Times have changed.  Medication and treatment for CF has improved drastically.  Now, the life expectancy is the mid-30s.

Samantha is 31.

Libby is 28.

And….guess what!!!  Samantha is married to Christian!  Libby is married to Will!!!

And…guess what, AGAIN!!!

Samantha gave birth to healthy twins last June!

And Libby and Will adopted a baby boy 5 weeks ago!!

So far, their dreams and their parents dreams for them have been realized.

Now, there’s only one left.  And it’s a big one.

The Animal Whisperer and I are passionate about helping to make sure Samantha grows old with Christian to raise their twins, Tommy and Luci.  We are passionate about helping to make sure Libby grows old with Will to raise their newborn son, Liam.

But, there is still a chance they won’t.

The final dream has to be realized:  Finding a cure for CF.

The history of progress in working toward a cure for CF is exceptional…but we’re not there yet.  Doctors and scientists have found the gene that causes CF, they’ve developed life extending drug therapies and treatments, but you’ll notice, despite huge advances, there is nothing there that says “CURED.”  We need your donations.

Last year, we could report that a new medication was significantly prolonging the lives of a small percentage of people with a specific kind of CF.  This year, there’s another medication which may drastically change the lives of a much larger percentage of people with CF.  The latest progress in treatment may help Samantha and Libby directly.

Tommy and Luci need their mom at their college graduations, they need her at their weddings.  They need her to advise them when they have their own kids.

And, they shouldn’t have to take care of her until she’s at least 90.  (check out the socks…adorable!!)

Here’s how you can help:

1. Sign up for The Goat Cheese Lady team here.  Start raising money now!  And, meet us at the Great Strides walk at America The Beautiful Park in Colorado Springs on May 18, 2013 !  Registration starts at 8am, the walk starts at 9am.

2.  If you don’t live in or near Colorado Springs, you can click here then click “Make A Donation” and donate to The Goat Cheese Lady team.  Whatever amount you can donate will help us reach the $6,000 goal!!!

Last year, we raised $5,500.

WITH YOUR HELP, THIS YEAR we can reach our goal of $6,000!!!

Liam needs his mommy to hold and cuddle and teach him through all the stages of his life.  He needs her to give him the life experiences that only she will be able to give him.

So, we have to make sure she lives.

Please help Luci, Tommy and Liam have a full life with their beautiful, energetic, full of life and creativity mothers.

Please join our team and walk with us or donate.  Whatever you can do will help find a cure!!!

-  The Goat Cheese Lady and The Team

Little Luci checking out Little Liam.  I just couldn’t resist showing you this picture.

This morning, Voila!  Magic!  There were kids!

New kids!

Sally’s new kids!  Two soft and cuddly (and large) bucklings!

But it took a minute for The Animal Whisperer to realize what was going on.

He went out to the barn around 7 am to feed.  When he lets the goats and chickens out of their various stalls, he always checks to make sure everything is as expected.  Every animal accounted for and in good shape.  He scanned the barn, saw all the usual suspects.  All goats and kids and chickens present.

But WAAAAAAIT just a darn MINUTE!  The kids cuddled up on the leaves right over there WERE NOT on the roster last night.

It’s got to be a funny feeling to look in on the animals and see two babies lying there, dry, cuddled up, sleeping, no signs of birth, no mess, no nothing.  Just all the usual goats plus two extra babies.  It’s the kind of feeling that might stop you in your tracks for a second until you do a quick early morning clear the cobwebs out of the brain scan and realize that yes, there is a goat in here whose voice told her quickly and efficiently that it was time to get those babies on the outside of her body, instead of the inside.  And thankfully, she did it without waking us up, producing two healthy little boys.

Sally, you are my new favorite goat.  Plus, you have the longest beard.  There are rare times that a beard looks good on a woman.  This is one of those times.

So, there you have it.  Potentially the end of our kidding season.  Potentially, because we’re not sure if Canela ever really got pregnant, despite being bred and bred and bred and bred and bred, until we finally sold her boyfriend.

If she does have some unexpected babies, it’ll be sometime in the summer and you’ll hear about it.

Now, I’ve got to go back and stir the first batch of feta I’ve made in six months.  Thank goodness the milk is flowing again!!!

-  The Goat Cheese Grandma.  Proud Grandma of this season’s 5 new kids.

Goats don’t plan their births for the most convenient times.  OK.  You’re right, they don’t plan them at all.  So, whoever is in charge of the whole “when should I get down to business and get these baby goats on the outside of my body instead of the inside” needs a talking to.

Two in the morning just isn’t acceptable.

I’m sorry, but nature calls me to be asleep at night.  Not to be in the barn.  So, thank goodness for The Animal Whisperer.  Nature doesn’t seem to call him to sleep at all, as much as he would like to, and since he woke up at 1 am and couldn’t fall asleep again, he decided to go check on Lucy to see if she was having any movement toward birthing the babes in her stomach.

