Lifescapes

Mesquite: Drought Notes #5

One tree that is unaffected by our two-year "exceptional" drought is the mesquite, an important tree in the ecology of our area. So many different species depend on it, from insects (especially bees) that thrive on the nectar of the flowers to raccoons, deer, coyotes, rabbits, and more that eat every ripe mesquite bean they can find. The other day, our neighbor noticed a fox under one of our mesquite trees. Pausing to watch, he saw another fox jump out of the tree, and the two foxes trotted off together. I love the story: I didn't know that foxes can climb trees! There's more about the mesquite here, but I want to tell you about my own adventure with this remarkable tree.

Yesteray afternoon I went out to the garden and collected a basket (about two pounds) of ripe mesquite beans. I picked them up inside the fenced garden, where they littered the ground, safe from the deer and other animals that have cleaned them up around the other trees. I dried the beans in the solar oven (2 hours, about 180 degrees). (Click on the photo for a larger view). Then I snapped them and ground them in my small metate, using a mano. I also tried grinding them in my blender and in the coffee grinder (I don't own a food processor), but stuck with the traditional hand-method, which seemed to me just as fast and considerably more satisfying.

This is what the grinding process looked like. The pods ground readily, to a fine, sticky, sugary meal. The seeds were much harder. With a great deal more effort, I might have been able to grind them too, but I gave it up: everything I've read suggests that the protein and sugars are mostly in the pods. The grinding itself was extraordinarily interesting. The tools--the metate and mano--are ancient, and as I was working with them, I felt a wonderfully strong connection to the uncounted and unnamed women of past times who have used these same tools to perform this same vitally important task: making meal of their wild-gathered or gardened seeds and grains--mesquite, maize, amaranth.

The result of an hour's work: about two cups of fine mesquite meal. It's surprisingly sweet to the taste and sticky with sugars. (As a medicinal, mesquite is under scientific study as a possible control for diabetes.) I've refrigerated it and will make some muffins with it in a few days, when Bill gets back from his trip to New Mexico. I'll let you know how it tastes.

I've been involved with gardening and food-raising most of my life, and I'm always impressed by how much work it takes to make anything "from scratch," whether it's growing and cooking our own potatoes or corn or green beans or chickens or other meat. Making mesquite meal certainly belongs in the "lots of work" category. But while I was working, I was thinking about how dependent we are on our extraordinarily complex, fossil-fueled food production system, and how little capable most of us are at the task of producing our own food, "from scratch." It was sobering thought, and a sobering experience.

I'll let you know how those muffins turn out.

Reading note I don't think we're looking for a single model [of food production]--one size fits all. The problem with our current food system: it is a monoculture economically, as well as on the ground. We have to let a thousand flowers bloom. We want to have many different food chains in this country because some of them are going to fail. We want to know that if there's a problem with organic, that we have local. And if there's a problem with local, that we even have conventional. We’re not looking for the right answer, the single answer for all of us, in all places. It's going to have to be locally adapted. And the more different food chains you have, the more resilient your food economy and the less likely you are to go hungry.--Michael Pollan, NPR, "Science Friday," Aug 21, 2009

Food and the Land

Food and the land. I've been thinking about this subject a great deal lately. Vegetable gardeners and farmers--those of us who have our hands in the dirt every day have to think about it.

But recently, more of us have been thinking about the relationship between the land and our food. I was surprised (shocked is more like it) and also very glad to see that Time Magazine is thinking about it, too--thinking enough about it to make this important topic their cover story this week: "The Real Cost of Cheap Food." Here's a paragraph:

"With the exhaustion of the soil, the impact of global warming and the inevitably rising price of oil -- which will affect everything from fertilizer to supermarket electricity bills -- our industrial style of food production will end sooner or later. As the developing world grows richer, hundreds of millions of people will want to shift to the same calorie-heavy, protein-rich diet that has made Americans so unhealthy -- demand for meat and poultry worldwide is set to rise 25% by 2015 -- but the earth can no longer deliver. Unless Americans radically rethink the way they grow and consume food, they face a future of eroded farmland, hollowed-out countryside, scarier germs, higher health costs -- and bland taste. Sustainable food has an elitist reputation, but each of us depends on the soil, animals and plants -- and as every farmer knows, if you don't take care of your land, it can't take care of you."

