snowy , but not too cold to be outside. Last week I got to finish the garlic. We had planted it the end of October and the beginning of November, 10,000 of them into the cold soft ground. Then I wait for frost, enough to freeze the ground to spread manure with the manure spreader and the heavy tractor and trailer don't sink in and compact the soil or crush the garlic. But no snow or the tractor slips. Last Saturday were the perfect conditions for that.
On Friday it had been sunny and warm and took the opportunity to put up a lost roofing panel that had blown off in the windstorm. To get the panel back on safely I attached a climbing rope to the front axle of the tractor inside the machine barn. I threw a thin baling twine rope with an attached tennis ball full of dirt over the barn roof to the tractor opening side, tied the heavy climbing rope to the thin rope and pulled it over the roof to the other side where the panel was missing. I learned the trick of throwing a thin rope with a weight first from my friend Paul Hetzler. That is how he gets a climbing rope into high trees. He even has a slingshot to catapult it. Len handed up the roofing panel and shadowed me tied to my fancy safety rope on the roof screwing it down. There were so many loose nails that I spent the next hour on the roof until I ran out of roofing screws. I went to town to get more screws but never made it up the roof that day again. I left the rope tied up on the tractor to finish it some other day.
The next day was manure spreading day as I told you before an it was very cold. As I wanted to take the tractor out to hitch up the manure spreader I noticed that the rope was still tied to it. And when I tried to get it off it was frozen stiff! I tried and tried and said to myself they have ropes on sailboats in the frozen arctic and they can do it, so can I. And I did but it took time. Next the PTO spinning shaft of the spreader was frozen to the ground and frozen, not extending to reach the tractor and when I got that working the little push in pin to hold into the tractor was also frozen. Every little bit was like test of:"are you up for this, do you really want to farm?" I passed the test, the manure is spread and on Monday the SLU students helped to roll out the large round bales of hay. The garlic is good to go until spring when we put on the netting. Oh,yes and the manure spreader chain did not break because I had put on a new one in the spring, yeah!
I am attaching a recipe for a beet parsnip soup:
Beet & Parsnip Soup
Serves 4
Total Time: 30 minutes
Ingredients:
2 small beets
4 parsnips
1 tablespoon olive oil (optional)
1 cup coconut milk (from a can) or unsweetened almond milk if you want a lighter version
2 cups vegetable broth
Juice of ½ lemon
1 tablespoon coriander
½ teaspoon chili powder
Directions:
Preheat your oven to 425*F
Start by washing, peeling, and roughly chopping your beets. Olive oil is completely optional, but if you do want to use some, toss 1 tablespoon into the veggies, and roast on a parchment-paper lined baking sheet for 25 minutes.
Remove from the oven, set aside 1/4 of your roasted parsnips if you want parsnip croutons for toppings. Next, just toss your remaining ingredients in the blender, blend until smooth, then transfer the soup into a pot on the stove, heat, and serve!
A great way to top your soup is to add a dollup of extra coconut milk or almond milk, chopped roasted parsnip (parsnip croutons!) and some pumpkin seeds. YUM!
Have a nice day,
Dulli