A Very Nice Afternoon

Yesterday, friend Delores Tucker and I went to Shaker Village at Pleasant Hill  (known locally as Shakertown) for one of their "Christmas Teas."  Of course anyone familiar with Shakertown knows how beautiful the buildings and grounds are.   They were decorated subtly and naturally for the season, but I had to think that those decorations were for us today and the Germanic and decidedly un-Shaker adornments would have been unknown to the residents in the early 1800's.

The teas are held in the Trustee's house, where the hotel and restaurant are.   

At the base of one of the famous twin spiral staircases, there was a beautiful - if un-Shaker - tree decorated and lit with fairy lights.

It was gorgeous, sitting at handcrafted cherry drop-leaf tables on ladderback chairs in the spare but beautiful room.  They brought tea, scones, then country ham biscuits, cheddar pecan wafers (everything was tiny - this was a tea after all), then tea sandwiches of country ham spread, chicken salad and pimento cheese, then date bread, pound cake and cranberry muffins.  Then, as if that weren't enough, there was dessert!  Lemon bars, chocolate turnovers and peppermint meringues.

photo by Delores Tucker

We rolled out of there - staggering a bit from the sugar high - and made our way on over to the Craft shop.   We actually went there both before and again after tea, because there was something I wanted that I had forgotten to buy earlier. Both times we were greeted outside the door by friendly cats, who had the uncanny knack of posing for the perfect photo until the instant you were ready to click the shutter - then they would walk away.  

photo by Delores Tucker 

It was a very gray and rainy day, but the rain stopped while we were there.  It wasn't too cold, and made for very pleasant walking around the grounds.  We saw some of the cattle and 'took a turn' (tea was making me feel very Jane Austenish) around their herb garden, still producing, even this late in the season.

On the way home, we discovered a "bulk foods" store - Kountry Kupboard - on Hwy 127 outside Harrodsburg.  It reminded us so much of our trip a couple of years ago to Amish country in northern Ohio, and as then, we came home with bags of food for very little money.

Shopping, eating (in an incredible setting), shopping, driving through beautiful countryside, shopping (for more eating) ....... my idea of a LOVELY afternoon.

New baby

Sara has her new baby Maisie, but I've got a new 'baby' at my house too.  On Friday,  the Woodford County Humane Society posted this on Facebook:

Now, who could not fall in love with this!!!!  I tried to talk myself out of it - it's Christmas time, of course they are going to show the really appealing animals, I have plenty (some would say too many) of pets already, and on and on.  In the end I could not talk myself out of it, made the call and went over to meet her.  She is a Chihuahua/Jack Russell mix. I have never liked Chihuahuas and although Jacks are cute - I tend to think of both breeds as 'crazy,' hyper, yappy and all things negative. She turned out to be the complete opposite. 

This girl was not the least interested in cats or other dogs, did not bark, and though she looks so sad in this photo (her "come and take me home" face) is very sweet, carries her ears perked up and is SUCH a love sponge.  So...........she is now mine.  They called her Prancer (the incoming animals were getting Christmasy names) and I thought I would keep it....but now it doesn't seem to fit her.    I've been trying on names with her and haven't found one that seems the right fit yet.   Poppy?   Sophie?  Trinket?   'Have any suggestions? 

She fit right in from the first minute.  She tells me when she needs to go out, and there was no question of her sleeping with me - she claimed her spot on the bed first thing.  When she gets cold, she dives under the covers.  On her first full day, she went with me to the open house/sale at Sweet Home Spun .  She travelled several hours in the car like a trouper and was the delight of the party.   

The cats are over their initial interest, and now share the couch/bed/chair with her wherever she is - not snuggling, but no problems. She and the buns are fine with each other, and she completely ignores the chickens. 

What a lovely Christmas present!! 

Would you have been ready?

photo credit - http://orgjunkie.com/2011/10/emergency-preparedness-kit.html

I post occasionally about emergency preparedness here, and this seems a good time to do it again.  

