Harvest Meal: Pad See Ew

There are two topics I want to cover in today's post: a new variety of broccoli that I'm growing this year, and the dish I keep making with it. Let's start with the crop.

It's a Brazilian variety of broccoli called piracicaba.  Yes, it's a mouthful.  Say: "peer-ah-SEE-kah-bah."  Piracicaba is referred to as a non-heading broccoli, but what that really means is that the heads it produces are quite small.  The largest ones I've seen on my plants are the first ones formed in the center of the plant.  They're big enough to divide into two or maybe three good sized spears.  When that one is removed, more heads start to form on the outer branches, each one smaller than the last.  The salient point here is that piracicaba broccoli was bred for its leaves, not its florets.  I learned to love broccoli leaves when I lived in the city and shopped at a good farmer's market.  There was a vendor who sold "baby broccoli leaves" which I used for stir-fries.  Maybe that vendor was hip way back then, and they were piracicaba leaves.  They were certainly addictive.  So growing a variety of broccoli which can deliver a steady supply of small and tender leaves all through the summer is a real joy.

But wait, there's more.  Perhaps it wouldn't surprise you to hear that a Brazilian broccoli variety is exceptionally tolerant of heat and drought.  The extent of this plant's endurance is on display this summer.  We've had scorching heat and very, very little rain; and the piracicaba couldn't care less, apparently.  Given the way our summers are trending with the global climate weirding, this is an attribute that has my full attention and respect.  Piracicaba is also fairly cold hardy.  I grew some last year as a trial and found that it held on till the first frost.  That did surprise me.  That's still not all though.  The most amazing thing about this brassica variety is that the cabbage moths (small whites) utterly ignore it.  I mean they have NO interest.  None, zip, zilch.  The only damage I find on the piracicaba leaves is from flea beetles, and that's pretty minor. 

Noticing this lack of damage from the cabbage moths last year, I resolved to grow no cabbage at all in the spring this year.  My spring brassicas therefore consisted of Tuscan kale, piracicaba, kohlrabi and a few turnips.  Without the cabbage in the garden to attract the moths, all the other brassicas took much less damage than usual from them.  I've got my fall cabbages under a row cover now, to protect them from the depredations of both moth and heat.

Piracicaba & pad see ew ingredients

So how do I eat this stuff?  That brings me to a harvest meal that's been in heavy rotation this summer: pad see ew, a Thai noodle dish.  I grew to love Thai food in those years I lived in the city.  Now I indulge in some of my favorites at home.  Thai cuisine is well suited to summertime in Pennsylvania, since I don't want to heat my house up any more than strictly necessary.  Thai cookery usually relies on lots of ingredient preparation followed by a very short cooking period which brings everything together into a delicious whole.  This describes pad see ew to a tee.

This dish is not at all spicy-hot, and can include meat or be vegetarian.  I've been making a vegetarian version, so that's what I'll describe.  What follows will prepare a generous single serving.  Scale up proportionally to feed more people.

Place 2 ounces of celophane (transparent) rice noodles in a pot.  Cover with cool water and soak for at least one hour before cooking.  The longer the soaking time, the less you'll need to cook them.  I've seen this dish most often prepared with the widest rice noodles.  These will require some heating to fully cook through.  Medium cut noodles require less, and the thin cut noodles can skate by with no pre-cooking if you soak long enough.

Prepare all your other ingredients.  Slice one or two shallots, and mince three large cloves of garlic, or as much as you like, according to your tastes.  Wash 3-4 ounces of piracicaba leaves and florets, or an equivalent amount of any other type of broccoli.  Trim them into small pieces that will cook quickly in a stir-fry.  In a small bowl measure out 1 and a half teaspoons of fish sauce, and add 2 tablespoons of soy sauce.  Keep both sauces on hand in case you want to add more during cooking.  Beat one egg in a small bowl.  Measure out one tablespoon of sugar in another small bowl.  Coarsely chop several stems of cilantro.  Have all these ingredients and some cooking oil laid out near your cooking area.  A long handled spoon or cooking chopsticks will be useful, and you may want tongs for serving.

