The Secret of the Librarian's Carrot Cake

So there we were at a potluck for the Concerned Citizens of Scotland County (an anti CAFO - Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation - group). The food was abundant and delicious, as usual. Kurt came back from the dessert table with a slice of carrot cake and I thought to myself - "meh - carrot cake. It's good, but it's nothing special."

HA! I would soon eat my words AND some of the best cake I've ever had.

He took a bite. His eyes got wide, and he whispered "you've GOT to try this!" I could not imagine what the big deal was until I took a bite myself. Oh. My. Freaking. Goodness. Absolute heaven on a plate.

Everyone at the table tried it. Everyone was gobsmacked (one of my favorite British sayings). We began to shout "WHO BROUGHT THE CARROT CAKE???"

From the other room came a small voice. "I did." It was Genisse, our favorite librarian. When we begged her for the secret, she paused only because she knew we would be horrified by the butter and sugar in it. We could not be dissuaded.

The librarian's secret? A buttermilk glaze poured onto the hot-from-the-oven cake. And just to gild the lily, the traditional cream cheese frosting is slathered on top. Sigh.

Below is the Milkweed Mercantile version. Genisse's cake was a little different recipe - it has coconut and pineapple in it, which I encourage you to play with. I have substituted a recipe from the Farm Vegetarian Cookbook because it is easy and vegan. It is also very tasty.

Carrot Cake
(Vegan, but you’d never know it!)

Preheat oven to 350
Grease and flour one 9x13” pan or three 9” round pans

In a great big bowl mix together (no electric mixer needed):
4 c. unbleached white flour
1 c. white sugar
1 c. brown sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1 ½ tsp. cinnamon
½ tsp allspice

Stir in:
1 cup salad oil
1 ½ - 2 c water or soymilk

Stir in:
3 c. grated carrots
1 c. chopped nuts (pecans or walnuts)
½ c. raisins

1. Bake in a 9x13” pan or three 9" round pans at 350 for 35-40 minutes. 
2. Remove from oven.
3. Pour Buttermilk Glaze (recipe below) over cake while it is still hot from the oven and still in the cake pan.
4. Let cool. Remove from pan.
5. Frost with Cream Cheese frosting (recipe below).

Buttermilk Glaze (vegan option below)
Yield: 1 ½ cups

1 c. sugar
1 ½ tsp baking soda
½ c. buttermilk OR ½ cup milk + 1 Tb lemon juice or vinegar
½ c (1 stick) butter
1 Tb light corn syrup
1 tsp. vanilla extract

1. Bring first five ingredients to a boil over medium high heat.
2. Boil, stirring often, four minutes
3. Remove from heat, and stir in vanilla.

Vegan “Buttermilk” Glaze
1 c. sugar
1 ½ tsp baking soda
½ cup unsweetened soy/almond/rice milk + 1 Tb lemon juice or vinegar
½ c (1 stick) vegan margarine
1 Tb light corn syrup
1 tsp. vanilla extract

1. Bring first five ingredients to a boil over medium high heat.
2. Boil, stirring often, four minutes
3. Remove from heat, and stir in vanilla.

Classic Cream Cheese Frosting (vegan option below)

12 ounces Cream Cheese
¾ cup (1 ½ sticks) butter, softened
3 c. sifted powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla

1. Beat together cream cheese and butter until fluffy, using stand mixer with whisk attachment. SIFT the powdered sugar.
2. Add in ½ cup increments, beating between every addition. Add vanilla.
3. Add more sugar if frosting is too wet, milk if it is too stiff.

NOTE: substituting 1/2 cup of coconut oil for 1/2 cup of the butter results in an amazingly coconut-ty flavor.

Vegan Cream “Cheese” Frosting

1 container Tofutti Better Than Cream Cheese
½ cube soy margarine OR 1/2 cup coconut oil
3 c. sifted powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla

1. Beat together Cream Cheese and margarine/oil until fluffy, using stand mixer with whisk attachment.
2. SIFT the powdered sugar.
3. Add in ½ cup increments, beating between every addition.
4. Add vanilla.
5. Add more sugar if it is too wet, soy milk if it is too stiff.

Cake recipe inspired by The New Farm Vegetarian Cookbook, Buttermilk Glaze courtesy of Genisse Lewis, the Librarian. Vegan options created in the Milkweed Mercantile kitchen.

We Heart Interns

We put the call out for interns - we got a ton of applications and accepted six. And then, out of the blue, came three more helpers - Danae, Elea and Katherine.

