Alpine Strawberries

Have you ever noticed that tiny blessings appear just when you seem to need it the most? I was blessed with one yesterday, just when I needed it the most.

This fall I was given a potted Alpine Strawberry (Fragaria Alipina). These are wild strawberries that grow a bit larger than their cousin the Woodland Strawberry (Fragaria Vesca), also a wild strawberry. I was told when it was given to me that it had never born fruit even though it had been grown outside all through the summer months. I did some research and found it is an ever-bearing strawberry and winters well indoors. Unfortunately, one article I read talked about how they need to be hand pollinated if they are kept indoors all year. Okay, I thought, not sure if I would ever get blossoms or berries but it is a pretty little plant nonetheless.

Alpine Strawberry (Fragaria Alpina)

Well, the pictures show what has happened with this lovely little plant over the past several weeks. It has not only blossom but a brand new baby berry as well, which I happened to notice yesterday when I most needed a tiny little miracle. There were only 2 blossoms that I could find, although I am sure there may well be more hiding in there somewhere. Today there is one blossom and one berry and I can’t wait to see if it actually does become a lovely little red strawberry.

Apples in the Pot to Apple Butter in the Jar-O

So last week was apple day at the Nest and I finally decided on making apple butter. I make my apple butter in the crockpot for several reasons. It never burns and it is such sweet torture to smell it cooking all day.

The first step is the apples. If you happen to have an apple tree in your backyard, wonderful. The only problem will be in figuring out how many pounds you have picked. Here is a chart and the link to help with that small problem.

            1 pound of apples equals:

2 large apples OR

3 medium apples OR

2 3/4 cups of cored & sliced/chopped apples OR

1 1/3 cup of applesauce

http://homecooking.about.com/od/foodequivalents/a/appleequiv.htm

If you do not have access to an apple tree, a good solution might be a local orchard. The apples are fresh picked, there are usually many varieties to pick and choose from and the apples are measured out by the pound for you.

Once the apples have been picked/bought, they need to be peeled, cored and chopped and thrown in the pot. Just add the sugar and spice and turn the crockpot on low.

Crockpot Apple Butter

3# apples

2 cups sugar

12 teaspoon cinnamon

1 pinch cloves or nutmeg

Simmer in the crockpot for 8-10 hours.

As soon as the apples are soft enough, I give them a spin in the blender and return them to the crockpot because I like a nice smooth apple butter. If you happen to like your apple butter a little more on the chunky side, you can use a potato masher while they are in the crockpot and mash them to the consistency you like. The apple butter should be cooked down to about half of what you started with. A wooden spoon should stand by itself in the middle of the whole hot yummy mess.

When the apple butter is done, put it into hot sterile jars and process in a canning bath for 25 minutes.

Four-legged Furry Staff

Just for the fun of it I thought I would share a picture of my furry ‘staff’ helping out with the writing of posts for this blog.

Meet Mona, she likes to keep the keyboard warm and tries to keep one paw on the touchpad with me. She enjoys watching the screen and started by watching bird videos. She has now graduated to watching just about anything happening on the screen.

Potato Soup

Here is a recipe that I have been making for years that I am not even sure where I ever learned to make it. I just know it is yummy good and can be tinkered with depending on what you have on hand.

Potato Soup

Ingredients:

6 potatoes diced

1 cup chopped onion

2 carrots thin sliced

2 ribs of celery thin sliced

4 cups chicken broth

¼ cup of flour

1 ½ cup of milk

Toss the potatoes, onion, carrots, celery and chicken broth in the crockpot on high. Cook until done, 2-3 hours should be good. Mix the milk and flour together like you would for milk gravy and add to the soup. Let it boil until thick and then turn on low to keep warm and serve.

Once again, no picture because I was not thinking of even posting this one but it is such a comfort food for a chilly fall day.

Creamed Cabbage (Baked)

So, I love creamed cabbage but I also love easy in the kitchen and this recipe seemed to have it all. Sorry there are no pictures for this one, we were really hungry and I guess I had never really intended to put this one on my blog at the time.

Since then I have decided that just because a recipe might seem strange or unusual, does not mean that there are not those out there who might like it and maybe did not even think to look for it. With that said, here it is.

