Simple Heritage Roast Turkey

Just in time for the holidays, here is an easy recipe for a fabulous turkey. Don't forget to add cultured side dishes to your meal to make it complete and easy to digest.

Simple Heritage Roast Turkey

Ingredients:

• 1 - 12-18lb Turkey, thawed with giblets and neck removed
  
• 3 tbsp sea salt
  
• 1.5 tbsp black pepper
• 1 medium onion, quartered
• 1 medium apple, halved
• 8 sprigs fresh thyme
• 4 tbsp butter, cut into four pieces
• 2 stalks celery, cut in two or three pieces each
• 2 cups turkey broth, water or a mixture of half water and half apple juice
  

Directions:

1. At least four hours before roasting, rub turkey inside and out with sea salt and pepper; refrigerate. Remove from refrigerator 45 minutes before roasting. Heat oven to 425 degrees.

2. Set turkey in roasting pan fitted with a V-shaped rack. Slip your fingers under skin to loosen it. Rub butter over breasts. Stuff vegetables, apple and thyme into cavity. Tuck wingtips under bird.

3. Pour broth or water into pan, around bird. Put turkey in oven and roast, uncovered, for 30 minutes. Reduce heat to 325, baste turkey with pan juices, cover with a foil tent and return to oven. Cook for another 30 minutes. Remove foil, baste again and place foil back on turkey. Cook for 30 more minutes. Remove foil.

4. When turkey has roasted for a total of two hours, insert a meat thermometer straight down into fleshiest part of thigh, where it meets drumstick. Check a second spot, then remove thermometer. (Do not let thermometer touch bone.) Thigh meat should reach no more than 165 degrees. Juices should run clear. (If bird is larger than 14 pounds, keep foil on longer and begin checking meat temperature at two and half hours.) To assure perfectly cooked white and dark meat, you may remove bird when meat thermometer shows thigh temperature at 155, then remove legs and roast them separately for another 15 to 30 minutes, depending on size of bird.

5. When bird has reached desired temperature, remove from oven and let rest for at least 30 minutes, covered in foil and with a damp towel on top of foil, to retain heat and allow juices to return to meat. Remove foil and towel and serve.

Serves 8-12.

Recipe compliments of NY Times.

Why there is no cure for cancer

The paraphrased quote from Watson (of Watson and Crick, discoverers of DNA), now in his 80s, sums up perfectly why the cure for cancer is so elusive:

"The cure for cancer ... is being exploited ... for the longevity of the research ... because so much of science is ... financially committed ... and ... dependent on it."

I love a good Blog - cookusinteruptus.com

I stumbled upon this blog on one of my many message boards. It is written by Cynthia Lair...here is her bio and the link. (She has an amazing recipe for cooking Kale!)


http://cookusinterruptus.com/index.php?video_id=25
Cynthia Lair (Cynthia Lair) - Author, faculty member (Bastyr and UW), speaker,
actress, improv artist.

Cynthia is a fresh local organic nutrition educator and cookbook author. She
lives with her husband of 25 years, Steve. Shortly before the economical crisis
he decided to cut the umbilical paycheck and go free-lance. Their daughter
Jane, has moved back into the nest with her 5-year-old son Joaquin in tow. She
doesn't have a job yet but dreams of her band making it big. Or maybe just
getting a catering job. Keeps things lively. Recently Steve's dad, Ward, came
for a visit. He doesn't like to be alone and his wife Doris seems to be on an
extended vacation. We're not sure where Steve's friend Darrell lives. At least
he can fix things.

