Glorious Weather!

The weather has been fantastic recently; it's like those first glorious days of good Spring weather where you throw open all the windows, air out the house, and try to squeeze in both work and play before it inevitably turns back into freezing cold Spring weather. The leaves are all off the trees here in Wisconsin by now, but despite everything being gray the sun still cheers me up immensely.

I refilled all the birdfeeders and need to work on keeping them full. The birds need all they can get so they can prepare for the lean winter months. They're going to be my entertainment this winter so I need to keep them around. The plastic is up on the bedroom window (of course since it's been 70 degrees it's way too hot in there now) and the balcony has been cleared of all garden remains save for the empty pots and my winter greens and swept clean. It's hard to think that by the end of the month we'll probably have snow, but it's a near certainty. Time to start preparing for the holidays!

I'm making Jambalaya this week; here's the recipe I'm using (from Allrecipes):

Ingredients

• 1 pound skinless, boneless chicken breast halves - cut into 1 inch cubes
• 1 pound andouille sausage, sliced
• 1 (28 ounce) can diced tomatoes with juice
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 1 large green bell pepper, chopped
• 1 cup chopped celery
• 1 cup chicken broth
• 2 teaspoons dried oregano
• 2 teaspoons dried parsley
• 2 teaspoons Cajun seasoning
• 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
• 1 pound frozen cooked shrimp without tails

Directions

1. In a slow cooker, mix the chicken, sausage, tomatoes with juice, onion, green bell pepper, celery, and broth. Season with oregano, parsley, Cajun seasoning, cayenne pepper, and thyme.
2. Cover, and cook 7 to 8 hours on Low, or 3 to 4 hours on High. Stir in the shrimp during the last 30 minutes of cook time.

We'll see how it turns out. If it's good, it'll go into regular rotation. I have to get ready to leave for work now, so I'm gonna cut this short. Farewell!

Tomato soup, and changes to our eating habits

I've been reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle (Which is today's recommended reading, by the way) and the more I read the more I want to change the way we eat. Not only because I don't want to financially support the terrible food industry in America any more than I have to, but also because I think eating local, in-season produce comes only second to actually growing all your own food as far as making you truly appreciate what's on your plate come mealtime. For example, you really start to appreciate summer's bounty when you're on a strict local-only diet and you've been eating potatoes, carrots, turnips, meat, and whatever you managed to preserve for 6 or 8 weeks and winter's only half-over. It's going to be a slow process, but I'm trying to reduce how much meat we eat while expanding our horizons as far as vegetables go. So far, I've eaten mushrooms (meaning I got over my aversion to consuming any sort of fungus whatsoever simply because it's fungus), asparagus, turnips, and acorn squash. Those are all things I either never liked before or simply hadn't had. I don't necessarily love them yet, but I have a feeling I will eventually. Still, this little project isn't without it's obstacles, the biggest one being my stupidly high metabolism and hypoglycemic tendencies. I need a lot of calories and protein and I cannot get through an 8 hour shift at work on nothing but salad and fruit. On top of that, I have lazy days where I don't feel like cooking and opening a can of Chef Boyardee ravioli sounds really good. I also have days where I get distracted and forget that I need to eat until it's too late to cook something before I have to leave for work, and due to the aforementioned hypoglycemia issues not eating before work is not an option for me. But I'm working on it. I'd like to eventually get to the point where we can just stock our freezer with free-range meat from local farmers once a year and get by on that. The only way that will be affordable is to reduce how much we eat. Same with milk. I drink way too much milk and if I want to buy all organic pastured stuff I'm going to have to cut my consumption. Getting Trevor on board with that idea is also something I'm working on.

To change topics for a minute, I pulled up the garden several weeks ago, but due to the rather mild summer I had more green tomatoes than red on the vine when I went to compost the plant. I couldn't bear to just toss them, so I decided to put them in one of my cloth shopping bags and see what happened. Then I forgot about them.

Well, a day or so ago I suddenly remembered they were in there while I was at work, and a pang of guilt hit me. Surely they'd be rotten by now, and they'd all go to waste. Owing to my wonderful ADD, I again forgot about them until today. I'd skipped breakfast (coffee doesn't count) and for lunch I had a salad, some cheese and crackers, and a handful of apple wedges. Seemed I'd hit a vegetarian streak, and I decided to continue it. We went to Half-Price books, and then Target, and the whole while my stomach growled and I tried to figure out what I could have for dinner that'd still be vegetarian. Then I remembered the tomatoes.

