Bruschetta

No measurements, just whip this up with fresh ingredients!

Topping:
Tomatoes (Our cherry toms are nice and sweet)
Basil
Elephant garlic (It's mild)
Olive oil
Salt
Pepper

Chop up the tomatoes
Coarsely chop basil (leaves only)
Finely chop garlic (it remains raw, so start small and add more as needed)
Mix up the toms, basil leaves, and garlic in a bowl, and drizzle in the olive oil
Throw in some freshly ground salt and pepper

Bread:
Slice some good bread that will hold up to grilling. (I think our Maison Nord rosemary bread is perfect!) Brush each side with olive oil and toast it on the grill.  It should be a little crunchy, but not blackened.

Assembly:
Spoon topping onto the bread.

Eating:
Hunch over your plate--half the topping will fall off as soon as you take a bite. 

Variations:
Add a little balsamic vinegar to the topping, especially if the tomatoes aren't as sweet
Mix in some cheese, like fresh mozzarella
Kick up the flavor by spreading pesto on the grilled bread before adding the topping
Use yellow tomatoes or a red & yellow mix

Chicks @ 1 month

The chicks are now 1 month old. We're getting a better sense of what their adult feathering will be, and we're checking for comb development, size, and fancy feathering/large tails. Bigger and fancier usually means they're roosters. We have nine chicks altogether, but some are pretty camera shy. 

Not camera shy:  I think this chick was posing for the picture! 

This one is at least part Barred Rock, but the pattern doesn't look 100% Barred Rock to me.

I'm hoping the smallish comb means this is a hen instead of a rooster.

Here's a great example of the awkward teenage phase.  This chicken's wing feathers are developing, but the chick still has lots of the lighter down, giving a scruffy appearance as the new feathers poke through.  This one is at least part New Hampshire Red.

A NH Red rooster breeding with a Barred Rock hen should produce males with the Barred Rock pattern, and black females with some red neck feathers. I think that's what we've got going on here, but I can't be sure. And I'm not a chicken breed expert (yet).

This white one is part Delaware, and has black feathers at the wing tips, which is a Delaware characteristic.

Delaware Heritage Breed Chicken

Many of our chickens are heritage breeds--those that have been largely replaced by commercial breeds in modern farming. The flock includes Delaware, New Hampshire Red, Wyandotte, Sussex, and Barred Rock hens. (We've got three roosters, also.) 

This girl here is a Delaware chicken, a breed considered threatened (fewer than 1,000 breeding birds in the U.S., with seven or fewer primary breeding flocks, and estimated global population less than 5,000) by the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy. We have some other Delaware hens, and one of our new chicks is feathering out white with a few black accents. The new chick is some kind of Delaware mix, since we don't have any pure Delaware roosters.We'll have wait a little longer to see if the new part-Delaware chick is a rooster or a hen. 

There's more information about heritage breeds at the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy website:  http://albc-usa.org/.

Keepin' Cool

We're not the only ones suffering from all the heat.  It's pretty tough on our chickens, especially when the temperature jumps suddenly with little acclimation time. To help them out, we have a fan on the floor of the barn on the hot days. Some chickens park themselves right in front of it, feathers ruffling in the breeze. We've been adding electrolytes to their water (like Gatorade for poultry), and set up the hose to create a fine spray out in the yard. The chickens take dust baths by digging a hole to get to some cool earth, then stretching out in it. We periodically spray down the yard with water to help keep the soil cooled down. We've also created some lean-to style shelters by stringing up shade cloth, as shown below.

The new chicks are doing well, despite the heat. (In fact, they probably like it.) We just created a separate area of the yard for them so they can explore the outdoors (with mother hen's supervision). Gotta get some new pictures!

Caterpillar Invasion!

When I went to the herb garden to cut parsley, I found this cool caterpillar. Then I saw another. And another! Closer inspection revealed seven caterpillars in the parsley. There are three on this plant alone:  the obvious one, one down at the base of the plant, and another on the left side. I'm not sure what the one on the left is, but the other two are the larvae of swallowtail butterflies. We like swallowtails, but we'd also like to keep our parsley. Fortunately, there's an easy solution for dealing with them:  they will feed on Queen Anne's Lace, a wildflower. I found a container, picked off all the caterpillars, and moved them to some Queen Anne's Lace on our property.

Stuffed Zucchini Boats Recipe

Preparation: 15 minutes; Baking: 30 minutes; Serves: 8

4 medium zucchini, halved lengthwise
2 tsp olive oil
1 small yellow onion, finely chopped (about 3/4 cup)
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1-1/2 tbsp all-purpose flour
3/4 C crumbled feta cheese
1/4 C shredded Swiss cheese
2 tbsp chopped fresh parsley
1 large egg, lightly beaten
2 egg whites, lightly beaten
1/4 tsp black pepper

Heat oven to 375°F. Spray a 13x9-inch baking dish with vegetable cooking spray. Scoop out the insides of the zucchini, leaving a 1/2-inch shell. Reserve zucchini flesh. Place shells in prepared baking dish. Set aside.

Chop reserved zucchini. In a medium skillet, heat oil over medium heat. Add onion, garlic, and zucchini. Sauté until softened, 5 minutes. Remove from heat.

In a medium bowl, combine flour, feta and Swiss cheeses, parsley, egg, egg whites, and pepper. Mix well. Add zucchini mixture; toss to combine. Spoon mixture evenly into zucchini shells. Bake until heated through, about 30 minutes. Serve immediately.

Tip: Select zucchini about 7 inches long and 2 inches in diameter. Large zucchini will hold the stuffing better and will not curl during baking.

Source: Healthy Meals in Minutes(TM) International Masters Publishers AB

New Arrivals!

As we wrote about a few weeks ago, one of our hens "went broody" and decided to sit on some eggs. We helped by slipping in some extra eggs from other hens. After three weeks, chicks started hatching.  At first we thought we had only three or four chicks, but mother hen was hiding some more chickies underneath her. (You can see how she spreads out her body to keep eggs and babies warm.) We ended up with nine chicks! We have several different breeds of hens and three different roosters, yielding an adorable hodgepodge of chicks: one all black, four black with some white markings, one yellow-white, two reddish, and one reddish with brown markings.  We can't wait to see what their "adult" feathering will be. On the other hand, the babies are so cute that we don't want them to grow up yet. 

Now the chicks are scampering all over the place, and the mother makes a special clucking noise to alert them when she's found food. She'll repeatedly pick up a berry or seed, and then drop it to tell the chicks it is something good to eat. If she feels threatened (like when we're cleaning out their coop), she calls the chicks. They run over and hide underneath her for safety. During nap time, the chicks sleep in the hay, sometimes cuddled up next to each other or against mama. One chick likes to climb up and sleep on the mother's back. (This only occurs when I don't have my camera.)