Sunday, February 8, 2026
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Lovina Shares a Recipe from Her New Cookbook

By
tammiehoeme
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0

Lovina’s Amish Kitchen
Lovina Eitcher,
Old Order Amish
Cook, Wife &
Mother of Eight

 

There are seventeen days left until daughter Lovina and Daniel’s wedding day. Although we are getting a lot accomplished, there is still a lot to be done. 

I sewed my dress, cape, and apron and also daughter Verena’s for the wedding. I still have Lovina’s wedding dress to sew. It keeps getting pushed off to another day. 

Today, sisters Verena and Emma; nieces Elizabeth and Emma and Crystal; and daughters Elizabeth, Susan and Loretta are all planning to come help. I have a list of things to do. We will make more noodles for the wedding. I need around 40 pounds, and we already made half of that another day. We also need to make rhubarb juice to put in cans for future use. I have strawberries here that need to be put into jam for the wedding as well. And then we will wash more windows if we have time. 

On Saturday, daughters Elizabeth and Susan cleaned the living room and dining room windows and washed the screens. The basement and back porch windows need to be cleaned yet and the bathroom and kitchen windows. Our house has over 40 windows, so it takes time to clean all of them. 

Last night, daughter Verena’s special friend Daniel Ray went with her to pick up her new glasses at the eye doctor. After they were back, Daniel Ray and Verena cleaned half of the windows in the pole barn where we plan to have wedding services. 

Last Saturday, the men in our family—my husband Joe; sons Benjamin and Joseph; sons-in-law Tim, Ervin, and Dustin; and special friends Daniel, Daniel Ray, and Clint (a brother to Daniel, Dustin, and Grace)—poured 31 yards of concrete in the new pole barn. A tree that had been dead for a while was cut down and the wood hauled away. Also, the garden was weeded and tilled. Grace (Joesph’s special friend) and my daughters cleaned windows or helped get lunch ready. We had a Haystack for lunch along with pumpkin bars, pudding cake, watermelon, ice cream, and more. 

For breakfast, we had breakfast burritos. Verena and Lovina made 50 the day before so we could just heat them up on Saturday morning. The men wanted to wait to eat until the concrete was poured. The trucks were here at 7 a.m. and they had it all poured in a few hours. A few of the men had to stay out there finishing it off while the others could do other jobs around here. What would we do without family? We sure appreciate their help with preparing for this wedding. 

Yesterday, Daniel had the day off from the factory, so he and Lovina went over to his place. He mowed while she worked on getting the house prepared. She has moved a lot of her belongings over there already. It’s always sad to see another of the children’s belongings move out of our house, but life goes on. I wish them a very happy and healthy life together with God always being their guide. Daniel and Lovina have plans to take a week after the wedding and stay at a lake house. After all the work, they can relax and enjoy their married life. 

Tomorrow afternoon, we plan to leave for Kentucky for nephew Issac and Susan’s wedding. Issac is Joe’s sister Salome and Morris’s son, and Susan is my cousin David’s daughter. We should get to see some family at the wedding. I have been asked to be a cook and so have daughters Elizabeth and Susan, but they won’t be able to go to the wedding. Sister Emma is also a cook, and son Joseph and Grace are table waiters. We have a driver taking us with his 15-passenger van. Those planning to go are sisters Verena and Emma and sons Jacob and Steven, Joe and I, sons Benjamin, Kevin, Joseph (and Grace), daughter Verena (and Daniel Ray). We will leave tomorrow late afternoon and plan to head home and be back Friday night, Lord willing. 

I left sister-in-law Sarah Irene a voicemail letting her know that her and the family are in our thoughts. I was glad to hear back from her. They are doing as well as can be expected. Albert is missed so much. May God help comfort them. Rest in peace dear brother. God’s blessings to all!

I am so excited to have the copy of my newest cookbook The Cherished Table in my hands. All the hard work the girls and I put in it is now worth it! I will share a recipe from the new book.

 

Barbecue Beef Sandwiches

3 pounds beef bottom round roast

3 green peppers, seeded and chopped

2 cups chopped onions

1 clove garlic

1/2 cup brown sugar

3 tablespoons chili powder

2 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon dry mustard

2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce

Combine all ingredients in a large Dutch oven or roasting pan. Cook at 350oF for 2 to 3 hours, or until beef is tender. (I put mine in the oven, but it can also be cooked in a crock pot over high heat.) Seve on sandwich buns. This is similar to pulled pork sandwiches, except with beef. 

