Fancy Schmancy Sammiches

Around here, we sometimes get tired of the same old-same old.

PB&Js get tired.

Plain ol' ham and cheese get old.

Even my number one fave, grilled cheese, gets boring.

Andrew has been having a hankering for a Rueben sammich lately.

I don't care for rye or sauerkraut but hey, if he likes it, by all means, eat it!

A trip to the deli counter and a lovely lady that let all 6 of us sample different cheeses and meats--

brown sugar ham? delish!

Jarlsberg cheese? yummy!

We came home with a nice selection of deli meats and cheeses to make 2 kinds of gourmet sammiches:

                                                                      The Rueben.

Rye bread with thinly sliced corned beef, swiss cheese, sauerkraut, and thousand island dressing then pressed on the grill with a side of pickle. The husband reports, "It tastes like another!" It looked good, Mom gobbled up her sammich, but just the smell of the sauerkraut after Andrew opened the can was enough to chase me out of the kitchen and keep me from trying a bite.  Glad you like it honey, more for you!

The Turkey Cubano.

A twist on the Cubano which normally pairs ham and pork, this one uses turkey and ham.

Lightly buttered kaiser roll layered with turkey, ham, jarlsberg cheese, dill pickle, and mustard then pressed on the grill. Oh man!!  SO freakin' good!  And I don't even like pickles!! Even the kids gobbled this one up.

It's nice to shake things up a little, to try something different once in awhile.

When I saw the recipe for Turkey Cubanos, I didn't know what Jarlsberg cheese was, though I had heard of it. I learned it's a swiss cheese, slightly stronger tasting than the usual plain swiss cheese. I tried a bite of Andrew's Cubano with a pickle and liked it, then tried a bite of one without pickle and found I liked the tangy taste the pickle added to it, so I made mine with the pickle, too.  It's the first time I've ever purposely eaten a pickle and enjoyed it.

Eaten anything new lately?

Promising

Despite my lack of attention to the garden and surrounding areas, things still look promising around here. I am feeling much, much better these days, but I did have a little bit of a relapse yesterday after being stuck in the car not being able to stretch my hip out and extra walking around the stores running errands. I paid for that with more hip and back pain.





Half of my rhubarb is doing pretty good. I've had better years, but with the chickens pecking the young shoots as soon as they come out of the ground, I'm happy with what I can get. I hope once the chickens are fenced in, the other half of my rhubarb patch will bounce back.

My cherry tree is so-so. It's over-shadowed by two large dogwoods and they need to be cut down. Previous owners went crazy with the dogwoods and our property has many of them. I can definitely stand to lose a few. I'm out of my cherry-almond jam (so good!) so I'm looking forward to picking cherries at the local orchard down the road from us. I know for a fact that this lone cherry tree won't give us enough for even one pint of jam.

The mulberries!! This was taken last week and since then, I have a tree with ripe mulberries that I can see from my bedroom window! It's a recently discovered tree, with all the branches are high up, so those berries are for the birds. Meanwhile, right around the corner from the ripe mulberry tree, the one closest to the house is a.l.m.o.s.t. there! Maybe in a week or two. Mulberry trees by the driveway and in the garden area are soon ripe, too.

My cousin and a friend both want to learn to make and can mulberry jam, so I'm going to invite them up as soon as they are ripe and plenty of berries come down daily. They bring their own jars and I'll provide the rest. Will be nice to have company in the kitchen when making jam!

