July 4th Fun

I was so excited to hear Hubby could take a little vacation time, so I started doing laundry, watering houseplants.....oh the fun that awaited.

First the garden got a good watering.  Hubby took to the vegetable garden, and I to the flower and herb gardens.  

With dogs and farm animals vacationing is a bit tricky.  I'm glad a few adult kids cold help out. 

Hubby surprised us and booked a hotel near a large firework display.   We stayed overnight and watched the show from our hotel window.  They had music to go along, via the radio station, and we listened and watched from the 6th floor.  It was a very nice show.

Rascals ~ Kitchen Happenings

This post should have been up a few days back. I hope everyone had a wonderful 4th of July.  I'll have an more current update in a few days.  Until then....
 
If you have been following my blog, you have heard about the raccoon that was taunting me.  We'll several days have gone by with nothing getting into my pots, so I replanted my organic medicinal seeds (I had to reorder all of my seeds).

A few days went by and the pots where untouched, until this happened.  Grr!  So frustrated.  I'll be buying whatever herbs do not make it this year.  I could put them all inside until they start, but I really don't want to buy seeds a third time.

Lemon Extract ~ Tinctures

I drained the last jar of lemon extract I had in the making.  this will last about a year or longer in our house.  It's not used as much as vanilla extract, which we go through a lot faster.

Sweet Cherry Jam and the Strawberry Saga

First, I have to tell you about the strawberries.  We have one plant that survived last year's monsoon, so we have zero strawberries.  Some years it's just how it goes.  We planted everybearing, and we did not like them anyway (small harvest, small berries, and never enough to can jam).

There is a place about 25 minutes or so from our house which sells very good strawberries.  This place is known for their strawberries.  They are huge and tasty.

I called, and found out that they were selling for only for one more day, and were picking that morning, and were to start selling at 9am.

Peas and Cauliflower for Breakfast ~ Mixing up Herbs ~ Timmy

Shell peas are slowly coming on, so I decided to take the first picked bit, and toss it into a breakfast frittata.  I did not have enough for a meal for all of us, nor enough to freeze.

This time I used cauliflower, potatoes (sliced), and peas. 

I had one green bell pepper ready to pick, and one hot banana pepper.  I tossed all of that into my cast iron skillet (cooking all the vegetables first), and did not add any other spice/herb.  I just added salt and pepper and it was delicious.

Sweet Potato Black Bean Frittata

Last Sunday, I decided to make us a healthier version of a frittata.  Hubby was complaining about "too many white potatoes" in his frittata, so I went in search of a recipe that used sweet potatoes - Sweet Potato Black Bean Frittata.

I found several online, and this was amazing - sweet potatoes, a red bell pepper, onion, garlic, a jalapeno pepper, spices, fresh cilantro, and black beans.  You bake it right in the skillet you cook your vegetables in, and only need one bowl to whisk eggs.   

Although packed with flavor, I could not even get my 17 year-old vegetarian to even taste it.  Her loss.  I put a piece away for me and two for Hubby's breakfast.

Here's where I got the recipe:  Sweet Potato Black Bean Frittata

It's Cooling Down!

My future goal is to have enough space for a good supply of sweet potatoes in a root cellar.  We are finding ways to swap out white for sweet potatoes more often, but I still like my red potatoes.  

Although a lack of rain is getting me a bit worried, I am keeping things watered.  The green onions looked terrible, but I found enough to whip up another sweet potato salad to go with our dinner (or be the dinner since the temperature was 91 degrees out).