RuminationsFor March 2015

Dateline: 26 March 2015

Marlene brought home that bottle of Fentiman’s Dandelion & Burdock a few days ago. She knew I would be intrigued by it. 

Ingredients: water, carbonated water, cane sugar, pear juice concentrate, glucose syrup, fermented ginger root extracts (ginger root, water, yeast), dandelion infusion (water, dandelion root, ethanol), burdock infusion (water, burdock root, ethanol) aniseed flavor.

It’s a soft drink, of sorts. Tasted pretty good. But at $1.99 a bottle, one was enough. Been there, done that.

A little internet research turned up the fact that dandelion and burdock are used to make a traditional brewed drink in the United Kingdom. You’ve heard of root beer?  Well, dandelion and burdock may have been the original root beer. You can watch a delightful little YouTube clip of the down-to-earth British bon vivant, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, making some dandelion and burdock brew At This Link.

I’m not much of a beer drinker. Fact is, I never drank a single beer in high school, nor in two years of post high school education.  My experience with beer is pretty much limited  to the summer of 1977. I was living with Bruce and Patty Womer in Craftsburry Common, Vermont, helping them to restore an old building (I wrote about it HERE). They were long, hot days of hard work, and every day after work, me and Bruce had a beer together. Just one. I can tell you that I really enjoyed those beers. 

I’m tempted to try Hugh’s Recipe. It’s the roots, the tradition, and the creativity that appeal to me more than the alcohol. I have a good supply of the necessary roots (for the digging), and spring is nearly here. But there are so many other things to be done in the spring.

Muskrat For Dinner

What, I ask you, would be better with a traditional dandelion & burdock beer than muskrat? 

In the comments section of my previous post, Everett Littlefield, the locally-famous native author of Block Island, related as how him and his brother once roasted a muskrat over an open fire, with the intention of eating it. But it didn't taste very good.

I'm no expert on the subject of cooking muskrat, but I did read my current Agriphemera pdf download from 1926, The Muskrat As A Furbearer: With Notes On Its Use As Food, and  it turns out that muskrats were once sold for food in retail markets in this country. They were labeled as "marsh rabbits," but everyone knew they were muskrats. The old bulletin is downright interesting, and it tells the right way to cook a muskrat.

By the way, I've read Everett's autobiography about growing up on Block Island, and it was a fun read, with some very memorable parts (getting a hatchet stuck in his forehead being the most memorable).

That Reality Show

About a month ago I Posted Here about a possible new reality television show with a Christian-agrarian aspect titled, For God and Country. I don't know if my mention of the show resulted in any responses to the casting call.

I had planned to write a lengthy commentary about the show but I don't have the time, and I really don't have the inclination. I will say that, in response to the show's producer asking me what I thought of the idea, I wrote him the following:

"Since you asked, I don’t think I like what you are doing with the program. I don’t think it is necessary or that it serves a good purpose."

Originally, I was going to supply the password to the Vimeo concept video of the proposed show, so that everyone would have a better idea of what it was about. But the producer changed his mind about that, thinking it might lead to a problem with the Discovery Channel, because the show is still  early in development.

The concept video showed people of differing Christian faiths who have decided to separate from the popular culture. They appear to have a decentralist, agrarian worldview. They are people who believe in limited government, and things like homeschooling, personal responsibility, and individual freedom. In short, they are people who think a lot like me (and maybe you). 

But these kinds of people can easily be misrepresented to mainstream television viewers. For example, one scene may show one of these Christian folk talking with great conviction about how they think the government is wrong to do such-and-such, or require such-and-such and, in so doing, the government is taking away Constitutional freedoms. Then, in the next scene, we see a group of Christians out shooting guns. That's part of what I saw in the concept clip for the show.

Now, there is nothing at all wrong with disagreeing with the government. And every good American should be vigilant about guarding the liberties that our founding fathers gave us in the Constitution. And there is also nothing at all wrong with being well armed, doing some target practicing, and teaching children how to shoot straight and safe. But when you create a television program for the masses and you juxtapose these two scenes, you are feeding into the totally absurd narrative that God-fearing, patriotic Americans are something akin to domestic terrorists. 

If you haven't noticed, America has become a police state, and a police state needs domestic enemies to perpetuate itself. American citizens who do not conform to cultural expectations, Who are hard working and self reliant, who disagree with unjust laws, and who hold to a "literal interpretation of the Constitution" are increasingly being characterized as dangerous threats to the state. 

There was a time in this country when such people were the backbone of a healthy Republic. But now they are looked at with suspicion. Welcome to the new America, where everything that was once good and honorable and commendable is now bad. And anyone who does not accept the warped new morality is an enemy of the state. 

The producer of the program told me that he was sorry I didn't see how this program would do a lot of good by getting the word out about a issues that are important to the country and to many Christian believers. Well, maybe so. I could be totally wrong. But, based on what I saw in the concept video, and based on the media track record of mischaracterizing many Christian believers, under the umbrella of entertainment, for propaganda purposes, I don't think it would be wise to participate in such a television program. 


One of these days, when time permits, I hope to write about Elijah and God's remnant (in the book of Kings, in the Old Testament), and my concept of the "remnant vision" that I think every Christian should have. Hint: the "remnant vision" is not about survival, and God doesn't need a television program to help preserve his Remnant.

Permaculture Orchard

Have you seen the Permaculture Orchard movie? If you are interested in developing a permaculture orchard, I recommend the movie to you. Excellent photography.

One of the surprises in the movie was the use of heavy plastic as a mulch in the mixed plantings. My Four-Day Carrots videos at YouTube have had some derogatory comments about the use of plastic mulch in my garden. I can understand the mindset, as I thought the same way for a long time—decades, actually.

But I had the best garden in 30 years of gardening last year, due largely to the help of plastic mulch. If you have a large garden (or a large orchard) and you do not have the manpower or hours to keep the ground cultivated, plastic is the solution. I'll have more to say about this in an upcoming blog post.

Raspberry How-To

If you are in a raspberry-growing region, you must have some raspberry plants. They are a perennial food source. Plant once, take care of the canes, and you have a perpetual, yearly abundance of berries. Planting time for raspberries is nearly upon us in the northern half of the country. The Raspberry Culture pdf download from 1948 that I have at Agriphemera.com (pictured above) is a good source of raspberry-growing how-to.