And, much different than poor Dottie’s experience, Lucy was done.

Finished.

She had birthed her baby bucklings on her own!

How nature intended.  No human intervention.  Just shear goat guts without an epidural.

When The Animal Whisperer arrived to the barn, the first boy was totally clean (licked off by his mama) and the second must have showed up on the scene a few minutes after the first, still partly covered in birthing fluids.m.

And, because this is a family affair, he came up to the house to wake me at 3.  A.  M.  And, because our children are part of the family, we woke them up too.  The nine-year old threw on his barn clothes and nearly sprinted to the barn, the five-year-old languished in bed whining and complaining that he was too tired and too cold but really wanted to see the babies…could he JUST go in his PAJAMAS???  (hmmm…let me think about that…NO.)

And, so it was that the Aparicio family met Lucy’s new little family.  At 3 in the gosh darn morning.

And, as for Dottie and her doeling, I’m happy to report, they are both doing well.

Dottie will have her last shot of penicillin today, she is healing and Chispita (Little Spark) is hopping and jumping around…splint-free!  Her back legs can now support her in all of her walking, jumping and pirouetting endeavors.

Lucy had a difficult kidding last year…we’re thankful she did it all on her own, successfully, this year.

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

P.S.  Next up is Sally.  Wish her luck.

Congratulations!  You win an all expense paid trip to the barn tonight to take care of her!  And her baby!

Yes, 4 days of labor is long.  She wasn’t in full-on labor the whole time, but we’d notice a contraction every once in a while.  Last night was when her water broke…that’s when we started seeing a thick mucousy strand hanging out of her.  For our experience here, that usually means things will move pretty quickly.

That was at 8:30 last night.  I went out at 9:45 pm, The Animal Whisperer went out at 11 pm and 3:30 am,  and I went out again at 6 am.

She still had the gooey discharge that had covered the tip of her tail and part of her udder.  Her udder was full (another good sign).  But no babies.

When I say it usually means things will move pretty quickly, I mean we’ll have babies in 2 or 3 hours.  So far, it had been 9.  I cancelled all the work I had planned to do for the morning, invited my mom over for coffee and birthing, and she, The Animal Whisperer and I hurried up… and waited.  The kids begged to stay home, but we sent them to school with the promise we’d get them out when things got more active.

We checked her about every 20 minutes, looked for contractions, saw weak ones every 4 to 10 minutes (too weak and erratic…not a good sign).  She started pawing the ground at some point in the morning…a good sign.

I finally picked the kids up from school at 11:15.  Not because there was rapidly progressing labor, but because I had to go to a meeting and The Animal Whisperer would need help and would not be able to leave to get the kids if the birthing began.

It didn’t.

Worried that she was not progressing, and remembering that Lucy had the same problem last year and birthed a stillborn, at 2 pm, he went in.  To her.  To get them.  After 20 minutes, he pulled out the first one.  A boy.  Stillborn.

I was still out in town, and close to the vet medical supply store.  He called, requested supplies, I got penicillin, more NutriDrench, rubbing alcohol, betadine and lubricant, and I hot footed it home.

Dottie and my husband were in the small goat shed, both with exhausted faces and Dottie still looking very pregnant.  Over the course of the next 2 hours, we pulled out 4 more kids.  After the first one that The Animal Whisperer delivered, she was no longer having contractions (bad sign.)

I washed up to above my elbows with betadine, gloved up and went in, to the second knuckle of my index and middle fingers.  Right away I felt a tiny hoof.  This, the second kid, I pulled out left back leg first, his amniotic sac had already broken.  I attempted, but just couldn’t turn him around.

Next, I reached in up to my forearm, found the next one in a bubble (she was still protected by her sac), and coaxed her out her head first.

Of all of them, Dottie delivered her the easiest…the lubrication of the intact sac helped.

Numbers four and five required reaching in up to between my elbow and armpit, both were stillborn.

We gave Dottie 2 cc’s of penicillin after the first kid was out, in attempt to protect her from the bacteria and germs that we were inevitably introducing to her system.  We’ll give it to her for 7-10 days.  We hope it works.  She had an awful, painful day.

Number three is the one that lived.  She can’t stand up on her back legs successfully yet, so I’ve splinted them at the knees so that they can’t hyperextend, which is helping her maintain standing, but she continues to topple over like a four legged tree at the drop of a hat.  So, no nursing for her yet.  Dottie’s udder is hanging too low and the baby can’t balance well enough to even think about latching on.  We’ve got her inside and she’s had a good amount of Dottie’s colostrum from a bottle.

We warmed her with towels and a heating pad, and now she’s sleeping in a Rubbermaid storage box.

Aren’t you glad you WON??  We’ll see you tonight at midnight at the barn for bottle feeding and checking on Dottie.  And, don’t worry, for the night time feedings, you can wear your pajamas.

