Parsnips, spring treats!

Parsnips just dug in the field

Parsnips awaiting scrubbing and chopping

Parsnips cooking!!!

Here is one of my favorite treats of the farm harvest year.  These spring dug, overwintered Parsnips are one of the tastier things in life.  You just cannot purchase parsnips with flavor like this in a grocery store.

It takes a bit of planning, and parsnip planting time is coming right up.  I like to get seeds in the ground in late April or early May.  Parsnip seed is only viable for one season, so make sure you get seed for the 2013 season. Don't plant last years left over seed either, get new seed.  Then Parsnips take about 30 days to germinate, so patience is required.  Many home growers plant a line of radishes an inch away from the Parsnips.  Radishes mature in 30 days so the timing is usually good.

Water, weed, thin and wait.  You can mulch the parsnips in the fall, but the freezing of the soil will not damage the root and just improves the flavor.  Try it for yourself, dig a parsnip in the fall, the flavor will be a bit harsh, almost bitter.  But after a few months of freezing weather in the fall and winter, dig up another one, the flavor will be rich, sweet and irresistible!  Parsnips are easy to store, just leave them in the ground! If you have any left, you will need to dig them in the spring once they start to grow a new green top again. The texture of the root will change and get too woody to eat.  You can always leave a few to go to seed if you like to collect your own seeds.

My current favorite cooking method is just to wash, slice and slowly braise or sauté' the roots in coconut oil with a pat of butter added about 10 to 15 minutes into the process, I also sometimes add a 1/4 cup of water and put a lid over the pan for 5 minutes to soften the parsnips a bit more.  Parsnips are also great added to roasts, chicken or meat or veggies.  Shredded raw parsnips can make a great curry style coleslaw.  You can go to my web site, www.morningstarfarmoftaos.com and click on the recipe link for more recipes.

ENJOY!  Farmer Melinda

Here is the finished pile, with me the proud author and teacher!  Notice that in El Salvador the readily available material for covering the pile was banana leaves.

Here is Rosa, watering the compost pile, note the leaves on top of the manure.

Compost 101

Seems like it might be time to discuss this magical and mystical stuff "Compost"

I have been making and using the stuff for twenty years now, and it seems that there is a lot of mystique surrounding the making of compost. I have to wonder about that. Compost is pretty straightforward stuff. Maybe like learning to bake a good load of bread.

Let's start with a general list of ingredients. What is needed for success is a combination or mix of materials. Stuff rich in carbon, (not carharcol ), like dry plant material, leaves, straw and such. Then you need something for nitrogen, like fresh green plant materials, your kitchen scraps, coffee grounds, or manure.  What else? Water and time! The correct percentage of nitrogen to carbon is 25 to 30% nitrogen to 70 or 75% carbon.

I think the problems start when you have to guess the amounts of carbon vs nitrogen any given material contains . I try for a mix based on volume. One good tip off is the ordor level of the pile. A pile too rich in nitrogen gives off a rather putrid ordor for several weeks. A thick covering of leaves or straw can often right this problem.

Then comes the water element. In the southwest we have to drench the pile as we build it such that water pools up and really makes a muddy mess! Then we have to find a porous covering that retains moisture. I like to use carpet, old funky stuff that is being torn out and taken to the dump. In a wetter climate you might have to consider keeping water out of the pile, but microbes won't grow and live in a dry pile and without them your pile will be a flop!

Time? I allow 5 to 6 months for my pile to complete the digestion process of the microbes. In a warmer climate less time will be needed. Also if you start with smaller pieces of material the process is faster too. I think here in El Salvador a pile with manure and leaves will finish in 3 months. One farmer wants to make pile with some large stuff, banana plants, palm leaves, whole corn stalks. I guess this pile might take up to year to break down.

How do you know the pile is ready? Smell and looks. The pile will smell like rich sweet soil and large plant stems, leaves and such will be smaller, broken down.

I build piles by layering materials and watering each additional ingredient. For example, in Romero we started with a bottom layer of large dry stalky plant material, ie carbon. We watered that thoroughly. Next we spread a layer of manure, water, dry leaves, water, manure and so on. We covered the pile with a deep layer of dry leaves and then topped it off with a layer of banana leaves.

Other problems you may encounter are animal pests digging in your pile. I don't have much trouvé with this. A disturbed pile can just be reformed . If need be you will have to get creative with chicken wire, pallets and such.

I hope you are getting the idea that this a process, and one that you will certainly perfect with some trial and error. Until you find a good mix of materials to work with, I would suggest that you keep a record of what you use, the date you started the pile and what you think of the results.

Take your recycling efforts and your garden soil to the next level and build a compost pile in 2013!