Every gardener knows this, too. That's why we pay as much attention to our compost pile as we do to the seeds we plant, and why we cultivate a closer connection with our local manure source--in my case, a pair of longhorn cows who are always willing to deliver.

I've also been thinking about food and the land in terms of a book that I was sent for review: Just Food: Where Locovores Get It Wrong and How We Can Truly Eat Responsibly, by James E. McWilliams. I expected to disagree with parts of the book, but as you'll see from my review, I disagreed with a lot more than that. I kept wanting the author to pay attention to the land, and especially to issues of climate change and resource depletion. That he didn't was a substantial disappointment.

And these days, I'm also thinking about food and the land because of the record-setting heat and drought here in Central and South Texas. Crops are dying, livestock is suffering, farmers and CSAs are forced to the brink of bankruptcy, gardeners are despairing. It's hard to know just how much of this two-year weather situation is just a part of the rainfall/temperature cycles we think of as "normal," or whether it's a real change in climate. But if this is a sign of what's to come with global warming (some forecasters foresee increased desertification throughout the Southwest), we're all in trouble. This situation has the potential to seriously affect our food.

Bottom line. We need to realize that our most intimate and enduring connection with the land is not scenic or recreational, it is through our food. Each one of us needs to commit to paying attention to what we eat; how it's grown; who owns and/or controls the seedstocks; who packages, distributes, and sells the food; and how it's advertised and marketed. These are hugely important topics. I hope you'll put these issues at the top of your list of important things to think, read, and talk about.

Reading note. What we really need to do is something Americans have never done well, and that's to quit thinking big. We already eat four times as much meat and dairy as the rest of the world, and there's not a nutritionist on the planet who would argue that 24‑oz. steaks and mounds of buttery mashed potatoes are what any person needs to stay alive. ...  The industrial food system fills us up but leaves us empty — it's based on selective forgetting. But what we eat — how it's raised and how it gets to us — has consequences that can't be ignored any longer--Time Magazine, August 21, 2009

Drought notes #4: no clouds

Here's a crepe myrtle blossom, keeping the faith--not much else in bloom these days, except for the stubborn portulacas, which just keep on keeping on, heat be damned. Today: #59 in the countdown of 100+ degree days, on track to break the record of 69 days set back in 1923. The difference between 1923 and 2009: the drought. It rained in 1923, so it was hot and damp. This year, it's hot and dry.

Here's a note from Bob Rose's blog. Bob is the meteorologist for the Lower Colorado River Authority, which is keeping an eye on the water in the Highland Lakes, all dangerously low. I was interested in his comment, because I hadn't thought of the heat from this angle.

But another reason this summer has been so oppressive for humans, pets and vegetation has been the number of sunny days. We’ve had very few days with enough clouds to block out the hot sun. I looked back at the weather records beginning June 1st and found only 2 cloudy days in June, 4 days in July and just 1 day so far in August. So all of us have literally wilted in the hot sun.  Of course it will take a lot more than clouds to break this drought, but they could at least help moderate the temperature.

He's right. We're all wilting under the constant sun. Another result of the heat: high electrical use. We're as frugal as possible with the AC and appliances and we have a small house, but our kWhs hit a record (for us) last month. And that's without my clothes dryer: I'm using a solar dryer now (called a clothesline).

Book report: Having more fun with the Darling Dahlias, primarily because of the 30s stuff. The time period just opens up so many possibilities--certainly makes the writing lively for me. I love learning new things. Today's rediscovery: roll-on garters. Thankfully, these were gone by the time I started wearing nylons (BP: before pantyhose), but I remember Mom wearing them. Ack. Wonder about the correlation between roll-on garters and varicose veins.