I looked into the bag when we got home and wouldn't you know it, they were just about all perfectly ripe. I inspected them and found one that was going bad, and while chopping them up I had to toss maybe two more smaller ones that were too bruised and mushy. The rest of them went into a pot with some minced garlic sauteed in butter and are now gently simmering along with some spices, salt, and pepper. I'm going to add some rice, lentils, and barley too and it'll make a hearty meal. I only wish I had some dough I could pull out of the freezer like I did earlier in the week with my roast. Perhaps tomorrow I'll do some batches of bread and dinner roll dough so I can have hot crusty bread anytime I want.

Oh yeah, speaking of that wonderful roast: I put it on the table and sat down to eat and it hit me... this meal was entirely homemade. There wasn't a single pre-packaged thing in it save for the milk and block of cheese I served with it, and I told Trevor that if we had a cow those would have been homemade too. I was proud of myself then and I'm proud of myself now. Maybe this whole "Eat more vegetables, less meat, and try to stay in-season" thing won't be so hard after all.

Here's how I made my soup, by the way: (EDIT: So as not to surprise anyone who decides to make this, this is not traditional smooth tomato soup. It's chock full of the barley, lentils and rice with a little bit of broth left over. Rich, hearty, and delicious.)

1 large clove of garlic (or 2 smaller ones)
2 tablespoons of butter (what I had on hand, you could probably use less)
2-3 lbs of fresh tomatoes
onion powder, salt, pepper, oregano, basil, cloves, bay leaf, sugar
half-cup or so each of rice, lentils, and barley and some frozen corn if you want

Heat the butter in your pot, mince the garlic. Sautee the garlic in the butter and take off the heat while you chop your tomatoes. Now, I had a food mill so I just chopped them, added 2 cups of water to the pot with the garlic, and threw in the pieces. Without a food mill you're going to have to blanch the tomatoes and remove the skins and seeds. (Hint: Get a food mill.) Added the herbs and spices and let it all simmer 20-25 minutes. Ran the lot through the food mill, added sugar to taste, and then put it back on the heat to bring it to a boil. I put in the rice and lentils and waited a couple of minutes before adding the barley and corn since it cooks quicker. After that, I let it simmer for 12-15 minutes and stand uncovered. It went from thin and watery to thick and rich. I served it with garlic bread. :)

No more leaves

The news is saying that the Fall colors are just about at their peak, and when we get away from the apartment, they are. Right outside, though, the trees are already bare. We're getting a lot of sunlight in the apartment and on the balcony now, which is good for my mood and great for the little rubbermaid full of leafy greens. Those are probably going to be history by next week, because now that they've been exposed to a couple of frosts they should taste really good. It's a shame I never managed to get any spinach or peas planted.

Now that we're settling into the cold part of the year, I'm going to have to find other things to do with my time. I'm currently crocheting a blanket which will probably end up being a baby blanket for our first kid whenever he comes (surely I'll have it done by then. Right? ... Right?) I'll probably bake a lot more now that the extra heat is a good thing, and I certainly need to work on my pie crusts. I'm also trying to cut down on buying food at work because there are other things I want that I can spend all that money on. I've been taking a lunchbox full of stuff to munch on throughout the day, though it's hard to find time when you work in a busy deli to take off your gloves, go in back where the customers can't see you, grab a handful of trail mix, come back, put more gloves on, and then keep going. Repeat that process enough times in one shift and you can't get your routine done. I'll be glad when I don't have to worry about finding time to manage my blood sugar while working.

I'm also trying to be more dedicated to cooking good food and eliminating some of the processed stuff we eat because we're too lazy to slap something together for lunch or dinner. Trying to cut down on our meat consumption has been a huge challenge, and it's going to have to be a long term goal because we need to broaden our vegetarian horizons and find out what we like before we can start cooking more vegetarian meals.

This is just a quick update, I actually need to hurry up and eat so I can finish the dishes and get ready for work. For now, I'm out.