Check your noodles.  If you are using any but the smallest of the flat rice noodles, put the pot of noodles on the burner and warm the water, giving the noodles a gentle stir from time to time.  You will not even need to bring the water to a boil.  (Don't put rice noodles you failed to soak into boiling water.  They'll just stick together in a tangled mess.)  Make sure they are well softened, but keep in mind they'll get a final cooking as part of the stir-fry.  Do not overcook them or they will fall apart when you cook the rest of the dish.  When softened, turn off the heat.  Have a colander in the sink ready to drain them at the last moment.

Preheat your largest heavy skillet over high heat for at least four minutes.  Add a generous amount of cooking oil to the pan and immediately add the garlic and shallots.  Stir these only long enough to separate them in the hot oil.  Then add the piracicaba and stir it very gently around the pan so that it just begins to wilt.  Drain the rice noodles, shaking off excess water, and stir them to combine with the broccoli.  Sprinkle the sugar over the ingredients in the pan and continue stirring until the broccoli is wilted.  Push all the ingredients to the edges of the pan, forming a ring of ingredients with a hole in the middle.  If the pan looks very dry in the center, add a little more oil.  Pour the beaten egg into the center and let it sit for a moment.  Pour the fish sauce and soy sauce mixture in a circle over the mixture of noodles and broccoli.  When you can see that the bottom of the beaten egg has begun to set up, mix all ingredients thoroughly in the pan.  The uncooked egg should coat the noodles and broccoli.  Check the color of the noodles.  They should be brown from the soy sauce.  If they are very pale, add a bit more soy sauce and mix well.  Cook just long enough that the eggs have cooked and excess liquid has evaporated.  Turn off the heat and mix in the chopped cilantro.

If you're a strict vegetarian you can leave out the fish sauce.  If you're a committed carnivore you can add small pieces of raw meat to the center of the skillet before the eggs go in.  Cook the meat thoroughly and push it to the edges with the other ingredients before adding the beaten egg.

Ugly picture, yummy food

I count this as a harvest meal for us since we produced the shallots, garlic, eggs, cilantro, and piracicaba that goes into the pad see ew.  The rice noodles, sugar, oil, fish sauce and soy sauce are purchased.   This is another one of those dishes that I just can't seem to get enough of.  Fortunately our six piracicaba plants produce very steadily.  From those six plants I can harvest enough leaves every three or four days to prepare a meal for my husband and myself.

I plan to have some piracicaba plants in the hoop house this winter.  We'll see how long they hold on in there, and perhaps they'll even overwinter with enough protection.  Piracicaba will definitely be a mainstay brassica in next year's garden.  I recommend it to anyone who loves broccoli and lives where the summers are warm.  Seeds are getting easier to find.  Fedco has carried them for at least the last two years.

What harvest meals are you preparing these days?

Just Every So Often

...the colors alone make all the gardening effort worthwhile.

Grillable Bread - Onion Naan

We're nearly out of our usual no-knead bread. I try to get a ton of bread baked and stashed in the chest freezer by mid-May, so that we have homemade bread all summer without the need to heat the house up by baking. Baking is a winter habit in our home. Alas, I was low on the bread flour we buy in 50-pound bags, and I didn't want to buy another one and hold it over the summer because this flour contains the germ of the wheat. Wheat germ contains fat, which goes rancid rather quickly in warm weather. So keeping 50 pounds of the stuff was out of the question with our summers.

Enter this recipe for naan, made with all purpose flour, and able to be grilled on a charcoal or gas grill. This is a fast rising dough, needing only 1 hour in warm weather to be ready for shaping and cooking. I usually give the dough more than that, part of the time in the refrigerator to slow it down and allow flavor to develop. I adapted this recipe from one by Mark Bittman, from his Best Recipes in the World cookbook. Leave it to me to figure I could improve on the best. This recipe makes a dozen flatbreads.

