More Milk!!

There I was this morning just about to write about the use of Zones at HHF and instead I glanced at the email Inbox. Big mistake leading to a change in topic.

Loren Cordain had sent out an email about The Paleo Diet and in particular an article he wrote on Dairy: Milking for all it's Worth

I won't refer to this as a long article as it really qualifies as a book. Anyway the tome writes off milk and milk products as the cause of a large number of health problems. Based on loads of research, studies and statistics there is an overwhelming case against milk it is difficult to argue against the arguments.

 

A good summary of findings is in Q&A

In a comment elsewhere the author in responding to a question in Dairy and Saturated Fats said “I suspect that raw milk would elicit a similar response”.

If you give this a bit of thought you might come to the same conclusion as I do and that is the vast majority of people drink pasteurised and processed milk and its by-products and the research provides a cloud over its food value and its health benefits.

So what about raw milk? Well you may want to take it on trust as I do that being an unadulterated product it is probably not too bad for you especially if you come from a gene pool that has an affection for the product.

And so we make our own decisions on this.

But just on diets lets make some observations:

Paleo (Loren Cordain) is High Animal Protein, Low Carbohydrate

The China Study (T. Colin Campbell) is No animal Protein

Joel Fuhrman is some Animal Protein but mainly Plant Based

Atkins (not so popular) is High Animal Protein Low Carbohydrate

Leslie Kenton (decades ahead in nutrition) High Animal Protein, Low Carbohydrate

Bernstein (Diabetes) are Low Carbohydrate, High protein

CSIRO is High Protein, Low Carbohydrate

Low GI laps over everywhere

And finally the Traditional Mediterranean is balanced.

 

In all contradictory advice I'll take the middle road.

Function Stacking

This is one of the concepts within Permaculture that really appeals. Whether it be incorporated in a simple task like compost making or whether it is embedded in the design of the property. For us it fits into our everyday activities as often as possible e.g. the cloths washing waste water onto the garden, I never head off to the workshop empty handed or come back empty handed. It's a built in desire to be as efficient as possible with every activity.

The reason compost making is enjoyable is because of the function stacking angle. Pruning and weeding are regular garden activities for us. What a pleasure it is to combine those outputs into a NZ compost and gain the output of that process for feeding the soil. By timing the pruning and weeding and coinciding it with compost making all double handling can be eliminated.

The chicken run is designed to be accessed by a trailer so that the build up manure can be easily removed and reprocessed in compost making. Kitchen scraps are put into the chicken run so that whatever is not consumed by chickens is scratched over and mixed with the bedding material. The cleanout is combined with compost making and building our annual Tomato bed.

Bees are kept not just for the honey but also to increase the quality of pollination in our Orchard. The Orchard contains a number of Apple trees. Some are for eating and some are pollinators for the eating Apples. The pollinators just happen to be very good Cider making Apples.

Some years ago we were forced to vermin proof the roof cavity as the rat population was in biblical proportions. Off came the roofing iron in sections, the old rat eaten insulation removed, the rat droppings vacuumed out, damaged battens replaced, joists repaired sheeting installed over the veranda, rat proof mesh installed in any access points, new glass fibre insulation installed in every space, even over the veranda, new vapour barrier installed and the roofing iron replaced and sealed. A massive effort taking four weeks but done once and done well.

The simplest function stack is motor vehicle movement. Going anywhere is prefixed with "What else has to be done?" Shopping in Raymond Terrace is a long round trip to the Post Office, Library, Fuel, Shopping, Bill paying,  collecting fresh Oysters, picking up milk for drinking and cheese making and often dropping in on our work place across the river to knock over a job or two.

Loving the Present or Fearing the Future

In his interview with Scott Mann, LarrySantoyo said
  

“What about embracing sustainability because we love the things we love about the present, not because we fear the future?”

What he said set me thinking. Maybe there is something in that statement.

At HHF we grow our own food, not because food in the shops will suddenly run out, but because we like the taste and the nutritional freshness of home grown. We know what went into growing the food and we know it is free of anything that can hurt us.

We incorporate Permaculture design methods and thinking as well as other practical planning and management processes because they make sense and make us more efficient in getting all those things done that we enjoy doing. Without good planning and execution it just isn't possible to fully achieve our goals. Things like Function Stacking and using Zones appropriately build both short and long term efficiency to everyday activities freeing up time for other tasks (such as reading).

