A New Mosquito Repellant

Mosquito (Image from Office Free Images)
Mosquito (Image Courtesy of Office Free Images)

I recently came across an article that told about a new bug repellant that can “save lives.”

According to the article, the repellant works not just for mosquitoes but for other insects like ants, flies and moths and works the opposite of the way DEET does —

“We decided to take a more aggressive approach and, rather than turn off the mosquito’s olfactory system, we could look for something that would turn it too far on, to see if we could design a new generation of insect repellents based on overloading their smell system,” Zweibel said.”

The researchers were funded by a grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

The repellant isn’t on the market yet and there is some debate over whether mosquitoes are “good” for the environment — (I believe you all know how I feel about that!).

For now, I continue to use the ThermaCell cartridges that work pretty well to ward off any mosquitoes that head my way. It doesn’t work for ticks though which I assume are on my property although I have yet to see one in the three years I’ve lived here.

The Kite Patch, that uses a patent-pending formulation that blocks mosquitoes’ ability to track humans for up to a day, is also not on the market yet. It is supposed to be used in Uganda to help decrease the spread of malaria and once they get the kinks out they hope to offer it worldwide. This is one project that I helped to fund as anything that wards off mosquitoes has my attention.

Below, I have a link to the article I read on the new mosquito repellant that is being worked on. Happy reading!

A Bug Repellant That Could Save Lives

Other News:  Mosquito virus hits the Caribbean and possibly heading to the U.S. 

The Oakdale Nature Preserve

On a warm yet muggy day, my husband and I decided to take a walk through the Oakdale Nature Preserve which is located in Oakdale, Minnesota. The Preserve has a Discovery Center that was closed when we were there.

Discover Center - Oakdale, Minnesota
Discovery Center – Oakdale, Minnesota

The paved pathways are easy to walk on — thankfully!

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Path at the Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

A lone duck sits in this rain-made pond. Can you see him over on the right sitting on the log?

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Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota
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Oakdale Nature Preserver – Oakdale, Minnesota

Wooded benches with names of people who donated them or for whom they are in memoriam are scattered throughout the Preserve.

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Benches at the Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

Throughout the Preserve, wooden birdhouses can be seen — some are attached to trees and others are on long poles.

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Bird house at the Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

There was a section of the park where they had set aside an area to grow vegetables. I’m not sure how that will work since deer frequent this park.

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Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota
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Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota
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Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota
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Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota
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Oakdale Nature Preservec – Oakdale, Minnesota

The Oakdale Nature Preserve is 220 acres. We saw people jogging, walking their dogs and enjoying the quiet of the area.

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Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

Since moving to Minnesota, I haven’t seen very many lilac trees.  This tree was in full bloom but did not “smell” like a lilac tree.

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Lilac Tree at the Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota
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Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

I want to get a few birdhouses for our property like the one below.  They are nice and tall and squirrels are not able to climb up the poles.

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Bird house at the Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

Since we had a late spring, the cherry trees are just now blooming.

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Cherry Tree at the Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

This handmade wooden bench gave me inspiration to make something similar to use on our property. It won’t be quite as fancy but I’m sure it will work fine. Shhhh … it’s going to be a project for my husband.  (laughing)

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Wood Bench at the Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

I have always enjoyed walking through or past groves of trees and this day was no exception. The appearance of “camaraderie” among trees makes me feel as if I’m one with nature. I would have taken a nice deep breath but for the cottonwood trees that were also in full bloom (achoo!).

Discovery Center - Oakdale, Minnesota
Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

Further down one of the trails we saw a playground.

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Playground at the Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

The preserve is well taken care of and there were areas where piles of branches were lain waiting to be picked up.

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Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

Continuing on our walk, we saw tennis courts. Hmmm … I wonder if my husband would entertain the idea of playing tennis. Knowing him, he’d entertain the idea but that would be the extent of it.

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Tennis Court at the Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

The evergreens appear like sticks of wood topped by greenery.

