Homestead Happenings

Harvest ups and downs

The past few weeks have had some ups and downs in regard to our harvest.  First we were blessed to be invited to go gleaning with my IRL freind MommaOfMany in a plum orchard.  Being pregnant it initially did not sound fun to go walking around for a few hours hearding children through an orchard but I was glad that we went when all was said and done.  So I took my buckets of plums home and had them put in the kitchen intending to can them the next day.  But the next day was co-op day so I spent all day cleaning, prepping, and teaching.  Then in the days after that a friend had surgery and I watched her children and schooled them with my own since letting them all have the day off would not have been best for them.  Then after they left my Miniman got sick, sick, sick.  Then Hubby got sick.  On and on it went.  I only got 1 pan of plums (about 2 buckets) cooked down.  So... a week and a half later.....when I opened the rest they were ...too far gone.  What a waste!    I felt terrible to waste such a blessing.  So that was my big down.

Then 2 days ago I went out to my garden.  First off I must say I did not do very well this summer.  So I planted a bunch of seeds in late August then carefully transplanted over 50 seedlings to my garden and set up drip irrigation to be sure they would be taken care of over our week long camping trip.  I was looking forward to a larger fall garden.  Then I came home to 45 dead seedlings!  Only a few survived.  Once again a big downer.

Back to 2 days ago.  I discovered the lone squash plant had taken over the barrel it was in. I peeked under the leaves to find a huge yellow suash and another small one.  Then I looked at the herb barrel to see that my basil has done very well.  So had my parsley.  So when I brought in the days harvest it looked like this...

What a haul!  Well I was not about to repeat the plum-trastrophy so I got right to work.  Rinsing sorting and bunching.  I ended up with 6 bunches or basil and one of parsely.  The loose leaves were dried in the oven and placed in jars.  The bunches were hung in my pantry shed.

Notice I did NOT hang up my little blessing that snuck into the first picture. .  I am so thankful for my pantry shed.  It was the first thing that Handsome Hubby built when we moved out here.  It houses the extra fridge and freezer and a 6 foot rack that holds extra kitchen supplies and food.

I am a cake decorator so all my cake dec stuff is out here too.  Below the herbs you see all of my 5 gallon buckets with gamma seals (horray for gamma seals!) they hold grains and beans that I buy in bulk from Azure Standard.  Someday I will get another 6 foot rack in there but it has to wait for now.

Here is what our chickens have contributed to our food supply

The brown eggs are from our Buffingtons and they are big even though they are the same age as the Aracanas that liad the blue & green eggs.  We only have 2 Buffington hens and 1 Roo.  They are supposed to lay thorugh the winter and be good Mommas.  So if that is true we plan to let them raise chicks and will get even more in the spring.

Daisy is still milking and still holding some back.. I am told she will do this until I get rid for her kid.  So I will be calling the auction house today.  I will use the miney made from selling extra goats (that do nothing but eat) on some new milk does.  A friend (Hi Tammy!) has offered me first pick of the kids expected from her Nubian does that has been bred to a very impressive Boer buck.  I am looking forward to seeing what she births!

So the waste of plums is a hard lesson learned.  Next time all will stop until the food is put up properly.  But the harvest from the garden is encouraging.  I will not give up.  I will keep trying and planting and learning.  The blessing of living on a whole acre is so great I can do nothing else. 

Tomorrow I plan to go to the Farmers Market to see if there are any deals to be had since the season is winding down.  The growers there are wiling to share their growing tips with me so that can be worth the trip alone.

Have a blessed day!

Mother of 6 blessings (and #7 due in Jan. 09!) from the Lord & Helpmeet to my Handsome Hubby who is my best blessing of all

Yummy Breakfast

I don't post very many recipes.  My IRL friend Momma is better at that.  However my favorite show is Good Eats.  I record it and watch it when I can.  My Handsome Hubby even got me a few DVD sets of Good Eats.  Some watch soap operas I watch Food Network. 

Anyway, I tried a recipe from one of his new shows and it was very good for breakfast.  It is called Dutch Baby.  You make your batter in a blender and put it in a cast iron skillet that has been heating in the oven.  It tastes like a waffle!  Some of us had it with syrup and some just ate it plain.  I doubled the recipe and cooked it in 2 skillets.  Once it cools down a bit just cut it into wedges.  How easy.  You can find the recipe here.  Next time I am going to add some fruit to it.  Give it a try.  Enjoy!

Mother of 6 blessings (and #7 due in Jan. 09!) from the Lord & Helpmeet to my Handsome Hubby who is my best blessing of all

Something NOT to do

My IRL freind, Mommaofmany, posted on her recipe blog a good substitute for eggs.  She wrote; "Just replace 1 egg in a recipe with 3 Tbsp ground flax seed and 3 Tbsp water.  I do this in almost every multi-egg recipe I have!"  So I tried it and it worked.  Wow!  What a handy thing to know.  It is an easy way to boost the nutritional value of what you are cooking.  Plus it is a handy way to save eggs if you find yourself running short. 

So last week, I was making oatmeal for breakfast and thought, "How can I add more nutrition?  Oh I know, flax seed!"  I ground up some flax seed and put it in.......

Remember the egg substitute thing?  Well it turns out that some how the flax seed combines with water and gels just like and egg.  So my whole pot of oatmeal had the texture of.....you guessed it....eggs....runny eggs.  Tasted fine but felt slimy.  My blessings ate it up but I didn't eat much.

Now I am not blaming Momma.  Just wanted to share so other could learn from my "experience".

My first baking day

My wonderful hubby gave me a Nutrimill for Christmas!  So I decided to start a weekly baking day.  Why should I buy that chemical filled stuff from the store when I can grind my own orgainc wheat right here at home and bake it into all kinds of goodies?  I made pizza dough, muffins, and bread.  The pizza dough and muffins I have made before so I could focus on the bread which I had not made before.

I used Alton brown "Very Basic Bread" recipe for the pizza dough.  It calls for store flour.  I used unbleached stroe flour.  I hope to soon adapt this but like I said I wanted to focus on the bread so I did not do any experimenting with it this time.  I made a double batch, let it rise then divided it into 8 balls with I wrapped in plastic and froze.  Now we will have fresh dough for pizza night.  We use to order our pizza then went with a take-n-bake.  Making your own pizza is very fun!  The children come up with all kinds of shapes, pockets , and pizza rolls.  

I made the "Basic Muffin" recipe from Nourishing Traditions.  A double batch made 3 dozen regular muffins and 1 dozen mini muffins.  Since the children asked for different flavors we ended up with a dozen each of banana, mango, and blueberry.  Yum!

Then it was bread time.  It was easy and the result were great (at least for me).  So here is my first attemp and fresh ground whole wheat bread....

My IRL, mommaofmany, said the texture is not good when frozen so we will have to eat it!  I guess if it goes stale I will make French toast.

Have a blessed day!