November - Waiting for Snow
Downtown Evansville's Old Fashioned Christmas (photo by Brian Carter)
November is a month in which everything seems to be holding its breath. Halloween is over, and the green begins to drain out of the plants and grasses as though it is being slowly sucked down into the ground. Like an old photograph left out in the sun, the color of the landscape slowly fades to sepia and then toward the monochrome of winter when all will turn to black, white, and grey. The roses are still holding onto a bit of green, as they will do until the last possible moment, but everything else is leaching its color into the soil. Seed pods appear seemingly out of nowhere looking like some kind of alien life form. Sometimes it is only by their location that I can identify the plant they once were.
There is never enough time to get everything done, and if we got everything we had planned to do finished, we would find yet more to do because that is the nature of the season. We are nesting, putting by, bedding down.
I managed to turn over a section of soil in the front garden to make another attempt at planting European poppies. I had been given a small packet of seeds last summer by the elderly Amish woman in Cashton from whom we buy perennials, and I scattered them directly onto the lightly worked soil last October. They failed miserably, and not a single shoot emerged this spring. It was with some chagrin that I returned this September to ask for more seeds so I could make a second attempt. If I can establish them, I will be happy to have them pop up wherever they like. I believe I can harvest the seeds from this variety to use in cooking and baking while still leaving plenty to spread their colorful blooms everywhere.
All of the brightly colored gourds we grew and displayed as part of our Halloween decorations were scooped up into a wheelbarrow and dumped, somewhat unceremoniously, in a heap near the back corner of the house where we hope they will volunteer in spring and we can avoid mistaking them for edible squash. Gourds are beautiful things, but they're decidedly unpalatable, though outdoor critters like them.
I have wrapped our young cherry tree with enough chicken wire that it looks like something out of a high security prison yard. Under the tree are the ashes of our beloved corgi Juju. The mice and rabbits ate the little tree right down to the ground last winter leaving only two fragile, brown stems less than a foot above ground. Harvest insisted I leave them alone because, as she says, "The plants always come back for you. Just wait and see." So I left the little sticks to themselves. By some miracle, two tiny shoots emerged at soil level, then three, then four, and the tree leafed out again even bigger than before. I suppose you can't keep a good dog down. I've done everything I can to make sure that Juju's tree won't be damaged again this year. I'll be shoveling a path through the snow so I can check on it every couple of days.
I had plans to thoroughly weed and till both of the gardens before frost, but that got away from me. There will be need to be some serious weed pulling in spring before I can till the soil, or I'll regret it later. I'll just have to live with it looking ratty when the snow melts.
I managed to bribe, cajole, and herd the chickens (not as easy as it sounds) into the garden area so they could scratch about in the late fall sunshine while I winter-proofed their run and coop. I wrapped their run in clear, heavy polythene plastic sheeting so they will be out of the wind and the worst of the cold when the winter sets in to stay. I plugged in the heat lamp in the coop as well. When the cold really bites in February, the girls will spend almost all their time in there snuggled up and warm. I submerged the water heater into their water bucket and plugged that in to keep the water from freezing over. Back in Victorian times, the chickens would have had a warm barn with other animals in it to keep them warm, and they could drink out of the animal troughs, but we have neither barn nor barnyard animals to accommodate them, so we have to resort to electricity to do the job horses would have done for us. Naturally, the girls were totally oblivious to all this effort as they scratched about.
(left) Barbara browsing among the broccolini 
(right) Judy, alert as always
Once they figured out what was on offer, the chickens were only too happy to trundle over and wander in through the garden gate. I kept a fairly close eye on them while they were out there for fear that a hawk flying casually overhead might spot an unexpected mid-afternoon snack. I've continued to let them out as often as I can, but as the days grow colder, they don't go far from the comfort of the run and the coop. Judy and Isis, who are smaller and lighter than the other girls, will venture out for only brief periods before deciding it's too chilly and heading back inside.
Rather than raking leaves out of our yard to be picked up at the curb, I raked up wheelbarrow loads of them and tossed them into the chicken run as the base layer for their winter bedding. The chickens love stomping around in the leaves almost as much as children, and it's a much better, and less wasteful, use for the leaves as well. I will note here that Scott Johnson of the Low Technology Institute reminded me not to use walnut leaves as they are toxic to other plants and would affect the garden soil if they were tilled into it, so I only gathered up maple leaves, of which there was an abundance. I was saved from raiding the huge pile of leaves across the street only by the misfortune of the city leaf pick up vehicle arriving and scooping them up before I could get to them. Leaf envy. It's a thing.
We harvested a good number of squash from the garden, and I rescued two more from the front porch of the former Masonic Lodge where the town's mock graveyard had been set up for our radio play production of Twisted Tales of Poe last month. We sustained a good deal of mouse damage last year in the basement pantry (they like chocolate chips and candle wax in addition to squash), so my initial thought was to put the squash into mesh slings and hang them from the rafters. An easier option presented itself in the form of the wire table I use for skirting fleeces, and they are now away from the wall, safe from little teeth, and have plenty of air circulation. Nevertheless, I have been forced to put out mouse traps again so that our foodstuffs are not contaminated. Each time I go down into the basement, I announce in a loud voice, "Hear me, all ye mousies! Stay far away! To come here is to court disaster!" So far, no mice. I sincerely hope they go elsewhere. It's reality, but it isn't pleasant.
