Hawk Haven Winery | Rio Grande, NJ

 

 

On my way down to see Cape May Brewing Company,  I drove past a sign for Hawk Haven Winery and it looked kind of interesting, so on my way home I stopped. When Todd Wuerker saw me get out of my car with a big camera, he scurried, afraid I was trying to sell him something. Eventually, he came back around and we talked for a couple of hours, and even drank some wine. They have a great product, a promising venue and a story to tell. I'll be back.

Cape May Brewing Co

Last weekend I ventured down to Cape May to see about a new brewery right here in our county and aptly named the Cape May Brewing Company. They've been open for a little less than a year, but they're getting ready to expand so I'll be visiting them again soon. Keep a look out around June or July.

Barn Raising In Goshen

 

 

SALT | CONCEPT ISSUE | APRIL 2012

Welcome to SALT, the concept issue. A digital magazine dedicated to Culture, Art, Retail and Dining in Cape May County, New Jersey.

For now, we're playing around with editorial content and guaging interest from the local business community. There's been a very good response so far.

We will be looking for contributors eventually. Mostly as a community thing. For fun. We won't be able to pay, but there should be some good exposure.

So if you're a photographer, writer or illustrator, or know one who you think is great, drop me a note with your submission ideas and some samples of your work. 

Have a shop, restaurant, event or personality that you think we should cover? Send it along.

Interested in advertising your product, company or service? Let me know. I'd like to make a note about this as well. While we will be accepting advertising, we have very strict guidelines as to the quality of the advertising we'll take. If it's not up to our artistic standards, we'll be happy to design your ad for you at no charge. But we're looking for branded advertising only. No specials. No coupons. No deals. If the advertising is tacky, the magazine becomes tacky. Then it's not worth doing.

This is the beauty of doing something yourself, and for which you don't care if you make money on. You can make your own rules.

For editorial submissions:

submissions@saltnj.com

To submit story ideas:

stories@saltnj.com

To ask about advertising availability:

sales@saltnj.com

The Magic Of Easter (Chicks)

Twenty days ago, we put 18 freshly laid eggs in an incubator, added a little water to the CIRCULATION trough, and plugged it in. Tomorrow, which will be 21 days exactly, we will have fuzzy, yellow chicks. It's incredible really. Any other day and I'm cracking eggs into a bowl to eat. But cook them at 100° for 21 days and you get a chicken. Astounding to me.

Jane woke me up this morning with a look on her face like Christmas morning. "We're going to have chicks," she said. The chicks were cheeping and cracking through their shells already.

This shouldn't actually be a big deal for us. We've done this six or seven times before. But unlike our last rooster, our current one didn't seem overly romantic. In other words, he wasn't tackling a poor hen every time we turned around and giving her what-for, which is what our last rooster did. Our old hens often looked like they'd been put through the wringer. Well, apparently, the new guy is doing his business, he's just doing it with a lot less fanfare, not to mention wear and tear on the hens.

Even though they're not supposed to be here until tomorrow, we have several eggs that have little holes in them and at least one that is working pretty hard to get out. The whole thing makes Jane a little claustrophobic. Imagine being stuck in a shell, trying to get out. Yuck.

The chicks have a little sharp part on their beaks at this point that helps them poke a little hole in the egg. From that little hole, they struggle to crack the rest of the egg. You can see them resting and panting, in between struggles. You can't help them. If you do, they'll just die. And if they can't get out in a certain amount of time, they'll also die. It's survival of the fittest. Only the strong survive.

We've had years where nearly every egg hatches, and we've had off years where maybe only half do. There are a lot of variables, so it's hard to know why.

Which is why we have 18 eggs in there at the moment. We certainly don't want or need 18 chickens. Then once you do hatch them, a few die along the way. They drown in their waterer or get trampled by the other chicks. It's a rough start.

If I had to guess, I'd say we'll end up with about a dozen when it's all said and done.

Most are going to Julia and Mike (my step-daughter and her husband), but a few are probably going to end up at Stan's Crow Creek farm. Stan is also getting our extra rooster.

That's right, we have an extra rooster. Little fact for you non-chicken-raising-people. You can only have one rooster in the hen house. That's no joke. Otherwise it's chaos. So we had to kick one out. He's just been hanging around the yard. I used to kill them. Just chop off their heads and feed them to the crabs at the end of our road. But I don't like doing that. And he's beautiful. He's just one too many.