Danae, who is Kurt's niece, stayed with us for a month last summer. I have never before seen someone fit in so seamlessly and have so much fun doing it. When she said that she'd like to come back this summer "for as long as the weather holds" (she's a Florida girl, and considers any temperature below 70 an insult to human beings) we screamed "YES!" with as much dignity as we could muster. She totally "gets" it, intuits what needs to be done before we've even thought of it, laughs at our (very corny) jokes, is incredibly even tempered and just a joy to be around. How did we get so lucky?

Elea and Danae working their magic

The Cicela family has been visiting Dancing Rabbit for as long as Kurt and I have been here - 1999. When we first met Elea she was three years old and cute as a bug. Imagine our delight to be able to watch her grow into such an amazing (and beautiful and smart and kind and articulate...) young woman. A wiz at permaculture, and more specifically gardening, she's only been here two days and has already transformed the garden. Every time I walk by my jaw drops and I can't help but jump up and down with excitement (we don't have TV here, and for those of you who worry about me, please don't - I'm just very easily amused). Elea is home-schooled and already taking college classes - because of Iowa law she cannot test for her GED until she's 18. So from the myriad of offers on her plate she chose to join us for a month. We may just tie her to her tent poles when she tries to leave in three weeks...

Katherine mowing with our "solar" (aka electric powered by solar power) mower

And last but certainly not least, is Katherine. She appeared three weeks and two days ago with the first Dancing Rabbit Visitor Group of the season. With a dazzling smile, an effervescent can-do attitude and a laugh that's always ready to go, we couldn't help but offer her a Work Exchange (intern) spot the second she showed an inclination to stay at DR after the visitor session ended (which was about two days after she arrived).

So - big contented sigh from the Top Banana. Look for things to actually get done around here - from blog posts to website updates to dusting - yippee!

Asparagus Doesn't Lie

Look what I found this morning in our garden!

OK. So it doesn't look like much.

But to me, a sunshine-deprived uprooted Californian, this little asparagus screams "SPRING IS HERE!"

It popped up sometime between late yesterday afternoon and this morning, and was waiting for me when I did my daily microscopic inch-by-inch inspection of the asparagus beds, hoping and praying for signs of spring. Because asparagus doesn't lie, nor does it mess around.

Welcome spring. We've missed you.

Bet You've Never Had One of These In Your Mailbox...

Last week a wood box covered with screen and filled with live bees arrived with our mail. Let me say that again just in case you missed it.

Filled. With. Live. Bees.

The Priority Mail sticker was slapped on top, and it arrived like a box or oranges or an overdue notice from the library. To be totally truthful, Kim the mail carrier didn't put the box in a mailbox - she carried it up to the Mercantile porch, very carefully. Since we are the last stop on her rural route, the bees had kept her company all day long.

Inside the box, the dozens of bees were clustered around a feeding tube in the center. There was also a queen bee, safe and secure in her own little compartment. A couple of dozen bees did not make the trip successfully - their little bodies lay on the bottom of the box, quite dead. Oh dear.

Ziggy and April, the bee recipients, were not at home and it was chilly out, so we bee-sat the box in the Mercantile until they arrived home. The room was filled with a low-level hum, a buzz that seemed to creep in through one's pores. It was the oddest feeling. Even better was the reaction when anyone would come in to the room and do a double take.

Hey, what's in the box?

Life is never dull here at Dancing Rabbit. So, what's in your mailbox?

I Suspect They Dress Themselves

Hi all. It's been incredibly busy here at Dancing Rabbit. I constantly write blog posts in my head, but somehow they don't actually get transcribed here.

Once again I hope to do better in the future.

Here's a little glimpse of our world here. Yesterday was pre-school. The kids from Sandhill, Red Earth Farms and Dancing Rabbit get together under the loving tutelage of Ali, Laura and an assortment of enthusiastic (and energetic) helpers. I (along with Mercantile guests) watch from the window - it's the best show ever, and it happens every Wednesday at 9:00 a.m.

And if you ever need fashion advice, I have just the folks to help you:

(check out the boots...)

Discussing the Speak and On Foot the Walk

Milkweed Mercantile proprietors Alline & Kurt waiting for "meddlesome guests."

I have a Google alert for "Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage." Imagine my confusion, and then my delight, when I got the alert for this "article."

It clearly has been translated out of English into another language and back again. We believe that it is an article that began its life as a post written for Sustainablog by Brian "Ziggy" Liloila. What an incredible way to look at our lives here. I have bold-faced the passages that I like the best. Enjoy.

