Independence Days Update: On the Cusp of a New Year
Sharon September 14th, 2009
I was awakened this morning by the honking of geese flying south – there’s no sound that so firmly says “gather ye fresh tomatoes while you may, those summer things are transient and passing.” I don’t really mind, but I’m hoping for a few more weeks (some years we get months, last year we had an early frost) of good tomatoes, peppers and eggplant before the inevitable frost. I still have hot pepper jam to make to go with chevre in the winter, sweet corn and pepper relish, and the corn for winter’s corn chowder to put up, and eggplant to freeze for parmesan…. I’m not ready to let go of summer.
This week will be a busy one, with light posting and preserving, as we get ready for the Rosh Hashana holidays. We’re having guests both nights, and looking forward to it, but there’s much to be done, including stacking all the wood on our driveway presently blocking handicapped access to the gate for our elderly guests.
Our one sorrow this week, as we enter into the New Year, is the loss of our cat, Zucchini. He was young, only three, and the perfect barn and house cat – summers were spent chasing mice out of the hay barn and accompanying us on walks in the woods, winters spent curled up on our laps. He’s been gone five days now, and we’re betting on a fox or coyote. The kids are heartbroken, and Eric and I are a little heartbroken ourselves. There’s still a chance he may come back, but the neighbors haven’t seen him and we’re increasingly doubtful.
We’re still on kid watch – Selene is huge and ready to pop (or so it looks) while Maia seems to be a bit behind her – she’s only just bagging up now. Meanwhile, there are 22 new chicks in our barn.
Official release date of Independence Days is coming up soon – I should have a copy of the book in hand by the end of the month, Independent bookstores will get it in October, and Amazon is delivering November 1. I’m very excited about it.
Tomorrow is the date of my great corn project – I put up 200 ears of corn. By the end of the experience I’m so thoroughly sick of corn – of cobs and husks and little bits of sweet corn that stick to your skin and corn silks everywhere… it is my single least favorite preserving job of the year. But it is *so* worth it to eat sweet corn chowder in the dead of winter, and warm yourself with summer on the tongue.
And much of the preserving rush is like this – some days I look at the tomatoes and say “oh, lordy, I don’t want to deal with them.” But then you hear the geese fly by your window, and know that every hour you put in is a meal you don’t have to think about on a short, cold January day, and know that the tomatoes, like all seasonal things, soon will pass, replacing overabundance with insufficiency.
Plant something: Transplanted a few ginko seedlings into a nursery bed
Harvest something: Tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, hot peppers, green beans, beets, chard, kale, broccoli, turnips, collards, betony, peppermint, sage, lemon balm, gotu kola, curry plant, rosemary, zucchini, eggs, milk.
Preserve something: Dried zucchini, made tomato sauce, salsa, tomatillo salsa, dried hot peppers, made spicy pickled turnips, made kim chi, dried sweet peppers, froze peppers, froze eggplant, made applesauce
Waste Not: Started some apple peel vinegar, otherwise, the usual composting, etc…
Want Not: Picked up some kids biographies and bunny cages at a yard sale.
Eat the Food: Nothing really new, although I’ll be testing out some new recipes for Rosh Hashana – I’m doing a vegan Mexican thing one night, and playing with tamale recipes…
Build community food systems: Nothing new, although I may have some allies to take on a project I’ve wanted to do for a long time.
How about you?
Sharon
- Independence Days Challenge
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Plant Something—salad greens, kale, peas
Harvest Something— cherry tomatoes, bell peppers, jalapeños, red okra, green okra, green beans, green onions, red onions, yellow onions, white onions, butternut squash, slicing tomatoes, shelling beans, passion fruit, various herbs, and pears from a friend. Flowers, herbs, bamboo, and berries from the gardens for flower arrangements.
Preserve Something—I froze soup and chicken stock and dehydrated pears. Added butternut squash and onions to coldest part of the house for longer term storage. Saved Jacob’s cattle and Emerite Filet Bean seeds. Made elderberry syrup.