The Last of Summer 2010

These 3 tomatoes represent the very last of summer's harvest. This is the first time we have eaten fresh tomatoes from my garden all the way into December! Before the first hard frost hit, back in late October, I harvested nearly all the green tomatoes. I left behind quite a few on the vine, and was going to get the rest the next day, but the next morning found them all mushy and limp under Jack Frosts' touch. Oh well, I still had the first harvest, which filled 2 milk crates-- nearly 8 gallons of green tomatoes!
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Our sun room was an add-on by previous owners, and we think there's no insulation, plus the windows are those slat-type windows, which all equals to either a very hot room in the summer, or a very cold room in the winter. Makes it perfect for storing green tomatoes and letting them ripen slowly. The tomatoes that got moldy or mushy went to the chickens and we salvaged some by cutting off the bad parts. I have one lonely tomato left and I am amazed that I've been able to eat fresh this late in the year.
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Andrew and I have long stopped buying taste-less tomatoes at the stores, preferring to wait until either the farm stands have them in the Spring, or from our garden. After the last tomato gets eaten, we'll be relying on all the tomatoes I canned over the summer-- more than 60 quarts worth! We are eating well.
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All in all, I'd say 2010 was a very good year for tomatoes! There are a few changes I want to make for 2011's garden, but I'll probably plant the same amount, tie them up the same way, use the soaker hoses again, and use the same old carpet for weed blocking. I won't be planting the dark purple cherry tomatoes, or the yellow and red striped ones, but then again, I didn't intentionally buy those and I think they were mix-ups from the farm store where I bought the plants. The purple cherry tomatoes were tasty, but the skin was tough and I was pretty much the only one eating them. I ended up mixing them in with the canned tomatoes for extra flavor. The yellow and red striped ones were pretty, but not much in the flavor department and they got mushy fast.
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As every gardener says, I am looking forward to the next garden and am already dreaming of trying new vegetables and new ideas for old planting habits. I hoped to have a winter garden this year, but time got away from me. Maybe next year will be the year!
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My goals for 2011 garden are:

• 2nd compost built
• strawberry patch
• asparagus patch
• grapes
• apple trees
• peach tree
• trim and train blackberry vines
• try onions (again)
• try broccoli (again)
• try cabbage (sigh, again)
• small greenhouse made from recycled materials
• chicken-proof netting around rhubarb
• herb garden

I think it's all do-able, not too costly to implement most of these, and I got some of the materials needed for some of the projects already. As soon as the holidays are over, the January birthdays have been celebrated, it's time to get started on 2011's garden!

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Eating and Shopping

Hello!! Are you are still in turkey-induced resting mode, or are you coming down from a Black Friday shopping high? Or perhaps a little of both? :o)

We had a lovely Thanksgiving. My Aunt and Uncle didn't come down because Aunt got sick and didn't want to make the rest of us sick. We missed them but the huge turkey she gave us was already thawing and it needed to be cooked! 22 pounds of lovely turkey went in the oven and between the seven of us, we didn't even finish half of a breast. Talk about leftovers!! the other breast went into the freezer for future meals, and then I picked over the rest of the turkey for pot pies this week.

Andrew and I make such a great team in the kitchen-- he helped me peel potatoes from our garden and we made sure to cook extra potatoes for breakfast later this week, and also made sure there would be leftover mashed potatoes for a shepard's pie as well. When we chopped carrots; he peeled, I chopped; we cooked extra for the pot pies. Then we danced around the turkey as he made gravy from the drippings and I sliced up the meat for our meal. We couldn't have planned it better, there were hardly any leftovers except for what we wanted and we also didn't over stuff ourselves and become miserable for the rest of the night.

I confess, I love Black Friday. I grew up going through the sales papers on Thanksgiving with my mom and sister, hunting for the best bargains and waking early on Friday to hit the stores. I dragged Andrew with me the first year we lived together and it was his first time shopping on Black Friday-- his mom never participated in that event. Andrew went with me a couple times after that, then quit when one year, we waited in line for hours and people were rude and loud and he told me that he had better things to do with his time than to deal with crazy people! I stopped for awhile, too, since we had everything we needed at the time, and then we had no money to shop either.

Ironically, that first time I took Andrew with me to shop on Black Friday, it was for a sewing machine. It was the only thing I wanted that day, so we got up at 4:30 am and made it to the store by 5 am when the doors opened. I got my sewing machine and all was good. This year, that sewing machine finally called it quits on me, and I need a new sewing machine. Lo and behold, Walmart has a sewing machine for $50 and the sale starts at midnight.

I like the midnight start time. That means I don't have to wake up the kids and drag 'em with me and then worry about them the whole time I'm there, making sure they're safe with me and they don't get lost in the crowds. We did this last year, because Andrew had to work, and it was a nightmare making sure the kids were safe, dealing with the pushy people, long lines, and hungry/tired/cranky kids who just want to go back to bed. Midnight shopping means I can leave the kids asleep in their beds, leave the husband to keep our bed warm, and Mom and I are free to shop.

I got my sewing machine! We got there around 11 pm and I'm glad we did, they did something different this year and let people shop for those sale items, but not pay until after 12:01 am for the sale prices. I made a beeline for the sewing machine and already the pallet was half-gone by then. We picked up a few more things and we were done by 12:15 am. Lucky us, someone directed us to the jewelry counter to pay so we bypassed the long lines and we were out the door by 12:30 am. It was a good night and I'm glad the crowds weren't so bad. Maybe they were all still in a good mood from good eatin'.

