Pioneer Woman at Heart

  New recipe tried - Kidney bean salad with Lemon (recipe is free online at A Virtual Vegan).  I did make slight changes to the recipe. What I did. . . Instead of cane sugar, I used a Tbsp. of lemon infused honey. I used a full organic English cucumber. I used both fresh parsley and cilantro (had some that needed used up, as it's not garden season and I have to buy it). I used red onion. I chilled the salad for a few hours before serving. We added crumbled feta to the salad when I served it.  Yum! Rain is here again.  It's due to come down off and on later and even tomorrow morning.  Our evenings will start dipping into the 30's (hopefully no hard freeze). Thankfully, my three cilantro plants, that came up by themselves, from last year's seeds, are still thriving in the herb garden. Kidney Bean Salad ©  April 2026 by  Kristina  at  Pioneer  Woman  at Heart

  In working on my home "apothecary" clean up, and re-organization, I found one lonely jar of dehydrated, wild picked stinging nettles.  I decided to grind them, and create a homemade herbal seasoning. To the seasonning, I brought in some dandelion greens and dehydrated those, and ground them as well.  I added that to the nettles, and added homemade garlic powder. Finally, I will be adding parsley and salt to the mix and using that for meals. I did not measure anything.  I just sort of eye-balled the amount I ground in even amounts, and in actuality, the salt could be left out.  I tend to salt lastly. It's my little herb seasoning experiment.  If we like the flavors, we may be trying it with more options - mint, thyme, rosemary, lemon balm, ginger etc. The rain continues here, and it's hit or miss with picking more wild violets,  wild violet leaves and dandelions. We had a really bad storm come through the area early evening, and of course we needed to...

  Yes, you can buy cans of chili peppers for about $.70 and up, but there is nothing better than homemade diced chili peppers.  A small 4 oz. can of organic diced chili peppers are costing about $2.19 a can in our area now. I have had this on my "try it" list since last garden season, and had intentions of canning them.  I am "on the fence" with canning them for now.  I'll explain. How I made our chili peppers - picked larger fresh Anaheim peppers from the garden.  Washed them, dried them, cut off stems, sliced them in half lengthwise, and cleaned out the ribs and seeds. I placed them all cut side down on a parchment paper lined baking dish, and roasted them in a pre-heated oven at 450°F.  I, however, decided to reduce the heat to 400 before placing the baking sheet in the oven.  I roasted my peppers for about 20 minutes, until the skins were bubbly (watch them so they do not burn).  These smelled fantastic right out of the oven! I removed them fr...

I have had one run-in with a baby deer this garden season.  I'm not sure who was more surprised, me or him/her.  Off it ran and no damage to the garden.  I do think we may have another ground hog, but have not seen it for a while.  A bug of some sort is having a feast on my garden kale, so once we catch up on the weeds and such, I'll sprinkle some flour with pepper mixed into it (husband's trick). It's a bit disconcerting to not have much to harvest yet , and hear the sound of locusts announcing fall is around the corner.  The rain is coming down almost every other day or every day, so the weeds are winning I think.  The bonus win is not having to drag 200+feet of garden hose out to water stuff. Our first Anaheim peppers from the garden.  They are huge as they should be.  However, it's not enough to process, so they are in the crisper drawer to use for current meals.  Or I have plan B too. The cherry type (heirloom) tomatoes are finally on an...

  We had another rainy day, so I was able to have a much slower indoor day (sort of).  It was also so humid outside after the rain stopped, so it was not even enjoyable.  There was also a smoke haze in the air, compromising the air quality.  I did not get any Swiss chard cut as it heavily downpoured most of the day yesterday.  Our garden is about 2-3 weeks behind, compared to last year.  I think it was due to a very cold May, and we planted much later.  I am getting kale, Swiss chard, and radishes.  The zucchini is on, but only about 1 inch long right now. I do need to dig the fall planted garlic up soon.  I dug one up already, and we are very happy with the size of it this year. I'm trying out my "vegetable" keeper container to see how long it keeps our freshly cut kale fresh.  I bought the containers on clearance a few years ago, specifically to keep pickling cucumbers in, to collect and keep fresh, until I had enough to can with....

Organic Daikon Radishes (a superfood, powerhouse of goodness) are sold in bundles of either 2-3 in our grocery stores, and each one can be up to 15 inches long.  I only need about a 1/2 cup of the radish, when I make kimchi for ourselves. It got me thinking. I could freeze the rest for meals, or I could dehydrate the extra. I used my handheld spiralizer and spiralized the extra daikon radishes.  I then placed those into they dehydrator (you get a lot, but it will dry up to almost nothing). I will store the dehydrated daikon radishes until the next time I want to make kimchi, and simply break up the dehydrated radishes, and re-hydrate them.   Easy, makes the most of our purchase with buying daikon radishes, and we don't have to eat it for days fresh.  However, I did find a recipe that uses daikon radish, that I do want to eventually try.   By the way, diced daikon radish goes well in soups and stews (and can be swapped for potatoes in soups). I also wan...

