Steeped In Herbs....

 I am still on my herb thing here….can’t get enough of them this time of the year – plus I am out in the garden clearing the way for new growth spending quality time with my herbs. Over the years herbs have come to mean something very special to me for my family, my life and healing.

First of all I incorporate them where ever and whenever I can, into nearly every aspect of my cooking, baking, and for our food and drink.  Their healing magical qualities then can infuse throughout my entire mind, body and soul because I am literally steeped in their energy.

Even though I have been walking this path for such a long time I still know I have quite a ways to go. My body is a work in progress as is my mind and spirit. Herbs have been my friend, my guide and my help over these many years and continue to expand their role in my life.

No matter what I am eating or drinking or what stage of food, fast and feast I am in – I find a way to include a variety of herbs with every meal. Tonight we had fresh rosemary bread, onion, nettle and cabbage stir-fry with herbed cous-cous…

Of course when I am fasting – these are the mainstay of my diet – I love the way an infusion of herbs can absorb directly into my system through my stomach wall. Herbs have such an intelligence, they go to work right away on functions and systems – just as nature intended.

If you haven’t yet entrusted your health to something ancient and wise – an energy who knows how to work with your body while creating only peace of mind – perhaps it’s time to befriend a herb!

Start out small – try a chamomile tea (get organic or grow your own), add some extra rosemary, thyme or sage to your meal – take a bath in sea salt and lavender.

Find a few ways to include herbs into your routine – your body will sing and your spirit will soar.  

April

Yarrow

Sage & Coconut Biscuits

Well, once again I find myself with things sitting around my cupboards and I want to be using it up....but also I like to expand my recipe base at the same time. Often we find ourselves stuck in with the way we cook, bake or go about preparing food.

When we venture out of that box and go back to the drawing board some interesting points tend to be raised. First of all you can do nearly anything - with what you've got. I am not one for special ingredients or strange stuff I will never use again or in anything else.

Secondly, we can tend to have some types of food we enjoy but only prepare it one or two ways. I was like that with cabbage, which I posted on yesterday with a lovely slow cooker recipe. But, I am also like that with coconut.

I love coconut - and use it shredded in several dishes such as muesli, cookies and cakes. I also like the coconut milk in rice dishes and a couple of soups I make. But that seemed to be it really - so yesterday I set about playing around in the kitchen with blocks of creamed coconut.

And the results were quite interesting! I ended up with a lovely biscuit that the kids loved and I can't wait to taste. It looked very much like a scone but I was told it was sweet and creamy tasting with a different texture from a floury scone.

To make these biscuits I did the following!

2 1/4 cups spelt or barley flour 

200 g creamed coconut

1 tablespoon rubbed sage

2 teaspoons baking soda

1/2 cup water (hot)

1/2 cup goat's yogurt or sour milk

sea salt

In a saucepan I poured the 1/2 cup hot water and added the coconut block - this was gently heated on the wood stove while being stirred until it was uniformly melted. In the meantime I preheated the oven to 180C and placed a piece of parchment over a baking sheet.

Next I measured out 2 of the cups of flour into a deep mixing bowl and added the other dry ingredients (soda, salt and sage). This was sifted around to mix thoroughly. In another small dish I placed the goat's yogurt - I ended up using half yogurt and half sour milk. (add 1 teaspoon cider vinegar to make the milk sour).

After mixing the milk mixture in with the coconut I added this to the flour in the deep mixing bowl. It will blend nicely into a soft ball which you can then turn out onto a floured surface. Use the extra flour to handle the dough sprinkling a little over top to keep it from sticking to your hands.

Flatten it down a little and start punching out round circles (sort of like cookies or scones) and placing them onto the cookie sheet. Once the dough is used up, sprinkle some more sage over top and put them in the oven for about 15 to 17 minutes. 

They turned out wonderfully (I made them twice with different flours) and smelled like they had butter inside - but they don't, it's just lovely coconut!

April

Sage & Coconut Biscuits 

Guinea Fowl - Crock Pot Recipe

Today I have been cooking a guinea fowl in the crock pot - mainly to see how it turns out but also in the hope of creating a new dish for us to all try. Although it is years since I have cooked one - it all comes back fairly quickly!

A guinea fowl is not like a chicken in that it is closer to it's wild cousins, has a completely different attitude and outlook on life and it's actually a useful animal. I remember them on the farm years ago, where they would behave like watch dogs alerting us to any foxes or strange goings-on.

Because they are very lean they also make a great addition to your Pagan Diet as well as give some other flavours and tastes in meals where you might have used chicken. Although the meat is mostly darker than domestic birds, it is far tastier.

I decided to cook this guinea fowl in the slow cooker in order to get the best flavour but also to ensure it wasn't tough in any way. I started out my adventure with 1 tablespoon of butter melting on the wood stove, then stirred in 1 tablespoon of spelt flour.

Next I added 1/4 cup of water to the butter mixture and kept stirring until it was all uniform looking. I placed this aside and prepared the bird for the crock pot. To do this I just washed and salted it inside and out and placed it on the bottom of the pot in 1 cup of boiling water.

Then I added the butter mixture and 1/4 cup of olive oil over top of the bird. Next I sprinkled 1 teaspoon each of dried sage and thyme and a few grains of ground black pepper. The slow cooker was on a high heat setting - this was left for the next 2 hours or so and then turned down to low.

Every hour I carefully basted the entire bird inside and out with the liquid in the bottom of the cooker and left it to simmer for another 3 hours. Once the meat was falling off the bones (each bird might be different depending on age and size) I turned it off to let it cool.

Now, there is lovely cooked guinea fowl meat for sandwiches, casserole, soup or stew or for just picking! My taste testers loved it added in to their chilli....

April

Guinea Fowl roasting in the crock pot

Vegetable Barley Soup with Sage & Ginger

All of this cold wet weather lends itself to warming, nourishing foods - of course the first thing on any agenda would be to cleanse, but once that detox is complete building your body up with some hearty vegetables in soups is a nice way to get back to yourself. 

I like using barley and would make cakes, cookies and breads with barley flour. Of course there is also Barley coffee which is a lovely warming drink especially on a cold winter night such as we have right now. And I love barley grain in a soup or stew.

Barley is a great thickener as well as a filling addition to any meal - it gives an earthy, nutty flavour to the dish and has been used in our foods for thousands of years. It is also easy to use and you don't need to add much.

Yesterday I made Vegetable Barley Soup with Sage & Ginger - this is a combination of tastes and textures that really work well together. And I happen to think that sage is the great underrated herb of all time.

We often only use it in stuffings or for fowl - but it is a very versatile plant and can be used nearly anywhere. I include it in my herbal teas as often as I can and have even made cookies with it - I will do a post on that soon.

To make my soup I started off as usual with the base - seaweed, garlic, onion, leek, salt, pepper, turmeric. I stir-fried the vegetables in a little olive oil then added them into the stockpot with the seaweed. 

Next I chopped carrots, sweet potato, turnip and a little pumpkin. These went into the pot along with only 1/3 cup of barley grain. This was brought to a boil and then turned down to simmer gently for about 45 minutes or so.

Once the soup was thickening and nearly cooked I put in 1/2 teaspoon each of ground sage (from my garden) and some ground ginger. Normally I would use fresh grated ginger for this type of soup, but as it was for my little daughter, I went easy on it so it would not be too strong.

Within about 10 minutes the soup was done, I let it sit for another while to cool - and then served it with a thick slice of homemade spelt bread with butter. It smelled and looked lovely!

April

Vegetable Barley Soup with Sage & Ginger