Rutabaga harvest

This year we had a ton of success with our root vegetables. The rutabagas(also known as yellow turnip) are the last to be pulled. I am super happy with the result. The reason for success? I believe it is our use of the raised beds. Take a look at the crop. I can't wait to cook them up for Thanksgiving.

Sunday update

Today began with an early morning (2 a.m.) thunderstorm that woke me out of a dead sleep.  I love thunderstorms, but Nora was not as pleased.  We were expecting rain all day today, so I spent 7-8 hours outside in the gardens yesterday, and hope to get back outside tomorrow.  Today will be a slower day.  I'm baking bread, and plan on roasting a chicken for dinner.  Hope to do a little reading (I'm on Book 5 of the Game of Thrones series); nothing too strenuous.

Yesterday I started doing some much needed clean-up in the flower beds.  The cosmos had all developed a fungus from the cool temps and rain, so I pulled all of those last week.  They usually act as great filler and add lots of color in the fall garden, so it was a bit disappointing.  Thankfully I had some zinnias that were doing quite well in the vegetable garden, so I relocated many of them to the circle garden.

Pink and "Peppermint Stripe" zinnia in foreground with coneflower in back.  The lupine have all gone to seed.  I let the pods dry out a bit and self-seed here, as well as use in other beds.

I also talked Nora into stopping by Willow Tree nursery in Potsdam yesterday morning, so I could grab some perennials on sale.  They were having a buy 2, get 1 free sale, so I scored!  I came home with meadow rue (Thalictrum), which I've been looking for locally for over a year, columbine (to fill in a gap in the shade garden), speedwell, echinacea (2 purple, 1 white), baptistia australis (false indigo), and bleeding heart.  Most of those filled in gaps in the circle garden and the new bed near the chicken area with the exception of the shade plants (Columbine and Bleeding Heart).  I also replaced some of the spent container plants with small zinnias from the vegetable garden to give a fresh splash of color.

I have lots more clean-up, dividing and relocating to do in the flower beds.  The berry beds all need weeding as well, and there is lots to be done in the vegetable garden.  The cool summer did a number on my tomato plants; between early blight and pests, I've given up on them.  They're tasty enough for the chickens and ducks, but not good enough for me to can.  I pulled up the two remaining cherry tomato plants yesterday and may do the same for the remaining Amish Paste plants tomorrow.  The fruit still on the vine is not ripening and many of them have been half-eaten by some unseen pest. The only tomatoes I've been able to salvage for our consumption (on delicious BLTs) were the early Glaciers and the beefsteak.  Sigh.  No tomatoes next year; I can't take the disappointment.  Otherwise, we have some edamame still in the ground, peppers, eggplant, pole beans, walla wallas (the storage onions and shallots have all been harvested and cured) and cucumbers.  The fall crops are looking healthy so far.  The pumpkins (I will have to take a photo later; pouring outside right now) are HUGE! There will be some seriously large Jack 'o Lanterns at the homestead this year.

Fall flowers: aster, cleome, sedum, black-eyed susan and sunflowers towering off in the distance in the vegetable garden.  You can see a hint of autumn in some of the trees as well.

Can a carrot be obscene?

I'm gonna say.... YES

put an xtra large egg in there so you could relate the size better

Here's where the expression "Beet red" comes from

Colorful cauliflower

Lynn harvested this the other day. Yes, a purple cauliflower. Cool looking huh? I think so. Last night I roasted it and served it up for dinner. Roasted cauliflower is delicious even for those that don't traditionally like that veggie. Here's what I did:

Preheat oven to 400
Cut up cauliflower into small pieces as you would if you were serving in a vegetable tray.
Put the following in a seal able gallon baggie (or bowl):
3 tbsp olive oil
1/3 cup soy sauce
tbsp minced garlic
tsp black pepper

Add cut cauliflower and mix well in order to cover the vegetable with the mixture. Line a cookie sheet with aluminum foil and spread the cauliflower evenly on the tray. Cook for 25 minutes on 400. Turn the florets every 10 minutes to get an even roast. Sprinkle shredded parmesan on top and cook an additional 5 minutes. The result, fabulous! Enjoy.

Happy St. Patrick’s Day

This is a ridiculously easy and scrumptiously delicious Irish Soda Bread recipe:

Ingredients

4 c flour

1 Tbs sugar

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

¾ tsp baking soda

1 c raisins

2 Tbs caraway seeds

2 c buttermilk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a round casserole dish. 

Mix well the flour, sugar, salt, baking powder and baking soda in a large bowl. Add the raisins and caraway seed.  Mix into flour with your hands.  Add the buttermilk and mix well.  Turn onto floured surface and knead until smooth (about 5 minutes).  Add dough and cut an X into the top.

