food

Forget About It

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It seems as if it has been a very long time since I posted a recipe in this space, so here goes nothing.  As I’ve said a lot over the past few months, finding my grandfather’s recipe box has been a fun adventure filled with cooking experiments and taste tastes.

This particular card has been one I have played around with quite a bit over the past few weeks. And this weekend, after a lot of testing and even more tasting, I think I’ve come up with a great pumpkin bread recipe that allows you to forget about adding in all of that refined sugar and unhealthy oil.  Enjoy!

Pumpkin Bread

1 1/2 cups honey

1 cup coconut oil (melted)

4 eggs

2/3 cup water

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon nutmeg

15 ounces pumpkin puree

Preheat your oven to 325 degrees.  In a large bowl, beat the honey and melted coconut oil with an electric mixer.  Next add the eggs and beat until smooth.  Then add the water and beat mixture again.  Set aside.

In another large bowl, mix both flours, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg.  Add the dry mixture to the wet mixture slowly, beating with an electric mixer.  Finally, beat in the pumpkin puree.  (I add dark chocolate chips at this point sometimes too 🙂 )  Pour into two greased loaf pans.  Bake for 55-65 minutes.

Season’s End

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This past Tuesday, our family gathered for our final “Tuesday Night Dinner” of the season.  We were planning to keep the dinners rolling through the school year, but my oldest is finding herself quiet worn out after a full, big-girl day of school.  And with dance and tumbling now under way for the fall, we thought it best to take a bit of a break to allow the girls some down-time.

Here is a little glimpse into our evening this past Tuesday…

Finding Time

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As the physical labor of the garden wanes, I find myself needing to supplement my days with a bit of an extra workout to keep my body and soul fit during these cool months to come.  But when?  This seems to be the question I have asked myself each morning for the past several weeks.  I’m not sure how, but I find not only the minutes, but the hours of the day disappear without my noticing.

The funny thing about the whole situation is two years ago at this time I was working full-time, carting my kids off to day care for 10-plus hours a day.  And now, when I do have so, so, so much more time to spend with them, it still seems like there is not enough.  I guess this is what all of those mothers meant when I had my first little baby, and they told me time and time again that time goes by so fast, and you must take in and cherish all moments, good or bad (or terrible for that matter), because they are so fleeting.

So I find myself today, sneaking in a very quick workout in my garage, while my youngest takes a tiny nap after her dance lesson.  We mamas have to just do the best we can, with the time God has given us.

I hope all of you find a bit of extra time in your day today 🙂

Apple Sauce

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A sure fire sign that fall is upon us is when we start to find apples popping up here and there at the farmers’ markets.  Last week, we found our very favorite farming family at market with their tables loaded down with the most beautiful apples.  There were Cortlands, Jonathans, Honey Crisps, and Crimson Crisps.  Each more delicious than the next.

With all of this goodness to choose from, the girls and I decided it was high time to start making apple sauce.  So yesterday, with much fanfare and hullabaloo, we began our apple-sauce-making soiree.

The girls did all the work, while I took pictures and drunk in the sounds of 2Cellos on the IPad.  They used our very favorite apple peeler/corere/slicer to do the majority of labor, and then took turns adding some yummy local honey and spicy cinnamon to the mix.  We make our apple sauce in our slow cooker, so we just set it and forget it 🙂

A few hours later, once the aroma of the sweet and tangy apples, floral honey and spiced cinnamon fill the air, we have the perfect apple sauce for our family’s liking.  Fall is here.

At This Moment

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At this moment I am…

~sorting through pictures of our trip, and creating a little slide show to share with the family tomorrow at Tuesday night dinner.

~packing homemade apple sauce into jars from a weekend filled with more canning and freezing and drying oh my.

~starting a quilting project for a very special couple.

~shaking our growler of mead (a.k.a. honey wine) we started to ferment this weekend.  (The recipe and information about mead can be found in this book.)

~watching our crazy cat try to crawl up the screen of our kitchen window.  Such a handful this little lady is.  She wants in on any and all action going on in the house.

~planning my oldest daughter’s first “kids” birthday party with twenty five of her classmates. I’m tired already 🙂

~washing clothes.  My typical Monday ritual.

~soaking in this absolutely gorgeous fall day.

~wishing all of you a happy Monday!

Fall Planting and Harvest

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Upon our return from Disney, it was to the garden we went for some fall harvesting and some more planting.  We came home to our second round of beans, ready and waiting for us on the vine.  They were a very welcomed surprise after eating a bit too much non-homegrown food on our trip.