-  The Goat Cheese Lady and The Animal Whisperer and Dottie and her baby girl.

Here’s Dottie:

Here are the facts:  Dottie was due yesterday, April 12.  Lucy is due April 21.  Both of them look like they are the beginnings of labor…TODAY.

Which one do you think will have her babies first???

Can’t wait to hear what you think…and can’t wait to tell you what happens!!!

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

…and we’ve planted 200 onions (with the help of my two boys)

…and the seedlings are up (look out greenhouse, here they come!)

…and I’m finished with my winter reading (awesome series, I highly recommend it.)

…and I even did the exercise plan my sister created for me. (killer, but improved from one time to two times!)

Yeah!! Spring is here!

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

Doug and Kim Wiley are the owners, milkers, gardeners, mom and dad, and ranchers at Larga Vista Ranch in Boone, Colorado.  In a chance meeting, Doug taught me about raw milk years ago.  Before we had goats, we had a share in their herd and got our raw cow’s milk from them.  They are the gentle, soft-spoken, forward progressing steam ship in the fresh-food-raw-milk-support-your-local-farmer-movement in Colorado.

And, this morning on Facebook, I learned a sad story.

Elsie, one of their best raw milk producers, had been sick after calving a few days ago, but had recovered and was thought to be doing well.  However, yesterday morning, despite all of their best care, work and intentions, Elsie died.

When a dairy farm loses a cow that was one of their best producers, they lose a huge part of their income.

We typically think that ”supporting your local farmer” means buying their milk, meat or produce…but you can also support your local farmer by shouldering some of the burden when they experience a loss…whether grasshoppers eat the whole crop, or the piglets die because their mother didn’t produce enough milk, or because a milk producing cow dies.

Please help Doug and Kim recover from the loss.  Please donate $10 that they can use to purchase another milk cow, or use to subsidise their loss of income.

If 100 people donate $10, they’ll have $1000.  If you can donate more, or can donate less, that’s great.  Everything will help.

Click on the donate button here or at the top right.

Thanks,

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

The Animal Whisperer took the boys to school…I was in a can’t-stand-to-hear-myself-talk-anymore-and-have-them-not-listen state of mind.  So, I went on a walk.  A beautiful walk!  Can you guess where I was?

Click on the Where Was I This Morning? link on the right side of the Home page (scroll down if you don’t see it) and put your guess in the “Comment” section at the end of the post (I still haven’t figured out how to get it directly under THIS post…I’ll take suggestions though!)

Thanks for playing, and I hope you have a wonderful day!

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

Before I proceed, I’d like to point some things out:

1.  My sister is an awesome skier.

2.  My brother-in-law is a smooth riding snowboarder.

3.  My husband and the boys are emerging from the beginner category.

4.  And, I, in the olden days, used to be pretty good.  Now, I just try to copy my sister.

Having said the previous, I’ll move on to the following delusion that overcame me.

Every time I go skiing, I wear the same thing.  Hand-me-downs and gifts that I’ve received over the years.  A purple and white jacket (gift), the warmest ski/boxing gloves ever (hand-me-down), helmet (rental), ski boots (rentals), ski socks (stolen from my husband years ago and now are close to reaching the holes in the heels stage), 15-year-old white and grey wool sweater with two of the original seven buttons (kind of like an old robe you’ll never get rid of), a black thermal shirt (gift) and navy blue, sort of shiny, ski pants (hand-me-down.)

It is the ski pants that caused a stir.

They ARE FROM THE OLYMPICS.  In 2002.

So, it was as I emerged from my bathroom stall after lunch, clomping to the sink in my ski boots (have you EVER done that?  Going to the bathroom while in your ski clothes is quite possibly the WORST thing about the whole outing.), that a thought briefly crossed my mind.

Feeling safe that none of the people in the bathroom had actually seen me ski, and knowing that “USA 2002″ was emblazoned across my left thigh, and visible for all in the bathroom to see, I thought slyly…maybe they think I was actually in the Olympics!

WHOA!  Then reality came screaming at me from the mirror.

No, there is actually NO way that ANYONE would think I might have ever skied in the Olympics.

It is possible that they thought I did some successful post Olympic 2002 dumpster diving though.

What’s your opinion?  Be honest.  If you really might have been convinced, even for a brief second, that I was an Olympian, please let me know.  And, if not, it won’t hurt my feelings any more than looking at myself in the mirror did.

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

P.S.  No laughing, please.

My Hypothesis:  The higher the pasteurization temperature of grocery store purchased cow’s milk of four different available 1/2 gallon varieties with similar expiration dates will negatively affect the outcome of homemade mozzarella.

