Before November comes to a close, I wanted to show you our fall color because it's almost too late! But things seem on a slower time table this year, and we still have leaves on the trees, which isn't typical for November. These photographs have been taken throughout the month.
When someone ask you what you're thankful for, what comes to mind? People? Things? Circumstances? In reflecting on that question, I'm realizing that this year, I'm thankful for something different. I'm thankful for a lesson learned. It's something I've always known intellectually but have never been able to actually own. That may be an odd thing to be thankful for, but hey! This is 2020!
What's the lesson? It's that I'm the guardian of my eyes, ears, heart, and soul. And that means I'm the guardian of my emotions. No one else, me. I can feed my emotions things that keep me in a worried, fearful dither, or I can feed my emotions things that promote well-being and calm. I choose. I choose what I look at, what I listen to, and what I think about.
Have you ever noticed the connection between thoughts and emotions? Thoughts can either be presented to us from outside sources (through seeing and hearing), or they can be memories. Sometimes we simply set these thoughts aside, but how often do we have emotional reactions to them? Our emotions keep us thinking about them, and our thoughts feed the emotional response. Have you ever found yourself caught in this cycle and wondered, why am I doing this to myself?
I have! And this year, I'm finally learning to say to myself, "Quit it! Quit beating a highway down neural pathways that don't take me where I want to go. Stop feeding thoughts that destroy my peace and rob me of my sense of well-being, especially for things over which I have no control. Choose to focus on something else. Choose things that are worthy of being dwelt on and ignore the rest."
I'm not saying I've perfected this yet, but this year, I've made a lot of progress toward learning that I'm in control of my thought life, not my emotions. I'm exceedingly thankful for that.
I'm always on the lookout for methods of alternative cooking, so I was quite intrigued when I learned about the haybox cooker. I was also surprised that this new-to-me idea is actually a very old method of cooking! Haybox cookers (also spelled hay box) are sometimes referred to as wonder boxes, fireless cookers, or thermal cookers. They cook food by using retained heat. In other words, the food is partially cooked first, then allowed to finish cooking in an insulated container.
Early haybox cookers were wooden boxes which used hay as insulation. People still use hay, but wool fleece is popular too. The box itself can be anything from wood to a thermal bag. They tend to be susceptible to moisture build-up, so probably the only thing that wouldn't last long would be cardboard. Dan made my haybox from an old travel cooler and leftover foam board from our pantry insulation project.
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| The cooler is from Dan's trucking days. Plugs into a cigarette lighter and keeps food cool without needing to replace ice. |
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| We had quite a few foam board scraps left from our pantry upgrade. As you can see, he cut them to fit a particular pot. |
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| Two more pieces of foam board cover the top of the pot. |
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| My recipe for rice is one cup brown rice and one pint of bone broth. |
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| I had no idea about timing the cooking. Some sources say one hour, some say several hours. |
If you're interested in more, there are tons of websites and videos on haybox cookers, all easy to find with a simple search. There's also a free cook book by Margaret J. Mitchell, entitled The Fireless Cook Book. It was originally published in 1913, but is now public domain and available for download at the Internet Archive. Amazon has an inexpensive paperback option, which I recently ordered, along with a more recent publication, Fireless Cookers Haybox Cookers & Retained Heat Cookers by George Eccleston. I ordered it too and will give you a review of both books soon.