Prep and Storage—Added ginger tea, Emergen-C, vitamins, and toothpaste to storage. Sorted pantry. Because of an otherwise busy week, we didn’t make much more progress in this area.
Reduce Waste—We continue to do our other energy saving measures and recycle, compost, and use a rain barrel. We had a fundraiser at our church this week. I used the leftovers from the buffet that I had brought for meals and snacks. We preserved the flower arrangements I had made for Sunday’s service. Passed magazines and a book on to a friend. Donated a few more items to the church rummage sale. I’m preparing the meals for the children each Wednesday night at church, and I brought real plates to use instead of disposables. We’ll be requesting hand-me-down plates and bowls for the kids program’s ongoing usage. Read the book Cooking Green, and I’ll be posting some of the energy saving ideas to the blog in hopes that others will read the book and try the tips. A friend passed some hand-me-down shoes on to our daughter.
Building Community Food Systems—We continue to purchase a weekly CSA basket. I made up some boxes at the church food pantry for easy distribution this week. I shared a gallon of sliced bell peppers with a friend. Shared some pears that a friend gave me with two other women who will preserve them. Gave our neighbor another butternut squash. I’m the speaker for the local Weston A Price Foundation meeting in two weeks. I’ll be talking about canning, and I have been planning for that. Our church will be holding another tamale making day, and I’m working with others to gather supplies. Donated a few toiletries to a program for at risk youth (I know that isn’t food, but it most closely fits into this category).
Eating the Food—For a fundraiser at our church last week, I made my herbed cream cheese spread and a crudités platter among other recipes. I substituted blanched green beans, cherry tomatoes, and squashes from the garden as a way of eating local. We enjoyed a delicious local meal Sunday night, noteworthy mainly because it was the return of salad greens with the weather cooling. We had fresh salad and baked potatoes with homemade salsa.
Son is on Coffee Grounds duty. When he drives home from college every day, he hits Starbucks for grounds. So far I’ve dug them into one bed and planted 21 cloves of garlic.
Harvested and canned tomatoes. Removed the plants – they really had stopped producing, and I need to prep bed and plant winter stuff.
Thinned turnips again, froze greens.
Started putting down newspaper and topping it with compost to convert lawn to garden for next spring. Will film video of that probably tomorrow and see if I can learn how to upload it to YouTube. YouTube is a community, isn’t it?
Frondly, Fern
“…And much of the preserving rush is like this – some days I look at the tomatoes and say “oh, lordy, I don’t want to deal with them.” ”
I know how you feel – last night I finished the last of 100 lbs of tomatoes.
I wanted to dry half of them into powder as an experiment – which means they have to be REALLY dry to even begin to powder and they are so incredibly hydrophilic they start to clump as I’m pouring from the blender to the storage jar.
And by the end, some of the powder particles weren’t quite as fine as the particles in the beginning. I too, was getting pretty tired of tomatoes.
But I keep thinking, “this is my food supply, this is all there is”. *Maybe* three or four weeks of peppers, tomatoes, corn, and melons and then that’s it except for stored root vegetables.
And for me, this is all research and development
– 100 lbs is my best guess for a year’s worth of need. I won’t know for a while if really they will last six months or two years. Particularly since a roommate discovered how good dried tomato slices are as a snack. :0
But I am so very grateful for every jar of whatever that I have put up.
Sharon, could you please say a word or two about how you freeze the eggplant? The book I have recommends cutting slices, and then blanching, shocking and freezing. This sounds like standard procedure for some vegetables. But it just sounds as though it would produce very unappealing eggplant after thawing. Is this what you do? Do you do much else, other than parmesan, with it after thawing?
So sorry about the cat.
Not much new here, except I’m having a go at making a raised bed startiing with the frame from a set of box springs. These were brought new for me when I was five and I was horrified when they collapsed a few nights ago, after only 42 years of use. Things just aren’t make to last any more.
