Lizard Tail Plants

April 25, 2015April 26, 2015 / Savor Blog Partners / 3 Comments

Yerba mansa is a member of a tiny plant family. Our Sonoran Desert has many such unique plants in it.

Jacqueline Soule here to tell you of a very unusual plant blooming in my garden right now – a member of the very unique Lizard Tail Family, the Saururaceae. This distinct plant family has only seven species in it, grouped into four genera. I am writing today about Anemopsis californica, also called yerba mansa.

What looks like a single flower is technically a cluster of tiny flowers.

Medicinal.

Yerba mansa is used as a medicinal herb, but it also makes a pretty pond plant. All parts of the plant have a distinct spicy fragrance, a blend of ginger, eucalyptus, a touch of juniper and a dash of pepper. The roots are especially fragrant, reminiscent of a cross between camphor and eucalyptus with a hint of pepper. One of the active compounds in yerba mansa is methyleugenol, an anti-spasmodic, similar in chemical structure to compounds found in other medicinal herbs.

Even when they are newly emerged, the leaves bear a tracery of the red pigments they feature in fall.

Yerba mansa is versatile; it can be taken orally as a tea, tincture, infusion or dried in capsule form. It can be used externally for soaking inflamed or infected areas. It can be ground and used as a dusting powder. In New Mexico the leaves are used to make a poultice to relieve muscle swelling and inflammation. Spanish settlers in California used the plant as a liniment for skin troubles and as a tea for disorders of the blood.

Planting and Care.

While it is a pretty garden plant, yerba mansa would not appear in xeriscape books. It requires consistently moist soil and will not tolerate drying out between waterings. But by definition a xeriscape should include some oasis, and this is often a water garden.

Yerba mansa features large leathery leaves when it gets ample water.

Yerba mansa is valuable in the water garden. Koi and other fish do not browse it like they do many other plants, thus it can readily spread and help clean the water. It also appears to help keep fish from getting bacterial infections such as Pseudomonas fluorescens (causing fin rot and fish dropsy) and fungal infections such as Saprolegnia.

Great for the water garden, yerba mansa’s antibacterial properties can help keep your fish healthy.

Cooler autumn weather can bring blotches of maroon to the leaves and stems. If the temperatures are cool but not freezing, the entire plant may turn color. If the temperature falls below 20 F, the leaves die. Not to worry, the plant readily comes back from the roots. The plant is considered hardy to USDA Zone 5.

Yerba mansa will send out runners seeking to colonize new territory. It will not take root where there is not ample water – like in the desert outside the water garden!

In our area the plant is gaining popularity and can now be found in a number of nurseries that carry water garden plants.

Harvesting and Use.

Roots for medicinal purposes should be collected in the fall preferably after the first freeze. After the first freeze the plant will begin to store the useful chemicals in its root system. Harvest the thick fleshy roots under the main part of the plant, not the thin roots on the runners.

The smaller white roots are the ones harvested and dried for their medicinal properties.

Wash roots to remove clay and silt, then set them to wilt for several hours before cutting them into small pieces (roughly 1/4 inch square). Continue to dry the chopped roots until firm and dry.

About Jacqueline Soule

If you live in Southeastern Arizona, please come to one of my lectures. Look for me at your local Pima County Library branch, Steam Pump Ranch, Tubac Presidio and more. After each event I will be signing copies of my books, including the latest, “Southwest Fruit and Vegetable Gardening,” written for Arizona, Nevada and New Mexico (Cool Springs Press, $23).

All text and all photos (except where noted) are copyright © 2015 by Jacqueline A. Soule. All rights reserved. I receive many requests to reprint my work. My policy is that you may use a short excerpt but you must give proper credit to the author, and must include a link back to the original post on our site. Photos may not be used.

Lovely Lavender

March 27, 2015March 28, 2015 / Savor Blog Partners / 5 Comments

by Jacqueline A. Soule, Ph.D.

If you want to grow and use your own herbs, or if you simply desire an attractive plant for the landscape, you can’t beat lavender. Cultivated for centuries, this charming low growing perennial has wonderfully fragrant flowers and leaves.

Lavender is forms a fragrant mound and can bloom for months with some added water.

Lavender Uses

The name of the plant is derived from the Latin “lavare,” meaning to wash. Leaves and flowers have been used for several millennia to do just that, wash. Fragrant baths, hair rinses, to cleanse and treat skin ailments, and, in the past, to help eliminate lice and bedbugs from the household. Lavender essential oil is popular in aromatherapy. Tea made from leaves and flowers has been used to treat sleeplessness, restlessness, headache, flatulence, and nervous stomach. At this time, Commission E, a German-based group which scientifically studied herbal medicines, recommends using lavender for insomnia and circulatory and gastrointestinal disorders.

Lavender also grows well in containers, but unlike many herbs, is fussy about being moved.

Growing Lavender

Lavender is easy to grow in our area. There are a number to choose from. English lavender (Lavandula angustifolia) and Spanish lavender (Lavandula stoechas) both tend to be stressed by our summers, but grow well in a garden that gets only morning sun. The French or toothed lavender (Lavandula dentata) does best in my yard in full sun with some noon-time summer shade. Perhaps the fuzziness of the leaves helps reflect sunlight and reduce water loss.

English lavender has difficulty surviving the Southwest summer. Photo by Karelj

French lavender is more tolerant of the heat than its’ English cousin.

Like most herbs, all of these lavenders do best in well drained soil. They will need watering during the dryer months, but can often survive on rainfall during monsoon or winter months. Fertilize in moderation or not at all to encourage greater production of the fragrant oils. Harvest and prune often. Like most herbs, lavender should be trimmed two to three times per year to control rampant growth and keep the plant producing quality blooms.

Native Lavender

Ideally however, plant the native desert lavender (Hyptis emoryi), a shrub often found growing along area washes. Desert lavender is a shrub reaching 4 to 6 feet high and covered with fragrant gray green leaves. Summer brings spikes of fragrant purple flowers that butterflies adore.

The native desert lavender is more of a shrub than its’ European cousins.

Harvest Lavender

Harvest stalks of lavender blooms as the lower-most flowers open. This gives you buds with optimum fragrance.

Dry your lavender, like all herbs, out of direct sunlight.

It is delightful

to watch over time

as the flowers unfurl.

Live Green

No matter what species of lavender you plant, you’ll be living green. Growing your own lavender reduces lavender imported from half a globe away, usually southeastern Europe. Growing your own also insures that you have a good source of quality organic lavender. For those exploring the energetics (chi) of products, growing your own lavender and harvesting as needed offers the many benefits of strong chi.

Native desert lavender or European species, lavender adds refreshing fragrance to your living spaces, both indoors and out.

Lavender and Parry’s penstemon grow well beside one another and attract many native pollinators to the garden.

Special Book Signing:

Eastside Costco, Saturday April 4, from 12 noon to 3 pm

Northwest Costco, Saturday April 11, from 12 noon to 3 pm

If you live in Southeastern Arizona, please come to one of my lectures. Look for me at your local Pima County Library branch, Steam Pump Ranch, Tubac Presidio, Tucson Festival of Books and more. After each event I will be signing copies of my books, including the latest, “Southwest Fruit and Vegetable Gardening,” written for Arizona, Nevada and New Mexico (Cool Springs Press, $23).

