Urban Farming and Foraging

Urban chicken farming.  Backyard chickens.  There has been a lot of buzz the last couple of years about raising chickens in a city environment.  To the surprise of many, it is legal in our city.  Bean and I had discussed getting a couple of chickens  last summer and researched it a bit.  Bean has been communicating with a few chicken owners to find out what we would need.  

Bean set up a couple of visits to fellow city dwellers' chicken coops.  So armed with a bag of freshly made pear ginger scones we went visiting.

                                                     

  

I was very impressed with their set up. The coops were clean, neat and odor free. This is especially important in an urban environment. They have one rooster, a Plymouth rock rooster, that just showed up in their backyard and four hens of two different breeds.  I don't remember the breeds of the hens. So much for taking a notebook with me to take notes! Just like dogs or cats, different chicken breeds have their own personality and characteristics. The photo of the hen above is of a breed that is cold hardy, sweet tempered and quiet.  The other two hens are of a different breed and have a tendency to be more vocal according to the owners.  The chickens' wings are not clipped, but it seems that they have not had any problems with them roaming outside their yard. The owners let the chickens run around the yard for daily exercise. In other words, the chickens seemed to be well cared for pets. Their garden was lovely with flowers, herbs and vegetables growing and did not seem to be suffering at all with the chickens running around it.  The chickens were surprisingly calm and quiet.  

Bean and I will continue our research to decide if it is a feasible venture for our backyard.  I just love the fact that people around the city are looking at  their living spaces and seeing a variety of possibilities  that extend beyond the normal expectations of city living.  When Bean and I went on our neighborhood garden walk, we saw more people growing vegetables, composting, and collecting rain water than in previous years.  One backyard even had a very busy beehive.   

At our house we compost some of our garden waste and most of our kitchen scraps.  We have a cheap and easy worm composting system set up that is basically a big plastic bin with a cover and holes drilled in the top and side for air circulation.  Harvesting the worm castings is a bit trickier than in the expensive worm composters that you can buy, but it is definitely doable.  Worm castings = black gold for your garden and houseplants.  Amazingly, there really aren't any bad odors once the worm farm becomes established which doesn't take long.  Bean chops the scraps in the food processor which helps everything get processed faster.  He is the main worm farmer in the house.

I love our little garden, even though right now it is a bit of a mess.  There is a lot of deadheading and weeding to be done.  The weather has been horrible - 3 showers a day kind of horrible.  It's been difficult for me to muster up the energy in the last couple of weeks to work much in the yard.  I am such a baby.  Most of the plants on the other hand, seem to be loving it.  The cucumber plants have gone crazy, wild.   This is the first year I have grown cucumbers.  I am growing lemon cucumbers which outgrew the the 4 foot trellis I made for them two weeks after they were planted!  

Yesterday on my day off from work I did a bit of weeding which led me to my decision on what soup to make for lunch. Cold purslane  and cucumber soup!  I decided to finally engage in a little urban foraging!  Three years ago I was at a farmers' market and I spied bags of green that looked suspiciously familiar.  " This looks just like the weeds I am always pulling out of my garden in the middle of the summer."  "It's purslane," said the woman at the booth.  In the last three years I keep running into  purslane; in my garden,in books, on TV, on the net, in the cracks on the sidewalk.  It's a favorite vegetable of Gandhi I read. Henry David Thoreau enjoyed it stir fried as a side dish.  Chock full of vitamins and minerals.  Loaded with Omega 3 fatty acids.  I watched a Mediterranean cooking show where they gathered purslane and other plants for a frittata with wild greens.    Eat it raw, cook it, pickle it....

I decided that it was time to join the purslane party.                                                                                                            

              

Lunch was cold purslane cucumber soup with a delicious chicken curry salad made by Bean.  The soup was made of raw ingredients, nothing was cooked.  The purslane was tart and lemony.  Unfortunately I was a little heavy handed with the onion.  C'est la vie! There will be another day, another soup and plenty of purslane for the picking!                       

Man Cannot Live by Bread Alone. Add Tomatoes.

There is nothing like a fresh picked tomato still warm from the sun, nestled between slices of white bread slathered with  mayonnaise and a sprinkling of  salt and pepper. Perhaps the perfect summer meal. The taste of sunshine and afternoon showers...m mm.  Unfortunately, the tomatoes in my garden are still green and small and have a way to go before I'll be able to indulge in this summertime ritual. I thought that my tomatoes were doing just dandy until I visited gardens yesterday on my neighborhood's garden walk.  Merely two blocks away stand tomato plants over eight feet tall. Glorious, healthy tomato plants with red fruit.  I now have tomato envy. I don't think that I have ever seen such tall tomatoes. And it is only half way through the growing season! One would need a ladder to harvest!  I was so overwhelmed at the sight, that I forgot to take a picture to document the setup. While I am waiting for my own measly tomatoes to ripen, I will rely on the farmers' markets which fortunately  have tables piled high with tomatoes.

