Poplar Hill Happenings

Organizing a recipe notebook was the best thing I've done to improve our eating whole foods. I am always find recipes here at HB and I print them off. Keeping them was difficult until I remembered something my mother did about 5 years ago. She got a notebook and filled it with a bunch of paper protectors. Then she slipped all her favorite recipes into the paper protectors. I've been doing this since I joined HB and it has paid off. I print your recipes and take recipes from magazines and put them in the notebook. My tomatoes aren't ready yet, but boy do I have tomato recipes ready for cooking them. My family will eat tomatoes every which way we can this summer. The notebook also helps me with my menu planning, when I plan my menu I've got the notebook out to flip through to make a shopping list of what I don't have on hand. I try and cook only with ingredients on hand, but sometimes a need something that we have run out of, cheese, eggs (I want chickens!), baking soda. My notebook has made a big difference in how we eat, because I've got healthy recipes organized. I still have my recipe box that has pre-homesteading recipes in it (there are some good ones from my grandmother), but I love my notebook.

I found an old favorite while cleaning out my recipe box last night. Just in time for the green beans that I picked from the garden. Ok, many of you may have this down by heart, but for me I was so excited to find it and make it and have it taste just like I remembered as a kid. So here it is:

6 slices of bacon

1/2 to 1 lb. of green beans

1 onion

1/2 cup water

2 tablespoons cider vinegar (I only had white last night and it worked just fine)

1/2 teasp. salt

1/8 teasp red pepper (I only had black last night, again it worked just fine)

Cook your bacon and remove it from the pan. I used my cast iron, because the bacon adds more seasoning to the pan and because the cast iron just cooks more evenly. Being aware that fat is not all that great in your diet I poured off about 1/2 of the bacon grease. Put the onion in the remaining grease and cook them up until they are translucent. Add the green beans, water, vinegar, salt and pepper. Cover and cook for 20 min. Stir occasionally. Cooking the 20 minutes is real important to soften up the beans and bring out their garden fresh flavor. Cook on medium to low heat.

This was just perfect last night and quick and easy because I had everything on had.

When the zucchinis come on there is a great zucchini, red pepper, green bean and dill recipe that goes great with hamburgers and corn on the cob.

Enjoy your summer eating! Christine, babysteps

Many-Pepper Steak Seasoning. From 15-Minute Low Carb Recipes. By Danna Carpender

I have no idea why this is called Many-Pepper. The yield is enough for 12-15 steaks. But so many recipes call for steak seasoning. I'm guessing it's about 8-10 Table spoons. But I'm probably way off.

1 tablesp. Onion powder

3 tablesp. Garlic powder

3 tablesp. Paprika

1 tablespoon oregano

1 1/2 tablesp. Pepper

2 teaspoons lemon pepper

1 teaspoon cayenne

Black Bean Salsa-a cool (in temp.) and cool (very yummy) way to get beans in your diet.

I found this in one of the Light and Tasty Feb/March 2005 . It was sent in by Maria Chiarino of Concord, North Carolina. It is a year round favorite of Clark and I. It is a great way to get beans into our diet and we all know the great benefits of tomatoes!

1 can (15 oz) back beans rinsed and drained.

2 plum tomatoes, diced

1 can (11 ounces) Mexicorn....I made my own last year the peppers and corn were ready at the same time and I just froze them together...or just skip the Mexicorn and add more jalapeno pepper to the whole thing.

2 tablespoons olive oil

2 tablespoons minced fresh cilantro--or more if you like

1 table spoon lime juice (o.k. this one won't come from our garden)

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

1/8 teaspoon salt

1/8 teaspoon pepper

Combine all your veggies and beans. Whisk together the oil, cilantro, lime juice, cumin, salt and pepper. Drizzle over the veggies and beans, toss to coat.

Clark and I often make this a whole meal. Great with chips!

I've decided that growing my own black beans is the only way to save money on this (really black beans are not all that expensive... a bag cost as much as a can and you still have the can and the bag to throw away. So to see if I can for a time reduce the cost and the waste of the can and the bag I'm trying a couple of rows of black beans this summer. You need 90 days and we have about 120 growing days, so we will see. From what I've read the beans dry right in the pod. You pick, shell and store. I'll report on my beans as the summer progresses.

You would never expect lime and radishes to go together! I pulled our first radishes last night and used up the left over shrimp and Mexican fixings from Friday's dinner and made this salad/taco that my husband and I love so much. We found it in Mexican Everyday by Rich Bayless.

1 to 1 1/4 pounds medium-small shrimp, cooked, peeled and defined (if you wish).

1/4 cup lime juice -fresh is best, but if you've got bottled it works great too

1 small white onion*-chopped

6 radishes, thinly sliced-wow my radishes tasted sooo good. Easy to plant wonderful to eat they are a new must have in my garden, dh said, plant some more right now there is still time.

1 fresh habanero (or jalapeno) chile stemmed and finely chopped (remember habenero's are the hottest pepper there is so you may wish to go with the jalapeno.

2 large rip tomatoes*, cored and chopped into 1/4-inch pieces-we find that the romas work best for Mexican dishes

1/2 cup (loosely packed) chopped cilantro*

salt

12 warm corn tortillas-make your own or buy at the store

*garden produce from your own garden very soon!

Mix it all together. Yum! This makes enough for 4 adults. Last night I just guesstimated the amounts I needed based on the left over shrimp I had.

Enjoy! We love Mexican and the next recipe I'll post is black bean salsa. What a great way to get your family to eat beans and other fresh garden produce!