The four milks I used for the mozzarella making experiment, and their details, are as follows:

Meadow Gold:  1-800-395-7004, www.meadowgold.com,  I spoke to Derick.  He says the milk is pasteurized at 161 degrees for 15 seconds.  My Colorado Springs milk comes from Meadow Gold Plant in Englewood Co.  All milk is purchased directly from farmers who are local to my region or my state.  If they can’t get enough milk from Colorado, they might get it from Utah, Wyoming or New Mexico.  The milk has a 16 day shelf life.  Just the ingredients on the panel are added to it.  The milk container is food grade plastic.  He didn’t know how quickly the milk arrives to the plant after being milked.  Once it arrives at the plant, the maximum hold time it stays there is 48 hours, then it is shipped to the store within 24 hours after pasteurization.  Effective July 1, 2008, they do not use milk from cows treated with rbst.  Antibiotics can be used but the affected cow would be removed from the herd.  Milk is not tested for antibiotics.

He also mentioned that each milk company has its own proprietary information as far as processing.  When I asked him what could be proprietory about milk processing, he couldn’t tell me/wouldn’t tell me.  He did say that bacteria levels, airborne bacteria, handling at the store, and temperature would all be factors.

King Soopers Milk:  1-800-697-2448, I spoke to Dianne.  She told me they pasteurize their milk at 170 degrees for 16 seconds.  (“If it says ultra pasteurized it is heated to 178 for 16 seconds”).  The processing plant is in North Hendren, Wisconsin, she said I couldn’t call the plant directly.  The shelf life is 7-10 days.  She had no information regarding how quickly the milk gets to the plant after being milked, or how soon it is pasteurized.  She had no information regarding the source of the milk, how long after it is milked it arrives at the plant, nor how long after it is pasteurized does it arrive to the store.  The paper carton contains a  paraffin coating to prevent leakage, there no glue involved.

Horizon Organic:  1-888-494-3020, www.horizondairy.com,  I spoke to David. They heat the milk to 161.6 degrees for 15 seconds for pasteurization (he called it “htst” which means high temperature short time.)   Vitamin D is added.  The milk comes from “family farms in the United States”, my Colorado Springs purchased milk would come from my state or surrounding states… “We’re not going to send milk from California to New York.”  The container is “paperboard lined with polyethylene which is a food grade plastic.”  The milk has a shelf life of 17 days from the date it’s pasteurized.  The milk has to arrive at the plant at a certain temperature (if it’s too hot it will be thrown out), usually it’s within the same day it was milked (but Dave was unable to verify this.)  (As a side note, he says ultrapasteurized temp is 280 for 2 seconds, 65 to 68 day shelf life.)

Sinton’s: 719-633-3821, www.sintondairy.com, I spoke to Michael.  He says they heat the milk to 170 degrees for 3 seconds.  170 degrees kills a certain pathogen that he couldn’t remember the name of.  The milk has a 19 day shelf life.  They don’t process on weekends, but do take deliveries on weekends.  Milk received Sunday may not be processed until Tuesday (worst case scenario), but most likely on Monday.  Milk is received either the day it is milked or the day after it is milked.  At the expiration date, milk could be as old as 24 days old, according to my math.  Vitamin D is added to the whole milk, nothing else.  All milk comes from Colorado via the Dairy Farmers of America cooperative.

And, now on to the exciting stuff…

I boiled a couple of inches of water in each of my four stainless steel cheesemaking pots to ensure they were sterilized.

Then set up the project.

Next I poured the entire half-gallon of each milk into its corresponding pot.

I dissolved 3/4 tsp citric acid into 1/4 cup non-chlorinated water (per milk pot) and gently stirred it into each pot of milk for 20 seconds.

Next I heated each milk to 98-99 degrees then slowly stirred (into each batch) 1/8 teaspoon vegetarian Mad Millie brand rennet that had been dissolved into 1/4 cup non-chlorinated water.

It rested for 5 minutes, then I cut the curd into 1/2 inch squares.  Here is Pot #1, Meadow Gold.

Pot #2, King Soopers.  (Not cut yet, just testing the curd.)

Pot #3, Horizon Organic.

Pot #4, Sinton’s.

I let the curds heal for 3 minutes, drained them of whey and formed them into “snowballs.”  In the case of #1 and #2, snowballs would not form.  The curd would not hold together.

Next, I cut the curd into 1/2 inch pieces, poured hot sea-salted water over them and stretched…or attempted to.  Pot #1, Meadowgold, is above.  That is definite NON-stretch.

Pot #2, King Soopers.

Pot #3, Horizon Organic.

Pot #4, Sinton’s.  Best Stretch.

Throughout the study, I checked the acidity at various points as indicated on the paper in front of each milk.  If you are ready to delve into acidity in cheese making, zoom in on those numbers.  Otherwise, forget about them.

And here are the results!  Sinton’s won first place, Horizon Organic was second, King Sooper’s third and Meadow Gold fourth.