Wow, lots going on here, but all at this slow pace of  Latin American.
I met with a few local growers and shared a bit about Morning Star Farm. What I grow, how and to whom I sell veggies to. Also about my growing practices. I was fore warned that even these small growers who wanted to use organic growing methods used chemicals. It was still shocking to see my host family father all dressed in rainwear with a dust mask on spraying some kind of pesticide .  Not very appealing to come onto his finca and weed for a few hours anymore.
Today I had an even bigger shock. Helicopters spraying pesticides on sugar came crops. Just plain nasty! The backyard wells here are all contaminated, and it is common for kids and older men mostly to die of kidney failure. What for? So the one large landowner can make a buck! The spraying really affects these small guys tryin to feed their families using organic methods.
What happens is that these blanket sprayings is that the entire insect population is killed, both the pest and the beneficial insects. As nature works the pests are faster at repopulating themselves, with the beneficial lagging behind a bit, must have a secure food supply you know? Anyhow when you blanket spray even with an organic pesticide, you continually disrupt this balance and your crops take the brunt of this imbalance. Here and in Baja it seems that white fly populations just take over.
My immediate response was just to shoot down the helicopter. This of course creates so many more problems than it solves, but, well , it is a very real feeling. As the day has unfolded I realize a far better solution would be for consumers to purchase organic sugar. I now know up close how much damage the chemical agriculture of sugar came causes.
Oops , hard to stay on track, back to the small growers. I ended the meeting by offering to come out to their parcelas, get a tour, and make a compost pile. I got permission to make a pile at the research garden and was feeling pretty comfortable about finding a good balance of carbon to nitrogenous materials with which to build a good pile. Have I already mentioned how eager I was upon my arrival to make some compost out of all this great manure . Have I lost my marbles or what?!? Been practicing BioDynamics for too many years now and I have never had the opportunity to use such great manure. Fresh cow manure from grass fed milk cows, like a pig in the mud.  I have made 2 piles with appointments to make 2 more in January.

First week of work in El Salvador

El Salvador continued......
Last week was my first official week of work and true to Latin American culture, it got off to a slow start.
I did get a better look at the demonstration garden at the center in Cudidad Romero. I am still thinking about how to up grade the drip system there and stick with the original idea to create one using   various material readily available and spending as little money as possible.
I spent Thursday getting dirty working with Freddy and Geraldo, the two gardeners at the center. We spent the day making a batch of Bocashi compost. I was quite pleased until I heard the pile had to be turned everyday for the next two weeks. I never turn compost piles! I was pleased to learn that they are paying good attention to the composting process and turn the pile because it heats up too much other wise and kills all the microbiology. I am hoping we can build a few other piles and experiment with creating a quality compost that does not require the labour  of turning it!
Another exciting thing to me is their new seed bank! So great to see their traditional seeds beimg saved and re-used. There are 4 or 5 types of corn commonly used, about the same amount of beans and various other vegetables. Other farmers are dropping seeds by, so the collection is growing .

I took advantage of my weekend and headed up to Alergria a lovely small town on the side of the Volcano Tecapa. I got out for a 3 hour hike up
And over the volcano with a great of lakes, the rio Lempa, the Pacific and beyond. 
I better quit while I am ahead so to speak, this technology is getting the best of me and I am reduced to posting blogs using the screen on my I phone. So please excuse any typo's. Onward
Melinda 

El Salvador

Hey, I finally got back onto my blogspot! I have been living on El
Salvador these past three weeks, and today starts my first month volunteering with the Mangrove association.
I spent my first two weeks in the capital San Salvador living with a Salvadorian family attending classes in Spanish . My family consisted of two women who did a great job mothering me and showing me around. They fixed my hair, painted my fingernails, went to the beach with me and Nena took me out Salsa dancing.
Spanish classes were great. The second week I was the only student at my level, so I got some great private lessons. I spent my afternoons in a Cultural and Political program. This turned out to be daily field trips with Don Oscar a great guide, so well versed in history. He was delightful and we went to many  museums, a few cathedrals, the war memorial, the Jardin Botanical, a organic coffee plantation owed by a cooperative, the Devils door, which is a really great formation of rocks that affords a view of half the country. Keep in mind that El Salvador is the size of Virgina and takes about 3 hours to get across the entire country.
The violence and grief from the Civil war is still very present here . Everywhere you go there are paintings and posters of Father Romero. He made a profound statemt shortly before his assisination, he said"If they kill me, I will be resurrected in the actions of my people". I am also in awe of how involved and educated everyone seems to be about matters of Political and Social justice. Americans seem so uninformed and apathetic in comparison .
Let me give some quick background information. At the end of the Civil War, 12 years ago the peace accords broke up the largest land holdings on this country and started a process to give parcels
of land to campesinos. Some of this land has returned to larger holdings, but most of the land here in the Bajo Lempa region is now owned by small land owners and they are building new communities with schools, public water systems and farming.  I am continually impressed by their knowledge of the enviremt, and there willingness to make personal sacrifices for the bigger good. Let me give a specfic example or two. Last week I got to see a Mangrove restoration project. The people in the surrounding pueblos dig out a canal by hand, hauling mud out by hand on canoes. It took them about 3months. The results just 3 months later are astounding , partially because they did not have access to large earth moving equipment and so had a very low impact on the environment as they worked. Mangroves must have a certain mix of salt with fresh water to thrive. Then in this Eco system there is particular type of crab. The emviromental impact studies showed they could sustainably harvest about 2000 a month instead of the 5000 they were harvesting. So the communities came together and agreed to a system of harvesting so that they were harvesting the 2000 crabs instead of the 5000.
I must wrap things up for today, I need to pick up my bike from the repair shop now. I will get back soon and share more about the Agriculture here and get some photos posted .
Ciao Farmer Melinda