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Grove of Evergreen Trees at the Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota
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Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota
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Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

A small creek ran through part of the trail we were on.

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Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota
Discovery Center - Oakdale, Minnesota
Path at the Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

There is a picnic area next to the Discovery Center.

Picnic Area at the Discovery Center - Oakdale, Minnesota
Picnic Area at the Oakdale Nature Preserve – Oakdale, Minnesota

The Preserve is peaceful and lends itself to absorbing oneself in ones thoughts.

Oakdale Nature Preserve

Sauteed Yellow Squash

This quick and easy paleo side dish adds a burst of color and a good boost of potassium and Vitamin C to the diet.

I used 2 yellow summer squash, cleaned and sliced them, added them to a bowl along with some rosemary and a little bit of olive oil and salt.

Mix all ingredents
Mix all ingredients

Mix everything up and add to a skillet on medium low then cook through until the squash are fork tender. Easy, yes?

Ingredients

  • 2 medium yellow summer squash
  • 1-2 tablespoons of rosemary (you could also use thyme)
  • Salt (to your taste)
  • 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil

I served this with a Bison with Apple Burger dish.

Bison with Apple Burger Dinner
Bison with Apple Burger Dinner

Quite delicious! Enjoy!

List of Other Paleo Recipes

 

Bison with Apple Burgers

These Apple Bison Burgers were absolutely delicious! We did not serve them with buns but had them with burger fixings, guacamole, sweet potato fries and roasted squash. This makes for a great summer meal.

Let’s look at the ingredients, shall we?

Apple bison Burgers
Apple Bison Burgers

I believe the apple really helped to keep the burger moist. It was a great combination!

You’ll be tossing all the ingredients together (in the correct measurements – of course).

Mix ingredients together
Mix ingredients together

Then you’ll be putting them on a skillet to cook them.  I used a little bit of olive oil on the bottom of the skillet just to get things going. Once you see that they are turning brown on the bottom, flip them over and cook them on the other side.

Grill the Patties
Grill the Patties

They should be cooked all the way through — no RED in the middle.

Cook the burgers all the way through
Cook the burgers all the way through

Ready to try it?

Ingredients

  • 20 ounces of ground bison
  • 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
  • 1/3 red apple, peeled and diced
  • 2 teaspoons minced onion
  • 1 teaspoon garlic powder
  • 1 teaspoon pure honey
  • 2 garlic cloves, minced
  • 2 teaspoons parsley
  • 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
  • Salt, to taste
  • Pepper, to taste

The leftovers made great breakfast patties.

Directions

  1. Mix all the ingredients in a bowl.
  2. Form the meat into patties (whatever size you’d like).
  3. Grill the patties in a skillet until they’re cooked.

I served the burgers on a bed of lettuce with sliced tomatoes, sliced onions, Guacamole, Baked Sweet Potato Fries and Sauteed Yellow Zucchini.

And this is the final product  with all the fixings

Apple Bison Burger Dinner
Apple Bison Burger Dinner

Hope you enjoy it when you make it.

This recipe was adapted from one found at Fast Paleo.  Click here to see the original.

List of Other Paleo Recipes

Paleo Chicken Pot Pie

My husband had been a hankering for pot pie (he really needs to stop looking at commercials). He used to love the Marie Callender’s frozen pot pies but that was many moons ago and we try to eat a more “fresh” food these days.

In my hunt for a paleo chicken pot pie, I came across this recipe. It looked good except that I didn’t “like” the recipe part of the crust so I decided to try a different paleo one.  That was a mistake. I don’t know if the one associated with this recipe would have been any better so next time I’ll have to try it instead of dickering around.

The recipe came out great! However, as far as paleo goes there is a huge cheat — the crust.  I was so frustrated with the paleo crust recipe that I found online (it fell apart) to replace the one that came with this recipe so I went to my cupboard and used my “old” ingredients for making a crust and used a Martha Stewart recipe instead.