Here are some of my observations:

1.  None of the cheeses tasted as good as raw goat mozzarella, or what I imagine raw cow mozzarella would taste like.  Overall, they tasted more like velveeta cheese.  (Yuck.)  There was no complexity of flavor and they tasted like I should have just peeled celophane off of them.  When I put #2, #3 and #4 on burritos, they didn’t really melt, just turned into something more like paste.

2.  Michael at Sinton’s Dairy was the closest to the operation…he didn’t have to use a computer to access his knowledge, he just knew it, he works at the plant and has specific knowledge about what goes on there.  Sinton’s was the only plant I spoke to directly.

3.  Horizon Organic, Meadow Gold and King Soopers all had call center people I spoke to, who accessed their information from a computer.  The Meadow Gold and King Soopers people I spoke to weren’t even in the same state as the processing plant from whence my milk came.

4.  The only milk I was assured to have come from my own state (Colorado) was Sinton’s.

5.  King Soopers and Horizon Organic have different (WAY different) definitions of ultra pasteurized, according to their call center representatives.

6.  How can milk processing have any propietary information?  Heat it up, cool it down and package it, right?

7.  My hypothesis that the higher the heat in pasteurization would produce worse mozzarella was wrong.  Sinton’s is pasteurized at 170 and Meadow Gold at 162.

NOW, after slogging through this experiment with me, since it doesn’t seem to have to do with pasteurization, do you have any observations that might help us solve the question of Mozzarella, mozzarella, why dost thou fail me?

I look forward to reading your replies…and until I can figure out how allow you to comment right below this post, you’ll have to go to the right side bar and click on this post there.  That will open it up with the ability to comment at the bottom.  Thanks again for your help!

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

The only kinds of milk you can use for cheese making are raw (best) and pasteurized (second best).  If you don’t have access to raw, you will buy pasteurized!  And based on what I teach, what every other cheesemaking teacher teaches and what you’ll read in every book and find on every website, chat room, board and blog, is that pasteurized milk will work!

But below is the ***disclaimer*** which caused me to carry out a study to determine which of 4 locally available pasteurized cows milks works to make mozzarella.  (Details coming up in Part 2)

***Disclaimer:  All milk that is labeled pasteurized will not work.***

In my study, I picked 4 locally available brands of pasteurized cows milk, both organic and non-organic, with sell-by dates around the same time.  One didn’t work at all.  Another one hardly worked.  The other two worked fine.

WHAT?????  If they’re labeled Pasteurized, WHY WON’T THEY ALL WORK???

Yes.  Good Question.  Why won’t they all work?

For now, I’m going to ask for your guesses.  I have hypothesized the answer, but am in the process of researching the milk companies to determine if my answer is correct.  So, I’m not telling you yet.

I want to hear from YOU.  Why do you think, if every cheese making piece of information everywhere says you can use pasteurized milk, WHY WON’T IT WORK in some cases?(OK, that’s an over exaggeration.  I haven’t read every piece of cheesemaking information everywhere.)

Comment below with your guesses.  Even if you’re not sure, still guess.  I’ll tell you more of the details in Part 2.

Thanks for playing!!

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

So, in the Book Reviews that will follow over the next couple of months, I strive not to be an expert at reviewing books, but only on sharing my opinion with you.

And, I will start by saying:  To write a book must be a HUGE undertaking, and I admire all of the authors who have done it, regardless of what I might say in the review.  Thanks for reading that little disclaimer, and now, I shall proceed.

The Joy of Cheesemaking, The Ultimate Guide To Understanding, Making, And Eating Fine Cheese, by Jody M. Farnham and Marc Druart.

I enjoyed the book and learned from it.  It provides great detail in some of the more chemical and biological aspects of cheesemaking (ie. molds and cultures), but lacks detail in some of the other chemical and biological aspects (ie. uses the term “flocculation” but I never found an explanation of what it means.).

The recipes it provides for actual cheesemaking are for larger scale cheesemaking than the home cheesemaker would undertake.  However, it does do an exceptional job of describing in great mathematic detail how to break down the larger measurements into smaller home-scale quantities.  When I decide to sit down and tackle the formulas it provides, I know they will be very helpful.

The authors provide delicious sounding and looking (nice pictures) recipes to accompany the cheeses they write about.  The fact that an odd thing (in my mind) like tomato jam (above) would be “so delicious you can eat it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner” makes me want to make it and see.

Overall, my opinion is that parts of the book are very well written and detailed, while other parts are not.  It seemed that in some areas of the book, the authors got tired and were less detail oriented.  And, there were many spelling errors.  At one point, they point out that you will get white fizz on your cheese as it ages.  Really, what you’ll get is white fuzz.

I will purchase this book for my library (this one is on loan from the Pikes Peak Library) to consult when I need to use the formulas.  It also has good suggestions for setting up a cheese board.  However, for goat milk specific cheese recipes, I will refer to other books with smaller recipe sizes to avoid going through the math.

