Especially if you’re new to gardening or have a new garden plot on an old urban lot, you might be concerned about contaminants in your dirt.
Take some to the Allegheny County Conservation District free soil lead screening from Wednesday through Saturday, April 19-22. Soil samples will be accepted and tested for lead, which can be hazardous when inhaled or ingested, at five locations around the city.
The twice-a-year testing, offered in partnership with Grow Pittsburgh, requires preregistration via this link. ACCD will contact registrants with detailed instructions on how to collect, label and drop off soil samples.
The drop-off locations are:
East End — Garden Resource Center, 147 Putnam St., Pittsburgh, PA 15206 (3 to 7 p.m. Wednesday and Friday and 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday)
South Side — ACCD Office at The Highline, 317 E Carson St., Suite 199, Pittsburgh, PA 15219 (8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesday- Friday)
Central — Phipps Conservatory, 1 Schenley Dr., Pittsburgh, PA 15213 (9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Friday)
North Side — Food for the Soul Community Urban Farm, Pittsburgh, PA 15233 (9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday)
West End — Farmer Girl Eb Shop, 1 Noblestown Road, Pittsburgh, PA 15220 (11 am. to 7 p.m. Wednesday- Friday and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday)
Results and information on how to understand and act on them will be sent to you within two weeks.
For more, contact Hayly Hoch at hhoch@accdpa.org or call 412-241-7645 ext. 8009.
Since 2010, Brazilian origami artist Jo Nakashima has amassed a trove of original designs ranging from modular cubes and kinetic works to multicolor, angular wildlife. His creations require just a single sheet of double-sided paper and a deft hand and vary in complexity: Nakashima marks the eagle with pleated wings, quacking duck, and writhing snake shown here as intermediate or above. Head to YouTube for detailed instructions on folding your own versions of his intricate designs, but take note of his warning: “Although I call it ‘simplified,’ it doesn’t mean it is simple: it is just simpler than the original version, but actually it is still a bit complex.”
Cabbage and sausage is one of the most delicious and satisfying combinations, IMHO. I’ve cooked cabbage and sausage together several ways in the past, but I wanted to test them out in the slow cooker to see if this easy, hands-off cooking method would work too. The verdict? It works! Cabbage and sausage cooked in a slow cooker turns out tender, brothy (almost like a cabbage and sausage soup), and totally delicious.
What Kind of Sausage to Use
You’ll want to use a smoked sausage for this recipe. I suggest using something like kielbasa or andouille. This smoky flavor and spices in the sausage help flavor the entire pot during the long, slow simmer, which makes everything extra flavorful!
Potato Options
I used baby creamer potatoes because they’re easy and didn’t require me to do any chopping, but you could also use red potatoes or Yukon gold potatoes, chopped into 1 to 2-inch pieces. Russet potatoes would probably fall apart a little too much to be practical in this recipe.
How to Season Cabbage and Sausage
My goal for this recipe was to keep it as simple as possible, so I only added a couple of teaspoons of steak seasoning (a chunky mix of salt, pepper, garlic, and red pepper). You could also use something like Cajun seasoning, or you could do something simple like a little salt, pepper, paprika, and caraway seeds.
How to Serve Cabbage and Sausage
I spooned the cabbage, sausage, potatoes, and broth into a bowl and at it as sort of a brothy bowl (not quite a soup, but not quite dry), but you could use a slotted spoon to leave the broth behind if you prefer. Either way, some crusty bread and butter on the side really solidifies this as the ultimate comfort food. :)
Slow Cooker Cabbage and Sausage
Slow cooker cabbage and sausage is an easy, hands-free way to make a delicious, filling, and cozy meal. Perfect for meal prep!
Chop the onion into 1-inch pieces. Place the baby potatoes and onions in the bottom of a 5 quart or larger slow cooker.
Chop the cabbage into 1-inch pieces. Add the cabbage and steak seasoning to the slow cooker.
Slice the sausage into ½-inch thick rounds. Add the sausage to the slow cooker along with the chicken broth. Stir slightly to nestle the sausage down into the cabbage. It's okay if the broth does not cover all the ingredients.
Place the lid on the slow cooker and cook on high for 4 hours or low for 8 hours.
After 4 hours on low or 8 hours on high, stir to combine the ingredients. Taste and adjust the seasonings to your liking. Top with chopped parsley, if desired, then serve hot.
How to Make Slow Cooker Cabbage and Sausage – Step by Step Photos
Chop one yellow onion into one-inch pieces. Place 1.5 lbs. baby potatoes and the chopped onion in the bottom of a 5 quart or larger slow cooker.
Chop ½ head of cabbage into one-inch pieces (about 5-6 cups once chopped). Add the chopped cabbage to the slow cooker along with 2 tsp steak seasoning.
Slice 14oz. smoked sausage into ½-inch thick rounds. Add the sliced sausage to the slow cooker along with 2 cups chicken broth.
Slightly stir the ingredients in the slow cooker just so the sausage gets nestled down into the cabbage a bit.
Place the lid on the slow cooker and cook on high for four hours or low for eight hours. After cooking, it will look a little like this.
Stir everything together, top with chopped parsley (optional), and serve hot!
If you’re part of a business or school that is a G Suite legacy free edition user, your organization will soon have to sign up for a paid subscription to continue using Google Workspace (via 9to5Google). Google will automatically upgrade free plans to a Google Workspace subscription “based on the features you currently use” if your organization doesn’t sign up for a paid plan by May 1st.
Only 34 paintings by Dutch master Johannes Vermeer, art history’s foremost painter of Side Views of People Doing Things Near Windows, have been known to survive to the present day, so when one of them is restored, it’s a big deal. The Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister in Dresden shared the first image of the completed restoration of Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window — and you might notice a pretty big change on the wall behind the girl.
The painting has been in the museum’s collection for more than 250 years and the hidden Cupid had been known about since an x-ray in 1979 and infrared reflectography in 2009. It had been assumed that the artist himself had altered the composition by covering over the painting of Cupid.
But when a major restoration project began in May 2017, conservators discovered that the paint on the wall in the background of the painting, covering the naked Cupid, had in fact been added by another person. When layers of varnish from the 19th century began to be removed from the painting, the conservators discovered that the “solubility properties” of the paint in the central section of the wall were different to those elsewhere in the painting.
Following further investigations, including tests in an archaeometry laboratory, it was discovered that layers of binding agent and a layer of dirt existed between the image of Cupid and the overpainting. The conservators concluded that several decades would have passed between the completion of one layer and the addition of the next and therefore concluded that Vermeer could not have painted over the Cupid himself.
There is a certain aesthetic amenity to the bare wall in the altered version but maaaybe the original Cupid lends the painting some figurative meaning?
@fxer Word!! And then also the two (?) masks at his feet, one up and one down? Previous victims. Also, what kind of cupid has that kind of leg build? And what is with the staff. I realize focusing on the tiny dick n balls is more succinct and immediate, but it truly only lures you into the further creep.
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