Our Welcome Home from Mother Nature

Mother Nature gave us one unwelcoming welcome home. We had at least 8" of heavy wet snow starting on Saturday and lost electric for about 27 hours. I have to say that I don't ever remember loosing electric for this long, even on the farm. We were very lucky, many will be without power for several days. Boy, we are definitely looking into solar panels, sooner rather then later. We really don't like being dependent on a utility company like this. Jane, I was thinking about you!

Saturday afternoon everything started looking like this. The electric went out early.....so, we headed to "The Italian's" parents. His cousin was up from North Carolina for a visit.

We had a wonderful lantern lit dinner of pasta, chicken, mashed potatoes and beans cooked on the gas stove top.

Sunday morning I got out the camp stove, made coffee and tea and then headed out for a walk around the block. I can't wait to get our much needed new stove. It's going to be dual fuel.

All of the following pictures are from a walk around one block. The damage is just amazing. Almost every home had major damage to trees.

As you can see from the pictures, the leaves are still on the trees and most haven't even started to change color. When I got home, we had a nice camping breakfast of eggs and toast.

It was quite warm and the snow was quickly melting. I attached the cold frame tops, cleared off the melting snow and opened them up.

You can see from this picture, just how heavy the snow was. The weight pulled the sides in on the squirrel barricaded garlic bed.

It looks like the weather is going to return to normal for this time of the year.....hopefully, it will stay that way for awhile and I can get some gardening done!

I hope that the rest of you that were hit by this early storm are safe and sound!

We made it home just in time for.............

SNOW!!!! Yes, it is snowing here in eastern Pennsylvania in October! I really can't remember the last time that we had snow in October. We haven't even had a frost yet.......but, that will change tonight. It looks like we will get about 6" of snow.....just crazy!

As you can see, I haven't put the patio furniture away and the annual flowers are still alive.

I did manage to put the cold frame tops on early this morning before the snow started. I am so happy that I re-covered the tops before we left. I will attach them permanently when the weather calms down....but, the bricks will have to do for now.

The veggies growing in the basement are looking good and will have to wait a bit to get hardened off and planted in the cold frames.

As usual, we had a great time in New Orleans. I did read all of the Thursday's Kitchen Cupboard posts both weeks and some other posts as well. For some reason though, our travel computer would not let me comment on most blogs.

I will do a post or two about some of what we did while we were away. For now, the kit-cats and the washing machine really need my attention!

Thursday's Kitchen Cupboard........10/20/2011

This post went up early since we are on an airplane headed for New Orleans! I will check in and respond later today after we are settled in. Due to our vacation, next Thursday Jody at Spring Garden Acre will be hosting Thursday's Kitchen Cupboard.

 I will try to post a couple of times this week with some happenings and great food from New Orleans!

This past week I confiscated some nice green tomatoes from next door. I used those tomatoes along with some green tomatoes that I had to make this Green Tomato Salsa. Diana at Voice in the Garden, gave me this recipe. Thanks's Diana!! I only made about a 1/4 recipe since I didn't have enough green tomatoes for a whole batch. We were also out of fresh cilantro. So we will just add some when we open a jar.

This Salsa is very good and a nice change from the traditional salsa that I make!

Green Tomato Salsa to Can from Diana's kitchen

•  3 TB Extra Virgin olive oil
• 11 lbs green tomatoes, chopped
• 3 extra large sweet onions, chopped
• 3 sweet red peppers, chopped
• 3 sweet green peppers, chopped
• 4 jalapeño peppers, seeds removed, finely chopped (+/- according to personal taste)
• 8 large garlic cloves, minced
• 1 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
• 2 TB sea salt
• 1/2 TB black pepper
• 1/2 tsp Cayenne pepper (or more to taste)
• 1 tsp Cumin
• 1/4 cup lime juice
• 1/4 cup white vinegar
• 1 TB raw honey

1. Add olive oil to an extra large kettle and heat on medium.
2. Add tomatoes, onions, peppers and stir.
3. Add and combine the remainder of the ingredients. Mix well, heat slowly to simmer, and cook uncovered for 25-30 minutes or until it reaches the consistency you prefer. Stir frequently and be careful of the temperature so as not to burn the mixture.
4. Ladle the hot simmering salsa into hot sterilized pint jars (or quarts), and fill to within 1/2 inch from top.
5. Wipe jar rims with a clean cloth.
6. Place sterilized flat lid on the jar and adjust the ring.
7. Place in a boiling water bath; water should cover the lids by about an inch. Bring the water back to boiling and process for 15-20 minutes.

