Dear Nature Academy: Week 1

Dear Nature Academy,

I must admit that today I was a little nervous...  I knew you all were special.  I've heard all the amazing stories about your infectious and deep characters, your strong spirits, intelligence and maturity.  I saw many of you at Jon Young's talk at the Monge Family home a few months back, I heard your stories about your Sespie adventure, and I've interacted with most of your parents.  I have greatly admired each of you before having met you, and I wanted to make sure that I was worthy of your work and efforts on my land.  I wanted you to feel welcomed and free.

And then you all got here!  Miles on his bike and everyone else caravanning up my driveway!  Excitement!  And then I was greeted with your amazing smiles.  I instantly felt normal again and at ease.  How great you all are.  So full of youth and life, and bursting with energy and will.  I said it at our closing circle and I meant it with all my heart.  The homestead felt fully alive today.  Thank you for bringing that energy to this place.

So our day begun!  I was able to greet you with the exciting news that our Mama Cat had given birth in the wee hours of the morning, and so we went on a kitten hunt!  There was no fruit from our labors other than the deduction that Mama Cat had her brood stashed deep beneath my house.  But still so fun!

Following that was goat introductions!  You all got to meet Miko, Terra, Lady, Ivy, and the babies, Honor, Opal, Timber and Darryl.  I loved seeing that you all had gravitated to the spot where our beloved Daisy was buried.  It was so sweet to sit around her little tree that her babies have relentlessly nibbled, and talk about all the benefits and beauty of raw goats milk.  She is the one that taught it all to me, so it was a perfect spot to pass on some of that knowledge.  I know she loved it.  : )  We talked about holistic approaches to raising these amazing creatures, about different types of cheeses and how they are made. 

And then we dined!  It was such a pleasure to prepare food for you all!  I hope that through my food, you felt my deep appreciation for each of your lives and for your presence here with me.  I made you two flavors of fresh goat cheese: rosemary with garlic and honey with sea salt.  I also made a couple loaves of french bread, and a frittata.  Here is the frittata recipe if anyone is curious:

2 sweet potatoes (cut into 1/2" cubes)
1 leek (sliced white part only!)
1 cup cooked black beans
3 stalks of asparagus (chopped into small slices)
10 eggs (beaten with a splash of milk)
coconut oil

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Melt the oil in an oven safe pan.  Add the sweet potatoes and fry until tender.  Add in the leek and cook for a minute.  Add in beans and asparagus and cook for 2-3 minutes.  At this point season the dish as you would like.  I added nutmeg, oregano, sea salt, just a little garlic powder and black pepper.  Stir to mix spices in then add in the egg mixture.  Cook in the pan for a minute to set the outer edges of the egg and then put into the oven for 10-12 minutes.  Don't let it brown too much on the top or else it will be dry.  You want to be just done.  Enjoy!

I loved that Doran reminded me to discuss hazards!  The most important of those was to be mindful of nails or screws that may be on the ground in the project zones, and to keep your eyes out for snakes! 

Then you guys said something amazing...  You wanted to do my chores... Whoa...  lol!  So I showed you all our grain mix recipe that gets fed to the goats and pig, and several of you participated in mixing the grains for me.  Made me so happy!  Here is the recipe we followed:

16% protein ration:
Ingredient	Amount
Whole Peas	3#
Whole Barley	3#
Whole Oats	2#
Black Oil Sunflower Seeds	1#

In the blink of an eye our day was at it's end.  We said our goodbye's, looking forward to next week's milking lessons, herbal medicine making and getting started on the bathtub herb garden project you guys wanted to work on.  I sent a link to a fun goat video for you all to watch in preparation for next week.  Here it is:

Blessings friends!

In gratitude,
Shayna

Farm Fresh Rice Pudding

The other night I got a little over zealous with the amount of rice that I cooked for dinner, and I ended up with A LOT of leftovers!  Fortunately I had the idea for this super simple recipe in my back pocket!  I looked around on the internet for some inspiration, and found lots of rice pudding recipes that called for cream, half and half, or fat free milk even... Cornstarch, egg whites only, and *gasp*, no butter! No thanks.  You know I had to throw my own little farmstead twist on it, so I put the recipes away and headed to the kitchen with just my fresh ingredients, and a slight understanding on how to get pudding to come together.

When I write and share recipes, I like to write them exactly as I did it with the exact ingredients that I used.  Since I use raw goats milk in all of my recipes, that's how I write them, but by all means use what ever milk you have easy access to or prefer.

So without further ado...

Farm Fresh Rice Pudding

2 1/2 cups of leftover sweet brown rice
4 1/2 cups raw goats milk
2/3 cups organic evaporated cane juice
pinch of salt
1 farm fresh egg, beaten
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp real butter
Cinnamon for garnishing

Combine the rice, milk, sugar and salt in a saucepan, and heat over medium heat.  Slowly bring to a boil, stirring often to prevent the milk from scorching on the bottom of the pan.  Meanwhile beat the egg well in a separate bowl.  When the milk mixture reaches a boil, remove about 1/4 cup and very slowly add it to the beaten egg, stirring constantly and vigorously.  This process is bringing the egg to the appropriate temperature so that when you add it to the milk mixture it doesn't cook too fast and you end up with chunks of egg in your pudding.  When it is well mixed, very slowly add the egg mixture into the milk mixture, again stirring constantly a vigorously.  A whisk works well for this job.  Continue to simmer and constantly stir the pudding until it is nice and thick like a custard.  This can take 20-25 minutes.  Once it is properly thickened, remove from heat, and stir in the vanilla and butter.  Transfer to a glass bowl, cover with plastic wrap, and place in the refrigerator to completely cool.  If you press the plastic wrap all the way down to touch the top of the pudding it will prevent it from forming a "skin."  I prefer not to do that though, because the skin doesn't bother me and it's super easy to stir it back in when it's time to serve up the pudding.  When you are ready to serve your pudding, spoon it into cute little glass dishes and sprinkle with cinnamon. 

And that's it!  A great, fun and yummy way to use up my plethora of milk!  Enjoy!