All rights reserved. I receive many requests to reprint my work. My policy is that you may use a short excerpt but you must give proper credit to the author, and must include a link back to the original post on our site. Photos may not be used.

Luscious Lemons

March 19, 2015March 19, 2015 / Savor Blog Partners / 1 Comment

As I write, the citrus trees in my neighborhood are beginning to bloom and sending waves of scented the air through my exuberantly flowering garden. This is the kind of experience poets rhapsodize about. The two big freezes we had in 2011 and 2013 affected most of Tucson’s lemon trees, and some gardeners went without lemons as the trees recovered. But this spring they came roaring back. It’s Carolyn this week giving you ideas for using lemons from your own trees, those you can beg from neighbors or buy at the farmers’ market.

Make Some Lemon Curd

The word “luscious” could have been invented to describe lemon curd. It’s sweet without being cloying; tart without being sour. Yum. I made it once before with so-so results. As with any recipe involving cooked eggs, there is always the chance of curdling if you don’t handle the ingredients delicately. This recipe, developed by Elinor Klivans from Fine Cooking reduces the risk. You can use your lemon curd on toast or scones or fill tiny tart shells for a dessert.

Lemon curd and English muffins make an elegant breakfast.

To make lemon curd, you’ll need to zest a lemon first. You only need a tablespoon of zest. You can use a lemon zester or get finer zest with a microplane.

Zesting with a simple lemon zester.

Using a microplane to make lemon zest.

Lemon Curd

by Elinor Klivans from Fine Cooking

6 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened at room temperature

1 cup sugar

2 large eggs

2 large egg yolks

2/3 cup fresh lemon juice

1 tablespoon grated lemon zest

In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar with an electric mixer, about 2 minutes. Slowly add the eggs one at a time, beating between, then add the yolks. Beat for 1 more minute. Mix in the lemon juice. The mixture will look curdled. Don’t worry as it will smooth out as it cooks.

Transfer the mixture to a medium, heavy-bottomed saucepan and cook the mixture over low heat until it looks smooth. You will find that the curdled appearance will disappear as the butter in the mixture melts. Increase the heat to medium and cook, stirring constantly, until the mixture thickens, from 8 to 15 minutes. Don’t try to rush this. Put on the radio or some music to entertain yourself. If you have a cooking thermometer, it should read 170 degrees F. when the curd is finished.

The curd is almost ready.

If you don’t have a thermometer, dip the back of a spoon into the sauce, and and run your finger through it. A path should remain. Most important: Don’t let the mixture boil.

Test doneness without a thermometer.

Remove the pan from the heat; stir in the lemon zest. Transfer the curd to a bowl. Press plastic wrap on the surface of the lemon curd to keep a skin from forming and chill in the refrigerator. The curd will thicken further as it cools. Covered tightly, it will keep in the refrigerator for a week and in the freezer for 2 months. Each tablespoon has about 50 calories.

Limoncello: A Treat from Italy

Italian limoncello is easy to make.

If you have ever been to Italy, you probably know about limoncello, the generic name for an Italian citrus-based lemon liqueur that is served well chilled in the summer months. All you need is lemons, vodka and sugar. When choosing lemons you want to use organic if possible to avoid wax and pesticides on the peel. This recipe is adapted from one given by the television cook Giada De Laurentiis.

Limoncello

10 lemons
1 (750-ml) bottle vodka
3 1/2 cups water
2 1/2 cups sugar

Start with a clean gallon jar. First, carefully peel the lemons in long strips with a vegetable peeler so there is no white pith on the peel. Use only the outer part of the rind. Put the rinds in the jar and cover with the vodka. Let it sit at room temperature for at least 10 days and up to 40 days in a cool dark place.

When you are ready to proceed, combine the water and sugar in a saucepan, bring to a gentle boil and let it boil 5 to 7 minutes. Remove from heat and let the syrup cool. Add to the limoncello mixture and let it rest from overnight to 10 days (the experts really differ on this. I just waited 2 days and it was fine.) Strain into bottles, seal and refrigerate.

Limoncello Cocktail

Mix half-and-half limoncello, seltzer water, tonic, or champagne and serve over ice.

Easier, Better Lemonade

No squeezing needed when you pour boiling water over sliced lemons.

I learned to make the best lemonade from my friend Ann who lives in New Jersey. She learned it from a woman in Germany. Neither of these areas are lemon-growing regions so it may be a way of conserving. Rather than squeezing them, slice the lemons and pour boiling water over them. Let them steep for a couple of hours, pour off the water and repeat. You can keep adding water, letting it sit and draining until the taste grows too weak. This makes a juice with greater depth of flavor because it extracts the lemon oils from the rinds. Sweeten to taste with your choice of sugar, honey or agave syrup.

And Don’t Forget…

Tia Marta is running several classes in gathering and preparing cholla buds. This is a great year for desert plants and the cholla buds are fat and juicy.

Workshop Dates (find a downloadable flyer on the website http://www.flordemayoarts.com):
Saturday April 4, 2015, 7:30-9:30am—register at 520-907-9471
Wednesday, April 8, 8-11am, Pima Co Parks & Rec 520-615-7855 x 6
Saturday, April 11, 8-11am, Westside, sponsored by NativeSeeds/SEARCH, call 520-622-0830×100

Saturday, April 18, 8:30-11:30am, Tohono Chul Park, 520-742-6455 x 228

Here’s to the Budding Desert!

March 13, 2015August 9, 2017 / Savor Blog Partners / Leave a comment

red staghorn cholla flower and bud (MABurgess photo)

Can you almost hear them? I mean the sound of buds swelling and bursting with life out there is the rain-soaked desert? This spring the wildflowers are a joy, for sure, but the perennials this season will really be in their glory. Tia Marta here with some wonderful ideas about how we can share in the coming cornucopia of cholla.

Cholla cactus flower buds emerging, covered with spines--brimming with goodness for all desert creatures….

Cholla cactus flower buds emerging, covered with spines–brimming with goodness for all desert herbivores….(MABurgess)

It should be a bountiful bloom this year–the buds are off and running already. Every branch on our Sonoran Desert chollas is loaded with little buds, and they seem to double in size every day. It looks the same in the western part of Arizona, the Mojave….a zillion buds on the golden branches of Cylindropuntia echinocarpa.

