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TreeHugger The top ten posts of the week, all lit up with LEDs Keep warm with scarves in comfy tents or tiny apartments. Latest Stories from TreeHugger The top ten posts of the week, all lit up with LEDs January 11, 7:52 AM by Lloyd Alter in Culture Keep warm with scarves in comfy tents or tiny apartments. 45 minutes, wide-ranging interview with Elon Musk and his brother Kimbal (video) January 10, 5:18 PM by Michael Graham Richard in Clean Technology If you have 45 minutes and are interested in Musk's projects, definitely check it out. New York City to make 20% of parking spaces ready for electric car charging over next decade January 10, 4:59 PM by Michael Graham Richard in Cars You know that we're not the biggest fans of individual cars in very dense cities like New York.

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Move lemon grass to warm quarters for winter Vern Nelson/Special to The Oregonian Many readers tell me they love lemon grass (Cymbopogon citratus) for its intense lemon flavor and light fragrance. Now they're worried about how to overwinter these frost-tender plants. The good news: Overwintering lemon grass is easy. The bad: You'll want to continue harvesting, and there won't be much to harvest unless you have a greenhouse or a warm, brightly lit room with full-spectrum grow lights. I started one of my lemon grass plants this spring from unrooted pieces I bought at an Asian market. World’s Largest Data Center: 350 E. Cermak « Data Center Knowledge {*style:<i>By: Rich Miller April 13th, 2010 </i>*} in Share And the number one entry in our list of the world’s largest data centers … An aerial view of 350 East Cermak, the 1.1 million square foot data center facility in Chicago.

Overwintering Stevia Plants It’s getting cold here in the —time to bring in the stevia plants before our first hard freeze. As far north as USDA plant hardiness zone 8, stevia plants can usually survive winter in the field. The tops might die back, but the roots can survive as long as the ground does not freeze. Mulch can help prevent frozen ground. I harvested my stevia plants more than a month ago, in September, leaving stubs of 4 to 5 inches in length. The plants have sprouted back somewhat, and we’ve had some frosts at night. Vegan & Gluten Free Christmas 2011 A while back we received an email from one of the editors at Bon Appétit Magazine, asking if we wanted to create a vegan and gluten-free Christmas menu for them, as a special web feature. We usually aren’t strictly vegan or gluten-free, but were so flattered by the offer that we didn’t have to think more than 2 seconds before answering them that we would happily take it on as a challenge (while dancing a silly dance and singing “We are working with BA, we are working with BA…”). We came up with five different recipes; Cinnamon roasted root vegetables, Mustard kale salad, Spiced spinach tarts, Christmas falafels and a Pomegranate cheesecake. It is always fun to cook at Christmas since you get to use holiday flavors like saffron, clove, cinnamon, mustard and lemon. We hope that the recipes will be of some assistance in all the Christmas commotion, wether you make one dish or go for the whole menu.

101 Gardening Secrets The Experts Never Tell You I like to use natural top soil to start my garden seedlings in. I usually don't use potting soil because it generally does not produce the results I want. I usually fill a large, deep baking pan I have with top soil and bake it for thirty minutes at 350 degrees. Frühlingskabine Micro-Farm We are finally, finally getting our “Herb and ‘Shroom Garden” going. And when I say finally, I mean FINALLY. I have been working so hard to get the main garden planted (and reading fiction novels which is quite un-characteristic for this non-fiction bookworm) that I have been struggling to get the Herb and ‘Shroom Garden going. But it is my goal over this next week to be all set in finishing up the rest of my oak logs for shiitake mushrooms and to plant an oasis worth of basil, parsley, rosemary, and other herbs to fill up our teeny, tiny side yard. And as part of that goal, I have finished half of the one hundred (yeah… that’s not a typo) inoculated plugs I ordered. Phew!

Edible Flowers, How to choose Edible Flowers, Eatable Flowers, Edible Flower Chart, List of Edible Flowers, Incredible Edible Flowers Edible flowers are the new rage in haute cuisine Photo of edible flowers picked in Linda's garden in July (lavender, thyme, dill, cilantro, day lily, squash blossom, Nasturtiums, chives, and basil). After falling out of favor for many years, cooking and garnishing with flowers is back in vogue once again. Flower cookery has been traced back to Roman times, and to the Chinese, Middle Eastern, and Indian cultures.

the tricky matter of when to harvest garlic TIMING IS EVERYTHING, THEY SAY, AND WITH GARLIC HARVEST that’s especially true. But since the crop is hidden underground, how do you know when this edible Allium is ready—when it’s just the right moment to insure a well-formed head that will also store well through the winter and beyond? Like fortune-telling, it’s all in reading the leaves, apparently. When to harvest garlic–and how. Lemon verbena and honey granita The lemon verbena plant that I planted last year and almost lost to a summer storm, is now firmly established and positively thriving. Whenever I pass it I can't resist rubbing a leaf, because it smells so wonderful. Transferring that wonderful lemony scent to taste is quite easy - simply steeping it in some boiling water for about 10 to 15 minutes does the trick. This granita is infused with the aroma of lemon verbena, soured with a little lemon juice, and sweetened with a delicate acacia honey. Any light colored honey will work here instead.

Do you eat your fig leaves? Here's 5 ways to prepare them. - Our Permaculture Life My fig tree (Ficus carica) is sprouting an abundance of soft large tender leaves at the moment. It’ll be a while till there are any figs ready, and to be honest, in this climate (subtropical), the amount of figs I can harvest is quite small. I have placed the fig tree in my landscape design to be close to the chicken house.

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