We are Scott and Kendra, a husband and wife team who are lucky enough to live in the lovely little town of Sonoma, California. Right in the heart of wine country. We have a modest little third of an acre, but with farmers as ancestors, and a passion for edibles, we make the most out of what we have. We’ve always gardened organically, but became even more dedicated to it when we started to offer our two young sons our homegrown fruits and vegetables as their first foods. We’ve read countless books, magazines, university research documents and newspaper articles on organic gardening and we hope to share a bit of what we’ve learned with you.
I’m mostly in charge of the flowers, he’s mostly in charge of the vegetables and together, we make a pretty good garden.
We’d love to hear from you. Both with your comments and via e-mail. You can reach us at kendra@kendraspencer.com if you’d like to say ‘hi’ or ask us a question.
Just wondering if you can share your recipe for canning nectarines. I have never canned anything before so please be very specific. Thank you. Steve
Hi Steve,
If you haven’t canned before, I’d really recommend starting by reading some books. There’s a lot of precautions you need to prevent things like botulism and I don’t feel comfortable explaining for fear that I’d leave somthing important out. But here are a couple of our favorite books:
Putting Food By
Joy of Cooking: All About Canning & Preserving
Both of those books should include canning nectarines and other cut fruit.
Thank you for your postings! I found you via the Carnival of Home Preserving. I too have a nectarine question – I wondered if you peeled them before canning them? I am getting mixed responses and wondered what you found to be your experience?
Hi Sarah,
We leave the skins on. Partially because we are lazy and partially because they aren’t thick or fuzzy like peaches. We’ve had good success with leaving them on in the past.
Hi Mel!
Very interesting! I love when we are simply rediscovering thngs that had a purpose 100yrs ago and are still modern…like bioagriculture…or philosophy! I was thinking maybe you would be interested in posting your blogs on my website, http://www.altglobe.com. All you need to do is creating a profile and let me know you want to post, and then you can actually just *email* your blog whenever you have a new post. It’s that easy! The website will take care about linking it to your profile and respect most of your editing (website links, images, fonts…) – yes it will crop out some things like weird smileys or what not -
We have a couple of bloggers who are doing that, it’s very convenient and help you with advertising yourself and us with traffic. if you’d like you can check them out! They are all on the home page!
(Note you cannot have access to any profile until you are registered, but you can see all the articles).
Please tell me how it sounds to you, hope to hear from you soon…
Cristele
PS: It’s free. PLUS, next week we enter our *first* blog contest, with prize kindly and generously offered by the members of our community! http://www.altglobe.com/altglobe-contest
PS2: I realize this is a comment AND an offer so if you want to delete this comment that’s totally cool
Hi -
I saw your comment on the Crunchy Chicken book review In Defense of Food on the Raw milk/fat issue. Yes, I noted Michael Pollen’s comment on the processing of milk. I’m a huge fan of raw milk — but had to stop because of the saturated fat wearing me down (weight gain, felt “sluggish”) and when I stopped, the energy came back and the weight gain stopped. I recently gave up dairy (went back to the Ornish lifestyle I practiced for several years) and feel really good, but miss that glass of raw milk or chunk of raw cheese every now and then. Suggestion: since the cream so conveniently floats to the top of the milk, why not skim it off and drink “skim” milk? No, its not the same without the cream, but you would be eliminating the fat. Nice blog!
Jill
a.k.a. Chili
I would like to know more about your jarring practices – maybe even having you speak at an event if you or someone you know is interested.
Please contact me in either case.
Thank you!
I was so tickled to find you in our “backyard”. You guys get more warm weather though. We are over on the Russian River in Monte Rio. I loved your article on green manure. If you two ever get over this way stop at the seed shop!
My beets are booming. I’ve pickled more than I can eat and would like to store them in jars. Any advice?
Great site I stumbled on. A little late this year but did get a garden in. Ripped up the back yard and put in a number of raised beds…live out here in Sonoma by Buena Vista. Any good resources for planting schedules and best crops? Looks like there is a ton of information here that I can use.
Looking forward to reading about the Succession Planting….want to go beyond tomatoes and zucchini and go year round…anything that applies predominately to Sonoma will be great…thanks for the site.
Hi John! It looks like we live only blocks away, so please do check in. Anything we can grow, I’m sure you can too!
Hi
I have been following your blog for a few weeks. It is the best that I have found, maybe, it’s because your interested in all the things that I am.
I am a firm beliver in mulching. I read a book by Ruth Stout over 30 years ago and I am still mulching.
I am also a firm believer in the Ornish diet. I was surprised you were following his diet. Sure does help keep the weight off and a lot of diseases.
I am looking forward to your updates. Found you when I was checking out Down to Earth blog, she had you listed as one of her favorites, now you are one of my favorites, too.
Just found your website. Really enjoying the information that you are sharing. Thanks.]
Would you have any reipies for rosehips. the hedgerows here in England are full of them and i would like to put some to use. Thanks Den.