Garden??? No pictures, just thoughts.

Well, ya'll..... both our tillers bit the dust last year and so we decided not to garden this year as hubby works alot of summer overtime anyway. But, the way the weather has been I am thinkng on trying to spade up a bit and at least put in some carrots, beets, spinach and peas. How am I going to live without my garden????

Kentucky Burgoo ... and other things

BURGOO (ewww) .... a southern soup-like dish I never thought I'd care for, but Hubby brought home some fixing's the other night .....

.... and we got at and added to, and made 3 huge pots-full. We canned 15 qts., put 1 qt in the freezer and had enough left for a couple meals for the 2 of us. (We had googled for a recipe to see what to add)

Doesn't it look good?? It is!

We just cannot see good food going to waste. So, leftovers from a company dinner, and a couple bags of lima beans, blackeyed peas, and celery, carrots, and onion that we had on hand.... oh, and 4 bottles of BBQ sauce and seasonings. and we have quick meals to open at a momments notice!

The kitchen had already been cluttered cuz I was out all day seeking references for paintings. But we pushed things aside and did it anyway. BTW, one of the most useful things I learned growing up was...

... how to stack dishes! Our canning was done and kitchen clean by 11 pm.

Meanwhile I have only a few inches til my 2nd sock is done. I will post when they are so you can see too (two ?)!

Ah, yes.... and I need to give Izzy a bath and a trim. Doesn't she look like she needs one???

Maybe I'll get to pick up a paint-brush yet this afternoon.

Rabbit meat processed

Ok, here it is .... this is what we did over Labor day week-end. Not exciting I know, but given the fact that hubby had to work Sat urday, Sunday afternoon and Monday; and we needed meat in the pantry, it was a good time as we had 10 rabbits we needed to "process".

14 pints tender, boneless rabbit meat, 12 quarts of broth for soup stock, and fried rabbit last night (Tues) for hubby's birthday supper (no way are we going to pay someone else for a lesser meal)

Oh yes, birthday supper included, besides the fried rabbit, baked potatoes, long green beans, and carrot-raisin salad with added pineapple chunks and mini-marshmellows, and one of his favorites, Banana cream pie! Sorry no photos of that, as Dd and Grand arrived and we had such a good time I forgot to take pictures (my bad).

The canned meat can be used for sandwiches, pot-pies, soups, cassaroles, and meat gravy over biscuits; any way chicken can be used. It is very nutritious and very low-fat.

Do any of you "can" meat of any kind?

Yogurt by the Gallon ... and other good food

Now that I am back home from a wonderful, refreshing vacation and seeing PA family once again; its time to get back on track with what I need to be doing as far as frugal living is concerned. I had been so homesick I had "fallen off the frugal wagon" so to speak. But that is behind me now and I am looking forward to each new day!

I stopped in the other day to pick up good wholesome, raw cow's milk from my Amish neighbor, Sarah. I had been wanting to get back to making yogurt and cheese so I purchased 2 gallons.

First on the agenda was to make some home-made yogurt.

I poured 1 gal into my 5 qt. stainless steel pot and raised the temp to 165* for 15 sec to pasturize it. (I don't try using raw milk for yogurt, as there is too much chance of failure and I need to be frugal especially after going on a spur-of-the-moment vacation ;) Then I cooled the milk in a sink of cold water to 115* and added my 1/2 cup Greek Yogurt as culture. After stirring that in, I lit my electric oven and heated it to 120*. I had a thermometer in the yogurt and one on the oven shelf. As I timed the temp drop in the oven I decided I needed to relight the oven for a few minutes every hour to keep the temp right. This worked very well, as the large amount of yogurt took a longer time to change in temperature, than it would have if I'd have put it in smaller containers. The temp range for this recipe called for 11o-118*.

It took only 4 hrs to set but I left it another hour to solidify more. I am really pleased with the result! No bitterness or sour taste at all. I will make half of it into yo-cheese and add herbs to it for a cracker spread, and use the other half for yogurt, adding a few strawberries or other fruit.

Our strawberry patch is producing quite well. Although the berries themselves aren't gigantic they have a very good, sweet flavor.

I made this Fresh Strawberry Pie for hubby soon after I got home, in appreciation for the vacation! (he stayed home and went to WORK, including many overtime hours, took care of our little dog, Izzy, fed the chickens, AND did all the RABBIT chores - He's an amazing man.... sigh)

(He likes his pie topped with a huge helping of vanilla ice cream.....)