I love this blog, and her emergency-prep post is a particularly good commentary on things people didn't have - or overlooked - during the Sandy disaster:  
http://homesteadrevival.blogspot.com/2012/11/lessons-in-aftermath-of-disaster.html

Personally, I had a couple of long conversations with a friend whose son lives on the Lower (East?) Side of Manhattan, and just had power restored after several days without.  They still had water, and a gas stove, so two requirements were met, and they were better off than many. Some of the things they discovered:

• How dependent most everyone is now on their cell phones for communication.   What do you do once the battery is dead?  Tops on their list, a hand-crank device that will re-charge a cell phone.  There are a lot of them out there, many as part of a ratio/light/recharger combo. 
• Speaking of a radio - my friend discovered during the last ice storm - that the only radio she has is ........on her cell phone.  Add a battery and/or hand-crank radio to the list.   
• How about a battery clock?   Do you have one? If you wear a watch it's no problem, or do you rely .......on your cell phone?  (pattern emerging) 
• Light?  Her son only had some candles in NY.  In an earthquake zone, kerosene lamps may not be a good idea, but there are lots of battery-operated  LED lanterns available.    
• How about a supply of batteries on hand for these things?  Try to be uniform in the supplies you acquire, and look for things that all take the same sized battery, such as AA.   You can also find hand-crank chargers for re-chargeable batteries.
• Food - the grocery nearest them stayed open via generator.  He said they made them line up outside, an attendant at the door would take their 'order,' and bring the groceries to them at the door.  What if you don't live within walking distance from a store.  Do you have some basics stored?  Enough to last you several days? 
• Cash?  All the ATMs were down due to the power outage and after a few days he began to run out of cash to buy what they needed.  The most heartwarming part of the story was that some friends who own restaurants loaned him some cash to tide him over.   Not what I expected in NY, but apparently every neighborhood is like a little town.   If you live in town, how about your neighborhood?   There is no way to know how people will react in an emergency, but are you prepared to share what you have stored with those around you? Or are you expecting them to take care of you?   I had someone say that to me once.  She saw no reason to prepare for herself.  She said "I'll come to your house, since you have everything..."      

The link under the photo above is based on the FEMA preparedness list, which is included in that blog post. The cabinet in the photo looks a little sparse to me, but it's a start.  If you feel you don't have room to store stuff, everyone can do something.   My friend's son plans to, and he lives in what amounts to a studio apartment. 

Think about it......... 

Fall Fantasy

I don't do halloween.  I know some people love it, but I don't, so there.

However, I LOVE the Autumn, and all that goes with it. I saw this photo posted on Facebook today by the "Tiny House Blog," both as a joke (just how tiny can tiny houses be?)  and also as a tip of the hat to the season.

The first thing I thought of though was, "wouldn't that be great to make by needle felting?"

 

Updated Blog List

I don't know about you, but the best way I have found to discover new, interesting blogs is to cruise the blog lists of like-minded friends.

For ages my blog list seemed 'broken.'  I couldn't add any, the ones I had added after my initial list was made didn't show.......  For some reason, the little widget was working today, so I took the opportunity to add a few, hide a few more, and generally did a little house-cleaning.  (now if I would get off this computer and do some cleaning of my real house!!!!)

My blog-reading list is a lot longer than the ones that I show here.   Some don't post very often, or have political overtones - like food preservation sites that are a little too apocalypse-minded.   The ones I have chosen to show are a nice cross section of fiber, friends and food blogs I hope you find as interesting as I do.    

Pickled Garlic

SO much garlic!  "You must really like it, or you must really like "pickling."  Yes to both.

Garlic is so abundant and priced right now, I just couldn't help but take advantage of sales, and add to what's left of the 17 heads of my own garlic I harvested earlier in the summer.  Now what to do with it?

There are many ways to preserve garlic - by freezing, in oil, but "pickling" (really fermenting, my new favorite way to preserve food) seems the way to go for me.  1. It's so easy.  2.  It only mellows the taste, doesn't really change it.  3. I'll have pre-peeled garlic cloves ready at any time to smash, slice or mince into a recipe.  4. I don't have to can it.  5. It won't take up any of my miniscule freezer space.

During the process, I found the easiest way to peel garlic (by far!) is to blanch it - dunk it in boiling water for 30 seconds or so, then into ice water.  Squeeze the root end, and it pops right out of the skin!  I was shooting them all over the kitchen until I got the hang of it.  The having pre-peeled garlic at the ready is the most appealing aspect of this, I think.

You could eat the cloves as-is once they are fermented, for the health benefits.  To each his own.  I put a lot of garlic cloves in when I make pickles, and I have found those are very good to eat 'raw.'  (did I mention I live alone?)

Put the cloves in a jar, cover with salted water, stopper the top, and leave in a dark place for a month, then into the fridge, where it will keep for at least a year. It's as easy as that.   For those who want a bit more detail in their instructions, try this site: http://www.deliciousobsessions.com/2012/09/52-weeks-of-bad-a-bacteria-week-32-lactofermented-garlic-updated-for-the-pickl-it/   I don't have one of the fancy jars she mentioned, nor do I use whey.  I just use a canning jar, with a baggie of water in the top of the jar to weigh the cloves down.  