Let me know what you think if you’ve read it!

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

P.S.  If you are new to the term “flocculation” in cheesemaking, it means the time at which the milk begins to coagulate/gel and become curd after you add the rennet. To test for flocculation, put a toothpick on top of the milk/rennet mixture right after you mix in the rennet.  Bump the toothpick every few minutes.  It moves, right?  Until it doesn’t.  Flocculation is the time at which you gently bump the toothpick and it doesn’t move.

The pictures contained herein are potentially vomit-causing if you are faint hearted or light of stomach.  Proceed with your eyes open or with your eyes closed, whichever you choose.  I am not too faint of either organ, so I find the pictures really rather amazing. 

 

 

Day 3:  Back at home.  Shiny stuff is antibiotic ointment my nurse sister-in-law gave me.

Day 4

Day 15

Lesson Learned #1:  Buy your donuts.  Don’t make them.

Lesson Learned #2:  Water and hot oil DO NOT MIX.  They cause explosions.  If you DO decide to make your own donuts despite the warning in Lesson Learned #1, use dough that is dry, i.e. you JUST made it.  You DIDN’T put it in a lidded container overnight in the refrigerator to collect condensation (water.)

Lesson Learned #3:  When you get the donuts out of the hot oil, use LONG TONGS.  Not a short fork.  This will allow more time for your hand to escape if there is an explosion.

Lesson Learned #4:  DO NOT…I REPEAT…DO NOT USE BUTTER OR MARGERINE OR ANY OTHER TYPE OF FATTY SUBSTANCE TO ATTEMPT TO SOOTHE THE BURN.

Lesson Learned #5:  DO put your burned part straight into a pot of ICE WATER.

Lesson Learned #6:  If ice is not available, cut a bunch of tomatoes in half and squish up the insides a little and put them on the burn.  You’ll need a lot of tomatoes.

Lesson Learned #7:  Crack an egg.  Smear the white all over your burn.  Apparently this helps with reducing scarring.  Peel the thin white layer out from the inside of the shell and put that on there too.  (Lots of people told me about this after the fact.)

Lesson Learned #8:  DO NOT POP THE BLISTER.  It is your body’s protection against infection in the burn.  It will be hard to keep it unpopped, but it is worth it.  Once it does pop, you have to keep VERY sure it doesn’t get infected.

Lesson Learned #9:  Accept help.  The school secretary (Lesa) told me about a parent (TJ) who I had never met.  TJ is a wound care nurse.  I called TJ, explained who I was, who told me to call her, and why I was calling.  She didn’t know me from Adam (as my mom would say…who is Adam, anyway?), but she drove to my house right away, on her way to taking her kids to school and going to work.  She looked at my hand from her car window with me in my pajamas and slippers standing in the driveway.  She gave me Silvadene (burn medicine) and adaptic (non-stick gauze) and told me what to do.  I did it, and no scarring is the result.  Now, TJ is my friend for life.

Isn’t it amazing???

I’d love to hear your burn stories and your burn cures…

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

I heard a loud noise, saw the oil sink down around the donut, closed my eyes, shrieked and jumped back.  I felt something slime my hand, sensed it was oil, and thought, Wow!  This actually doesn’t really hurt!  Maybe it won’t be so bad! 

Duh.

Here is what ensued:

I sprinted to the backyard pila (water retention sink) with my left eye squeezed shut where I could scoop water into a big bowl and submerge my (now burning) hand.  I shouted for someone to GET ME BUTTER!  My husband’s Aunt shouted for someone to GET HER TOMATOES!  I shouted NO!  GET ME BUTTER!!  She shouted GET HER TOMATOES!

My five year old saw the derelict donut and groaned.  “Great!  Now we can’t EAT that one!  It’s on the FLOOR!”

I began rapid breathing.  Gasping breathing.  Now it hurt like H.E.double-sticks.  Someone got me margarine.  Surely that would cool the burn.  I had learned that somewhere in my past and slathered it like diaper rash cream on a baby’s bottom.

SH$%!!!!  That was WORSE!!!!!!!!  I would have been better off letting my hand sizzle on a hot griddle.

In my mind: GET THE BUTTER OFF!  GET THE BUTTER OFF!  (rapid breathing) He eh hoo uh, he eh hoo uh, he eh hoo uh, he eh hoo uh.

Out loud:  GET ME TOMATOES!!!  (What for?  I have no idea.  But Aunt Carmen seemed to think it would do something.)

My brother-in-law ran in with a baggie full of tomatoes.  The whole flotilla of the Aparicio family was in action.  Carmen sliced them, squished up the insides and slopped them onto my hand while I (still standing over the sink and beginning to reminisce that this was exactly like the unescapable pain of childbirth) moaned to her to put them on my face.  My sister-in-law and mother-in-law helped with whatever they could.  Pain was leaping out in scattered spots on my face, neck and arm.  Semi-tolerable.  The hand, I would have preferred to cut off.