So without a steady stream of income and more mouths to feed, Cynthia agreed to
do a web cooking show in her home. Family life proceeds as usual during
shooting, sometimes Steve, Jane, Ward or Darrell pitch in but mostly they
interrupt. There's not much money in the mattress (or the 401K) but we're
saving the world, one recipe at a time. And around the house, both the plot and
the sauce thicken.
------------------------
"This is a really silly, but totally informative cooking show online from
Cynthia Lair, the author of a great cookbook, Feeding the Whole Family . "How to
cook fresh local organic whole foods despite lifes interruptions " is exactly
what I need! The short instructional videos are fun (and funny!) and the food
quickly comes together while life happens around Cynthia, her "husband," Steve
and their "daughter," Jane. She provides full meal menus on the website, both
meat and vegetarian options, and I know from her cookbook that they will be
healthy AND full of flavor." -from Dawn at The Sustainable Table

http://cookusinterruptus.com/index.php?video_id=25

Whats4Eats

Thank you, Angie (of Angie's Cultured Veggies) for sharing this wonderful website. The first page reads: "Whats4Eats is a celebration of the various cuisines of the world. Cook your favorite ethnic foods with recipes from Algeria to Vietnam. Searchable by cuisine, recipe name, ingredient or method."

Ha, it even has a category for "Comfort Foods". Click this link and have fun, fun, fun.

http://www.whats4eats.com/

Below is Angie's email to me about the site.

Cynthia,

Dr. Price would have liked this! Here’s the link to the site I told you about. It’s done by a chef that has traveled the world. You can search by region, country, culture, meal time, holiday…you name it! This is an awesome tool for homeschooling - we can make meals to coordinate with our history and geography lessons! There are interesting things to learn and try here no matter what our ages or educational status…

I’m imagining an WAPF chapter international meal party – as long as everyone makes their dishes traditionally nourishing, of course!

Bon Appetit!

Angie

http://www.welcomehomefamilies.com

Joel Salatin on global warming

Several years ago I engaged Joel Salatin of Polyface Farm to give a talk to the area WAPF Chapters. His talk was titled "Heal the planet by healing your plate".

Recently he spoke at a college and is still singing the same song. I wanted to share this with all you meat lovers so you can have the verbiage to respond to the "Red meat is destroying the planet" articles out in the world.

“Every bit of the alleged science linking methane and cows to global warming is based on annual cropping, feedlots and herbivore abuse. It all crumbles if the production model becomes like our mob-stocking-herbivorous-solar-conversion-lignified-carbon-sequestration fertilization. America has traded 73 million bison requiring no petroleum, machinery or fertilizer for 45 million beef cattle, and we think we’re efficient. At Polyface, we practice biomimicry and have returned to those lush, high organic matter production models of the native herbivores. If every cow producer in the country would use this model, in less than 10 years we would sequester all the carbon that’s been emitted since the beginning of the industrial age.”

Stop and think about that for a moment: Raising beef cattle with biomimicry can stop global warming in its tracks almost singlehandedly.

Yet another reason to support our small farmers and avoid at all costs animal products from CFO's (Confinement Feeding Operations)

(Quotes copied from http://localnourishment.com/2009/10/29/what-joel-salatin-said/)

Cultured Vegetables

How cool is this!? One of my favorite blog writers www.nourishedkitchen.com has put together a free e-book on cultured vegetables. To quote the blog:

Each recipe in Get Cultured focuses on nourishing probiotic, naturally fermented vegetables and all the recipes are dairy-free. I strongly recommend that you purchase a vegetable fermenter (see sources) for these recipes, though mason jars will due in a pinch. Fermentation is an inexact art and variances in the temperature of your home, the weather or the season may yield a quicker or slower fermentation period than outlined in the book, so use your judgment in preparing these wholesome probiotic foods.

And here is the link to the e-book http://issuu.com/nourishedkitchen/docs/getcultured/6

Which one will I start today?

Enjoy and please share your successes with me.

Homemade Laundry Soap

Preston and I love this concoction for it's simplicity, effectiveness and almost "greenness" It sure is a lot kinder to the environment than Tide or the like and works tons better than Seventh Generation and such. Not to mention it is CHEAP to make.

All the ingredients can be found in to laundry soap aisle at the grocery store.

1 Cup Fels Naptha (grated and powdered)
1/2 Cup Washing Soda
1/2 Cup Borax

Use 2 TBS average load or 3 for heavy load

That's it!

You can add a scent if you like when you mix to powder but I find it lovely on its own.