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Back from Spain and lamenting that I was unable to stuff Jamon Serrano and Pata Negra in my suitcase. I had no idea what to expect from the kitchens of Spain, especially outside big cosmopolitan centers like Barcelona. I hardly have to mention that the food was amazing in Barcelona. You don’t really need to know anything about Spanish food to find culinary delights there. We were directed to a few gems by our host, Sergi (places which were incidentally also suggested in Lonely Plant. I love Lonely Planet). These included Tapas 24 where we enjoyed rabo de toro, un buger con foi, gambas a la plancha and a bikini with black truffle. We also tried Tantarantara where we had a crazy hash of patatas, more foi and eggs- life was good with that alone but we went further and had duck. Our last night we splurged on a smaller restaurant called O’ Gracia which specialized in more traditional Catalan cuisine like arroz negro and rabbit.

My main staple through the trip remained my late morning café con leche and “Pantomaca,” bread with garlic and tomato rubbed on it and, if it was a hungry day, ham Serrano and cheese (Manchego, a cheese as common to them as Cheddar is to us).

I have returned deeply inspired by Spanish food. I love that it is rustic and simple in many ways but relies on well-crafted ingredients. I wish I had the time and contacts to learn the craft of some of these foods. For now, I will have to rely on books and experimentation in my kitchen.

Note: These great photos from Tapas 24 are by “joone!” on Flickr.

The “preservation project” has become a family endeavor. My sisters have gotten involved in canning. I am so excited. My lil sis, Amanda, is a kick a** pastry chef who creates a learning environment while we cook together. Like when I stuck her fancy candy thermometer straight in the marmalade, cover and all and she showed me how to use it properly.

Amanda recently joined me to the Maker Faire to listen to some presentations on cheese making and fermentation. This corresponds nicely with my recent acquisition of buttermilk cultures and rennets from the New England Cheese Making Company. While I have been making yogurt for the last year, I tried my hand at buttermilk last weekend. We use it alot for cooking breads, cakes and pancakes. It seems to have come out nicely and was insanely easy to make. Next on my list is mozzarella and chevre. After the aged cheese presentation, I am a bit intimidated to try any hard cheeses. I don’t own my own special caves to age my cheese in…though I started eyeing the tunnel at Lake Merritt.

Yesterday’s scene in my kitchen with my sisters was precious. We dragged a comfy chair into the kitchen and my older sister, Antoinette, took care of the baby while Amanda and I sliced, boiled and stirred. Pots of preserves slowly reducing and sweeting provided a fertile environment for conversation.

The day’s canning included boysenberry jam, orange marmalade, and brandied cherries. I also made a batch of lemon curd on request. Amanda counted 18 jars of preserves from the days effort.

We next turned to trying our hands at sauerkraut and dill pickles. The presentation we saw suggested using plastic bags full of brine to weigh down the contents. I am as much into this process for the beauty as the product so this method is not working for me too well. I will be in search of glass weights that might work. in the mean time, we have ugly baggies. I think we may used jars a tad too small. We’ll see what develops.

I am in the process of developing a recipe section to the blog. I got as far as adding a heading in the sidebar but now I have to figure out how to add pages within it. Anyone know how to do this?

As mentioned before, I have been struggling with rats in the garden. Last autumn I noticed a cat hanging around my house alot so I tried to lure it to stick around and named her “killkillkill.” Then I found out she was not a feral cat but a smart indoor/outdoor cat who lived directly across the street and had several neighbors showering her fat butt with food and probably champagne. She has since moved.

On a random day when I could not deal with the rat problem, I packed a cat carrier in my car and headed straight to the SPCA to adopt an outdoor cat. I learned that the SPCA will not release an animal for adoption for outdoor living. However, there did tell me about some feral cat resources. One is the Island Cat Resources & Adoption (ICRA). They have an entire section on Garden Cats. ICRA animals for adoption have had the following:

• Spayed or neutered
• FeLV and FIV tested
• FVRCP vaccinated
• De-wormed
• Treated for fleas with Frontline

The Feral Cat Foundation (FCF) also looks like a great resource but I did not find information on their health and reproductive status. The FCF has a section of adoptable kitties dubbed, Barn Buddies. I especially like how all the barn buddy cat photos have them looking they are perpetually hunting. I fell fast in love with Pepper Annie at FCF. Her photo (at top) makes her look like she could do some damage.

