A Video on the Chickens Page

A movie by Kate, starring Grandpa and the girls. Go to the Chickens page to click on the link.

A Long Gravy

For those who may not know, rice and gravy is considered a compound word in south Louisiana, and it is, of course, one dish. Meat and rice and gravy were a mainstay in our household, and Mama could always be counted on for fork-tender meat and a deliciously seasoned gravy. My mother was the master of the “long” gravy—the meat and gravy dish that consists of more gravy than meat and is needed when you aren’t sure of the number of people who will show up for dinner. It’s not that she did not expect us; it was more that she didn’t know just exactly how many of us would arrive—for we knew that she was always going to be cooking, and she knew that some of us would always stop by just as she was putting food on the table.

This weekend, as I was preparing a Christmas gumbo for our family, I thought of my mother’s gravies and the number of meals she must have cooked in her lifetime. She had only a few pots, one knife, and one cooking spoon. By the time my mother died, her cooking spoon had been worn thin. The bowl had been sharpened in a right-handed slant by the thousands of rouxs she had coaxed to brownness—and there was an actual pinhole in the lower left center of the bowl. Her spoon now hangs in my kitchen—an object d’art that has paid its dues and now watches my gravy-making attempts from a small expanse of wall between my refrigerator and the pantry door.

This weekend, I realized that making a gumbo is really just making one of Mama’s long gravies. I didn’t have an exact count of the relatives who would arrive for our Christmas gathering, but I knew I could never go wrong if I had a good gravy and a pot of rice. It took several days to get everything done: browning the roux, chopping the seasonings, simmering the stock. Mama would have had it all done in one day and on the table for eleven o’clock. She was much more efficient in her cooking than I am—and I do not ever remember her wringing her hands over whether or not she would have enough food for everyone. I always imagined a parallel between her pots and the loaves and fishes story of the Bible—no matter how many people were at the table, she always managed to feed everyone, and everyone left the table satisfied. From the meals at her table, I learned that one chicken can feed ten people when those eating are more concerned about everyone else’s having enough to eat than they are about how much meat is on their own plate.

The Christmas gumbo began with a rooster, two guinea fowl, and a chicken. Later, doubt about whether or not we would have enough food made me add another chicken to the pot. I was feeling confident that I would have enough for my family. Then the doubts began to raise their heads again, and I added two more chickens—four in all. That was the magic mix. In the gravy I used all three cups of roux I had prepared, and at the end when I wasn’t sure if it would be thick enough, I added some okra. It was very much of a try-something-and-see-what-happens kind of gumbo. It might be that that is the best kind.

Everyone enjoyed the rooster-guinea-chicken-okra-sausage gumbo. We had enough to feed everyone that was here. I thought of Mama often during the day and knew she would have been proud of my progress in making long gravies. I have a long way to go before my cooking spoon wears the badges of honor that hers bears, but I am glad to be following in her steps as I make my way around my own kitchen floor from the stove to the sink to the fridge.

Ruby Rita Descant Moreau

December 20, 1912 – March 29, 1989

Gotreaux Family Farm Tour

What do people do in the fall on All Hallow's Eve eve? 

They go out to Scott to take a hayride around the family farm of

 Brian and Dawn Gotreaux.

Brian and Dawn are successfully implementing sustainable farming practices that connect one farming operation with another--a type of closed system known as permaculture. You'll see what I mean as you look through the pictures.

Brian is driving the tractor. No seat belts other than
the arms of parents and grandparents--what an excuse for a hug!

We start at the hoop houses of the talapia ponds. 

Brian has built more than one of these giant ponds,
all filled with hundreds of fish. Don't worry about the smell--
there isn't any!

Brian explaining the system of growing fry in smaller vats.

Powerful aerators keep the water oxygenated.

Now it's time to get some "hands-on" experience.

Everyone wants a turn.

Some hydroponic seedlings are grown
in the hoop house--no soil, only pond water.

Others are in flats, watered with the nitrogen-rich
 water of the talapia pond.

Pond water is run through giant filters that are back-washed
 frequently. The backwash drains out to the farm's compost pile
 located in back of the hoop house.