Lovina’s Amish Kitchen is written by Lovina Eicher, Old Order Amish writer, cook, wife, and mother of eight. Her three cookbooks, The Cherished Table, The Essential Amish Cookbook, and Amish Family Recipes, are available wherever books are sold. Readers can write to Eicher at Lovina’s Amish Kitchen, PO Box 234, Sturgis, MI 49091 (please include a self-addressed stamped envelope for a reply); or email [email protected] and your message will be passed on to her to read. She does not personally respond to emails.

Baffling airline rule

By
Milo Yield
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0
Thayne Cozart
Milo Yield

Last week I used my entire column to tell the miserable tale of personal airline debacle on our air trip to Knoxville, Tenn., to the wedding of our grand-daughter. However, I put off until this week a discussion of a baffling airline travel safety situation that is not rigorously enforced by the ever-alert Transportation Security Administration (TSA).

I learned the hard way years ago that you can’t board an airline with a cheap pocketknife in your pocket. That’s becuz I had a pocketknife confiscated by the TSA at the airport in Wichita. The TSA will also confiscate metal fingernail clippers — too dangerous to carry on an airliner or in airport concourses.

Now I will admit that it would be possible, but not easy, to kill or maim a fellow airline passenger with a pocketknife. However, in my long lifetime I’ve never once heard about someone killing or maiming someone with finger nail clippers. A fingernail file? Perhaps. But not clippers.

Which brings me to the point about the baffling TSA overlook when it comes to air travel safety. In my old age, whenever I expect to walk a goodly distance, I take along a very nice walking stick that I bought at a curio shop on the Grand Canyon four years ago. Since I expected to have to walk quite aways in the Dallas-Ft. Worth airport on our trip, I took along my walking stick.

Now, my walking stick is four-feet long and about an inch and a half in diameter at the head. It weights a couple of pounds at least. While technically it’s a walking stick, it could serve equally well as a cudgel stick — a club if you choose. If I had a mind to do harm to someone, my cudgel stick would serve the purpose quite effectively. In short, it would be easy to clunk someone in the head with my walking stick. It would be far easier to cause personal injury with my walking stick than it would with my pocketknife or fingernail clippers.

But, do you know what? The ever-vigilant folks at the TSA — without hesitation or question — happily escorted my walking stick through their security check line. I picked it up with my billfold and shoes and kept it with me throughout our lengthy airport delay ordeal. I carried it on to the plane and stored it in the overhead bin. I could have clunked any number of obnoxious persons I encountered, but I didn’t.

However, I can report that my dangerous walking stick provided me a sense of personal security just in case I happened to need it. Glad the TSA didn’t confiscate it!

***

A faithful rancher reader, ol’ Manny G. Kowkamps, from Bennett, Colo. — with beef enterprises in both Colorado and Wyoming — wrote me a personal letter this week thanking me for opposing the introduction of wolves and Grizzly bears into mountainous cattle country. Both of those predatory critters love the taste of fresh-killed beef.

Manny sez that in Colorado it’s all the “woke” folks, from the governor on down, who advocate for wolves and bears. I’d wager a guess that few, if any, of them have personally laid eyes on the ravaged remains of a bovine critter painfully and frightfully brought down alive and eaten by those predators. I doubt very much that their squeamish stomachs and animal-loving hearts could handle the sight. But, they might imagine what happened through the eyes of the beef critter, rather than through the eyes of the predator.

Anyway, ol’ Manny says that “speaking up” is about the only way he has to hopefully bring about change. He also mentioned that part of his “speaking up” is to apply bumper stickers to his vehicles that read “Shoot, Shovel and Shut-up.” He says when Colorado “woke folks” ask him about the bumper stickers, he tells them it’s for “perverts, pedophiles, and politicians.” He gave me two such stickers and I attached them to my old, decrepit UTV.

***

I know it’s after Memorial Day, but I didn’t become aware of the following patriotic poem until just a few days ago. It wuz written by my old high school English, Literature and Drama teacher, ol’ deManza Rhymer. Yep, he’s considerably older than me and he’s still kickin’ and creatin’ in Kansas City. Here’s his Memorial Day poem:

 

Ode to Those Who Fought

In days of yore, when freedom’s flame
Did flicker low, and tyranny’s name
Did reign supreme, a heroic band
Did stand and fight, with hearts so grand.

