My Organic Journey - Bringing Home the Bacon

Saturday was thrilling. We drove out to Fenwood Farm and I think I smiled from ear to ear the whole time; It's rare that I get my husband out of his office due to school. Between that and bringing my son to a real farm for the first time was spectacular. We arrive to see a few couples leaving and pulled up outside a fenced area with 6 emus. One we thought was doing his morning prayer ritual only to see him get up and see two doing a kind of ritual. My son's first romantic encounter. The driveway was lined with trees and had to be 2 miles long. It was quite romantic. They also have large fields on either side for corn. We pulled up to a house where on the side was the store. inside was small but they had maybe 5 deep freezers and a sliding wall fridge with all kinds of different meats and cuts. To my surprise with every purchase they give you a bag of organic chicken bones for free. Saves at least 10 bucks and homemade chicken stock is the best. So far, I've made turkey sandwiches for anyone who wants and broccoli leek soup out of the homemade stock. At present I have the bones of a 20 pound turkey stewing for turkey stock. None of which I contemplate my demise while enjoying every bite. My goal is to make a few dishes. One I plan is a buckwheat pasta turkey salad and of course some homemade turkey soup. As the title says, I also bought organic bacon and breakfast sausage which I'll use when the urge takes me there. I'm sure it will be in the company of my wonderful family and probably some friends. I look forward to telling you more about my organic journey.

Fenwood Farms - My organic Journey

I got an email yesterday from Carol Fennema about my order for a humanely raised turkey.It's going to be ready for pick-up next weekend. I plan to roast it and use it for a number of dinners and lunches and maybe a midnight sandwich or two. I will also make an incredible stock with it that I can use for a variety of dishes and soups. I also got organic bacon. I've had organic bacon twice before and there is nothing like it. So here is how my quest for sustainable meat for consumption started. Well... I'll tell you why I went looking recently. I was going to order a Turkey for Christmas from Beretta Farms. I never got around to it and one of the reasons is because its all the way in King City which seems like quite a drive. It was also our first celebratory Christmas dinner and I decided on duck instead, which I already had in the freezer. In the new year I started looking for a local, organic meat CSA to subscribe to but I didn't find one that suited my budget and desire. I wanted not just beef but whole organic chicken or Turkey, organic bacon and beef in a combination box. I found wholeearth.com and stoddart.ca as well as looking through all the farms listed on the eatwild.com website which I found on Michael Pollan's website under the resource section. I finally came across Fenwood Farm and I can't, for the life of me, find the website that gave me a link to their farm but I'm sure glad to have placed an order via an online submission form. What pushed me over the edge to buy this turkey was that the price was not that much higher than a regular turkey you buy in the store. In fact,I bought a smaller utility turkey from a generic grocery store a few weeks ago. Cooked to perfection but every time I ate it I had this conversation in my head. Is this bird going to kill me? how was it processed? Did all the people involved in getting this to the store take as much care as needed to ensure I wouldn't get sick? When did he loose his wing? Why? Do I need to know? Instead of enjoying a perfectly cooked delicious turkey I was paranoid, I couldn't enjoy it to the fullest and maybe I was just lucky not to get sick. As Marion Nelson writes in her book "What to Eat" 370,000 people in the US every year get sick because of something preventable in the food chain. 5000 people die every year because of the industrialization of food. I had to get closer to my food source so I'm going to the farm to personally shake the hand of the person who has cared for my bird and then I'm going to enjoy it in probably close to 20 different meals. I'm going to walk on the grass that my turkey walked on and I'm going to be fed by the people who fed my bird. I'm pretty excited to embark on my organic journey. I feel like its an adventure and in some way I am becoming directly linked to my food. I am becoming an active participant in the food chain instead of a bystander. I am slowly coming out of the coma of food commodity. I'll let you know how it goes.

Toddler Pneumonia

My 18 month old son was diagnosed with pneumonia yesterday. I was 2.5 hours away doing a sales call and my husband was just under an hour away. I immediately called the doctor when our daycare provider (that baby whisperer) said his fever was back. This would have been the 3rd day that I had thought the fever was gone. We had 30 minutes to get to the Doctors office before the doctor was gone and I had his health card. Talk about a stressful situation. I knew if the pediatrician didn't see him the walk in clinic would require his health card.

Although, I didn't know it was toddler pneumonia at the time, I knew it was serious with a fever back again!

My husband arrived at the doctor's office and she was kind enough to wait in order to see my son. She quickly diagnosed him and sent us down for an x-ray confirming the infection in his lungs. Mild pneumonia, confirmed.

I was feeling really guilty about not catching it sooner. I thought he just had a cold because he was acting his normal self. Playing lots, running around. I knew he was sick because he wasn't sleeping well and he was coughing a little.

The Doctor prescribed him Amoxicillin 3mls 3 times a day and already the mucous is starting to come up. His nose if running more and I can hear it come up when he coughs.

My homemade remedies to sooth and help the antibiotics are:

steaming the bathroom for 10 minutes and clapping his chest and back with my hands for another 5 minutes 3-4 times a day. Including honey and cinnamon into his cereal before bedtime at night. Warm air humidifier in the bedroom during all sleep times.

Here is a helpful website I referred to when learning more on the illness: Dr. Sears  I also check this website for many other questions I have about the golden boy.

First Family Christmas

We started off small. Still no decorations, no tree, no stockings. But, at least we had our own intimate Christmas celebration.

The week before Christmas I decided I was going to have a private dinner for us, just the three of us. Being on a tight budget I thought about what I could make for dinner. I remembered the whole duck I had sitting in the freezer, he was there for the perfect meal. I get so sick of turkey after celebrating both US and Canadian Thanksgiving so I was relieved to have something different. I paired it with a double baked mash potatoes that I roasted in the duck drippings, smothered them in balderson white cheddar cheese for a delicious dish that will keep me happy for years. I think the rest of the fam liked it too.

We kept it small, no dessert. Duck, double mash potatoes and some veg. It was a perfect start to a new family tradition.

For Christmas morning I wanted to have a new tradition too. Lattes, a breakfast casserole and fresh, hot sourdough bread. Another hit that will remain our family tradition for years to come.

I am looking forward to adding something to the festivities every year. Next year we'll get adventurous and pick out a tree. Hopefully our delightful kitties will resist the temptation to get it horizontal too early and we'll enjoy it for a month. Maybe I'll even throw in a from scratch pumpkin pie, my babe will never get sick of that number.

What are your favourite things during the holidays that make it special and create cherished memories?