Grilled Onion Naan

1 Tbsp. active dry yeast
1 Tbsp. sugar
2 Tbsp. live culture yogurt
2 Tbsp. milk
1 medium onion, peeled and roughly diced
2 tsp. salt
4 cups all purpose flour (you can substitute a whole grain flour for a small part of this volume)
1 egg
3/4 cup water
extra flour for kneading
oil for the bowl

Thoroughly combine the yeast, sugar, yogurt and milk in a small bowl. Set this aside.

In the bowl of a food processor, combine the diced onion, flour and salt. Process for about 30 seconds so that the onion is finely diced. Add the egg and process another 15 seconds. With the blade running, add the yogurt mixture through the feeding tube. Then add the water in a moderate stream until a more or less uniform ball of dough forms. You may not need to add all the water. The dough should be fairly sticky but not as liquid as a batter. Add water or flour a tablespoon at a time if the dough is either excessively dry or wet.

Take the dough out and place it on a well floured board. Knead it 8-10 times and form a ball. Place this ball in an oiled bowl with a capacity at least twice the volume of the dough. Cover and place in a draft-free spot for 1-2 hours, or keep in the fridge for 5-6 hours.

When ready to shape, take the dough out and form it into a thick roll on the floured board. The roll should be about 2 1/2 inches thick and about 20 inches long. Cut it in half and then in quarters. Cut each quarter into three equal pieces. Roll each piece into a little ball and set them on the board. When they are all finished, cover them loosely with plastic wrap or a clean towel. Let them rest for 15 minutes.

Holding the dough in your hands, shape each ball of dough into a flat oblong, roughly 5 by 9 inches. Start by thinning the dough in the center and then work outward in a circular fashion. Let the dough hang from your fingers, always working at the top, turning it, gently pulling it, gradually stretching the edge so that the dough elongates and thins. Each naan should be quite thin in the middle, slightly thicker at the edge, but try not to have any paper thin areas as these will burn quickly on a grill. If you stretch one part too thin (hold it up to a light to tell), pinch the dough together over that area to make it thicker. Dust the shaped naans with a little flour and place them on a baking sheet as you finish each one.

Cook the naan over a moderate charcoal fire or high heat on a gas grill. Holding the naan on your fully open hand, slap the dough down on the grill and make sure no part of it folds over on itself. Don't overcrowd the grill. Keep an eye on them as they can move from cooked to burnt in very little time. They will cook very quickly, no more than 2-3 minutes on the first side, and less on the second. Keep tongs handy to turn them so each side is nicely cooked. If you wish, you can brush the naan with melted butter or garlicky olive oil as you remove them from the grill.

These naan go well with just about any grilled meat and are much better than store-bought buns when folded in half for hamburgers. They also compliment BLTs and Indian dishes. Or put some good, soft, thinly sliced cheese on the naan while still on the grill, as soon as the first side is done and you flip them over.  We've been making these naan quite often. It's not the same as the multi-grain round loaves we like to slice and toast to eat with our eggs, but it's good fresh bread that doesn't heat up the house. You can also omit the onion if you want a more all purpose bread, but you'll need to add just a bit more water when mixing the dough. They'll also bake up well on a preheated baking stone in a hot oven if you want to make them indoors in wintertime.

Horrific Heat

This gardening year certainly has been a change from last year.  We got rain almost every single day in June last year.  This year it's been incredibly dry and unseasonably hot since the beginning of June.  I've never had to water a garden so much in my life, and I've gardened in three extremely diverse climates.  Frankly, it's been a struggle to keep the plants watered.  But for a brief respite last week, the daytime temperatures have reached into the 80's and 90's most of the last four weeks.  Today, we're supposed to see 97 F (36 C).

I spent about 90 minutes watering the garden this morning, starting at 5 am.  I got some help from my husband's rain barrel, which he rigged up so that we could lay out a slow drip line through my three sisters planting.  All the corn fields around us look parched.  The plants are stressed, with their long leaves tightly furled and pointing upwards, giving them all a spiky appearance.  My own popcorn plants look somewhat better, but they're still not thrilled with the dry heat.  I hope the constant drip from the rain barrel along with my spot watering will see them through.

