Pioneer Woman at Heart

                                        The sauce comes out of the center piece and into a pan (white part), and the "trash" comes out the left side and I put a pot there to catch it.  It's the seeds and peelings of the tomatoes.  Basically, anything sauce made, I do not have to de-seed or remove peels, as this hand cranked machine does it for me. However, I always assumed it was doing it's job well the first time. (second time running it thru) I have no idea why no one, who uses a sauce maker, ever told me this tidbit!   I always "assumed" that my sauce maker worked well enough to give me the "goods" when saucing anything.  Wrong!  Run your "trash" thru the sauce maker a second time to get the most of those tomatoes.  I am still using my old sauce maker, as the new one has not arrived yet, and boy did I get more doing it twice.  I found out about t...

  One of my extreme clean projects (craft binders) landed on the kitchen table, and it made me realize, I need the table for tomatoes.  Yikes.   Tomatoes, although we are getting black rot on some, are rolling in, so I have set up a small camping table for the extras, as they are not all turning red at the same time this year.  The sound of locusts outside, reminded me to wash our bathrobes while I still had good clothesline weather.  Plus, they were on the bathroom door, and I need that door taken down to paint anyway.  Eventually. I didn't get a photo, but that clothesline was full.  I washed all the towels, clothing and anything else to beat the rain. Speaking of laundry, my washing machine is now acting up.  I am getting codes, and it will stop completely.  We got it running again, but it is 14 years old.  It may be the next appliance to be replaced.   So, what would eat jalapenos?  I have one plant almost eaten c...

  I finally found the other tomato worm, while I was tying the tomato plants up again.  By the way, the plants are as tall as me , and have gone way above their stakes.  I am a hair from being 6 feet tall, if that tells you anything.  We will be watching end of summer sales, for 6 foot metal (sturdy) tomato cages for next year.  I  don't know that they'll work, as our plants are fully loaded, and very heavy when the tomatoes are on.  I don't know what I was thinking.  I went out, thinking I'll just quick pick green beans and be back inside for inside work.  Ha!  Not only did it take an hour to pick beans, but I had more zucchini, and cucumbers to pick.  I had no yellow squash, but the plants are once again loaded with blossoms, and the bees are a buzzing out there. I sent more zucchini to work with my husband, and I will be taking any other extra to the library staff next.  I am still freezing some for us, but it is coming in d...

We have had foggy, cool mornings for several days now.  However, we will heat up again next week.  Literally into the 90's for a few days.  We were not expecting that. I had good intentions of going to the garden first thing yesterday (after two days of rain), but the weather was not good.  It was foggy, cloudy and misting.  Finally when the fog lifted and the sun came out, I was able to check the garden. I brought in some hot peppers that went to work with my husband (not enough to can anything with), and another 40 some pounds of tomatoes.   By evening I got, what felt like 2 minutes of crochet time.  I am learning a new crochet stitch that I came across the other day (winter scarf).  I'm using up stash I already have to keep costs down and prices lower for a craft show.  I'm sure my husband will be happy it's "stash" yarn, ha ha!

  Well, here we are to the weekend.  The one and only perfect holiday weekend day to take the motorcycle out, and my husband left at 4am. I have tomatoes to deal with, so that is happening after I down a pot of coffee and figure out a breakfast with minimal cooking. I put up 22 1/2# of tomatoes yesterday, but here is the situation....I brought 38# back inside (bwahahaha!).  Oh my. My husband is laughing, but I have no idea how I dealt with our 500# year.  I do need to freeze some tomatoes, can crushed ones, and make another batch of soup and pizza sauce (will gift the kiddos). He joked "tomato fight" as the plants are literally almost dead, tomatoes falling off and some rotting as I try to keep up.  The summer heat waves were the cause of the late ripening. I'm hoping to get my fall garlic planted.  Rain is moving in late Saturday and for several days (unless that changes).

I woke up in time to see this beautiful sky.  I did however, sleep in, and did not get to see my husband before he went to work.  He is taking over a supervisor position for a few months.  Let's just say the coffee pot is pre-set at 4:30am now.  Unless I try and put up another table in the living room, I am plum out of room for ripe ones.  I'm trying my best to get things canned, but I can only do one sauce/tomato recipe in one day. We have surpassed 200 pounds of Amish paste this year.  There are more out there, and the plants are dying.  Sheesh, but so thankful for the stock up with all of them. The recipe I use for the Lemony -Tomato Basil soup is from this magazine.  Looks like a magazine, but thick like the ball regular canning book.  I think I bought it at TSC farm store.  I canned another batch of this soup. It is also the same magazine that has the BBQ sauce recipe that I can.  To me, it's the best one we've tried so far. I ...

  I've been busy with tomatoes, and more are turning red now.  It's been a strange season.  The squash didn't produce a lot, and is now ready to get yanked.  Same with the cucumbers and green beans. Some tomatoes are splitting open, and some rotting due to the weather we are having.  Not sure how much we will get this year. Took advantage of needing jalapenos in the recipe, and saved seeds for next year.