Frugality and waste reduction leads to saving money and to independence. It is, surprisingly, a more efficient way to operate.

Why are Jean and I so frugal and hate waste?

 

Its not because we want to save the planet. For Jean it's very simple. Somebody put some energy, love, tenderness and care into creating that object. It now has its own aura. To throw it away without having used it to its fullest is disrespectful to both the person who was its creator as well as to the object and to the source of the material of which it is constructed. And it's a waste of money.

Isn't it good to hear the point of few of others such as Larry Santoyo to stimulate the mind and think more deeply?

 

It doesn't even matter if you agree with them. It is the review of your own thinking that is important.

What is in the Pantry that should not be there

I opened a pantry door (we have more than one pantry) and spotted something. In fact I spotted two things and then looked further and then went and looked in the other pantries.

The first thing noticed was the castor sugar. Then there was(were) the jam(s)

It turned out that the jams are there for visitors. Some like sugared fruit on toast in the morning. Fair enough we all have our own poison. Some years ago we gave up jams and composted the bulk of our sugared fruit supplies and just kept a few varieties for the odd visitor.

The castor sugar? That was a left over from the days when we used sugar in cooking according to the pastry chef Jean. We now use either honey, Stevia or rarely Dextrose. The castor sugar will find a new home in the Cave and used as priming sugar for bottling beer, cider and sparkling wines.

I see a half empty jar of treacle. That was from making Worcestershire sauce some years ago. It was such a tedious recipe and really wasn't worth the effort. A compost candidate.

Vegemite, mmmm. Well maybe that better stay. The ingredients list isn't that bad and we only have it every month or two. Lovely on toast with lashings of butter. Vitamin B as well to make up for the colour and preservative.

Out in the Cave there are a few jars of  jams and pickles. Gifts from friends and visitors. A bit sugary. Most have been composted and these few remainders are now well past used by date.

So that is about it.

Over the last few years we have gradually eliminated rubbishy foods from our diets especially the sugary kind. We have even cut down on the home made oven roasted olive oiled chips on Fridays. Now its not every Friday. Moderation.

What do you do with a bountiful harvest. Too much of a particular fruit? Freeze some, give it away or talk to the chickens about it.

Juice seems to be a another popular end product. But what about the vitamins and minerals in the skin  and pips. Citrus pith has all the bioflavonoids which work well with the acidic juice and fibre in the pulp.

We enjoy watching cooking shows but not Master Chef and My Kitchen Rules with their annoying pauses in speech. The things that really annoy us in any cooking show or book are when a fruit or vegetable is adulterated to make the dish pretty. No concern is apparent as to the nutritional value being discarded. It often seems that looks override or that flavour must be extracted and concentrated rather than the entire product valued for its different beneficial features. Sometimes just too much over cooking.

There have to be some treats in life but as much as possible rubbishy food should be the exception. Treats now are the first home grown Tomatoes or the first Asparagus. Freshly shucked oysters from Karuah, home made chocolate with honey as the mild sweetener, fresh fruit from the garden with yogurt, that glass of your own wine or cider. Even just trying a new recipe which innovates the way a vegetable is prepared or cooked. The palate does change. And it can't be all that bad for your health.

What is in your pantry that should not be there?

Are you maximising the nutritional value of the fruit and vegetables you use?

They say it's best not to try and change everything at once as that will lead to failure. Get in the habit of adding something good to your diet or removing something bad (not both) one thing every 40 days or so and change your diet and your health.

A quiet day at home

A quiet start to the day - it is after all Sunday. A yoga session to the salute the sun and then plodding along getting stuff done.

The first thing was to skim the cream off the milk and get the yogurt going. The cream was inoculated with culture to be turned into cultured butter tomorrow. We are starting to run down supplies of butter and in this case we were prepared to sacrifice the yogurt and make skim milk yogurt. I was pinching the cream from the drinking milk but Jean hates her tea with skim milk. The other option is skim milk fetta but we already did that and there are 4 pails I the cheese fridge.

Skim yogurt under way

Next job was to scrub off the labels on some wine bottles and run them through the automatic steriliser (dishwasher). A full load of 12 for this run plus dishes.

Our cattle needed their breakfast of sprouted Oats. It doesn't take long to empty the colanders into buckets, pour a little molasses over it, give the colanders a rinse, empty yesterday's soaking into the colanders and give the soaked grain a quick rinse. Fill two more buckets with fresh grain and add water. They love their breakfast Oats and wash it down with a small biscuit of Lucerne.

