Wednesday 3 June 2015

Carrot Sticks

At Chantelle's birthday one of the munchies was carrot sticks, along with crackers, chips, dip and what have you. Quite often when I go to friends they're eating carrot sticks, and I dunno, I've never really enjoyed raw carrot - usually roasted or boiled with honey to go with dinner is the way to go for me. Until I tried said carrot sticks with dip, omgosh. Yum! They had this sort of Kumera and Pumpkin dip, so mixing it all together was so good, I kept thinking, I must buy some carrots and this dip to have at home. Yesterday afternoon, whilst stalking through town chucking up posters for my YF fundraising, and trying to get more sponsorship, I bought a bag of carrots, but sadly couldn't find the dip. :( Instead I've got some sort of sour cream and chives one, which isn't as nice, but it'll do. I think my family think I'm nuts!

I'm kind of doing Junk Free June, kind of anyway. I'm not going all out, because it'll be too hard to change my meals around when everyone else just sticks to status quo. I'd never heard of it, until other friends started spreading it around on FB - basically it's this thing you do, like Sugar Free September, or Dry July, and if you make a profile on the website you get your mates to sponsor you and it goes to the Cancer Society. In this case though, when you reach certain intervals of sponsorship, you get a prize.
So yeah, I'm not going all out, haven't signed up and not getting sponsored to do it. Instead I'm going a month with no food that I consider junk, that I can do without affecting the rest of the family. So, no chocolate, no biscuits, no chips or crackers, no fizzy drink or fruit juice - those sorts of things. If I did it properly I'd drop out the white bread, white rice, white sugar, processed foods, certain oils, takeaways etc etc. Now I'm just sitting here munching away on two carrots with some dip - not the warmest though, I have to say, but hey. I'm three days through, only 27 left! lol and this could be a good habit to get into - they say it takes three weeks to make a habit, so....

I'm really struggling with this assignment I'm doing, it was meant to be finished by Monday and that was my intention, to finish it and send it on Tuesday - once the mail sorted it self out after the long weekend. But alas, I'm only 3000 words in, and I need about 5000. I'm stuck with no idea what else I can write, because I'm sort of worried that the more I rave on and on, the more I'll go off track and the question itself won't even be relevant...It's difficult too, only really understanding how dairy farming works, so when they talk about seasonal fluctuations in the markets, I can't say things about sheep and beef, or deer. I've no idea on their breeding seasons, and when the best time is to buy and sell them.
Heck, I even googled New Zealand Sheep 101, but didn't get anywhere!
I really need to get it finished and sent off by the mail cutoff, 5pm. I'm not sure of my chances though.


Going out tomorrow night with the Young Farmers, dinner and a movie - gosh, sounds like a date. Lol! Should be good though, I'm really getting used to their company.

22 comments:

  1. Okay, look for a pumpkin and Kumara humus; that stuff is *amazing*. It goes perfect with crackers and raw carrots. It tastes similar along all of the brands, but I think the Lisa's brand is best,

    And how could you not like raw carrots, girl!! Although roasted carrots are also very tasty, so you're forgiven for your trangression. ;D

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    1. Roasted Carrots are the best thing ever invented, that's why :P

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    2. Best thing since sliced bread, huh? :)

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    3. Even better than sliced bread Xj! Roast carrots are unbeatable!!! And, wait a minute... Chocolate is junk food? On LSAR, we're issued with it and told to give it to lost parties to boost their energy!!! :P

      That assignment sounds fun,. especially since it was written by a total townie. Sheep don't actually have a set "breeding season", I know of atleast one land corporation that times it to have their sheep lambing all year round, so that they can supply the market all year round. Even the "usual" breeding season can vary from anything between now and after Christmas...

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    4. Sorry, but roasted carrots can't beat roasted potatoes. Especially with garlic and rosemary....mmmm ;) haha

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    5. No. Chocolate isn't junk food. If you've read Harry Potter it's supposed to fight off the effects of Dementor attacks, so definitely not junk food. :D

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    6. And roasted potatoes can't beat roasted kumara.

