Aromatics Worthy of Framing
July 18th, 2010 · 2 Comments · Posted in Recipes

Onion, leek, garlic, carrots, thyme, parsley
These are the components of my boiled beef tongue, minus the tongue. I loved the way they looked in the pot. After adding the tongue, just cover with water, bring to a low boil and cook for three hours. The broth alone is worth the effort. I strain it and keep it in the fridge to reheat as a beverage–even better than tea or coffee. It’s like a garden in a cup.
The carrots, garlic, pasley and thyme come from our own garden. And later this year we hope to be using our own leeks, which will represent quite a savings from what we purchase elsewhere.
Does anyone ever steal your basil? That thought never occured to me here. So … do they, ha!? When that starts happening, you’ll really know you’ve hit a tipping point!
No one has stolen anything out of our garden. We also have lots of people ask how we “deal with” squirrels, rats and other forms of nature. Answer: we don’t deal with any of it. Squirrels love to play in newly turned soil. Sometimes they dig up the seeds we’ve planted. Rats love to munch on melons and other sweet things. We don’t plant them. The worst problem we had was with a family of field mice who climbed into the tomato plants to munch on the tomatoes. Otherwise, the garden takes care of itself.