A week of canning, gleaning and baking

For those of you readers who don't follow me on Facebook or just don't like Facebook, I wanted to give you a wrap-up of what I've been up to the last week. Or, if you're on Facebook and you missed it, here's what's been going on around our homestead. Well, aside from the usual gardening business of being inundated with tomatoes, basil, blackberries, lettuce and green beans.

Gleaning

1. Apples (Round 1) - from the neighbor down the street. I've gotten apples from them in year's past and this year, they let me pillage their tree again. These apples are small and not very attractive. I ended up making applesauce as well as juicing them and making apple jelly (see below). I got about 8.5 pounds.

2. Apples (Round 2) - from the next door neighbor. These apples are much larger and tend to have less scabs and other problems. I used some of them for the apple jelly and still have a fridge full of apples. This is the first time I've asked these guys for their apples. They don't speak English very well and it took a bit of back and forth before they understood what I was asking. I got about 20 pounds.

3. Tomatoes - I walk by a house down the block that has a parking strip vegetable garden, so I get to check out what's growing every day. I've spoken with the owner a number of times before. I was noticing that they hadn't been picking their large yellow tomatoes so I decided to see if they'd be willing to trade tomatoes for some apple jelly. My neighbor was more interested in giving the tomatoes away as she was getting sick of them. She was also in the middle of making apple butter from her own tree and asked if I wanted some apples. Since I already has a fridge full of them, I reluctantly passed. But, I did score more tomatoes than we could reasonably eat in a day or so with the promise of more to come.

Canning

1. Bread and butter pickles - I had a ton more pickling cucumbers lurking in my fridge after making two batches of spicy relish. I love bread and butter pickles, so I decided to finish off the cucumbers making them.

2. Brandy applesauce - I used the crockpot for making this. Since the gleaned apples were small and I was planning on running them through the food mill, I just tossed a ton of them in the crockpot with some cinnamon sticks, vanilla beans and water and let it break down overnight. After milling them and bringing it back up to temperature, I added 1/3 cup apple brandy and canned them. Yum! (my Courvoisier Applesauce recipe is here).

3. Cinnamon brandy apple jelly - Yes, I like brandy with my apples. I really didn't feel like peeling and coring all those tiny apples, so I juiced them in my Breville Super Juicer. I added 2 teaspoons of ground ginger and 1/3 cup apple brandy to the final creation. I'm making more of this since it turned out so amazing.

4. Smoky blackberry rum jam - I spent far too much time running our backyard blackberries through the food mill to remove all the seeds, but the end result is well worth it. Dried chipotle chiles and rum give this jam quite a kick!

Baking

1. No knead honey sandwich bread - After reading a bunch of sites on no knead bread and how to adapt it to sandwich bread, I tweaked it a bit to include honey and whipped it up. It doesn't rise as nicely as kneaded sandwich bread, but it's so easy, who can complain?

2. Blackberry pound cake - My husband actually made this one, but I helped, so I'm going to include it. I'd take a picture, but there are only crumbs left. Here's the recipe though and the picture of what it should look like :) We didn't use basil, but home grown lavender instead.

Blackberry pound cake perfumed with basil

Picture courtesy of Kitchen Vignettes

3. Pumpkin chocolate chip bars - Yes, I made this again, this time without the black bottom and just milk chocolate chips throughout. My son loves it so much I'm going to make it again tomorrow after work cause it's so easy.

Whew! It's been a busy week! What have you been up to?

Spicy Sweet Relish for the weekend

We are supposed to be on vacation in Southern California right now. But, unfortunately, my husband's cancer complications have made the last month a very painful one for him. And, as luck would have it, he started radiation therapy two days before we were scheduled to fly out. Aside from him being in a lot of pain and severely fatigued and everyone being stressed out I, honestly, don't mind. I get to hang out in my garden during peak production time. Is that weird?

Marketmore cucumbers

Anyway, our slicing cucumbers are finally coming in and I've got a huge bag of pickling cucumbers staring at me in the fridge. So, since we really can't do much of anything this weekend, I think I'm going to make my favorite Spicy Sweet Relish. Plus, there's nothing better than standing over a steamy canner when it's hot out.

This year, I only planted a couple of cucumber plants (about 3 each, slicers and pickling cukes). Last year I went nuts and planted way more than that and we are still up to our eyeballs in pickles. I didn't want a repeat of that. I think I may have skimped a little too much on my plants this year because of the overproduction from last year. Maybe one of these days I'll get it figured out.

