Eating Local

Our coat closet pantry

Watermelon Limeade

Eating local seems to be a hard thing for our area. We live in an area where the closest town is 20 minutes away and the closest city is 45 minutes. But we try to do the best we can, we could do better if I put the time in to research but right now I don't have much of that.

We do garden and this year seems to be a good year, since by this time every year the garden is a mass of weeds and I am done with it. But this year for maybe the first time it is still going strong and I am as well. The no till/deep mulch we did this year has made it really fun and has kept the weeds at bay as well as easy to pull when they do pop up. And the early morning seems to stay cool enough that gardening isn't such a sweaty chore. Even though I do get plenty sweaty out there.

Our pantry this year which isn't just in the closet pictured above is mostly home canned items. We have some under our bed, and in each of the kids rooms under their beds. Ash is water and emergency things for hurricanes. Yguy is dry pack stuff. Oh, and our closet has about 25 or so spaghetti squash, and canned peppers, tomato sauce and stock up items from Sams. The recently canned chicken is partly under our bed and in the closet pantry. Total we canned 15 pints and 14 quarts.

Last night Yguy made Watermelon Limeade from a watermelon he grew he has 3 more big ones out there that we will pick today. The one we picked yesterday split from all the rain but it was so sweet and good.

Here is the recipe for a very surprisingly refreshing drink.

Watermelon Limeade

from Aug/Sept 2010 Organic Gardening

8 cups cubed watermelon (seeds removed) or 1 qt watermelon juice.

1 cup fresh sqeezed lime juice

1/2 c sugar (we used stevia)

place half of watermelon in blender and process still smooth. Strain through a fine mesh sieve set over and large bowl; discard solids. Repeat with remaining watermelon. (should have about 1 qt of watermelon juice)

add lime juice and sugar to the watermelon juice and stir till sugar is dissolved. Taste, and add more sugar if desired. Transfer to a nonreactive pitcher and refrigerate till chilled.

Serve over ice and enjoy.

Have a Blessed Day

Erika