This summers onions, leeks, shallots and scallions

I don't know what I would do without onions and garlic. Leeks and shallots are kind of a special bonus, I enjoy their different flavors. We begin almost every dinner meal by peeling and chopping onions and garlic. With the amount of onions I planted and tended all summer, I should have had enough onions to last until next summer, but I don't. I planted three sets of a Copra storage onion, about sixty to seventy plants per set. I planted the onions in four different locations in the garden, so some were in the hottest sunniest place in the garden, and some were lower down on the hill where it was cooler and moister. I didn't notice a difference between the different locations, however there was a huge difference between how the varieties grew. I also planted Ailsa Craig, which is a sweet white onion that supposedly gets large enough to be an exhibition onion but does not store well. I planted one set of red onions, a couple sets of leeks and a small amount of shallots. The Ailsa Craig and the red onion actually grew to decent sizes, unlike the Copra which grew to about golf ball size and then sat there for the rest of the summer. I've had the onions hanging and drying indoors and just took them down last week. I bagged up the storage onions and have them hanging in mesh bags under our house, which stays in the high forties low fifties. I'm guessing I hung about twenty pounds of golf ball sized Copra onions, I'll use them and be thankful - but peeling tiny onions is more work.  So for now I'm stoked to be cooking with the full sized sweet onions. I may have to chop a bunch up for freezing, dehydrating or preserves as I'm not sure they are going to keep much longer. I'm guessing I've got about thirty pounds of Ailsa Craig in two baskets to be used up over the next month or two. I did dehydrate one batch of sweet onions, they taste surprisingly sweet and have a nice texture. I saw a recipe that ground up dehydrated onions and mixed them with sour cream - or I'm thinking chevre, for a chip/cracker dip. I've also been thinking of making a carmelized onion preserve to go with roasts or meat dishes.

Shallots were a complete failure. I ordered a half a pound along with my onion order, but they shipped separately- so shipping them cost more - so an indulgence that I had high hopes for. I planted them in early May and covered them with plastic. They started off growing well and early in good soil. Then a hard rain came along in June and they were all flattened, never to make a comeback and start growing again. They started rotting at the base, so I pulled them and dried them, but most of them were rotten on the outside and barely usable. I love shallots, and usually splurge for shallots at the store this time of year, especially for squash soup. But this year the onions are so tasty, I haven't been missing them.

The leeks grew pretty well. We were pulling a few here and there for soups as early as late July. They stayed in the garden until we had a couple frosts, and they were looking droopy. I spent a couple afternoons cleaning leeks. I chopped off the tops and froze a few two gallon bags full, to pull out and use for stock. I also froze a few gallon bags full of the white parts. I just finished off using a bag of fresh leeks, so I haven't pulled out any frozen ones yet - my first time freezing leeks, but supposedly they didn't need blanching, I'm wondering how they will slice up, maybe I should have sliced them and frozen them in serving size bags. Leeks are kind of a frivolous crop. It would be different if they could stay in the garden all winter and I just pulled a few whenever needed. But as they take up precious summer garden room and then, most recipes just call for the white part, and they take a lot of time to clean...well I love having my own leeks around, so I'm enjoying them in soups this winter.

I was thrilled with the scallions this year. I love scallions. I almost always have fresh scallions in the fridge - they are a staple on the grocery list. I sowed them around the first of May and covered them with plastic. They grew really well, and we harvested them as needed from late June to late September, four months of my own scallions, and the ones picked in August and September were huge. I've grown scallions in the past and tried getting a jump start by starting them indoors and transplanting them, which is tedious. So direct sowing them was the way to go. I'll be planting twice as many, and more varieties next year.

Dreaming of Self Sufficiency

For several years now I have felt an urgency to live a self sufficient lifestyle. Partially because of how remote our homestead is, and maybe because I have little faith in our government and economic structure. Throughout my parents lifetime, our economy has known no limits, our knowledge has barely kept up with how fast infrastructure and technology have grown. That is coming to a close and times are a changing.

