We have corn!

Fried, creamed, boiled, or grilled this is some of the sweetest corn you will ever get. And, oh boy do we have corn! It is beautiful and tasty! 

If you interested please email me katiebranch@att.net

Fresh picked corn is 4 for $1.00. We can shuck and cream for you upon

 request. This year has produced some of the best crop we have ever had. Be sure to get some for yourself.

Cutting Wheat

We were blessed to find and be able to bring home a combine to the farm this weekend. Farmer D has wanted one of these since he was a kid. His dad had one when he was growing up and he has some wonderful memories on it. He wanted to be sure to grant little miss E some of those same great memories for her childhood. For those of you like me, you may have no idea what a combine is. Well, this high tech tractor is used to cut wheat and many other things on a farm.

Definition from Wikipedia says...
The combine harvester, or simply combine, is a machine that harvests grain crops. The name derives from its combining three separate operations comprising harvesting—reaping, threshing, and winnowing—into a single process. Among the crops harvested with a combine are wheat, oats, rye, barley, corn (maize), soybeans and flax (linseed). The waste straw left behind on the field is the remaining dried stems and leaves of the crop with limited nutrients which is either chopped and spread on the field or baled for feed and bedding for livestock.

Seeing the excitement in Farmer D's eyes when he took little miss E for a ride was priceless.

Happy Rabbits

Thankfully we were able to move our Rex rabbits to the farm this past weekend. As you can see in a few post back these rabbits have been living in our laundry room sink since we got them. I am not sure who was happier about the move; the rabbits or myself. The pen we are now using for them was once before a chicken coop. We plan on building some much smaller runs for the rabbits to stay in but it was longer over due for these little guys to get out and get some grass so we used what we had on hand until then. We will move these rabbits around the pasture about every two days to new grass, we are feeding them some each day but intend for most of their diet to come from the grass and vegetable garden that we have. 

Branch Farm dinner

This may look like an ordinary dinner plate to you but to us here at Branch Farm this is something we have been hoping and praying for! Finally one of our Farm dreams came true. On Thursday night of last week I made dinner for us. You may ask what is so special about that or this plate? Well, everything on this plate came directly from Branch Farm. Starting with the chicken at the top to the squash and zucchini next to it, then the creamed corn, next the green beans, the white acre peas, and last the roasted tomatoes. It was such a wonderful feeling to know that we made everything we were eating that night. We are hoping to make this an every night thing! Part of the reason we started the farm was to fully self-sustain. I am happy to say it looks like we are on our way there.

Pickin Peaches and eating them too.

Yum!

Around the Farm

By request I am posting some picture of the farm. Hope you enjoy!

 Our Ossabaw Island Pigs

 Squash plants are the lower ones to the front, the green beans are
the taller plants running up the poles we have staked.

Harvest of tomatoes this past Friday are on the left and some extra large zucchini are above. These will be food for the pigs tonight.





Below is a picture of our very ingenious idea of weed control. We have placed left over carpet rolls cut to size between our vegetable rows to keep the weeds out. This was thought of by Farmer D on our attempt to garden the most all natural organic way that we can. So far it is working wonderfully! I am continually impressed with all his ideas. He is the smartest Farmer I know!

Need Squash?

We've got you covered!
This is a picture from Thursday's picking this week. All this squash was picked in just one day. And the funny thing is that squash can and do need to be picked each day. So does anyone needs some squash?
If you do please let us know!

Farm Favorite Recipe

This is one of my all time favorite summer recipes that I use here on the farm. It is super easy and very tasty. With the 100 plus tomatoes that we are picking each day it sure helps to have a recipe handy that uses a lot of them.

Roasted Tomato & Feta

Cut tomatoes into thin slices place on greased cookie sheet or aluminum foil (use as many tomatoes as you can fit on sheet)
sprinkle tomatoes with a high quality balsamic vinegar
season with salt and pepper
top with feta cheese
Place cookie sheet in pre-heated oven on 300 degree for at least an hour until you see the tomatoes starting to wrinkle up and the cheese is browning
Remove from oven and Enjoy!
I usually do this as an appetizer while we are getting dinner ready but you can easily add it to any meal as a side dish.

Meet our Roosters

Upon decided or should I say receiving our chickens (the first six were a gift to my husband for his birthday from my wonderful mother-in-law) we quickly agreed that we would not have a rooster on the farm. Nothing against roosters but we do have a small child that we want to keep safe and the many rooster stories had us a bit leery of them. However, as with many things we say around here things do CHANGE; and we now find ourselves with a rooster and not only one but two; Dapper Dan and Russel Crow as we refer to them as.

Dapper Dan is a Dominique that we purchased from a friend who was doing a 4-H project with her students. We purchased five from her at around 1 week of age; we had no idea weather they would be male or female chickens. We were hoping all would be hens to produce lots of eggs for us.

You can see Dapper Dan on the far right of the picture running from little miss E. He has a beautiful set of tail feathers that this pictures just doesn't do justice too. (I am not a good photographer that's for sure). He is a vey young rooster and walks around struting his stuff the entire time we are around. I think he has his days and nights mixed up because he crows all evening. Someone needs to change his a.m. and p.m. settings.
Right now we are glad to have him around as he helps protect the other hens. And he will be allowed to stick around the farm as long as he continues running away from miss E and not towards her!
Russel Crow is pictured below, he is also a dominique chicken.

We never set out to get a rooster but have been blessed with two I guess you could say. :)

Have any of you had an encounter with a Rooster? If so, we it good or bad?

Locally Grown Foods!

The Benefits of Eating Locally Grown Foods!

