomatoes to heirloom. Traditional favorites cultivated in homestead gardens include: Early Girl
10 Delectable Duck Egg Recipes
Duck eggs, a favored delicacy in China, Malaysia, Vietnam, and the Philippines are quickly gaining popularity in the United States. If you’ve never tried them, duck eggs are richer, contain larger yolks, and (due to their thicker shell) stay fresh longer than chicken eggs. Not only are duck eggs considerably larger than chicken eggs, but
17 Great Depression Era Recipes
Nowadays, with the never-ending supply of cookbooks online and in bookstores, and the family recipes your parents passed down, there’s an exhaustive supply of meal ideas. And with modern technology and agriculture, we can basically get any ingredient we need with a quick and affordable trip to the grocery store. But back in the 1930s,
Make Your Own Homemade Tea Blends With These 8 Recipes
Homemade tea blends can be very simple or more complicated, and you can customize your recipes to suit your own tastes. These are some of our favorite hand-crafted tea ideas to stock your pantry or for your gift list!
10 Killer Quinoa Salad Recipes
There’s nothing like a good quinoa salad… it’s filling, refreshing, and makes you feel awesome knowing the goodness you just put in your body.
Holiday Recipes
Among the best comfort food are those dishes that are prepared during the holidays. Thereโs something about gathering your whole family around a magnificent spread of food that makes everything that much better. So whether youโre planning a dinner for the whole family or just your and your significant other, weโve compiled some of the
6 Different Ways To Use Thinnings and Scraps
When you start gardening, you start the process of raising your own food from the soil and cooking meals you grew with your own hands. Itโs an amazing feeling, but as you begin to read gardening manuals and cookbooks to expand your skill set, youโll come across phrases that make the hairs on the back
Big Vegetables in Small Spaces – How to Start a Container Garden
If you have a deck, porch or even a window sill, you can have a garden. Container gardening can be a great way to start gardening, try something new, out wit predators, or bring kids into gardening. Having a garden, even a modest one, will bring beautiful food to your table and a sense ofย satisfaction.
Organic Choices
Inspiration Green Organic Choices, See which foods have the least and most pesticide residues. USDA data.
7 Best Veggie Burgers
Best Veggie Burgers
15 Seeds You Should Save
If you enjoy your current plant varieties, you may want to save the seeds for next year. A healthy garden, both flowers and vegetables, is certainly something to be proud of. Inevitably there will be some plants that you prefer over others, and as luck will have it, some of these plants will be annuals.
Types of Basil
Commonly used in many Asian and Italian recipes, basil (Ocimum basilicum) is a world-famous herb primarily cultivated for its aromatic leaves. Surprisingly, both its flowers and stems carry flavor that goes well in sauces, stews, and stir-fries. Technically, basil (also known as great basil) has an annual lifecycle. However, you can plant basil at home
Stop Spraying Your Dandelions: 3 Simple Methods For Making Dandelion Tea
I find it a weird mix of sad and amusing that our current culture spends so much time killing dandelions. These nonnative lettuce relatives were brought to the United States from Europe for their very useful purposes as food and medicine. In a great stroke of what now seems irony, the grass was torn out
8 Best Plants for Clay Soil
Clay soil can be a challenge for gardeners. However, some plants can tolerate and benefit from those growing conditions. Shallow-rooted vegetables, for example, can tolerate clay, and others can benefit from the stability of heavy clay soil. Root crops like potatoes and daikon radishes help break up clay. One of the issues with rich clay
10 Delicious Vegan Sandwiches for Back to School
Sandwiches might seem like typical, boring packed-lunch fare, but these vegan sandwiches are far from it!
Hugelkultur: What It Is & Inspiration For Your Permaculture Garden
Instead of putting those small branches, leaves, and grass clippings in bags by the curbside…build a hugelkultur bed. Simply mound logs, branches, leaves, grass clippings, straw, cardboard, petroleum-free newspaper, manure, compost, or whatever other biomass and organic matter you have available, top with soil, and plant your veggies or perennial plants. What you’ll get in return
Top Ten Pea Shoot Recipes (In Season Now!)
Like most green leafy vegetables, pea shoots – the young tendrils and leaves of the garden pea plant – are incredibly nutrient-dense. You can start looking for them at farmers markets or Asian markets in the spring and early summer. Two cups of raw pea shoots have 10 calories, zero fat, 35.5% of your recommended
Making Homemade Kombucha
Kombucha, the fermented, sweetened tea that has caught the attention of many, has actually gone through several phases of popularity over the years. The traditional tonic is quite trendy right now, but the natural probiotic drink has a number of health benefits and tasty flavors that date back to 221 B.C when it was known
Ramps
Type:ย Perennial Region:ย Eastern United States and Eastern Canada Used For:ย Food, Medicine Walk through a forested area in early spring, and youโll experience several wonderful sensations. The squelchy, living feeling of mud beneath your boots, the sweet, somewhat spicy, aroma of decomposing leaves, the breath of the breeze that, finally, is not bitter cold, choruses of newly
How to Plant, Grow, and Harvest Yacon Root
With a sweet taste and crisp texture similar to apple, yacon (Smallanthus sonchifolius) is a flavor-packed root vegetable that’s quickly gaining popularity with homestead gardeners. Yacon is a tasty treat to put away for winter. Yacon tubers are stored the same way as any other root vegetable and can be dehydrated, pickled, or canned. Dried
Beef Tongue: What It Is and How to Cook It
There are two ways youโve clicked on this article. One, youโre curiously horrified at the image of a huge, disembodied tongue, and you came here to see how in the world anyone could consider that thing as food. Two, youโre one of the enlightened few who have access to beef tongue and know that within
Types of Cucumber
Fresh or raw, cucumbers are one of the most refreshing produce you can add to your meals. Growing your own cucumbers will introduce you to many varieties remarkable flavors and textures.