Their cause was just, their will unbroken,
Their courage unshaken, their hearts unspoken.
For they knew that democracy was the key
To freedom’s door, where all may be.

These brave souls fought with strength and grace,
Their voices raised, their hearts in place.
They stood against the tide of hate,
And fought for what is right, for what is great.

Today, we must honor their memory,
And heed their call to stand in unity.
For if we do not, democracy’s light
May fade away, and darkness takes its flight.

So let us stand, and fight for what is right,
For democracy’s sake, and for our sight.
For if we do not, we shall surely fall,
And tyranny will stand tall.
***

These words of wisdom for the week come from the aforementioned Manny G. Kowkamps: “Take a deep seat, a short rein, and a far-away look and never eat or drink anything you can’t pronounce.” Have a good ‘un.

The Big Pink Blob

By
Lee Pitts
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lee pitts

I’m a big Temple Grandin fan and in one of her articles Temple explained how a sudden scary event in an animal’s life, when it happens for the first time, can create “fear memories that can last a lifetime.

The first time I hauled my wonder horse Gentleman I had to do it in the only trailer available to me: Grandpa’s old two horse trailer that he won at a roping in the 1940’s. Gentleman loaded easily enough but then he had to try to remain in an upright position while straddling the trailer axle and without putting too much weight on the floorboards because they were rotten. If it wasn’t for the accumulated manure there wouldn’t have been any structure for Gentleman to stand on at all.

Gentleman did not enjoy that first trip in the old trailer and when I opened the tailgate he pulled back with such force he broke the rope halter and came flying out of there. When I finally caught him a mile away Gentleman was still shaking like a meadowlark trying to pass a peach pit. As a result a fear memory was imprinted on Gentleman’s brain and henceforth not even the offensive line of the Kansas City Chiefs, several four by four fence posts, a skid steer and an assortment of chains, ropes and a garden hose could have gotten him to load.

Temple didn’t say so but I think fear memories can also be imprinted on the human brain. Because I didn’t have a lot of money to start out with I raised sheep instead of cattle figuring I’d do my learning and experimenting with cheaper stock. It turned out to be a wise move because I needed more experience in calving heifers and cows. So I learned on sheep. I found it relatively easy to grab on to the head and two front feet of a lamb and after making sure the feet belonged to the right head I could pull a lamb.

By the time I had three seasons of lambing out a flock of sheep behind me I felt ready to tackle cattle. I’d taken a course in artificial insemination and felt I knew my way around the inside of a cow and so I started out with what I called “one-shot” cows, figuring these old grannies wouldn’t have any problems with calving and I could gradually learn on the job. But this idea of starting with older cows instead of bred heifers presented its own set of problems. One day while Gentleman and I were checking on the cows I was shocked to see an old cow with a gigantic pink blob hanging out her butt. It was my first experience with a uterine prolapse and I was so stunned by the big pink blob that it created a fear memory in my brain that has never gone away.

My vet was tied up elsewhere so I called on my neighbor Jeep to come help put this 30 pound mass back inside the cow where it belonged. We got the cow standing up in my squeeze chute and did the best we could cleaning the filthy blob, than Jeep said we needed a five pound sack of sugar to coat the blob to reduce its size. I don’t know how we did it but we managed to make the blob disappear. But then we had another problem: how do we keep the cow from giving birth to her own uterus again as she was attempting to do. Jeep then requested a Mason jar that we filled with water and put the lid on real tight. Then Jeep had me put this jar inside the cow hoping the weight of the water in the jar would keep the uterus inside. Finally I sewed up the vulva of the cow, allowing her enough room to pee but not enough for her to give birth to her uterus again.

After she’d fattened up a bit she looked pretty good so I sent the old gal to the auction, completely forgetting that I hadn’t removed the Mason jar like I was supposed to. I’ll bet a real fear memory was created in the next rancher (who probably bought her as a “one shot” cow too) when the old gal gave birth to twins… a calf and a Mason jar.