Bringing in the Harvest

If it is true that "In the Spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love," then Autumn is the time when old women's thoughts turn to bringing in the harvest!! I do a little canning, almost no freezing, and I'm interested in other forms of food preservation.

I know, I know, it's been a very long time since I have posted anything, but this summer was the pits. At least a month of 100 degree temps decimated the garden, and work was a bear, taking up all of my emotional energy.

Now that we've had a month of cooler (and sometimes downright chilly) temps and some blessed rain, anything in the garden that wasn't ruined has bounced back.

I pulled up the San Marzano tomatoes today, not because they are done, but because I need the room to put in some fall/winter plants. I got almost nothing off those tomato plants all summer, but when I pulled them out, they were packed with green tomatoes. I will let some ripen inside to use later, and some will go into green tomato salsa. http://www.farmgirlfare.com/2005/09/saving-harvest-green-tomato-relish.html#   I think I post this every year.  So does the Farmgirl, as it turns out.   One of the comments on the post also suggested roasting the green tomatoes (!!) with sweet potatoes.

In a repeat of last year's "haul" photo, this is what I got off my 4 plants.  Enough to fill a 5 gallon bucket.

                          

The Corno de Toro peppers (there is a red pimento pepper peeking out of the background) need just a little more ripening.  The "sun side" is ripe, but the "shade side" is still green.  These are OK, but an improvement over banana peppers?   I don't know.  I might try both next year to test them side-by-side.   

                         

Another reason for pulling out the paste tomatoes is to give my favorite German Pinks as much sun as possible, Hoping to ripen these babies on the vine.  

                          

It's hard to appreciate how large these are in this photo.  I have at least a dozen 1 to 2 lb. tomatoes still on the plants. German Pinks are a very late/fall variety.  There is just no getting around that.  It doesn't matter how early the seedlings are started or when they are set out, this plant will only produce the occasional tomato until September.  They can go until frost kills the vines.  Then the green tomatoes are still fine to bring in and ripen.   The lady who gave me these said her family did that every year, and have had fresh tomatoes as late as Thanksgiving!!    
  

My dehydrator has been going day and night for a couple of weeks. I bought the peppers in the photo below at the local farmer's market.
                         

I have dried peppers, zucchini and yellow squash, but my favorite thing to dry this fall - is greens!  I only occasionally eat greens cooked by themselves.  I prefer them in something  - think any recipe with the word "Florentine" in the title. Any greens can be dried - spinach, kale, chard, turnip ...you get the idea.  I dry mine on the lowest temperature available, to preserve as much of the nutritional value as possible.   Dehydrating maven Mary Bell suggests powdering them after drying, which is fine, but I like to just lightly crush them into flakes with my hands before storing. They can then be added to any dish while cooking  - soups, stews, rice, couscous, pasta - they would be especially good in veggie lasagna.    

Another favorite is to buy fresh mushrooms on sale at the store then slice and dry those.  They dry especially well.  When reconstituting, the liquid makes a great mushroom stock, and they are good in so many things too - like that veggie lasagna. (do you sense a trend here?)

My other new way of preserving is fermenting. Yes, the experiment I talked about in my long-ago previous post went very well, and I have fermented many things since then!

                           

I love these pickles!!!!!! They taste very different from vinegar-preserved pickles, and they are so freakin' easy to make!!  I have also done radishes, which I liked a lot  -

fermented radishes at the beginning:
                 

photo credit:  http://www.seriouseats.com/2012/06/in-a-pickled-fermented-radish-slices.html

And when they're done -

                         

I just wanted to show you that the fermenting processes draw the red out of the radish skins, turning the radish white, and the liquid pink.  It looks a little weird, but tastes good!!  I also made 6 quarts of sauerkraut, which are in bags in the freezer.  I tasted it as I was bagging it, and I think it will be very good.

I didn't like broccoli at all, and I'm not fond of the cauliflower I fermented.   I made beet kvass  (how-to here: http://thenourishingcook.com/how-to-make-fermented-beet-kvass/ ) which is the liquid drawn off fermented beets.  Um......it's an acquired taste...I don't dislike it, but it is different.  It is so good for you though, I keep taking a swig now and then.

I made preserved lemons.  The instructions I had called the ones with added spices Moroccan lemons, and the plain ones Italian.   I made plain.

photo credit and how-to here:   http://www.foodgal.com/2009/01/meyer-lemons-the-salty/

Since I had to use lots of fresh lemons to get enough juice (unlike the photo above the lemons have to be covered with liquid) I peeled the zest (no pith) off the leftover lemon rinds, I'm steeping them in vodka, and will soon be making my own Limoncello.  I'm doing the same with Bing cherries to make homemade Kirsch.

What are YOU preserving this fall, and how?