Self-Sufficient-ish – a wonderful phrase for what the authors refer to as their urban guide to almost self-sufficiency. Dave and Andy Hamilton, of the UK, are founders of an interactive Web site (www.selfsufficientish.com), and a book just out this year: The Self Sufficient-ish Bible – An Eco-living Guide for the 21st Century.

The philosophy that drives both the book and Web site is that many people would love to give up their job, move to the country and grow all of their own food, but the reality is that few of us will ever be able to accomplish all of that. So, in the meantime, Dave and Andy have gathered a whole passel of information on growing your own food, brewing your own alcohol, collecting wild food and a host of other practical and useful tips for becoming self-sufficient-ish in an urban setting.

The tone is definitely British, but the tips are universal.

Last week I wrote a blog on finding windfall apples in my neighborhood and the pie I hoped to make with them. Actually, the day after writing the blog I brought two schnitz apple pies into the office to share with my cohorts. The pies were a hit and I now plan to make an apple dessert each fall from found apple (apples I didn't grow, but are from abandoned apple trees) to share with the staff.

Schnitz pie was my father’s favorite pie. He was quite disappointed when I learned to enjoy it, as that meant one less piece for him! You might notice that the photo of the pie is not s pristine as I would have preferred it to be. Before I could locate a camera, the pie had been ravaged by my office mates – I guess I should take that as a compliment.

Here's the recipe.

Line a pie pan with crust - store bought or homemade.

Sprinkle a quarter-cup of brown sugar and a quarter-teaspoon of cinnamon onto the crust.

Peel half a dozen good-sized apples and slice them thin into the crust. The apples should fill the pie pan.

Sprinkle a half-cup of brown sugar and a quarter-teaspoon of cinnamon over the apples.

Pour a cup of heavy cream over the top.

Bake in a 350 degree Fahrenheit oven until the apples are soft (about 45 minutes).

Share if you must! 

PHOTO BY JENNA WOGINRICH

Will this turkey become Thanksgiving dinner?

Back in May when I was driving to pick up my spring chicks, I wasn't planning on also picking up dinner to-go. But when I arrived at the feed store I discovered I could go home with a free-range turkey dinner for five bucks. Well, if I wanted to raise my own that is...

Inside the brooder crates holding their chirping throngs there were a half-dozen random turkey poults for sale. They were orphans from an abandoned order and had no farmer to raise them. In an act of homesteader-impulse I took one of the broad breasted white poults home with my laying hens and goslings. The plan was to raise him along with the other birds, but unlike his egg-laying siblings, he would be for the holiday table. On the ride back to Cold Antler, I called my parents in Pennsylvania to announce that Thanksgiving Dinner was on me this year. Which is a weird call to get if your daughter is a vegetarian. But that's another story.

Raising a turkey turned out to be an easy and rewarding experience. Since it was the lone gobbler in my chicken coop, it seemed to get along fine with my flock. Some farmers warn never to mix your turkeys and other poultry together, and I suppose in larger numbers that is sound advice. But my little guy never showed any aggression or caused any problems in the henhouse. He lived out his summer as a free range yard bird, plodding behind the geese and chickens. Spending his nights in the safety of the coop on soft straw. I was proud to have him here on the farm, which generally only produces eggs, wool, and vegetables. And being able to hold a three-day-old poult in your palm in the spring, and then help pluck its feathers on harvest day in late October was a wholesome lesson in the source of one family's entree. It felt really good to know I was producing food for the holidays that lived such a great life. TD, as I came to name him (an abbreviation for his destiny) was a gentlemen to the end.

Alas, it didn't pan out. The turkey I raised won't be adorning my family's Thanksgiving table (there was some discomfort from some family members about eating someone they knew, and my offer was respectfully declined) but I did get to trade the 26-pound bird for an hour of private herding lessons with a sheepdog trainer. So TD not only helped teach me about raising a healthy meat bird, but in his own way taught me how to work with a border collie on a small herd of sheep. Which in my book is a hell of a trade, and that's a lot more than most people are getting from the Butterballs in their grocers’ freezer.

Jenna Woginrich  is the author of the forthcoming book, Made from Scratch: Discovering the Pleasures of a Handmade Life, from Storey Publishing. Want to hear more about Jenna's turkey? You can visit her blog at Cold Antler Farm or hear her talking turkey on NPR's Morning Edition here.

Before you delve into this blog, let me warn you the content may not be appropriate for some viewers. As the subject implies, this article has to do with killing — the killing of animals raised for their food value. The reality is, for any of us to live (vegan or otherwise) others must die.