In my search for a feline that would fit the farm lifestyle, I learned a few interesting things about feral cat adoption:

1) Black; black and white; and white cats are discriminated against for adoption. Now that I know this, the fact that my neighborhood is full of black and black/white cats says something about my neighbors. Did I mention I love my neighborhood?

2) Don’t expect to form a loving bond with your feral cat. Consider yourself fortunate that they stick around (I’m pretty sure I can do this. I am married after all).

3) When you encounter a feral cat, do not try to pet the cat or get your fingers near it (Wow).

4) Feral cats don’t purr or meow but they will hiss and growl and spit (Oh, thats fine. My Abuela Lupe is a little like that).

I kind of like the feeling that I may have to bust out a chair and whip to feed my feral cat. I’ll take adventure where I can get it.

I have encountered the dreaded problem of rats in my garden. I first noticed when I watched a rat come out at dusk and eat my first harvest of Fuji Apples in October. I was not so pleased and decided to harvest ASAP to avoid more destruction. I brought the apples into my cool dry basement where I had kept potatoes and winter squash successfully the year before. Within a few days a rat (or rats) had located the honey sweet apples and irresponsibly taken bites out of each one. Through December ferociously hungry rats gnawed clear through an industrial garbage can several times to eat the high protein turkey food housed within. Incidentally, they also managed to eat off the bottom of a brand new light weight water resistant bike pannier that contained an unused gel shot (caffeinated no less). As a desperate measure to ensure these heavily caffeinated and hungry rats did make their way into the house, I poisoned them. This is not a preferred method for a number of reasons but the snap traps did not work and I have negative zero interested in catch and release- catch maybe but release, no way. I found said rats postmortem.

It turns out the word is out in the rodent world and I am dealing with a persistent problem. One very fat one in particular has become so bold it walks around at all times in the day foraging very near to me. I watched it yank the last of my strawberries right off the plant. I did not get to eat one berry off those plants yet thanks to that rat. I am also concerned that its all day double duty implies babies near by.

I have considered all manner of methods to expire this animal and its kin- knife throwing; poison; pellet guns…which I learned are quite powerful. I found a pellet gun with a shooting distance of up to 575 yards (five football fields) and a .177 caliber pointed steel hunting pellet. From my hillside yard, I can see what is the Grand Avenue valley, 575 yards means a neighbors car or window across the main avenue and several blocks away. Then I learned that 1) Pellet guns sound just like actual guns when discharged and 2) It is completely “unlawful for any person to at any time fire or discharge, or cause to be fired or discharged, any firearm or any projectile weapon as defined in this chapter within the limits of [Oakland] (Code § 9.36.080).”

The city of Oakland considers the following as projectile weapons “air gun, air pistol, air rifle, gas-operated gun, BB gun, pellet gun, flare gun, dart gun, bow, cross-bow, slingshot, wrist rocket, blow gun, paint gun, or other similar device or instrument.” I find the listing of slingshots deeply ironic in a city where illegal firearms are discharged frequently.

Apparently a person “shall be guilty of a separate offense for each and every firing of a projectile weapon or discharge of a firearm, and shall be punished accordingly.” If you saw the size of the super tiny pellets, it would seem ridiculous to be punished for each and every one of them but it’s the law. Punishment includes up to $1,000 fine, less than 12 months of jail time and your neighbors thinking you are the biggest jackass in the world.

I retired the idea of shooting the rat from my dining room window and next turned to the natural and perfectly legal method of a hunting animal. My first thought was a feral barn cat that needs no human contact but will deter rodents. This may be a good long term approach but to rid the garden of her infestation I will need an animal that can actually mow down the population. This brings me to “Princess”, my sister’s Rat Terrier.
Turns out her high strung mess of a terrier is actually a keen rodent killer, or so she claimed. I brought Princess over, I pointed her in the direction of the bold fat rat as it poked it s head out of its spot and when I released her, she ran out of the garden, up the driveway and to the car where she sat obstinately looking to and fro from the car door to me. I brought her in the house to calm her nerves and she sat backed against the front door for about an hour shaking. So much for Princess the Fearless Rat Killer.

