Tragedy at First and Bimini, Speeding Driver Kills Scooter Rider

Just after 10 p.m. on the evening of Wednesday January 10, Bimini Place neighbors report hearing a car crash, and seeing a small explosion. Shortly after lights went out briefly.

Deadly car crash on First Street at Bimini Place – photo by Bimini resident

A driver in a white Mercedes car had been travelling fast heading west on First Street. One observer stated that the car was going “like 100 miles per hour.”

Photo of snapped utility pole – via Citizen.com

According to witness accounts, at the north end of Bimini Place at First Street, along Virgil Middle School, the driver crashed into a utility pole (breaking it in half), a parked minivan, an unhoused person’s shopping cart, before striking and killing a person riding a Lime e-scooter.

In what suggests street racing, eyewitnesses report that several nice cars arrived at the scene, and other young men ran to the driver of the white car, and helped him out of the car. They left soon after. (Some other witnesses, posting to Reddit, assert that the driver appeared drunk.)

Bimini Place neighbors report that paramedics treated the driver, who appeared mostly unhurt. They put a neck brace on him, and carried him away in a stretcher.

The paramedics did not attempt any sort of resuscitation of the scooter rider, who lay contorted and motionless on the ground.

The crash victim’s name was Kowshik, a 23-year-old exchange student from Bangladesh, who arrived in L.A. about six months ago. Kowshik died two blocks from his home on New Hampshire Avenue.

Kowshik’s roommate and longtime friend Sazzad described Kowshik as the glue of the friend group of the young exchange students, “the jolly one that brought everyone together.”

Lime e-scooter crash debris spotted that night in the gutter on the south side of First Street (thrown from the crash which took place on the north side of the street). Photo by Bimini resident

(The coroner listing has a couple of apparent errors, including showing the date of death as January 11)

DIY solar cookers have their day in the sun – but don’t leave them out in the dew

I brought two DIY solar cookers to my cat-sitting gig in “THE VALLEY”. Because they are so portable, and because this home has every modern convenience + solar panels, it’s a cheap thrill to do something low tech and hands on.

How portable are these cookers? The five pieces of poster board form a 14″x14″x1/2″ packet!

4- 14″ sq, 1-10″ sq. posterboard,
4 clothes pegs and a shoelace.

Or, you can fold it like a fig and invert it into a shopping bag.

Invert it into shopping bag

Fold it like a fig

The neighbors gifted me some freshly caught tuna and I had butternut squash from LA EcoVillage garden. I always use a meat thermometer when cooking fish or meat. The covered pan is wrapped in an oven roasting bag to trap heat.

Tuna and squash

Use thermometer for
meat or fish

In spite of the cooker’s curled edges, the cooker cooked the cabbage.

Despite the warped pasteboard edges of the cooker on the right, a pot of cabbage was well cooked.

Solar cooker tip: Don’t expose the poster board cooker to moisture – not even over night dew – because the edges will curl. After a few days under heavy books, they resumed their former shape. At the EcoVillage, when I store the cookers outdoors, I wrap them in plastic.

Solar Cooker Demonstrations: It is my intention to plan a solar cooker demonstration to fund raise for Solar Cookers International and for the LA EcoVillage, so stay tuned for that announcement.

Solar cooking after weeks of rain

I want to begin with a huge public thank you to Federico who built a beautiful cart from upcylced materials for the newest, largest, heavy solar oven. I am so grateful to move it out of my apartment, to store it outdoors so I do not have to navigate stairs while carrying it.

Now it can be easily pulled around the garage area to the current sunny location (just like a cat)

Also, thanks to Jimmy who made his shop and welding skills available to Federico for this project. They both kept it a secret from me until it was ready.

I am so happy with it and hope it will make it easier for others to cook with the sun, too.

After several weeks of cloudy – often rainy – days I decided to binge cook on a sunny day before the afternoon high winds set in.

I put the homemade “fig” solar cooker and the reflector solar cooker in the more protected courtyard. They are both light weight and may blow away in the wind.

