Canning Catch up

  I'm running behind on my fall canning.  I have two boxes of apples that I want to turn into apple sauce, two big bags of green tomatoes that need to be converted into salsa or relish (thanks to Rachel). Since I've made one batch of salsa already I guess relish is a slightly higher priority at the moment.  I also still have about 4 gallons of saurkraut that needs to be canned and my grapes will finally be ready to juice in about another week. An obsessive canner's work is never done.

   I tried out the green tomato salsa tonight and I like the recipe that I found on the internet. There were a lot to choose from but I had to go with "Linda Lou's Green Tomato Salsa".  I doubled the recipe so I was supposed to end up with ten pints but actually ended up with a only little more than eight.  The ingredients for the doubled recipe are as follows:  Assume that everything that can be chopped is chopped.

10 cups of green tomatoes

3 cups of seeded long green chiles ( I substituted bell peppers)

1 cup jalapenos

8 cups of onions

2 cups of either lemon or lime juice

12 garlic cloves

2 tablespoons ground cumin

6 tablespoons oregano

2 tablespoons salt

2 teaspoons black pepper

   Combine all ingredients into a large saucepan, stirring frequently, cook over high heat until it begins to come to a boil.  Reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes. Then ladle into pint jars leaving 1/2 inch headspace and process in a boiling water bath for 15 minutes. I'm including a picture in spite of the fact that Linda has already scooped me and posted pictures on her blog.

    In addition to the green tomato salsa I did my first batch of grape juice.  You will note the deep purple color. This is from a concord type of grape named "Valiant". I planted them about five years ago and it took about four years before they produced any significant amount of grapes. Last year the birds cleaned them out before I realized they were ripe.  This year I kept a close eye on them and harvested them just aas soon as the birds started on them.  I'm not getting a real good grape harvest this year from some of my vines due to our unusually cool weather. The "Interlaken" vines on the arbor over the back deck have a lot of grapes but the jury is still out as to whether they will actually ripen.

Our Ducks Now Have Names

   I finally have decided on names for our three india runner ducks.  I've named the male "Popeye", the larger female "Olive Oyle", and the smaller female "Sweet Pea".  The chicken now has a home of its own next door to the ducks and is anxiously awaiting some company from the batch of baby chicks currently being brooded by the Bedlamites.

Baby Chick Day in October

  Linda and I met up with Beth and the Bedlamites this morning at Monroe Feed (located next to the fairgrounds). They are baby chick central and have more varieties of poultry available over a longer period of time than any other feed store in our area.  Our India Runner ducks came from Monroe Feed.  We purchased a total of ten chicks, comprised of  4 Ameracaunas, 4 Cuckoo Marans, and 2 Rhode Island Reds. That should give us a pretty good variety of colored eggs.  The kids had fun helping get the baby chicks but they were really taken with the star attraction at Monroe Feed, a talking parrot named Sky.  He can sing a number of songs to include "I've Been Working on the Railroad." and "I Left My Heart In San Francisco". We were told that the oparrot likes adults better than kids, but he put on a pretty good show for the Bedlamites. You can see that from the photo below that he had John's attention.  Sky is a hard working bird and serves as the feedstore equivalent of a Walmart greeter. He makes a point of greeting customers when they enter the store, entertains them for a while, and always says "Bye" when they leave.

     Britton and Lucy carefully held the box with the baby chicks during the ride home. We then transferred them to their new home in the workshed.  Some of the chicks are destined to move to our house when they are older while some will remain with the Bedlamites in Monroe.

Pickled Beets Update

   I did get the beets done while Linda was gone to Maryland. I just didn't have time to blog about it.  I made a total of 28 pints of pickled beets from my 25 pound bag of beets. I even had enough beets left over to make a big pot of borscht, one of my favorite soups. Even if you don't care for pickled beets you have to admit they are very colorful.  I have already begun distributing them to the various pickled beet fans in the family. I feel a little sad that the Romeros are now living too far away to be able to share home canned goods with them.

   I also got some of my saurkraut canned while Linda was away.  I still have about four gallons left to process.  I finally managed to find some of the old fashioned jars with the rubber seals and the metal clamps. I want to try keeping some of the saurkraut in the fridge without canning.  I like the taste of the fresh saurkraut and I've read that nutritionally it is supposed to be better for you fresh.

Tour De Squash

   I didn't have much luck growing winter squash this year. I believe I can blame that failure on our strange weather and lack of much of a summer. Fortunately, I found a good selection at our local Fred Myers, including many varieties that I'm considering for next year's garden. So far I have purchased the following varieties: Sweet Meat, Kuri; Buttercup, Gold Nugget, and Acorn. The acorn squashes are my least favorite winter squash but they are relatively easy to grow.  The others are all maxima types and are better for winter storage. So far my favorite winter squashes all seem to be maximas. The large squash below is a Sweet Meat. The Kuri is sitting on top of the Sweet Meat while the Gold Nugget and Buttercup are to the right with the acorn on the left.