Creamed Cabbage (Baked)

Ingredients:

1 cup milk                  
2 Tablespoons butter             
1 dash black pepper
¼ teaspoon salt

2 Tablespoons flour                    
1 cup of Romano cheese

1 medium head of cabbage

Shred the cabbage and steam it until it is tender. To do this, I used a pasta kettle. Fill the bottom with a few inches of water, not enough to reach the top part. Bring the water to a boil and put the cabbage in the top for about 5 minutes or until it is tender. The time will vary depending on how thin or thick you shredded the cabbage.

In a heavy kettle over medium heat, melt the butter and then mix in the flour, salt and pepper and stir it into a soft dough ball. Add the milk and whisk the milk and the dough ball together and bring back to a boil to thicken the sauce. When sauce is thick and hot, whisk in the Romano cheese. (The original recipe calls for the cheese to be added to the cabbage separately and not added to the sauce.)

Put the cabbage in a baking dish, pour the sauce over the top and bake at 350° for about 30 minutes or until the sauce is hot and bubbly. (The original recipe calls for the cabbage, sauce and cheese to be put into the baking dish in layers.)

www.allrecipes.com/recipe/creamed-cabbage/

Apple Cider Pork Roast

Here in Southern Minnesota fall is apple season. This year we had the time and wherewithal to visit our local apple orchard, Welsh Heritage Farms Apple Orchard and Pie Shop and Harbo Cider. I love, love, love these places. It always smells to good and you get to taste test some of the wares, yummy.

Of course I bought apples and some local honey before moving on to the cider store. Not only do they sell fresh apple cider but they also sell hard cider and specialty cheese here.  It was the fresh apple cider and the pork roast in the freezer that had me hooked on this recipe. Not only did it sound like something different and tasty, it seemed to be just what the doctor ordered for this time of year.

Crockpot Apple Cider Pork Roast

Boneless pork shoulder or sirloin roast (3 ½ - 4 lbs)

2 medium onions sliced

4-6 carrots cut into 1 inch slices

2 cloves of garlic minced

½ teaspoon of salt

1/8 teaspoon of pepper

½ teaspoon of allspice (I used whole)

1 teaspoon of chili powder

1 teaspoon of  dried leaf marjoram or thyme

2 cups of natural apple juice or cider ( I used 1 ½ cups of apple cider and ½ cup of apple cherry juice)

2 Tablespoons of cider vinegar

Layer the onions on the bottom of the crock pot and put the roast on top of them. If there is netting on the roast leave it on.

Next put the carrots in the pot around the roast and put your spices on the top of the roast.

Pour the apple cider/juice over the top, cover and cook on high for 1 hour.

Finally you can either turn pot to low for 6-8 hours or leave it on high for another 3-4 hours.

When the roast is done, the juices can be transferred to a kettle and used for gravy if you like.

Accompany this dish with some sort of starch like mashed potatoes or buttered noodles and enjoy.

www.southernfood.about.com/od/crockpotporkandham/r/r81002c.htm

Here's what mine ended up looking like... yummy!

Disclaimer: This is not the entire roast... we were hungry!

Grandma's Tomato Jam

This is a jam I looked forward to every summer. I remember having it at my grandmother’s house when visiting and when I had my own home and my own garden I also made this yummy jam. Once again, it has been many years since I have made this jam and it still turned out just as yummy as I remember it.

6 cups of fresh tomato sauce (about a dozen medium to large tomatoes)

6 cups of sugar

1 tablespoon of lemon juice

Prepare the jars you plan to put jam in and the you will need to peel the tomatoes. The easiest way I have found to peel tomatoes is to set them in boiling water for a minute or two and then take them out, letting them cool enough to handle and slip the skins right off. Cut out the stem and any undesirable spots and throw the tomatoes right into the Dutch oven (remember the Dutch oven?).

Here’s what I think of as the fun part. By this time the tomatoes should be cool enough to squish them up with your hands. Keep squishing until the tomatoes look like chunky tomato juice. Next I add the lemon juice and bring the tomatoes to a boil before adding the sugar After adding the sugar, I boil the whole hot mess until the sugar is melted into the tomatoes. Simmer what is now jam over medium heat for 1-2 hours or until it is thick enough to coat a spoon.