Solar cooker on left roasted 4 lbs of carrots, 2 lbs at a time. Solar cooker on left roasted 3/4 lb chicken livers for our resident cat.

Below, the Global Sun Oven roasted a few lbs of chicken on a layered bed of onions and celery. While the oven was still hot after I removed the chicken, I baked a sun-oven appropriate version of Rhian’s g.f., vegan carrot cake. Optimal solar cooking time is 10 am – 2 pm and it was after 1 pm when I was ready to bake the cake. I put it into a wide pan instead of a loaf pan to hasten the baking time. That work-horse oven heated to 350 – 375 degrees.

Last year I taught a few solar cooking/ diy solar cooker construction workshops. I haven’t planned any for this year, yet. Interested people may contact me.

Happy Earth Day in the garden

The garden has been so responsive to the rains that we gardeners are working hard to keep up with the growth and overgrowth. Check out some of the abundance:

Bulb-out garden brightens Bimini Place

Jess’ Onion Abundance

First artichoke: the cooking water looked like it had been dyed brilliant green

Below: Peas were reluctant to germinate this year and required 4 re-plantings. The ones that sprouted flourished. I usually eat 1/2 of the daily harvest while I’m picking them, and we still have plenty to share with neighbors. While the pea vines begin to decline, the Fava (broad) beans are maturing.

I love growing Romanesco broccoli because it is so beautiful. Unlike the broccolini that preceded it, it won’t have side shoots, so that is the cost of beauty. Next year we’ll grow them simultaneously for abundance and beauty.

I can’t say enough about the efficiency of planting sweet potatoes and potatoes. Cut one into several pieces, plant each piece and each piece may yield 1-3 lbs! We harvested sweet potatoes in late fall and we started digging potatoes mid- March.

Some Ecovillage children, led by Autumn, spent hours digging wild onion out of this plot, hauling bricks to frame it and planting.

Solar cooked eggs

This is so low tech – I love it.

Eggs cook faster in a solar oven than in the cooker. I haven’t got the knack of predicting whether they will be hard or soft cooked, yet, so I just try one & decide whether or not to let them cook longer.

Eggs in DIY solar cooker

• place the eggs you want to cook in a cardboard egg carton
• remove the top of egg carton
• put carton in solar cooker or solar oven
• after temperature reaches 212℉, continue cooking until you think they’re done the way you like them.

Next LA Ecovillage solar cooker workshop Sat., Oct 15, 2022, 11 a – 1 p. Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/cooking-with-the-sun-solar-cooking-workshop-at-los-angeles-eco-village-tickets-392699293157

Solar cooker comfort food

I was introduced to this Tromboncino heirloom squash at the Hollywood Farmer’s Market. It reminded my so much of a sleeping cat that I had to buy one. That resemblance made it harder to slice!

I’m making chicken soup, a comfort food for my visit with my Aunt Annie tomorrow. She’s 105 years old, lives alone in an area west of San Diego and mostly looks after herself. This visit was originally scheduled to celebrate her recent birthday, but, her last son died last week, our visit is just to be together. This soup has to be special because it may be our last meal together.

Yesterday, in the solar cookers, I made chicken broth with lemongrass (from garden) and wakami (not from garden), roasted chicken livers (for auntie and the cat), and roasted carrots. Today I roasted the skinny part of Tromboncino on a bed of onions with a little turmeric and cumin seeds, and made chicken bone broth. It was fun to have all of those cookers working at one time. I’ve been usurping any piece of furniture around here that will hold a cooker! Ideally, I’d like help to put wheels on a few for the heavier ovens.

Today I added the ramen noodles (millet/ brown rice) that we now stock in the bulk room.

I also experimented with peanut butter, almond meal, date cookies, (lower left). That’s it- just 3 gf, vegan ingredients! I plan to bake them again at the Saturday solar cooker workshop – and sneak in a little sweetener.