.... and the chickens didn't even miss me, as proven by the beautiful eggs they are still laying.

Nothing says country like wonderful fresh-made yogurt, home-picked strawberries, and fresh home-grown eggs!

I had a wonderful time with my kids and Grands, but I am glad to be home again!

My Frugal Hubby ... on using what you have ...

Time to fence in the new 16-acre field that hubby made hay from this year (we have one week to get our fencing materials together )



We have fence posts that we brought with us years ago when we moved here, many of them pretty rusted up, bent, and many too short, all different lengths. But when my hubby goes to work on something he does a terrific job! And thankfully, over the years, he has accumulated the needed tools and taken very good care of them.......



He needed 100 T- posts to go in between the wood posts, and at about $5 or more each for new, he decided to keep his money in his wallet and make do with what he had. Step by step, and spending many evenings after work he got the job done.

1. Weld posts together to make them all long enough and all the same length



2. Wire brush to remove all rust, with a grinder tool and wire brush disks



3. Move what he can out of the workshop to set up room to paint them, as we have been having rainy weather here for eons.



4.Paint and try to get dry running a little heat in there.... Flip and paint the other side... then again.




Finished product.... 97 like new t-posts!



My hubby is one frugal dude! We are ready for fencing to begin!

Food Preservation at Our House - part 1

I use many methods of preserving food from our gardens to keep us through the winter months and beyond. I freeze corn, broccoli, melon chunks or balls, grapes; can or freeze green beans; can peaches, pears and applesauce; pickle beets; make saurkraut in the jars; cool-store winter squash and sweet potatoes; and the list goes on .....
This year I am especially enjoying my pepper garden ...... just look at all the colors!


I cut these in strips for fajitas, mixed them with cut up onion, and tossed into freezer bags. Do you know how much this stuff costs in the stores in off season?? Peppers are so easy to freeze.
But they do take up room needed for other things, so ....



I also dehydrated some. This little bag-full came from a good-sized 3-gal pail of peppers!
My oldest daughter now has the dehydrator her grandmother had, an ExCalibur, so last year I bought a new one, same brand, both have 9 trays with a temp control and timer. Great dehydrator!




This morning I was up at 4;45, could not sleep , so I cut up some yellow squash ( great for adding to veg. soups) about 7 small ones, and started them drying.





I also added a sliced roma tomato on one shelf to see how it would turn out.




and there is the finished product. My hubby has also made a mean beef jerky using this dehydrator. That stuff is expensive to buy..... The thing is making sure to get the food dry enough, so mold and bacteria cannot grow.


We did not always have a dehydrator. Years ago I dried my onions, garlic and dry beans on old window screens and covered with cheese-cloth in the sun in the back yard. I hung my herbs from the rafters in the barn loft. Fruit leathers were dried in the oven. As for canning, I had a three burner hot-plate on a home-made stand on the front porch (way out in the country) and made my tomato sauce in a double boiler, one that covered at least 2 burners. One year I canned 700 hundred qts of produce, Well, gracious.... I had 5 children to feed! (#6 came along later) But I never canned that amount after....

We have also canned chicken, rabbit and venison. I may be canning hamburger this year to be able to shut down a freezer and save the utilities. As far as other meat we have also "salt-cured" hams from our home-grown pork... but thats another story ..........

and now I am off to work for a hour on the border of my Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt. A restful end to a busy day!

Processing Chickens (not for the squeamish...)

We like our chickens and they have a good life while they are here, but the time comes for some of them to serve their purpose.... on our dinner-table.

Here in a nut-shell is how we process them. Hubby takes a sharp axe and with a swift blow cuts the head off, immediately rendering the chicken dead. The nerves of the body still cause it to move some for a couple minutes, but no pain is felt as the brain is seperate from the body. This procedure also allows the carcass to bleed out.

We immediately remove the feathers, skin and inerds, and remove the feet and legs to the first joint, then plunge the bird into a 5 gal. bucket filled with cold, cold water. The bucket will hold about 3 good sized birds, and we change the water frequently. After the chickens are butchered we cut them up into pieces; legs, thighs, breast, backs necks and wings, and put on the stove in large pots to cook until the meat starts to fall off the bone.

