Good day for tea and stroopwafels

Another snow storm is stirring outside. Inside, its tea and cookies for me.

Now you would think that with all the homemade cookies available that I would have a stockpile of them. Unfortunately, any I find, I eat right away. So today I unwrapped a package of Caramel Cookie Waffles from Dutch Brothers Bakery Goods in Billings.

I know many people who go gaga over chocolate. And its fine stuff, I admit, but Im a caramel person myself. Chocolate and caramel is swell, but I really, really enjoy caramel by itself, and these cookies make me very happy. They taste like caramel wrapped in crispy caramel. You can go to the Dutch Brothers Web site to see how they are made. There you will also learn that although in Montana they are called "Caramel Cookie Waffles," the Dutch word is stroopwafels.

Somewhere I read that these cookies are meant to be put on top of the tea or coffee cup, to be warmed to an enticing melty goodness. Try it, youll like it, too!

The people who bake these exclusive cookies (apparently the recipe is known by a select few) are enthusiastic about their product. You can bet they put a lot of love into their job.

The tea I am drinking today to accompany these caramel delights is Natures Peace Melody of Mint, which I bought at the farmers market in Eureka.

Its difficult to get a good photo of the label, but the serene picture of mountains and water in the Tobacco Valley in Northwest Montana is painted by Montana artist Randy McIntyre.

So although the temperature is expected to drop down to 10 degrees tonight, I am cozy inside with plenty of tea. Sadly, I ate all my stroopwafels. But Ill go get more when they clear the road.

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Cold day warm tea

No matter what kind of heating you have inside, when its 2 degrees outside, you feel cold!

In addition to being very very cold, I have been barely hanging in emotionally with all the work Ive had to do since mid-September. I thought I was finished Nov. 18, but then I had one more "little" job. This little job is driving me crazy with its needless complexity and new tools to learn, with too little time to do the job properly.

Needless to say, I welcome a soothing cup of tea.

I dont need anything strong, so I reach for a pretty herbal blend of rooibos, peppermint, and chamomile, called Petticoat Peppermint. Tumblewood Teas is the brand, and a darn good one it is, with creator Riza Gilpin making sure the teas are fresh, flavorful, and, yes, fun. Riza names each tea so it, er, blends in with its Montana surroundings: Restful Rancher, Comman-Chai, and Pony Express.

Unfortunately, drinking tea doesnt make the pile of work go away, but it does make me feel better about slugging through it all.

Do you want some lovely Tumblewood Tea, too? Contact Riza at tumblewoodteas @ gmail.com.

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Tizer Gardens tea

Near Jefferson City -- about 20 miles south of Helena -- is an unusual botanical garden. Located in a mountainous area surrounded by evergreens, Tizer Botanic Gardens offers a series of events throughout the summer. I attended a High Tea (in fact, an Afternoon Tea) with a friend and her children.

Like all great teas, this one consisted of three courses of bite-sized tidbits that didnt look like theyd make an adequate meal but were in fact quite filling.

Savory sandwiches

Tasty scones with mouthwatering lemon curd

The dessert plate

While we ate, harp music filled the air.

Everyone was dressed up, including one lovely woman who decorated her own hat. She was celebrating an important birthday: hers.

Before tea was poured, Belva, one of the owners of the garden and our hostess, gave us a tour. With 28 places to explore, there is a corner of the garden for everyone. I couldnt take photos of everything, so youll have to visit to see for yourself. Picnics are welcome.

Prickly Pear Creek

Vegetable patch with scarecrow

A corner of the herb garden

On Tonka Bridge

A place to rest

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Compost Tea Watch Microoganisms Multiply

 I have several experiments that I want to do with my new microscope.  Im a novice with the microscope so I may make some mistakes. I did not know that I needed microscope slips, so these first videos are a little blurry.

Growth is slow at first, but within minutes the organisms find food, and begin to multiply. This video takes us from the first few minutes after I added molasses and water to 21 hours later. Eventually the food will be used up, and toxic waste will build up. The organisms will die if left in this solution, so its important to use the tea while they are thriving.

 Using a piece of acetate for a cover slip I examine the sample of compost tea I took five hours earlier.  The slip makes this video clearer than the one I took this morning.  Even though there was no aeration this jar of tea has continued to grow more microorganisms.

This next video is about 30 hours into the brew. I wanted to determine if Neem Flour (a botanical insecticide) will kill beneficial microorganisms and to see what progress they have made since the brew began. I had previously looked at a sample with no neem flour and it looked the same as this sample so I saw no reason to show both..

Neem flour is said to kill non-beneficial nematodes and anthropoids.  My conclusion is that it does not kill many of the microorganisms,  I lack the skill to determine if beneficial or non-beneficial nematodes and anthropoids were killed,but I feel confident that neem flour does not kill all of the microorganisms.

