
Muir salt!

Yum!
Good luck!
Muir salt!
Yum!
Filed under Ag, agriculture, arts & crafts, Field Trip, food, Giveaway, photos, Uncategorized
Filed under Ag, agriculture, Beef, photos, Ranch life, Uncategorized, Wordless Wednesday
I apologize. I meant to write this back in December. Obviously, it didn’t happen, but hey, better late than never right?
As you recall I went down to the Renegade Craft Fair in San Francisco right before Christmas. I had two reasons for that, the Fair (to buy crafty stuff I couldn’t make) and I needed ocean water to make sea salt for gifts.
I had read somewhere that is it was fairly easy and free to make your own sea salt. Since I am a foodie, I have like 6 different kinds of salt in my kitchen already; this project was right up my alley. I started buying gallons of water so I had clean bottles to bring my salt water back in, this worked great!
On our way back from San Francisco we took the long way home. We went over the Golden Gate, and went to Muir Beach to procure my seawater. This is where I realized I was not as organized as I thought. I didn’t think that I would literally have to wade into the ocean to get water, I forgot about a little thing called waves.
See? Trying not to get wet as I make a new animal friend. This did not work.
I couldn’t get salt water in my boots and skinny jeans, so off with my shoes and socks!
The downside to skinny jeans is they are skinny and won’t roll up. Since I wasn’t smart enough to realize the ocean has waves and I should have brought shorts or a change of clothes, I had to flat out commit to get my salt water. It was cold.
When I get an idea in my head I am like a dog with a bone. Come hell or high-water, I finish what I start.
Did I mention it was cold? And I pretty much was in the ocean from my waste down? COLD.
We met kayakers that were crabbing (I totally want to do that!) and I met more animal friends.
After I got the salt water, it was still a four hour drive home. Plus I always have to stop at Whole Foods to look at meat and buy Lucero olive oil (even in wet pants). Let me tell you what, those 4 hours in wet jeans were not fun, but I learned my lesson and next time will bring a change of clothes.
I ended up with 6 gallons of seawater. I was very proud of those 6 gallons.
I recommend straining your seawater through several layers of fine weave cheese cloth. Get all the sand and floaty things out.
I went to the second hand store and bought a big pan I wouldn’t feel bad about ruining. Since I had a woodstove, my plan was to place the seawater pan on my woodstove until it was all evaporated. It worked really well. But the 6 gallons of seawater took a lot longer to evaporate than I planned. My salt was not ready in time for Christmas.
My woodstove evaporation method.
The woodstove evaporation method was messy. I had to re-blacken my stove after doing it.
It took almost a week to evaporate all 6 gallons. The really upsetting part was, it looked like this project was a complete fail until I started on the 4th gallon. I didn’t see any salt crystals forming. It just looks like murky gross water. I was sure that I had screwed up simple salt making and felt like a prize idiot!
Finally I noticed salt crystals forming. As I saw them I gently used a slotted spoon to remove them from the seawater and place in paper towel lined bowl to dry further. I kept doing this until just a small amount of water and salt were left. I was told not to use the very last salt and water because that is where all the impurities would be and since I love my friends, I didn’t want them getting anything but perfection.
SO much salt. It made more than I imagined.
The 6 gallons of seawater made several cups of salt. This bowl is what I had leftover after giving out late Christmas gifts.
This was a fun and cheap project! The salt, which I call Muir Salt, is quite tasty. I have enough Muir Salt leftover to make truffle salt for late Christmas gifts (what I’m only 3 months late!).
Filed under Ag, agriculture, arts & crafts, Field Trip, food, Humor, photos, Ranch life, Uncategorized
Filed under Ag, agriculture, family, photos, Ranch life, Uncategorized, Wordless Wednesday
San Francisco. I’ve been to several major cities in the world and San Francisco is still one of my favorites.
San Francisco City Hall
I got to take a little day trip down to San Francisco to do some reconnaissance. I am currently trying to sniff out some different markets for my meat, especially since I am exploring raising pastured poultry and heritage pork. In addition to that there was an art show in City Hall, my friend had gone and told me how amazing it was, and I decided to kill two birds with one stone.
Fatted Calf. Dreamy. Expensive. Worth it.
I spent the morning walking around the City. I saw Fatted Calf, had lunch at an amazing Thai place, did a little shopping, tried a new beer, it was glorious.
Tommy’s Joynt – I’m going here next time!!! It was so cool, but I was too full of Thai food to eat there. http://www.tommysjoynt.com/
New beer from Africa! It was good.