While the chollas are preparing for their yearly reproductive ritual–a wildly colorful show for attracting pollinators–many desert creatures will be benefitting from this flamboyant event, including Native Desert People who have always shared in the bounty.

cholla feeds many desert creatures (MABurgess photo)

You can learn traditional and modern ways of harvesting, preparing and cooking cholla buds in one of several classes coming up soon in April. With the guidance of ethnobotanist of Tia Marta (yo,) we will get out in the bloomin’ stickery desert, get up close and personal with chollas, get to know their lore, their anatomy, their culture, learn to carefully de-spine them, cook, dry, pickle, and prep them into the most unusual and fun recipes. Their health benefits are off the charts–we’ll learn about those too.

prepping cooked cholla buds with I’itoi’s onions for White Sonoran Wheatberry salad (MABurgess photo)

The biggest kick will be impressing your family and friends with off-the-wall gourmet recipes that no one else makes (other than some wild and wonderfully creative foodies like Janos Wilder, Chef of the Downtown Kitchen, not to mention NativeSeeds/SEARCH staff cooks!)

rusty orange flower of the various-colored staghorn chollas

Rusty orange flower of the various-colored staghorn cholla, Cylindropuntia versicolor (MABurgess photo)

We have many cholla varieties in the Sonoran Desert—each with its own distinct characters and timing of flowering. The cane cholla (Cylindropuntia spinosior) is found in a few places in low desert but is more typical of higher desert and desert grassland. It’s the one with the persistent round yellow fruits, and gorgeous magenta flowers. The jumping cholla (C. fulgida) always has long clusters of green persisting green fruits hanging like bunches of grapes. It typically blooms with the monsoon rains of summer with a lovely deep rose flower. If you can find the buds of either of these chollas in their season, their buds are great tasting too. The buds of both are spiny, but the first-mentioned staghorn cholla (C.versicolor) bears easily-removable spines, so that’s the one my Tohono O’odham “grandmother” and mentor Juanita preferred to pick. I will be demonstrating her teaching at our upcoming workshops in April.

cane cholla in bud with last year's persistent yellow fruits

Cane cholla (C.spinosior) in bud with last year’s persistent yellow fruits

fruits of jumping cholla clinging to former years' fruits

Fruits of jumping cholla (C.fulgida) clinging to former years’ fruits

Tongs specially designed for harvesting cholla buds and prickly pear–available at Flor de Mayo tent Sunday St Phillips farmers’ market

The best instrument for safely harvesting buds is simply a pair of tongs. Long barbeque tongs can help you maneuver through hazardous cactus branches at a safe distance. We commissioned a young woodworker from Sedona to fabricate the right size tongs for us out of fire-killed ponderosa pine—available at the NativeSeeds/SEARCH store and in our selection of handmade wooden utensils at our Flor de Mayo booth at the Sunday St Phillips market.

Cholla buds from yellow and red flowers–de-spined and ready to cook (MABurgess)

After de-spining, the buds must be further prepared by roasting or boiling before eating them either plain as a tasty vegetable or fixing into other delectable dishes.

Here’s an easy sure-fire winner for pot lucks……

Delectable cholla bud and white Sonora wheat-berry salad

Marinated Wheat-berry Salad with Cholla Buds!

Ingredients: 2 cups cooked and cooled White Sonora Wheat-berries** 1/4 -1/2 cup of your favorite Italian vinagrette dressing

¼ cup chopped celery
¼-1/2 cup chopped colorful sweet peppers
¼ cup minced I’itoi’s Onion bulbs and tops, or minced red onion
1/2 cup cherry tomatoes cut in half (optional)
½ cup cooked and cooled cholla buds. Romaine lettuce leaves as bed

Instructions: Marinate cooked white Sonora wheat-berries in the dressing overnight in frig, stir once or twice.
Mix in all fresh chopped veggies and cholla buds.
Serve on a fresh romaine leaf. Makes 6 generous servings.

first cut into cholla bud cornbread–yum!

At our up-coming Cholla Bud Harvesting Workshops you will joyously taste cholla in a variety of gourmet recipes. You will a;sp learn how to preserve them, dry them for storage, learn their survival strategies and how those natural “tricks” can help us. Come “internalize” a deeper appreciation of these desert treasures!

For more photos and interesting details, please check out my Edible Baja Arizona article from April 2014 online at http://www.ediblebajaarizona.com. You can view a neat short clip about cholla harvesting created by videographer Vanda Pollard through a link on my website http://www.flordemayoarts.com. Best of all, you can attend one of our scheduled Cholla Bud Harvesting Workshops to learn the process first-hand! From there you can harvest your own–and bring these nutritious and off-the-wall taste treats into your home and party menus.

Hoping to see you at one of these fun classes! Happy harvesting–to all budding harvesters and cholla aficionados!

**Certified organic heirloom White Sonora Wheat-berries from BKWFarms are available at the Flor de Mayo booth at FoodInRoot’s Sunday St Phillips Farmers Market, St Phillips Plaza, N Campbell Avenue, or online from http://www.flordemayoarts.com in ½ lb, full pound, kilo bags, and greater quantities for chefs. Also available from the NativeSeeds/SEARCH Store, 3061 N Campbell Ave, Tucson.

Dry cholla buds for reconstituting to cook are available at San Xavier Coop Association booth at Thursday Santa Cruz Market and at NativeSeeds/SEARCH.

Time for Some Thyme

February 27, 2015February 21, 2015 / Savor Blog Partners / 4 Comments

Common thyme (Thymus vulgaris) is best grown with a dappled noon-time shade in the summer in the southwest.

Special for Savor the Southwest February 2015
by Dr. Jacqueline A. Soule

Spring is springing out in my garden – and the little thyme cutting I got from Savor Sister Muffin Burgess back in at our anniversary party in November is finally starting to take off. November was a terrible time to take cuttings of this warm climate herb – but the great thing about herbs is that humans have been mistreating them for 7000 years or so, and the weak ones have mostly died out.

There are many species of thyme, like this species in the Jerusalem Botanical Garden, used for the herb blend za’atar.

Thyme is a large and very popular genus, with over 350 species and countless cultivars grown around the world. Aside from looking lovely in the landscape, thyme is a strong herb used in cooking, and has some proven medicinal properties as well. It can also be grown indoors in bright, indirect light.

Many herbs that do in the Southwest are originally from a similar climate – like this Thymus vulgaris growing wild on the rocky hillsides of the Galilee.

This lovely, fragrant, tasty, and healthful herb in native to the rocky slopes of the mountains of the eastern Mediterranean region, in the area that is now mostly Greece. Since they are pre-adapted to low water conditions, most species of thyme can be grown here. I grow my thyme plants where they get roof run-off, thus I rarely need to water them; and yet they offer a lush look to my entryway with their glossy green leaves.

Not just tasty, thyme is also another pretty face in the garden! For peak flavor, it is best to harvest this (and most culinary herbs) just before they bloom.

Make sure you grow your thyme in well-drained soil. You may have to add some sand to your soil. I killed several thyme plants until I had finally added enough sand to their bed.

There are many thymes to choose from, but here are the species most commonly found in the nursery.

Common or culinary thyme (Thymus vulgaris) is a low woody plant barely reaching a foot tall. It quickly becomes leggy with bare wood showing so harvest and use or dry your thyme often. (You can give friends jars of your dried herbs as truly personal and unique gifts.)

Creeping thyme (Thymus praecox) makes an attractive and useful groundcover. It is culinary too! Harvest as needed.

Creeping thyme, with tiny leaves and charming purple flowers, is perfect for a fairy garden.

Lemon thyme (Thymus X citriodorus) is a delicious and fragrant low-growing variety with glossy green leaves, and goes wonderfully with fish dishes.

Lemon thyme is great for flavoring fish dishes – two flavors for the price of one!