Close to Our Food

Where I now live, we are close to the source of our food. While I studied self sufficiency in the '70s through the pages of Mother Earth News, Organic Gardening, Shelter, etc., my wife and I are now living what we only read about in the past.

In those days, we had a large, suburban garden and practiced “edible landscaping.” My wife “put food by” in our basement shelving and freezer. We grew as many as 60 tomato plants in one season; in addition to keeping honeybees; growing grapes, blueberries, strawberries, asparagus, raspberries, apples, and a myriad of other standard vegetables. We had a dual bin compost system and instead of raking our leaves and having them hauled to the landfill, we asked the township to deliver truckloads of other folks’ leaves to us, and we used them for mulch.

We were working full time, and there were many times when we wanted to do things outside the house, but everywhere we looked in the yard we saw work. That’s ultimately why we moved to a home that was basically work-free.

Now we’re back on the land — with ten acres of cornfield, which we had plowed and disked after we moved in. We’re expanding our gardens from the house south, into this treeless expanse. This year (our second year here), we tripled the size of our gardens. This means two-thirds of our beds are first year beds.

With the cost of everything on the rise due to the dramatic increase in the price of oil, we feel fortunate to have this opportunity to “grow our own,” and now associate with local folks who have been doing so for generations.

Really Close to Our Food

We are in meat and dairy country. We enjoy the occasional lowing of the neighbor’s Angus from our back deck. Dairy and beef farms are only a short walk away. A few miles away, an ex-urbanite is raising lamb for distant markets. And we live among dozens of Amish families. In addition to our experimentation years ago, we are learning from those who have been doing.

While we don’t have a Whole Foods Market or Trader Joe’s nearby, we do have family owned meat markets. One is a country market that sells more than meat, but it's one of the few in the area that is USDA approved. USDA is involved anytime meat is sold to the public via a retail outlet.

In addition to great bacon, steaks, jerky, roasts, ribs, ground meat and ham balls, our market sells the honey and blueberries we produce.

We’ve gotten to know many of the folks that work at the market, including the owner. Never one to miss an opportunity for learning, we asked and received permission to see how the meat was processed … beginning on the killing floor.

The Killing Floor

Three men work on the killing floor. One has been there 23 years; another, 13 years; and the third, for only 30 days. They say it’s difficult keeping good help; there isn’t much joy in this work.

The animals are kept in small, indoor pens until it’s their time. They are then prodded along a narrow walkway that leads to the killing floor. A quick death follows a steel rod that is “shot” into their brain. The movie No Country for Old Men made this device famous.

Immediately after death, the animals are hoisted by their rear legs, their throats are cut, and the blood is drained from their systems. A blood sample is taken and checked for brucellosis, which is not harmful to humans who consume the meat, but is of concern to the kill floor workers and other animals that are exposed.

BILL HAKANSON

A five-gallon bucket captures the blood of a Scottish Highland cow.

The first step in tenderizing is underway: an electronic shock is administered which causes its muscles to flex.

BILL HAKANSON

After the animal has been killed, drained and shocked, it is laid on its back on a movable rack and its hide is removed.

BILL HAKANSON

They start by severing its hooves at the first joint. The hooves remain with the hide. After the hide has been stripped, the animal is hoisted by its rear legs again and its innards are removed. This is one point where the USDA inspector steps in to check the condition of the liver, etc. He looks for contamination and disease.

The liver and heart are the only organs retained. Following the removal of the innards, the animal is sawn down the middle, hosed down, sprayed with lactic acid to prevent bacteria growth and moved into a cooler for the meat to age. My wife refers to the cooler as “Rocky Land”.

Following aging (which dries the meat), the carcass is cut into the steaks, roasts, and burgers most of us enjoy.

The men on the killing floor are professionals. They take their jobs seriously. They were gracious and hospitable, and told us we’d be welcome to return anytime. Next time, I’d like to see exactly where the steaks, roasts, chops and bacon come from.

A time-honored tradition for country folk is harvesting wild foods, such as fiddle-head ferns in the spring. But sometimes, on the edges of former homesteads, you can find semi-wild foods (or food that has gone wild!), such as apples.

Pioneers and homesteaders have been planting apple trees since Plymouth days. Apples are a wonderfully versatile fruit; they can be stored for months and used as is, or transformed into cider, sauce, and dried apples for pies and cobblers. Johnny Appleseed (John Chapman) spent much of his life in the late 1700 and early 1800s planting apple nurseries, primarily in Ohio, Illinois and Indiana. It is said that some of those trees are still bearing apples.