Shipping container house! I want to build one on the Ranch, but not like this, I want a courtyard!
Harvey Milk! Thank you Mr. Milk!
Some of The Ten’s photos
Such a beautiful building!
Buy a case of wine and ALRP gets $30 (or $2.50 a bottle) – guess who is going to buy some wine?!
Mr. Hirsh, his partner and Mr. McBride. They were a kick in the pants! And do excellent and needed work, thank you!
Filed under Ag, agriculture, arts & crafts, Beef, Field Trip, food, photos, Pigs, Ranch life, Uncategorized
A few weeks ago, I found myself tagged in a comment by a facebook friend of mine, Glen Groth. It was on a page called American Meat. They were looking for young ranchers and farmers under 35 in California. Well sure enough I got an e-mail from them, asking about me and the ranch.
Things progressed and the director Graham, finally gave me a call. We chatted for a while and we set a date for American Meat crew to come on out to the Ranch. I got the morning off from my town job, cleaned my house and hoped I wouldn’t sound like a complete moron.
Graham and Andy.
This is what getting video’d looks like.
Filed under Ag, agriculture, Beef, Humor, Media, photos, Ranch life, Uncategorized, Video
I’ve made the “appointment”. The pigs are going to be slaughtered March 8. I’ll admit I’m already a whisper sad about it.
I grew up raising my own food animals. I did 4-H and FFA. Every year I watch as our commercial calves are loaded into trucks to become food. I watch the custom exempt slaughter of our personal freezer beef. Heck I even worked in a slaughterhouse. I’m not new to this lifestyle, but for some reason I am already bummed out about the pigs.
Maybe because this was my project, my idea, my money, and my time. It was the first time a bright idea of mine worked out successfully (ask me about goats sometime). Since October, I have spent every day with these pigs making sure they were the happiest pigs they could be. In December I started making their food. I’ve cooked for these pigs more than I’ve cooked for myself.
Happy pig
Treats!
My “man” hands. I’ve very proud. I missed them.
Work. Lots of work. All weekend worth of work. I need a weekend from my weekend.
Filed under Ag, agriculture, family, food, Humor, photos, Pigs, Ranch life, Recipe, Uncategorized
Filed under Ag, agriculture, Humor, photos, Ranch life, Uncategorized, Wordless Wednesday
Remember last week when I wrote about Mann’s new product, Veggie Mac-and-cheese? Well this is the week when I tell you what I thought of the product.
First off a little about me.
I am a food elitist (but not the judgey, holier than thou, kind. More like the picky, mind my own business kind.)
In my defense, I can’t help it! I grew up in a home where all of my meals were prepared fresh by my Mom. We ate our own meat, always had lots of local fresh veggies and fruit. We rarely went out to dinner, but when we did, it was never fast food. In college, my friends would fight to come home with me for a Mom made lunch or dinner.
I loved the packaging. Maybe it’s because I am in my early 30’s, but I thought this kid was really cute (OMG, did I really just say that?! Quick get me my cat!)
This was the bacon and cheddar and fiesta cheddar (my two favorites) and I added cooked chicken.
Perfectly cooked crisp veggies. SO GOOD.
One dirty skillet, no prep or clean-up, its really good and I felt healthy. This product is a winner in my book.
Filed under Ag, agriculture, family, food, Giveaway, Media, Ranch life, Uncategorized
Once upon a time, a long, long, long time ago, I dated an almost vegan (my Dad and I were fighting, naturally him being a cattle rancher, I dated vegan as a punishment). It was a rough few months of no meat eating for me, before I could start enacting my catch and release program.
If you are unfamiliar with my catch and release program, I’ll fill you in. I date a vegetarian/vegan, show them the ranch, provide facts when I can, and cook delicious meat based meals, therefore converting them back into omnivores, then I release them back into the wild (I have an 100% success rate).
During the few month transition phase of this relationship, I flirted with vegetarian and vegan cooking because, if nothing else, I am supportive of diet choices. My college friend noticed what was going on, and was cool enough to send me some coupons for her companies’ products. She just happens to work for a vegetable company.
Mann’s, the company my friend Elena works for is really great. Not only are they a vegetable packer, they are growers as well! Their farm has been family operated for 74 years (that’s 3 generations!) My favorite part though? Mann’s is WoMANN owned! That’s right a female run family farm, BAM! How can I not love this company? It’s everything I want to support.
I love this product. LOVE it. It’s a major part of my diet.
My special delivery!
YES! Veggie mac and cheese!!!!
Filed under Ag, agriculture, food, Giveaway, Humor, Ranch life, Uncategorized