Don't forget the Cottage Tales Festival (see the post at the top of the page). Lots of chances to win a book, lots of fun stuff about Beatrix, the animals, the Lakes, and more.

Reading note. I think we are bound to, and by, nature. We may want to deny this connection and try to believe we control the external world, but every time there's a snowstorm or drought, we know our fate is tied to the world around us.--Alice Hoffman

  

You're Invited!

To celebrate the upcoming launch of The Tale of Applebeck Orchard, we're having a Cottage Tales Festival. And you're invited!

I've gone back through my blog visits and other posts and compiled ten of the best--lots of information about the Cottage Tales series, the individual books, the Lake District settings, and (of course!) Miss Potter herself. To make it easy for you to find these posts, Peggy (my webmistress, She Without Whom Nothing Gets Done) has set up a Festival Page of links and necessary information.

And of course, there are book drawings--ten of them! Advance reading copies of The Tale of Applebeck Orchard, first-edition copies of The Tale of Hill Top Farm, and a grand prize.

The Festival opens on Monday, August 17 and runs for two weeks (plus a couple of extra days for the final drawings). The more often you visit, the greater your chances of winning a book. So join us, please, for some Cottage Tales fun.--Susan Albert

Lessons and the Hadley Cell: Drought Notes #3

The garden is having a heat stroke, but a few things are holding on. This is Oaxacan green dent flour corn (not an "eating ear). Maybe it's better adapted to the heat. Over the years, I thought I'd become an experienced gardener. But I've never had experience with this kind of consistent dry heat. It's teaching me some new and interesting lessons about which plants grows and thrive, which sulk, which shrivels up and dies.

We're now in our 51st day of 100+ temperatures, due to the high-pressure ridge that's sitting on top of us. I got curious about that the other day, and looked around on the Internet and found that the heat is due to something called the Hadley Cell. The heat and moisture rise along the equator and spreads out in the upper atmosphere, rather like a fountain. The hot air, exhausted of its moisture, sinks back to earth at about 30 degrees latitude, north and south. (Sinking air creates high pressure.) We're at north latitude 30.7. So what we have is a huge blanket of smothery hot, dry air falling across us. Not complaining, just saying.... And just wondering whether next summer will bring a repeat performance. Unfortunately, global warming is likely to heat up the equatorial region, which means even more hot/dry stagnant summer air for us.

Moving forward with the Dahlias, finding several voices for it. I've been listening to Fannie Flagg reading an abridgement of Fried Green Tomatoes, which is helping me to hear Southern voices in my head. Love that book, love her reading even more.

Next week, to celebrate the upcoming publication of The Tale of Applebeck Orchard, I'll be putting up some posts about Beatrix Potter, the Lake District, and other bits and pieces related to the Cottage Tales. There'll be drawings for ARCs of the book. Maybe you'll get lucky and win your very own advance copy! So stay tuned here (and on Twitter and Facebook) for all the details.

Reading note. It ain't the heat, it's the humility.--Yogi Berra

Starting a New Series: Part 2

When I'm choosing a book to read, I'm happiest when I can find books that are firmly and authentically situated in a place--preferably a real place, even more preferably, someplace I've lived or visited or know something about. But I also like to read about foreign places, far-away places, even imaginary places. As long as the place seems real to me (even if it is entirely fictional), I'm happy.

The same thing is true when I settle down to write. Place is almost always at the top my mind. I may be writing from a place, or in a place, or about a place--whatever, place is important to me. And so, when I begin to think about a new book, and especially about a new series, place is one of the first things I think about.

I've already written about choosing the 1930s as the time period for my new mystery series, The Darling Dahlias. That part was easy. But it wasn't so easy to choose a place. At first, I thought about setting it in Texas--but that seemed too close to the China Bayles series, which is also set in Texas. Then, I thought about my home state of Illinois, or my mother's home state, Missouri. Both of those would be okay, but...

