Ode to the egg

It's worth returning to the egg for another examination. The marketers got it quite right when they proclaimed it not just edible but incredible so many years ago. But, recent research and the rise of both small family farms and even backyard poultry show us that the egg's place in our diet is on the rise.

The egg is the backbone of most of the tiny operations here on our island, mirroring, I suspect, the context in the surrounding Puget Sound region, although certainly not the larger breadbasket of the state, where monoculture still dominates. It is the egg, usually brown or a rainbow collection, that brings folks to the farm stands, the egg that sells out first at the farmers market. For us, it is the egg that brings people up our driveway when the stand's cooler is empty, inquiring with hope and hesitation, whether perhaps by chance are there any just boxed or lying in wait in their collection basket?

And for good reason. It's almost safe to say that there's not really any such thing as "the egg" anymore. There's growing awareness out there that the factory eggs sitting on the supercolossalwonderstore shelf are simply not the same food as the hand-washed beauties resting in a cooler at the end of your neighbor's lane. My son refuses to eat eggs in restaurants now. They are pale shadows of what he gets at home and Dylan claims they are simply taste free.

Eggs are high in protein and contain every major nutrient except vitamin C. Farm fresh eggs from free-range pastured hens not only look and taste a world away from factory eggs, they are dramatically lower in both cholesterol and fat. All this makes them just about the perfect food, and we haven't even touched on their versatility yet!

What else can you fry up for breakfast, slice onto your just-picked greens for a terrific lunch salad, whip up and bake in a crust with veggies and a little ham for dinner, then fold into flour and chocolate chips and a little (OK, a lot) sugar to munch on for a treat?

To celebrate, I think it's time for another quiche recipe, especially since the Fried Green Tomato Quiche gets so much traffic. Quiche is perfect for any meal of the day and also reheats well - so make 2!

Enjoy this one with a chilled crisp rose or Cote du Rhone and some mixed greens drizzled in herbed olive oil and a splash of red wine vinegar. The perfect meal to highlight the bounty of August ~

SSF sauteed greens and bacon quiche

Preheat the oven to 425.

Prepare your favorite pie crust or roll out a store-bought one and smooth it over a lightly oiled pie pan, crimping the edges. Bake until just lightly golden, 5-7 minutes. Remove and set aside.

Wash and cut the spine out of 1 bunch of chard or kale. Don't dry. Chop roughly and saute with 2 cloves chopped garlic in about 1-2 TBS olive oil until wilted, about 5 minutes.

Meanwhile whisk 3 large eggs with 1/3 C whole milk or half and half - or some combination thereof.

Chop 1/2 pound crispy-cooked bacon into bits.

Crumble about 1/3-1/2 C of feta cheese over the bottom of your pie crust. Sprinkle the bacon bits next. Spread the wilted greens over both, then pour in the egg mixture.

Bake for 15 minutes, then turn the oven down to 350 and bake for another 10-15. Allow to cool for 10 minutes before cutting and serving.

From our flock to yours - enjoy!

Fowl Company

One thing about SSF - one is never alone for long. No matter how one might wish to be. With an Australian Shepherd - also known as the "Velcro breed" for the way they stick to their person - 2 curious cats, 30-something hens, and 2 too many roosters, someone is always interested in whatever I might be tackling.

Even though they arrive in a cardboard box at 1 day old and are bred and shipped in a fairly factory setting, chickens nonetheless develop remarkably unique and quirky personalities. Do a little Googling and I bet you will turn up myriad personal odes to the chicken. They are just a hoot. When they are fist-sized fuzzballs scurrying around an old plastic wading pool or a cut-down fridge box, jostling for position under the heat lamp, it is tough to envision the comic, and at times elegant or even regal, individuals they will soon become.

Our accidental rooster has thus far shown himself to be a gentlemen and therefore has earned himself a place in the SSF family as long as he behaves himself. He is all things Excellent Rooster: stunningly beautiful, proud, quite covetous of his flock, gentle in his...couplings - relatively speaking anyway, courteous to his humans, and he has a magnificent cocka-doodle-do that so far he has limited to respectable hours of the day (unlike the 3AM performances of his predecessor). And, like his girls, he is intensely interested in whatever I am doing right now.

His 2 accidental male counterparts, however, not so much. They are not regal, nor nice, nor particularly interested in protecting the flock. They are, very much, interested in what being a rooster around a bunch of beautiful hens, gets them. They are mean to the hens and oblivious of everything else around them. So, in short, they annoy me immensely. We look forward to enjoying them in Coq au Vin.