The weather this November has seesawed back and forth. One day frost lies crisp and bright on the ground, and the next day it feels like early spring. We've not had a hard frost yet. Given that in February the temperature will drop to well below zero for days on end, the lakes will be frozen over, and ice fishing huts will dot the frozen surface all the way from one end to the other shore, I welcome every one of these warmer days; each day holding off the cold a little longer and bringing me closer to spring again and a green world. Even so, we march inexorably toward winter. The fire in the woodstove burns every day, all day and into the night, and we keep the teapot warm by sitting it on top. On the weekends, I usually fire up Milly in the back kitchen, and that area of the house gets nice and toasty. When we had the back kitchen built, I insisted on having a grate put in the kitchen ceiling so that the heat from the woodstove out there could make its way up to the second floor. It's remarkable how well this combination works. Our heater doesn't really come on until early morning when the fire has died down. We figure we break about even using wood instead of gas, but the wood comes from trees which are being cut down anyway because they have fallen over or need to be removed for some other reason, so the wood doesn't go to waste, we get heat, and it keeps our local arborist in business.
The weekend before Thanksgiving is Evansville's Old Fashioned Christmas. The shops on Main Street put on their best finery, and there are horse drawn carriage rides, including Bo, the wonderful, black Percheron who ferried us around for Sweetest Day last year (see "The Surrey With the Fringe on Top" from last November for that story). There were two new additions this year, shown above, and three horse-drawn wagons rolled through town until just before dark on Friday evening as they must have done over 100 years ago. On Saturday morning, Santa and Mrs. Claus arrived downtown by fire truck as they do every year. Our Santa has a real beard. I think children know the difference. These little ones don't need coaxing to have a chat with Jolly Old Saint Nick.
The following Thursday, Thanksgiving Day arrived, and as usual, Harvest organizes a complete culinary blowout in grand Victorian style. This year's menu was as follows: Roast duck, baked acorn squash with mixed rice stuffing, pumpkin and squash soup, sweet potato casserole (no marshmallows), another stuffing of breadcrumbs, dried fruits and nuts; Harvard beets, carrots, green beans with almonds, mashed potatoes, dinner rolls, pecan pie, vanilla custard cups, and cranberry sauce. There were only three of us at the dinner table, but that mattered not. I took charge of roasting the duck and preparing the stuffing, carrots, mashed potatoes, and dinner rolls. Harvest did everything else except baking the pie which was purchased from a local woman who bakes in her home.
The antique roaster is pressed into service to cook the duck.
The size of each dish was moderate, but even so, we had Milly's oven and the conventional oven going simultaneously and both stovetops as well. We felt very fortunate to be able to offer so many wonderful dishes to our guest, and not a scrap went to waste. Even the chickens got the leftover pie.
Bear waits patiently for his portion of the feast
I must add a side note here to those who avoid duck because of its greasiness. I read a recipe somewhere years ago that has made all the difference, and I pass it on to you: Before you roast the duck, prick it all over, just under the skin, and then put it into boiling water for about 5 - 10 minutes. This accomplishes two things: a good portion of the excess fat is left behind in the water, and it makes the roasting much faster. I've done this for years now, and it never fails.
And as we wait for snow, we have been inspired to try brewing tea in a unique way. This odd looking bit of kit below is a samovar. More precisely, a "samovar on wood". The name will become clear in a moment.
Sometime last winter we discovered an amazing vlog on YouTube called "Country Life" (I highly recommend it). It isn't at all what you might imagine - American farmers driving enormous tractors across vast fields or ranchers driving cattle out on the open range. It's a vlog produced by a couple and their son who live in a small village in Azerbaijan near the Caucasus Mountains. They have a homestead on which they work an organic garden and raise cows, sheep, chickens, ducks, and geese with two pet rabbits and two dogs. We have watched all manner of interesting projects and hand farming, including the building of a new house with only three men to do it. The wife makes the most incredible dishes over an open fire or in a wood-fired, hand built oven, and she cooks outside all year round, even in the winter with wolves howling in the mountains nearby (I do not jest). Almost every episode, and there is a new one about every three days, includes the brewing of tea in a much fancier samovar than our low budget version which looks a lot like a leftover prop from Star Wars. We were so fascinated, we had to try it ourselves.
Our very own samovar on wood
The idea is simple. There is a doughnut-shaped reservoir inside the top container into which water is poured. A fire is built somewhere (ours was in the woodstove), and once burning, hot branches are dropped down the central chimney of the samovar where they continue to burn and heat the water. When the water is hot, the little spigot is turned and the teapot is filled. There is a dish built into the top of the samovar on which the teapot can sit and stay hot from the steam of the hot water. It's amazingly efficient and not at all difficult to clean. It is, however, very smoky, and I found myself having to put the burning brands into a coal scuttle and taking them carefully out to the porch so they could be dropped down the chimney. As you can see, the contraption was placed on the cement rail of the porch well away from any flammables. There's a bit of technique as to how large and how long the pieces of wood need to be and how much can be dropped down the chimney without snuffing out the fire, but I think my first try was pretty successful. It will likely be put to use more often when the weather allows us to build a fire outside (We are not as cold hardy as our friends in Azerbaijian). For now it has a place of honor next to the woodstove and stands ready for service. It's ugly, but I love it.
And so, dear reader, we leave you on the cusp of winter. May your own holidays be full of light and good friends and family. May your hearths be warm and your teacups full and hot. Until next time.
