Farm Work

Tuesday September 11, 2012

About 90% of what we eat, we grow.  We hardly ever buy anything from the grocery store.  We do
buy cheese, milk,  flour, sugar, coffee but not much else.  Tonight for supper we had bread, roasted cherry tomatoes, fried peppers, hummus and salad.  Maria Pia traded raw chick peas for use in the hummus and sesame seeds to make the tahini.  The lemons we got from her moms tree in town.  We usually don't have cheese every day.  Actually, not too often at all.

Because today was bread making day and there was no bread for breakfast, we picked figs to eat.  Italo's friend always manages to bring a gallon of his wine just in time when the previous gallon is running low.  For lunch (our biggest meal) we had linguini with broccoli rabe, tomato flatbread, homemade seitan,(wheat gluten) and tomato salad.

Just when I think we've almost depleted the veggies from the garden, we plant for the next season.  Now we are planting a lot of broccoli, onion,  fennel and salad greens.
We are constructing a type of greenhouse using bamboo walls for people to go in  to read or whatever to get away from the flies.  They are horrible right now.  Last month mosquitoes were horrible.  I wasn't here for that.

I have 2 roommates now.  Jonathan (24) from Belgium and Markus (23) from Germany.
Markus is a world traveler.  He's working  on his civil engineering degree from a university in Germany where college is free.  He has been at this farm before but just returned for a week until he flies home to help his uncle build a new house.  Then he'll return to college.  He wants to build straw houses or ones made from clay.  He left here the first time to go to Sicily for a month WWOOFing.  He spent a year in Australia working and living in his car that he bought after he got there.  He said he really likes sleeping in his car because he always has all his STUFF with him.  Interesting person.  Speaks English with a heavy German accent.  

I went to the market by bike this morning in San Salvatore.  They sell everything from used clothes for 1/2 Euro to olives, cheese, fruit and most anything in the line of food even live chicks and quail.

Tomorrow school starts here.  Max will be going by bike.  Every child has a choice but once you make the decision of how you're getting to school, I think you have to stick to it.  If you choose the bus, the parents have to pay.  If you choose bike, you can't ride the bus.  Max worked many hours today finishing his summer homework.

Almost everything we make to eat caters to Jonathans inability to eat dairy (cow), nuts and chocolate.
I've baked a few things substituting sunflower oil for butter.  Not as good but that's what we have to do.  Tomorrow I think I will cook with Italo's permission and make potato, chick pea curry with rice.
I'm missing baking every day but I just saw a big basket of green apples in the back room.  So maybe I can make an apple cake too. It's very nice of Maria Pia to say we shouldn't have food that Jonathan can't eat.  I know he appreciates it.