For more information about neem I found these sites to be helpful.
http://www.neemfoundation.org/neem-articles/neem-in-organic-farming/pest-management.html
and
http://www.infonet-biovision.org/default/ct/229/recipesForOrganicPesticides

I will continue to monitor the microorganisms, and I will post an update for the second part of this experiment which is to determine when the tea begins to get too old to use.  I may also experiment with dilutions and additional molasses to see how long tea can be kept viable.

To eliminate the possibility of anaerobic bacterial I will conduct this experiment again after I get my cover slips, but I will aerate the samples over night rather than simply leave the jars open.  Its unclear to me at this point whether or not the increased microorganisms is due to anaerobic organisms which may be less beneficial to plants.

More about microorganisms: 
These two are good for identification of compost microorganisms
microbeorganics.com/microbeidentifypart1.pdf  
http://microbeorganics.com/microbeidentifypart2.pdf

http://www.microbeorganics.com/
http://www.microbeworld.org/types-of-microbes
http://www.gardeningrhythms.com/preparing-extract-samples/
http://www.youtube.com/user/garendingrhythms/videos
http://www.gardeningrhythms.com/category/composting-for-growing-soil/soil-testing/
http://www.cellimagelibrary.org/browse/organism




 http://www.microbeorganics.com/

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Compost Tea Brewer with Vortex Action

Im testing various pumps and designs before applying glue and Uniseals to the final version of this  compost tea brewer. 
I tested the brewer with an Eco Plus 7 air pump,  an old hot tub air jet blower, and a DR 083 Rotron regenerative blower . 

The Eco Plus 7 is capable of 200 liter/minute.  It handled the 48" depth very well.  
 
The hot tub blower puts out a lot of air, and also handles the depth very well.   But its noisy,     I may switch between the two, and use the hot tub blower during the day and the Eco Plus during the night.

The regenerative blower delivers a massive 18 cubic feet per minute, but its incapable of pumping air deeper than 24" so it will not work for this application. 


Four air lift pumps were too many, and even the hot tub blower worked best with just 2 air lifts.  Thats OK because 2 air lifts rather than 4 simplifies the design, and cuts the cost by quite a bit as well.

I might build a very simple brewer out of the left over parts.  Im thinking of one that would simply fit down inside of a barrel.  One air lift and a center pickup.  Keeping it from being swept away might be the biggest obstacle.

This is a concept drawing of my brewer where a vortex is created.  

After testing for a while I finally decided to use only one air lift and the Eco Plus 7.   Other people have made good compost tea with less, and I felt the noise from the hot tub blower was excessive.  The 200 lpm Eco Plus is a substantial amount of air, and the vortex is still plenty strong.

I have also seen brewers made with a small drill press mounted to a piece of plywood.  The drill press is then placed on top of the barrels, and a long stir rod is inserted down into the liquid to create a vortex.  This design lacks the extreme air provided by an air lift, but this design is being used at the Earthworm Soil Factory with good results. 

A common design is to simply drop an air stone into the batch and let it bubble over night.  This too seems to provide adequate aeration and movement, but I felt that the air lifts were the best of all the designs I had seen, and worthy of the extra effort.

My first batch worked well.  The microbes cause a lot of foam on top at first.  I would advise keeping the liquid level at least 12" below the top of the barrel.  Im told, adding more molasses will extend the useful life of the tea.

Im pleased to say even at 1/3 full the air lift continues to circulate the remaining tea.   This is good because it keeps the tea steered up while Im draining the tank.  I used an old barrel with previously drilled holes for my prototype, and ended up with a 1" drain.  I will use a 2" drain next time. 

When I fill my bucket I place a paint strainer bag inside of a 5 gallon bucket unless Im just dumping the tea on top of the soil.  This lets me use the tea in my watering can; otherwise the spout gets clogged.   The second time I made a batch of tea,  I placed the dry compost in strainer bags.  This also worked but not as well.  Below is a commercial brewer with a similar, but better idea.

I have been using the tea during initial seed planting.  It also appears to help avoid transplant shock.

I like this machine because it uses a bag which keeps the tea clean of debris.  Also the spray guns are great.

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Ouch

In some ways, Tuesday was not such a good day for stroopwafels after all.

Lest you think eating in Montana is all joy and endless delight, I must insert a warning here that you should also take care of your teeth.

While biting into a chewy Caramel Cookie Waffle, I lost an inlay. Luckily, it was not a filling, which leaves a big hole in your tooth and must be taken care of immediately or you are in endless pain. An inlay leaves a big gap, but the tooth itself is covered with something that protects it and there is no pain at all, although there is the danger of infection.

A snow storm raged while I contemplated what to do about getting to a dentist. Im still not comfortable driving icy roads, so the thought of having an emergency was daunting. It turns out, however, that I was able to make an appointment for today when the roads had cleared pretty much, and the intervening 3 days were endured with minimal unhappiness. (Though the sadness at giving up caramels will linger.)

My dentist in Columbus did a nice job replacing the inlay. All is well. But I wont be eating caramels again any time soon.

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