So far, the plant in the picture above is our only definitive casualty of the heat.  That's one of our two Hokkaido squash plants.  Over the last few days I watered it like crazy.  In the heat of the day, no amount of water seemed to perk it up, though it bounced back in the cool of evening.  Yesterday evening though, it still looked miserable and limp. It looked no better this morning, despite the extra watering I gave it yesterday.  Hokkaido is a northern region of Japan, where the sort of heat we're having would be very unusual.  So I guess it's no surprise this plant couldn't hack it.  The other Hokkaido plant looks to be doing alright, and I hope I can keep it alive.  I grew these last year and they are not prolific producers.  So the loss of one plant will mean a serious reduction in our squash supply this year.

On the other hand, a simple row cover has allowed us to keep several lettuce plants alive and well through the infernal heat.  This is a double layer of floating row cover, arranged so that the bed is shaded to the south.  It's pinned up on the north side to allow good airflow and prevent the row cover from making the bed even hotter than it otherwise would be.  It seems that simply keeping the soil temperature cooler, and the dark leaves out of direct sunlight allows the lettuce to tolerate the excessive heat and dryness.

They're saying we may get some rain on Friday, but we have another week of scorching weather to get through first.  I guess we have no worries about the late blight at the moment.  But this is a steep price to pay for that reassurance.

P.S.  Most of you who asked for kale seed have a small packet on the way in the mail.  I temporarily ran out of envelopes, but the rest of you should have your packets this week.

Elderflower Cordial

Mmmm!  I'm thrilled to report that the two elder plants we put in last year have produced well already.  The one that died and came back from the root stock is much smaller than the real survivor, but both have set blossoms.  I was hugely excited to try making elderflower cordial from our own harvest.  (Despite the name, this cordial is non-alcoholic.) What little was left over when I'd filled my canning jars was just enough to pour over two tumblers of ice and mix with our good well water.  It's delicious.  Very different from the outrageously expensive bottled stuff from Austria that I used to buy.  Ours has more floral and green notes, and a more complex taste overall.  I think I honestly prefer ours on the basis of taste alone.  Add in the personal satisfaction, lower carbon footprint, and financial savings and there's no contest.  If I could make enough cordial, I'd drink this stuff every day of the year.

In making the cordial, I took instruction from The River Cottage Preserves Handbook.  Basically, it's elderflower essence with citrus zest and juice, plus sugar - a pretty easy recipe and procedure so far as food preservation goes.  I'm so enamoured of all things River Cottage at the moment that I actually pre-ordered this title before it was published, and paid full price for it, though admittedly by using a gift card.  The Preserves Handbook is no less impressive than the two other River Cottage cookbooks I've got.  Really an inspiring range of usual and unusual preserves, and very much geared to those who like to graze the hedges and forage.  Though originally published in England, there's not much here that seems out of reach to my mid-Atlantic American milieu.  I don't know that we have fruiting edible hawthorns or wild gooseberries, but everything else at least sounds familiar. If you're accustomed to following USDA recommendations for canning, the British methods of preservation set out in this book will seem either a little lax or refreshingly low on the paranoia scale, depending on your perspective.  I found it easy enough to follow the recipe to prepare the syrup, and then use the Ball Blue Book recommendations for canning other syrups.  I may try to squeeze in another batch of this cordial this year.  If I can scare up some crab apples (I think our neighbors have a tree) I plan to use some of our elderberries in the Handbook's hedgerow jam recipe later in the year.  If not, the recipe for Pontack, a sweet-sour sauce made from elderberries, sounds right up my alley.

The River Cottage Preserves Handbook mentions that there's a lot of variation in the scent and flavor of blooms from one elder to the next, and I can see even from our tiny sample pool that this is quite true.  The first batch of elderflower essence I made from the blooms of the smaller plant had a strong green-grassy aroma, not all that pleasant in fact.  I ended up throwing that batch out before adding any of the citrus or sugar; not much invested, so no great loss.  The blossoms on the larger plant smelled better on the branch, and I also took the precaution of removing as much of the stem from the blooms as was feasible before steeping them.  It made all the difference.  I look forward next year to trying batches from the two different elders we put in this year.  In the meantime, maybe I can find some gasket-topped bottles to store the cordial in.  That would be both prettier and easier to pour.

