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Stories, articles, and updates from the Ranch community.
There are piles of sand and clay ready to be formed into adobe bricks or wattle and daub mix, piles of starfruit and lemons waiting to be fermented, stacks of bamboo waiting for the next bamboo construction workshop, piles of green papaya anticipating its second life as kimchi, piles and piles of knowledge held in peoples brains, piles of books filling up the library waiting for the next curious mind, piles of manure, compost piles, worm piles, piles and piles of piles.
You can make fruit vinegars from all kinds of different local, seasonal fruits. Using the scraps from the fruits (i.e. the peel and extra bits) is a way to value the marginal (permaculture principle) and turn a “waste” product into something of purpose.
Before coming to the Ranch, I only knew of kefir as a tasty, sour, probiotic milk product - almost like a liquid yogurt. I loved it, and knew of it’s health benefits, but didn’t think kefir could be anything more. Turns out, kefir can refer to both milk kefir, the product I’ve known and seen in grocery stores, and water kefir, a delicious fermented soda and a staple for us here at Rancho.
Llegar a un curso de bioconstrucción es una señal. Quien busca el conocimiento teórico y práctico en este campo, probablemente haya empezado a transitar un camino hacia el cambio de mentalidad y forma de vida; posiblemente muy pocas personas que aterricen en un curso de este tipo lo harán por azar y la mayoría lo hará como consciente consecuencia de su inclinación por un cambio de paradigma, de estilo de vida, por la búsqueda de coherencia entre el discurso y la práctica. Este fue nuestro caso.
Even though growing shiitake in bags of synthetic logs is more common due to labor and material costs for bigger scale production, we decided to go for the traditional natural log cultivation, as it has been grown for thousands of years. So if you’re thinking about starting mushroom cultivation, here are a few tips on how to do it:
Food nourishes us and forms the heart of our community. Understanding where it comes from, how it is grown, and who has grown it helps us value our food in a way that we have lost in the modern era. We can get overwhelmed by the challenges of the modern world and food can provide us with some of the easiest and most accessible ways that we can begin to regenerate our planet.
Being a permaculture and sustainable education centre, we try to source as many of our ingredients either directly from the farm itself, or from the local community. Some parts of the pizza are easy to source locally, others not so much. This has come to pose a few challenges at times, and often we make some compromises for the sake of indulgence.
Cooking food can make it tastier, easier to digest and absorb nutrients, and safer and healthier to eat. Cooking at the Ranch happens multiple times a day, and on some days, pretty continuously throughout the day. We generally have a lot of hungry bellies to fill! Over the decades we have been steadily reducing our use of propane to meet our cooking needs.
Bamboo is a wonderful fast growing grass, it comes in all shapes and sizes and has an incredibly diverse list of uses from many cultures all around the world. Bamboo is incredibly fast growing and can grow up-to a meter a day and achieves 80% of its height in the first 2months of its life! This ability to grow quickly and produce a huge variety of usable products has got many a permaculturists and green living enthusiasts excited by its potential.
About eight years ago, Kealy and Ivannia were talking about how they wanted to continue to be strong, badass women. They wanted to support one another and thrive, and step outside the stereotypical woman’s role that is often seen in the Mastatal community. Kealy was once again visiting for a few months from the States and was leaving in a few days so plans needed to happen soon!