There were also about 80 tomatoes begging to be picked, and a whole lot of raspberries ripe and ready for a little princess to pick for her afternoon snack.

We then set to planting our new beds with some cold-hardy greens.  We are hoping to add a hoop house or some type of low tunnel over these beds once the frost sets in. (Even though that seems very far off at the moment, as I listen to my air conditioner humming at this precise moment, when it is a whopping 90 degrees again today.)

Suburban Homestead

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Amid the labyrinth of power lines and close proximity to our neighbors, we are slowly but surely developing for ourselves a bit of a suburban homestead paradise all our own.  When we took possession of this property four years ago, we were given a perfectly blank slate to work with because the previous owners had just filled in their in-ground pool.  This left us with a lovely, flat, fenced-in canvas that we are now able to glean a great deal of food from.

{Before.  Late July 2012.}

The gardening space we previously had contains 12 4X8 foot raised beds and one 4X16 foot raised bed.  Then just outside that space we have a smattering of lavender and rhubarb and some heirloom perennial flowers.  Last year we added 2 apple trees, an asparagus and strawberry patch, raspberry bramble and an herb garden to the mix.

And now, here we are…

I am so thrilled by how the space turned out.  I must say I was a little skeptical for a while there, when the vision in my head did not seem to match what lay before me.  But with a bit of digging, a little building and a whole lot of hauling, I am satisfied to say the very least.

We used the beautiful circa 1850 barn timbers I mentioned in a previous post to create a more permanent border for the existing asparagus and strawberry patch.  We used the remaining timbers to create a brand new perennial vegetable bed that will soon be home to more rhubarb (rhubarb wine here I come!), asparagus and Jerusalem artichokes.

We then added three additional 4X8 foot raised beds and one 4X4 bed.  This fall these beds will be loaded with cold hardy annual vegetables that we then hope to cover with a hoop house of some sort.  We are crossing our fingers this will give us delicious, fresh vegetables year round.  We also plan to add some gorgeous tree stumps around the fire pit for prime seating for those s’more-roasting evenings right around the corner.

Our Weekend

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This past weekend we opted to stay close to home because many of us in our little household of four were getting over the lovely beginning-of-the-school-year sniffles. It always seems so odd to me to have a cold in the middle of a ninety degree heat wave, yet that was our particular situation this weekend.  So with lemon tea and honey in hand, we set to having a fun-filled weekend none the less.

The first pumpkins of the season made an appearance at Friday’s market, so we had to buy just a couple.  The girls worked hard all of Saturday morning, digging out the seeds and preparing for some roasted goodness.

While the girls worked hard on the pumpkins, I got busy making my homemade granola. We were able to purchase some delicious home-grown oats from Hazard Free Farms, which helped to make the granola extra yummy.

I also tried another treasure from Grandpa Dit’s recipe box: piccalilli.  I must say, standing in the kitchen over a giant pot of boiling veggies on a ninety-seven degree day was not one of my brightest ideas, but the final result was quite tasty.

And I chopped the day away, getting food ready to put by in the freezer for the winter months.  Andrea Hazzard, from Hazzard Free Farm, gave us a great suggestion for preserving watermelon.  Pour boiling water over a bit of honey, making honey water.  After cooling down the honey water, pour it over diced watermelon until all watermelon is covered.  Then freeze it for enjoyment in the winter months.

Rajah enjoyed finding a new hiding spot.  Oh my.

And Tyler enjoyed some brewing time.  He concocted a batch of caramel creme ale.  Yummy.

I have also been hard at work in the backyard, continuing with our garden expansion.  I am so excited to bring you the finished product in tomorrow’s post.  Hooray!  See you then.

Master Chef Jr.

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My children have an addition.  They cannot seem to get enough Master Chef action on Hulu.  My oldest especially, wants to audition for the next season of the show, or at the very least, start her own restaurant in the very near future.  In fact, she recently asked the owner of our favorite local restaurant if she could live there.  Precious.

So to curb their enthusiasm, I told each girl she could prepare her own dish to serve at dinner.  And I must say, I was thoroughly shocked at the result.  This five-year-old and three-year-old created two different dishes that not only tasted good, but in the words of Gordon Ramsay were “visually stunning.”  It is truly fascinating to me what the minds of small children are capable of when left to run free without boundaries or restrictions.