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    7. Roasted carrots can beat roasted potatoes, under all circumstance :D
      Oh I'm stoked at the moment, we've just bought two bags of different kumara varieties (purple and orange) from the people who sell them on the side of the road (sounds legit, right?), combine that with the yams mum and dad bought at shopping the other day (an expensive delicacy we don't often get) potatoes (there you go Bee!), carrots and boiled Brussels Sprouts/brocolli/cauli with any roast meat and gravy/cheese sauce. *sighs* the best combination ever for winter....

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    8. Oh! Of Course it's not junk food, in that case anyway! Lol Xj

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    9. Lol. Until a few years ago I did my best to avoid eating kumara :P

      And chocolate is so not junk food anyways. haha

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    10. Haha, yeah, true that Bee, roasted potatoes are definitely top of the list, if they're done properly... Haha, Chocolate comes from beans, so it's a vegetable. Very healthy.

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    11. How could you not have eaten Kumara for all these years Bee?!?! That's ridiculous, you've wasted so many years without them!

      yep, chocolate is made from beans, the beans are on a plant, which is a tree, therefore chocolate is a salad :P

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    12. Lol Kayger. Cos who eats kumara when you you could eat potatoes?! :P

      pfft. chocolate.

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    13. Seriously, you have to catch up on lost time Bee. We even *grow* kumara... Sweet potato, so therefore, if you like potato, you have to eat kumara!

      Haha, which also means chips are healthy, they come from potatoes... Vegetables aren't junk food are they? Hehe, we'll have your junk free June sorted in no time!!! :P

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    14. You're like my mum, won't eat Kumara or much pumpkin. Dad won't eat Brussells (Zeriods, to us) I mean, they taught us not to be fussy!
      Golly, who can't not like Kumara?

      We don't grow kumara as we're not too successful with them, but there's a big kumara community in the region, thankfully :D

      Andrew, tut tut, I won't fail!! haha

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  2. Oh yeah, I can see chocolate is good that way, definitely. But it's bad for us, especially since we live only 10 minutes drive from town, or two minutes drive from a gas station. Mum and I during a bad day, when we're peeved about something, cold or tired in general, are like, do you feel like chocolate? Yep, ok grab the keys.
    Ok, so maybe not that extreme, but still!'

    Weird, I thought they did have a breeding season, as they only had so many weeks where they could physically get in lamb? From what I remember from previous years study through telford anywho...I dunno.

    Update, assignment is done! I quit at about 4300 words and 8 full pages, plus the bibliography page. They said "around 5000 words", so I figured that would be OK...

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    1. One of the best ways of ensuring a long essay is removing the contractions. Isn't becomes is not, and you have automatically gained another word! :D

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    2. Yep, Mum was reading through it and reminded me of that - can't believe how many "they're"s I had that gained me more words once they were sorted...!

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    3. Haha, yeah, and also descriptions... Like instead of "putting rams out", as you would normally say, you can instead say "Putting a couple of rams out with the main mob of ewes at a rate of a hundred ewes per one ram." I mean, that is what, an instant 20 words, to say pretty much exactly the same thing??? :P

      Ewes do tend to have a set season of sorts, but that varies across breeds, and once teaser rams enter the scene, can be totally destroyed. The main lambing season for most farmers is late winter to early summer, which is probably what the examiners wanted, but there are definitely larger farms which get their ewes lambing all year round, so that they can supply the markets all year round and such, and get massive loads of cash for supplying lambs during the off season, even though they're poor quality lambs having been raised in the worst conditions... So not common, but possible.

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    4. I reckon! I'm like that with essays or paragraphs for school. Suddenly 500 words becomes at minimum 600. Minimum word requirement complete!

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    5. Hmmm, interesting.

      Yep, it's nice to extend out essays from that reason :D

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