I am also virtually out of knitting wool. The lovely Aran I had my eye on at church as gone to some one else, who will no doubt make a lovely garment of it. I have enought for three hats and the tights I want to knit ala Elizabeth Zimmermann (whom my mother refuses to belive is an Englishwoman on the grounds that a gage of 5 stiches to the inch is barbaric). And then I’ll be in the strange position of having nothing to knit. Nothing left to undo and do up either, unless I take the foolish step of unravelivng things with lots of wear left in them. My mother is down on three skiens of red for mittens and a white baby shawl that is so fiddly she calls it her penance.
Perhaps it’s time for the universe to waft another bag of tangles wool smelling a cigs and cat piss at me.
As I said, not doing much new here.
Plant: Nothing, but spent some time cleaning out the herb beds in preparation for a fall planting. In the process I noticed some volunteer basil & cilantro sprouting, and the tomato plants that weren’t destroyed by the worms seem to be making a comeback … more leaves/roots/blossoms and even some tiny, non-worm-eaten green toms!
Harvest: tomatoes, peppers, basil, oregano, okra, peas; lots more worms for the chickens
Preserve: okra (frozen, for frying … mmm!), pepper vinegar
Waste Not: *Only used the a/c one day last week! This was big for us mentally, as it’s been in the upper 80’s and sticky. Having done it, though, it was fine. The warmest the house got was about 85; it was breezy, so we just did outside stuff then. *We had LOTS of extra laundry this week, as we’re battling head lice. I washed everything in hot water and used the clothesline for drying for the first 6 days; on day 7 I decided that maybe the heat from the dryer might actually be necessary to get rid of the little buggers once and for all. I’m hoping that the lack of a/c might counteract the extra electricity used for laundry. *The usual recycling.
Want Not/Prep/Store: *Used the HECK out of my homemade laundry detergent. I only need to use between ¼ & ½ cup of the liquid/gel to get everything super-clean. I love it so much! *After our bout with lice this week, I’ll be storing a couple sets of delousing combs and a couple of bottles of tea tree oil shampoo & conditioner.
Community Food System: Invited some friends over to share in the pea harvest. Since we put up so many peas earlier in the year, we plan to share this “volunteer” crop with as many people as possible.
Eat the Food: poblano peppers in everything possible (good grief! how many peppers can one plant MAKE!); recycling leftovers into various meals; eating almost exclusively from storage and our garden right now, as finances continue to be very tight
Plant something: nope
Harvest something: tomatoes, peppers both sweet and hot, tomatillos, chard, beets, potatoes, basil, sage, mint, delicata squash, pumpkins
Preserve something: canned potatoes, canned chicken stock from leftovers, canned tomato sauce and salsa
waste not: made produce bags from an old t shirt and some leftover muslin fabric
food systems: Taught my sister in law how to pressure can, talked about where to find local meats.
Eat the food: haven’t tried anything very new. Lots of homemade pizza sauce made into pizza, first chicken pot pie of the season from homegrown veggies and home rendered lard.
Another slow week here, lots of rain, lingering illness and a thankfully short-lived tendinitis of the knee for me, and a perfect storm of work for my partner. When the sunny weekend rolled around, we were both happy to loll around watching tennis on TV and reading books we bought at a big two day library book sale. It was really relaxing.
Plant: No.
Harvest: Tomatoes; cinnamon basil.
Preserve: No.
Waste Not: Used up egg whites leftover from making ice cream with yolks and whey from failed yogurt. Updated storage log.
Want Not: Restocked on buckwheat flour; bought canned soup on loss leader sale. Got cookbooks (including 1950 Betty Crocker I have been looking for), fakebooks, a great (to browse) medicinal plant books, two ca. 1960′s sewing books, scifi and art books, and opera CDs. Also got some heavy duty trays to use for storage of fruit/tomatoes in single layers in the basement – cardboard box lids didn’t work so well for us.
Community: Shopped the farmer’s market.
Eat: Blueberry-cinnamon basil ice cream (a yummy adieu to summer); a special breakfast full-skillet white peach and almond pancake that ended up being more like a bread-ish pudding due to operator error but still quite edible, served with red raspberries; smoked cheddar with backyard tomato and cucumber sandwiches. Otherwise I really checked out on cooking this week.