DIY Solar Fusion aka Russian Doll Solar Oven

When Jamie’s mom visited EcoVillage in June, Jamie, her mom, Sage and I made an insulated box cooker that didn’t get very hot. I’ve been fusing with it and got it over 300℉ by putting two half bricks in the bottom, the diy mylar solar cooker on bricks, a black pan on the bottom of the cooker & the food I want to cook in a dark pot inside a roasting bag!
I think I’ll rename it the Russian Doll Solar cooker.
Warming Feature: the bricks are are still warm after food is cooked, so remove mylar cooker, put food in box & close box lids. After 2 hours, it was 130℉.

Shameless promotion: Solar Cooking Workshop – including demo of a cheap, easily portable DIY cooker- Sat. Aug 27, 10 am. tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/cooking-with-the-sun-solar-cooking-workshop-tickets-386203142997

How much food can a Solar oven cook when a solar oven doesn’t get much sun?

Ambient temperature was low 90s when I decided there might be enough sun breaking through to try cooking in the pre-heated sun oven: 1/2 lb. ham, 2 fish fillets, 2 chicken legs, 2 large sweet potatoes and green beans. I don’t recall what time I began, but by 1:45 pm voilà

Day 9- Solar Cooking Sabbatical

in which I nap too long and try to crank up the temperature in the cooker

After a bike ride and lunch, I napped while the veggies were roasting. My plan was to roast chicken next, but it was 3:30. Is that too late? I spread 2 brined chicken thighs, seasoned with lemon & oregano over a bed of onions, cumin seeds & lemon grass; put the pan in a roasting bag and onto a metal rack in the cooker, (to let heat circulate under the pan). I pegged two halves of a large roasting bag across the cooker opening: 285° on the pan’s lid and digital in chicken probe = 156°.

Boost cooker T with roasting bags & metal rack.

Not wanting to ptomaine myself, I cooked chicken in toaster oven, 285° for 9 min. until chicken was probe was 165°.

Day 10 – Can the cooker temperature increase enough to roast an undelicate “delicata” squash?

At the farmers’ market yesterday I bought what appeared to be a delicata squash on steroids. When I tried to slice it this morning I discovered that, instead of the delicate, edible skin of a delicata, it had the rind of a gourd. I wanted to make a bean-boat, so I scooped out the center, flipped the lids of two cans of organic Goya beans* -and the cats appeared in a nano second.

They became polite but disinterested observers as soon as they discovered that the cans were not tuna!

Bean boat topped with ginger and remaining scooped squash.
Re: leftovers. I love the beeswax cotton wraps – in lieu of plastic.

Winter squashes need 400° + to bake.

• How close can we get?

• Will slow cooking compensate for temperature?

At 10 am I did the same routine as yesterday: pan in roasting bag on metal rack, covered cooker with roasting bag.

T = 310° when I returned from bike ride at 1 pm – and squash was cooked. (Taste is bland, not like delicata!). (Did I mention that there was only 1 farmer and a lot of misc. vendors at the NoHo Farmer’s market.)

Bike ride side note. Used my new telescope to watch cormorants feed their “babies” in their nests high in the trees at Sepulveda Nature Preserve.

Get your ticket while the oven is hot

for the Solar Cooking Workshop on Saturday, Aug. 27. If you can’t make that one, we’ll plan to channel the rays again in Oct., and maybe Tea and Solar Treats in Sept.

• Product placements are part of my effort to demonstrate cooking with easily accessible food.

Super Solar Monday

Hot rocks and patio furniture in lieu of our EcoVillage clotheslines. Back ground, modified DIY solar cooker is trying to bake cornbread. Stay tuned for results on that.

Our August 27 solar cooking workshop attracted attention from Luther Krueger who hosts Saturday Solar Cooking Brunches in Minneapolis, gives s.c. demos across the state and interviews solar cooks around the country. He says, I think what you are doing is really up at the top for getting the message out–and DIY cookers are soon to be a big focus of my ….outreach efforts.

