Definitions

I used to just be a writer who liked to garden. Now apparently I'm also a locavore, foodie, urban farmer into green sustainable living using permaculture principles. It's all getting so complicated, the simpler it gets.

After an easygoing Sunday meandering through apple orchards and the countryside with my family I find myself searching the MLS again for properties with land, streams and barns. I may be entering my Thoreau stage.

This summer I saved the clippings from the garlic harvest to put to use in the cob oven project I've been planning. Unfortunately I haven't been able to tackle the project given my ever increasing decrepitude. Looks like it will have to wait till next season.

Cob ovens seem to be suddenly cropping up everywhere. They are on everyone's hip list. There was even a multimedia slide show of a 36 hour dinner party cooked in a cob oven in the New York Times this weekend. That was one dinner party I wish I'd been a guest at. The earthy breads, root vegetables and the pudding. Yum. The rustic pizza with a raw egg on top reminded me of the wood fired pizzas I ate on the streets of Dusseldorf's Altstadt back in the 70s when I lived there for a year. It was the first time I'd ever seen an egg on a pizza. So delicious!

See link below for the inviting NY Times slide show. (Warning: some photos may be offensive to vegetarians.) http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2010/10/10/magazine/community-oven.html