Away for most of the week in the Mad River Valley in Vermont. I did my first, second, and third natural water swims in the Mad River (too much rain and resulting pollution to do that around where I live in southern Ontario). Picked up local veg and cheese in our travel and had some great meals in our condo kitchen. Brought home a 24 of brewed-in-Vermont organic beer. I was surprised that there was so many brewers doing it in so many varieties in Vermont. Supporting local economy is very big there. The only “multi-national” we bought from was Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream — and they’re from Vermont.
Did do a whirlwind harvest of the garden when we got home on Saturday and all the tomatoes I had put in the cellar and the greenhouse had ripened, so fire-roasted. pureeed, and canned on Sunday. Still more tomatoes coming and I’m going to have heaps of tomatillos.
So the detailed update is here: http://smallvictoriesgreen.wetpaint.com/page/Sept+14+09
I have been very remiss in posting Independence Days updates. Part of the reason is we feel somewhat limited by being in a rental while looking for our own place. We don’t want to do too much to this place so many plans are put on hold. Another reason is it turns out I’m piss-poor at remembering to write down all this stuff so I can report on it. But, FWIW, here’s some of what we’ve been doing for the last little while.
Plant something: Hubby is planting something every single week, and I don’t always know what it is. He’s doing hydroponics in containers only so that we will be able to move everything when we find a place.
Harvest something: No harvests yet but the okra, peppers, and tomatoes are all blooming. We’ll still have non-winter conditions for some time here (not to rub it in or anything *grin*). Fresh produce comes from the CSA weekly.
Preserve something: Dried Thai basil and celery leaves, made prickly pear liqueur and peach liqueur, learned to make vinegar this summer and made a bunch (apple, Asian pear, peach, peach-plum, and prickly pear), trying to convert some pomegranate red wine I don’t like into vinegar, froze 20+ pounds of fire-roasted green chiles, canned pear butter and applesauce.
Waste Not: The vinegars were all made with fruit scraps. Composting continues, now with the addition of dog fur. Picked up a big load of coffee grounds from Starbucks for my hubby’s planned vermiculture experiment and shredded most of the Sunday paper for worm bedding.
Want Not: Picked up tons of velcro strap and bungee cord material at yard sale, as well as another couple boxes of canning jars.
Eat the Food: Enjoying homemade vinegar on fresh summer vegetables! It’s much more flavorful than the storebought vinegar. Roasted veg sandwiches were enhanced with a homemade “steak & burger sauce” made from peaches, plums, and apples.
Build community food systems: shared pear butter and pear vinegar with my CSA, along with the recipes. Sampled prickly pear liqueur at CSA for volunteers and staff. Asked a stranger this weekend if I could harvest some of her pomegranates since they were falling off the tree and took her a jar of jelly later as thanks.
My greatest sympathy for Zucchini. Hoping for a miracle for you!
I’m so sorry about your cat.
My update is on my blog, here:
http://inthepurplehouse.blogspot.com/2009/09/independence-days-challenge-week-20.html
Hi Sharon,
Thanks for the information on Macon. I’m planning to come.
I’m so sorry about Zucchini. We lost our eight-year-old cat, Topper a couple of years ago. We’re pretty sure it was a coyote. After a few months, we gave up looking and we adopted another tuxedo cat from a shelter. These little creatures add so much to our lives and ask for so little in return. It is heartbreaking to lose one.
Plant something: Nope, but we did get the ground plowed.
Harvest something: Texas Queen field peas, tomatoes, okra, sweet red peppers, apples.
Preserve something: Canned 6 qts of apples and 6 qts of Texas Queen field peas
Waste Not: The usual recycling and composting. Feeding the chickens very well which means I didn’t do a very good job utilizing the leftovers. Need to plan better.
Want Not: Didn’t add anything this week.
Eat the Food: Corn on the cob w/ barbecue; Strawberries
Build Community Food Systems: Helped neighbors pick peas and okra. They shared the produce and I shared some jellies with them.
Very sorry about Zucchini. Hope he makes it home.