Solar cooking soars beyond hippies and science experiences

• to the Conrad Hilton’s Summit rooftop bar, Washington, DC, where the Director of Food cooks with a solar oven;
• to the Saibaba Ashram, Maharashtra, India where an enormous solar cooking system produces thousands of meals daily and saves nearly 220,000 lbs of cooking gas per year;
• to refugee camps and villages where solar cookers reduce the need for kerosene, charcoal and dangerous wood-gathering forays for cooking and sterilizing drinking water.

I’m on a solar cooking sabbatical

Cookers made from poster board, weigh 8 oz. Disassemble into 14″x14″x1″ easily portable package.

People asked me about solar cooking on camping trips and solar cooking for unhoused people so I brought these DIY solar cookers, made by Sage and me, to my cat-sitting gig. I’m challenging myself to use these cookers in lieu of gas or electric appliances as often as possible because the yard here has all-day sun.

Solar cooking is easy. It’s very forgiving: it doesn’t burn food. 

That said, there are some foods- like these chicken thighs and grains – that will sit happily in the heat after they’re safely cooked.

Digital probe read 167℉. Cooker temp was 320℉. Ambient T = 96℉.

Pre-soak buckwheat, millet; rinse quinoa to reduce cooking time & cooking water needed.

Here’s a quicker alternative.

1 c rice mixture + 2 c. water.

Other foods, like these veggies – want to be monitored a little closer if you want them crispy.

Green beans, chayote and spinach leaves from Eco-village garden

Summer squash, carrots, apples

I searched for some quick cooking vegetarian/vegan protein and found this line of “riced” products made from chickpeas & lentils.

I got 3 servings from this packet. Mixed with veggies it was delicious; on it’s own it’s a little gritty.

Ready to channel the sun?

Get your Eventbrite ticket to join Sage and me on Saturday, August 27 at the LA EcoVillage, as we cook and bake in 4 varieties of solar cookers. We’ll demonstrate how to make a simple cooker and have low cost DIY kits available for purchase. Limited to 12 participants including youth at least 10 y.o.

Forage, bake, eat

Solar and mental reflections while LA Eco-village kids bake with the sun

Collecting the mulberry blizzard on tarps makes harvesting easier. Why aren’t more people harvesting?

Reflectors direct the sun’s heat into this cork-insulated oven. (Made in Portugal using renewable cork). It gets hotter than boiling water, so only adults should put food in & take it out.

This collapsible reflecting cooker uses heat proof bowls to create an oven. It’s better for cooking than baking. Why is solar cooker use mainly a science project? Where resources are scarce, many people use a variety of solar cookers – from $5 Kyoto boxes to Solar Cookers International’s projects to cook food, sterilize water and reduce fossil fuel use. Now that many people are working from home, why hasn’t solar cooking caught on? While I try to choose fast cooking recipes to fit into a 90 min. demonstration, when I’m cooking on my own time, I usually food – especially beans & lentils – in the oven in the morning and come take them out at sundown, a little dry, but not burned!

Pulling stems & cores from mulberries.

Kids take turns to prep, add and mix ingredients, (see end of post for recipe).

Muffins at the edge of the oven were a little gooey. Next time, rotate the pan 1/2 way through baking.

To accommodate a wide variety of dietary preferences & needs I bake gluten free, vegan food for demonstrations. Here’s one of many that I have adopted from Rhian

I substituted mulberries in Rhian’s Blueberry Muffins   

Ingredients

▢60 g (¼ cup) coconut oil (or sub olive or vegetable oil)

▢200 ml (⅘ cup) unsweetened almond milk (or any other plant-based milk)

▢2 tablespoons lemon juice *

▢8 tablespoons maple syrup (or sub any other sweetener) ( i used 4 Tbsp)

▢1 teaspoon vanilla extract

▢Pinch salt

▢150 g (1 ¼ cup) ground almonds (almond meal) **

▢150 g (1 ¼ cup) gluten-free flour blend (or sub plain flour if not gluten-free)

▢2 heaped teaspoons baking powder (ensure gluten-free if necessary)

▢¼ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)

▢100 g (1 cup) fresh blueberries ( i subtituted mulberries)

Instructions

Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius (350 degrees Fahrenheit). I preheated sun oven for 1/2 hr.