When the jam is done, pour it into your waiting jars and process them in a canning bath for 25 minutes.

Tomato Jam on the left.

Beet Jelly

Beet Jelly

This year I made Beet Jelly for the first time in many years. I was also extremely frugal. I cooked the beet leaves to get my beet juice for the jelly. Here is the recipe for that jelly along with how I did it. This should make around 4 pints of jelly but I like to have an extra jar or two at the ready just in case. Besides you never know when you will have a partial jar to put in the refrigerator and use right away. If you know you like Beet Jelly, this recipe can be doubled.

What you will need is:

5 cups of beet juice

½ cup of lemon juice

5 cups sugar

1 package of pectin (the no added sugar kind)

The first thing I do is measure everything out, once you get going with making the jelly it will go pretty fast.

Measure the beet juice right into the kettle I am using along with the lemon juice. You will want to use a heavy kettle that is deep enough that your juices only come halfway up the kettle. I like to use a Dutch oven, the heavy kind that you make pot roasts in. Next measure the sugar into containers and you are ready to begin.

Stir the pectin into the beet juice and bring to a full rolling boil, stirring constantly. This is a boil that cannot be stirred down. Add the sugar that you have measured out and bring back to a full rolling boil. Keep this boil going for a full minute stirring constantly.

Remove the kettle of jelly from the heat and let sit for a few minutes to let the foam come to the surface. Skim the foam from the top and pour the jelly into prepared jars. Seal the jars and process in a canning bath for 25 minutes.

Beet Jelly on the left and Tomato Jam on the right.

Making Jams & Jellies

How to Use Pectin in Jams and Jellies

When there is a recipe on the Sure Jel insert, use it. I have tinkered with these recipes and usually have good results. What you don’t want to tinker with is the amount of lemon juice the recipes call for. The lemon juice is what adds acidity to your jam or jelly and keeps the botulism at bay as well as other nasty bacteria that will ruin your jam and make you sick, very, very sick.

This is for when there is not a recipe on the Sure Jel insert. If you need to figure out how much lemon juice to use in your recipe find a similar fruit to see how much if any lemon juice to use.  I have not found any general rule of thumb for this one. A lot of times I will simply stay away from jams and jellies that I feel are not acidic enough to prevent spoilage.

The old school method of making jams and jellies without pectin was simply equal amounts of sugar and fruit, cooked down until they were thick and coated the spoon. This is still the preferred method for ‘butters’ usually made out of apples although I have recently found one made from pumpkin that was pretty good. If you are using this method but want to assure a nice thick jam or jelly, there is always no sugar needed pectin (Sure Jel, No Sugar Needed). This is not a sugar free pectin but a pectin that can be used without adding any sugar OR adding the amount of sugar you want to add. I am thinking I will probably be using this type of pectin exclusively from now on.

Anyway, that is my take on making jams and jellies. Below is a site that talks more thoroughly about making jams and jellies.

Hot or not so Hot Pepper Relish

Today it was back to the kitchen for more fun with the peppers and I found a recipe for Pepper Relish. Initially I was a little leary, I like to taste my peppers and not have my tongue numbed by the heat.. My solution was a combination of jalapeno peppers and banana peppers, about half and half, with just a few bhut jolokia peppers, aka ghost peppers, tossed in for a little real heat. No matter what kind of peppers you use, you should have 2 quarts (8 cups) of peppers when they are cleaned and chopped.

Here is a chart that will help you choose your peppers. Peppers are rated on what is called the Scoville Scale. The higher the Scoville number the hotter the pepper.

http://www.eatmorechiles.com/Scoville_Heat.html

Peppers can vary in heat depending on a lot of different factors. The biggest factors are how mature they were when they were picked and how many seeds are left or not left in the peppers when you clean them. Don’t get me wrong here, a hot pepper is a hot pepper, no matter how you slice it or how many seeds you leave in or take out.

THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT! Peppers naturally contain capsaicin that gives the pepper heat. When you are cleaning hot peppers you will get capsaicin on your hands or gloves. It is very important not to touch your face, eyes or any place else you don’t want to be irritated while you are cleaning the peppers. Wearing waterproof gloves is a good idea here. 

