A Different Kind of Kid

This weekend, the kid-chefs and I got to know goats.  Five of them, to be exact.  And they were cute!  A friend knew my son is enamored with goats and a local woman who raises dairy goats had an urban husbandry workshop nearby, so we checked it out.

She'd brought two does (females) and three doelings (baby girls, about 4 months old) in from her farm and demonstrated how to milk them, trim hooves and described what it's like to have a small herd.  They were hilarious. 

Munching on poison ivy and every branch in site, butting each other out of the way, bleating when the moms were led off for the demonstrations - they were very entertaining.

Then it was time for the food!

We tried some milk, fresh from the goat, some cheese and some icecream.

The milk tasted like the milk we're used to (cow's milk, that is!) and the cheese was a farmer's cheese, similar to chevre, but less creamy.  The icecream?  It was delish.

It was a fun couple of hours and I love that the kids (mine, not the goats') get to see where their food comes from, and hear about the effort it takes to raise it yourself.  Thankfully, there are so many local farms and people around our area making these kinds of events easy to find and experience. 

I left convinced that having a few dwarf goats on an in-town lot could be fantastic, but as of now, that's not an option in our town.

I'm not sure we'll be milking goats ourselves twice a day any time soon, but angora goats might be another story....once we move out of town!

Time for Ice Cream

It's suddenly gotten to be 100 degrees here and hot!  That can make for some pretty miserable end-of-the-school year events, but it's perfect for at least one of our favorite foods: ice cream!

I have always wanted an ice-cream maker at home, and lingered over the recipes for home made sorbets, frozen yogurts and the perfect vanilla ice cream.  Well, this year, my mother sent the kid-chefs a summer-celebration gift.  Yup, you guessed it - they have their own ice cream maker!

Since they share the experiments with me, I can't be too terribly jealous....

Our first trial was a learning experience.  We learned that 2% milk is no substitute for cream when making ice cream.  Ice cream.

After a series of well-timed turns of the crank, we dished up some frozen 2% milk with blueberries.

It was delicious - sweet milk, defrosting rapidly in our dishes, with perfectly ripe blueberries.  It didn't last long!  Our next experiment turned out better - stayed tuned!