Apron Stringz is two years old! Over that time, the content has grown like a nursing baby with knee dimples. While much of what I write is just day-to-day flotsam, I do sometimes crank out a useful and, I feel, enduring post. And I hate that blogs (at least, free ones like mine) don’t support any decent kind of index for these posts. Blogs are ephemeral, meant to be enjoyed hot off the presses, I guess. But it bugs me to no end that our hard work, one week after publishing is more or less lost to the world.
So here is a directory of posts on the wide subject of food. These are all posts with a more practical edge, those that you might reference. There’s an equal number of my more journal-style posts which I have left out, particularly on the subject of gardening. They make an interesting read if you like that sort of thing (and if you read this blog, you probably do) but seemed less in need of reference-able indexing. If you’re going for the journal aspect, try the archives. A few brave souls have apparently read start to finish.
How to Make Home Cooking Work:
Kitchen Efficiency
Cooking Efficiency
Not Menu Planners – solace for the rest of us
If You Can’t Stand the Heat, Get Out of the Kitchen — summer cooking
Tools
Rescuing and Seasoning Cast Iron
Cast Iron for the Rest of Us — taking care of your pans
What and How to Cook in Cast Iron
Pontification
Caution: Martyr in the Kitchen
Sourcing Good Groceries:
Responsible Consumerism: How to Make it Work
Putting Your Money Where Your Mouth Is, Part One
A Trip to the Grocery Store — peeping Tom my cart!
Whole Wheat Pasta Rises from the Grave
Punk Housewife Tip: Oil and Wine
Home Food Production:
Gardening
Planning an Efficient Garden — it’s all about follow-through
Self Irrigating Planters Made Easy
Chickens
Just Wing It — build a half-assed coop and get by, if you need to
Preserving Local Bounties:
Bringing Home the Basil — how to make, store and use pesto
Monastery Marmalade – scavenged fruit and citrus pectin
Marmalade Redooo — note to self: it is entirely possible to make too much marmalade
Truly No-Nonsense Tomato Sauce
Recipes:
Bread
Bread Evangelizing – the perfect cherry-popper bread recipe
Bread Every Day, Part One: Ingredients
Sprouted Wheat Bread: an exploration
Mastering Sprouted Wheat Bread!
Breakfast
Homemade Grape-Nuts — they’re just caramelized bread crumbs!
Grrr-nola: Make Your Own Breakfast Cereal and Stick it to Kellog Corp (from the old blog)
34 Times Round and a Recipe for German Pancakes
Bouquet of Choice: A Recipe for Swiss Chard Muffins
Anything But the Kitchen Sink — leftover granola muffins
Slow Cooker Leftover Granola Bread
If You Can’t Beet ‘Em — pink pancakes win major mama points
Leftover Easter Eggs to Savory Breakfast Pockets!
Food to Go (a well packed snack bag = less emergency food purchases)
Surprising Kid Snacks — no recipe, just a plug for seaweed
Dinner
Stop Buying Salad Dressing NOW
It’s What’s Fer Dinner — favorite quick meals
Baking Bonanza — home cooking in the real world, plus a recipe for easy lasagne
Good News For Half Beer Lovers — meat and/or mushroom carbonade
Green Tomato and Turkey Enchiladas
Dinner Deconstructed: Ground Meat Patties, Brown Rice and Glazed Carrots — thorough instructions for beginner cooks
What to Feed Kids When You Really Need Them to Eat — at our house it’s macaroni and cheese’n'fish’n'peas
Sunday Dinner Any Day of the Week — pot roast your local grass fed carbon-neutral meat to melt-in-your-mouth perfection
Value Menu: Whole Chicken — get the most out of your $4/lb farmer’s market bird
Chicken an’ Bisket — my favorite roast chicken and what to do with the leftovers
Of Stock and Bullion (from the old blog)
Making Your Own “Canned” Soups (also the old blog)
Leftover Queen – savory vegetable pie
Dinner Every Night: Pasta with Lentils
Dessert (which is to say mostly chocolate)
Chocolate: Cures What Ails Ya — the easiest way to stretch $9+/lb fair trade chocolate chips
The Best F***ing Brownies Ever
HOT Hot Chocolate – turn your thermostat down 5 degrees and whip up a batch!
Holiday Baking Party — German Christmas bread and super easy truffles
Food Recycling: Lickety Split Leftover Apple Pie – with the easiest ever pie crust
Flaky Whole Wheat Pie Crust — not the easiest, but so good
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Do let me know if you find this index useful, it will help motivate me to keep it updated!
Wow!
Amazing timing again, CJ- I’ve just figured out the chicken coop I want to buy, and have been saying to myself, must go back thru Apron Stringz and reread all her wisdom! Thanks again!
check out harvey Ussary’s fantastic website, The Modern Homestead. he is a wealth of chook knowledge. the link takes you to his poultry page, which starts out with a plug for his new book, but scroll down for an index to his extensive and very useful online articles. i’ve been meaning to put him in my sidebar since i discovered him, oh some 3 years ago! whoops. better late than never.
Will do!
Love this! Thanks. I can happily stalk your old posts now. :)
D
x
Meadow, you really need to think about a book. You have a lot to offer, and now, oddly enough, even appear organized. I also think you need to apply to the Smithsonian to be listed as a national treasure. When I read your blog, it just makes me feel good.
national treasure? oh bob, you are a piece of work.
as always, i do appreciate the outrageous encouragement!
Great idea!
If you haven’t already, you might look into using the category feature/ tool. This would allow you to assign a tag or category to every post (like, efficient kitchens or good groceries or recipes, etc). WordPress has widgets for your side bar that can list out all your categories, and the system should automatically create pages of posts in a specific category when a user/reader clicks on a specific category. It won’t save you from having to go back through old posts and assign categories, but it will save you the future work or having to update indices.
And if you know all this already, please forgive the unsolicited advice!
thanks, i do already do this. but when you click on a category it just takes you to a list of every post i’ve ever written in that category, with the first paragraph of each, which adds up to pages of listings. extremely awkward for perusing i think.
This is very helpful. If you have time to maintain it, or do another one in 2 years or something, listing the new stuff, that would be awesome. But no pressure.
CJ, I just have to tell you. I have used this post so many times already! Making chicken stock today from a whole chicken, leftover granola muffins tomorrow, tried the mac n cheese nfishnpeas the other day… I even moved some stuff around in my kitchen based on your oh-so-thorough Real Life Kitchens posts. Thanks!!!
oh daniela, thank you SO MUCH for taking the time to tell me! i’m so glad it has been useful.