Always the Summers are slipping away

Well folks, the sun has set on the last day of Summer. Normally I'm in full squirrel-mode by this point (Well okay I still am even this year, more on this later), and pretty leaves and pumpkins are the only things on my mind. This summer, however, has been a very special one for me, and I'm sad to see it go.

I've learned a lot this past season. Not only about gardening, but also about myself. I've grown to care about things such as agricultural sustainability, homesteading, and the value of knowing how to just do things yourself. I've realized that I'm really, really good at picking up new skills on my own just by looking up a how-to page on the internet. I feel like I will one day be able to do a lot of things that most people would balk at. Hell, I already know how to bake bread all by myself without using a machine of any sort. Just the other day someone was surprised when I told them I baked bread often, but don't own a bread machine. Sometime in the near future I'll be doing my own electrical wiring (actually this coming spring I'll have to rig up some lighting for seed starting!) and minor home repairs, just because I want to prove to myself that I can. I'd fix the broken switch on the washing machine so we don't have to lift the lid to get the basket to spin, but that involves buying a replacement switch and Trevor won't let me because that's the management's responsibility. I agree with him there, so I think I'll just have the repairman show me how when he does it.

Before I go too far off on that tangent, I'd like to go ahead and go back to that whole squirrel-mode thing. I don't know what it is, but every single year around Autumn I get the urge to hoard food. And this isn't a recent thing, I did this as a very young child. I specifically remember making a list for a winter cache and raiding the kitchen so I could store stuff in my room. My mother was none too pleased to find a bunch of cereal and other foodstuffs stashed in my own cupboards instead of the kitchen's. This year, I have a canner. This year, I bought an entire bushel of apples. And this year, I have garden veggies to freeze and raided the Madison farmer's market for enough jam and honey to last through the coming winter. I still have a few apples to can, but let's just say I won't be hurting for applesauce or apple pie anytime soon.

This year, my ridiculous squirrel instincts have been (mostly) satisfied. It's... well, satisfying. The only thing that would make me happier is if I had an actual cellar with a huge wall of shelves full of jars. Maybe in a few years. I can't wait to see how bad this urge gets when I have children to care for, because my maternal instincts make me even more irrational than my squirrel instincts. Trevor will probably refuse to talk about it.

Oh yes, the garden! The last few pole beans are slowly coming in. I have several pods that I just left to completely ripen and dry out so I can save the seeds for next year. Got some good tomatoes (finally). Those went into vegetable soup. The anaheim peppers have blossom-end rot, so they're going to be a total loss unfortunately. Very frustrating, but at least now that my chili pepper is going wild with blossoms I can give it some milk so they don't end up like the first batch of tomatoes and the anaheims. I bought a string of peppers for drying at the farmer's market, so I won't go without. One little strawberry plant is hanging on like a champ, but I know I'm going to lose it to the same wilt that got the others so I'll probably yank it and use the pot for cold-weather crops. My basil is going nuts again, I'll probably trim it back soon.

As far as cold-weather stuff, I've already got kale, lettuce, and swiss chard planted. They're all leggy as hell since I started them from seeds and only have one puny light in there. I put them outside in the sun before any more damage could be done and picked the strongest ones when I thinned them, but they're still floppy. Ah well, they're still growing well. I plan to plant some spinach if I can just find some seeds. I may have to order some, since apparently none of the stores around here have heard of fall planting. I think I'm gonna do some garlic too, and when it gets too frosty for anything to grow I'll fire up the old Aerogarden.

The summer was a cool one, but it was still kind to me. I learned a lot of lessons and will have a bigger, better garden next year. Signing off for now. Fare thee well, Summer! Until next year.

Applesauce!

I bought a quarter peck of Lodi apples at the farmer's market yesterday, and since they're not that great for eating and seem too soft to put into a pie, I decided to make applesauce. I have two small jars in the canner right now, and just got done licking the bowl. I put maybe 3/4 cup sugar in there since they were tart apples, and a few shakes of cinnamon and pumpkin pie spice. It took on a reddish tint when I stirred it all up, and it's absolutely delicious. Can't wait until my dad gets here so we can do some more canning. I did learn one lesson today, though: Water bath canners take forever to boil, and even longer if you have an electric stove with small elements (the single large one on my stove doesn't work.) Next time I'll put the water on long before I start anything else.