Now I can finish my advent calendar and sew the tree and pockets on the backing . We are in the middle of putting up the tree and decorations, and then after the kids go to bed, I'll start sewing with my new machine! It's not a fancy machine, but then, that first sewing machine I bought on Black Friday 13 years ago wasn't either and it lasted me this long. Here's to another 13 years or more with this one.

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Waste Not, Want Not

*Edited to add recipe for scratch Pumpkin pie*

I never understood that expression when I was a kid: Waste not, want not. I never asked what it meant and no one ever explained. Now that I am older and a little bit wiser, I understand now and I am trying to teach my children what it means.

At the Library on Oct 30, the kids got to paint little pumpkins. They've been sitting on the shelf, kind of forgotten, since Halloween is over and the decorations are put away. Seemed like such a waste of perfectly good pumpkins not to do anything with them. Hm, why not? I told the girls I was going to turn their pumpkins into pies!

After washing off the paint (I happened to note it was non-toxic, washable paint), I chopped them in half, gutted them, tossed the seeds to the chickens (we don't like pumpkin seeds), and popped the pumpkins in the oven. Evelyn helped puree the pumpkin and from 3 little ones came 12 cups of puree! That equals 8 pies! Yum! I made 2 pies tonight for dinner tomorrow and the kids can't wait to eat their Halloween pumpkins.

While I was preparing the pumpkins to go in the oven, I explained to the girls about not letting food go to waste. Here were some fine pumpkins and if we did not eat them, and instead let them rot, we'd have no pie. Later, when we are hungry for pie, we would remember how we let those pumpkins go to waste and kick ourselves for not using them when we had them. If you don't waste it now, you won't want it later= Waste not, want not.

I can't say for sure if the girls understand what the expression means, but they did say they would much rather eat pie than toss out their pumpkins. Whether or not they understand it, one thing is for sure-- Dessert will be savored tomorrow! :o)
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At the request of my sister, here's how to cook and prepare pumpkin for making pie.

Cut pumpkin in half. Remove stem, blossom end, seeds and stringy parts. Bake in a covered pan or covered with foil for about 1-hour at 350 until fork tender. Drain off liquid and cut into smaller pieces and process in a blender or food processor until pureed. You can freeze puree in zippy bags. I always make 2 pumpkin pies at a time, so I freeze in 3-cup portions for 2 pies. If you use pumpkin puree in other recipes, feel free to freeze in smaller increments.

My recipe for 2 pumpkin pies:

2 cups sugar
1 tsp salt
3 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp allspice
1 tsp ground cloves
3 cups pumpkin puree
3 1/3 cups evaporated milk
4 eggs


Mix all ingredients until smooth. Pour evenly into 2 pie crusts and bake 15 minutes at 450* then reduce heat to 325* and bake another 45 minutes until knife inserted in center comes out clean.

Eat and enjoy!! :o)

P.S. We ate pumpkin pie for dinner and it was deeeeeeeelicious!! We had my Aunt and Uncle here for dinner and polished off one pie. Still have another pie for Saturday's dinner! yum!
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Shocker

For the first time ever, since I've taken up canning 10 years ago, I am running out of jars! I never imagined I would run out of jars to fill!

My tomatoes have exceeded my expectations this year and I have canned 41 quarts so far. Not enough if we were pioneers and lived solely off our garden, but it's so much more than the previous years! I still need to tweak how many plants of what tomatoes, but I am pleased with the harvest so far. Several plants are starting to wither and fade, but at least half are still going strong.

If it wasn't for the corn, I'd still have empty jars, but I'm not complaining-- filled jars are better than empties! I have 3 cases of pint jars left and 1 case of half-pints. Zero quart jars. I have been feeding the kids applesauce more often for snacks just so I can get the quart jar back! The kids eat a whole quart in one sitting. I doubt I'll make applesauce this year, I still have plenty from last year. I think I will get a bushel or two of apples to make pies and apple chips though and to eat out of hand.

