food security – Apocalypse Farm

Food Is Love

There are two kinds of food love, the kind that fixes a loved one’s favorite dishes, and the kind that makes sure loved ones are getting all the nutrients they need. Both are important, whether you’re feeding your human loves or your animal family.

I must be pretty good on the nutrition part. I have a 15-year-old chicken who gets greens and mealworms along with her pellets. Then there are the 14 and 15-year-old cats, whose feedings are as complicated as a newborn’s.

The cats regularly threw up the dry food I’d been feeding them for years. I transitioned to food for cats with digestion issues, and they threw that up, too. I switched them to pates, small portions several times a day, after researching which ones could satisfy their nutrient requirements. There’s still the occasional upchuck, but it’s no longer a daily cleanup chore. It’s a chore, nonetheless. I’ll take care of them and love them as long as they’re around, but I’ve decided no more cats.

When Dale and I got married, he assumed I was a good cook because I could make biscuits and gravy. He didn’t know that most of my repertoire was made up of experiments that I perfected for one of the many columns I wrote for the PERKINS JOURNAL. Maybe he was also swayed by my first book, a collection of interviews I did for the JOURNAL, each of which ended with the interviewee’s favorite recipe.

I was not a spectacular cook, and I never will be, but with a family to feed, I got better. And with all my nutrition research, their diets got healthier. The healthy part didn’t always go down well. Dale sure misses the biscuits and gravy, but he doesn’t need all that white flour and fat. That doesn’t mean I can’t make biscuits as an occasional treat.

I feed my family because I love them, but we need to spread the love. If we want to make a real difference in the world, what’s a better place to start than making sure the families in our communities are fed?

Does your community have a food bank? Do your local churches offer food assistance? Does your school provide nutritious meals, breakfasts and lunches, for everyone, regardless of their ability to pay? If not, is there something you can do to help?

I believe in public education for every child. If we want kids to be prepared to learn, they need to start the day with a full belly, with food that meets their nutritional needs. What if we spent as much money and time on free, healthy meals for our school kids as we do on sports? Don’t get me wrong; I think sports are an important learning tool, but if we put as much emphasis on our school cafeterias, and if we make sure students who can’t pay aren’t singled out, who knows what new sports star could come of it, or a new thinker, a new artist?

If you’re one of the lucky ones, donate to your local pantries. If you believe that free, healthy meals should be available in our public schools, write your legislators and tell them so. Do it for love.

The Last of the Pontiac Reds

Featured by sharonedgemartin

I just steamed the last of the lovely red potatoes I grew in my garden this spring, and it made me think of my Grandma Edge and her potato supply. She raised several long rows of potatoes in her garden on the east bank of Buck Creek. She kept the potatoes and the produce she canned in the storm shelter that was connected to the house by a breezeway. Her potatoes lasted into the winter. Mine don’t.

There’s two reasons mine don’t last. Pontiac Reds are one of my favorite potatoes, and they are early spouters. Also, I don’t grow nearly as many potatoes as Grandma did.

Grandma had help. There was a tractor to plow the long stretch of garden beside the creek. And when it came time to harvest, the potatoes were uncovered before family members went down to the creek with Grandma to gather them in. This potato gathering is one of my fondest memories. It may be why I grow my own potatoes when potatoes are always available at the grocery store. But I do like growing new varieties, discovering their textures and their tastes.

This year I got an inkling of what happens when something interferes with the potato harvest. Oklahoma weather is iffy. You never know if container gardening or in-ground gardening will be best. This year, the potatoes I planted in the ground produced almost nothing. I could blame moles, but I saw no sign of digging. I got a good crop from my containers, so I’m inclined to think it had something to do with the soil. A fungus, maybe?

My containers are old stock tanks. I drilled holes in the bottoms and filled them with good soil. I got enough potatoes from the containers to keep me to fall and to share a few with a friend.

Next year, I’ll dig new in-ground potato beds and see if I have better luck. I’ll plant King Harrys and Yukon Golds along with the Pontiac Reds to see if one variety is more successful than the other. I might even give in and start testing my garden soil like my friend, Phyllis, has been urging me to do. I’ll never be as self sufficient as my grandparents were, but I can do better. As I learn more, I’ll keep you posted.