Place the coconut oil in a large bowl and melt over a saucepan of boiling water or in the microwave (skip this step if using any other oil). (We melted it in sun oven)

Once melted, add the milk to the same bowl along with the lemon juice, maple syrup, vanilla, salt and ground almonds.

Sift in the flour, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda.

Mix well, adding a tiny splash more milk if it’s looking too dry. (Mulberries were wetter than blueberries so no extra liquid was used).

Add the fresh blueberries (mulberries) and fold in gently, to make sure you don’t crush them. (Mulberries crush!)

Transfer the mixture between muffin cases in a muffin tin.

Bake in the oven for 20 minutes until risen and an inserted skewer comes out clean. (about 90 min. in sun oven on clear, sunny, hot day).

Tastes best when fresh, but keeps covered in the fridge for up to a few days.

Why build a worm bin?

During our Eco-village Garden Exploration May 21, I plan to include vermicomposting by demonstrating DIY worm bins. (Eventbrite is helping us with the ticket hustle: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/explore-gardens-at-los-angeles-eco-village-tickets-326749395237

Why demonstrate a few puny worms munching on food scraps when we’re going to show off our 3 bin hot composting system?

Because building a DIY worm bin from discarded material aligns with 3 of our Core Values:

• Celebrate and include joy in all our endeavors. I feel a rush of joy when resources “magically” appear after I envision a project. And I enjoy the magical transmutation of food scraps into rich humus.
• Take responsibility for each other and the planet through local environmental and social action.
  • It doesn’t get much more local than plunking your food waste into your own worm bin
  • a DIY worm bin is pretty cheap, and
  • easier to fit into small spaces – indoors or out – than a large composting system.
• Learn from nature and live ecologically. (Worms help us) gain a better appreciation of the intricate balance and interdependencies in nature…inviting us to tread more gently upon the Earth, says Mary Applehof, Worms Eat My Garbage.

Gather discarded material

Worm Buffet

Worm bin covered with shade cloth in shade of orange & papaya trees

Worm bin on blocks = instant sun shade for Taurine, LA Eco-village hardworking cat.

Cycles. Converting waste to a nutrient rich resource is just one of the natural cycles we’ll consider during our garden exploration, May 21. Please get tickets at Eventbrite https://www.eventbrite.com/e/explore-gardens-at-los-angeles-eco-village-tickets-326749395237

Cycle of life in the April garden

Cycles are one of the themes of a walk-about tour through Eco-village gardens, lead by Sage and me on May 21. Event tickets available through May 19.

Blossoming trees in their prime

Fejoa (Pineapple guava) blossoms behind Terraces

Pomegranate blossoms in front of Terraces

Persimmon blossoms along Terrace right-of-way

California Primroses by 117 front gate

Bounty at the end of plant life cycles

While Sunflower seed heads look raggedy at the end of their season,
birds and squirrels feast on them.

Nasturtiums often harbor aphids at the end of their season so I harvest them when they start to die back.

Pickled, nasturtium seeds taste like capers.

• 1 pint Nasturtium seeds – let them dry a few days
• 1 pint white vinegar
• 2 bay leaves (from bay bushes in front of Terraces)
• 1 tsp. sea salt
• Peppercorns (optional)

Boil vinegar, bay leaves, salt & pepper. (This year I boiled vinegar in sun oven). Cool. Pack seeds into clean pint jar & pour cooled vinegar mixture over them. Store several weeks before using them.

Pizza topping: combined with crushed garlic and oil.

Nettles – the plant you love to hate!

