Monday, April 06, 2009

Sugarfree Day 4 again/Victory Garden 2009

It occurred to me when a friend offered me cookies sweetened with maple syrup, and as I considered agave-ing my oatmeal, that I should probably define this project as a No Refined Sugar situation. Cutting sweets entirely ain't gon' happen in a month for this girl; that would most definitely be a set-up for failure. That said, the above cookies (cashew butter crunch somethings) are badass, and I'll post the recipe once I make the suckers.

But back to not setting myself up to fail. Cutting refined sugar is manageable in some ways. I can at least identify which foods are likely to be sweetened with refined sugar or high fructose corn syrup. "Baked goods and anything processed" has been a pretty handy rule of thumb. Drinking a cup of mint tea or just a big glass of water have not been entirely satisfactory fixes, but they've worked well enough to get me through two three-day stretches without sugar.

Enough blah blah blah, though. Victory Garden 2009 is well on its way. I (with intermittant help from friends and girlfriend) built three raised beds. The tomato and kale seedlings are going to town on our kitchen table, and the peppers are starting to sprout. The starts (so far: oregano, lavender, strawblies, arugula and mesclun mix. to come: mustard greens, beets, collards, leeks, onions, potatoes, garlic, runner beans, basil, mint and cilantro) are hardening off in the glorious sunshine that we've been getting. The chard and salad greens in the self-watering containers are doing smashingly. I plan to make a vaguely propagandistic sign for the raised bed in the front (it's the big one - 7' x 4') about victory over economy, food not lawns, or something like that. Any suggestions on the text are welcome.

Pictures of the garden and seedlings and the rest of it to come. Really this time.

1 comment:

Meg said...

Drop beets not bombs! ;) Hahaha.