In addition to the pickling cucumbers, I'm also trying to avoid making eye contact with the pile of massively overripe bananas on the counter. I already have more frozen bananas than humanly necessary and I've been charged with making banana muffins. But, I really dread turning on the oven when it's over 80 degrees in the house.

Are you preserving anything this weekend? (And, yeah, I'm going to pretend that it hasn't been 8 months since I last blogged something).

Urban farming with the Nonagenarians

non·a·ge·nar·i·an /nänəjəˈne(ə)rēən/
Noun: A person who is from 90 to 99 years old.

A few weekends ago I went to a book release party and ended up hanging out with the parents-in-law of the author. The dad had a birthday coming up that week and was turning 91. His wife was also turning 91 this year, in August.

I don't know how we got on the topic, but our conversation turned to gardening, raising chickens and canning. They had been doing it all for decades and still grew a huge amount of food in their yard and canned like fiends every year.

They were excited to find someone my age so involved in doing something that, in the intervening decades had lost its "popularity", so to speak. Having lived through the Depression and WWII, victory gardens weren't something they did just during time of need. They were a wealth of information, sharing tips on pressure canning, canning peaches and nectarines and secrets of canning green beans.

My own grandparents didn't make it to their ages. Both grandparents on my dad's side passed away in their 50s, long before I was born. My grandparents on my mom's side lived longer, but there was no tradition of raising food since they lived their entire lives in Brooklyn. My great-grandparents owned a farm in upstate NY and my mom remembered visiting them, with stories about chickens and the like, but otherwise there was no shared knowledge to pass down.

On my husband's side of the family, being of Italian roots, there's a lot more by way of food traditions. My mother-in-law is quite a green thumb, growing tomatoes and herbs in her tiny backyard in Philadelphia, but not much else. Her grandparents used to make wine out of their Philly brownstone, which made it a popular place in the neighborhood. But, all that knowledge has been lost to us.

So, needless to say, I was excited to spend some time gleaning as much information from these two knowledgeable, elderly folks. Especially since they were still so energetic and proud about continuing these activities. They had so many years of trial and error to learn from that I rarely run across. Most people I know who are interested in urban self-sufficiency are my age or younger. And we are still in the trial and error stages. And, more importantly, most people my age are more concerned with getting the latest iPad than with growing their own food.

How about you? Do you have older folks in your life that are a resource for your urban homesteading? People who you can share experiences and learn from?

Canning withdrawals = canxiety

We leave Friday morning for a three week vacation, travelling about the East Coast via plane, train and automobile. While I write this, my husband is busy buying carbon offsets for our trip starting in D.C. where I have a meeting with President Obama and Michelle for a private tour of the White House vegetable gardens. Oh wait, that's just me taking an early trip to fantasy land.

In any case, after 5 days in D.C. we are taking the train down to Norfolk, VA to hang out with my brother-in-law for a week and enjoy some Virginia beaches. From there we are taking the train up to Philadelphia for four days to visit with family and then up to New York City for more family action. I'm fairly certain I will be sick of trains by then, but I love the subway, so our week-long stay in an apartment in Greenwich Village will be the highlight of our trip.

I've been trying to think of what all I'll be posting about while I'm on the "road". Expect lots of pictures, but I'm going to try to focus on finding at least one sustainable thing each day during our travels and report on them. Anyway, the above is not at all what this post is about. It is merely a warning of what to expect in the days ahead.

The problem with this trip is that it is during prime canning season around these parts. Just today I noticed that my favorite local strawberry farm has their berries 3 pounds for $5.98. This is the time of the year where I would be making vats of strawberry jam of various flavors. Blueberries should start rolling in soon as well, but I'm hoping that since we've had such a cool spring the harvest will still be going like gangbusters when we come back.

I'm trying hard not to have canning anxiety attacks. Let's just say that I'm "canxious". This will be the first time in about four years that I haven't bought flat after flat of strawberries to can or freeze for later in the year. I suppose I could make a last minute attempt to freeze a bunch, but that still would require a lot of food prep time - time that I don't really have since I'm busy getting everything ready to go for such a long trip.

Why couldn't the season have started just a week earlier? Sigh.

What about you? Do you get canxious when you see or grow produce that you don't have time to can or otherwise prepare for long-term storage?

For those of you wondering why we are taking such a carbon heavy vacation, well, we are going while my husband is having a stretch of good health so he can visit his family. Normally, I'd be more critical of the air travel, but I'm mentally trying to give it a free pass. And, yeah, I know the carbon offsets don't really make up for the impact. Sometimes one choice wins out over another.