The local farm store is sold out of quart jars. I'm hoping to score a case or two when we go into town this week. I was hoping to can irish potatoes with some of the smaller ones when we harvest potatoes. Last year I shredded the smaller potatoes, blanched them, then froze them for making quick hash browns. It took up a lot of space in the freezer and a lot of my time to prepare them and besides, making fresh hash potatoes isn't that hard, so it wasn't like a huge time-saver. We do, however, love irish potatoes and now that I have the pressure canner, I thought I'd try making my own. Quart jars would be nice for this purpose.

I hope I'll always have this problem of not having enough jars. It means my harvest is going well and we'll eat good this winter! May you be as fortunate! :o)

Pressure Canner Love

I don't know what I was so nervous about, working with that pressure canner was pretty easy! I am so glad I got one and I'm already dreaming up other food to pressure can!

My very first pressure canned batch of corn-- 14 pints total.

I love the fact that it holds 10 pints (reg. mouth) at once, so that'll speed things up, but the downside is, it takes a whole 55 minutes to do one batch of corn. Now I understand why my friend's Grandma got so upset when one of her two pressure cookers broke and she immediately sent her husband to the store to buy another one. He ended up going from store to store before finding one and came home about two hours later. It was my very first time helping to can tomatoes and I didn't really understand what all the fuss was about. Having 2 pressure canners going at once would definitely help things go faster, but maybe later. First, I want to be skilled at using this one, then in a year or two, I'll buy a second. Or maybe when I get frustrated at the wait time, I'll send Andrew off to the store to get me another.

In the middle of me working on the corn last night, Andrew called from work and told me he was going to his friend Jim's house after work to pick up some peaches. We had a storm roll through in the late afternoon and Jim's neighbor had peach trees. The wind knocked a lot of peaches to the ground and the neighbor shared them with Jim, not wanting them to go to waste. Well, it was too much for Jim, so he called Andrew wanting to know if we wanted them. Well, sure! I'm not going to turn down free peaches!

We got four bags of peaches, some of them were badly bruised, but most of them were salvageable. Jim's lady hinted at peach butter, so I took all the smushed peaches and made up a batch of peach butter.

I started out with a full pot of peaches, about double the recipe in the Ball Blue Book, and it simmered for the next 5-6 hours before it was thick enough to round up on a spoon. Those peaches were juicy! I spiced it with a teaspoon of cinnamon.


I ended up with 6 pints of peach butter. I'll share them with Jim and his Lady, since he was kind enough to give me the peaches. There are enough good peaches left over to make peach cobbler and to eat out of hand. I had to fend the kids off the peaches so I could make sure I have enough to last a couple of days.
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Kind of funny how things work out-- I've been wanting to stop by the farm stand and pick up some peaches, but every time I'm out by the stand, I never have enough money on me (they only take cash), so I don't stop. I've had a real craving for peaches lately, I haven't eaten any this year yet. Then unexpectedly, we get a bunch of free peaches! Nice! I'm going to save some of the pits and plant them, see if I can get any to grow. It'd be nice to have a peach tree to replace the one we have now. The peaches never grow any bigger than a ping-pong ball. Any tips on getting a peach pit to grow? Do I need to let it dry or can I plant it now?
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Success!

I love it when a party goes as planned. With the exception of a few missing guests (we missed you!!), most everyone on the invite list showed up. I made sure to cook 90% of the food the day before, so I could enjoy myself at the party, too!

The menu: Pulled pork BBQ sandwiches, hot dogs, 2 kinds of potato salad (one is Andrew's Grandmother's recipe and the other is mine), chips, veggies and dip, and of course, cake and ice cream.

Evelyn requested a 'buggy' cake, so after much thought, I came up with a caterpillar cake. Cute?

It was hard frosting this, especially on the cut ends of the cake, but I'm happy with how it came out. 10 candles:: 2 for Peter and 8 for Evelyn. M&Ms for the spots, twizzlers for the feet and mouth. (there was going to be a butterfly cake, too, but the frosting just wasn't cooperating, so it got shoved into the freezer. I'll probably try to frost it when it is frozen and use it for Peter's cake later on his actual birthday. I'm sure he won't mind having a butterfly cake--it's a bug, isn't it? maybe I can switch it into a regular ol' fly? hmm)

Evelyn and the kids sure liked it! Peter fell asleep and napped while we had cake and ice cream. He was a cranky thing before I got him down, so I didn't want to wake him. He'll have some cake and ice cream on his actual birthday in July. There was plenty of cake left, so I'm kind of glad the butterfly cake didn't work out. That would have been just too much cake!

