I’ve loved cooking for as long as I remember. As a young girl that meant macaroni and cheese or Hamburger Helper from a box. Being from the mid-west casseroles were of course an early specialty. But we did not eat healthy. We were like most suburb-dwellers since the rise of supermarkets and fast food. Canned vegetables, TV dinners, bologna sandwiches, I’m sure you get the picture.
My palate and preferences have evolved significantly over the years, a good deal of it thanks to Handy Hubby, who is a fabulous cook. What we like to cook differs, but usually compliments one another, and our time cooking together is fun and bonding, usually. That is, as long as he doesn’t watch me chop anything.
Our preferences took a big leap when we started growing much of our own food. This has been a huge and continuing learning curve, but it excites me to learn new things and I find growing and harvesting our own food immensely satisfying.
For newcomers now it’s becoming much easier with homesteading-type courses popping up all over, even online. City and country folk are really getting organized around important traditional food and lifestyle concerns, like raw milk, GMOs, pesticides, water quality and on and on. I find it thrilling it’s getting so popular! In the beginning friends and family thought we were nutcases moving out here and experimenting with this lifestyle and no one knew what “homesteading” meant in the way that’s now becoming quite a movement. Much more on all of this in future posts!
For now I just wanted to share for those just starting out on the journey to better health one course I just heard about through The Weston A Price Foundation, an amazing resource for the traditional foods resurgence. My favorite cookbook is written by their President, Sally Fallon, called Nourishing Traditions: The Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictocrats. It’s got it all: fermenting, cultured dairy, game and organ meats, sauces, condiments and very interesting culinary history.
The course sounds like it would be a great place to start for anyone just getting interested, and it’s free!
https://foodwifery.com/processed-to-real-foods/
Kensho Homestead 
The resources and community have exploded, it’s so exciting! And yes, even getting ‘hip’ — or so it would seem. Not quite yet in these parts, but certainly in some areas.
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Thank you for sharing your favourite reads, I am always on the look out for new books! I think it has been great that homesteading has become more popular because the more of us in the community, the more we have to share. Produce, knowledge, help. It’s really exciting not to the the odd one out or the outside on the edge, homesteading is hip now apparently.
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