We can't seem to get a break from the rain right now.  I checked on the garden.  It's flooded.  Like parts of it have 4 inches of standing water.  Woke up to a chilly 36°F outside.  So cold, I had to turn a heater on, and today I need to order propane (gulp!).  Way too cold for a garden to grow, so I am praying my already planted herbs and flowers survive this dip in temperature.  Wet and cold do not mix well for an abundant garden.  My feverfew seeds did not sprout at all, so I may need to re-buy them if we want a harvest this year. I have been bringing in about 2-3 asparagus a day lately.  We are at the end of harvest, but we keep getting a few a day. I'm already utilizing fresh herbs from the garden.  The cilantro seed sprouts are holding up in this colder weather too.  Same with the dill seeds I planted. About turnips . . . Turnips are the most under-rated cruciferous vegetable in my opinion.  Probably along the same path ...

Nothing is tastier and more satisfying, than picking freshly grown cucumbers from the garden.  In anticipation of summer garden goodies (trying to pump myself up, because I'm lacking garden mojo this year), I'm trying a new recipe.  More so, I wanted to taste this combination, because it would be great for a hot summer day when eating a full meal seems too much work.   The credit goes to the cook book "Come Hungry" by Melissa Ben-Ishay. I borrowed the book from the library.  It has a lot of good recipes, and some repeat instructions I already know, but one caught my eye for a high protein snack.  It's nice to have a hearty snack available when we come in tired and worn out from garden work. If you have dill growing in your herb garden, that is a plus to make this.  Along with a few pieces of homemade sourdough bread. In the making of this, cottage cheese was one cheese I never got around to making when we had dairy goats here at the homestead.  Do you ...

My goodness!  It's 13°F this morning.  Spring can't make up it's mind around here.  I have the newly purchased tulips and hyacinths (in pots) indoors for now.  I had high hopes to plant them by now. I am praying this early cold spell in April does not kill my wild violet harvest, or fruit tree blossoms.  I have yet to see one asparagus up either.  It was up much earlier last Spring. A new recipe tried.  Baked Perch.  Recipe is from allrecipes, but I adapted organic/non-gmo ingredients.  Perch (lake perch from our state) was gifted to us, and instead of frying it this time (vs. beef tallow), I baked it.  In the past I have baked walleye and it turned out delicious. By the way, in the past I have baked walleye, and it was very good.  I did read the recipe reviews. Some people used panko instead of crushed saltines, some used all grated parmesan cheese.  I found organic/non-gmo saltines, but I'm thinking all parmesan cheese would ...

  The weather is 19°F this morning, as I post this blog post today.  Brr.  I sure hope it warms up, but if not, it's a good day to bake something. I used my larger cookie scoop, and used the back of it to spread the cookie out a bit. One of the kids wanted a healthy banana cookie recipe, and I have a few.  I had to dig this one out and make to see if it was one of my keeper recipes (I have a habit of not taking notes). It's a soft cookie - no flour, no sugar. 3 ripe bananas, organic, mashed 2 cups of organic old fashioned oats 1 cup of finely diced apple or dates (I used half of both for this batch, using organic apples/dates) 1/3 cup organic canola oil * 1 tsp. homemade vanilla extract 1 1/2 tsp. organic cinnamon A few dashes or so of organic nutmeg Mix, drop on parchment paper line baking sheets, and bake for 20 minutes.  Cool on a rack.  I let these sit on the baking sheets a bit after taking out of the oven. I had larger bananas, so they needed a bit mo...

  March is what we call our "mud" season.  Everything is thawing, or there is rain and flooding, and sometimes a snow shower in the mix.  Mud.  We get lots and lots of of a muddy mess, which prevents any or all outdoor work or play (unless we find paved hiking/walking trails). Mud season can feel unending and arduous, but also inspiring as the warmer/sunny weather arrives. Monday - 13°F windchill in the morning (I attempted to sit in the sunshine for a hot minute, and the clouds moved in of course) Tuesday - 36°F windwill in the am.  High for the day was 60°F (insert smiling face), but we had am rain. Wednesday - 53°F (windchill of 48°F), rain Today?  - 37°F Snow!   Nothing new going on.  We are patiently waiting for spring to stay put.  If you remember, we were trying to get an online appointment for new tires last weekend? Well, my husband actually got an appointment made over the phone, and drove there after work to the said appointm...