Bake 50 minutes to 1 hour (depending on whether you use convection oven).  Remove from oven and rub the top with butter; sprinkle with sugar.  Let sit for 10 minutes.

Served warm with heaps of butter.  Delicious!

O Tannenbaum

We love Christmas trees! There is just something very calming and mesmerizing about them. We put ours up early this year given the short span between Thanksgiving and Christmas. And we put up two trees. One in the dining room and one in the living room.

This tradition started years ago. Lynn and I did not exactly see eye to eye on the decorating of the tree. I love colored lights and a mish-mash of ornaments. Lynn, being a more organized( nice way of saying anal retentive) person, prefers while lights and an overall theme to a tree. Of course I won the battle given my overwhelming exuberance over all things Christmas. (Or it could have been a major tantrum, doesn't matter) And my opinion is that Christmas is the time to be tacky in your taste if you are ever going to.

One weekend Lynn was particularly exhausted and stressed out. It could be that she had been working non-stop for weeks without a day off. This was back when she worked full-time and went to law school at night. (We call that the Dark Period). I felt bad for her so I ran out to buy a small tree, white lights(although against my better judgment) and a slew of matching ornaments. I insisted that she take a break and help decorate the Lynn tree. She complied and the rest is history.

This year, I surprised Lynn by making one of her favorite treats, Harry and David's Moosemunch. I searched for a recipe and found this: Homemade Moosemunch recipe. I elected to add chopped pecans during the baking process and drizzled both melted semi-sweet and milk chocolate. I have to admit it turned out pretty darn well. Lynn was thrilled. So we put on Sara McLachlan's Christmas album, poured ourselves a glass of port, and  munched on the wonderful mix of salty and sweet while we decorated this year. A great time was had!!


Dining Room

Living room

Edible garden update part 2

Clunk !!. Ugh, As I write this Jacques is at it again this time with Ruby screaming at him. Even she has put aside her strong predator instincts to call him stupid. Man, that bird. I am surprised he has evaded natural selection for this long.

On to the vegetables.
The green beans have been producing for a little over a week. We pick them and Lynn steams them for two minutes, removes them from the heat and places them into an ice bath. From there they are toweled off(sounds like a spa treatment) and vacuum sealed(using the Foodsaver) where they are stored in the freezer for use throughout the fall and winter.

Um excuse me, get a room! I gotta eat those beans. Sheesh.

Next up are the onions:


Yellow

Red

Shallot

Summer squash. We planted a mix this year so every plant is a surprise. So far we have seen zucchini, yellow, and round zucchini which is ball-shaped.

We use cucumbers for pickling as well as the regular size cukes for salads and such.

We planted three types of beets. So far we have picked a regular red beet and a striped one.

Lynn made this delicious salad over the weekend Beet salad 

 Well that is all there is to update for now. Until next time...

Edible garden update part 1

Despite the ridiculous wet weather we have had, our fruit and vegetables seemed to survive. It was touch and go there for a while. We planted at the end of May and had nothing but rain in June. In fact it was so bad that I started to build an ark, then I remembered that I didn't know how. As you know, all plants need a combination of sun and water. The potatoes were under water for almost a week.(who knows how they will turn out, still too early for them)Thankfully, the last week or so has been amazing. A nice mix of sun and rain.
Anyhoo, I thought it was due time for a post or two on the harvest. If you are anything like I was, then you have never seen this stuff on the plant.

Fruit



We have been getting blueberries for the last three weeks. Early in the morning Lynn walks out to pick these and then bakes To die for blueberry muffins. Believe me, they are well named.

We are harvesting our second batch of strawberries

And the second batch of raspberries:

Raspberries look like warts as they are developing(pictured above). Not appetizing at all. They look contagious to me. But then they turn into this:

 And then the strawberries and raspberries turn into this:

Jamelly and jam. (Our strawberry jam has a lot of fruit on top and the gel on the bottom so we call it jamelly. All you have to do is mix it before using.) This year Lynn made the raspberry jam using the Kitchen Aid fruit and vegetable strainer. Thanks to my sister Dee's(who I have called MacGyver for years) recommendation last summer. The attachment is amazing in that it separates the seed and stems from the juice. Huge time and aggravation saver.

Last but not least we are awaiting the first of our blackberries. Here is a shot of an early berry.

That's all on the fruit front. Next post, vegetables.

