Spring Distillations

I always have the best of intentions when it comes to documenting note worthy events. Journals, blogs, pocket calendars; I pick them carefully, decorate and arrange them lovingly, write a few entrees excitedly, and then totally forget about them. This is my attempt to break the cycle, not only for breaking the cycles sake, but because there are way too many incredibly note worthy events and collaborations and concoctions happening here at the henhouse to let them reside only in the memories of those physically present to witness them.

It is March 11th. Day light savings is over today. The equinox is in a week. It's blustery and overcast with brief bouts of light rain. And Mercury goes into retrograde tomorrow (just so you know). It's the kind of day where the change in the air feels palpable, even tangible. We've been preparing to turn our backyard into a burdgeoning eden of vegetables and herbs. We have everything we need: seeds, boxes to plant our seeds in, and a mountain of dirt for the seeds to take root and spread inside of. A giant rosemary bush that's taken up residence in the sunniest spot of the yard has been the only impediment left in the way of our grand vegetable garden dreams. We've been hesitant to remove it because of the considerable medicinal/astringent properties of its leaves and flowers.

However, today is the day that all the elements have finally aligned for us to distill it, those elements being our friend Monica Fine the herbalist of The Seasonal Apothocary and her Alembic Still.

It started with pulling all the viable parts off the leggy bush to strip off its tender bits. As we sat, kvetching about relationships, sipping on our tea and plucking delicate rosemary flowers off the gnarled branches, I felt equal parts like a fledgling witch preparing to

brew up a magical concoction and a prairie wife, working with my community of sisters to make medicine. I reckon when it comes to herbs, at the end of the day, the line between magic and medicine becomes indistinguishable.

Here are the blossoms and leaves going into copper distilling pot.

After plucking and pulling till our fingers were numb and sore, the pot moved to the stove and Monica put together the rest of the distilling apparatus. How does it work do you ask? Well, the rosemary is covered with water and brought to a boil. As it heats, aromatic chemicals are released and burst into gas. The heat in the pot pushes the vapor up through the neck, and moves through the condenser coil,which cools the molecules so that they turn back into a liquid. What you are left with is hydrosol, a potent water containing microscopic bits of essential oil and thin glistening puddles of pure essential oil floating on the top of the water.

This is an upclose shot of the condenser coil. The copper basin the coil is sitting in is filled with cold water so that the vapor is forced to cool down as it travels through the coil. Water drains off the top because the coil gets very hot and heats the water, so the water has to be replaced constantly.

And here at last, after 6 hours, is our final distilled product: three jar-fulls of intensly camphoric rosemary hydrosol. We plan to use it for housecleaning, facials (it makes a crackerjack toner that neutralizes skin ph), lovely bath times, an aromatic natural vapor rub should a case of the sniffles arise, and as an ingredient in some of the many herbal beers, tonics, and elixirs that we are creating. But thats a blog for another day...

a sad day

One of our dear chickens, Getty, was killed by a neighbor's dog this afternoon. We buried her by the chicken coop currently being built. Pictures of the coops progress coming soon.

Any question of whether or not we plan to eventually eat our chickens has been cleared up with an emphatic and plainly obvious, no.

Welcome to the Henhouse

Weve lived here a good long minute, aka 10 months. And we, the "we" being one Miss Celia, one Miss Melanie, and one Miss Rebecca have had the intention from day one to document the lovely, inventive, clever, and delicious ideas that have come out of our heads and into this home in the form of decadent food and creative home renovation through a blog just like this one. However, we experienced some ruts along the way. Winter was most definitely as much of a metaphorical experience for us as it was a literal. But here we are, and it's spring, and all of the ideas and dreams that have been percolating in our heads are getting ready to greet this temperate season like an explosion of wildflowers.

My family has a gift. The gift of making perfect pies. And a perfect pie, as we all know, starts with perfect crust. Flaky, tender, salty; its a delicate balance of texture. One that holds your pie together like a firm embrace and effortlessly breaks apart in your mouth like a cloud. My mother has been baking pies since before I was born, which was 27 years ago. She's so competent at her craft she might as well just wave her hand and a pie would appear; it's that effortless for her.

I've attempted multiple times to summon the pie crust magic running in my mother's veins and every time I've come away defeated. Instead of having the ingredients come together easily, I would end up with a sticky mess that would refuse to become a ball of dough. I would coax it with extra sprinkles of flour, pleading with it to cooperate like a desperate young mother in over her head with a disgruntled child. It would always be to no avail. I resigned myself to being the member of the family who didnt inherit the magical gift and did my best to move on with my life.

Well, recently, I decided to try again. Celia has an internship at Chez Pannise and has been cooking up a flurry of tasty little treats and with all the vigorous flour slinging and sugar scooping, I felt inspired to make something delicious contained within a pie crust. Then my mother brought by some gorgeous organic strawberries and in the same afternoon I happened across some fresh rhubarb at the grocery store, so it was a done deal that I was going to take on Strawberry Rhubarb Pie despite my reservations. I began to assemble the ingredients for the pie crust. This pie crust recipe has been in my family for a spell and many women in my family have won blue ribbons for having used this recipe. It starts simply enough, 2 cups flour, 1 cup shortening. In my idealism, I've attempted in the past to use organic, non-hydrogenated super special fancy shortening. Therein lied my mistake of the past. The secret is Crysco. It is the ONLY way the magic will work. So, lacking a pastry cutter, I chopped the Crysco into the flour using two knives and eventually used a fork until it was all integrated into crumbly bits. In a separate bowl I whisked a egg with a tablespoon of ACV (apple cider vinegar) and a tablespoon of water. This here, is the moment of reckoning. This is moment where the magic either happens or it doesn't and you are left with a sticky mess on your hands wondering where in this relatively simple process you went wrong. I took a deep breath and poured my liquid into the flour mixture and lightly stirred the two together with my fork. And wouldnt you know, before my very eyes, like pie crust magic, it effortlessly formed into a beautiful ball of dough that rolled out like a dream! I yelled at the top of my lungs " I'VE GOT THE GIFT!!!" I hastily assembled my fruit mixture ( 2.5 cups of sliced strawberries, 2.5 cups of rhubarb, 1.5 cups of sugar and a third cup of flour), dumped it into the crust and popped it all in the oven. By the time it came out it was late at night, so I got to wake up and have this as my breakfast. Needless to say, I am extremely and magically pleased.