The tomatoes turned out to be the ONLY thing that soothed the pain.  Nothing like an epidural, but they cooled the burn.  The thing was, after about two or three minutes of me rubbing them on my hand and her rubbing them on my face, the soothing goodness would wear out.  Someone would slice more, squish them up and slap them on.

I continued moaning, standing, bouncing, tensing, thinking to myself that I should pretend I’m in yoga and slow down my breathing.  I sat down.  Crouched over, tight, folded, surely cutting off blood flow to my brain, attempting la maz, pressing tomatoes to my hand, seething in pain.  She suggested I lie down.  Maybe that would help me relax, for, Relaxed I was Not.

Ahhh.  I uncurled onto a pillow on the caned couch.  At least my organs were not compromised of circulation any more.  My other sister-in-law, a nurse, had been called at her job a couple towns away.  At her request, some special cream arrived from her house down the street that Aunt Carmen began slathering on in frosting-like layers.  Someone brought a fan at which I directly aimed my hand.

Within about 30 minutes or 7 hours, life began to come back into control, although very slowly.  And, our niece’s fifteenth birthday party (similar in style to a wedding, but she wore a purple dress and married no one) was in about an hour.

And, I still looked like that.  (see tomato picture above)  But needed to look like that.  (see right hand hiding behind birthday girl below).

That was the beginning of me learning to do things one handed…left handed…and I’m right handed.  I showered left handed with my right hand held high in the air.  I washed my long hair left handed…that would have been a nice time to have short hair.  I put on makeup left handed.  Have you ever put on mascara with the wrong hand?  (Men, that is not something you should try. Ever.  Women, good luck, and try not to poke out an eye.)

And, that was also the beginning of wondering why there was almost no outward sign I had been burned!  Save for a little redness here and there, I had nothing to show for it!  Seriously???  I have gone through pain second only to going through labor and there’s nothing to see???

Ahhh…I judged to soon.  You’ll see in Part 3.  And I’ll finally tell you all of the lessons I learned.

Until then…

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

Whenever we go, my sister-in-law, Janell, (she and I are the only two gringos in the group) and I like to cook something for the family that is from us.  Kind of a gift from us to them.  But…many of the ingredients we use aren’t available in a single store like they are here.  Making something “our style” is quite an undertaking.  So, after two days of preparation, we made delicious, homemade pizza over the back yard “kitchen” fire.

Do I need to tell you IT WAS AWESOME?  Some qualifiers though:  First one, the crust was too soft. (It’s not as if she and I have a lot of pizza-over-the-fire cooking experience.)  The second one was PERFECT.  And the third one, people had to scrape the charcoal off the bottom of the crust.  But, all in all, it was AMAZING.

Next time we’re there, we’ll whip you up some.

And, when it was finished, we still had lots of dough.

AHA!!!,  I thought, Tomorrow, we’ll use the rest of the dough to make donuts!  What a stroke of brilliance! (Self imposed compliment.  After the following description, you may question my brilliance.)

We packaged up the dough in a plastic container with a tight fitting lid and put it in the fridge.  It’s a fast rising dough at 6500 feet in Colorado Springs, and WAY faster rising at near sea level, the lid would hopefully keep it contained.

Little did I know, the condensation it also kept contained would become the bane of my existence.

We arose the next morning, poured four or five inches of cooking oil into a pot, turned on the gas stove (no fire cooking today), and started forming the donuts.  Three by three, we gently placed them in the oil, me giving a lecturette I learned from Little House on the Prairie on how you know when the donuts are done.  On about donut fifteen, and just after I had told my kids to back away from the stove MORE, and just after my 1 1/2 year old niece had been ushered OUT of the kitchen, the donut I was pulling out of the oil with a dinner fork (did I mention I wasn’t using long tongs?  Yes, a 5 inch long dinner fork) EXPLODED.

It didn’t pop a little.  It didn’t spatter a small bit of oil.  It didn’t shoot one of those tiny drips that invisibly flies from the pan and lands on your forearm.

The blasted thing EXPLODED!

Any guesses what happened next?  Any idea what the lessons learned were?

Stay tuned for Part 2!

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

I never was particularly attracted to them.  They’re bony, their bodies are out of proportion, they didn’t register on my cute animal meter, and they really were never on my radar of “things I hope I own one day”.

They don’t have the majestic beauty of a horse.

They don’t have the big, round, teddy bear eyes that a cow has.

They don’t cuddle with you like a cat.

They’re not all cute and fuzzy like a bunny.

They don’t protect you like a dog.

BUT…..in case you hadn’t noticed, I’ve been converted.  Goats are quite possibly nature’s best animal.

