Tuesday Teabag Tidbits ~ Holiday Baking Starts ~ Cashew Brittle

Canning took up most of my morning yesterday.

We've been out of Candy Apple Jelly for over a year, so some of this is going in the pantry.

I had to whip up a batch of homemade ginger-ale syrup.  Youngest texted me that she was feeling pretty sickly.  Thankfully, I have club soda on hand, but now I'm out of honey.

Made my first batch of organic cashew brittle.  I hope to make one or two batches more yet.

Dinner was easy yesterday.  I used leftover mushroom gravy, combined with homemade condensed mushroom soup, and cooked pork chops it in the crock pot.

Random Tidbits

I walked right into an orb weaver and it's web, while walking from the garden to the house (shiver).  The good news, is when I looked back, the spider was still in the web.  The web was hanging under one of my clotheslines.

Bought another peck of hot banana peppers and canned more hot pepper relish.  We love this stuff.  So glad I tried a new recipe this year. 

I've had more requests to sell these again, but wonder what price you'd pay. It requires 20 yards of netting.  I think I used to sell them for $3/each but wondered if I'm shorting myself.

It's pretty thick too.  I just haven't made any for about 2 years.

On a funny note, Hubby and I bought a plastic black rat.  The first time we tried to scare our youngest it failed.  She brought it downstairs so I put it in a wall cabinet in her bathroom, where she keeps her toothbrush etc.  We got her good!!

Once again they warned us severe storms were rolling in, and even tornadoes.  Woke up to a slight wind and that was it.  So glad we didn't get it, but I'm starting to doubt the weather forecast (again).

Gifted ~ Homemade Crushed Red Pepper Flakes ~ Hot Banana Pepper Relish ~ Dehydrated Tabasco Peppers

It was a day to label all those jars and find a place to store them for winter.  In doing so, I found a pint of last years green tomato salsa.  I cooked a small amount of corn off the cob, and black beans, mixed those in with a bit of our hot salsa and the green tomato salsa and boom - a cold meal was made.  If you call it a meal.  It was a back up for the two coming home from a very hot day.

Latest berry picking.  Looks like a snack vs. freezing it.  Or into a smoothie.

Hubby brought home a loot of peppers, given to him from a co-worker.

I was tickled pink to get them too.  I was so, so happy to receive the generous gifts - hot banana, chili, jalapeno, and tabasco peppers.  And one single habanero.

Here's what I made:

Fire powder.

Fire powder is a mix of hot peppers that we simply use to flavor just about anything.  The habanero went into the fire powder, along with a few of every hot pepper.

To make them, simply slice hot peppers, place them with seeds on parchment paper lined dehydrator trays.  Dehydrate per your unit's instructions.

Allow to cool.  I like to grind the peppers first, then toss in the loose seeds (or grind up everything) to have whole seeds in the mix.  Store in an air tight container.  Your dehydrator instruction book may also instructions for this, as well as many dehydrator books available today.

I use the same process of dehydrating and grinding, to make crushed red pepper flakes with the chili peppers.


Dehydrated the tabasco peppers, and ground them into a powder.  I can add water to make tabasco "sauce" or simply use it as is.  No canning or freezing required.

I canned hot banana pepper relish, using the hot banana peppers, some of the jalapenos, and our home grown green bell peppers.

Gardening and Stocking Up ~ Another HOT day

The garden has been nothing but a struggle this year.  

On the up side. . .and all done in 2 days . . .

I got a small batch of salsa canned, and some tomatoes made it to the freezer.  I left the jalapeno seeds in this time.  I'm labeling these jars "ON FIRE!"  Boy is it hot. Super hot.  Hubby loves it.  I do not.  Next batch, if there is one, will not have the seeds left in. It's a new recipe for me to try (Ball book recipe), but it fit my need with how many tomatoes I had.

Onion soup made it's way to the freezer - 12 pints made.

Another batch of Cowboy Candy was canned.

A small bit of green beans went into the freezer, and some into our tummies.

Since we don't have a root cellar or basement (yet), the tiniest of the potatoes were boiled with the green beans, with bacon and bacon fat added.  One of our garden favorites.