So, these guys flounce around chasing and harassing all the hens, but Owl (our Excellent Rooster) and the Girls migrate to scratch and sniff the general vicinity of wherever we happen to be working. I joked yesterday as Dylan, Mark, and I prepared a potato bed inside our deer-fenced veggie garden, that we were like zoo animals - the hens, cats, and dog were all parked just on the other side of the 8-foot fence, watching our goings-on keenly (except the 3 intrepid hens who'd tunneled in and were "helping" us by snatching up every precious worm we overturned). Jessie whined and harumphed occasionally to express the unfairness of it all, and the cats were just generally unimpressed with the whole thing.

So, it's never lonely here. Whatever's on your mind, there's someone to talk to and plenty of fowl gossip to hear. The multi-specied gals and guys of SSF are always up for a good huddle.

The Accidental Rooster, Part 2

Uh, oh. One of our hens started crowing the other day.

We'd begun having suspicions when this particular "hen" grew more colorful and stunningly beautiful with each passing day. As we all know from basic biology, the more spectacular the bird, the more likely it is to be of the male variety. One need only recall the peahen as compared to her more vibrant male counterpart to envision the perfect example of this natural phenomenon.

Sigh. It is early days yet and the captain could turn out still to be that rare gentle rooster that struts about and gets along just fine with fowl and sapien alike...but I'm not holding my breath. Our last accidental rooster started out a wee fuzzy chick too, only to morph into a terrorizing demon by the time he was half a year old. We tried to make it work, we gave him chance after chance. But, in the end, after I lost one of the girls to his brutality, we called in the Chicken Assassin and peace reigned once more across the land. That's how it is in Layer Land - GRLZ Rule and roosters are expendable.

I wish it were different - I will hold out a little hope that it turns out that way, because I'd much rather create hens the old-fashioned way than ordering them from Iowa.

UPDATE:  I started this post over the weekend and shelved it to pen my depressing mid-life crisis post which I am sure started the week out for you all on an especially inspiring note.  I went out to get a photo of the big guy earlier today and, well, as you can see, he's found his calling.  I swear I did not plan this photo - I was zeroing in on him, completely unaware that he was zeroing in on her.  And, yes, like most barnyard activities, the reality bears little resemblance to what folks might imagine "chicken love" to look like.

Two steps forward, one back

I did something today I haven't done in probably two years - and thought, quite honestly, that I'd never have to do again. I bought eggs at the supermarket. Brand-name eggs from a poultry operation that isn't local, but does claim to be humane and organic. I know these labels are treated vaguely in the law, totally unenforced, are manipulated by an open door at one end of the standard long hen prison, a patch of grass - are, at the end of the day, just this side of meaningless.

But, I needed eggs. Or, more precisely, I wanted eggs. And my hens are 100% on strike until it warms up. Most of them won't even venture out of their now extremely ripe coop. They peep and chirp and squeal; they fly in my face and try to dive into the giant trash can where their feed is stored. They hate the feel of snow on their feet, are pretty much coming to hate each other and are just all-around cranky as hell and not one bit interested in sharing anything of any value, like an egg.

So, I stood in front of the egg case, which of course, this being our beloved Thriftway, means in front of 25 different egg selections. And most people must surely behold this refrigerated shrine to Choice a wondrous or at least precious thing. But, I was just sad. I have plenty of projects under construction and even more abandoned or yet-started dreams, but eggs are my success story. Our farm offers up the best, very best, eggs there are. So buying eggs is a special kind of failure for me. Because I know that it's not just me buying eggs - by the time I buy eggs, there's a lot of other folks in the neighborhood who've been walking and driving by...and seeing none, go to the store and buy eggs. That makes me sad.

Sometimes I wish I had a driveway sign for all these nuanced occasions. Today, it would say "We'll be back!"

On the other hand, just three years, one day, and 8 hours after we moved in, we (Mark) are (is) putting the handles on our kitchen cabinets! It would be frankly tough to overstate the thrill of this occasion. Handles, schmandles you might be saying, but these particular handles were chosen through tortuous decision-making nearly four years ago, have taken up exquisitely-precious shelf and drawer space, and, truly, are the jewelry that sparkle up a kitchen. Not to mention that they also make opening drawers and doors easier. I am not giddy on this front yet, however, because we could only get through about 60% today...and anyone with a home knows the danger this portends.

And, in the midst of this unprecedented winter chill, another small victory. I may have bought eggs today, but I did not buy lemons. At last, my spidery lemon tree has kicked into gear for real, offering up luscious sweet Meyer lemons and throwing a show of flowers so thick and brilliant, I can finally hope for my own supply of winter citrus, ready for the picking whenever food or drink commands.

Two steps forward, one step back.