Nettle seeds drop off dried plant

If you’re not dressed for success – long sleeves, socks, long pants and gloves – you may be painfully introduced to nettles. I try to keep them pruned from paths, and let them grow in less traveled areas. Young plants are among the earliest greens to emerge and I enjoy adding them to soups, so I let them re-seed themselves. They can be used to make fertilizer and they help composted material break down. Chickens and other birds are said to deworm themselves by eating nettle seeds. Fibers from nettle plants are used for making rope and are spun into a silky fiber. (Who knows when we may need to harvest nettle fibers?).

Shameless Commerce Division

Sage & Springer, Solar cooker and Garden guides, invite you to explore the water-wise, integrated vegetable and flower gardens, with over fifty fruit trees in our eco-village urban oasis. We’ll demonstrate various composting methods and offer optional composting participation. When the walk-about concludes, we invite you to socialize with us over a solar baked snack and garden-herb tea. Eventbrite tickets

Sweet potato slips gift (try saying that 3 times!)

I usually select a few of last season’s sweet potatoes to grow “slips” for the next season’s planting, but the ones I selected this year haven’t sprouted. I was on the verge of buying slips when I noticed sweet potato leaves in two areas of the garden, so I dug really deep and retrieved pieces of last year’s crop that had sprouted. I carefully cut off slips that had a few root hairs and re-buried the potato to see if the rest of the sprouts would develop roots. I harvested 10 slips and planted them. Sweet potatoes grow very well here and I usually harvest 2-5 lbs / plant. Spaced a foot apart and with the foliage staked, they lend themselves well to the practice of vertical growing that conserves space in our urban gardens – and, exposes them to more sunlight in the partially shady areas that I steward.

If you live near-by and want to help plant some, please come to our Solar cooker demo/ LA Eco-village garden walk about on Sat.April 23. Tickets available at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/solar-oven-cooking-demonstration-and-garden-walk-about-la-eco-village-tickets-304468572697

Wind harvests mulberries

Mulberries from the damn mulberry tree in front of the terraces.

Rumor has it – and purple tongues confirm – that the kids are enjoying the harvest. Sage and I baked mulberry muffins (vegan, gluten free) in the sun oven. We plan to serve them at the above Solar cooker demonstration.

Backstory to caption: Mulberry roots broke through plumbing pipes and invaded neighboring gardens. Adding insult to injury, mulberry foliage shades those gardens, so many residents are unhappy with it. An arborist from TreeCare,LA recently advised us about strategies for coping with it. We’re waiting for the implementation costs of said strategies. Stay tuned to see if we’ll have mulberry muffins in 2023!

What’s solar cooking this week?

Sage and I were heat-wave opportunists last weekend as we took advantage of 90-100℉ days to try new solar cooked recipes for future Solar Cooking Demonstrations at the Eco-village. We want to use foods in season as often as possible so we hustled to harvest 8 “end of season citrons” from our aka lemon tree. Combining them with last season’s poppy seeds, we made 16 Lemon Poppyseed mini-muffins and had enough batter to also make a loaf. This recipe called for almond flour which was easy to make in a mini-food processor.

I have been delighted to land on Rhian’s Recipes in my search for new vegan, gluten free recipes. Rhian’s recipes are very easy to follow and have lots of useful tips and information.

Carol puts lemon-poppyseed muffins into pre-heated SunTaste oven (250℉) where they baked for 75 min. Temp reached 275℉. After 1 hour, I opened the oven briefly to let steam, then re-sealed it to let muffins brown for additional 15 min.

Lemon poppyseed loaf baked in Global sun oven, 275 – 300 ℉ for 90 min.

Other meals this week included garlic-roasted chicken thighs on a bed of freshly harvested lemon grass. I’ve also been making lemon-grass tea. It’s calming and helps relax muscles after hours of gardening.

Sage requested buckwheat, so I combined pre-soaked buckwheat groats, millet and freshly harvested leeks and cooked them in the reflector solar cooker.

Mulberries are beginning to ripen on the Terrace tree, so this evening, Sage & I spread tarps to catch them. Look out for Mulberry muffins next – hopefully on April 23 – our next solar cooking/ garden walkabout.

In spite of daylight savings time, food is ready for solar cooking demo.

