pieces.

I haven't fallen off of the cook.eat.think. wagon here. I actually had a Pyrex explode into a million tiny pieces in my oven. I have a thing with glass. It always breaks no matter how careful I am. And, it always gets stuck in my fingers or feet, no matter how obsessively I clean it up. And it stays in my feet sometimes for months - even with my attempts of digging it out with sharp objects. So, this was a big thing.

So, I left it for a few days. Cleaned the floor 120 times (yes, it blew up just as I opened the oven, and glass literally flew OUT of the oven at my head, and landed up to four feet away). Put a rug in the kitchen. Let it sit for a few days. Bought big giant thick gloves. Pulled out the big pieces. Let it sit for a few days. Wondered how in the world I would ever get all that glass out of my oven. Looked for a shop-vac rental. Tried to sweep it out a little. Let it sit a few days. Wished I could just get a new oven (ha!). Let it sit for a few days.

I don't know when I will feel that I got enough glass shards out of the oven to EVER feel that I can cook in it again, but here's hoping. The holidays are coming. And a big birthday for a four year old is only 9 days away ... hmmm ... maybe I should order a cake...

So while I have been cooking a lot, it has been in the slow cooker on my counter. Big long all day soups and stews. Bread in the bread machine. Beans soaking on the counter. Panini's on the counter top grill. Now if I could just make this oven disappear and a new one magically appear in its place, I'd be set! ;)

The final CSA Box!

Today was it! The final CSA pickup of the season. We usually also do a late November storage share, but did not this year and are instead relying on our garden and a few local farmers for our final stocking up and some regular pickups throughout the winter!

In our box this week: sorrel, brusselini, potatoes, carrots, cabbage, celeriac, squash, onions, turnips (purple top & hakuri).

In our box this week last year.

winter garden.

While we have been busy in the kitchen we have also been out in the garden. I love yard work (yeah, I love shoveling too!). I will admit that we have a LOT of clean up after growing food plants rather than ornamental bushes, but it is worth it. The glorious weather has helped make the garden clean up even nicer. We are pulling, clipping, raking, and planting. We prepped and planted garlic and shallots. I love planting even as the cold comes. Speaking of planting...


This year we are planning to try to grow certain herbs and greens inside to see how much we can stay local for veggies even throughout the winter. Our pantry and freezer is packed with everything we preserved from farms and our garden all summer, but we still wanted fresh greens. With a sprouter we have a lot of variety throughout the winter for salads as well as bread, but we wanted more! So lets give it a shot and see how far we can go.

We plan to do a few succession plantings as we figure out what works best (or doesn't work). Our first planting::

-mustard greens
-salad bowl lettuce (cut and come again)
-spinach
-cilantro
-chives
-swiss chard
and by special request we will try
-window box roma tomato

To winter greens!