What are you canning these days?

On the Pleasures of Being an Adult

I've been very bad lately.

As background, I'm more of a vegetable person than a fruit person. That is, I can easily go without fruit for several days in a row, and can easily go for weeks or even months without fresh fruit. Whereas going without green veg for more than a day makes me feel low and crave vitamins. This is a handy set of preferences, given my locavore ambitions, since fruit is in shorter supply and has a shorter season than the wide range of vegetables that grow in my area. While we've planted several types of perennial fruits, they take so much longer to mature than annual vegetables.

But, oh! when I get my hands on fresh local fruit ... I do tend to go to excess. This past week my husband brought back three pints of sweet dark cherries from the farmers' market. He called to let me know what he'd scored before he even came home. So I whipped up a pie crust and had it ready to roll by the time he got home. While he pitted the cherries, I rolled out the dough and picked some anise hyssop from the garden (on which, more to come soon) for an accent to the rich cherry flavor. As he stood there watching me arrange the filling in the pie he asked, "What's for dinner?" I gave him a quizzical look and answered, "With dessert like this, who needs dinner?" Arguments? None. Man, do I love being an adult!

Then, just yesterday, we returned a borrowed chipper to some gardening acquaintances. These are the sort of people you can never do any nice thing for without having them turn around and do something twice as nice for you. So I always go to them bearing gifts. Yesterday it was eggs from our hens and some sprigs of the aforementioned anise hyssop. They in turn sent us home with a pint of their homegrown blueberries.

Now, we're rather low on the few foods we still buy from the supermarket just at the moment. There were no leftovers from a proper meal that needed to be finished off. This is an unusual situation in our house. But I did have an extra pie crust from when I made the cherry pie. (I always make a double batch.) And I had two lemons in a nearly empty fridge. What else did we have? Well, eggs from the girls, of course. Is it obvious where this is going? It was obvious to me. Honestly, it hardly felt like I had any choice...

Lemon curd tart with blueberries.

This didn't quite end up being dinner, but it was a close thing I can assure you. Nor, let the record show, did I indulge in it for breakfast today. I had to finish off the few blueberries leftover after making that gorgeous thing. They disappeared rather quickly with my mueslix this morning. These are stupendously good blueberries, possibly the best I've ever had in my life. Now I'm really, really glad I put in those blueberry bushes this year. As for the lemon curd, it's surprisingly easy to make. (I use this recipe.) I know it's got sugar and butter and eggs in it. I'm well versed in the conventional dietary wisdom, thank you very much. But I challenge anyone to take a bite of freshly made lemon curd and tell me with a straight face that it's bad for us. Go on, try it! You cannot possibly condemn it. Lemon curd and fresh blueberries together are just so right.

Yeah, I could and probably should eat my fruit with less sugar. It's just that fresh fruit is such a rare commodity in my diet that I can't help but want to celebrate it. Summer is the season of sweetness, after all. The frugal angle? Well, I dunno if there is one, I just felt like sharing. But if it's really examined, the lemon curd-blueberry tart hardly cost me anything. I paid for organic butter, sugar, lemons, and flour. The eggs and blueberries were free (or nearly so). And I have a plan to grow my own lemon tree starting next year, hardiness zone 6 be damned! With luck, that will be one more product that becomes both homegrown and local for me.

July Frugal Action Item: Stay Cool Without Touching That Thermostat

Time for another monthly Frugal Action Item. I realize it's a little late in the year to address cooling issues for some of you out there. But here in the northeastern US, so far we've had a rather cool spring and early summer. Herewith are my suggestions for beating the heat on the cheap.

Get used to it. Slowly. Your body is designed to operate in a wide range of temperatures. It has multiple strategies for cooling itself down. But after a long winter of trying to keep you warm, it needs a little time to dust off the cooling system and get it running again like a finely tuned motor. Seriously. The adjustment takes about two or three weeks, and during that time you will be a little uncomfortable sometimes. The rest of the suggestions here will help. But if you give your body that time without confusing it by hanging around in AC all day, it will make the adjustment. Your blood vessels will distribute your body heat closer to the surface for better cooling. And your sweat glands will work more effectively. Eric Brende reports on this phenomenon in his book, Better Off: Flipping the Switch on Technology.