So — this is a semi-paleo recipe.  (laughing)  I know, I know.  There is no such thing as a semi-paleo recipe — it’s either paleo or it’s not but, well, I had to improvise.

So — ready to see what I did?

First the ingredients …

Ingredients for Chicken Pot Pie
Filling Ingredients for Chicken Pot Pie (Chicken, Salt and Pepper not shown)

You’ll be adding the celery, carrots, onions and garlic to a large pot and cooking the veggies until they are semi-soft.

Add veggies to a large pot
Add veggies to a large pot

Next you’ll be adding the rest of the ingredients to finish up your pot pie filling including about 2 cups of cooked chopped chicken. Then add salt and pepper (to your taste). That’s all that’s needed for my me.

However, my husband said he thought the filling was a bit bland but keep in mind that my husband likes spicy food. If you want more of a “kick” to this recipe, add a little bit of cayenne pepper — just a wee bit at a time until it tastes good for you — or even curry powder.

Add the rest of the ingredients
Add the rest of the ingredients

Here’s how it looks before I added the crust — just before I put it in the oven.

Chicken Pot Pie Filling
Paleo Chicken Pot Pie Filling

And here is a picture after the pot pie is baked –with the Martha Stewart crust. (Stop laughing at me!)

Chicken Pot Pie
Chicken Pot Pie

And — drum roll please!

A Slice of Chicken Pot Pie
A Slice of Chicken Pot Pie

The filling looks a little “soupy” and it was just a tad liquid-y. It needed a little more arrowroot to help thicken it up more.

I served the pot pie with a Spinach Orange Blue Cheese Salad that I created. I don’t have the recipe put together for that yet so you’ll have to wait on it. It looked quite beautiful though — see?

Spinach Orange Blue Cheese Salad
Spinach Orange Blue Cheese Salad

Here’s the recipe for the chicken pot pie filling that I adapted just a bit …

Ingredients

  • 1 tablespoon olive oil (for bottom of pot)
  • 1 onion, chopped
  • 1 carrot, sliced
  • 1 stalk celery, sliced
  • 2 cloves of garlic, minced
  • 1/4 cup green beans
  • 1 cup chicken stock
  • 14 ounce can light coconut milk
  • 3 tablespoons arrowroot (for thickening)
  • 1-2 teaspoons salt
  • Pepper, to taste
  • 2 cups cooked chicken, chopped into bite size pieces

Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 400° Fahrenheit.
  2. In a large pot, add the olive oil and heat it through.
  3. Add the onion, carrot, celery and garlic then cook through until the vegetables are semi-soft.
  4. Add the chicken stock, coconut milk, salt, pepper, green beans and chicken then bring this all to a boil.
  5. Reduce the heat to low and then add the arrowroot little by little until it’s all dissolved and the liquid is thick.
  6. Pour the filling ingredients into a greased pie plate.
  7. Lay the pie crust over the filling and crimp the edges so the filling is trapped inside.
  8. Using a knife, make a few slits in the crust.
  9. Place the pie plate in the oven and bake for approximately 10-15 minutes making sure to check that the pie crust doesn’t burn.

To make the pie crust, click here for the recipe.

Original chicken pot pie filling — click here.

Enjoy!

 

Beef Taco Salad with Avocado Dressing

This is a really easy meal to make, Paleo Beef Taco Salad — for lunch or dinner, your pick.

Here are the sets of ingredients you’ll be needing …

Ingredients
Ingredients

And the spices …

Ingredients - Spices
Ingredients – Spices (Salt and Pepper not shown)

To make the avocado dressing, you’ll be needing the following …

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Avocado Dressing Ingredients

Next you’ll be cutting up the vegetables that you’ll be using as toppings.

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Toppings

The avocado dressing is quite creamy … and green. Green tastes delicious!

Avocado Dressing
Avocado Dressing

Lastly — this is what your Beef Taco Salad with Avocado Dressing will look like.