1.  They fit in the back of a truck. (cow doesn’t)

2.  The stuff that comes out of their underside is very valuable.  (not so with a dog)

3.  The stuff that comes out of their back end is AWESOME for the garden.  (don’t even go there with a cat)

4.  They have really cute babies.  (OK, I’ll give that one to all of the above mentioned animals.)

5.  They provide meat, hair and hide, and if you’re my husband, Rocky Mountain (Goat) Oysters.

6.  Their gestation is only 5 months! (9 1/2 for a cow)

7.  They don’t require a large amount of space.  (Horse?  Cow?)

8.  They are awesome at fire mitigation.

So, now, I love goats.  Not to say the others aren’t great too, but goats really are an incredible amount of everything put into a small, bony, out of proportion, horizontally pupiled, milk, cheese, yogurt and ice cream producing, sweet, curious, cute animal.

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

But, I just kind of want to do it.  We’ve been thinking about it for a couple of years, but I never completely bought into the idea.

Now, I have…for a variety of reasons:

1.   It would force me to make new cheeses that I’ve been wanting to make, but just haven’t done it yet.

2.  I could use my new wine refrigerator for a cheese cave.

3.  It would be fun.

4.  It would bring more people to my website, which would hopefully bring more people to my classes…and maybe even cause me to create more classes.  (ie…more money for the farm).

But, I need your input.  Please, help me here.  I don’t want to spend a lot of time making videos if you don’t think you’ll watch them.

So, I’ve got some questions.  Would you be so kind as to answer them?  I want to know, if I make the videos, what do you want to see?  How long should they be?  Should I even do it?

Thanks for your help.  I’ll let you know what I decide!

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

I used to put up a fight: My hair dryer was new, shiny black, one of the few things in pristine condition in our house, and used only by the only girl in the house.  I wound the cord up perfectly as any good Type A cord winder can do, and stowed it away for the next major holiday when I might decide to do my hair.

And, every so often, over the years, The Animal Whisperer would request it for some outdoor thawing issue.  Painfully, I would hand it over, “JUST BRING IT BACK IN!”, fearing that it would be commandeered as a permanent part of his shop.  Faithfully, he always brought it back in.  Not quite as shiny as it was when it left, but I forced myself to deal with that…no complaining.  At least not out loud.

So, today, I was interrupted for the third time while stretched out on the floor in the patch of sun streaming through the window, trying to take a sugar induced cat nap.  My five-year old opened the door and shouted in:  “MOM!  Papi wants your hairdryer!!!”

Du-du-du-dum.  The gloom filled music thumped in my head.  The faucet must still be frozen.

But now, after the years of begrudgingly allowing the use of my hairdryer for, what I deemed un-ladylike (although necessary) use, I peeled up from the floor, and dutifully retrieved it.  In the walk from the bathroom to the crack in the door where his little arm reached inside, I noticed the scuffs, dust and white paint marks that have become part of its faded shiny blackness, and handed it to my son.

I’ve wizened to the point that I now happily give it up for The Greater Good.  I blow-dry my hair maybe four times a year.  We need water in the barn every day.  I know, I’m really becoming a better person.  Right?

Because, for as long as the faucet remains frozen, the two hoses must be hauled up to the house and hooked to the faucet in the garage,

stretched through the garage,

to the stairs,

down the stairs,

to the goat pen,

and water given to the animals and the greenhouse, and drained then recoiled before the water that’s inside of them freezes.  It’s a huge pain in the neck.

The bad news is, today, the hairdryer did not thaw the faucet.  What is usually a 10 minute watering process turned into 30 minutes.

The good news is, while I’m sitting outside typing this with my fingers slowly numbing, I have no idea where my hair dryer is.  And, I’m OK with that.

Volunteering it to the ice-thawing cause to help The Animal Whisperer not have to go to so much work is worth it.  Really, I’m a great wife.

Happy New Year!

-  The Goat Cheese Lady

December 16, 2012 by csukach

But, ringing in my ears are always the words of my high school volleyball coach, Judy Barnett.  (I’m sorry if you didn’t get to play for her.  She was an icon.  Still is.)

“NEVER SETTLE FOR MEDIOCRITY.” -Judy Barnett

So, in that vein, I hired a Facebook Manager.  What that means to me is that he will pretend he’s me when he writes on The Goat Cheese Lady Facebook page.  He’ll write on it more often…like, every day.  He’ll increase the Likes and increase the Traffic and post pictures and Share stuff and Comment and whatever else he knows how to do.  Which is about 1,000 times more than I know how to do.

And, if he falters with any of these requirements, he’ll have to sleep in the guest room and I won’t make him coffee in the morning.

I run a tight ship around here, you know.

- The Goat Cheese Lady

P.S.  So, go check us out on Facebook.  It’ll be full of news and pictures and class schedules and things.  Please Like us when you’re there too!