What’s That Got to Do with the Price of Eggs?

September 27, 2023 by sharonedgemartin

I have one lonely chicken in my coop. Chickens are flock animals, and I feel guilty keeping Bessie here alone. She’s an English Creel, a bantam who roosts in the rafters of the coop. She’s at least fifteen years old, the only chicken left of the ten bantam pullets I ordered from Cackle Hatchery all those years ago.

She comes running when I walk toward the aptly-named run, the run that’s the reason I have only one chicken. It needs to be rebuilt. The framework is falling in, but Bessie’s still secure beneath the sagging chicken-wire cover. I could keep her in a cage while we’re rebuilding, but the plan was to let the last flock I bought as chicks live out their lives before we rebuilt. I didn’t expect them to live 13 years, 14 years, and in Bessie’s case, 15 years.

Meanwhile, I’m buying eggs from friends who have their small flocks. I don’t argue about the price, unless they charge too little. I know how much it costs to maintain chickens. Even when the pandemic and bird flu drove up the costs of eggs, they were still a bargain.

I understand that four and five-dollar eggs hurt the budgets of those whose budgets are already stretched thin. Still, a dozen eggs provides a family of four with 18 grams of protein each. So would a pound of beans. Eggs and beans can help stretch food dollars. And there’s good news on the inflation front. At my local dollar store, eggs sell for less than two dollars a dozen.

Would chickens in family yards be less likely to succumb to bird flu? Maybe we could start a chickens in every yard campaign, as they did during World War II. We would also need a nonprofit to build secure runs and tight coops in people’s back yards. We could call it Habitat for Poultry. I guess we could also teach people to make chicken stew when their old hens are no longer laying.

Meanwhile, I keep feeding Bessie and she keeps running to the gate to greet me. I’d like to think I could do the right thing if she were an essential source of nutrition for my family, but I just don’t know. She’s like a member of the family now.

Are We Back to Normal Yet?

Featured by sharonedgemartin

That depends on what you call normal. Oklahoma’s weather has always been a challenge. The natives who were forced here on the Trail of Tears called it “the place where it’s too hot in summer and too cold in winter.”

We could usually depend on spring and fall tornado season, though. Rain was hit or miss, but it was spread out across the seasons. To quote an author I can’t name but whose lines have stuck with me for years: “We average 27 inches of rain a year, but I’ve never known an average year.”

Rainfall patterns have changed. Oklahoma has known droughts before, but we seem to be evolving into a place where rains come as monsoons separated by long periods of no rain at all.

Last year, we had 15 inches of rain in a single month, that’s more than a third of the year’s average. This year, we had day after day after day of rain, but the rain was so light that the inches didn’t add up. Still, unlike last year, the tomatoes flourished. My pantry is full of the little Juliets that I can whole for winter salads and the Park Whoppers that I dice and can for winter soups, thanks to my friend, Phyllis, one of the most productive gardeners I know.

I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m not a great gardener. I can’t take the heat, so I neglect my garden in the hottest part of the summer. But I still manage to can and freeze and prepare. And what I’ve discovered during the last few painful years is that life goes on, and a full pantry takes away some of the worry.

I still see masks in the grocery store and understand, there are vulnerable people trying to go about their schedules. I go to the gym, and we hold our breaths when someone in our yoga or Tai Chi class is out sick. But life goes on, in the gym, in my kitchen, and in my garden.

Garden + Pantry = Tacos

July 2, 2019July 2, 2019 by sharonedgemartin

When I think about food preparedness, I don’t see a basement filled with freeze-dried meals. I see a sensible plan that includes pantry, shelves of home-canned produce, root cellar for storable foods, sprouts on the counter in winter, a garden and farmers’ markets in summer, DIY skills, and a community of likeminded people. As with any worthwhile endeavor, there’s more than one path to food security.

When it’s cold outside and time is short, I stir up pantry meals with a side of greens. Right now, though, garden produce is coming in. Some meals are all garden, like yesterday’s new potatoes and green beans. Today’s lunch was a hybrid meal, part garden and part pantry,

On my way home from yoga this morning, I was wondering what to do with the half package of taco shells in the pantry. Chicken tacos, that’s what!