Once the peppers are cleaned and chopped very fine you will have 2 quarts of chopped peppers. Add 2 tablespoons of pickling/canning salt to the mash and let it sit for 3-4 hours. Mine looks more like a mash because I used the chop setting on my blender

Pepper mash

When the pepper mash is done sitting around, just cook the whole mess up with the 2 cups of white sugar and 2 cups of white vinegar for about 45 minutes. Stir it often enough that it doesn’t burn or scorch. Put the relish from the pot to the jars to the canning bath for 10 minutes. Of course, the taste will depend on what pepper combination you started with. Mine ended up nice and mellow with a little bit of bite that catches you by surprise.

Pepper Relish in the Jar-O

The recipe:
     2 quarts finely chopped peppers                    2 tablespoons of pickling/canning salt
     2 cups of white sugar                                    2 cups of white vinegar
http://www.pepperfool.com/recipes/canned/hot_relish.html

Pickled Beets

Back to the little corner kitchen to do some canning today and today's star of the show... beets. I have already done beets once this year but I do not turn away any fresh goodness from the farm and this year must have been a good year for beets.

Since I have quite a few beets in the freezer, this offering of the wonderful ruby red root will be pickled in the old farm style way. Simply, with vinegar, sugar, salt, cinnamon and cloves. Here is the recipe I intend to use:

10 lbs of beets (about)
2 cups of white sugar
1 Tablespoon of pickling salt (it is very important to use pickling salt)
1 quart (4 cups) of white vinegar
1/4 cup whole cloves
Stick cinnamon

While making pickled beets is fairly simple, it is also time consuming but well worth it.

The very first thing you need to do is boil up your fresh beets till they are done enough that the skins slip off. When they are done, drain and let them cool enough to handle. I generally don't worry about washing the beets first unless I am planning on using the juice for something. In this case, no juice is required. I just don't sweat a little dirt in the water because the beets come in their very own wrapper of sorts and the dirt will boil off in the cooking.

Hot steamy beets chillin' in the dish drainer. yes, a dish drainer can double as a mega strainer sometimes.

Now you can slip the skins off the beets and cut them into slices, about a quarter inch thick. The smaller beets I slice whole while the large beets I half or even quarter and then slice them. You want the slices to be small enough to go into the jars without too much trouble. Put the sliced beets in a bowl for now.

Put the rest of the ingredients, except the spices for now, in a large kettle. (I used my gross grandma's old dutch oven because I think it brings the spirit of her kitchen to mine). This is called a brine. For the spices there are several ways to go here. The easiest would be to divide the cloves among the jars and then tuck a cinnamon stick into the beets after they are in the jar. You can also tie up the cloves and cinnamon in a piece of cheesecloth and simmer them in the brine. I usually used a clean piece of cotton cloth because I never seem to have cheesecloth around. I am thinking I might just tie up the cloves and simmer them in the brine.
 I have always liked cinnamon sticks tucked in jars so that is what I will be doing with these beets as well.

After the brine is is done, but the sliced beets in hot sterile jars* with any spices you have decided to add to them in the jar. I use pint jars because around here a pint jar seems to be just about the right size for a snack for the two of us. Cover the beets with brine and seal. Once they are sealed you will want to put them in a hot water canning bath for 25-30 minutes. As I have posted before, when the time is up, I simply turn the canning kettle off and let them sit over night if I can. If I need the canner for another batch of something, I take the jars out hot and turn them upside down on a towel on the counter. This is where they will sit without moving overnight so you will want to think about that and place them somewhere kind of out of the way.

*To heat and sterilize your jars, a dishwasher works great. Otherwise a wash in some hot soapy water and a good rinse in hot water works well too. If I want to do this ahead of time, I will then put the jars in pans and just hold them in a warm oven. Usually the lowest setting keeps them plenty hot.

Pumpkin Butter

Rainy days here in Southern Minnesota as fall begins. Perfect weather for the last of the canning. The apples, grapes, squash and pumpkins to name a few. I also picked up some gourds this year and will be drying them and hopefully crafting with them in the spring, sooner if I am lucky. That is another post though.

