Nourish and Thrive
Elderberry season is always an exciting time. I love watching the local elderberry trees come into flower in the summer, then slowly start producing berries as fall approaches. Fall is by far my favorite season, so this is the beginning of wonderful things to come in my mind! Elderberries are amazing for the immune system,…
Most of us in the fermenting world know all about kombucha, whether we’ve made it ourselves or just purchase it at our local health food store. What I’ve only recently learned is that kombucha is also great for the skin and makes a wonderful soap! It’s also the perfect way to use up any extra…
We all know that fall is all about pumpkin spice everything, but why don’t we have a zucchini spice craze in the summertime? I’m about to change that! Zucchini is abundant in gardens everywhere, and can be used in yummy baked goods like this zucchini spice bread. When I was first searching for a zucchini…
Hot summer days mean one thing to me: blackberries are ripening! It’s usually sometime in August that we start foraging for blackberries, and I always make sure to reserve some for making a gallon (or two or three) of blackberry mead. Of course blackberry cobbler and crisp will also be made, and they are delicious,…
Some summers are zucchini summers, and we are in the midst of one right now! While last year most of our summer squash plants got eaten by squash bugs, this year we have so many zucchini that we don’t know what to do with all of them. We’ve given them away, fed them to the…
My husband Joel has been making this awesome homemade natural fertilizer for our garden using comfrey, and its been working amazingly well! It’s super easy, too, especially if you have comfrey growing in your garden already. Basically, it’s a simple comfrey tea, or infusion to be exact. Joel wrote this post for us today to…
Making homemade soap is one of my new favorite skills. I especially love soaps that are made with foraged and wildcrafted ingredients. My friend Jan Berry, blogger at The Nerdy Farm Wife and author of 101 Easy Homemade Products for Your Skin, Health & Home and the Natural Soapmaking eBook, has a great recipe for…
I love herbal medicine, and when I first got really into it I was surprised and pleased to learn that so many common herbs and spices are medicinal. Many herbs and spices that most of us already have in our spice racks do double duty as powerful healers. I’m going to go over five of…
I love cooking with foraged ingredients, but I especially love it when I can do something fun with wildflowers (wildflower mead, anyone?) While the season for fresh wildflowers is generally pretty short, they are easy to dry on a drying screen and store for use throughout the year. Dried edible flowers are perfect for using…
Fermenting foods is one of my favorite pastimes, and I’ve been especially fond of naturally fermented sodas recently. This fermented turmeric soda I made recently really got me hooked! They are so easy to make and can be flavored any way you like, plus they are actually good for you. I had heard of sweet…
Summer is the time for bugs, and not always the good kind! There’s nothing worse than going on a relaxing camping trip near a beautiful river or lake, only to get eaten alive by mosquitoes the whole time. The only problem with commercial bug spray is that there is often toxic chemicals in them that…
Many people know about stinging nettles, but they are much more well known for their painful sting than their edible and medicinal qualities. If prepared the right way, stinging nettles are delicious and nutritious! So many edible wild “weeds” are brushed off as being a nuisance, when they are actually quite tasty, and often have…
Homemade herbal products are some of my favorite things to make. It’s so satisfying to make an all natural salve, lip balm, or herbal remedy with real ingredients from scratch. It’s usually easier than you would think, too! One of my most popular items in my Coco’s Herbals Etsy shop is my Vanilla Lavender Lip…
Rhubarb is an interesting vegetable that is most commonly eaten as a fruit. It is tart and delicious with an old time flavor that grows on you over time. I love it, and was very excited to discover a rhubarb plant growing in our backyard when we moved into this house last year. Rhubarb is…
Asparagus is one of my very favorite spring vegetables. I love when I start seeing them at the farmers market, as that’s a sure sign that warm weather is near! Plus it’s just a tasty vegetable that can make any meal feel fancy. Making fermented asparagus with garlic is one of the best ways to…
Violas are one of my favorite flowers, not necessarily because of their beauty, but because of their hardiness and multiple uses. They are an edible flower, which are my favorite kind, like calendula, lavender, and nasturtiums. They also have some medicinal uses. Viola is actually a genus composed of many different species, including pansies, wild…