My friend Phyllis grew a lot of onions. I didn’t get mine in the ground this year. Thankfully, she shared. I have tomatoes coming along nicely, green ones, but I picked up a few pounds of ripe ones last week at the farmers’ market. Add chicken, some fat for sautéing, homemade salsa from last season, and some good cheese. Yep, I had everything I needed.

I have an abundance of seasonings, food for the taste buds and the soul. One might even call me a seasonings hoarder, except I use them up and I share them.

I sautéed the onions, added leftover chicken meat, and seasoned to taste. If you don’t have leftover chicken in the fridge, use canned chicken.

I warmed the shells, chopped tomatoes, shredded cheese and set it all on the table with the salsa. It was as delicious as I hoped it would be. And simple.

This winter, when there are no more tomatoes ripening on the counter, make sure you have a few jars of whole, canned cherry tomatoes in the pantry. They taste almost as good as the freshly chopped tomatoes we ate today. Almost.

Twenty-First-Century Skills

August 6, 2018August 7, 2018 by sharonedgemartin

Evidently it has become a problem that so few people like to cook, about 10% of us according to one survey. Wait! What about all those cooking shows on television? Is that just wishful thinking, like someone saying, “Someday I’d like to write a book.”?

I prepare food every single day. I have my fast-food options: scrambled eggs, salad, tuna or sardines, apples and peanut butter. I don’t bother with too many fancy recipes. A lot of meals are simply a steamer filled with what’s available at the time, including potatoes, carrots, cabbage, sweet potatoes, whatever is in season. Put it on the table with butter, seasonings, and cheese or beans and you have a meal.

We aren’t vegetarians. I make a pot of beef soup some weeks. Other weeks I make a beef and pork meatloaf. A whole chicken lasts a week—fried leg quarters and wings one evening, chicken breasts and vegetables another. I boil the carcass, removing any meat left on the bones, and make soup. The dog gets gristle, fat, and anything that’s left except the bones.

In my freezer are locally sourced chickens, whole-hog sausage, ground beef from grass-fed cows, and ground lamb. I raise chickens for meat and eggs, and what I don’t grow in my garden I pick up at the farmers’ market, from gardening friends, and from Oklahoma Food Coop. That includes my Oklahoma peanut butter, Oklahoma lard, and yogurt from grass-fed cows.

What do I buy at the grocery store? Sardines and tuna, frozen salmon, almonds, avocados, and coffee. Oranges in their season. Jar rims and lids. Apple cider vinegar, although I have made my own. Chocolate. And some cheese, although much of that also comes from Oklahoma producers.

When foods are available, I can, freeze, and dehydrate. In August, my pantry is filling, but I need a lot more green beans, more jars of tomatoes and tomato sauce, and apples. If they’re available along the roadside when Dale returns from his art shows in Colorado, I’d like another bushel of peaches.

What I thought of, when I heard the piece on NPR bemoaning the loss of cooking skills, was this: what’s missing are time and education. If you work all day away from home, how do you make time to preserve food? Without training, how sure can you be that your home-canned foods are safe? We need to address these issues. People need to know how to grow and preserve. As climate change progresses, this education may be what saves us.

Yes, I’m often worn to a nubbin, as my mother would say, during canning season. But in the winter, when I serve a meal from my freezer or my pantry, I’m grateful that I know how to feed my family. And I’m proud that I’m passing this education on. The ability to grow and preserve may be more in need in the coming century than even tech skills. The only thing more important, if things continue to go downhill, may be the ability to find water and dig a well.

When You’re Privileged

June 7, 2018 by sharonedgemartin

I got out early one morning this week to feed and water my chickens before the temps hit the 90s. While I was out there, I mucked out one of the pens. I pulled chickweed, dandelions, and various weedy greens from the potato bed and tossed them to the girls. Almost two hours later I came in soaking wet and happy.

Chickens and a garden are the best mental health professionals I know. Only long walks in good weather can come close.

I grabbed a bottle of San Pellegrino and drank about half of it down. One of my favorite songs from My Brightest Diamond ran through my head.

When you’re privileged, you don’t know you’re privileged. When you’re not, you know.

I know how lucky I am. I live in the country surrounded by tall trees. I’ve spent years trying to turn a clay creek bank into a garden. While I don’t grow nearly enough food to feed my family, I enjoy the fruits of my labor. When my labors fall short, there are well-stocked grocery stores within a few miles.