I made some eggplant parmigiana twice already. I must be the only one around with eggplant growing in the middle of the front yard. I usually make a dish of something then freeze some for winter.
I enjoy the wild animals in my yard…grackles, cedar waxwings, sparrows migrating through currently. If a predator nails one of them its none of my concern…just business as usual.
Still can’t imagine how hummingbirds fly such long distances.
Sorry about the kitty, Sharon. We have 3 kitties and a dog so we know how attached one gets to the pets.
At the risk of being gauche, when you’re ready there are many, many kitties at shelters looking for good homes. How many mice are we talkin’ here?
Nothing posted to the website yet, so:
Plant something: not this week
Harvest something: not yet. Lettuce & radish seeds came up Saturday night
Preserve something: froze basil and pumpkin
Waste not – just the usual
Want not – nothing beyond better organization.
Eat the food – baked pumpkin, froze some, made pie. Ate soup from local goods.
Local foodiness – usual farmer’s market and subversion of co-workers into buying there. This one lasts into December
Also met a local farmer I’m looking forward to buying from.
Sorry about your cat…….a shocking amount of them disappear in our urban neighbourhood, and we don’t even have coyotes. Next door neighbour has gone through 4 cats and a dog in the time I’ve known them.
August is usually our last month of winter here though sometimes we still get snow in September, but this year we’ve had the warmest August in 155 years (which is as long as anyone has been keeping records). And this after an unusually cold June. So there’s definitely a seasonal shift this year, and it is already very dry, with lots of warm windy days.
Plant something: Thornless blackberry, golden oregano (scored cheap plants from a market stall), celery seedlings, more peas, some sprouted oca discovered after cleaning out the tuber and onions storage. Having no luck getting lettuce seed to sprout indoors, but self sown lettuce seedlings are doing well outside. Which is good but I want to add a tight headed cos variety to the resident lettuce population. Planted out a few bush beans in a sheltered spot – we’re still getting frosts, so it is a gamble, but I’ve got some glass over them. Moved the first batch of windowsill seedlings to the cold frame, ready to start the next batch.
Harvest something: Lot’s of parsnips, the last few carrots, parsley, garlic scapes, and oodles of eggs. Brocolli, cauliflour, and tatsoi. Piles of chickweed for the chickens.
Preserved: Nope, but got a new preserving recipe book so I’m ready
Waste not: Not doing so well considering what I found when cleaning out the tuber and onion storage area. Nasty…….and drippy. I really should poke my nose in there more often
Incorporated leftover egg white back into the chicken’s mash.
Prep and storage: Stocked up on toothbrushes, garden stakes, and pasta on sale. Currently sharing my office with 6 months supply of wheat due to all the mouse activity in the garage.
Building community food systems: Donated lots of seed to the seed exchange bi-annual seed swap, and scored some lovage seed, and some from an interesting sounding chili pepper.
Eat the food: Looking for baking recipes that use lots of eggs – made brioche rolls for weekend lunch (5 eggs), yummy. Made icecream (4 eggs) but no-one but me is eating it, fussy brats that they are. Also made individual self crusting quiches with lots of grated parsnip, and a bit of grated thumb.
Finished the last stored home grown pumpkin. They’re not cheap in the stores now, so I should have bought a few more as well back when they were cheap. Also using up the homemade dried peppermint, and it is just sprouting in the garden right now. Still eating the dried fruit as snacks and in oatmeal, and looks like the jam from last summer is going to keep us supplied until I start making it again.
I guess that this relates to the ‘community’ portion of Independence Days. I am very discouraged about our community. This year, I’ve tried to get more involved with local people instead of living in my ‘own little country place bubble’ and all it has done is discourage me. I live in a small, rural southern town and the amount of prejudice and backwards thinking absolutely appalls me! If one wants a real community of ANY similar minded people, do you sometimes have to move? I love my home and I love the idea of ‘adapting in place’ but sometimes is it impossible? Please, add your experience…I hate to give up, but…
Froze peaches and plums.
Canned 40 pints of chicken.
Turned lots of spaghetti and butternut squash from our garden into freezer meals for Parker.