It's another canning day today.  The paste tomatoes are rolling in and I have 38# in my kitchen.   Looks like we get to enjoy leftovers again tonight.  I made a sheet pan chicken fajita dinner and it I am loving it.  Sheet pan dinners are quick and meat and veggies, and less dishes to wash.  Work is buying lunch for the employees, so I only had to pack breakfast for my husband. Breakfast was thrown together with what I had - zucchini, onion, garlic, eggs, tomatoes and fresh basil from the herb garden.

Hubby and I were sipping coffee at 5am on the porch Friday morning (won't be many more mornings to do this), and the radio had garden talk and advice going on.  They gave advice on whether to pick your tomatoes and bring them in to ripen or have a tomato fight.   If you pick green tomatoes when it's in the 70's, they will ripen in two weeks.  If you pick them in the 50's, it will take 4 weeks.  I decided to get out there and pick them all.  We had a frost warning, and after that they won't be any good.  The ladies and Stud Muffin Sparta had a hay day helping clean up too. As for the garlic, it depended on the weather at 4:30pm when Hubby got home.  Rain was in the forecast.  We managed to toss down some peat moss, and get the garlic bed tilled just before rain arrived.   Once the parsley left the dehydrator, plantain went in.  I'm hearing more people are getting bitten by spiders this year, and requiring doc...

Pear picking has begun.  Deer have ripped down a branch, but the trees are loaded.  We carried back what we could, but need to go back out.  It may be the year to make pear wine.  We need more practice at it anyway. I also picked another 6# of tomatoes.  Those went into the freezer with hopes for more.  Some plants are dying, while a few are thriving. I was able to get 1 head of organic cauliflower in the freezer.  I snatched up one on clearance - $1.49.  I am hoping for more. Here's what went with that leftover corn bread - dutch oven chili with bacon (but cooked in the crock pot this time). Baked a blueberry-lemon bundt cake.  I felt bad when Hubby asked on Monday if I had baked anything "sweet."  Monday was a busy day.  It sort of stuck in the pan this time - added extra blueberries.  Lip smackin' good. Got some more weeding done until I ran into this..... I'm waiting on rain or Hubby to extract th...

We've had a very happy garden moment!  I picked 17.5# of tomatoes on just one picking.  If you've been reading my blog regularly, you know we planted about 100 plants and got under 20# since they started producing.  I wanted to climb the roof and shout it to the world, I was that happy. How to preserve tomatoes for sauce making.  Rinse and dry tomatoes whole.  Freeze in freezer bags or freezer containers.  Don't forget to label so you know the exact weight.  Thaw and use for sauce making recipes.    By the way, the skin comes right off of these when they thaw.  It didn't help me with my sauce making (I toss them in a pot, and run through a sauce maker), but if you don't have a sauce maker I thought I would share. Dug this bad boy out for the first time this season. Such a happy day for me yesterday!!  Tomato sauce!!

It didn't take long for the recent medical bills to start flowing in (again).  I spent time on the phone taking care of those, so I can pay monthly until they are at reasonable amounts to fully pay off.  A bit of sad news.  The small quilt shop that I have wanted to take lessons at (and procrastinated for years) is now closing it's doors.  It was very close to home too, and local.  I guess Youtube and I have a date this winter.  The sewing machine sits and waits for me.  Yeah, not happening any day soon due to the last haul of tomatoes. Lemony Tomato-Basil soup was canned first.  I had very little basil in the herb garden, so I did a mix of parsley and basil this time.

We recently grilled burgers and we took advantage of that open jar of canned caramelized onions.  Mmm.  Goodness.  Grilled organic / non-gmo beef burgers, topped with swiss cheese, canned onions, and home canned ketchup.  I should have mixed some hot peppers and greens into the beef, but I was just so hungry, ha ha ha! (15 lbs.)

(before sauce reduced to half) It's been a canner-ganza week.  I'm thankful for that too, and we haven't checked our pears yet (no apples or plums this year again).  Homemaking goes to a new level when you homestead as well.  It's not just cleaning, tidying up, dusting, paying bills, vacuuming, sweeping, purging, baking, cooking, washing dishes, getting kids to appointments and off to school.....it's hard work.  My kids hate me this time of year, ha ha!  Literally.  Deep down, I know they appreciate it. I'm looking forward to a huge crock pot of delicious chili soon.  All these tomatoes are making me hungry. Got coffee?  Tea?  Adult beverage (ha ha!)  You may need one to sip while you read through today's post.  Sorry for the length.  Like I said - a busy kitchen week. I used about 23 pounds of those delicious tomatoes, to can up some seasoned tomato sauce (recipe is in the Ball Blue Book). I used p...

First off today, it's the first day of school and this Mom didn't wake up until 9am.  I feel so awful.  I had a busy day yesterday, but Grad Daughter was up and took my traditional bus leaving the house photos.  Her bus picks up at 7:04am this year, and normally I am up. I woke up to an almost empty coffee pot and then realized I missed her getting on the bus.  I feel terrible.  Oye.  Oh so terrible.  At least Hubby already had coffee made, and I already had breakfast made.  That should have helped ease her morning. Yesterday, my day started with chopping up and coring 10-11 pounds of tomatoes.  Our tomato year is poor this year. they are much smaller and we have very little compared to last year.