Homemade White Bread

I kicked off the weekend by baking a couple of loaves of homemade white bread.  This is a Amish recipe from Lovina Eicher, who shared much of her culture, tradition and recipes in her newspaper column, "The Amish Cook."  Many of her recipes have now been collected in a series of books: The Amish Cook at Home, The Amish Cook's Baking Book and The Amish Cook's Anniversary Book.

The following recipe can either make 1 large loaf, or 2 smaller loaves.  I use two 5 x 9 loaf pans.  Cast iron makes a better loaf, but the typical non-stick variety will do the job. 

Ingredients:

1 package active dry yeast
2 1/2 cups lukewarm water
Lard (the size of an egg); you can substitute Crisco here if needed
2 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon salt
Enough bread flour to make a soft dough (usually about 5 cups)

Grease pans and set aside.

In a small bowl, dissolve the yeast in a 1/2 cup warm water.  In a large bowl, combine the lard, sugar, salt and the remaining 2 cups of water.  Add the yeast mixture to the bowl and stir until combined.  Add the flour, 1/2 cup at a time, mixing until the dough is elastic and doesn't stick to the sides of the bowl.  Cover the bowl loosely with a damp cloth and let rise until double in size, about 1 1/2 hours in a warm, draft-free place.

Punch the dough down and place on lightly floured surface.  Cut the the dough into 2 equal portions.  Punch down a little more and form each into a loaf.  Place the dough into greased loaf pans.  Cover with a damp cloth and let rise again until the dough is level with the loaf pan, about 40-50 minutes.

While the dough is rising, preheat oven to 325 degrees.  TIP: place a cast iron pan on lower rack in oven and let heat. When you place the bread in the oven to cook, pour 1-2 cups of water into heated pan and leave in closed over for 5-10 minutes. The steam makes a fabulous crust on the bread.

Bake the bread for 40-45 minutes.  The bread is done when it sounds hollow when tapped on top.

After removing the bread from the oven, brush with butter for a softer crust.  Remove the bread from the pans and place on cooling rack. 

The bread freezes well and will keep for up to 6 months. 

The Most Scrumptious Banana Bread Ever

I started eating bananas a few months ago.  I had never been a big fan; I’d buy a bunch of 4-5 and half of them would go all brown and mushy before I ever got to them.  I mentioned this to a friend who told me there was no need to throw them into the compost at that stage.  Rather, put them in the freezer until you could use them in baking.  What a marvelous idea, I thought!  So I did, and then I tried numerous banana muffin and bread recipes until I found the perfect one. Really it is.  Give it a whirl.  You’re in for a tasty treat.  It freezes really well too. 

Sour Cream Banana Bread

(click here for a printable version) 

Prep time: 15 minutes; Cook time: 1 hour 

Ingredients:

4 very ripe bananas, divided	2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup white sugar	1 ½ tsp baking powder
¾ cup butter, melted and cooled	½ tsp salt
2 large eggs	½ cup chopped walnuts
1/3 cup sour cream	2 tsp white sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract	½ tsp ground cinnamon

Directions:

1. Preheat over to 350 degrees.  Grease a 5x9 inch loaf pan.
2. Mash 2 bananas in a bowl with a fork.  Place remaining 2 bananas in a separate bowl with 1 cup sugar and beat with an electric mixer until creamed and fluffy, about 3 minutes.  Beat in melted butter, eggs, sour cream and vanilla until combined.
3. Whisk flour, baking powder and salt in separate bowl.  Stir the flour mixture into the banana/sugar mixture and combine thoroughly. 
4. Fold in mashed bananas and walnuts.  Pour batter into the loaf pan.  Tap on the counter a couple of times to remove any air pockets. 
5. Stir 2 tsp sugar with cinnamon in a small bowl and sprinkle the mixture over the top of the loaf.
6. Bake in preheated over until bread is golden brown and set in the center.  The recipe calls for 1 hr and 15 minutes.  I find mine is always ready in 50-60 minutes.  Rotate bread ½ way through cooking process.

Cool in pan for 10 minutes before removing to finish cooling on wire rack.

Tasha Tudor's Oatmeal Bread

The weekends, especially winter weekends, generally involve a bit of cooking and baking.  This morning began with baking some oatmeal bread.  This is a Tasha Tudor (more on Tasha in later posts) recipe I first tried about a month ago.  I cut her recipe in half to make two loaves. 

If you’re interested in this recipe, as well as some other good, old-fashioned New England recipes, I highly recommend her cookbook, The Tasha Tudor Cookbook: Recipes and Reminiscences from Corgi Cottage.  It’s chock full of wonderful recipes (I highly recommend the corn bread!), some dating back to the 1700s, as well as her delightful watercolor illustrations.