And notice how clean the floor is now

Time then to check on our bees. Still scope for more honey in the super so no need to rob. They look healthy and busy. There was no sign of Small Hive Beetle up top and the base board trap didn't have any fresh activity. I cleaned the access slots for the trap but I'd better have a closer look at the hive next week when there is some more time.

 It was time to take some barrel (demijohn) samples of the 2014 wine for tasting. We will do this with our meals over the next week. The wine has barely finished fermenting but because of the extended post fermentation maceration the tannins have softened. The tannins are still quite distinct but the wine at this point contains the maximum health giving benefits. A small glass with every meal being beneficial. Over time the wine will soften but consequently begin to lose some of its goodness. The colour of all these wines is inky black.

The down side of taking samples is that there are more containers to clean afterwards.

While I was out in the Cave enjoying my winemaking hobby, Jean was in the kitchen slaving over a hot oven making Karithopita for morning tea. Morning tea today was at 2pm. Oh, that Greek thing is Walnut Syrup cake served with Cinnamon and yogurt.

We finished the day off with some yard work i.e. whipper snipping the last of the garden bed edges and harvesting some dried beans - yet to be shelled.

A cucumber turned up in the Tomato bed which added well to the green salad. A nice sized zucchini was BBQed along with the onions and mains. A pleasant dinner for two.

We celebrated the day with  a wine tasting.

Permaculture Audit on HHF - Guest Post on Eight Acres

Being offered an chance to write a guest post on another blog is an exciting challenge. Suddenly there was a need to raise standards of literary entertainment as well as take a lot of care with grammar and punctuation. When doing something for yourself, there is some latitude with quality, but when it is for another, personal pride demands a lift in standards because of the responsibility to the requestor. This is especially so when the recipient blogger, Farmer Liz, sets a very high level of presentation and content.

There is no guarantee that what has been written will meet those standards; but we tried. The opportunity, however, did create an environment in which it was possible to attempt to improve writing, think more deeply and review the status quo here at HHF.

 

The link to the post on Eight Acres is Guest Post by HHF

Escape

Sometimes Jean and I talk about why we lead the life we do. Growing our own food, careful with expenditure, not being wasteful, recycling, reusing, living frugally and simply. It's not as if we can't afford to be splash out on things. And it isn't always easy. Getting out in the garden when its hot and humid isn't the most pleasant thing to do. But if we don't plod along jobs fall behind and you get gaps in the food chain. And things get out of control. Not that they are ever that much in control.

The day before yesterday we ran the mower over the lawn which after all the heavy rain was getting a bit long. All that needed doing next was the edges and the areas where the ride on mower doesn't fit. Jean had said to herself if she spotted a snake she'd get stuck into it. Well the Brown was more scared of me than I was of it but as it turned out I was on the way into the garden shed to get the whipper snipper. That snake has good timing.

We don't do a lot of things that our friends do. They travel a lot, they change cars frequently, they buy lots of new toys. They eat out. We were lucky in the past to have eaten at some of the best restaurants but find what we prepare at home is as good if not better in terms of quality and freshness. We spend months discussing whether we would really use a $50 e-reader. And our car begins to fall apart from just age before we replace it. We don't mind local travel i.e. taking the dogs for a drive. But with responsibility for chickens and gardens it prevents us from being away too long. Yes we could get a baby sitter but then the trouble with dogs is they miss the pack leaders and we miss them. Maybe when they leave home we might venture out for longer trips.

 

So many friends and acquaintances refuse to modify their lifestyles and take responsibility for their own wellbeing. They are content to consume medications rather than give up junk food and embark on even the most modest exercise program.

 

The world today is built on sand in terms of a growth economy based on devouring resources. There is a lack of honesty and consideration of others. Greed pervades and there is no appreciation for quality just a scrabbling for more. Rushing from one consumption event to another.

 

We get a lot of pleasure, when the wine turns out really well, when the Tomatoes are fresh and abundant, when there is success with a cheese. All those little events throughout the cycles of the year bring satisfaction and enjoyment. And they are tangible and reoccurring but always slightly different and raise expectations. But it is more than just that. I suppose John and Jean are just escaping from the artifice of the today's society.

 

"The noise and din of the town still ringing in his ears ... died away in the night, the peace of the hills and open fields soothed and quietened ..."

 

'The Country Child'

Alison Uttley