Before we get complacent, here are a couple of things to think about:

Almost a quarter of the children in Oklahoma are food insecure. That’s a function of our politics, but how does one get out the vote when people are struggling to just get by? How does one change the mindset that hunger is all ones own fault?

We’ve just come off one of the coldest Aprils on record and THE hottest May on record. Coupled with drought, what will this do to our food supply? What will it do to food prices in a state where too many already have trouble feeding their families?

We all need to appreciate our own good luck. We also need to think about what we can do to share our luck and our know-how.

From Idea to Fruition

May 30, 2018May 30, 2018 by sharonedgemartin

It’s always easier to get an idea than to execute it.

I live on the bank of a deep creek bed. A couple of dry creeks flank the back yard where I raise a garden and chickens.

Because there are so many trees surrounding the place, sunny spots go for a premium. A few years ago I put a small greenhouse in one of the sunny spots to replace my cold frame. I wish I had the cold frame back. Or the sunny spot.

The green house isn’t big enough to be self-sustaining during the winter cold, so I had an idea. Directly behind the garden and the chicken coops, one of those dry creeks is man deep and two-men wide. What if I chiseled out straight walls and set them with blocks to the top of the bank? I’d add a few feet of repurposed windows for height and a clear roof. The two ends would be double paned for insulation and include doors and vents.

When the trees are bare, there is more sunlight. Because summers are so hot here and spring is so short, wouldn’t winter be a good time to plant potatoes, cabbages, and other cool-season crops in a greenhouse? Would the depth and the dirt help control the temperature?

This idea resurfaces every so often, like it did today when I was cleaning out a chicken coop and wondering where I was going to put all that dirty, half-composted hay from the run.

You know what I need? I need someone by whom I can run my ideas, someone who isn’t cleaning chicken coops and weeding garden beds and killing potato bugs. Maybe that person could say, “Hmm, let’s give that idea a try.”

I’d be glad to help…if I have time.

What I have instead is a son-in-law with his own ideas. He thinks I should turn that deep, dry creek bed into an aquaculture setup.

Of course, about every ten years we get so much rain that the deep creek backs up into the dry creek beds. What then?

What’s in Your Pantry?

April 22, 2018May 24, 2018 by sharonedgemartin

When I first started thinking of the unthinkable–food shortages because of climate change, political turmoil, or natural disaster–I bought a few bags of wheat. Man does not live by bread alone, but bread would certainly help with survival. Wouldn’t it?

Then, I started getting a little older…and a little achier in the joints. I not only did my gardening homework, I read widely about the relationship between diet and health. I gave my buckets of good organic Oklahoma wheat berries to another person with a long-term pantry.

Now, instead of wheat and sugar, I had rice, quinoa, beans, oats, corn and honey. These were backups for my real plan, of course. I was building the humus in my acidic clay-bed garden and raising chickens for meat and eggs. And I continued to do research.

My diet isn’t the result of fad but of desperation. My mother lived for sixteen years with dementia. My dad, a minister, cared for her. He also worked at the church’s food pantry. The diet of his poor…and the food he brought home to mother…were laden with wheat, sugars, dubious fats, and a long list of unpronounceables.

In his eighties, he was diagnosed with dementia. He was healthy, active, and sharp. Then, he wasn’t. What role did the catch-as-catch-can diet play in his and mother’s conditions?

Certainly genetics plays a role, but our lifestyle can often override our genes. We all have health risks. My mother and her mother were crippled by deteriorating joints, and this is why I gave up wheat and sugar.

I asked my dad once, “Don’t your joints ever hurt?”

“Nope,” he said.

Well, mine did.

You can do wonders with achy joints these days. Now I am determined to do what I can to stave off the broken brain. Once again, I’m rethinking my pantry.

I’m convinced more than ever that the garden and the chickens are the real key to security. Here are your necessary vitamins and minerals, your proteins, carbs, and fats. Here are the foods necessary for survival and for more than that, good health, tantalizing tastes, and good times with friends and family around the table.

More research is required. I have decisions to make about what goes and what stays in my emergency stores. Meanwhile, I’m pretty sure soil building, gardening techniques, seed saving skills, and animal husbandry are the real long-term pantry.