Apple-chip, poppyseed upside-down, vegan, gluten-free cornbread baking in solar oven

Dang! I thought DST returned in April, so when the clocks sprung forward last weekend, I realized that I’d have to adjust our solar cooking demonstration plans by cooking some of the food in advance.

Can you see the steam rising out of this cornbread?

No worries. I’ll just demonstrate using the sun to save energy by toasting the cornbread, heating the lentils and cooking the whole grains. We’ll also save time by letting everything heat and cook while we walk about the gardens and work on the compost!

In preparation for this event on Sunday, March 20, Sage and I counted the fruiting shrubs and trees: 26 varieties on the Urban Soil properties! Plus macadamia nuts along the public walkway. While we’ve planted some of these in recent years, we continue to reap the harvest made possible by Eco-villagers who lived here before Sage and I moved in.

Weather permitting, we intend to do this sun-cooking demo/ garden walk-about monthly, so let us know if you’re interested in future events.

Freesias! I wish you could smell them.

There was a greenhouse near where I used to live in northeast CT. It was an occupational therapy training site. Every year they grew freesias to sell at the beginning of February, and the fragrance enveloped everyone who walked in. You couldn’t arrive much past the moment they bloomed if you expected to buy some because they sold quickly to sensory deprived people facing a few more months of eastern winter. (We had a saying: 30 days hath September, April May and November, all the rest have 31 – except February – which has 60!)

I planted the little freesia bulbs last fall and wondered if they could push their way through our hard-packed clay soil. Hazzah! they did – and I’m very pleased to have them back in my life. If you’re walking through 117 front gate, say howdy to them & give ‘em a sniff.

Fossil-Free Solar Cooked meals at Los Angeles Eco-Village

Thanksgiving, November 25, 2021

Butternut Squash from garden and rice for Thanksgiving (2021) prepared in solar cookers in next photo.

Cork insulated solar oven from Portugal Collapsible solar reflector

Hartley and I conceived this impromptu Thanksgiving potluck the morning of and we had these meals ready to eat by 12:30. I was eager to test the newly acquired SunTaste solar oven from Portugal.

It was partly overcast and chilly that day, so those are very impressive solar cooking times.

February ’22 -Gotta’ practice cooking food in 90 min. or less for the launch of our Solar Cooker Demonstrations beginning March 20, 2022

Lentils – presoaked overnight – took too long in the round pot but cooked in 90 min. in the small roasting pan.

Grains in 90 min. or less:

Rice (pre-soaked)

Quinoa, Millet, Amaranth

Polenta with corn, coconut and okras

Gluten free foccacia – it’s more of a steamed bread and flavor of garlic topping seemed enhanced.

Beans – I’ve cooked them in the Global Sun Oven but mostly left them there all day. Will try again when sun is stronger to see if they will cook in 90 min.

8 year old Eddie learned to bake cornbread in Global Solar Oven.

Now it’s your turn! Want to see how simple it is to cook without fossil fuels? We’ll demonstrate each of the Solar cookers pictured in this blog beginning Sunday, March 20, 2022, 9:30 – 11:30 – and, if El Sol cooperates, we’ll eat what we cook, so bring your eating wares! Want to know how to sign up? Stay tuned – we’re working on it.

What didn’t work – pasta!

When asked about cooking pasta in a solar oven, the owner of Global Sun Ovens says I only made it once! I agree.

Fortunately, the chickens love that gluey pasta. (they also eat grubs!!!)

Job Opportunity here in LA Eco-Village

Excited to let you all know that we have an opening for a new resident manager for our 45 unit Urban Soil-Tierra Urbana limited equity housing co-op. You get to live and work in LAEV plus health benefits and a salary of $24 to $28K depending on qualifications.

Send us a letter about yourself and a resume. Check out the full job description and where to send your info here: http://laecovillage.org/urban-soil-tierra-urbana/job-opportunities/

Oh, and deadline for applications is August 6, 2021 or until filled. Please spread the word.