I think I'll go ahead and bake some bread today too, since I'm already messing up my kitchen and doing heaps of dishes (I've probably done 3 sinkfuls already and will have 2 or 3 more by the time I'm done). The weather is rather mild today, so I won't be roasting here in the apartment.

Another Job

I found out yesterday that I'm being hired back at Sendik's, which is a higher-end grocery store here in the Milwaukee area. I'll be making $9 an hour, 4o hours a week. Yeah, big load off my mind. I've been watching our savings steadily decline while waitressing and was really starting to get worried. Crisis averted!

Anyhoo, I did my fall seed-starting. Well, some of it anyway. I found seeds for kale, lettuce, and swiss chard. I still need peas and spinach, plus some new containers and dirt (I didn't plan that out very well.) Here's hoping that we'll have some lovely fresh greens right up until the frost gets bad enough to kill them all off! In other news, my pole beans are flourishing. Every couple of days I go out there and pull off a good handful of deliciously snappy beans. I've been mostly eating them raw rather than cooking them. They're good in salads.

The tomatoes have been struck with blossom-end rot, unfortunately. I'll still have a few decent ones but all the biggest ones are rotting. This is another lesson learned: Forget relying on commercial feed. I've been using Miracle-Gro for them, but apparently they don't put enough (or any) calcium in it, which has led to a calcium deficiency in my plants which causes blossom-end rot. Next year I'm going to do some composting out on the porch and ditch the Miracle-Gro (it's owned by Monsanto anyway and they're not getting another dime of my money if I can help it.)

Not sure what's up with my big pepper, either. It's not getting any bigger and I assumed it just needed to ripen, so far it's still green but it's shriveling in the middle. Dunno if that's normal or not, I'll keep an eye on it. There are more tiny peppers starting to develop on there too, and still plenty of flower buds to open yet.

My strawberries... well, I think they're a bust too. They seem to have Verticillium Wilt. I've already lost two plants, and the others are showing signs of having it, even the little baby runners. I mowed the big ones down to ground level to interrupt the disease cycle, we'll see if they last much longer. Either way I think I might go ahead and yank them and dispose of the soil and bleach the hell out of the containers. At least then I can reuse them for my lettuce and stuff. I'm thinking strawberries might take up too much space for so little yield anyhow. I might ditch them in next year's garden and wait until I can put a big patch in the ground to grow them. Next year when it comes down to jam-making time I'll probably just hit up a U-pick farm.

I bought some new books, including one called "Almost Vegetarian". We're trying to cut back on the amount of red meat we eat, so the books I bought should help towards that goal. Tomorrow I'll go to the Farmer's Market and stock up, today I think I'll take whatever scraps I have left and make pork or chicken fried rice using this method. Maybe even shrimp, although I don't much care for shrimp.

Oh look, it's 10 AM! I Love Lucy is on. Toodles!

Stock!

I will be making a small batch of chicken stock today. I've got leftover chicken bones from our dinner the other night and I saved the giblets too (heart, liver, gizzard, no neck unfortunately). There is a wonderful tutorial on stock-making at http://www.goonswithspoons.com/Chicken_Stock. Trev has also requested a batch of banana bread, so I guess I'd better get on that. It's oppressively hot in Wisconsin today, up to 90 degrees and humid. Windy too, otherwise I'd go take some pictures of the garden to upload. When it calms down I'll try and get some. In other news, I had a job interview the other day. If I get it I'll be making over $10 per hour. The hours are random and that will suck, but I'll at least be able to start putting back money again. Oh yeah, it rained really hard yesterday morning so we had to put off the fair until Wednesday :(

Recommended reading today is the 1969 edition of Betty Crocker's Cookbook. I bought one off Amazon for my dad and have been looking through it, and there are so many good recipes in there it's not even funny. If you come across one, I'd suggest trying to get ahold of it. Right now they cost anywhere between $45 and $100 on Amazon.

Alright, I need to get my stock going and I'm gonna have to do some cleaning today, too. I hate to turn on the oven, but Trev wants his bread so I suppose he's going to get that as well. Toodles.