It's pesto time of year again (and the price of HIVE goes nuts!)
Due to the slightly weird year we've had with an unusual amount of cold, most of my basil is well into the flowering stage already so I took the opportunity to give it all a good trim and create my favourite healthy snack. As you can see in the above image I had to review my recipe from this time last year in order to remind myself of the quantities! Thank goodness for Hive. Thank goodness too for the price which has been rather enjoyable lately, giving us a new ATH at around $1.14 last night.
I could in this moment easily slip into a long monologue about how the world's most popular decentralised social media site is perfectly poised to accept the flood of masses who are waking up to the reality that sites such as Facebook & Twitter will never offer the kind of freedom we experience here, or indeed the rewards! But something tells me you've seen a few of those kind of posts already, so I'm just gonna stick to pesto. With a few family shots for you at the end.
Hey presto, it's pesto!
We anticipated being able to save some into the winter last year but it was all eaten so quickly. To remedy this I grew a whole bunch more than usual, mostly in the courtyard where they are better protected from bugs.
These two in the palate planter were the biggest and had started to take over the tomatoes, so they were the first to receive their trim. Having collected a ton of seeds last year I am happy to chop the flowers at this stage.
In the main planter they were taking over the chives. And we can't have that ;)
So, into the processor everything goes and it's time to eat. For those of you wanting this recipe please check my pesto article from last year.
Ideally served with some of my freshly baked sourdough bread.
I mentioned in my last post we have an abundance of tomatoes at the moment which is great because these make the perfect accompaniment.
The flavour combination is out of this world and my lunch was thoroughly enjoyable after nine months with no pesto!
Am currently training the tomatoes to grow in an arch around the entrance to our living room. All in all a very enjoyable and peaceful place to eat lunch and do my work when I am alone.
In other news Esteban & Luna are doing great, enjoying their summer, unaware for the most part of what is happening in the world.
Luna has glasses these days, but they are not like regular glasses. She only wears them for a few hours a day and there is no prescription, just a glaze over her normal eye, forcing her magic eye to work harder. The eye doctors think it will help. Not so sure about this myself and I preferred the sessions she was doing with the energy worker, but unfortunately she has quit her job as she cannot continue her work legally without being vaccinated.
Esteban is so in love with the piano it is the first thing he does every morning.
Working through the lessons on the ipad app he is improving super fast, playing confidently with both hands at the same time now.
It brings me a huge amount of joy listening to him playing. He has even started composing his own tunes and I am sure it won't be long before he is drawn to writing songs like his papa. On that note I am writing one currently which is a bit more upbeat than the previous few. Perhaps I will start posting my songs here. For some reason they seem more personal & private than these posts and I struggle to share.
Finally I wanted to tell you something I am seriously excited about! We tasted our first French mangoes from a local producer today and they are simply magnificent. Esteban & Luna remember mangoes from Bali and they are even more excited than me.
They are smaller than usual but more intense too! Naturally I have kept the stones and will be planting them immediately. This is what the kids ate for pudding today, with grapes from the garden.
Oh yes, last thing... I have a coffee machine! Don't know how it took my entire life to get to this moment, always accepting filtered coffee as being good enough? Now that I have a machine I realise it is so much more enjoyable this way!
While I know coffee is not the most natural way to start the day I also know that coffee beans won't be available forever. At least not at a price I am willing to pay, so I'm just going to enjoy little pleasures such as this until I can't. And that's it.
Love & Light everyone 🌱
Hive at a new ATH woot!
Yeah right, super cool eh!
And this is just the beginning...
now I'm hungry for salad :)
Bon appetite! 🍃
Would love to hear some of your music Sam - and so happy that your son is enjoying the piano. My brother loves pesto - I'm not so keen,
Hey Eden. Apparently I have a soundcloud account which has some of my older stuff. Check it out if you're interested ;)
How can you not love pesto???
Wow! He will make a good artiste, love when kids shows true potential and love in what they do🥰
The key thing is that he really loves it! So if he chooses to stick with it, he will become great at his chosen passion. I imagine like me he will have lots of creative things which float his boat ;)
Smile.... That's good to hear
Heheh, do you have a meal called "pudding" there? Never heard of it.
Speaking of meals, did you enjoy a toke with your lunch outside with the tomatoes? :) Tomatoes like cannabis smoke and vapour, but get sick from tobacco, so if you use that be careful smoking it around them.
The tomatoes look great! We like pesto too but can't find pine nuts for anywhere near a reasonable price, and they have to be imported, so we generally don't.
What a difference location makes! Here in BC, my 2 types of basil did poorly this year because it was too hot. I watered enough to keep it happy, but it was the intense direct sun and 45C heat that held it back. Even the aloe plant and cannabis (male) out in the yard couldn't handle it. Even my basils in partial shade didn't produce. Hell, even the birdberry tree in the back yard didn't flower or produce berries this year! I've really had to coax the tomatoes along - I won't get a crop from them, but I'll get my seeds back, barely. I started in February and have worked nonstop on this little garden all year, and I've got nothing to show for it. Brutal year! There weren't even any insects for pollination, and we got 6 weeks of darkness, ash, and smoke right in the middle of summer. And it has only rained 4 times since last Christmas.