I looked into a catch and “release” and found one small enough for chipmunks but apparently even squirrels can fit in there. The thought of catching squirrels in plain sight of the rat made me think of what I know of the rat mammalian brain from my neuroscience courses. They are extremely smart, especially the wild ones. If they see the trap go off, they will not go near it.

I have decided to go with the Tomcat bait trap only big enough for rats and smaller rodents. I am sad to use the poison method but I cannot allow rats to live among my crops.

Time has been a scare commodity these days, as has been quiet and sanity. Today with hammers continuing to rock the house and saws squealing through metal, I decided to take a definite moment for myself. I floated through the farmers market on a flavorful cloud of the buche goat cheese from Pug’s Leap Farm and fresh berries. I splurged on some whiskey maple sage sausage and green garlic. Once home, I cooked a brunch for me and only me. My “housemates” have different dietary preferences than myself. I like to recognize what I am eating and find pleasure in the beauty and simplicity of my food. My housemates like food that is mushed and fried into a spicy rich saag. Granted one of my housemates is 90, which likey plays into the preference for mushy…but still. They also only eat meat when it is hidden in food and they claim not to know its there.

So I made a crispy breakfast pizza for myself. I loved the pizza before it went in the oven for its cool ingredients: Viking Purple Potatoes sliced and baked with olive oil, fresh herbs, and green garlic, more green garlic, rosemary, fresh mozzarella, the lovely Prather Ranch sausage and No Name’s egg on top (I stopped naming my birds for obvious reasons), some salt and pepper.

Absorbed in my world of simple beauty, flavors, and creativity, the sound of five men a few feet beneath me yelling to each other over their own noise faded. Now, fortified with my pot of tea, plate of pizza and the latest edition of Edible East Bay, I am ready to go locate a pellet gun to deal with the rat problem that has manifested this last year.

I was pretty excited to come home to Volume 18 of Make Magazine this week. They included an article I wrote on how to calculate your backyard diet. They also posted some helpful links online to plan out your food garden.

I have been thinking long and hard about motivation for the last year. I am fascinated by the idea of motivation and honestly don’t really understand what it is or how it works. Why do some people have more and others less? How is it that the most random influence can fuel an activity that seems against the odds of success? While I have endless questions on the nature of motivation, what really entertains me is to see myself act on my own motivation. What impels me and what creates barriers is unpredictable even to me.

In the last three weeks, Dipak has launched a project of such magnitude it is hard to understand. It is even harder to predict how it will impact the household. In these last few weeks when I have had running water, it has been only cold. My phone line (and therefore server) has been down on and off; the electricity functioning in only 1/2 the house; gas on and off; sewage lines broken, repaired, and broken again; no parking in the driveway; and all the furniture has been moved to the middle of rooms to shift weight to the center of the house.

Interestingly, I have had an exceedingly high tolerance for these inconveniences. The only thing that whipped me into a frothy mess of anger was when I found my garden hose buried beneath a pile of concrete. I had only two stipulations at the onset of this project. 1) Do not cut off my water source to the garden 2) Do not make my garden supplies inaccessible.

I’m thinking I was not thorough with my requests. I have had to crawl over piles of nail studded wood and other debris to reach my garden and animals. Yet, each morning, feed bucket in hand, I am determined to make it over the mountain of crap that was for some reason placed directly in my path to the garden. Even on the days with ten or so guys yielding jackhammers, bobcats and shovels, I am deeply motivated to look the other way and find a shred of sanity in the garden, Nesquick billboard and all.