A batch of zucchini meatballs made it's way to the freezer.  Bought the zucchini from a neighbor down the road, who has a produce stand.  I also got more jalapenos from him too.  I actually added diced jalapenos to these.  I should have double the recipe with winter around the corner.  Guess I'll put it on my list of to-do's along with our beef/pork meatballs.  Gotta get it done before the freezer fills up, or it'll be stuck to the upper racks (again).

A veggie frittata, loaded with dandelion greens, was made for us early birds for breakfast.

...and because it was so stinkin' hot (some area schools let out early due to no AC in the schools), I made a cold dinner - Mexican Quinoa (using thawed and cooked corn off the cob, leftover zucchini salsa and some fresh grape and cherry tomatoes).  After I took that photo, I took treats to the hens, and found purslane.  I added some to the dish.  

I'm already writing up a plan for next year's garden.  We may be moving it though.  I know cabbage, watermelon (and other various fruits), along with more tomatoes will be on the list.  Then I can supplement Stud Muffin and the ladies to offset the cost of expensive organic feed.  Oatmeal, only if I can locate it bulk and cheap (for the hens).

Our oldest daughter stopped in with grand-pup Mia.  I'm gonna have to get some dog treats made for their future visits.  She of course raided the fridge.

So, are you wondering what I'll be doing on a hot rainy day?  Most likely cleaning indoors.

 

Random Tidbits

Monday, while Hubby and daughter were scrambling around getting ready at 5:45am, I was mumbling.  

"I have to work out, can jam, clean the coop, make a scramble for the week, do the dishes, do the laundry...."

Hubby said, "what'ya gonna do after 9am?"  

I laughed, and laughed.  That is true.  There is an advantage of being up early.  Sparta was giving me heck while cleaning the coop.  He kept getting out of the door, and out into the open garden area.  I had to keep chasing him back into the run.  I think he's getting old or his broken leg from years ago is giving him trouble.  He's having a bit of trouble walking and climbing the ramp now.

Speaking of scramble - this weeks breakfast for a few days.  It's made with some swiss chard, jalapeno, home grown potatoes, onions, green pepper and bacon.

Tuesday, I was up at 4:26 am precisely.  Work called Hubby in, and the thunder and pouring rain kept me from going back to sleep.

I hope we are well stocked now with Cowboy Candy, but if I can get more jalapenos, I'll can it one more time.  We love it!  I canned blackberry-red raspberry (our berries) jam and more peach jam.  I just wish I could find some hot banana peppers now. The purchase of our organic hot banana pepper plants were a fail.

The garden. . .popcorn may be a fail this year too.  The last storm we had, brought very strong winds, and my patch has been somewhat flattened.  Now with more heavy rain, thunderstorms, wind...who knows what'll happen.

Sadly, the 2# of tomatoes I had brought in, starting rotting in a few days.  

Although Hubby is against it, I'm back to considering working again.  We have to buy almost everything our garden didn't provide to stock up, and our cost to put the garden in has set us back.   Not sure what we'll do just yet.  I was so busy Monday, dinner time crept up on me quickly, so I'm struggling to figure out how to even hold a job and keep this place afloat.  There are many things we'll do without I believe too.

One dinner this week was smoked turkey bone soup.  I don't normally like soup in summer, but it was delicious.  I just added whatever I had, but the smoked carcass from my younger brother was worth keeping.  Yum.

I also made a new side dish - a cheesy jalapeno corn mix.  I used the frozen off the cob corn and it was very good!

Oh, and here is the latest new recipe I tried in my dehydrator. . .

Peanut butter cookies.  They were much easier to flatten than the oatmeal.  The only con to this, is it uses 1/2 cup organic coconut oil.  Same with the oatmeal.  I will however, keep this recipe for group meals and holidays.  I think they'd freeze okay, and if I triple the recipe I can fill my entire large dehydrator and save me time and ingredients.

Busy Kitchen

I hit it hard Monday morning with canning.  Well sort of.  I ran out of sugar so it continued into Tuesday too.  There has been no weeding, as the rain keeps coming, but just enough to keep me indoors.   Last night it poured and we are due for more today.