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Thanks to Paleo Grubs for sharing this recipe online. Head over there if you need more directions.

 

La Cocinita Mexican Restaurant

Not too far from Lake Elmo, tucked away near the St. Croix River, is a small town called Bayport.

My husband decided to find a new restaurant and, because he’s a Mexican food lover, he chose this place.  No — it is absolutely not paleo. No where near — not even a hint of paleo. Remove the word paleo from your brain.  This is more than a “cheat” — this is Mexican food.

The restaurant is small on the inside and I  imagine it can be quite noisy when it’s full of people. There was only one other couple there when we arrived.

The sign on the outside said they were looking to hire a bus “person,” waitress and dishwasher. In spite of that, we were greeted and served right away.

They serve chips and salsa — the salsa was really good but you have to pay for more than one bowl (not that we needed or wanted more than one).

The food was — well, to be frank, it was quite cheesy.  I ordered the White Sauce Enchilada and it had more cheese than anything else.  Too much cheese and I was a cheese lover before paleo entered my life.

I had to order the black beans instead of the refried beans because the refried beans are made in lard (ugh!).  Not having had beans in ages, I didn’t like them but that could be because my taste buds have changed.

Here’s a picture of my meal –

La Cocinita Mexican Restaurant
La Cocinita Mexican Restaurant

So — we won’t be heading back to La Cocinita.  We’ll have to find a simpler “cheat” for our paleo palettes.

 

 

 

Of Tree Loppers and Angels

While gathering yard supplies in the garage, I picked up the pruners and walked towards the garage door.

Within seconds I felt a quick breeze to my right. The loppers, that had been put upright against the garage wall, plopped down right beside me onto the floor.

Tree Loppers
Tree Loppers

What a near miss!  If they had fallen just half a foot over, the blade would have hit me on the back of my head and you might not be reading this post — or any other post for that matter.

“But let all who take refuge in You be glad; let them ever sing for joy. Spread Your protection over them, that those who love Your name may rejoice in You.”  Psalm 5:11

I am thankful for the protection I receive as God sends His angels to watch over us.  Imagine how many other times I’ve been protected and wasn’t aware of it.

 

Beef Short Ribs in Chipotle Sauce

Beef Short Ribs — sounds good, doesn’t it?  This paleo Beef Short Ribs in Chipotle Sauce came out really good. I adapted the original recipe (see below) to use ingredients that I already had at home. It does take a while for it to cook through although it’s simple to make and is quite tasty.

There are a couple sets of ingredients you’ll be needing … here’s the first one.

Ingredients
Ingredients (salt and pepper not shown)

And here’s the second one. I used canned red chili peppers and took out the seeds so it wouldn’t be so spicy.

Ingredients
Ingredients

After preparing the short ribs, you’ll be browning them in an oven proof pot.

Brown the short ribs
Brown the short ribs

Make sure you brown the edges also.

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While the meat is browning, prepare the rest of the ingredients.  I like lots of garlic.

Prepare Ingredients
Prepare Ingredients

Once the meat is browned, you’ll be removing it from the pot then adding the garlic and chipotle chilies in the “sauce” that’s left in the bottom of the skillet.

Add garlic and chili peppers to skillet
Add garlic and chipotle chilies to skillet

Next add the chopped mushrooms and sliced green pepper.  Are you getting hungry yet?

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Then you’ll be adding the water and the canned tomatoes.

Add broth and tomatoes
Add water and tomatoes

It looks quite soupy, doesn’t it? Don’t worry — a lot of the liquid will evaporate.

Next you’ll be adding the beef short ribs back into the pot, stirring it all together and bringing it to a boil.

Add short ribs back in
Add short ribs back in the pot

You’ll be popping this in the oven for about an hour or so then bringing it back on the stove for another half hour where a lot of the liquid will evaporate.

See how pretty it’s coming out?

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Ready to try the recipe?  Good for you!