I found Recipes from America's Small Farms at my library just in time for the up coming garden harvest this summer. I loved the simplicity of this book so much I purchased it on Ebay. The recipes use garden ingredients that any gardener would have, can purchace at the farmers market or get at the grocery store.  The sauces and dressings in the book are simple and look very tastey.  The book discusses how the veggies are grown, harvested and cooked. It focuses on Community Supported Agriculture and describes the workings of farms that produce organic fruits and veggies.  Get to your local library or bookstore and check it out.  It might be just in time for your harvest too.  Hmm I'm just a tad hungry for a salad.

I learned a hard lesson last night. This might be obvious to many who have been cooking with CI for a long time, but I guess experience is the best teacher. Last night I cooked some meat scraps for the cat to eat and left them in the pan over night. Just the little bit of moisture in the pan rusted the edges! I had just gotten some steal wool for cleaning them the other day, knowing I would eventually need some. Well I got out the steal wool, scrubbed off the rust, cleaned the pan, oiled it and seasoned it a little on the wood burner. Hopefully my experience will help you. Clean your pan ASAP or work extra hard the next day. Christine

I've been blogging about cast iron because I've not seen anyone else. Cleaning cast iron is very important because you don't want it to rust. I am not an expert, but I thought I'd offer what I've learned.

I purchased my cast iron preseasoned so I didn't need to go through that process which is very important before using your pots and pans. Seasoning needs to be done every so often too, but my pan is so new I haven't had to venture there yet.

When I am finished cooking I wipe out as much of the food as I can with a rag. If it comes out clean as a whistle then I just place a little oil in the pan and rub it all around. It's ready for the next use then. It rarely comes out super clean so after wiping out food I rub it down with salt. The salt seams to act as a scouring agent and also absorbs extra liquids from the pan. After a good rubbing with salt. I wipe it out again and then oil it.

Cleaning extra yucky stuff in the pan---Once there was so much cheese stuck to the pan that I put some water in the pan heated it slowly until the water began to steam. After steaming for about 3-5 minutes I took it off, poured out the water and went through my wiping, salting, wiping and oiling process.

It has been pretty easy. I really like my cast iron. My Teflon would always warp for some reason and then it wouldn't be flat on the stove (electric) and move around. My cast iron NEVER moves around it is so heavy. I don't have to hold on to it at all. I now want a bigger skillet. My husband says ok, but he's going to keep using the Teflon. Surprising considering the things he knows about environmental contaminants and cancer, oh well, I don't think I'm going to cook MY food in the Teflon any more. For many reasons.

Taking babysteps, Christine

Well it is cold enough to have a pretty good fire in the wood stove today. So it's a good day for cooking with cast iron. At noon,  I put the Dutch Oven on with three chicken breasts, some carrots, potatoes, onion and a little green pepper. It is beginning to smell great!

My philosophy about how to cook on top my wood stove and in my cast iron has been-start early and if it's not ready at dinner time stick it in the electric oven. Well so far I've not had to stick anything in the electric. Today I did microwave the carrots a bit, because they really do take a bit longer than everything else. So here's what I did.

1) a little olive oil in the bottom of the Dutch oven

2) three chicken breasts on the bottom

3) I cut up carrots, onions, potatoes and a little green pepper (enough for my family of 3)

4) I "nuked" the carrots for 4 minutes to give them a head start

5) I pilled all the veggies in the Dutch Oven on top of the chicken and around the chicken

6) I put the Dutch Oven on the stove

7) I've checked it once and it is doing well. I stirred a bit to give the veggies a different spot and turned the chicken breasts over.

8) I'm pretty sure it will be all done in time for super at 5:30

9) Yum-yum roasted veggies and chicken. We got the same meal we would have in the electric, but we were able to do it on top the stove!

A personal thank you to Spinning Grandma who had a suggestion for my summer kitchen. You got my brain working and I had forgotten about the stove we have in our garage. That lead to discussions with my husband and we came up with an even better idea, particularly for canning. I'm going to use our propane grill a lot more this summer and try to keep the house cool.

Please post your cast iron cooking recipes.

Well it's time to add wood to the fire.

Christine, taking those babysteps toward a self sufficient life.

Since I began to bake more breads this year I picked up this yummy recipe over at Homesteading Today. I think Tracy Rimmer first posted it. She stated that her kids gobbled up a whole loaf one day at a friends house. We've had the same experience with this bread. My daughter eats it for breakfast, lunch and snacks. The original recipe calls for 2 cups flour. I use whole wheat so that I can sneak good grains into my daughters diet. She has no idea the brown color is due mostly to the whole wheat, she thinks it's the cinnamon. I use only a 2/3 cup of flour and have been trying to think of what would be just as good for an alternative sweetener. So here is the yummy SIMPLE recipe....

Cinnamon Quick Bread

2 cups flour (I use whole wheat)

2/3 to 1 cup sugar

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp salt

1 cup milk

1/4 cup oil

2 eggs

2 tsp vanilla

Beat it all together. Pour in the pan of your choice and bake at 350 for 50 minutes.

Christine

P.S. This cooked up great in the dutch oven on top the wood burning stove.  With a good fire it took about 2 hours to cook up.  I probably should have vented the dutch oven more.  I ended up with moisture on the oven lid that kept dropping down on the bread and made the top wet.  It was still yummy.  Perhaps even the last 1/2 or so I could have just partially covered the dutch oven with aluminum foil.  When