Fowl Lessons

Our first year of raising chickens and ducks for protein was a learning experience, and we did not realize just how much until we began to raise this years batch.  We kept last year's fowl well into early fall because they just did not seem be growing as expected.  When they did go for processing and we got them back they were very thin and tough.  With the exception of I'd say two, they have spent the rest of the time in our freezer, with us not quite knowing what to do with them.

That is where this year comes in.  All of our birds are huge and growing very fast.  In fact we will call for a processing appointment on our ducks in about two weeks!  I would say it was a problem with the breed, we changed hatcheries and went a different route on the chickens this year getting Red Rangers, but we kept with Pekin ducks so now I believe it was just the quality of stock coming from the hatchery.  From day one the chicks were aggressive eaters and foragers.

With a very wet start to summer, and rain in the forecast for most of this weekend, we got some tasks done when we could outside, but mostly focused inside and clearing out the freezer.  B had the great idea to try pressure cooking the chickens to see if that made them more tender, and then pressure canning the meat for future.  That, did the trick!  We ended up with 6 1/2 quarts of beautiful shredded chicken, and 7 quarts of a rich stock, all canned and ready to make easy meals on busy nights.

#100HappyDays :: Day 25

We finished our first canning of the season, and tried a new rhubarb bread recipe yesterday.   I always make and freeze several loves of zucchini bread to pull out at various times after the garden season ends.  I believe that the rhubarb bread was a winner and a couple of batches will also be heading to the deep freeze.  We doubled our rhubarb chutney recipe from last year, which I am thrilled with, we will see what other tasks need to be done for next weeks gardening, we may just have to re-visit this recipe again as not to risk running out!  It is a wonderful feeling to begin to enjoy the produce from the garden and preserve it so that we can taste the flavors of early spring in the darker and colder days of winter.

One Last Round

As I sit here listening to one of the roosters crow....yes when you get a straight run of broilers, you get multiple roosters, I am wrapped in a blanket.  Overnight it seems we have transitioned from late August to October.  Though fall is my absolute favorite season, I cannot bring myself to turn on the heat before mid-September!  Hints of winter predictions to come?  Possibly.  It does, less than subtly, announce the gardens end.  It has produced well for us and now that the plants are all dying back, there is a certain catharsis in final harvests, clearing out, and putting the beds each down for a long, well earned, nap.  One last round of salsa and a final go at sweet corn will only leave applesauce for later this month, so two of the three canners that have cluttered the kitchen will also be tucked away.  I may not quite be ready for the dramatic cool, but it does feel good to wrap up in a flannel shirt, step outside, and fill my lungs with crisp air.  Here is to a VERY long Fall!

Re-Entry

Late August brings us not only an amazing shift in light, but also seas of goldenrod beginning to bloom.  The sun hitting this beautiful weed and the sound of cicadas greeted us when we returned home mid-week.  I was thankful for that glimpse, what with school and sports practices starting immediately.  My friend emailed me a welcome home, and said good luck with re-entry.  I'd never thought about it that way, but man is that true!

As much as we relished the special time away with family, we came back ready and eager to dig in and see how the garden had fared.  No surprise we had squash the size of pumpkins and loads of everything else.  The tomatoes delayed slightly for us and are just beginning to really produce. We planted mostly paste and drying tomatoes this year in the hopes of a good canning year.  It looks as if we may have gotten lucky!  I wanted to have a stocked pantry this year, especially so after I saw the latest predictions from the Old Farmers Almanac.   To top if off, our crocked cucumbers were perfectly ready for canning when we got home!

Of course since we have had such a mild summer, we have come back to hot and very muggy.  In fact after boasting to the family all last week that we had not seen a single 90 degree day this summer, it appears that is what is in our forecast over the next several days.  Between this and the almanac's thoughts on our upcoming winter, we stopped procrastinating and set the wheels in motion to replace our elderly heating unit and non working a/c.