"Ever wondered what it felt similar to to live in a indeed tolerable community? Wonder no more, since Dancing Rabbit, an Ecovillage formed in northeastern Missouri may be a life varying experience for any person who’s peaceful to learn, live and work beneath their Eco-minded philosophy.

Dancing Rabbit was started to put the ideals of green communal living to action. In 1997, DR Land Trust purchased 280 acres of land in Rutledge, Missouri to emanate a residents of similar to disposed Eco activists and continually expands as the residents increases in its population. Nathan Brown, a long time proprietor and orator for Dancing Rabbit, sat down with me not long ago and talked about the expansion of Dancing Rabbit and why any person meddlesome in green office building should advance revisit and maybe even live as a member of this successful Eco village.

All Residents follow ecological covenants and discipline set onward by the community. Anyone who has an fascination in green living and office building are acquire to advance come together this bustling and peaceful community. The race has doubled since the commencement of Dancing Rabbit and Nathan surmises that race will twice from its stream race inside of couple of years.

This Eco encampment and zone is ceaselessly expanding as green living becomes more of a direction in the US. But the residents of Dancing Rabbit isn’t subsequent to a trend, to them, green living is a way of life, something that is ardent inside of them and they are discussing the speak and on foot the walk. Of march with any Eco disposed village, innate green office building is segment of their architectural plans.

Most of the office building materials are done of innate resources similar to staw scoop , cob, earth smear and earth floors. Dancing Rabbit moreover explores advance green technology and tries to confederate them in to the stream office building methods. Some of the office building methods that Dancing Rabbit hopes to implement are: made of clay flooring , rammed earth, earths hip, and living roof tiles where plants are planted on tip of the roof. All of the buildings on Dancing Rabbit are built with substitute energy.

A important e.g. of innate green office building is the Milkweed Mercantile , an Recyclable inn, green broad store and Organic grill that is segment of Dancing Rabbit. “Construction of the Milkweed Mercantile at Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage began in the spring of 2007. We non-stop the store in July 2009, and had the authorized Grand Opening in April 2010,” says Alline Anderson, owners of Milkweed Mercantile. The two story strawbale residence runs only on solar power. The motel has 4 bedrooms and can residence up to 12 people. Visitors who are meddlesome in partial stays at Dancing Rabbit can stay at the Eco BB.

Green internships and green construction jobs are existing to any person who wants to live and work in the Eco village. The internships are jobs are not only paltry to green office building but moreover to organic gardening, green business such as the Eco Inn and Organic Cafe and moreover publishing."

In closing, I'd like to leave you with this: We look forward to your meddlesome partial stay. If you have something ardent inside of you please come visit us here where we are discussing the speak and on foot the walk.

Yo Woodie Guthrie - Thanks for the Song!

It was on this day in 1940 that Woody Guthrie wrote the lyrics to "This Land is Your Land" — now one of America's most famous folk songs (below is one of my favorite versions - love the brass!)



The melody is to an old Baptist hymn. Guthrie wrote the song in response to the grandiose "God Bless America" song, written by Irving Berlin and sung by Kate Smith. Guthrie didn't think that the anthem represented his own or many other Americans' experience with America. So he wrote a folk song as a response to Irving Berlin's "God Bless America," a song that was often accompanied by an orchestra. At first, Guthrie titled his own song "God Blessed America" — past tense. Later, he changed the title to "This Land is Your Land," which is the first line of the song.
Although Guthrie wrote the words to the song in his notebook on this day in 1940, he didn't perform it until 1944, and it was several years more still before he published it in a book of mimeographed folk songs. The song really took off in the 1960s. Bob Dylan did a famous version, and the song was huge in the Civil Rights movement.

Several other countries have appropriated the great American folk song. There's a Canadian version with the lyrics: "From Bonavista to Vancouver Island / From the Arctic Circle to the Great Lakes waters, / This land was made for you and me."

In a British version, which Billy Bragg often performs, it's "From the coast of Cornwall to the Scottish Highlands / From the sacred forests to the holy islands /This land was made for you and me."

And for the Irish, it's: "From the northern highlands to the western islands / From the hills of Kerry to the streets of Derry / This land was made for you and me."

There are Welsh and Swedish texts as well. Bruce Springsteen sang "This Land is Your Land" at 2008 rallies for candidate Barack Obama, and then performed it at the big Obama inaugural celebration concert at the Lincoln Memorial, We Are One, which 400,000 people attended.

Lifted directly from Writer's Almanac. Thank you Garrison Keillor.