For now I am filling my time with pumpkins. This year I made something I have never made before, have never even heard of before. Pumpkin butter. Every year I do apple butter, one of Dad's favorites, but pumpkin butter is new to me.

For Starters One Medium Roasted Pumpkin

After some internet research for recipes appropriate for canning up for the winter, I found one I was satisfied had a high enough acid content to be safe for winter canning. After roasting a nice pie pumpkin it was simmered in the crock pot until it was thick and yummy looking. I figured when a wooden spoon stood up straight in it, it was probably thick enough.

Simmering Away in the Crockpot

It was put into jars, given a hot water bath and there you have it. Cinnamony, citrusy, yummy pumpkin butter for a cold winter's night.

Pumpkin Butter in the Jar-O

The recipe I used for this yummy stuff is below.

3 c pumpkin puree
3 c brown sugar
3 tablespoons lemon juice
1 teaspoon of cinnamon or 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon and 1/4 teaspoon of pumpkin pie spice.

Mash everything together and put in a covered crock pot on low. Do not uncover for 1 hour. Next, uncover and continue the simmer for 2 more hours. Put into hot clean jars and put into a hot water bath for 25-30 minutes making sure you have 1 inch of water over the top of the jars. (When I used my water bath canner, I just turn it off when time is up and leave the jars in the canner overnight.) You should end up with about 2 pints of butter plus a partial jar to eat right away.

Here is the recipe/instructional I got my base recipe from and it also has good directions on the actual canning process.
http://www.instructables.com/id/Pumpkin-Butter/?ALLSTEPS

And now here is the disclaimer. Many sites talk about the dangers of botulism due to the low acid content of pumpkin. One of the reasons I chose this recipe was because it used a fairly large amount of lemon juice which along with the sugar, raised the acidity.  As always, when canning anything,  be ultra clean and careful. If you are concerned about the acidity of this butter, the finished product can be refrigerated for several weeks or frozen for several months.

Open Letter to my United States Representative

Dear United States Representative,

Wish I could believe the BS that all of you politicians are spouting, I used to believe in all of you and trust all of you. I don't anymore and I feel like a total idiot for ever being that naive. Congress, the Senate and you Mr Obama, should not be getting paychecks after letting this happen AGAIN! You all fight and bicker like a bunch of little kindergartners. I know if I had your kind of work history and work ethic, I would not only lose my paycheck but my job as well.

Personally, I am sick and tired of seeing the taxpayers being your financial pawns. Our government sends troops to other countries to fight oppression while our government oppresses our hard working citizens right here and for some reason that is okay. This makes me feel like I don't matter at all except to give more and more tax dollars to the government. I am pretty sure that if any company in the private sector handled other people's money the way that the government handles our tax dollars, they would be or are in prison. I KNOW that if I handled money the way the government does, I would be destitute and homeless in a country that could care less.

Washington DC, grow up and run this country like you were hired by the taxpayers to do!

Sincerely,

One of many taxpayers who pays your salary

Beautiful Fall Day

It is a beautiful fall day here in Southern Minnesota and a great day for a drive. Met up with family and friends in the big town of Cleveland, Minnesota. Lo and behold there was a little Hey by George pumpkin patch set up at the one and only local convenience store and gas station.

They had a wide variety of pumpkins and gourds, some of which I had never seen before. There were also books about Hey by George and home grown popcorn, corn shocks and straw bales.

Since I live in an apartment, the corn shocks and straw bales are pretty much out. I did get some of the home grown popcorn, a couple of gourds and another pumpkin. We love popcorn and the gourds were just too cool to pass up, at least I limited myself to 2 of them. Just had to have another pumpkin too. After all, you pretty much need a pumpkin for carving and a pumpkin for eating... right? All these treasures for under $15, not a bad deal at all.

Thinking the eating pumpkin is going to turn into pumpkin butter. Will let you know how that turns out. By then I will have had a chance to try the popcorn too.

Closing with a picture of my treasures from the farm and the pumpkin patch.

Bittersweet

Part of bringing the harvest home is remembering to bring home into the harvest and leave little seasonal reminders around your nest.

One of my favorite fall reminders, absolutely love it!