And then there were three.  Yesterday morning we gathered our meat ducks and took them to the processor.  This was our first foray in to sourcing our own animal protein, and I must say that though we were somber, we knew it was right.  One of our goals when moving to the homestead was to teach our kids and better appreciate ourselves where our food comes from.  We knew that they had had an amazing life romping in large open spaces with room to swim, and weren't cooped up in some large facility.  The three remaining are mascots and hopefully an egg layer or two.

My mind is spinning after a week away, re-entry accomplished, now to write.

First Canning of the Season

Many times as the summer progresses, Sunday's become our main day for canning.  Yesterday among all of the farm tasks that had to get done, especially those important things at the beginning stages of garden growth, we added our first canning of the season to the mix.  The question is always what to do with the rhubarb.  We have a couple of smaller plants and this mammoth one that is so good to us.  I love to make cakes and crumbles with it fresh, but I tend not to be in the mood for the flavor later on when I crave the stone fruits of summer or heavier winter confections.  Our favorite jellies are the red currents and berries, so I really do not use the rhubarb there.  Last year we pressure canned a lot of rhubarb, and it is still waiting to be used, so it will be added to our next batch of wine.

As I brain-stormed ways to utilize it I began looking for savory recipes.  When I came across the Rhubarb Chutney I began to see the perfect way to use it year round and store volumes of it.  Needless to say the savory spice with the tart rhubarb leads to a perfect chutney to serve as an accompaniment for chicken or pork, puree into a BBQ sauce, or simple pour over a block of soften cream cheese and serve with sesame crackers (must try that this week)!  I think that this recipe will be utilized at least once more this season, maybe twice.  I want to hold onto this tasty stuff for as long as I can this year!

Spicy Rhubarb Chutney

based on a recipe from Accidental locavore

4 lbs rhubarb, chopped 1/2" dice

3 C red onion, diced

8  cloves garlic, minced

5 Tbsp fresh ginger, minced

3 C golden raisins

3 C brown sugar

2 Tbsp kosher salt

2 tsp allspice

2 tsp coriander

4 tsp mustard seeds

1 tsp red pepper flakes

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp smoked paprika

2 C cider vinegar

Place all of the ingredients except the cider vinegar into a large stock pot, bring to a boil and simmer for 30 minutes or until onions and rhubarb very soft.  Add cider vinegar and cook for another 30 minutes until the chutney is very thick and will mound on a spoon.  Place into hot jars with 2 part lids and water bath 15 minutes for pints.  Yield 9 pints.

Random Five Friday

1.  We are officially in the midst of soccer season.  What could be better than to watch his dedication coupled with pure enjoyment.

2.  These brown sugar oatmeal cookies of PW Woman, are fantastic!!

3.   Remember our bumper garlic harvest??  Well, I sold 60 heads of garlic to a local organic grocery store this week!  So exciting!

4.  Our larder is filling nicely with beautiful canned goods.  My hope is that we can keep our energy high through mid-fall to increase this exponentially. 

5.  One of the first things that we did when we moved to the farm was have a big party and to give it a twist, we made it a chili cook-off.  Over the years it has taken on a life of its own and tomorrow is our 6th installment.  We are running around finishing last minute preparations for around 80 people (almost half of who are children)!   This year we have 7 chili entries and 5 pie entries for their respective competitions.  Who will get to keep the chili pig and the golden rolling pin this year??  What better way to spend the final weekend of summer!?

Linking up with:

 

Summer or Fall?

Our summers are far too short in a regular season.  After the tremendous heat 10 days ago and perfect weather for fair week, the last two days have plunged us into brisk fall temperatures that make me wonder if it really is just the end of July.


As we set about work around the farm today, I realized, this sneak peak has left me both excited and longing for my favorite season to come.  The time when golden light and the crispness in the air make everything hold such promise.

We were energized to get the tough outdoor work done.  Our little homestead is going to be the venue for a wedding at the end of September and operation primp the farm is underway.   We installed  a new well head cover to replace the one that was blown over and shattered during a storm last winter.  We also transplanted a number of hostas and mulched the entire front below the wrap around porch that we cleared late last fall.

I am more motivated than ever to stay on top of the canning.  We made another nine pints of jelly today; a red currant raspberry mix.  Huge thanks to julochka who turned me on to this book.  It is now one of my preservation bibles as we finally are consistently getting all of our jams and jellies to set perfectly as a result of its wisdom.