Chickens are enjoying the banquet served in the compost.

In the background you can see a flock of smooth-skinned sheep.

Now how hard do you think it is to tell the difference
between smooth-skinned sheep and goats! 

These are the goats.

We are moving to the poultry area. Brian and Dawn have
over 1,000 laying hens.

These hens know the meaning of free-range!

The egg mobile. It is moved each night. Droppings fertilize
the grass, making it a rich source of food
for the grass-fed animals to graze.

Inside the egg mobile: roosts, feeding troughs, openings for
"fertilizer" to drop to grasses below.

From another angle...

One wall is lined with nesting boxes.
How wonderful is this picture!

Here's a close-up of those hens loving the compost pile.

What do all kids do around chickens? Collect feathers, of course.

She has become known as "the Chicken Whisperer."

These movable pens (chicken tractors) are for meat birds. Each day the pen is moved
to a new spot in the pasture giving the birds fresh grass to eat
while fertilizing the area with their droppings.

The Gotreauxs raise Cornish Cross chickens and Guinea fowl
(in separate pens). 

Two people can easily push the pen to the new location
because of the PVC pipes that form skids for easy sliding.

Guineas are raised and butchered in time for Christmas gumbos.

We are now on our way to the garden. Talapia hoop houses are
on the left, the garden hoop house is on the right.

Happy plants--

Brian telling the story of how it all started...

...beginning with a few raised beds.

There was time to do a little independent exploring.

The Gotreauxs raise beautiful sunflowers to attract insects--and
to include in the many CSA boxes they prepare each week.

Inside the hoop.

The goat pen borders the garden, making it easy

to give them scraps through the fence.

This ends the tour. 

We have made the circle. 

The talapia ponds are right behind the goats, 

and our car is parked right outside the ponds.

Not a bad way to spend an afternoon.

Gotreaux Family Farm--an impressive place you might want to visit.

Oreo Milk

 My grandchildren introduced me to one of the latest horrors of processed food, a cookie straw through which children suck up milk. The “straw” is lined with a sweetened flavoring (no doubt high fructose corn syrup), and the milk is flavored on its way up from the bottom of the glass. This surreal product was, of course, found in the cereal aisle—one of the places all shoppers should avoid. Once you pass the steel-cut oats at the beginning of the aisle, there is nothing else worthy to be classified as food. (I do not know just how we found ourselves so far down this aisle, unless it was to find the marshmallows we needed for hot chocolate.) But, like any grandmother worth her salt when confronted with the pleading eyes and begging voices of her grandchildren promising that this is absolutely the last time they will ever ask for processed food, I put the box of straws right into my basket and took them home with us.

Shortly after this shameful incident, I was introduced to one of the great pleasures of local food—Oreo milk. No, it is not what you are thinking. Oreo is a cow who lives about ten miles from here. Her owner told me what her breed is, but like all things that don’t really matter to me, I’ve forgotten what he said. What matters is that I can recognize Oreo by her markings (what else, black with a white band all around her stomach) and that she is gentle enough for my grandchildren to milk her (which means I don’t have to be afraid).

I began getting Oreo milk about a year ago. Her owner was sharing milk with a friend of mine, and through the kindness of both of these people, I began to be included in the weekly gallon of whole (4-6% butterfat) raw milk. I still remember my first taste of Oreo milk. It was unlike any milk I could ever remember drinking. It had a creamy texture and rich taste that was completely unlike anything I could buy in a store. I drank glass after glass, and my grandchildren, who usually leave their perfunctory glass of store bought milk at the same level at the end of a meal as I poured at the beginning, drank glass after glass, as well. 

Drinking raw milk from a cow like Oreo, whose owners are an “ag” professor and a veterinarian, is not a problem for me. She is a healthy animal; her environs are clean; she is tended well. This is not the case with all dairy animals. I would not drink raw milk from large dairy factories—places where required pasteurization takes the place of the husbandry Oreo enjoys. (See Weston A. Price Foundation for more information about raw milk.)