Shorter Days Cooler Autumn Nights

Here we are once again, closing in on the Wiccan New Year (Samhain). After a wonderful warm summer the nights become blessedly longer and cooler. Lazy days turn to days of getting the last of the summer activities done and preparing for the dark and restful winter days.

Back to work with a new hip and it is going ohhh so much better. It was one of those things where you didn't know just how much you hurt until it didn't anymore. After being back to work now for over a month, I realize that my hip had been deteriorating for longer than I thought. It simply came to a head when it actually collapsed. Even though I feel like a new person, I have been told that it will probably be a full year before I am totally and completely healed. I still am having some very strange reactions to the surgery that have nothing to do with my hip and I am hoping that these will all be gone by next May. Friends have come and gone through my recovery and I am sure will continue to do so. That might be best left for another post.

Besides work, I have been able to get back to my beloved cemetery walks, honoring my ancestors and the ancestors of others who have asked me for photos through Find a Grave. I don't always find who I am looking for but I always find someone who wants to be found and remembered. My latest 'project' has been the resting places of the young children. They can be so easily forgotten and lost in time due to their short stay here on this Earth. Planted on Earth to bloom in Heaven, author unknown.

On a more mundane level but no less rewarding level, it is canning season. A time to put away all the lovely fresh garden foods I can lay my hands on for the winter. So far this year I have preserved sauerkraut, spicy red cabbage, beets, beet jelly, tomato jelly, jalapeno peppers, banana peppers, pepper sauce and salsa. That is so far, coming up soon will be apple butter, grape jelly and pumpkin butter. Even though I might get sick of it now, I will be glad that I continued on around January.

Closing this post with a photos of pepper sauce in the pot and in the jar along with a wonderful batch of salsa.

Thoughts and Memories

So... a little over a week ago I had major surgery to repair/replace my collapsed hip. For the week or so prior to and ever since the surgery I have been experiencing bouts of depression. 

Those bout I had before the surgery I chalked up to fear of surgery and the bills it will be laying at my door step. I believe I have come to terms with these fears. I have decided that I don't want to spend the rest of my life in a chair if there is something I can do about it, even if I will be paying the bill for the rest of my life.

The bouts I have been having since surgery seem to be triggered by a number of different things and before I continue I will say this. I did quit smoking a few days before the surgery and have been trying to stay quit since so I have been tobacco free (more or less) for over two weeks now. Anyway, back to my train of thought here. The bouts since having surgery seem to be brought on by a number of things.

Initially, I have spent time being angry that my body has betrayed me so in such a short time. Up until now I have been fairly healthy and able to do the things I enjoy doing, all active and done outside and on foot. To suddenly have my body ground me as it has is a bitter pill. It is getting better but I still wonder if I will be back to where I was before the collapse. 

Next came the wondering and questioning of things are are. Is my life really as it appears or are there undercurrents that I either can't see or don't want to see. I have felt very isolated and deserted since the surgery. It feels like I have had to deal with it all alone while everyone who has called themselves friend and family go their merry way with hardly a thought spent on how I am doing. I do realize how selfish and self-centered this sounds on my part and that just proves to exacerbate the depression brought on by this crazy phenomenom.

Now in the past few days, I have spent time thinking about old friends and lives that are long gone. Not sure why but it what I do know is that it makes me feel like an old lady sitting around waiting to die. Not really where I want to be. Hopefully this is just a phase I need to work through.

The solution to all of this is simple and complicated at the same time. I have done it before but that was years ago when I was younger and a bit stronger all the way around. I am thinking I need to start over... again. Not just thinking, I know this is what needs to be done. I need to take a good hard look at my life and decide who and what will stay and who and what will go. I do have a pretty good idea of who and what needs to go and almost all are already gone. 

All that I plan to keep I still have but getting up and going on starting over is not as easy as it may sound. Some of the things I have not been able to keep have left some deep and painful holes in my life. I don't know if filling those holes is even an option. I think it is best to know the holes are there, know that I love those who used to live where the holes are and go on with life. 

Others will come and others will go. Sadly it seems like the more often this happens the easier it is to deal with. my goal is to be level and have things under control before the first snow. The first snow has always been a point of change for me but that is best left for another posting.