 I hope that I get to see a lot of goodies posted later today!

Harvest Monday...............10/17/2011

It's another week of the same harvest.....peppers, peppers and more peppers!

The entire harvest for this past week was picked yesterday at the plots. Although most of the harvest was peppers, I did harvest a few small eggplants, a little bit of broccoli and another small white pumpkin.

We are going on vacation later this week and it looks like we may get our first frost while we are away. I don't think the house/garden/pet sitter will want to truck over to the plots to pick the last of the peppers. So, I harvested everything that was a decent size. 

A little broccoli, a few small eggplant and some hot & spice peppers.

Probably the last of the sweet peppers from the plots.

These were given to my in-laws and sister in-law. I still have two pepper plants at the house which will be pulled before we leave.I thought that there were about four large peppers on those two plants. After taking a closer look, I think that there are about a dozen.

I just totaled my pepper harvests to date for this year. Sweet Peppers - 47.75 lbs  Hot & Spice Peppers 27.3 lbs. It's definitely been the year of the Pepper!

Total weighed harvest for the week: 10.375 lbs


Broccoli - 2 oz.
Eggplant - 16 oz.
Peppers:
    Hot & Spice - 18 oz.
    Bell - 98 oz. (6.125 lbs)
White Fortna Pumpkin - 32 oz. (2 lbs)

Stop on over to Daphne's Dandelions, our host of Harvest Monday to see what's going on in veggie gardens around the globe!

Thursday's Kitchen Cupboard

Wilderness over at Growing and Cooking made a great suggestion to start a weekly preserving post similar to, but different then Harvest Monday, for bloggers to share what they have been putting away and recipes. I thought this was a great idea! With her permission I am starting "Thursday's Kitchen Cupboard". This will be a day to share what you have been canning, drying.....or to share a recipe, a picture, a tip.....or how you have used some of your preserved goods.

So come on and join the first

"Thursday's Kitchen Cupboard"!!

A couple of weeks ago I purchased some pears from a local grower. I got some Bartlett, some French sounding variety that I can't remember the name of and a bag of seconds.

I canned 4 pints of Bartletts since they were the first to ripen. I like to can mine in part juice and part extra-light syrup. I use some of the seconds to make the juice and add it to the syrup.

Then I made some Pear Vanilla Nutmeg Jam with a mix of pears that were ready. Boy, this stuff is good!

Last year I had found a recipe for Pear Vanilla Jam. Then this year I was doing a little research and found a recipe that had a little nutmeg in it. I had also purchased some Real Fruit Pectin made by Ball. The recipe on the flap allows you to adjust for the amount of fruit you have. So, I chopped up what fruit was ready and came up with this.

I don't remember exactly how much fruit I had. I have adjusted this recipe to make a batch with one box of powdered pectin.

Pear Vanilla Nutmeg Jam

• 5 1/3 Cups Finely Chopped Pears
• 1 Pkg. Powdered Pectin or 6 Tbsp. Ball Real Fruit Pectin
• Grated Nutmeg
• Lemon Juice
• 5 Cups of Sugar
• 1 tsp. Vanilla

Directions:

1. Peel, core and finely chop pears. Put them in a bowl and sprinkle with lemon juice. I put them in a bowl as I was peeling and chopping and stirred them to keep them from getting brown.
2. Put prepared fruit in large pot
3. Grind a little nutmeg onto the fruit
4. Gradually stir in powdered pectin and bring to a full boil
5. Add sugar, bring back to a boil that won't stir down. Boil for 1 min.
6. Remove from heat and stir in Vanilla
7. Ladle into sterlized jars, cap and process in boiling water bath for 10 minutes

Since I had several cups of pear juice and extra-light syrup mixture left over, I decided to try to make some Pear Syrup. After rummaging through the booze, I found some Pear Liquer that "The Italian" must have had in his dowry. I added 2 oz. of the liquor to the liquid and boiled away.

The mixture was boiled down to less then half, which took about 1 1/2 hours. This syrup will be great for dessert toppings or to add to an adult beverage! Maybe there is a pear martini in our future! "The Italian" will have fun with this! The syrup was not canned and is being stored in the refrigerator.

After what seemed like forever, the French Pears that "The Italian" says are Anjou Pears, finally ripened enough to make a small batch of plain old Pear Jam.

I made this jam according to the instructions on the Ball Real Fruit powdered pectin.

So, join in and share a recipe or a good tip on preserving the harvest!