Walking With El Salvador

It is not likely that when indigenous peoples of North America and European settlers sat down together to give thanks, they had crock bowls filled with green bean casserole topped with fried onion rings at their tables. It is likely that green beans were among the fruits of the land gathered during bountiful summer harvests.  It is one of the foods which originated in the Americas. People in Central and South America have eaten green beans for centuries.  Green beans made their way to Europe in the ships of 15th century explorers.  Green beans were expensive and rare, gained culinary popularity in France in the 1600's and eventually made their way into Midwestern USA casserole dishes with mushroom soup and onion rings. Thanksgiving dinners give honor to many fruits and vegetables which are native to the Americas, In El Salvador, green beans are very often prepared with eggs.  This is one of our favorite dishes served at Casa Concordia in San Salvador.  Alt...

"What should we do with this big sweeper?" I asked my husband.  I had been cleaning out the garage, giving things to our grown kids and loading up pots and tools for the urban greenhouse project.  "Sell it?" he suggested over the phone. We bought the sweeper just after we moved into our house.  Pulling it along behind our tractor mower has helped us gather up mountains of leaves and too-long grass over the years -- much easier than raking all of that stuff into the compost pile. Now, I just wanted it gone.  Once we made the decision to downsize, to move to a smaller place in the US so we could spend significantly more time in El Salvador, I was eager to begin the process. So, I wheeled the sweeper down to the bottom of the driveway.  I tiptoed my dirty, garage-cleaning self into the house and grabbed a piece of scrap paper, a black sharpie and some blue painters' tape.  I wrote a note: We will gladly accept a donation for this sweeper to support minis...