Equally fragrant and delicious is the golden lemon thyme (Thymus X citriodorus ‘Aureus’). With wonderfully variegated leaves, it looks good in the landscape.

Not generally used as culinary herbs, two popular species of creeping thyme are useful in the landscape. Mother-of-thyme (Thymus serpyllum) and woolly thyme (Thymus pseudolanginosis) both grow well between shady flagstones, and smell great when stepped on.

Add some fragrance to your landscape – plant this heat tolerant woolly thyme between the flagstones of your path.

Sprinkle thyme (either fresh or dried) in soups, salads, on meat dishes or use in herb breads. Use an ample number of sprigs in herbal vinegars and oils for an intense and refreshing flavor.

We use ample thyme in our cooking. This 8 ounce jar gets refilled several times a year.

For a quick meal at the end of a long day make Sopa de Farigola, or Thyme Soup, a dish popular in the Catalonia region of northeastern Spain, and thus part of our Sonoran heritage as well. Fresh eggs and day-old bread are topped with a boiling broth made from water, sprigs of thyme and some olive oil. Great for replacing electrolytes after a day working in the garden!

More about thyme in my books which I will be selling and signing at the Tucson Festival of Books March 14 & 15 this year – Southwest Fruit & Vegetable Gardening (Cool Springs Press 2014, $23), and Father Kino’s Herbs: Growing & Using Them Today (Tierra del Sol Press 2011, $15) also available at Tucson area bookstores, nurseries, botanical gardens, and state parks.

© 2015, Jacqueline Soule. All rights reserved. I have received many requests to reprint my work. My policy is that you are free to use a very short excerpt which must give proper credit to the author, and must include a link back to the original post on our site. Please use the contact me if you have any questions.

On Emptiness, Filling, and Cups Overflowing: Chocolate–Chiltepin Cupcakes with Cool/Hot Frosting

February 6, 2015February 8, 2015 / Savor Blog Partners / 5 Comments

Aunt Linda here: Happy February ! The peak of February’s very gorgeous very Full moon was Tuesday. Also easily visible with the naked eye, the planet Jupiter played flirtatiously around the moon for several days.

Today’s blog offers a little parable. So pour yourself a cup of tea, coffee, or whatever you prefer, and travel with me.

Once upon a time, during a moon such as this with Jupiter visible to the naked eye, in a land not so far away …. a pilgrim, or a seeker, or a soldier, or an emperor, or someone just like you and me, crested the peak of a mountain having finally found the Wise One. After many moons of seeking this particular Wise Person, the seeker arrives with high hopes of learning what they had so dearly yearned to learn. They were in Search of Answers.

“Ah”, said the Wise One, “sit down and let us talk over some tea”. So, after warming the water and preparing tea, the Wise One began to pour the liquid into the cup of the One in Search of Answers.

The Wise One poured.

And poured.

Until the tea cup overflowed. Spilling onto the table, the floor, the person.

In some versions of the story, the more polite seeker, is startled, and exclaims: “Teacher! Perhaps you have not noticed that my cup is spilling over!”. In another version, the tea spilled onto the robes of the (not so polite) emperor, who becomes angry, chiding the Wise One for ruining his robes.

In each version, the reply of the Wise One is the same: “There is no room in the mind of the seeker, for the wisdom he/she says he wants, and has searched for for so many years. Emptiness, whether mind or cup, is needed before new insights can be received”. Being filled with opinions, speculations, habits of mind, hinders the ability to take in of fresh insights/knowledge.

Temple Grandin ran into this phenomena in the world of animal husbandry. Having discovered extremely practical wisdom about how to work with large animals more efficiently and calmly. She developed methods that significantly decreased the stress on both animal and human, and other methods that significantly increased efficiency. Her ideas were practical. Her ideas were “humane” and efficient . They offered ranchers and industry alike, to save money.

And they were met with “full”-on resistance, if you pardon the pun.

Rolling forward in time, the vast majority of ranchers, have integrated some if not all of her ideas of moving animals. Corrals and shoots have been redesigned. Transportation trailers for horses were redesigned (diagonal facing not front facing) . It goes on and on. But before the “industry” could take in all this animal-human wisdom “it” had to empty It’s mind of preconceived ideas.

We redesigned our corrals. No more box shapes with corners. Curves allow flight animals such as cows and horses to feel safer and move as they would in the field.

On a personal level, when my mind is “full” of worry, I can sometimes miss the more innovative solutions available to me. Conversely, when I empty my mind enough, life gets easier. For me, “easier” is simply more practical.

One example from the week: I discovered a nest of baby mice in the feed bin this week. I immediately felt stress. TO be clear, I am not “anti-mouse”. I am just “anti-TOO MANY MICE that it becomes unhealthy”. An occasional mouse is not uncommon around poultry, and the “girls” (the chickens themselves) or a king snake take care of them. Until recently, our cat was a good “mouser”, but she is 20 years old now and no longer on the job. So this issue of mouse nests is a new dilemma for me. I do not want unhealthy mouse droppings around the hens and eggs. I do not want mice eating the feed, and bugging the chickens all night long, as they nibble here and there. Follow the trail of mouse poop and you will be amazed at what acrobatics they are! I hate to use poison for a variety of reasons, one being fear that a predator such as a hawk or neighbors cat could be poisoned itself if it eats the bait-ridden mouse. And baby mice, despite knowing all of the above, are just so cute. I don’t Want to kill them!

Adorable for sure, this nest of baby mice is nevertheless not welcome in the hen house.

I was full -on- fretting. No space for innovative solutions to present themselves. Deciding to relax my mind, I went for a walk, switching mental channels from a litany of methods of killing mice, none of which I liked … to a question… How does Mother Nature do it? Mice have a plethora of babies, presumably because there are a plethora of animals that eat/need those mice. What eats mice? Snakes came to mind. ( Just as I am not anti-mouse, I am not anti-snake either. All have their place. It is BALANCE that I am looking for). I sent out a text (modern world) and within minutes had a Python present itself. Then another snake owner said she was looking for a good source of mice for her reptile. Later this afternoon, a litter of mice, will be delivered to a Python. And I will be rid of the “seed” stock of multiple generations of mice. Whether or not the snake-owners will raise the mice and feed them as needed, or freeze them for later feeding, I do not know. Stay posted.

The Recipe:

Chocolate-Chiltepin Cupcakes with Cool/Hot Cream Cheese Frosting

I Love the sensation(s) on my tongue as the cool of the mint in the frosting meets the heat of the chiltepin! And while it is my “go to” cupcake recipe all year long, it might be a Very fun Valentines Day treat, what with the Chocolate/Chile combination as well as the sensual mint-chile interaction.

Ingredients for Cupcakes:

1 Cup Milk (cow, almond, rice, coconut, etc)

1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar

¼ cup honey (local honey if you can; it is good for you and your local beekeepers)

½ cup oil of your choice

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup unbleached all purpose flour

1/3 cup cocoa

¼ teaspoon dried and crushed chiltepins, seeds removed if desired.

¾ teaspoon baking soda

¾ teaspoon baking powder

¼ teaspoon salt

How to:

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and line 12 cupcake cups with paper liners.