  Linda usually doesn't like me to leave stuff on her kitchen counters, but has allowed the squash as she considers them to be decorative.  Of course, that leaves me feeling encouraged to add to the inventory. I would really like to incorporate more winter squash in our diet. Its very nutricious and I like it. It really just comes down to finding more ways to fix it other than baked squash.  I've tried adding it to mashed potatoes with good success. I'd also like to try some soup recipes. I'm hoping Linda with eventually decide that she likes baked squash after she gets used to eating squash in other dishes. I guess what it really comes down to is me fixing it myself as its unlikely I will ever persuade Linda to cook more winter squash. She does like it in pies but one can only eat so many pumpkin/squash pies.

  I have grown Buttercup and Gold Nugget successfully in the past with purported maturity days of 115 and  85 respectively. Sweet Meat lists a muturity time of 115 days while Kuri is 85 days.  Acorn squashes mature in a mere 70 days.  This year I tried growing a Sugar Hubbard which is supposed to mature in 110 days. The problem is that you can't start counting those 110 days until it is actually warm enough for the squash to grow. I liked the flavor of the Buttercup and it has a convenient structure in that there are less seeds and they are close to the surface.  The only problem is the 115 day maturity makes it difficult to grow when we get less summer than normal. I'm thinking that either the Gold Nugget or Kuri might be a better choice with their shorter maturity times. I might just have to settle for buying hubbards, sweet meats and buttercups at the grocery store.

Simple Pleasures

    As much as I enjoyed babysitting Lance and Luna this past week it was very nice to come home again. I spent most of the day doing pleasant chores such as tending the garden and the animals, splitting wood, and working my bees.  As is often the case, I'm running a bit behind with both the bees and the garden.  I need to get the rest of my honey off, get the bees fed up for winter, and do some fall mite treatments. Its been a very busy summer.

    I also spent a few hours today (Monday 9/5/11) with my friend Quentin retrieving some free carpet from another friend in Woodinville. We're going to replace some of our carpet upstairs and install carpeting downstairs whereever Grandma Cozy would like to have carpet.  Its a real good quality berber carpet and looks brand new.

   My pile of wood to be split is mainly from the Smith Street Mill in Everett.  They are currently milling poplar logs to make pallets for California citrus fruit. For some reason pine and fir pallets are not acceptable for citrus fruits. They have to cut the logs off at certain lengths for them to go through the mill which results in a lot of small pieces that they sell off for firewood.  The current rate is $20.00 for about a half cord of wood. I currently have about one cord split and another cord to be split.  I'm planning to get a fireplace insert for our living room so our firewood usage will hopefully increase this winter.

   My saurkraut is progressing nicely.  I will probably be bottling it while Linda is gone to Maryland.  The only other canning project in the hopper at present is 25 pounds of beets that still need to be pickled.

Here Comes the Judge

    I spent most of the day in Puyallup serving as one of three judges for the honey and beeswax exhibits at the Puyallup Fair.  It was a bit of a drive but a fun experience.  I was very fortunate to have Louis Matej's able assistance to guide me through the process.  Louis is the chairman of the Masterbeekeeper Committee and is one of a handful of master beekeepers in Washington State. I took my camera but got so absorbed into the process that I forgot to take any pictures.

   I felt very well qualified to judge the actual honey and beeswax exhibits,  The criteria are fairly objective so its merely a matter of being consistent. I was a little less comfortable with some of the other areas such as the educational and art displays where the grading is very subjective. I particularly enjoyed judging the honey baked goods which included cookies, corn bread, several different sweet breads, granola, muffins, candy, and an apple pie. We also judged beekeeping gadgets, other hive products (including a honey facial mask), pollen, and mead.  I had to recuse myself from judging the flavor of the mead but they had a willing volunteer who stepped up to take my place for that portion of the judging.

    Having entered stuff in the fair myself I know what it feels like so I wanted to be encouraging.  On the other hand, ribbons are supposed to reward excellence and they lose their meaning if they're given too easily. We gave perfect scores to one of the extracted honey entries, the one pollen entry, and a few of the baked items. They really were flawless. One the other hand , I had no problem finding good reason to subtract points on a number of the honey entries and the candles.

    Unexpectedly, I was given $50.00 and two fair passes as compensation for serving as a judge. This was more than I would have gotten for jury duty and it more than covered my gas and lunch. Also, one of the friendly grange people came by giving away sweet corn.  We had it for dinner this evening and it was about as good as I've ever had. It was definitely deserving of a blue ribbon.

    As much as I enjoy our local Evergreen State Fair, I have to admit that the Puyallup Fair is more of a class act. The facilities are much nicer and newer. I was told that the Puyallup Fair is the 4th largest in the U.S. which is hard to imagine. I'm not sure I'll even get to use my free fair passes with our trip to Disneyland next week. We'll see how much time and energy I have left after Disneyland this coming week.