Grated and froze zucchini for quick breads.
Purchased canning jars from a yard sale to get ready to make and can applesauce from my parents apples and pumpkin pie filling from our garden pumpkins.
This is our area’s case lot sale time. Purchased cases of needed items.
Ordered wheat.
Froze lots of ears of free corn.
Preparing for the canning class I will be teaching Wednesday night.
Plant something: endive, turnips, radish, spinach, and more buckwheat. I want to plant my cover crops (wheat, rye, vetch, peas, clover, favas) – I’m trying them all this year! – but the beds arent really ready for them, so I keep planting buckwheat in the middle of everything. It’s an experiment.
Harvest something: Tomatoes, zucchini, peppers, okra (really coming in), green beans, pumpkins, blue hubbard squash, sweet meat squash, asian greens, radishes (and daikon), kale, beet greens, snow peas (just a handful here and there).
Preserve something: froze tomatoes, dried peppers & okra. with dehydrator. Also redried a couple things (I dont think that I dried them enough the first time). I hope to start kimchi tomorrow.
Waste Not: more brewery grains for the compost and lasagna beds (prepping for spring potatoes and fall garlic).
Want Not: found a tin to store seeds during planting season (after I take them out of the freezer.) I ordered rolled oats and hulled barley for storage. Also several herbs (nettle, oatstraw, burdock, dandelion, tumeric…)
Eat the Food: eggs with greens and tomatoes. Cottage cheese with pan roasted sunflower, and red and yellow cherry tomatoes, and sweet peppers… nothin fancy.
Build community food systems: played music at the Heritage Harvest Festival at Monticello on Saturday (sponsored by Southern Exposure Seed Exchange). 2700 people came. There was a seed exchange in the morning. I brought some seeds to share and also received some interesting varieties of corn, beans, tomatoes, and gherkins. I attended a couple of the workshops – growing heirloom beans and another one on no-till gardening with Cindy Conner. She will have a new dvd out in Dec. She recommends planting corn in hills (circles) 5 to a circle and on 4 foot centers. when corn is up plant sweet potatoes in the rest of the bed. 2 weeks later, plant pole beans for ea corn plant. She had good recommendations for cover crops (which ones to plant before certain main crops). Her website is : homeplaceearth.com. She has some nice pictures of covercrops in her garden.
The Week In Review: Planted? No. Harvested? Mostly corn, potatoes, tomatoes, apples, grapes, eggs, filberts. Some chives, parsley, basil. Firewood. Stored? Firewood, applesauce, tomato puree, dehydrated tomatoes. We took down and stored the summer burlap awnings. Seeds saved this week: tomatoes. All the bean varieties went into a second bearing, so we’re respectfully waiting for those to all mature and we will, with any luck, dry and shell them. Curing onions, winter squash, pumpkins. Set up fifteen gallons of –we hope– grape wine — if not, then lots of vinegar! We have three volunteers at the community gardens this week, but, again, not me, I’m canning for the home front … but we are definitely the Women’s Land Army! Ate? Whatever was not nailed down, with special emphasis on applesauce and tomato soup left over from canning, and lots and lots of corn on the cob. The variety that turned out well was Silver Queen, which was a gamble for us but it has turned out to be a long season here.
Plant: nothing
Harvest: green beans, tomatoes, sage, thyme, thai basil
Preserve: drying thyme and mint, froze 2 packs of salsa
Waste not: composting & feeding chickens, took some decorative shelves from the neighbors for candles w/ mirrors behind
Want not: am trading food for locally made beeswax candles, stocked up on lemon and lime juice, bought 30# potatoes from our neighbor, got a tag along bike from a friend, and our chickens started laying!
Eat: the boys have been eating up barely ripe plums and the apples before I can get them preserved, last year’s jam, made pumpkin coconut bread from storage supplies.
Build community: made some great new friends at a Transition Town party, ongoing Barter Market at my house, and planning our yearly neighborhood ice cream social.
My update is here
http://kirbanita.typepad.com/take_joy/2009/09/indepen.html
I’m sorry about your cat, Sharon. I hope he shows back up.