Whisk together the milk and vinegar and in a large bowl and set aside to allow time to curdle. Once curdled, add the honey, oil, and vanilla extract and blend well.

Sift the dry ingredients together and slowly add to the wet mixture, stirring between additions. Divide batter among the cups, filling each about ¾ full.

Bake in preheated oven for 18-20 minutes.

Once the cupcakes have cooled, you can frost them with the Cool/Hot Cream Cheese Frosting that you have made while the cake-lets were baking.

Ingredients for Frosting:

2, 8-ounce packages cream cheese, softened

2 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 teaspoon mint extract

1 teaspoon chocolate extract

1 tablespoon cocoa powder

¾ cup powdered sugar

1-2 tablespoons milk (cow, nut, coconut etc)

¼ teaspoon dried and crushed chiltepins. Note: leave seeds of you are going to eat promptly or want the heat to remain stable. Remove seeds if you will be eating frosting in a few days and do not want the “heat” to increase. The “heat” from chile comes from the oils on the seeds, and with time, the heat will “grow”. Experiment and see what you prefer!

12 springs fresh mint – for an edible garnish atop the cupcakes.g

How to:

Combine all the ingredients except the fresh mint in a food processor bowl and mix well until combined. Add just 1 tablespoom of milk to begin, adding the rest by teaspoons if you want to thin the mixture.

Frost the cupcakes; top each cupcake with a small sprig of mint for an edible garnish.

More Ideas for Wild Dates in Borderlands Towns

January 30, 2015March 16, 2015 / Savor Blog Partners / 1 Comment

Washingtonia filifera near UA main gate (R.Mondt photo)

Our native fan palm, Washingtonia filifera, near UA main gate. Original seed from Arizona’s KOFA Mountains. (R.Mondt photo)

Yes, we can delight in the most fabulous wild dates right here in Baja Arizona. We don’t have to put out lots of energy into finding these tasty little morsels because they are now all over the urban landscape. Once, in olden times, they were confined to oases, but now they line every old neighborhood street in low-desert towns. Harvest at the right time and enjoy their bounty.

Our Native Fan Palm Washingtonia filifera, UA photo (Note the stout trunk)

Tia Marta here to continue our culinary explorations of native fan palm fruit. Our street sentinels are more than vertical shade. They bear other surprising gifts. Our so called California fan palms (“palma taco”) offer tiny sweet and plentiful fruits (the size of a plump pea), and were harvested and relished by Native People of the Sonoran and Mojave deserts long before Hispanics brought date palms (the pinnate-leafed palms) from the Old World.

Washingtonia robusta in a S.Tucson landscape

Washingtonia robusta planted in a S.Tucson landscape

When ripe in summer into fall, zillions of fruits hang from pendulous stalks of Washingtonia filifera, with 20 pounds or more of the little buggers in one cluster—talk about prolific! As mentioned in my blog-sister’s post two weeks ago, Carolyn and I were challenged by renowned ethnobotanist Dr Richard Felger to try our hands at creating some “contemporary” recipes for this ancient and well-adapted desert food—which is now disregarded as nothing more than a columnar street planting. We know from ethnographic accounts (see them summarized in Wendy Hodgson’s Food Plants of the Sonoran Desert, UA Press, 2001) that for the Native Cahuilla of Southern California, the fan palm meant survival—a staple in their diet, used both fresh or dried and ground, hard seeds and all, into a flour for cooking or griddling. Another ethnobiologist friend Dr. Amadeo Rea (1997) documented Pima children collecting fan palm fruits as snacks. Dr. Felger intends now to bring this native palm back into new, appropriate use as a sustainable desert food crop.

Fruits newly harvested from the California fan palm Washingtonia filifera (MABurgess photo)

Washingtonia fruit is mostly seed, but the small amount of pulp has a group impact (MABurgess photo)

Washingtonia fruit is mostly seed, but the small amount of pulp has an impact in numbers (MABurgess photo)

Harvesting the high hanging fruit clusters proves challenging. Native harvesters used a lasso. More recently some harvesters fit a sharp can lid to the end of a pole to cut off the entire fruit stalk. A Tohono O’odham saguaro harvesting kuipaD might suffice—or a long-poled tree-trimmer—both worth a try.

In addition to their success as hot-desert food producers, both fan palms native to southwest North America, Washingtonia filifera (the stout, shorter one) and W.robusta (the super-tall, spindlier one), provide excellent nutrition. It has been estimated that one fan palm’s fruit could sustain one human’s nutritional needs for more than 200 days! Get a load of these figures from James W. Cornett (Principles Jour.Internat.PalmSociety,1987): Protein 3.1%, Carbs 77.7%, Fiber 10.4%, Calcium 110 mg per 100g, VitaminA(Carotenes) 180mg per 100g. Comparing these wild date nutritional figures with the commercial date palm (Phoenix dactylifera), our wild fan palm is way ahead on all counts except carbs (carbs 94.1% in standard dates).

Washed and drained fruits of Washingtonia filifera ready for snacking! (MABurgess photo)

Washed and drained fruits of Washingtonia filifera in Tarahumara sifting basket, ready for snacking! (MABurgess photo)

Since the fruits of W.robusta (the tall one) are even tinier than W.filifera, I chose to do my foodie experiments with the latter one’s “bigger” datelets–both small. Fruits of both are mostly seed, a stony seed surrounded by a thin layer of sweet skin and dry, date-like pulp. Here are two fun ideas I’ve come up with for using fan palm fruits, which can be done easily in any kitchen or patio. These ideas also might present interesting potential for commercial-scale food production. (I hope our wonderful local companies like Cheri’s Desert Harvest are listening to the significance herein!) So, here’s my first idea–really in three delicious parts:

Simmering fan palm fruitsSolar Fan Palm Syrup, Datil Molasses, or Datil Candy

SOLAR FAN PALM SYRUP

Directions:

Wash thoroughly and drain 4 cups desert fan palm fruits. Place in a saucepan with 8 cups drinking water to cover fruit well. On stove-top, gently simmer the fruits for at least 30 minutes, (if using solar oven, make it 1 hour). Add more drinking water to keep fruits covered. Let cool and stand in refrig for 1-3 days. This process is bringing out the complex sugars into solution. Again, when you have a little time, bring back to simmer 15-20 minutes. Taste the liquid. It should be deliciously sweet with a rich, almost smokey bouquet—but still thin. With a sieve, decant the sweet liquid from the cooked fruits, saving the fruits aside.

After sieving out the simmered fruit, the liquid is being concentrated in a solar oven with oven cover slightly open to release moisture (MABurgess photo

[Here is where my experience reducing thin saguaro fruit juice kicked in. I knew that this thin, sweet liquid from the fan palm dates had to be cooked down slowly.]

Pour the juice into a solar-oven-worthy pan and put in preheated solar oven—without a lid on the pan. Let the glass cover of the oven be slightly open to allow steam/moisture to escape. Check after 15 minutes. If syrup is desired, check for correct syrup consistency. Keep heating until thickened to pourable syrup. Then, try this wonderful and healthful solar syrup over mesquite pancakes for the ultimate Southwestern breakfast!