As to fair, the kids came home with a stack of ribbons.  They did great in archery, photography and vegetables.  The bunnies had a bit of a tough time this week and did not place as well as hoped, but showing this year was a great learning experience for the kids.  All in all a great week!

Canning Tomatoes

 As you can see, our garlic did amazingly well this year! 

I have always thought of harvest in general, and tomato harvest specifically, and a race to get it all preserved.  We would get a ton of ripe tomatoes and dedicate an entire day or a whole weekend to processing everything.  Maybe that is because it is always a race against the clock here in the North to get enough ripe tomatoes at once to make that all happen.

This year they began ripening right on time, between the warm weather, and our pick of a couple of determinant types we are having volumes ripen, but staggered slightly to more an every other day time frame.  It has been a refreshing change to be canning a batch each night for a couple of hours, instead of the marathon to get them all done at once.  Trust me it is much more relaxed!  I have found that two cookie sheets of quartered Roma tomatoes will produce four quarts.  So far we have eight quarts done and another four that we made into sauce right away for consumption.  To give you a comparison, in the entire of last season (albeit a cool one) we had a total of six quarts of ripe roasted tomatoes; then of course 150 pounds that we processed into green tomato relish and sauce.  I must say that I am enthusiastic to be able to stock up and at this much more relaxed pace, it is the perfect way to settle into Fall!

Monotonous Rewards

I have a love hate relationship with canning.  I love to find recipes, create, process jars and fill the root cellar with the fruits of our labor.  With canning tends to come an afternoon of repetition, and by the end, exhaustion.  Oh, don't get me wrong, it is well worth it, but with a never ending processing to do list right now, it can be tiring.  Then after peeling and roasting a few of our tomatoes, that thankfully ripened, there was just a little of each kind left over.  Not enough to fill a jar, but they melded together beautifully, visually preserving a fresh reward to be opened in winter's darkest days.  Note to self: growing multicolored tomatoes is not only fun, it has the simple benefit of taking the monotony out of canning!

A Serenade of Pops

Pop..... pOp..... PoP..... poP....

Such a gratifying sound to listen to.  It is the sound of a jar successfully sealing down after it's come out of the boiling processing water.  The eighteen jars that we just canned are serenading me as they seal.  It seems that most of this years canning is on a theme...green.  With the weather turning so cool and the garden a couple weeks behind because of the cool start, we have only been able to can two quarts of roasted tomatoes and now we are focusing on condiments.  Yesterday we had some friends over and canned most of our harvested tomatillos into salsa, a rich beautiful green color.  We decided to use the remaining tomatillos to make tomatillo jam, which turned out to be a pale golden green color.  With a continued lack of warm days in the forecast we will turn our attention soon to a mass processing of green tomatoes into relish. We are continuing our preservation of a bumper crop of green beans, and will try to preserve green ancho chillies.  Ripe or no, regardless of your season, there is a wonderful way to utilize your bounty.  What unique ways do you use your garden/farmers market rewards ?

Tomatillo Jam

12 C Tomatillos

2 C Lemon juice

5 C Sugar

2 Packets unflavored gelatin

Zest of 2 lemons

Process your tomatillos in a food processor until they reach a fine texture.  Place the processed tomatillos in a large soup pot with the lemon juice and 1/2 of the sugar and bring to strong rolling boil.  Once boiling slowly add remaining sugar and cook down for about 15 minutes, while stirring regularly.  Bloom the gelatin to the package instructions, add to jam mixture and stir vigorously for 5 minutes.  Stir in lemon zest to combine, remove from heat, and put into hot sanitized jelly jars. Place on two part seal and process submerged in boiling water bath for 15 minutes.  Remove to counter to cool and listen to the serenade of pops!