From December to June, my husband Bean  treats tomatoes like the poison love apples they were once thought to be.  "You're not going to put any of that red stuff on my salad, are you?"  Red Stuff.  They do not even deserve to be called tomatoes.  During the winter months he will only eat canned tomatoes that are cooked in a dish.  I can't really blame him.

It is hot and humid and time for some good easy summertime dishes.  I made some gazpacho, which rather freaked my husband out.  Why would I ruin beautiful tomatoes with some old stale bread?! Um... because that's how it's traditionally made.  It is a bread soup after all.  The tomatoes I used were not all a deep red color, but an assortment of heirlooms of different hues.  The resulting color was a pretty salmon hue.  My husband declared it pink soup.  Too girly for him perhaps?  Maybe it was the heat, but I couldn't help messing with him a bit.

Lunch was girly gazpacho soup with salmon pinwheels. Yeah, he liked it.  He still can't let go of the idea of stale bread in the soup thing, which is odd because one of his favorite salads is panzanella, which uses stale bread.

 

Lightly toasted bread, a variety of tomatoes, fresh basil,onions tossed with a lovely vinaigrette over a bed of French Merlot lettuce from my garden.  Stale bread has never tasted so good!  


I cannot forget to mention  a very easy soup that is very quick, adaptable and often served with stale tortilla chips, or fried tortilla strips.  Again, a recipe that can use left over bread, in this case tortillas.  Although I have made the soup often without the tortillas.  This is a great soup when fresh tomatoes are not readily available.

    Gazpacho

• 2 or 3 slices of bread  soaked in a cup of water
• 3 medium tomatoes (quickly blanched and peeled)
• 1/2 of a green pepper
• 1/2 of a red pepper
• 2/3 of a medium cucumber (saving the rest for garnish)
• 1/2 of a small onion
• 1 or 2 cloves of garlic
•  1/2 tsp cumin
• 1/4 c olive oil
• 2 Tbl red wine vinegar
• salt and pepper to taste

Traditionally the ingredients are mashed in a large mortar, but nowadays it is very easy to use the blender.  At this point you need to determine how chunky you would like your soup.  I like a very smooth soup with a bit of crunch from the peppers and garnish. I throw everything in the blender, but the peppers which I keep separate and mince very fine. You can throw everything into the blender though and blend as smooth or as chunky as you like.  Wring the bread out a bit when you put it in the blender and add water until you get the consistency that you like. I pour the blended soup into a large bowl and add the peppers and chill until needed.

I like a smooth soup to contrast with the crunchy bits of garnish.  In the soup pictured the garnish has chopped cucumber, finely minced onion, cilantro, minced and sliced hot red pepper and a splash of olive oil and a sprinkling of salt. The flowers if you are wondering are Johnny jump ups which do indeed jump up all over my garden.  Some other garnishes that would be nice are diced tomatoes, ham, chopped  hard boiled eggs,sweet peppers,  parsley or basil.





Southwestern Style (Tortilla) Soup  3-4 servings

• Strips of tortillas pan fried until golden or tortilla chips (optional)
• 1 small onion
• 1 tsp of cumin
• 1 jalapeno seeded and thinly sliced 
• 1 red sweet pepper
• 1 cup of cooked chicken, shredded
• 14 oz can of fire roasted tomatoes
•  3-4 cups of chicken stock
• 2 sprigs of fresh thyme 
• cilantro  (or fresh parsley)
• Salt and pepper
• 1 lime

Garnish suggestions:  diced avocado, shredded cheese,queso fresco, scallions


Saute the onions, sweet pepper, jalapeno,thyme leaves, cumin, salt and pepper for 8- 10 minutes.  Add the chicken stock, canned tomatoes with juice and simmer for about 10 minutes.Add the chicken and heat through thoroughly. Stir in chopped cilantro or parsley.  Right before serving add juice of one lime, or add juice and individual wedges of lime into each bowl. 

When serving place some tortilla strips at the bottom of the bowl and pour the soup over.

The flavor of this soup can be changed by using different kinds of hot peppers: jalapenos, serranos, poblanos, Anaheim, dried peppers.  You can also add other ingredients to the soup  such as corn, garbanzo beans or black beans.  Just make sure that the beans are cooked before adding to the soup.


Make it your own!