The pool was a big hit with the kids!! I am so relieved. I worried all night, after we filled it, that we'd wake up to an empty pool the morning of the party. We made sure the water guy "approved" of the digging out we did before we filled it all the way up. It isn't perfect, but so far so good. *knock on wood*


After the pool was filled, we still had water left in the water truck, so we filled up all the bins I had previously used to try and salvage water from last time. Turns out I am glad we did, Peter has lots of fun going from one bin to the other and we use one bin for dunking feet before getting into the pool. Of all the big bins he could hang out in, he chooses to sit in the bucket! Silly Peter!

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I'm sad to see the weekend end, it was such a nice long weekend with Andrew off beginning on Friday and not having to return to work until Monday evening. We are enjoying the luxury of our own pool and the only downside is the kids begging every waking moment when can they go swimming again. "Can we go swimming yet? Now can we go? Is it time to go swimming yet? When can we go swimming? Now? Is it time yet? Can we? Can we? Can we??" I can't blame 'em. I remember when I practically spent the whole, entire summer at the pool when I was a kid. Only difference was, there was a lifeguard there, so Mom or Dad didn't have to go with me all the time.

Shoutin' From the Roof Tops

I'm so excited I could just pee my pants! The Mulberries are ripe!! It's been a slow torture watching the berries form and grow slightly bigger week by week and then all of a sudden, they're ready! I have 4 mulberry trees and they ripen at different times, but we are getting tons of berries. yum yum yum!

Seeing "berry faces" is a regular thing around here. We pop berries into our mouths whenever we walk by one of the trees. You don't want to see the "berry feet"!

We even go in our jammies in the morning to munch on berries before breakfast!

I love that we are teaching Peter to pick and eat berries, too. Took a few tries but he understands now which berries to pick. The branches have so many berries on them, they are touching the ground, which makes it easier on me, I don't have to pull branches down for the kids-- they can just pick their own and the ones I pick for the berry bucket stay in there!


Another happy berry face!

The black raspberries and cherries are ripening too, so we are filling up on all kinds of fruit! My cherry tree is still small, so I still want to pick from the local PYO cherry orchard, but it's nice to eat my own cherries! Peter really likes the cherries, too. I eat half of the cherry and pull the seed out, then give him the other half to eat. He makes me stay there and pick more cherries for him and if I try to walk away he blocks me and pushes me back under the cherry branches. Looks like he'll be a cherry lover like me! :o)

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Fried Wontons:: Make Your Own!

I've said before that I love chinese food. Since we moved away from our favorite chinese restaurant 5 years ago, and discovering not a single good chinese place around here, I have been teaching myself how to cook chinese. A few weeks ago, I decided to try making my own fried wontons. They're pretty easy to make, but be sure to start a couple of hours before you want to eat these.. they take some time to put together.

I made my own wonton wrappers-- you can buy these in the store, but at the time I wanted to make these, I didn't plan ahead and I wanted them now, so I found a recipe to make my own wrappers. If you buy the wrappers, then you've cut the prep-work in half. Here's how to make your own wrappers::

Begin with 2 cups of flour, 1 tsp of salt and 1 egg.


Don't forget to take your ring(s) off and then get your husband to put it back on for you later.

Using your hands, work the egg into the flour, then add up to about 3-4 tbsp of cold water.
Knead until it is smooth and holds into a ball without crumbling. You'll need to roll this out, so the texture is somewhat similar to a pie crust.

This is what it should look like when it's done.

Cover with a damp cloth then refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, get your wonton filling started:

1/2 cup of ground pork (I use a little more--about 3/4 c), 1 clove of minced garlic, a pinch of pepper. You can add a tsp of cilantro, but I didn't have any on hand and it's optional.

Mix well then put in the fridge.

You can buy sweet and sour sauce for dipping, or you can make your own.

I made mine.

You'll need 2 tbsp water, 1 tbsp white vinegar, 3 tbsp sugar and 1 tsp of plum sauce.

Stir to combine then cook to dissolve sugar. About a minute in the microwave, 5 minutes on the stove. I used my plum jam instead of plum sauce and it tastes just like the real thing. I think I'll add cornstarch to thicken it up a little bit, but the flavor is great. It keeps well in the fridge, the last batch I made a month ago is still good.

By now, the wonton dough has been in the fridge long enough.