Senior Citizens Encouraged to Apply to Receive Checks to Buy Fruits, Vegetables, Herbs and Honey at Farmers Markets in Reno County

By
Guest Columnist
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0

Low-income Kansas seniors may be eligible for a program that provides coupon
vouchers to purchase fresh, unprocessed fruits and vegetables and honey at farmers markets in selected counties throughout the state.

The Kansas Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program (KSFMNP) is providing low-income seniors who meet age and income requirements with $50 in coupon vouchers to purchase fresh fruits, vegetables, herbs and honey from authorized farmers at local participating farmers markets. Coupon booklets containing 10 vouchers worth $5 each will be distributed.

To be eligible to receive KSFMNP coupon vouchers, the following criteria must be met:

1. Age: A senior must be 60 years old or older, or at least 55 years old and a member of an Indian Tribal Organization, on the day the money is issued.
2. Income level: A senior’s annual gross household income (before taxes are withheld) must be at or below 185% of the federal poverty level. For example, a household of one must have an annual gross income at or below $27,861, or a monthly gross income at or below $2,322.

The Kansas Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program application process in Reno County will again be conducted by telephone. However, those who do not have a telephone may visit the Reno County Department of Aging at 120 W Avenue B in Hutchinson for assistance. The application period begins June 18, 2024.

To apply, Seniors may call 620-694–2985 or 620-694- 2909 beginning June 18, 2024, between the hours of 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. M – F. No early calls will be accepted.

A limited number of coupon vouchers are available and will be distributed on a first-come, first-served basis. For more information about the Kansas Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program, call the Reno County Department of Aging at 620-694-2911.

Eligible foods to purchase with the KSFMNP checks from authorized farmers at participating farmers markets are defined as “fresh, nutritious, unprepared, locally grown fruits, vegetables, locally produced honey and herbs for human consumption that are produced in Kansas under normal growing conditions.”

The Senior Farmers’ Market Program is a project of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food and Nutrition Service (FNS). The program is coordinated by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE), which is collaborating with local partners to identify and distribute coupon booklets to eligible seniors.

The program is currently available in the following counties: Allen, Anderson, Atchison, Barton, Bourbon, Brown, Butler, Clay, Cloud, Chase, Cherokee, Cheyenne, Coffey, Cowley, Crawford, Decatur, Dickinson, Doniphan, Douglas, Ellis, Ellsworth, Finney, Franklin, Geary, Harvey, Hodgeman, Jackson, Jefferson, Jewell, Johnson, Labette, Leavenworth, Linn, Lincoln, Lyon, Marion, Marshall, McPherson, Miami, Mitchell, Morris, Nemaha, Neosho, Norton, Osage, Osborne, Ottawa, Pawnee, Pottawatomie, Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation,
Rawlins, Reno, Republic, Rice, Riley, Saline, Sedgwick, Shawnee, Sheridan, Sherman, Stafford, Smith, Sumner, Thomas, Wabaunsee, Washington, Wilson, and Wyandotte.

This institution is an equal opportunity provider.

KDA Animal Health to Host Regional Workshops

By
Guest Columnist
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0

The Kansas Department of Agriculture’s Division of Animal Health will host regional meetings across the state this summer to discuss critical topics related to the livestock industry in Kansas. KDA encourages livestock owners, veterinarians, and county officials to attend to learn more about how animal disease response plans may affect them.

Each workshop will include two sessions. The afternoon session (1:00–4:00 p.m.) is intended for emergency management professionals and county officials; discussion topics will include the role of the county in a disease response, livestock truck rollover, disposal and sheltering. The evening session (6:00–8:00 p.m.) will be for veterinarians and livestock producers; discussion topics will include animal disease traceability, secure food supply planning and disease response plans. A networking dinner will be held between sessions, which is open to all attendees.

Locations for the workshops are:

June 11: El Dorado — Butler County Community (4-H) Building

June 12: Fort Scott — Cleaver/Boileau/Burris Agriculture Hall at Fort Scott

Community College

June 18: Hutchinson — Kansas State Fairgrounds

June 26: Scott City — Western Kansas Child Advocacy Center

June 27: Dodge City — Ford County 4-H Building

July 10: Colby — City Limits Convention Center

July 11: Hays — Ellis County Emergency Management Office

The workshops are free, including the networking dinner, but registration is required. Go to agriculture.ks.gov/AnimalHealthOutreach or call 785-564-6608 to register for either of the two sessions.

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