While it is still hot, we pick the meat off the bones, pack the jars, and pour broth over them.

Processing takes 1 hr and 15 mins for quarts, and 1 hr for pints, even though it has already been thoroughly cooked.

This makes for a wonderful meal that can be gotten ready in short order. It can be used for chicken and noodles, chicken and biscuits, chicken noodle soup, baked chicken cassarole, chicken sandwiches, and the list goes on and on....

We processed 14 quarts from 12 chickens, one did not seal and went to the fridge, and one went in the freezer. But doesn't this look absolutely yummy? We had chicken and noodles for the first meal with a side dish of fresh green beans from the garden. Another side dish of fried apples compliments it well.

D-Day

Today is D-Day for the roasters, er.... roosters, red and black both.

We will be keeping several black hens for layers.

Hubby will do the butchering and I will be cooking, cleaning meat off the bones and canning it up . I wonder how many quarts of chicken meat I will get from 12 chickens??

More good food...

I know most everyone around here is sick of rain, but it has done wonders for our garden that got planted so late......

These are our first pears on the tree we planted last year.....

and our blueberries got soooo big......

so are the cantalopes...

and peppers galore ....... it takes lots of water to grow good peppers.

I have to keep my volunteer cukes picked before they get too big

The corn was doing very well ,

.... until the raccoons visited. But it did not go to waste.

We salvaged what we could for ourselves, then cut the stalks and fed them to the cows....

Meanwhile the green beans and tomatoes are also coming on..

How is your garden doing?

My clothesline.....present and past.

I had had a clothesline strung in the back yard between 3 maple trees for the last couple years, but when the ice storm hit it was torn down by the falling trees branches. Out of nessessity during the resulting power outage, Hubby proceeded to put one up for me in the carport.

I enjoy hanging out a wash ....... maybe because it slows a person down enough to relax, and take a deep breath of fresh air, look up into the sky and watch the birds, or the wind blowing through the leaves, or notice the first wildflowers starting to bloom......

Then there is also the fact that we are not "burning up" electricity for that 45 minutes it takes to run that dryer load. It used to be that it took about $.17 per load to run the dryer on medium heat. Now.... with the increase of electricity costing us 25% more, it is more like $.22-.23 per load, x's 8/wk, x's 52wks per yr, well that adds up to $92/yr at the low end. And that is just for 2 people. Now I am not saying everyone should hang out their wash...

But I do remember the time I didn't have a dryer ........ when my children were little ...... I took my 4th child out in the stroller one day in the fall time of year, while I hung out the wash. It was a warm day... breezy, and the fall leaves were scattered all over the ground. As I hung the clothes to dry, I heard this chuckling belly laugh behind me. Turning around I saw my daughter laughing at the wind blowing the leaves, making them dance as they scurried along across the ground. She laughed and laughed at the sight of them going this way, then that. THAT memory, my friends, is a PRICELESS gift that I would not trade for any dryer.

Rendering Lard

Just for the sake of self-dependency,we are going to, for a moment , side-step the health issue in this post. We are choosing to be on a tight budget right now, given the present economical conditions., so making do is "in".I had run out of bread at breakfast time ( I know .... should'a baked over the week-end, butI was involved in other things) and I decided that for lunch I would make chicken-rice soup, home-made of course, and biscuits; forgetting that I had also run out of Crisco last week. Then I remembered I had a small bucket of lard that I had bought as an ingredient in seed cakes for the birds.

Okay, so using lard once in a while isn't going to kill us. I made my biscuits, and they were wonderful. No.... no pictures. They were gone too fast. But it brought back the memory of learning to render lard (as in, make your own...)

The lard I made at the time was made from the hardest white fat of a hog. You need to cut it into small chunks , or if you have a meat grinder you can grind it up. Put it in an old kettle, to which you add water enough to cover the fat, and put it on to boil, stirring once in a while. This takes a few hours, depending on the size of the pieces and the amount you are working with. It needs to boil slowly until all fat is melted. Then put a cheese-cloth over another pot and strain the liquid through it. Place it somewhere cold , as out in your back porch in winter until it hardens. The fat will come to the top and the water and sediment will be on the bottom. You can pick off the resulting solid "lard" and store in a tightly covered container in a cool place.

Many good cooks and especially the Amish, still use lard today for flakey pie crusts and tender cookies, and ever so tender biscuits.