But you don’t have to go to those states to find free-for-the-asking apples. Just by taking an autumn drive in the country, you will probably find an old farmstead with an apple tree or two loaded with apples, ready to become deer and bear fodder. Before picking, always try to find who owns the trees and if it is OK to pick the apples. You also might find trees, full of ripe apples, in your neighbor’s. They may be thrilled to have someone pick them rather than having to deal with rotting apples in the grass.

I was prompted to write about windfall apples by my experience at work this week. A group of us were taking our noon walk, where we routinely pass a closed retirement facility. Most of the leaves have fallen and so I noticed a formerly hidden tree, full of red somethings. On closer inspection, I discovered that it was an apple tree, still loaded with good fruit. Since no one is currently living on the site, I felt comfortable taking a few apples to make into apple sauce. Many of the apples had blemishes and some bug spots, but on the whole, they were perfect for boiling down for sauce. What a serendipitous find!!

I think I will make a note on the calendar for next fall to locate some more orphan apple trees in my area. Making apple sauce from a variety of apple types makes for the best tasting sauce. And if I find enough really tasty ones, I can make my father's favorite apple dessert - a schnitz pie. But that story will have to wait for another day.

Do you have a favorite found food? Tell us about it.

Photo by SuperND/Fotolia

A few years ago, I lived on some acreage where I raised two pigs from weaner to slaughter size in about 5 months. I was amazed at how fast they were able to put on weight. The little pink critters went from 50 pounds in May when I acquired them to 300 pounds in October. 

It was a rewarding experience interacting with Hambone and Tenderloin. (Never give names like Daisy and Curly Tail to animals you intend to eventually serve for supper.) They would come up to the porch each day, along with the dogs, for their afternoon treat. It was also a very difficult experience raising the pigs - following through on having them slaughtered so we could have ham, bacon, sausage and pork chops in the freezer. We traded the meat from one hog for an equal amount of grass-fed beef that some friends raised on their mountain ranch.

Free-range pork is a wonderful taste experience and Hank Will, the editor of our sister publication Grit has taken on raising some Mulefoot hogs - listed as critical by the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy (ALBC) - that will both increase the continuation of the breed and supply his family with some good eating. Of course with faces this adorable, it is hard to know how they will be able to think of their little charges as hambone and tenderloin. For now, Hank and his wife just enjoy watching them root around in the dirt and take naps in the straw. Be sure to read Hank's blogs here and here. Watch the piggies enjoying breakfast, below.

Photo by Kate Will

If you’ve got a weed problem, we’ve got the solution: goats. All across the nation, frustrated landowners are turning to these animals, who happily munch away on much-hated noxious weeds and other invasive plants without so much as a drop of gasoline. Renting goat herds has become a popular, affordable and effective way to control weed problems and reduce the need for herbicides — read more in this article from The New York Times. And don’t forget to check out Interview with the World’s Best Weed Eater, Mother Earth News’ exclusive interview with a real live goat!

iStockphoto/Judy McPhail

My husband, Rob, and I used to joke that we liked nature as long as we could see it through a windshield. I have no idea when or how that changed; one day, we had a gym membership and prepackaged food in our pantry, and the next we were cranky if we couldn’t get out for a hike and chafed at any food that we hadn’t bought directly from the farmer. 

Our organic transition was kicked off by a chance encounter with the joyful movement called Slow Food. After a while, it seemed natural that we would move to a rural area, somewhere mountainous and beautiful, private with a decent garden space. 

We found a house — the house — a red-roofed 1941 farmhouse in a community where people smile at one another and offer useful advice. 

We’ve lived here for two months now and I can finally admit that we have no idea what we’re doing. Our major previous garden success was a squash plant that we couldn’t have stopped had we wanted to. Rob once camped out at a festival. I like to can jelly and preserves, despite my 60% gel rate. We have a lot to learn. 

We expect to work hard, but after all, we’re chasing some pretty major goals. We moved here in hope of reducing our environmental footprint, and to get away from total dependence on the grid. But we also moved here to start fresh: to redefine our idea of success, to move backburner dreams to the forefront, and to become the people we want to be. 

But first things first: finding the local cheesemakers… 

Sarah Beth Jones is taking a break from a career in newspaper, magazine and business writing to learn how to live more wisely in Floyd, Virginia.

Photo by Rob Jones