We have one missing, too, and the neighbors have seen a big fox down in the woodlot where she liked to spend the days . . . she may yet turn up, but I suspect we have one less cat now.
I haven’t been participating in the Independence Days project, although I do read it with absolute awe at what other folks accomplish. I just have to toss out to folks who will care that I’ve made my first batches of jam *ever* this year — 2 batches of strawberry (traditional with “oh my g-d!” amounts of sugar), one of which turned out more like jarred, slightly more moist fruit roll-up. Oops. (I followed the directions for when jelly is ready instead of for jam. I have plans for it, but it was a little disappointing at the time.) One batch of regular peach jam — smells TOTALLY yummy, but all the fruit is at the top of the jars.
It jelled, so I’m thinking I just need to stir it up when I open them, but suggestions are welcome. I have enough peaches to do another two batches, so I’m going to do some with lower sugar pectin, and some with some crystallized ginger added. My sister-in-law is supposed to be scoring me some (FREE!) organic pears in a couple of weeks — a friend of hers has an orchard at her barn and is generous. I said I’d make pear jam or butter for her, and I think that sealed the deal. 
I’m also going to be getting more strawberries to try the low sugar route — the husband will actually eat strawberry jam, so I definitely need to make more of that.
The other project for this week is tomatoes — saucing a bunch for canning and then I’m going to hopefully can some diced as well. Last year we pureed and froze them — just used the last batch, so we did pretty good for volume.
Now I just need to figure out how much I’ll need raw to produce actual cooked down sauce.
The tomatoes in the garden are remaining stubbornly green — a combination of a really cool, dry summer here in MN and poor garden layout on my part. We are fixing that for next year. The summer squash didn’t totally succumb to squash vine borers this year, but hasn’t produced much either, and the eggplant has all of *2* eggplants on it. I think it got too dry. The orange peppers are ripe though, all 2 of them, and the red are looking like they are contemplating ripening, so it wasn’t a total loss. In fact, they did better than they did last year, so I’m happy. Altogether, we did get some produce from the garden and used it/are using it, so yay! Even small steps are good, right?
It turns out my daughter’s cat, who moused for us for thirteen years, went off on the same day. We think this is it for her … yes, these things can be a big hole in the heart …
Sorry to hear about the loss of your cat. But, congratulations on the new goatling.
I’ve not posted an Independence Days accounting… but, we are doing a pantry inventory and I just wanted you to know that we are putting the lessons and inspiration from your food preservation class into real practice out here. Thank you so much!
Since July – I couldn’t begin to count what we have harvested, eaten, shared with friends and neighbors or received in return, but we do have some 20 cases of jams and preserved fruits. We are now starting on pickling green beans, canning beets, pressing cider, making wine and juice and drying several large crates of pears. Hopefully, these things will turn out successfully as the deer jerky experiment did.
Additionally, we are ramping up our recycling, composting and efforts to create an official food ethics campaign that includes supporting the local community economy.
We are still planting, transplanting and turning beds here as the weather is quite nice.
I began a campaign to link up with local community volunteer efforts and this week several of us served senior meals at the community center on Wed and Fri and have been bringing baked goods to churches, neighbors and friends. Additionally, we have been chopping, delivering and stacking firewood to neighbors in need.
Best wishes to all readers in their efforts. You are inspiring, one and all!
Laurie in MN, take the firm jam out of the jar and heat it gently, gently with a little water. It might help to break it up a bit first. Keep stirring til you have the most amazing pancake syrup, ice cream topping or pound cake sauce you’ve ever tasted. If you’re feeling brave, add a little booze to it–I use brandy and serve that over a bland biscuit type scone with whipped cream.
Ask me how I know this. ;O)
Mea, would you like some yarn? Email me and we may be able to work out a trade–I have a stash that I could knit on til I die and it would still be there.
I just finished al blanket for a double bed made from all my odd balls left over from years of projects–only the browns and greys and creams. I have another blanket started that’s based on the nine patch quilt pattern made from more yarn I have–totally seamless and done in garter stitch with never more than 40 stitches on the needles at any one time.