My recipe says to use a rolling pin and roll until very thin, almost transparent. I have a big, bulky rolling pin, so instead, I used my pasta maker. Did the job just fine! I started at the largest thickness and worked my way to the 6th level. There is one more notch to make it thinner, but 6 was just right.

If you rolled it with a rolling pin, cut 3 inch squares, flour lightly and stack.

If you used a pasta maker, I trimmed the really wavy ends and eyeballed it.

Don't worry if your squares are not perfect, it'll still taste good.

Before there were chinese restaurants with their perfect pictures of food on the wall, chinese food was made at home, after a long day of working, so I'm pretty sure they didn't hack off someones head if their wonton wrapper wasn't perfectly square!
Anyway, keep rolling and cutting until you've used all the dough and you have a nice stack of wonton wrappers. It makes a lot!

Take a small amount of pork mixture-- like 1/2 a tsp or less; you can't use more because if there is too much, then the meat won't cook before the dough burns in the oil. Who wants blackened wontons with raw meat in the middle???

Put the meat smack dab in the middle of the wrapper...

Fold it like so...

Turn it around...

Dunk a finger or a thumb in cold water...

Wet one corner of the dough then bend it towards the other corner til they meet in the middle.

Takes practice.. after you do a couple, you'll get the hang of it.

Press the two corners together to seal it and it should look like:

This!

Repeat, repeat, repeat, until all the meat is gone or you run out of wrappers.

If you run out of meat, you can cut the wrappers into strips and fry them for those nice crispy strips they use for toppings in chinese restaurants. The kids love them!

If you run out of wrappers, you can use the meat for something else, cook it into the meal you're making or freeze it for another time.

This is one batch of wonton dough. It makes a lot, I tell ya! I ran out of meat, so there were 4 wrappers left, which I fried up into strips.

Get your vegetable oil hot, and fry up a few of these at a time.. about 30-45 secs on each side.
Remove and drain on a paper towel or newspaper.

Ready for eatin'!

Serve with your meal and the sweet and sour sauce on the side.

I made chinese chicken and potatoes for dinner and we had the wontons as a side.

Delicious!! The kids gobble this up!

Don't forget to get your husband to put your ring back on!!

"Will you marry me?"

"Yes! Again and again!"

"Mwah! I'm so happy! C'mon, let's go on our honeymoon!"

Excuse me, gotta go folks!

:o)

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Damson Liquor

Back in August, I made my very first batch of Damson Plum Liquor. I made two different ones-- one with Gin and the other with Vodka. It is supposed to steep for several months, then you strain out the plums and voila! Damson Liquor!

This is what it looked like in August, and the one on the right is what it looks like now.

I strained out the Gin batch a few days ago and it was just tasty! I can't believe it was that easy to make and it turned out so good! The photo above on the right is the Vodka batch and I haven't strained it out yet, but it smells heavenly! Can't wait to taste it!

The color of the Gin batch is lovely, like a nice, deep, dark wine color. It filled up this bottle and a little overflow into a small canning jar. Nice flavor, reminds me of blackberry liquor. Any ideas on how I can use the plums?? I know I can still eat them, but do I just eat them right out of the jar or can I cook with them?? I'd love some ideas. Maybe I can make some sort of cake and chop the plums for a plum/gin version of rum cake??

Andrew and I aren't big drinkers-- we did the whole drinking and getting drunk scene when he was in the Navy and I was in college, and we have had enough of that. We do, however, like to have wine now and then, or a recipe calls for beer or wine, or when we are feeling sick, there's nothing like a shot of rum or vodka to knock you out and kill the germy germs. My dad used to let me have a shot of blackberry liquor when I wasn't feeling good and that will be next on my alcoholic ventures this Spring, when the blackberries are in season. I keep thinking that this would also make some nice gifts, bottled up in some nice glass bottles.

Strawberry wine, Peach wine, and Damson liquor-- all excellent results! Well, a 50/50 success rate with the Strawberry wine-- half of it went to vinegar. I learned from that and stayed on top of the Peach wine and that turned out to be just right, with a bit of sweetness to it. The strawberry is stronger with a bit of tartness. Looking forward to making mulberry wine and blackberry liquor!

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It's Definitely Fall!