Gone canning

I got a surprise batch of plums from a neighbor friend yesterday and made 21 half-pint jars of Cinnamon Ginger Plum Jam with Lillet. That still left a ton of plums so I'll be working on making Cardamom Plum Fruit Leather. If there's any left over I might make some Plum Bread for freezing or I might just freeze the plums straight up for use later.

I checked on my kale, since I was planning on freezing that as well, but I noticed they are infested by tons of tiny white insects. Anyone know what these things are and how to get rid of them? They are not aphids, I think they are some kind of mite.

Finally, in order to save some grapes that were a little too high on the tannin side, I made some grape juice, which was really easy and the kids are enjoying that as well. I have some good news about my apple trees, but that will have to wait for another post because I am too tired.

What kind of preserving/canning/freezing/drying are you doing right now?

Photo courtesy of Coco Cooks.

Spicy sweet relish recipe

I've got a new recipe up over on Crunchy Chicken Cooks for Spicy Sweet Relish if you are looking to do some canning this weekend and/or you have a crapton of pickling cucumbers and don't know what to do with them.

Indian Masala Strawberry Jam

I've been canning strawberry jam today - we are getting a bunch of late season strawberries in from a local farm and I've got a whole flat to work with. And, since you know I don't like making plain, straight-up jams I've added a little bit of flair to this one.

So, come check out the recipe for my Indian Masala Strawberry Jam over on Crunchy Chicken Cooks.

Tomorrow I'll be making a Chocolate Rum Strawberry Jam, so look for that recipe as well!

Homemade pizza sauce

In spite of my San Marzano tomatoes getting a bad case of blossom end rot, I managed to salvage enough other tomatoes to make a huge vat of homemade pizza sauce from fresh tomatoes. I made enough for 6 jars of sauce that I put in our chest freezer. I'm hoping to add more as the rest of the tomatoes ripen. It's been such a late year around here for sunshine and the rain just started again, but I'm still hopeful.

My recipe is pretty simple: olive oil, garlic, tomatoes (peeled and chopped), bay leaves, salt, pepper and fresh oregano. I heat up the garlic with the olive oil (so the garlic doesn't burn) until it's fragrant and then throw in the tomatoes, bay leaves and salt. I simmer until the desired consistency is reached and then add the fresh oregano and pepper.

Since the tomatoes I used were a weird combination of Brandywine and Black Prince the sauce was pretty juicy, so I ended up simmering it down for about an hour to remove a lot of the moisture. I then added a touch of cornstarch to thicken things up and it came out perfectly.

The best thing is the only ingredients that didn't come from my garden (or someone else's I know) is the olive oil, salt and pepper. That's the most satisfying part. Oh, yeah, that and it's orders of magnitude better on my homemade pizzas than making it from canned tomatoes!

Plum crazy

I've gone plum crazy. I can't stop thinking about those plums I "saved" from the neighbor's tree a few weeks ago. They were falling off the tree onto the sidewalks and making a mess out of things, so I did some community service by picking them. And stuffing my face with them. Well, actually the kids inhaled them before I ate much of the 20 or so I rescued.

But I wish I had saved enough to make at least one batch of jam since they were the sweetest plums I have ever eaten in my life. They had a hint of pineapple or something I can't quite put my finger on. (I did manage to make a great plum and port wine reduction from some of the leftovers so all was not lost.)

But now. Tons of local, organic plums are available on sale at my local grocery store. And I can't stop thinking about them.

Do I have time to squeeze in at least one batch of plum jam? Should I attempt drying some for my signature Crunchy Chicken Marbella (new recipe posted on my Food Blog)? Do I need a dehydrator? The sun has been non-existent around here this summer, so sun dried plums are out of the question.

How about plum wine? Have any of you had success in making plum wine? Oh, the misery - the choices are endless!

Blueberry jam

I went on another canning expedition over the weekend and made 13 jars of blueberry jam. I was really hoping to go to one of the organic U-pick farms to pick our own blueberries, but we have had just too many things going on the past few weeks that I was worrying we would miss the blueberry season altogether.

So, I compromised. I bought two big flats of blueberries from the grocery store. They weren't exactly local (I missed out on when they were offering those), but at least they are in season and I'll try not to beat myself up too much because now I have all those glorious jars of blueberry jam.

I tried some (blueberries must have more pectin in them than strawberries because it seems like they set up a lot faster) and can't decide which one I like better - the blueberry or strawberry jam. They both have their merits!

Of course, since we hand picked our own strawberries, I have a much nicer memory associated with the strawberries, rather than just picking them up from the store. But at least I got the canning done that I wanted too.

Thornless blackberries are coming into season, so hopefully we can do our own picking of those. The prickly blackberries that grow like weeds around here are too hard for the kids too pick.