So he's moving up the road to live with Stan. And a few ladies will join him once they're old enough. If they don't all get picked off by owls, hawks and eagles, or eaten at night by coyotes, weasels, raccoons, or foxes, they'll be fine.

Spring Cleaning | The Tavern House

It's spring cleaning around The Tavern House (aka Uppie's Farm). The Tavern House is the name of our house. We didn't make it up. It's what people used to call the house. The Tavern House was built in 1725 as a private home. At some point, we think in the 1800's, it became a Tavern and stagecoach stop for travelers coming from Washington, D.C. and Philadelphia on their way to Cape May. At the end of our road, there was also a shipbuilding yard, which I can only guess also contributed patrons to a local tavern. On some of the old maps, it's referred to as The Hotel. At some point we know there was a fire, but how and when it became a residence again, we just don't know.

Clockwise: spigot, blueberry bush, raised beds, hosta

We often refer to it as Uppie's Farm. Uppie is my wife, or at least that's what she's know by to our nieces, grandchild, and a growing number of people. We've come to that point in our lives, where grown adult friends are starting to call us by our nicknames. It won't be long now till friends and family all start calling me Grandie. Uppie's Farm is how our nieces referred to our home when they lived in Switzerland. We had a big yard, chickens, pigs, a garden, so naturally they thought of it as her farm. I just live here.

Clockwise: Tavern House, Side Porch, Sconce, Mailbox, Front Porch, Hedgerow

Today is a nice Spring day. Not really nice, but the kind of day that's nice to work in the yard. Or at least it's a nice day for someone to work. I prefer to take pictures and write about it. So Jane hired a young guy who's cleaning out the gutters, clearing brush away, etc... He's no joke.

Jane got a new rain barrel for Mother's Day. It's here a bit early. I still need to hook it up, but being I'm about as handy as a one-armed violinist, I'll need to get one of our daughter's husbands over here to help.

Clockwise: Rain Barrel, Brass Spigot, Black and white, Intake

They're made out of old Whiskey barrels, refurbished, and then fitted out with intakes and a brass fixture. They're pretty actually. Ours is currently sitting by our back door. Not sure if it will be able to stay there or not.

Jane's hired man Paul, cleaned out the raised beds a few weeks ago and spread mulch, so the garden already looks pretty good. He also totally cleaned out the raspberry bushes, which were completely out of control. We replaced them with two blueberry bushes, which we're hopeful about. Jane also planted some leafy greens, which are just about the only thing you can put in the ground this time of year. Our perennial herbs look good but even they need to be controlled or they spread like weeds. As they say, the definition of a weed is any plant NOT growing where you want it to.

Clockwise: Romaine, Oregano, Black-Eyed Susan, Red Leaf Lettuce, Chives, Rosemary

Jane wanted to paint the living room this Spring, but it just may have to wait until the Fall. I think she's already over the idea of having someone in the house. She's moved on to other things in her mind.

Clockwise: Kitchen Window, Child's Boots, LR Window, Basket, Firewood, Pots/Pans

Admittedly, we're in between seasons. It might be nice our during the day, but that doesn't mean you don't want a warm fire blazing later than night. Although as the season has definitely changed, Jane cooks differently. Not because we have access to different kinds of fresh foods, but because things that might have been acceptable a few weeks ago, are now "winter foods." She claims that a lot of it is how much time she wants to spend cooking, rather than doing things outside.

A summer meal, is a meal without a lot of preparation. You want to spend as little time as possible, and you want cook inside as little as possible. Everything should either be raw, or able to throw on the grill outside. Winter meals can take all day, involve not only the oven, but every burner on the stovetop. What else are you going to do?

Final photo are a few from upstairs. Not everyone sees this area of our house, and Jane might not like showing a room she didn't inspect first, but I think they look great. Even the damn bathroom.

In a weeks we should have baby chicks, as we have a dozen or so in the incubator. Only problem is we don't know if the eggs are fertilized. Jane thinks our Rooster may be gay. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Clockwise: Master Bedroom, Upstairs Bathroom, Stairwell, Bedroom Floor, Bed