Concentrated Solar Fan Palm Syrup--nothing added--just water and fan palm fruit! (MABurgess)

Concentrated Solar Fan Palm Syrup–nothing added–just water and fan palm fruit! Come taste it at the StPhil’s farmers market!(MABurgess)

“DATIL SYLVESTRE” MOLASSES

With more time and further moisture reduction, there are more delicious options….. Here’s one: For the best, richest “Datil Molasses” you ever tasted, let the liquid cook down for another 45 minutes or an hour (depending on sun intensity). Be careful not to overcook, which might leave a sweet glue on the bottom of your pan. (The same reduction of liquid can be done of course on the stove-top or over a fire, like reducing maple sap, but hey, this is a desert product. We’ve got our fuel overhead! Let’s use it.)

“DULCES DE DATIL SYLVESTRE”

Carrying the process of concentrating the syrup yet another step further…If an even more chewy candy is desired, you might use the concentrated sweet molasses in a candy mold or for gelling like a fan-palm gummy bear.

Here’s another totally delightsome, exotic yet simple idea for maximum pleasure from fan palm fruits…..

DESERT OASIS CORDIAL

Wild Fan Palm Cordial (MABurgess photo)“Desert Oasis Cordial”

It takes about 4-5 weeks to make this rich cordial liqueur, so plan ahead. With a fall harvest of wild dates you could start making your Desert Oasis Cordial by Thanksgiving and have it ready for Christmas-time celebrations. But don’t wait—when the fruits are ripe, go for it.

This is how I did it:

Wash, wash, wash and drain at least 2 cups of ripe native fan palm fruitlets (W.filifera), enough to pack firmly into a mason jar. Into the packed jar, pour vodka of your choice, filling all the space between the little fruits to the brim to cover them. (You could use tequila or EverClear for differing degrees of delight.) Screw on lid and place jar in a cool dark corner of your kitchen, where you can be reminded to agitate it. After a week, open it and add more vodka to cover fruits, as the fruit tissue will have absorbed some of the alcohol. Shake and turn over the closed jar every week. For the herbalists among us, you will recognize this process is basically tincturing the wild dates. After 4-5 weeks, decant (i.e. separate) the liquid from the fruit. The decanted liquid will be a rich dark chocolate brown color like Godiva liqueur only translucent. Taste it and serve sparingly in small cordial glasses. Store any remaining liqueur in a closed decanter for the next festive occasion.

W.filifera fruit AFTER tincturing and decanting makes a fabulous alcoholic treat (seeds to be discarded) (MABurgess)

Decanting the marinated fan palm fruits from the liqueur (MABurgess)

After both your Fan-Palm Syrup-making and your Desert Oasis Cordial-making, you will have delicious fruits left over in the straining or decanting process.

Don’t forget the simple joy of snacking on little fruits, doing the pulp-from-seed separation maneuver with your tongue and teeth. Move over, sunflower seeds! The boiled fruits after syrup-making are still tasty. Better still–the vodka-soaked wild dates give an extra kick, so don’t overindulge.

Both can be briefly quick-whirled or mashed in a blender, meat grinder, or CuisinArt to begin the process of separating the remaining pulp from the hard seeds.

After decanting the cordial, remaining fruit is whirled and put thru colander to separate pulp from seeds

[If someone has a good idea of how best to separate seeds from pulp easily, please share it!] Fruit leathers, energy bars, jams, “datil newtons”, spreads, supplements—there are SO many ways the remaining fruit pulp could be used, so that none of the nutrients and fiber need go to waste. Even the hard seeds could be parched and ground into a nutritious flour—as Native People did in earlier times, to their advantage.

“Desert Oasis Cordial” from wild fan palm fruits (MABurgess photo)

BTW, after snacking on Washingtonia fruitlets, be sure to check your smile in the mirror for black flecks of the yummy pulp between your incisors. I can see it now—the next fad question after “Got milk?” will be “Got datil?” That could make for a wild date experience. Enjoy!

For a taste of the native fan palm fruits, come by our Flor de Mayo booth at Sunday’s St Phillips farmers market, 9am-1pm. There we also have a demo of solar-oven cookery in action. The cleverly designed solar ovens are for sale from us with a discount and no shipping costs. We’d like to see every household in Baja Arizona equipped with a solar oven for emergencies as well as for sustainable living.

You can find the perfect makings for the pancakes to eat with your Solar FanPalm Syrup for that Southwestern breakfast–mesquite flour and heirloom White Sonora Wheat flour— at the Native Seeds/SEARCH store (3061 N Campbell, Tucson) and at Flor de Mayo’s booth at St Phillips farmers market. See you on Sunday! Have your taste-buds ready for a wild date.

Onion Planting Time!

January 23, 2015February 10, 2015 / Savor Blog Partners / Leave a comment

The Southwest is ideal for gardening all year long.

Jacqueline Soule with you here to share some timely planting tips. Speaking as a gardener – one of the best things about living here in the Southwest is that every month is the month to plant something! Right now, in these cool months with short days and long nights, it is time to plant onions.

If you have never before had a vegetable garden, onions are a great way to start. Of all the garden vegetables, they are tolerant of abuse and forgiving of mistakes. In the ground, in large or small pots, under the shrubs in the front yard of your HOA home (the weed-police are mollified by “bulbs”), wherever you have a little space you can plant some onions. As long as we get rain every ten days, you may not even need to water them. Onions fresh out of the ground have so much more flavor you owe it to yourself to try them.

Onions can be tucked into almost any space in the yard. These I’itoi onions stay small.

Which ones? There are more varieties of onions than you can shake a stick at, a number of different types with conflicting names (bunching, bulbing, multiplier) and technically a few different species, but rather than start a discourse on all of that, lets just key into the fact that the days are short, thus you need to plant “short day” varieties.

Onion sets can be planted in pots with potting soil.

Now? In the coldest time of year? Yes! But you will plant “sets” not seeds. Sets are already started from seed onions, or, in the case of multiplier onions and garlics, they are divisions off a larger bulb.

How to plant sets? Just set them into the soil. (Sometimes gardening terminology makes sense.) Plant with the green side up, the bulb entirely below the soil.

Look in the background in this shot. Some varieties will grow faster than others.

Most of our local nurseries know that now is the time for onions and have a selection of sets to choose from. Big box stores don’t – just another reason to shop local. In past years some of the Farmer’s Market vendors also offered onion sets.

A general planting guide follows.

Light. Remember the whole “short day” thing? The short days of winter will mean that the onions will need as much as you can give them.

Soil is not as critical as with most vegetables. But for best overall health, plus full flavor and good final size of your crop, an improved garden soil is recommended. Or plain potting soil if you grow them in containers.

Water is needed on a regular basis for nice fat bulbs and succulent leaves. In general this means two or three times per week, but maybe more if the onions are in pots.

Fertilizer is not much needed by onions. If you want to, use one for root crops, high in nitrogen and potassium. Avoid fertilizer for flowers, like a rose or tomato food. Flowering takes energy away from creating succulent bulbs.

These onions got too much flowering fertilizer. Rather than develop good bulbs, they spent their energy producing flowers and seeds.