Plantain Weed
Learning about Mother Natureโs edible and healing plants is a critical component of living a sustainable, self-sufficient, and prepared lifestyle. Broadleaf Plantain, commonly pronounced plan-tin, is a โcommonโ weed that most folks recognize. You likely see it in your lawn, but chances are you donโt know its name. However, there is nothing common about Broadleaf
15 Trellis Plants For Your Wall, Pergola, And Arbor
Pergolas, arbors, and trellises look mighty boring without a plant wrapped around their nooks and crannies. But why should you bother finding trellis plants to cover your garden structure? It might be to provide privacy, add a decorative element, or save space in a small area. And if youโve run out of room on the
๐ฅซ Food Preservation
How To Make Dandelion Wine
I wish I knew decades ago what I know now about the medicinal and nutritional benefits of dandelions: I remember my dad spending hours trying to get these sunny little “weeds” out of our suburban lawn. But savvy homesteaders, foragers, and DIY-ers know that the flowers, leaves, and roots of dandelions are edible. The greens
13 Effective Homemade Face Wash Recipes
Take a look at the label on your face wash. Does it have a long list of ingredients that you can barely pronounce (let alone identify what they are)? Does it include things like parabens, phthalates, and formaldehyde? Nowadays, youโll find these ingredients in all sorts of skin and hair care products because theyโre a
20 Homemade Floor Cleaners For A Sparkly Clean House
Mopping is one of my least favorite chores. At least, it was until I stopped using store-bought cleaners and transitioned to homemade solutions. The store-bought stuff never seemed to clean my floors (they’re mainly wood, laminate, and tiles) and left them feeling tacky to the touch. I also hated the odor of anything store-bought. Everything
How To Cure Meat
Most meat eaters have had salumi, ham, lox, pancetta, beef jerky, or bacon. All those foods fall into the same category of cured meats, but we donโt often stop to think about what curing means and how it affects the meat. Are cured meats healthy? What does curing meat actually involve, and how do you
Beets: From Growing And Preparing To Canning and Cooking
When I was very young, my mom taught me how to can and pickle beets, and I have continued to do so since my husband loves pickled beets. I have always wanted to eat beets, but Iโve never been a fan of the earthy flavor. Beets are such a healthy vegetable supplying large amounts of
Canning Peppers
Whether you overplanted peppers in your garden this year — or stockpiled a bunch that were on sale at the store — don’t let them go to waste! After you’ve made your red pepper soup and spicy jalapeno salsa, consider canning the rest of those peppers to store through the fall and winter. If you
Insteading Giveaway – December 2019
Regardless of whether you had a large harvest of food from the garden this year, or simply found a lot of cucumbers on sale at the grocery store, preserving food is an excellent way to provide yourself with a little more self-sufficiency in the winter months. While canning and dehydrating are common methods of food
What is Seasonal Eating?
Have you noticed the idea of seasonal eating “cropping up” in lifestyle magazines and organic-themed publications? I find myself viewing the trend with the same strange feeling as when I read modern articles about off-grid living, or pasturing livestock. Though these concepts are presented as new, they honestly couldnโt be more ancient. As mislabeled as
Cultivating And Harvesting Wild Rice
Wild rice (Zizania palustris) is known as the โcaviar of grains.โ Contrary to its name, wild rice is actually the seeds of wetland grass. Other common names include water oats, Canadian rice, marsh oats, and blackbird oats. A native, aquatic, ancient cereal grain that grows in isolated riverbeds, marshes, and shallow lakes across North America, wild
Wild Spinach (Goosefoot, Lamb’s Quarters)
Type: AnnualRegion: Native to the Americas, India, Australia, and South AfricaUsed For: Food, medicine, fodder, bioremediation When it comes to good advice for what you should eat, including dark, leafy greens is always at the top of any list. But with greens like organic spinach sometimes being sold at a wallet-busting $8 a pound, what is one to
Growing Kale
Kale has become somewhat synonymous with the modern health movement, but this nutrient-packed green has been a bastion of good eating for centuries. In fact, thereโs an old Scottish story that tells of a young doctor, traveling in search of a town to start his practice. He was advised, โIf you see kale growing in
Homestead Stories: The Mighty Apple
Letโs talk about apples. Why apples? Over the past year, Iโve gained insight and appreciation for apples: their history, as a life strategy, in new ways to eat them, and their associated health benefits. The goal of this article is to share this new found interest and recognition, and hopefully, pique similar feelings in others.
15 Different Types of Alaskan Berries
The Last Frontier, the 49th state, land of the midnight sun, or in other words, Alaska. The state many dream to visit and few actually do. Alaska is home to some of the worldโs most beautiful natural wonders: the arctic and associated tundra, North Americaโs tallest mountain (Denali), megafauna ranging from muskox to polar bears,
How To Deal With Egg-Eating Chickens
Is there any image more quintessentially โhomesteadโ than a coop surrounded by clucking chickens? Being able to walk to the coop, basket in hand, and return with tomorrowโs breakfast, is a true homesteaderโs delight. But what happens when you go to the coop and find the nesting boxes unexpectedly empty for days on end? Your
Enjoying Garlic Scapes
There are some obvious benefits from having a garden — freshly grown food, meaningful, rewarding work, and a relationship with your land that you can feel good about. Then there are some benefits that aren’t as obvious, such as getting “bonus” foods that you’ll rarely, if ever, find in a grocery store. These are fleeting
Community Supported Agriculture
The Community Supported Agriculture, or CSA, movement is an important step in locally sourcing your food. With more and more food recalls being issued by the government and food producers on non-meat items and food prices rising along with oil prices, having locally sourced food can be a key component of a family’s budget and