Recently there has been a lot of buzz about eating locally grown foods, but why?  Eating locally is oftentimes less convenient and more expensive than buying mass produced foods, yet the benefits that these foods provide for your body and the environment make it worthwhile in my eyes.

Why locally grown food is better for your health:  According to the Center for a New American Dream (CNAD), small farms are less aggressive than large factory farms about using chemicals on their plants. Even the non-organic small farms are less likely to have dangerous pesticides and herbicides.  

Why locally grown food tastes better: Farmers that sell directly to local consumers select and harvest crops based on when they are at their peak quality of freshness, nutrition, and taste.  In contrast, many large corporations give priority to packing, shipping and shelf life instead. Tomatoes that you can pick up at the grocery store have been harvested early and then sprayed with gases that cause them to turn red and appear ripe. This is not natural!

Why locally grown food is better for the environment:  Small farms are more likely to grow a wide variety of crops.  Variation protects biodiversity and preserves a larger agricultural gene pool, which is important for ensuring long-term food security.  

Why eating locally helps farmers: On average farmers only receive 20 cents of each food dollar spent because of the cost of transportation, processing, packaging, and marketing.  When you buy locally, the farmer receives the direct profit of the money spent. And more farms equal more healthy food.

Adapted from www.openhand.org

Zucchini Rice

Zucchini Rice yup that's what I said... seems strange but a must try! A friend sent this recipe over to me since she knows I am always looking for new ways to use the ever abundant fresh Zucchini that we have from the garden. I wanted to pass it along because it was super delicious and super easy. You can't beat that combination. I hope you will get the chance to enjoy it for yourself as well. 



Cheesy Zucchini Rice
adapted from Comfort of Cooking, originally from Real Simple

• 2 cups chicken or vegetable broth
• 1 cup long-grain white rice
• 2 Tbs butter
• 1 medium zucchini, grated on the large holes of a cheese grater
• 1 cup shredded sharp cheddar
• salt and pepper, to taste

Bring the broth to a boil in a medium saucepan.  Stir in the rice, cover, and reduce heat to low.

Cook about 20 minutes, or until most of the liquid has been absorbed.

Remove from heat, add the butter and zucchini, and cover.  Allow to stand 5 minutes, then stir to incorporate.  Stir in the cheese, season with salt and pepper, and serve.

Original recipe came from Josie and Pink Parsley @ http://www.pink-parsley.com/2011/08/cheesy-zucchini-rice.html?showComment=1342055392263

Thanks!

A special thanks goes out to my number one commenter of the month; well of the year I should say. A good friend of mine has been very faithful in commenting on this blog page and I truly appreciate it. She received one of our very soft Branch Farm t-shirts for her support. You too can win Branch Farm items... please become a follower and a commenter on my blog and you will be entered into monthly giveaways that I will be having.

Did you know?

Did you know that pasture raised hens produce far superior eggs than the commercial eggs you purchase at the grocery store. Why pasture raised chicken egg are better you may ask? One reason that really bothers me... is that the eggs you purchase at the store have been washed in chlorine and many other chemicals resulting in the outer shell breaking down and passing traces of these chemicals to you when you consume the egg. Official USDA data states that eggs from pasture raised hens have 1/3 less cholesterol, 1/4 less saturated fat, 2/3 more vitamin A, 2 times more omega 3 fatty acids, 3 times more vitamin E, and 7 times more beta carotene. Pretty interesting stuff huh. Well the list goes on and on about the health benefits as well as the environmental benefits of pasture raised animals. Raising chickens may not be the most glamorous thing we could do but it sure is nice to know where our eggs come from and to know the benefits we are receiving from them. We have thirty seven chickens right now, 35 are hens and we have two roosters. Below are are a few pictures of some of our eggs.

Yes those eggs in the back of the top picture are in fact blue and green. We have two hens that are a breed that lays what they call "Easter eggs" since they are colored. I think it is really neat and enjoy having these in our mix of eggs.

Does this make you want to have your own hens? :)

All in a Day's work

Farm work is hard but very rewarding and until this last week I can say that it has always been lots of fun as well. However, we temperatures soaring over 100 degree this week has not topped that of my favorites when it comes to tending to the animals and garden. Here is little miss E as we are getting started today. She's got her shade close by and ready for use.

We are making an effort to check on everyone at the farm several times during the day to make sure there is enough water and shade for the animals. The weather is not fit for anyone or anything to be outside!

A hat sure helps keep the sun away while we are tending to our chores! 

First stop; momma pig. Then off to check the chickens. But not before we speak to the cow according to miss E! After checking all the animals water, looking over the vegetables, and making sure we spoke to everyone for a bit; Little miss E and I parked the tractor and heading to the car. As I buckled her in the car and gave her some juice she gazed at me and shook her hands to sign "all done".

Yup, I said. All done for now.

Ordinary to Extraordinary

Since deciding to give a go at the farming business Farmer D and I have discussed our long term goals and created a family plan for our lives. Our family plan includes being compeletly debt free. Therefore this adds a certain twist to the daily farm operations; meaning we must be creative as we look to cut cost and save money. So that bring us to the laundry basket pictured above. This may appear like an ordinary laundry basket. However this basket has served many purposes here at the house and the farm lately. Right now this laundry basket doubles as a play pen during the day for the rabbits. Our Rex rabbits that I mentioned in a previous post came from a friend several weeks ago. And yes these babies are still inside our house. The unbareable temperatures outside lately have keep us from putting them at the farm with all the other animals.  (not to mention Farmer D still hasn't finished their cage; shh you didn't hear that from me). In the picture below you can see them hanging out in the sun eating some left over veggies from the garden.

What kind of things have you resorted to finding multiple uses for in an effort to save money or be frugal?
(I've got an interesting one to show this afternoon after I get a picture of it at the farm)