I brought in one 5 oz dinky serving of green beans, and two dinky hot banana peppers.  No yellow squash yet.   Our harvesting days are pretty pathetic lately.

Peach jam got canned., along with sweet pickle relish, cinnamon-blueberry jam and corn relish.  Whew!

A few zucchini's made it sliced, blanched and into the freezer, but the blackberries are still red.  Also, so far of what we've tasted, the blackberries are sour this year.  I'm not sure what I will do with them if they are all sour

More blueberries made it to the freezer.

We have run into a small sna-foo with the camper.  Once we hooked it up, only the turn signals work.  Brake lights and hazard lights are not working for some reason.  I'm sure my smart husband can figure it out before we do go camping.

I lied.  Our peach tree gave us one very nice looking peach this year.

I finally got around to making stuffed shells again, and some went into the freezer for an easy meal on a future busy day.

As you can see no more greens have made their way into the freezer. I am hoping this rain provides us some.

My back was pretty sore and my entire body pretty tired, so after washing a boat load of dishes and putting them away, I took my handiwork to the porch.  

Wild Violet Jelly ~ Garden Tidbits

My homestead has a somewhat good amount of wild violets.  

I was itching to pick some wild purple violets, for my "new" jelly to try this year.  I've never made it and we had a very busy weekend.  So...I picked the violets....

Canning, Bourbon and Crochet ~ Cherry Bourbon BBQ Sauce

Tuesday started out just gorgeous.  Caught these photos after seeing it going out to fetch firewood.  Just makes a person smile.  

BBQ pork chops went into crock pot yesterday.  We had leftover wild rice, and it was a perfect match.  The sauce is home canned, with added fresh onion, green pepper etc.  Yum.  Recipe is in the cookbook, "Fix it and Forget it."  Although I think it's called "Spicy" not BBQ in the book.

Now if you just read the blogpost title and wondered (hiccup) if I indulged (hiccup) in that bourbon or (hiccup) not .  .  . 

 . . . Cherry-Bourbon BBQ Sauce was canned. Recipe is a "pile to file" keeper recipe.  I've had this on my list for over a year now.  It's from "The All New Ball Book of Canning and Preserving @ 2016."   And you bet I tasted it right away.  Yum!    I would recommend it for gift giving for any occasion too.  You can use it on meat, fish, rice or other grain, on burgers, in other recipes...endless ideas.

I couldn't get my towels out on the line until noon, but the high winds dried it spankin' fast.  The sun was out too. 

Yesterday's snack?  Pumpkin hummus.  Mmmm.

It was also a day to blanch and freeze 3 bundles of organic dandelion greens, pick some more kale, and bring in one egg from my free loaders.  The kale is in this morning's breakfast.  I'm thankful it's still producing.

I got up extra early this morning, to make a fresh hot breakfast (not a reheated one Hubby usually takes to work).  Why?  Well, ha ha!  Oh boy.  I watched him walk out the door with pancakes on a plate with syrup and a fork.  There was no stopping him either.  It could have been bad with him driving and eating pancakes to work.  He arrived safely and on time, but today he'll not get away with do that.  

I'm making omelets - onion, red pepper, potatoes, ham and kale.  Gotta get them greens ya' know.

Pears ~ Carrot Cake Jam

Pears are about ready to be picked.  Hubby brought in 5 or 6 and some were hard as a rock, so we have time yet to pick them.  Thank goodness.

Two of them were ripe however, so I used one to can carrot cake jam for the first time.  Using our homegrown carrots, a home grown pear, and a few purchased ingredients.  I used this recipe:  Carrot Cake Jam.

It uses the same amount of sugar that most recipes online require, but a mix of white granulated and brown sugar.  I have wanted to try this recipe for years, but put it off.  We didn't get any carrots last year either.  I can't remember why, but we didn't get beets or carrots.  

Anyway....

Habanero-Apricot Jelly

Preserving continues....

 

I started the early morning (yesterday) by canning one batch of habanero-apricot jelly with some of the habanero peppers.  

We enjoy this jam on biscuits, rolls, crackers with cream cheese, on meats etc. It comes in handy for family/friend gatherings for appetizers and snacks.