Lose weight This is a perfect example of the anyway principle. If you're carrying around an extra 25 pounds, you know you should shed it for so many different reasons. Keeping cool ranks around #14 on the list of reasons to lose weight. But it will help you feel cooler, as I know from personal experience. Fatty tissue holds in body heat. Your body will be better able to cool itself when there's less insulation.

Cooling herbs and foods Don't discount the old-time wisdom of drinking mint tea or other cooling beverages. Many herbs and foods have long been held to cool the body. Cucumber and watermelon are famously cooling. There are many tasty and safe herbs that help cool our bodies. Mint, lemon, oats, and pomegranate are considered refrigerant plants. Okra, garlic and oregano are diaphoretic, meaning that they promote perspiration. Chamomile and sage are vasodilators, meaning they help your blood vessels widen. This both lowers blood pressure and facilitates cooling. Try adding some of these to your diet in the summer months.

Cool drinks A glass of ice water costs almost nothing, and can cool you down more effectively than just about anything, short of submerging yourself in cool water. Consciously schedule cold drinks into your daily routine. If you work outside in hot weather you should have a cool drink anytime you feel thirsty, or at least once every hour. Even if you don't do physical labor, you could trade up your morning dose of caffeine for a cold version: iced coffee or iced tea. Sun tea is particularly cheap to make, and once brewed can hang out in the fridge for a few days as you drink it down. No fussing with brewing it every single morning. Same goes with regular tap water. Keep some in the fridge so you don't need to run the tap until the water gets cold. However, beware water intoxication - the overloading of your body with far too much water. This can be fatal. Make sure some of your beverages include some electrolytes, and use common sense, and you'll be fine.

Ceiling fans go a long way to making you feel cooler than the air temperature would suggest. You can run a ceiling fan all day and not use up the same amount of electricity as you would running an air conditioner for one hour. If your fan has a switch to change the direction of the spin, be sure it's set to turn counterclockwise as you look up at it during the summer months. The clockwise spin forces warmer air downward, and so is intended for the winter season.

Put your feet in a basin of cold water. If you don't have your own pool and you don't want to pay for the privilege of using one, you can still cool off by submersion. A basin of water just big enough to fit your feet in will provide a surprising amount of cooling power. I've been told that this method can actually prevent heat stroke for those who lose power during a heat wave, though I haven't seen any formal studies on this claim. I have tried it myself and been very impressed by how much cooler I feel just by soaking my feet. Of course, if your neighbors have a pool and offer to let you use it, dive right in.

Get a summer haircut. You know you can lose a great deal of heat through your head, which is why your mother always told you to wear a hat during the winter. If you've worn your hair long for many years, even if you usually wear it up, you may be stunned at how much cooler a short haircut can be. Even if you typically save by cutting your own hair in a simple style, one short professional cut in late spring will probably let you slide well into late summer if you plan to just grow it out for winter. Guys, for you, buzz cuts are the way to go, and you can save by doing them at home.

Wear as little as possible. If you're in the privacy of your own home, you can pretty much do whatever feels comfortable. Tank tops are my sartorial choice when at home in hot weather. Many women also swear by skirts made of light fabrics - cooler than any sort of pants or shorts, and these can be worn outside the home almost anywhere.

Hit the library for some free AC. You pay for it through your taxes, so you might as well take advantage. If you're letting your body adapt to warmer temperatures though, be aware that this may set back any adjustment it's already made. You can let your body handle the early days of summer, and save the library for an hour or two during the most scorching days.

Sleep as low as possible. If you have a multilevel home, sleep downstairs if you can. The lower rooms of the house are naturally cooler, since hot air rises. Sleeping on an air mattress on the floor will also help a little bit if you have only one floor. An air mattress holds less of your body heat close to you than a conventional mattress will. So if you've got one of these for guests, consider breaking it out when the hottest weather strikes. If you cool your house for more than a couple of months per year, you might even break even on the purchase of a new air mattress the first year, providing you really do run the AC less often.