My mother is the queen of craft. Growing up she taught us girls how to sew, crochet, work felt like no ones business, and make all manner of gifts with just about anything we might have had on hand. Naturally, she is always up to something. She’s always had a sweet potato growing in an old shoe somewhere. Her garden now is a little playland of mundane objects revived with sweet sprays of flowers. One of my personal favorites is her bird feeders. She drilled an impression on the bottom of a teacup saucer and glued the saucer to a dowel and the cup to the saucer. She stuck the whole thing in the ground and voila! a bird feeder.

I have a friend that decided years ago his claim to the “olden days” would be that we were alive to see the day of the $.10 avocado. That was only 17 years ago but give it another ten, when avocados are $5 each, and then we have a really marker in the timeline. Even today however, those of us that love the pale umami flesh of those precious fruit, also know they can be a real drag on the wallet. So when I moved into our home and realized the sad neglected tree in the back was an avocado, I was pretty excited. Even if it was old, brittle and according to the neighbor hadn’t produced fruit since some time on the mid 80s (due to a bad frost), I still held hope that some TLC might work. Each year I fed it, piled the compost on and gave it a little extra water in the dry months. For three years the spotted and yellow leaves continued to drop. The cracked bark flaked like the skin of a nonagenarian. Then, last year I noticed leaves came in February that appeared glossy and dark. I decided to try an old trick that my gramps told the family about years ago. He said, if an avocado tree has gone dormant due to cold, after the last frost of the year get a belt and whip it. Yup, whip it.

So with Dipak snickering at me, I did just that. I felt terrible but you know, sometimes tough love it the best kind. Its hard to isolate the causes of things out in the garden. There are so many uncontrolled factors. However, come April the tree had a tiny spray of blossoms on it. I monitored it for months with the high hopes of getting fruit. Especially since I had also started keeping bees right beneath the tree. But no. It bore no fruit.

This year however, the tree is covered in blossoms.

I do not know how avocados reproduce. I do not know if the flower is a female one day and a male the next or if another tree is needed. I do know that the signs of life in the last year indicate that it has been malnourished. Since I have no idea what really to do for it to coax it into bearing fruit I suggested to Dipak that we make a song and sing to it this year. Remembering last year’s whipping antics, he asked me if I was playing good cop bad cop with it. Haha, funny. Lets see who is laughing when we have pricey avocados dripping off the tree for free.

Actually, it’s my neighborhood that I love so much. I have the coolest neighbors. They are from such different places and perspectives but we seem to share a desire for connection and community. Now that I am such a chai drinker I love sharing it with others. It is a courtesy both Dipak, and my father-in-law, Kumar have impressed upon me. Accordingly, I recently had a neighbor, Angie, over for chai. I learned she is from Bolivia. And then I learned where exactly in South America Bolivia is.

Our conversation ambled comfortably along the path of new friendship. We talked about the urban farm. We shared our families stories of self sufficiency and good food. I shared that I recreated my experience out of need to express my identity. She misses her foods and culture and wants to grow and prepare food to reawaken this, and most importantly to share it with her young son.

I happen to have some lumber lying around, some landscape fabric that I got for free and a Saturday to help out. What more need be said?

This project is going to take several days to complete but the hardest parts are prepping the ground and hardscaping. I think these before and after photos convey the amount of labor we all put into the day’s effort.

Before

Step One: Weed Removal

As we launched into the massive project of pulling weeds, another neighbor, Susie, and her daughter came to help us (thank you so much!!). Then, several neighbors passing by offered to let us use their green bins (garbage cans for compostables) as they saw we would quickly fill our three. We ended up using six or seven. Everyone was so kind and generous.

Wrapped in the warmth of healthy work and a supportive neighborhood, we spent the day of intermittent rain digging and talking. It was a pleasure. I learned that Susie’s parents migrated from Germany and that they too grew their own food. Then, Angie’s mother-in-law joined us and I learned that her parents were farmers that ran a 40-acre farm in Mississippi. In fact, they grew their own food on the 5-acres they lived on. Their crop included cotton, peanuts, collards, and all other manner of food. I am excited to learn more about the culturally specific foods my neighbor’s families grew and prepared. My block is like a living encyclopedia of food heritage, not to mention a group of folks that are not afraid of rolling up their sleeves and turning the soil.