Soooooo, complain away about the cool damp weather, and your pea plants that produced for months, etc etc LOL
Price of food at the farmers market is up 100% this year. Box of tomatoes $30, last year $15. Head of broccoli $7, last year $4, and so on. Even the semi-pros are struggling to produce anything here. General food prices at the store are already creeping up 5% every month... I think this poor harvest is going to compound that over the winter. I will be canning as many tomatoes (mostly from the farmers market) as I can. We make a lot of stews, pastas, and chillis during the cold months :)
I have a second little sprout on the way. We are very excited about the addition, but very scared about the next 7 months. Katie's spine is fused and her organs were burned badly by radiation for cancer as a child (they didn't know cannabinoids would have instantly cured the type of tumour she had). So surgery is the only way, meaning we have to inject ourselves into the evil big pharma beast system we have been fighting to destroy for 10+ years. We barely made it, with Brett. So many doors closed right after he came, and we said "good thing he's the one and only". Now we're squirming a bit. I'm trying to convey how I feel without giving the algos my entire soul but you get the picture. I wish we could hang for a minute.
Love from Canada.
You don't say pudding? I suppose you don't. You live in a land where rubbish bins are trash cans and pavements are sidewalks ;)
Interesting about tomatoes and their preferences. Never heard that before. Would love to try a controlled grow, one with the addition of cannabis vapour, one without, to see the difference. All I need is a grow room now...
Yes, pine nuts aren't cheap. There are plenty of pine trees around here but I don't have a clue how to harvest their nuts! Should probably look into that. Am waiting for the local walnuts to ripen enough before I start making the parsley pesto. I wonder if you could substitute sunflower seeds for pine nuts? Might be worth a shot. Perhaps roasted sunflower seeds?
I wasn't so much complaining about the cold weather, more just commenting on it. In fact the temperature is perfect at the moment and the figs have just come into season, so I've started making jam with them. Ten pots so far...
Your Summer really does sound like an extreme test. And it is hard for me to comment. If you only had one variety which was doing well in the heat I would say to focus on that, but it doesn't sound like there was anything. My only thought (as impractical as it may be) is to create a sunken greenhouse for next year. Might even make a cool place for you to hang out if your AC goes down. This is the first link which came up when I googled it, but it seems to have some good suggestions: https://insteading.com/blog/underground-greenhouse/
Thank you for reporting on your local food prices. That's pretty crazy. But not altogether unexpected. Things have increased here but not by that much. Yet.
Congrats for the baby coming! Bit tricky on the timing but something my dad used to say comes to mind - 'where there is a will there is a way'. Do you remember that thing we were discussing relating to the ethics of faking something to be a part of a system you are against? Perhaps, knowing what you know about your situation, you could make an exception on this occasion and look into it? At all costs the poison should be avoided. Especially if you are pregnant.
We could always schedule a chat if you feel like talking?
All the best to you brother.
Beautiful green looking garden with many pot plants and banana tree! Would love to try some of your pesto and lovey bread.
Two cats on the window listening to the music! Nice life for cats!
That mango looks very interesting. Hope you could grow some mango trees too. The children look so happy and healthy. What a lovey family you have there!
The biggest banana tree is just about to flower. Fingers crossed we will get bananas this year! A late hot summer should do the trick nicely ;)
The cats love it there for some reason. Perhaps because it is our little musical corner ;)
I will post about the mango babies as soon as they sprout...
Waiting for the bananas!
Love you cuddlekitten!
@samstonehill muy bueno todo saves a mi me gusta comer todo verde. no me gusta muchos los tomates. una vez me hicieron un comentario y soy sincera no lo investigue que el tomate daña los huesos cuando se come en exceso? entonces decidi no comer
Bonsoir mon ami,
This made me smile throughout :<)
Your food looks so good!
And your kids are so extremely cute and incredible.
Love to hear that piano story.
Enjoy your coffee machine luxury for the time being. I am still in a love-hate relationship with this liquid gold ( hence the character Cold Turkey in my upcoming book.
Coffee seems to upset my stomach and head more than I like to admit, but I wonder if the former mainly has to do with other things. When I'm balanced I can stomach anything ;<)
Sending you a hug from Portugal,
Vincent
Am so pleased this created some smiles for you :)
Yes, the piano (despite its electronicness) was really a great investment and so too was the ipad (also known as Bob) which has received a lot of criticism in the past as a useless distraction. I am 100% sure Esteban would not be loving it so much without Bob. Even I have found myself drawn to those black and white keys where I can create and dream of the real piano which is coming soon! Sabrina is also working through the lessons on Bob (which sends daily reminders to her phone) and has been surprised by how much she loves it and how fast she is improving. Before she met me she believed herself to be unmusical and uncreative, which let's face it, none of us are!
Definitely associate with that love/hate coffee relationship. But now I get to feel like I'm working at a real coffee shop when I make it. So cool! Am grateful at least that 5 years ago I stopped putting milk in it and never looked back. Perhaps one day I will give that a try again when we we have our own cow!
Didn't know you were writing a book? You are a man of many talents. Do please let me know in a direct message when you are done with that. Would love to have a read.
All the best to you Vincent 🌲
It's incredible how learning has advanced. There are some advantages, every now and then, to this insane / crazy world we're living in.
Awesome to hear that you are awaiting an actual piano. Or perhaps you meant to say manifesting. No matter what, it will come your way, sooner rather than later.
And...
What!!!
You didn't know I am writing a book!
;<)
That means you haven't read my blog since November 2019, at least... hahaha
I write about it in almost every single post.
No worries, I get it. It's hard enough to focus on our own stuff already. We can't all stalk other people's timelines ( like I still do ). It's draining.
I think you're gonna like my book though. It started as a novel and is ending up to become a series of books that are fun for adults and hopefully also for ( slightly older kids ) and vice versa.
Will do, buddy.
I feel sure I have checked out your blog in the past, just missed the book references! Am very conscious I need to stop telling myself this, but I really don't know where my time goes each day and having a moment to read other people's blogs doesn't come around often. I love that you stalk my timeline! Please don't stop :)