People living on family farms have been drinking this milk for centuries. It is one of the few kinds of milk that agrees with lactose-intolerant people like me. And if you are wondering where you can buy raw milk, I have bad news for you. You can’t. It is against Louisiana law to sell this marvelous milk. Many other states do allow the sale of raw milk, but Louisiana lawmakers are standing firm in protecting the health and safety of our citizens (as they ride motorcycles, sans helmets, along our highways). For now, you can get raw milk only if you are one of the lucky few, like I am, who has a friend with a cow who is willing to share. My wish for all of you is that you are able to find such a friend.

By the way, I was cleaning the pantry today and threw away the remaining “straws.” They’ve been on the shelf for months without a single request for a second helping. It gives me such pleasure to know that is not the case when Oreo milk is available for my grandchildren.

Chick Pics

Are you sure you don't want to see any more chicken pictures? The new pictures may surprise you...but then again, they may not!

Page Updates

A few new gardening pictures have been added. Remember to scroll down. (Someday I'll get sophisticated and really learn how to do this blog thing.)

More Thanksgiving recipes have been added. Now it will be on to Christmas cooking!

More chick pictures will be coming soon.

Community Supported Agriculture (CSA)

Harvey and I have been going to the Hub City Farmers Market on most Saturday mornings for a couple of years, primarily because it gives us an opportunity to visit our grandchildren (an excuse, albeit a good one, for traveling twenty miles to buy homegrown organic vegetables).  

Farmers markets have become real players in the food industry. A movement that started a few decades ago in this country has spread nationwide, and the big food industry is contributing to its growth with every food recall that hits the news. In recent years, people like Michael Pollan and Eric Schlosser have publicized the hidden agenda of many commercial food suppliers, and people are educating themselves and seeking out more healthful choices. Even the staunchest supporter of the big commercial food chain, the United States Department of Agriculture, has come up with its own veneer of support for the local consumer with its new slogan: Know your farmer, know your food.

We have gotten to know our farmers. In fact, in the years that we visited our local farmers market on a regular basis, we got to know our farmer so well that he and his wife are the very people who have allowed us to garden on their land. In the last couple of years, we have gotten to know other farmers through an outgrowth of the farmers market movement—Community Supported Agriculture, or CSAs.

CSAs are basically subscriptions that a person buys from a farmer in exchange for a share of the produce that the farmer is growing. Generally, the subscriptions are for an eight to ten week period during fall and spring harvesting. The cost and the amount of produce received varies with the farmer, but in the two years that we have been buying CSAs, we have found a constant: we must find innovative ways to get all of the produce eaten before it is time to go back to the market to pick up more bags or boxes of collards, carrots, beets, turnips, and squash.

When you buy a CSA, you are providing cash flow for the farmer for a growing season. Payment is made at the beginning of the season, so you have no idea whether you will realize any return on this futures transaction. Both you and the farmer are hoping that your payment and the crops will not be eaten up by hornworms or flooded by Katrinas and Ritas. It is a gamble, but one I am willing to take in order to support people like David Klier, a young farmer who is trying to make a go of his Helping Hands Farm.

We met David last year when we first began our regular stops at the Hub City Farmers Market. He does not fit the stereotypical image of a farmer, not with his bearded twenty-something face and dreadlocks tied behind his head. I think those characteristics intrigued me and made me want to know more about him. As we briefly talked each week, I found him to be an extremely knowledgeable farmer, with a dogged desire to succeed at his vocation. It was not a difficult decision to buy a CSA from David. I had gotten to know him, and I knew his food.

Yesterday was the final pick-up for this season’s CSA. I can now evaluate whether or not I got my money’s worth with the deal that I struck: $250 for ten weeks of vegetables and ten bouquets of flowers. Without a doubt, we have had an abundance of fresh, organic produce that more than satisfied our food needs—the flowers were a bonus, along with the jar of pepper jelly David threw into the mix at the beginning of the harvest when he thought the bag of vegetables was a little light.

And if it had not turned out this way? If the crop had failed or if weather had not cooperated, would I still have no regrets about having supported a farmer who is trying to provide himself and a small community of people with healthy food? You know the answer to that.