Deb in Wis
Hi Sharon,
Sorry about your kitty. I’ve had two different male cats that would occasionally get frightened by something and run up a tree and get stuck. One cat was stuck for four days and sat through a rain storm before I found him. Maybe try looking up.
Plant something: transplanted pumpkin, spinach & tomato seedlings.
Harvest something: mixed lettuce, coriander, parsley, endive, tuscan kale, broccoli leaves, lemons, 2 snow peas & 2 strawberries.
Preserve Something: lemon cordial, apple & date chutney
Prep & Storage: restocked tinned tomatoes.
Build Community Food Systems: registered for local film screening/community garden discussion session. Started a conversation with some friends about how much I’m able to grow in styrofoam boxes… there were sparkling eyes
Reduce Waste: Planted out seedlings (started in toilet paper rolls), into pots converted from unwanted small plastic rubbish bins. Used up last wrinkled apples for chutney, plus composting/recycling as usual.
Eat the Food: bean & veggie wraps; spring veggie risotto; lots of salad; stir fry tofu & veggies with noodles.
Oops – I’m anonymous!
Thanks everyone for the sympathy about Zucchini – still no sign, we think we’ve lost him. It is a sad thing for us – yes, we’ve got six cats (5 now) but Zooey was our favorite (shhh, don’t tell the other cats we play favorites) and the children’s. We will be adopting another cat – as Eric observed, we *said* when we agreed to take two cats in last time that 6 cats was not going to be a norm for us, that we definitely were NOT getting more cats when one died (we have two very elderly ones). Yeah right! There’s a shelter trip in our future, definitely!
As for the eggplant – the only ways I’ve found to preserve it are simply to bread and bake it halfway as though you were making baked eggplant, and then take it out before it is completely done and freeze it – or to make baba ganoush/strange flavor eggplant/some other eggplant guts dish and roast or grill it, scoop it out, mash it up and freeze it. It is a food that defies preservation.
Sharon
Deb:
I am actually planning on using one jar of it for thumbprint cookies, and my husband made the suggestion of covering balls of it in chocolate. (Yes, he’s evil, and that’s why I love him.) I think I may need to make it more of a truffle/ganache kind of thing for that, but all the suggestions sound awesome. Brandied strawberry syrup — yummmmmm.
Thanks for the tips! I recognize the voice of experience when I hear it.
Any suggestions about the floating fruit? I’m beyond delighted that the stuff is actually *jelling*, but of course want to refine my technique “next time”.
Sharon:
So very, very sorry to hear about the loss of your cat. I can’t imagine what I would do in your situation — probably be distracted beyond words — but I am a city girl with indoor cats, no children, no goats, and no farm. (Thus, lots of time to lavish on my cats.) Still, all my sympathies to you on the loss of your feline partner and the new little buckling.
I don’t have much to report on this week, didn’t plant anything; no major reuse projects or anything
Sharon’s Independence Days Challenge- Year two, week 19
1. Plant something: Not a thing
2. Harvest something: Basil, Tomatoes;From the community garden- Basil, tomatoes, Chard
3. Preserve something: Made some Basil Cubes; Dehydrated basil;
4. Reduce Waste (recycle, reuse, reduce, repair or compost something): Made some lanterns out of recycled materials for the Arts Aglow festival in Burien; other than that just general recycling, composting
5. Preparation and Storage: Filled my Gas cans for the generator with gas, starting to read up on propane conversion for generator
6. Build Community Food Systems; took Tomatoes, Basil and chard to the food bank from the community garden; did my watering day at community garden
7. Eat the Food (cook or eat something new)- Ate tomatoes and Basil in a Portobello Parmesan; (A dish I came up with because, while liking veal, I dont like how it is raised)
Deb — I can’t figure out to to email you.
Thanks for the offer. You can reach me at
rekniter at yahoo dot com
and I’d love the pattern for the blanket. I get tired of sewing squares together.
Sharon- sorry to hear about your cat- My deepest sympathies-It’s tough losing a friend.