What's happening?

Yeah, why am I so slow and don't give daily updates this week(?)
Well, I actually bought a "thingie" to hold the camera for me, when I do something, I would like to show you.
But...
It's not as easy as it looks. Taking the video is no problem, it's the editing!
You see, I did this to be able to show and explain more easily, but it takes time to learn to make a decent video. I want to make it as short as possible, and cut out all nonsense.
I hope it'll turn out to be ok, and become better with each task, and in the mean time nothing seems to happen here...
But trust me, the chilli is still growing strong ;-)

Make your own safran

The most expensive spice on earth: safran. Why not try to make it myself, just in the spirit of living self sufficient. It's not like I want to start a production to sell safran, but I want to grow it for own use and mostly for fun, just to be able to say with pride:" safran, yes of course we have it :-)".

Safran crocus (sativus) differs from the normal crocus (the kind I know and love). Safran Crocus flowers in the fall. 

You plant the flower bulbs in August-September, and the flowers bloom October-November. 

So in a well prepared area with a lot of chicken manure, I planted my bulbs and cant wait to see the result and how difficult it is to harvest and dry the safran. Its going to be a new experience.

Herbs in the freezer

When I know, that I'm not going to use all my herbs, I cut and wash them and stuff them in the freezer.
Actually we strive to do this with anything we grow: we freeze all the stuff, we don't use. Also in order to be self sufficient, you of course have to grow a huge surplus, to feed yourself and the animals thru the winter.

As you can see from this tiny area of my garden, it's time to harvest herbs. Here the price for fresh herbs is approximately 1,5€ when it's cheap, so freezing herbs is a good way to save some money.
Further more, like all the tasks we do to be self sufficient, it's a satisfying feeling to have grown it yourself

Winter garden

We dont have a winter garden or alike. But even though the temperature is getting low outside, we can still grow a bit indoors.
I don't want to just "clean out" the garden. I select some plants to take indoors.

I have a low cayenne and bush tomato, that can easily be nice in the kitchen. Also a jalapeno and herbs could be nice to have in the window.
It's not like I think these plants will get us through winter, but it's nice to have a little homemade stuff to nibble on. So I dig them up and plant them in a pot indoors as a reminder of the summer and a little self sufficient like production.

Make your own Pomegranate for free

I love pomegranate, the taste is wonderful and the pips can be very decorative in salads, desserts, drinks etc.
It would be lovely to have my own plant...

So let's see what we can do ourselves to get a pomegranate plant for free, just by using the seeds of a fresh fruit we had anyway.

Peaches and nectarines for free

Remember we got the seeds from the fruits some time ago, cause it could be fun as well as it could be great to harvest our own fresh fruit. I cleaned them and put them in water, and now I have just rinsed the stones again.

So it's time for planting, quite easy really. It's big stones, I'm going to plant, so I use one pot for each stone.
Now we just wait and see, if we are lucky and something starts to grow.
If so, well have our own nectarine and peach plants for free. There's nothing boring about self sufficiency. The bigger your imagination, the better ideas.

Make your own wine for free

It's not like I want you to perform miracles like Jesus, but it should be easy to make your own wine plants for free.
We have a wine plant with blue sweet grapes, that tastes delicious. I don't know the exact name though, since the plant came with the buildings. But since it's able to grow and give delicious fruit in our climate, I would love to have more plants in the garden. So as a self sufficient household, I cut some branches, when I was harvesting grapes anyway.

Let's face it... I have absolutely no idea of what I'm doing. I have read everything I could, but didn't find a well described explanation.
But we'll, what's the worst that could happen(?)

Chickpeas sprouts

As normal procedure, I put the seeds in plenty of water and let it sit for 12 hours, rinse the seeds and change the water, and let it sit for 12 hours more.

Now we just rinse the sprouts each 12 hours (morning and evening), and pour out the water.

This kind of sprouts however, you have to cook for 5 minutes because if natural toxins. So put it in a dish, where you eat them cooked.