Ingredients (Beef Rub)

  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
  • 1 teaspoon ground cumin
  • 1 teaspoon red chili powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon ground coriander
  • Beef short ribs

Ingredients

  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1/2 cup sliced green pepper
  • 4-6 large garlic cloves, chopped
  • 2 tablespoons canned chipotle chilies (seeds removed and diced)
  • 1 – 14 ounce can of diced tomatoes
  • 1 – 14 ounce can of water (use the tomato can)
  • 1/2 cup sliced mushrooms

Directions

  1. Mix the overnight “rub” ingredients together then cover the beef ribs with it.
  2. Place the ribs on a plate, cover with plastic and chill in the refrigerator for 1 hour or up to overnight.
  3. When ready to cook, preheat the oven to 350° Fahrenheit.
  4. Heat the olive oil in a large ovenproof pot over medium heat.
  5. Add half of the ribs and brown them on all sides then transfer them to a plate and add the other half of the ribs until all the ribs are browned then add them to the plate.
  6. Reduce your heat to between medium low.
  7. Add the garlic and chipotle chilies to the pot and cook through.
  8. Next add the mushrooms and green pepper.
  9. Add the water and canned tomatoes to the pot and stir it all together.
  10. Bring everything to a boil and scrape the bottom of the pot to make sure you get everything from the bottom mixed in.
  11. Return the beef ribs back to the pot and place them in a single layer.
  12. Bring the mixture to a boil then remove from the stovetop and place in the oven until the ribs are almost tender which could take 1 to 1-1/2 hours. (It takes less time in a convection oven so check, check and check.)
  13. When the meat is ready, remove the pot from the oven and skim the liquid fat off that’s sitting on top.
  14. Place the pot on the stovetop and simmer uncovered until the ribs are very very tender — another 20-30 minutes.

I served this over white rice — we really didn’t need anything else for this meal.  It was quite scrumptious.

Beef Short Ribs in Chipotle Sauce
Beef Short Ribs in Chipotle Sauce

This recipe was adapted from Beef Short Ribs in Chipotle and Green Chili Sauce.

 

Free Ferns

I spent part of yesterday morning digging up ferns.  Yup. Ferns.

It feels like I have thousands in my backyard. Okay, probably not thousands but I would venture to guess 300-400.

This is what my backyard looked like last July. Now, truly, that’s a LOT of ferns, isn’t it? I was not looking forward to it looking like this again.

Backyard
Backyard

So I decided to thin them out a bit. Yeah, so, here’s this mid-50 year old woman with a soft cast on her right hand due to a sprain along witha bulging disc in her back that causes sciatic pain with a shovel in her hand. Can you see her? Uh, me?

Last week I decided to pace myself and pull “only” 20 ferns. Once I reached 20 I stopped and worked on something else.  I’m not superwoman — ya know? I was able to re-plant about 12 of those ferns.

Today, I had leaves to clean up from yesterday’s yard work before I started working on fern pulling. I must’ve pulled another 15 ferns.

I really think I could pull 50 ferns a day and still have enough on our one acre. Don’t worry about me though — I’m not insane — yet.

Okay so — I thought to myself “What am I going to do with these ferns? Should I just throw them out?” I couldn’t do it. The ferns looked at me with their baby green eyes … Naw, just kidding. But seriously, I couldn’t throw them out. It seemed so wasteful.

So — I did what any normal eco friendly person would do. I posted them for free on Craigslist.  Within 10 minutes I had one person willing to pick up 10 of them in the next 20 minutes.  Not bad, eh? I waited for her outside and gave her a box to take whatever and whichever ones she wanted.

When I came back inside, I got back on my computer and lo and behold!, I received another email. This woman wanted ALL the ferns I had.  Really!  Her email said “I will take all of them” and she also was willing to come right away. Ferns must be in demand.

I took my Craigslist ad down immediately.  I will be calling this woman and letting her know she and I can both go and dig up as many ferns as she wants.

Not bad for a day’s work, eh?