Harvest – once the tops die down and start to turn brown (usually in late May into June). For long term storage the garden books from “back east” tell you to dry your onions in the sun – but don’t do that here!! – they will get sun scald and taste yucky. Dry onions in a cool dark place that does have good air flow. I put mine on screens in the laundry room and leave the ceiling fan on low for about three days. Once they have dried onions will store without rotting.

Storage & Use. Some varieties of onions store better than others. Plan on about four months maximum for best flavor and texture. (Ours are eaten so fast this is not an issue.) Don’t forget to save your onion skins to make a great natural dye for Easter eggs and textiles.

I keep a bag to add my onion skins to every time I cook.

Onion skins produce a warm brown dye.

For more about onions and other vegetables and fruits that will thrive in your Southwestern garden, please consider my book Southwest Fruit and Vegetable Gardening (Cool Springs Press 2014), available at Antigone, Arizona Experience Store, local botanical gardens, state parks, and nurseries.

Playing with Washingtonia palm fruit

January 9, 2015 / Savor Blog Partners / 10 Comments

Washingtonia filifera (California fan palm)

It’s Carolyn this week, taking you backstage to a food experiment. As we move into a hotter, drier climate here in the Southwest, we’ll have to consider agricultural products that can handle the changes. Although I’ve been playing with edible wild plants for decades and Tia Marta (Muffin Burgess) has put in similar years of work, it’s always exciting for us to find something new. We’re going to do a two-part investigation of what to do with a wild food new to both of us.

A big box of W. robusta palm fruit arrived at my house.

Last fall I received an email from noted ethnobotanist Dr.Richard Felger. He and a colleague, Dr. Don Hodel, an environmental horticulturist for the University of California Cooperative Extension, were working on some wild palm fruits, two species of Washingtonia, also called Mexican or California fan palm. He wondered if I could come up with some recipes. Back in the early 1970s when I was just beginning work with wild edibles, Dr. Felger took me on one of my first plant walks and over the years has answered many questions for me. I figured I owed him. I also asked Tia Marta if she wanted to join in the fun.

After a couple of days, FedX deposited a box with about 10 pounds of tiny hard black nodules on my doorstep – Washingtonia robusta fruit gathered from a park in Signal Hill, Calif. , near Long Beach. Not promising, they were little more than skin on seed with almost nonexistent flesh, nothing like their cousins the palm fruits we know as dates. Humans have a long history of using palm fruits – in fact some scholars think that the honey referenced in the Bible was actually date syrup.

Wendy Hodgson, THE expert on wild desert foods, says in her book Food Plants of the Sonoran Desert, that the Washingtonia fruits were very important to the Cahuilla and Cocopa. She writes, “They made flour from the ground dried fruits and mixed it with other flours and water to form a mush.” We don’t eat much mush anymore (unless you consider oatmeal for breakfast), so I’d have to devise something else to do with them.

I took 4 cups of fruit and covered them with 8 cups of water. Brought it all it to a boil, then simmered uncovered for 30 minutes. I ran the softened fruit through a blender in batches and strained the liquid, ending up with 5 cups of almost black liquid that tasted something like prune juice.

Even flowers don’t make this liquid look appetizing.

. I simmered it until reduced to ¾ cup pulpy liquid then spread the remaining pulp and seeds on a cookie sheet and put it in sun to dry. Later, I sifted out ¼ cup dried flakes and discarded the hard seeds.

Pulp and seeds drying in the sun.

At this point I wrote Dr. Felger my scientific assessment: Sweet — but definitely not yummy. I pressed on and made some tasty muffins. Since there is interest in natural sweeteners, I concentrated on that aspect. Using a standard muffin recipe, I substituted the palm syrup for the liquid milk and reduced the sugar. I added the dried flakes just because I had them and to add some texture.

Muffins with palm syrup and dried flakes.

Fan Palm Muffins

Makes 1 dozen

1 ¾ cup unbleached white flour

¾ teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons baking powder

2 tablespoons sugar

¼ cup dry powdered milk

¼ cup dried Washingtonia flakes

2 eggs

¾ cup pulpy Washingtonia syrup

3 tablespoons melted butter

Mix dry ingredients in a bowl. In another bowl, mix eggs, Washingtonia syrup and melted butter. Stir wet ingredients into dry ingredients. Do not overmix; some lumps are OK. Bake in greased muffin tins at 400 degrees F for about 15 minutes or until they appear done.

Washingtonia filifera fruit (about 1/4 inch) on left and W. robusta on the right.

Meanwhile, Dr. Hodel acquired some Washingtonia filifera fruit from a street tree near Indio, Calif., and sent another 10 pounds. Oh boy. They were still tiny, but bigger than the robusta. I put them through a similar process of simmering, blending, straining and reducing. The taste difference was subtle – more date-like than prune-like. Better.

I decided to use the filifera syrup in a healthy treat, showcasing its natural sweetness, and came up with these truffles. I used almond butter, but other nut butters will do.

Nutty truffles sweetened with palm syrup and rolled in cocoa.

Nutty Truffles

Makes 1 dozen

½ cup almond butter

½ cup popped amaranth grain

¼ cup ground popped amaranth

6 tablespoons Washingtonia filifera palm syrup

1/3 cup cocoa or carob powder

Combine all ingredients except cocoa in a bowl and blend with a spoon. Form into 12 small balls. Roll each in cocoa. (You can buy popped amanranth at Native Seeds SEARCH)

♥ ♦ ♥ ♦

What’s the point of trying to find a way to use the fan palm fruits? With climate change bringing hotter, drier summers to the Southwest, ethnobotanists like Dr. Felger and Dr. Hodel are looking for plants that can take those conditions and still produce food.

I don’t expect a rush of people heading out to gather bushel baskets of fan palm fruits. They’ll appeal to the more ardent wild food enthusiasts who, like me, want to taste every berry on every bush. But they may have uses in more industrialized food production. They are sweet and easy to harvest and process. Some entrepreneur may see opportunity there. After all, nobody I know makes their own agave syrup.

(Check out Dr. Richard Felger ‘s article at “Arizona Native Food Plants for a Dry Future” in The Plant Press: The Arizona Native Plant Society vol. 37, no. 2: 1, 3-5.)

Celebrate the Solstice-tide with Heirloom Bean Treasures

December 19, 2014December 13, 2018 / Savor Blog Partners / 3 Comments

Our ancestors did it—and we still do it today in many ritual ways—we await and call out to the returning light. Indeed in these holy-days of Solstice, Hanukkah, Shálako, Christ-mass, the Yule, we still hope and pray that the light will return to our hearts and our communities throughout our small planet!

Four Corners Gold beans in a Tarahumara madrone scoop

Tia Marta here to share some ideas of foods that have assisted in traditional winter rites, and which can grace our tables anew for these holy-days.

To me, sprouts, more than anything else, symbolize the return of longer light, the rebirth of life–on so many levels. Out of the darkness and dormancy a sprout brings new life, vitality, a tiny, fragile but hopeful future. Nutritionally, a sprout is a wave of exuberant phytonutrients surging with life-giving properties for itself–and for those who might consume it.