Beating the Heat

This first Friday of September has been very productive.  We have farm bag number seven ready for pick up and are thrilled that everyone will be able to taste the beauty of late summer in their meals.  It is funny how I start out a week wondering if we are going to have enough, to deliver the variety and quantity that I want to.  Then, by the time we are ready for people to pick up, the fridge is bursting and I am jotting handwritten notes on my typed contents list to add on extra goodies.  This week's bag has three types of tomatoes, tomatillos, beets, eggplant, enough green beans to freeze a few batches after eating fresh, and some of the first new potatoes and peppers.

As I walked around the property last night, I noticed many of the elderberry bushes were heavy with ripe berries, ready for picking.  So this morning we also spent a little time downtown at a great shop called D P Wiggly.  We got an impromptu lesson on wine making and bought the necessities for getting our first batch put down.  The first steps have been completed, but this topic deserves it's own post, so there will be more soon.

We also canned our first jars of roasted tomatoes this season and blanched more green beans for the freezer.  All in all a great way to beat the heat on this 92 degree Friday.

Happy Weekend!

Canning vs. Freezing

 This years unusual rain has been amazing for the garden.  Even more noticeably than the vigorous plants is that the harvest has been staggered.  What a relief!  Last year we had tomatoes & cucumbers simultaneously.  Though we still have cucumbers, the bulk of the cucumber eating and processing is done.  I think one last farm box with cucumbers will be distributed if the recipients aren't burnt out on them :)

Now this weekend, we have consistent tomatoes ripening (those too should be in this weeks box).  Because of last years onslaught, we peeled and froze most of our tomatoes so that we could take our time and make sauces etc. as we needed them.  Yes, we used them up, but it wasn't as convenient as I would have liked.  On busy school nights, I don't want to think about making something from scratch.  I want to reach for something healthy that won't sap what's left of my waning energy.  So we are making a very conscious and calculated effort to can quarts of tomato sauce and pints of salsa.  We started as soon as we had several ripening at once and I'm happy to report, we're staying on top of things nicely so far!

I guess since we started canning so early this summer, it's become a bit of a habit and I don't see it as so much of a chore or inconvenience.  We've also discovered some recipes and techniques that make delicious healthy food and aren't horribly labor intensive.  Don't get me wrong, the deep freezer is virtually full (yet another reason to can, I'm out of space)!  Since we're in a tomato kind of mindset, I thought I'd share our two newest recipes...

Oven Roasted Tomato Sauce

5# ripe heirloom tomatoes

1 sweet yellow onion

8 lg. unpeeled garlic cloves

1/2 cup fresh basil leaves, roughly chopped

2 teaspoons sugar, to taste

salt and pepper to taste

Pre-heat oven to 475.  Cut tomatoes in quarters and seed (we used our Roma's and only needed to cut them in half).  Put them in a large bowl.  Peel onion, cut into wedges and add to bowl along with the garlic cloves.  Drizzle with olive oil, toss and transfer to a broiler pan.  Place in oven for 10 minutes then reduce the temperature to 425. Cook for 40-50 minutes.  Let cool.  Remove tomato skins and squeeze garlic cloves and discard skins.  Transfer to a pot, add basil, sugar, salt and pepper.  Use an immersion blender and puree to desired consistency. 

Ladle into prepared canning jars and process in a water bath.

**for appropriate storage acidity, you need to be sure you've put 2 Tbsp of lemon juice in the bottom of a quart container or 1 Tbsp for a pint container.  Makes 4 Quarts.

Sweet Pepper and Tomato Salsa

3# cherry tomatoes, quartered and left to drain

2# baby bell peppers

2 onions

1 head garlic

1/4 C. apple cider vinegar

1 C. cilantro, roughly chopped

1 Tbsp. Cumin

1 Tbsp. Coriander

Roast all vegetables in a 425 oven until slightly caramelized and onion soft.  Once cool enough to handle, roughly chop peppers and onions and squeeze  caramelized garlic cloves from head.  Place in a pot, add remaining ingredients and bring to a boil.  Place in prepared jars, and process (10 minutes for pints).  Makes 9 pints.

** remember to use the lemon juice in the bottom of jars!

Don't get rid of the 'tomato water' that has drained from your tomatoes!  It can be used to make wonderful cocktails, both of the alcoholic and the non-alcoholic varieties!

Enjoy!