Then I thought about the South, and about Eudora Welty (who gardened in Mississippi) and one of my favorite garden writers, Elizabeth Lawrence, who gardened in North Carolina. Southern gardening, Southern women (like the wonderful characters in Fried Green Tomatoes and Steel Magnolias and To Kill a Mockingbird.) and Southern writers: Faulkner, of course, and Flannery O'Connor and Harper Lee and Truman Capote and Welty. Yes, the South. That's the place. But where? Near the Gulf coast, or in the mountains? East, in the Carolinas, or west, in Louisiana? Or.... 

I was thinking about all this when Bill and I drove through Alabama on the April book tour, and stopped in Monroeville. It's just a little dot on the map, but it's an important place, the site of Harper Lee's Mockingbird and Truman Capote's The Grass Harp. That's when I decided the series would be set in southern Alabama, and I would use Monroeville as a model--not an exact replica, but a source, a place in which imagination can take root, and flourish, and blossom.

So that's my place, these days. I'm living here in Texas (in the middle of the hottest, driest period in human record-keeping), but I'm also living in Southern Alabama, in the 1930s, with the Darling Dahlias. And I'm loving it.

Reading note. Feelings are bound up in place . . . Can one explain otherwise what makes a given dot on the map come passionately alive, for good and all? --Eudora Welty

Lindheimer's Muhly: Drought Notes #2

The color of this grass says it all, doesn't it? This is not an exotic "ornamental," but four clumps of the distinctive native grass called Lindheimer's Muhly, native to Texas, first recognized (and named for) the botanist Ferdinand Lindheimer, who settled in New Braufels in the 1840s and went about the task of identifying "new" species. Muhly is a tough, adaptive grass, much loved by cows and horses, that flourishes along creek banks and seeps in calcareous soils, here in the Hill Country. Meadow Knoll was part of a huge a ranch through the early 1970s, and much overgrazed. When Bill came here, he fenced out the cows. When we settled here, we found the muhly and encouraged it by careful trimming. The color you see here is it's normal October/November, post-freeze color, indicating high plant stress--and when the muhly is stressed, you can believe that everything else is even more stressed. You can also see several other brown trees in the background, and if you could look down the creek (dry now for 12 months, a record here), you'd see that all the little trees and shrubs are brown.

We got some rain on Thursday (.8"), just enough to green up the grass a little, temporarily reduce the fire danger, and cool the air a bit. We're very grateful. However, that relief doesn't change the fact that July, 2009, was the hottest month on record, since records have been kept in Austin TX. Not the hottest July, but the hottest month (an honor usually reserved for August). Here in the country, we used to be a few degrees cooler, but the soil temperatures are now as high as the asphalt temperatures in the paved-over city, so our temps here have been just as high as the 104s and 106s recorded in Austin.

The Dahlias are blooming. I'm starting Chapter 2 today, after fiddling for several days with the voice. I'll have more about that later this week. I want to answer a reader's question about place ("Why Alabama?") by posting about setting.

The garden is keeping on keeping on, with the summer plants (what's left of them--I've been ruthless, because I don't want to waste water) doing their summer thing. The eggplants and watermelons are producing, the corn is struggling (too hot, too windy), and the sweet potatoes look pretty good, although I have no idea what's going on with them underground. They hide their secrets until the day I dig them up. I don't know what's going on with the peanuts, either: this is the first time I've grown them. Maybe they're waiting for cooler weather to put out their peanut-producing runners? I've cut my Irish potatoes and have them ready to go into the ground this week--the cut sides need to dry for a few days. This week, I'll also be putting in some fall beans, spinach, and peas, for harvesting in September/October. We're building some new beds, so I'll have more space for experiments.

If you haven't seen the trailer for my new memoir, Together, Alone: A Memoir of Marriage and Place, please do take a look. It's beautiful. I love it.

Reading note. How hard it is to escape from places. However carefully one goes they hold you--you leave little bits of yourself fluttering on the fences--like rags and shreds of your very life.--Katherine Mansfield