Four Corners Gold bean sprouts on the 2nd day just emerging from seed coat

Ancient cultures of the Southwest have used sprouts in ceremony since time-immemorial, helping communities through rough times of transition, phases of seasons, new homes and life changes. My special favorite for sprouting is the beautiful Four Corners Gold bean, a bright mottled golden-yellow Jacob’s cattle bean, a genetic gift from Native Zuni farmers over the centuries. I sprout the beans by first soaking a ½ cup of dry beans overnight in a cup or bowl, then rinsing and draining them at least 2-3 times daily over a 3-5-day period. Watch life virtually explode out of those little packages of potential! I use the sprouts as a respected garnish or as a flavorful addition to salads or stir-fry. It is like a form of communion to eat sprouts–ingesting renewal.

Four Corners Gold beans up close–check out the difference with Yellow-eye–very different tastes–both wonderful

These colorful dry Zuni beans cooked from scratch also make a hearty and nutritious soup or chile-bean dish for chilly wintry nights. On sunny winter days I like to cook the dry beans (pre-soaked the night before) in the solar oven and have them “at the ready” later in the frig. A pot of beans on the back burner during the holiday season can help make a party happen. Cooked beans are a wonderfully patient food you can have waiting to leap into culinary action when company pops in unexpectedly, or if teenage appetites require between-meal satisfaction.

Heirloom Scarlet Runner Beans washed and ready to soak for cooking

Here’s a hearty Tia Marta recipe for enlivening a holiday season buffet:

BARBECUED Heirloom SCARLET RUNNER BEAN Dippers
These make the perfect vegetarian hors d’oeuvres to serve at a holiday buffet or to have ready to heat for drop-in company!

Start them the day before you want to serve them by soaking 1 cup of dry Scarlet Runner Beans.
Soak beans in plenty of water (3-4 cups) for at least 12-24 hours until fully plump and twice their original size.
Drain beans, and add 3-4 cups drinking water.
Simmer on low (stovetop or crockpot) for 3-4 hours until done through and pass the taste test, beyond al dente. The beans should keep their shape and integrity. This will produce extra beans to freeze for other recipes or for doubling the recipe. You will need about 8-10 oz or 1 generous cup of cooked beans for this barbeque recipe.

BBQed Scarlet Runner beans glazed and delicious after simmering in sauce

Ingredients:
1 large or 2 medium onions, diced 1 Tbsp. olive oil 3-4 Tbsp. butter 1 tsp. sea salt
4 Tbsp. molasses
1-2 Tbsp. prepared mustard
1/2 cup mild chile salsa
1 Tbsp. cider vinegar
1-2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce
Dashes of Tabasco or Red Devil hot sauce to taste

To make the Barbeque sauce:
Saute onion in butter until clarified. Add all seasoning ingredients to sauteed onions, stir and simmer for 5 to 10 minutes or more.
Add in cooked, drained beans–8-10 oz cooked Heirloom Scarlet Runner beans (about 1 generous cup). Simmer smothered beans and sauce 10 minutes or longer (the longer the better). Making the BBQ scarlet runners ahead, you can refrigerate them at this point. Heat before serving.
Serve smothered beans on a hot platter or in a chaffing dish with a fancy toothpick in each bean for a wonderful party surprise that is more satisfying than meat-balls. Serves a gang of hungry party-ers.

(By doubling this sauce recipe you can use all your cooked beans in it.) Bon appetit! And happy holidays to you and your guests!

Barbequed Scarlet Runner beans as hors d’oeuvres–each one is a perfect tasty bite!

At New Year’s, our family tradition, with one branch hailing from the South, has always been Black-eye Peas. It is a joy to know that there are Native People here in Baja Arizona who adopted black-eye peas into their own traditional cuisine when European padres first brought them from the Old World. Locally-grown black-eye peas (u-us muñ) may still be available from a Pima farm at http://www.ramonafarms.com and sold through the Native Seeds/SEARCH store.

Heiloom Yellow-eye Bean–a delectable alternative to black-eye peas for New Years or great as baked beans anytime!

For those who want to break away one step from tradition, it is fun to try a delicious alternative New Year’s bean—the yellow-eye. Natives of New England introduced it to Colonists and it became the real Boston Baked Bean long before newer varieties like navy beans or great northerns ever came on the scene. Yellow-eye has a flavor like no other bean and is worth trying in different dishes. I especially like yellow-eyes spiced with freshly ground pipian rojo móle from our own local Mano y Metate (www.manoymetate.com).

We think of cranberries as a holiday fruit but have you tried cranberry beans for warming winter dish? There are many Italian recipes for cranberry bean. My stick-to-the-ribs favorite, which delectably uses winter’s plethora of fresh greens, is cranberry beans-and-greens. Tucson’s Mission Garden is producing bundles of the best acelgas greens ever—available at Thursday’s Santa Cruz farmers market at Mercado San Augustine. I invite you to scroll back to last December 2013’s savorthesouthwest.wordpress blog for more great holiday bean recipes.

Heirloom Christmas Limas can lend themselves to our BBQ bean recipe as well

Until I was introduced by Dr Barney Burns (co-founder of Native Seeds/SEARCH) to the diversity of Southwestern heirloom beans, I was a beans-out-of-the-can cook. Indeed even now, with growing awareness of heirloom foods, there are many folks whom Rod and I meet at our farmers market booth who are daunted by the idea of cooking beans from scratch. Yes, dry beans do take time—but with simple low-tech tools like the crockpot or solar oven, multitasking is a breeze. Nothing could be simpler! Cooking one’s own beans opens up a whole new array of flavor possibilities. It’s a color and flavor rainbow of Native American, Hispanic, and pioneer traditional beans which we now have available (largely through the exploratory Southwest seed-saving by Native Seeds/SEARCH over the last 30+ years). All beans are not created equal. Each heirloom has its own unique flavor and bouquet well worth tasting, and its own adaptations to the Baja Arizona desert well worth planting in your garden. Scarlet runner, for example, is long season. Plant it under a mesquite and watch it vine up into the branches, blooming with red flowers for the hummingbirds—the best in edible landscaping! Harvest the giant pods in the fall for next year’s holiday feast.

For limited budgets, buying and cooking dry beans also saves money—big-time. One pound of dry beans when cooked will yield the equivalent of 4 to 6 cans of heat-and-serve beans. Nor will you find our rich SW variety of heirloom beans on any grocery shelf. The Native Seeds/SEARCH store at 3061 N.Campbell Ave, Tucson and the NSS website (www.nativeseeds.org), or the Flor de Mayo booth at Sunday’s St Phillips farmers market (www.flordemayoarts.com) are the very best places to experience that AH-HAH moment when you see 18-20 beautiful heirloom varieties spread out before your very eyes. I look forward to your visit to our market booth!

Christmas limas with recipe ideas–a yummy stocking stuffer–at Flor de Mayo Sunday St Phillips market booth

When one thinks of the cultures, the farmers, the planting and harvesting knowledge, the years of patient selection that all this bean diversity represents, it can boggle the mind and can truly humble the best of cooks and gardeners.

Tia Marta and Rod of Flor de Mayo are sending our thanks to those traditional farmers and to the many young innovative organic food growers. May the light be born again in us as we share honorable heirloom foods graciously with our family and friends this Solstice-tide!

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