My dad called me a farmer recently in a joking sort of manner and then followed up by basically saying that it wasn't a complement, and that it is generally viewed as a less than respectful or admirable position in society. He basically said that "farmer" was more or less a derogatory term. Well, that was news to me. I'm thinking that maybe it was good that he waited until I was twenty-nine before telling me that because by now it has no relevance. I was flabbergasted. I rather haughtily responded by saying that farming was the most admirable profession I could think of, and that nothing seemed more sensible than being able to grow my own food and to feed others.

It is really too bad and may in fact be our downfall, that our society has these stigmas around farming. We are so out of touch with where our food comes from and what we are putting into our bodies and how we treat the people that grow our food! There is a growing awareness of the necessity for more farmers and government assistance for small farmers in our country. What a difference it would make if our President would actually make some changes in how our government treats small farmers. But that is a topic for another day. For now I'd just like to dream about having enough money to set my family up to where we would be completely self sufficient if we needed to be.

So, if I had the money, or as the song goes, "if I had a million dollars" this is where I would be. I would have a piece of property that is at least 30 acres. We would be on a south facing hill that dips down into the flats for pasture. Our home would have a well, a large wood-stove, a wood cookstove and be able to be off the grid, powered by solar energy. We would have a creek, stream or pond on our property. We would have one barn with does, chickens, sheep, pigs , ducks, alpacas, black angus or other cows for meat and livestock guard dogs in it, with our buck goats apart from the rest, on their own. Leading out from our barn would be different fenced off pastures, big enough to sustain the animals during the warm months. We would also have enough land to grow grain and grass crops such as wheat, barley, oats, brome hay and experimentals such as millet, amaranth, quinuoa, field peas and alfalfa. During the summer months all of our livestock would be on pasture. We would also harvest enough hay and grain, and store it for lasting through the winter.

We would have a huge garden, or rather fields of vegetables. We would grow enough vegetables to sell CSA's (Community Shared Agriculture Shares). Feeding twenty to thirty families would be a nice start. We would also have enough established raspberry, rhubarb and strawberry plants to offer u-pick, during the good seasons. We would raise enough chickens to supply our extended family with chicken meat and eggs. If laws allowed, I'd raise enough goats to supply our friends, family and interested customers with fresh milk, cheese and other raw milk dairy products. I would have a pottery wheel and make pots for fun, gifts and extra to sell. I'd have a spinning wheel and loom to make our own clothes, blankets, rugs, towells etc. I'd also make our own soaps, herbal medicines and candles (all of which I make currently).

As far as food sufficiency the hard things are spices, coffee, oils, wine and chocolate. Some spices can be grown here. We'd probably have to do without chocolate and coffee. I'd like to experiment with growing some cold hardy grapes. I'd also like to try making wines out of different fruits and vegetables. There are numerous fruit trees that are showing up in the catalogs that are hardy enough to withstand our winters. Including apple trees, apricot, pear, currants and many more that I can't think of at the moment. So I'd love to have a small orchard in our hills with all kinds of hardy grafted fruit trees. We would probably be able to make our own beer. We'd just need to grow barley, wheat, hops, and stock up on some other brewing supplies. As far as oils go, we'd probably make due with animal fats, but it would be interesting to try and grow enough sunflower plants and try to press the seeds for oil. Fortunately crops that grow in abundance here are cranberries, blueberries, wild raspberries, edible plants and medicinal herbs, salmon and moose

So that's about all I'd ask out of life. Well in addition to a large happy family of course. After we build our main house and barn, I could see multiple small cabins here and there throughout our woods for family and close friends to reside in. For what could be better than having all our family and like minded friends close by during tough times.

You can call me crazy but I think it is more important to invest any and all money into building a self reliant homestead than say investing in stock or saving money for college. I don't think our society will be turning up our noses or looking down at farmers much longer. And, don't worry dad, as an aspiring farmer I'm planning for your future too.