I love the cooler weather we are having now. There have been a few days where we came close to starting a fire in the wood stove, but we held out. On nights where the temperatures dip into the low 40s, we have a little space heater we use in the hall, aimed towards the bedroom doorways and it wards off the night-time chill. Pretty soon, the wood stove will be fired up, I'm sure, but the longer we can put it off, the longer our wood will last.

It's been an extra busy week here. I took the remaining green tomatoes off the vine and turned it into green tomato salsa. Oh my! How tasty that was! I made a small batch first, to see if we would like it, and it was so good, that I made a bigger batch the next time, after buying what I needed to make more. I ended up canning 12 pints of green tomato salsa to enjoy during these cold winter months.

My Aunt and Uncle also brought us 150 pounds of russet potatoes! I took about 25 pounds and turned them into potato skins, loaded with bacon and cheese and froze them for later snacks/meals. All the potato that was scooped out has been turned into potato soup and mashed potatoes. Yum! We are a family of potato lovers and we definitely eat our fair share of potatoes around here.

Oldest was playing around with the bungee cords that we are using to keep the chairs with the table, to prevent Baby from climbing them (read previous post for more info). We tell the kids all the time not to play with them, they are like big rubber bands and they'll snap back and might poke your eye out or hurt you. Sure enough, Oldest hooked one end to the door knob, the other end to the sliding door handle and it popped off and clipped her in the eye.

*The day after*

It gave her a deep little cut in her eyebrow and left a shiner the next day. I am SO relieved that it missed her eye. She had a very swollen eye for a day, and now she is left with what looks like a bad make-up job on her eyelid. I hope she has learned her lesson (a painful one at that!) and will not play with the bungee cords anymore.

There will be one more preserving of food for me before I can finally put away all my tools for the year-- pumpkin! I have no pumpkin left from last year and am looking forward to making pumpkin pies, breads, cookies, and more! Hope to get a pumpkin this week and believe it or not, I'm actually tempted to get another bushel of apples. Wait and see how busy it gets this week, before I decide to get more apples. I feel like I turned all the apples into sauce before we really got to eat any out of hand, so I am craving the crunch-crunch of apples and the juice dripping down my chin. Plus, I've never made caramel apples for the kids before, and I think the kids would love to try them!

Damson Plum Liquor (recipe follows)

There was an ad in our local paper, from the same orchard where I got my cherries, for rambo apples and damson plums. I looked up damson plums on the internet and found they make a great jam and liquor. The rambo apples are good for pies, jelly, and drying.

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I definitely wanted more apples for making apple chips. They went so fast last year and I didn't make a whole lot of them, so this time, I got a whole bushel that will be just for apple chips. The rambos were only $9 a bushel so that's a great deal! This also breaks up some of the labor of peeling hundreds of apples all at once for applesauce and chips. The apples I use for applesauce are not ready yet, so this is nice to only work on making chips.

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I am intrigued by the idea of making damson plum liquor, and at 80 cents a pound, I thought it would be worth a try. I bought 25 pounds worth of plums, some for making liquor and some for jam.

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I am not a big drinker. In college, I went to my fair share of parties and night clubs, and I did the whole party-hearty thing, but now, I just like the occasional wine and a swig of the "hard stuff" when I feel rough around the edges. I have always liked fruity flavors, so I enjoy sangria and margaritas and such, and I really like the strawberry wine we made last year, so I think (and hope) the damson plum liquor will be something I like.

I found 2 different recipes on the internet for damson liquor. I am trying both. They are basically the same, except one uses more plums and more sugar, but less alcohol.

Recipe 1:

1 quart of damson plums (it didn't specify, but I halved and pitted them)
1 1/2 pound of sugar
375 ml vodka or gin (I used vodka)

Combine ingredients and pour into a gallon jar. Keep lid loose for fermentation. Stir weekly for 6 to 8 weeks until sugar is dissolved. Should be ready by December.


Recipe 2:

1 pound of damson plums, pitted ( I halved them and pitted them)
1 pound of sugar
1 quart of gin or vodka (I used gin)

Combine ingredients and pour into gallon jar. Stir weekly. Should be ready in 3 months. (Didn't specify, but I'm keeping lid on this loose as well)


I'll be keeping these in a cool dark place, the heat and humidity will spoil the fruit and I don't want that to happen. Hopefully this turns out yummy and I'll let you know how it tastes.

Now, I need to get started on peeling and slicing a batch of apples for the dehydrator. If I get it in tonight, they'll be dry by morning and ready for another batch!