My new piece is up at the Cafe and I need to thank Caelius, M, and Lee for their help and inspiration on it, even if it was unintentional or unintended.

Well, the jack-booted thugs that LP is always complaining about came calling yesterday in the form of a letter to our landlord from the management company that “manages” our subdivision.

The compost bin has to go.

We placed the bin under a low-hanging pine tree so that it was darn near invisible and it never stunk or drew animals or otherwise was a “nuisance” but apparently rules are rules…

Our landlord thought it was pretty stupid too. (We got off to a great start the first time he saw the statue of Mary outside our front door—he’s Egyptian and his father was a Coptic Orthodox priest.) He’s got a compost pile at home and has offered to give us some of his whenever we need it.

Now I’m wondering what happened—whether a neighbor complained or whether some employee encountered it and am wondering what this may mean for our container gardening plans. And I’m trying to figure out if a potato-filled stack of tires would fly!

Lee’s put up a review of a review of a cookbook which inspires me to think out loud a bit about food.

The points raised about cooking are spot on—that is, cooking is an essential skill that Americans need to know. My mom made me learn when I was young and I got experience in Boy Scouts in planning meals, buying food, and cooking it over propane and open fires (and starting said fires, of course…). Both M and I love to cook and we try hard to make the grand majority of our food from scratch.  The result is food that tastes good and where we have  control over the ingredients.

There’s no question that it takes longer to prepare than take-out—but it also costs less and that’s been a huge factor in the course of our life together given our various situations. Again, workinmg from home gives me some flexibility there; I’ve chopped onions and stirrd risotto while on conference calls.

To get back to Lee’s post and the book to which it refers, I was struck by one of the sensible criticisms of it:

It can be easy for someone like me to forget that many people would see Bittman’s plan as untenable, since the kinds of foods he recommends aren’t sold in affordable chain or fast-food restaurants or available prepared or frozen in every suburban supermarket. Some of his advice — carry nuts and fruit around with you for snacks, so you can avoid vending machines — may be tenable for them, but some of the rest will seem even less practical than the Atkins Diet.

This got me thinking about some of the cookbooks I’ve acquired recently that seem to focus on what I consider novelty foods—fruits and vegetables not easily acquired or found outside of run-of-the-mill food stores.  I wonder what we happen if we took sober account of what actually can be grown locally and what foods would be available at various times of the year. Yes, I can cook quite well—but I’ve never looked at recipes weighing whether I could get their ingredients easily locally at all times. I’ve not given much thought to food preservation cooking. Using fresh veggies is great and preferable—but where do cucumbers come from for a January salad? I see three main options if you’re going to remain committed to low-energy, local food options:

1. You don’t make salads in January, or
2. they’re called “pickles”, or
3. start building your greenhouse…

Now I’ve always been a fan of cooking “peasant food” which I define as basic ingredients with big flavors (we don’t go in for delicate flavors so much here). A perfect example is one of our cold-day favorites: potato soup. Potatoes, onions, and garlic sauteed in bacon fat with broth and the cut-up rendered bacon and croutons. Hmm—all ingredients that could be stored and/or harvested through the winter… Imagine that…

Yes, I think it’d be a good idea for people to start acquiring cooking skills, but I wonder if it wouldn’t help to orient them—and even those of us who already know how to cook—back toward the basic recipes and ingredients that make sense based on where you are and what your climate is.

Well, I went and did my civic duty. Can’t really say I “dropped the handle”; “touched the screen” doesn’t really have the right ring to it…

This election for me was a lesser of two evils decision. If only McCain had run the platform he ran in 2000. If only Lieberman had been his running mate. Oh well—we rarely get what we want…

But I did start thinking about what I want. I think it’ll be a term for that. With—most likely—a Democratic president and Congress, it’ll should provide space for thinking about the shape of politics to come. Here’s what I’d like:

• A moderate coalition
• fiscally conservative (pay as you go only)
• economically moderate with a focus on conservation and localization

To expand a bit on that last point, I’m not a free-trade capitalist. Some interference in the markets is necessary. And, for the desperate cause of moving away from a cheap energy economy that means  tax credits and incentives for:

• business and households that reduce energy consumption/are fitted for demonstrable energy conservation (including incentives for telecommuting and mass transit use)
• emphasize local industries
• support a move away from service industries and cultivate local food production and small manufacturing industries
• tax out-sourcing for investment in local community colleges/vocation programs 
• stop fuel subsidies by taxing fuel to the real cost of production and use the tax gains to work towards a lower energy infrastucture (electrified railways, et al.) 

Would this look like protectionism? isolationism? On the first, yeah—it would. On the second—not in principle but in practice. 

On social issues? Give me a break… We’re tired of the culture wars. I have yet to see a cogent argument for how gay marriage is an attack on hetero marriage. If you want to protect marriage, then make marriage counseling mandatory for couples of all sorts.

I don’t know—it’s still stuff I’m kicking around. And it’s not like anyone’s going to ask my opinion anyway—it’s just what I’d like to see…