Install an attic fan. This is one of the most cost effective house cooling measures out there. Attic spaces can easily reach above 100 F on a day that is sunny but merely warmish. Removing that hot layer above the living space will dramatically lower the cooling needs for the rest of the house.

Cook outside, or not at all. Summer is a great time for salads and lighter fare that needs little or no cooking. So steer clear of the boiling vats of water for pasta dishes, or an hour-long oven run for casseroles. Raw foods won't heat you up, nor the house. When you want a cooked meal, think about what you can do with a grill or a solar oven. It may take a little planning to cook this way if you're not accustomed to it. But if you make it a habit, it'll become as routine as anything else in your life. Remember that grilling doesn't necessarily mean a plate full of meat. Eggplant, peppers, asparagus, summer squash, large mushroom caps, and corn on the cob all make fantastic grilled fare. If you have an outdoor electrical outlet on the porch, you can plug in a crockpot or a rice steamer outside. Or you could run an extension cord outside if there is no outdoor outlet. No sense in heating up your kitchen if you don't have to.


Unless you're in the southern hemisphere, there's really no Alternative Action Item this month. Wrong season for you? Check out Staying Warm with the Thermostat Set Low, which in many ways is a mirror post to this one. If you're in the midst of summer and all of these suggestions are already old hat to you, then your Alternative Action Item is to add a new cooling tip in the comments!

Stay cool, everyone.


New to these Frugal Action Items? More here:

January: Compact Fluorescent Bulbs & Hot Water Pipe Insulation
February: Kitchen Competence
March: Rein In Entertainment Spending
April: Go Paper-less
May: Solar Dryer
June: Increase the Deductible on Your Auto Insurance
August: Repair It!
September: Insulate
October: Preventative Health Care
November: Frugal Holiday Wish List
December: Plan Next Year's Garden

Save Heating Oil During the Summer Months

A great many homeowners in the area I live in rely on heating oil to keep their homes warm during the winter. The most common arrangement is an oil-fueled water furnace that heats water for baseboard radiators, and sometimes radiant heat floors. Seems like a no-brainer to save on heating costs during the summer, no? But there's a simple way to save more oil, beyond just not needing any heat for the home. Because in most cases, the temperature for the hot water that comes out of the tap is controlled by the same setting as the water for the radiators.

I've found myself lately taking very tepid showers, trying to cool down during the hottest period of the year. I don't take truly cold showers, but I'm guessing that the temperature that feels good right now is somewhere around 80 to 85 degrees F. Given that the house can be as hot as 80 degrees during the day, there's no risk of a chill. But the wintertime setting for our hot water is 160 degrees. For our personal use, we don't need water anywhere near that hot. Our dishwasher heats our water to an appropriately scalding temperature on its own. And I use cold water for nearly all our laundry.

So the simple fix is to lower the setting on the furnace as soon as we no longer need to heat the house. Our gauge actually has two settings, a kick-on setting for the lowest acceptable temperature, and the kick-off setting for the highest necessary temperature. I set the kick-on temperature as low as it could be set: 110 degrees. And the kick-off temperature is a mere ten degrees higher. The water that comes out of the tap is still plenty hot for washing dishes, so I don't worry much about sanitation. If we cook anything particularly bacteria-laden, like meat, we either put the cutting board and kitchen tools through the dishwasher, or sterilize them with bleach. We eat so many vegetables during the summer anyway, just trying to keep up with the output from the garden. In other words, there's no downside. The savings may be small, but it costs us nothing but a minute or two of time to accomplish.

I have no idea how much oil this simple switch is saving us, but at more than $4 per gallon for heating oil, it's something worth doing. I only wish that I had thought of it earlier in the warm months. We've got at least a few more months before we'll need to raise the temperature to effectively heat our home.

If any engineers or heating specialists out there know a way to calculate the savings, please let me know!