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Putting Food By: Pickled Beets

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Despite the extreme heat we have had the past several days, our beets seem to be absolutely thriving.  In fact, they seem to be the only thing in our garden these days that are not being absolutely devoured by Japanese beetles.  Ug.

But enough of the negative and on to the positive…these beets.  Yum.  We pulled up our first round of beets this week and we were thrilled to find they had filled out nicely beneath the thick layer of soil.  My favorite way to eat beets is to pickle them, so I used a very easy pickling recipe from Putting Food By (listed below with a link), and before I knew it we had jars full of tart and scrumptious pickled beets.

 

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Some of our favorite home preservation books are:

Putting Food By by Janet Greene, Ruth Hertzberg and Beatrice Vaughan

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver (There are some great canning recipes scattered throughout the piece.)

The Big Book of Preserving the Harvest by Carol W. Costenbader

Fresh

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Each morning I make a lovely cup of piping hot coffee and stand at my kitchen window overlooking my garden.  Even in the dead of winter, when the garden is buried beneath layer upon layer of snow, I do this.  It allows me to view one area of the earth, each day, and observe all of the changes that take place and often go unnoticed.

Yesterday, as I was conducting this every day task, I noticed that the mint in my herb garden had reached an all-time-out-of-control-I’m-goiing-to-take-over-everything state.  I now had more mint than any human could ever even dream of consuming.  I twiddled my thumbs for a bit, trying to think of what in the world to do with even a small bit of this mint.  Then it came to me.  On our trip to Champaign this past weekend I indulged in this exquisite homemade, flourless cake that was served with fresh mint ice cream.  Yummy.  So, that was it…fresh mint ice cream!

I used my normal ice cream recipe, but this time I added fresh, finely chopped mint at the stage when I add the vanilla.  I covered the pan with a ceramic plate and allowed the mint to steep in the mixture until completely cool.  This allowed the lovely, fresh flavor of the mint to infuse into the ice cream.

Enjoy!

Recharge

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Sorry for being away for a few days longer than normal this weekend, but my hubby and I took a long weekend to relax, recharge and reconnect.  Despite the fact it didn’t seem like the trip was needed, once we got on the road and the distance between us and our home lengthened, we realized that indeed this trip was necessary.  It is so easy to get caught up (and let’s face it, sometimes bogged down) by the day to day.  It was extremely refreshing to take a break from the normal hum drum of our daily lives and just be at peace for a bit.

Now, when normal people go to exotic places to get away, my hubby and I went back to Champaign, Illinois…the place where we went to school, the place we lived and worked for five years of our adult lives, and the place where we started our family.  There was a lot of walking, dining and just plain hanging out.  It was divine 🙂

Wishing you all a lovely week!

Berry Pickin’

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This past weekend the whole Fagan crew was out in full force, making our way through the wild black raspberry brambles.  There was picking’, snacking’ and laughin’ going on all afternoon.  It was perfect.

The little ones really got into the entire process this year and picked for quite a while before they retired to the cool pool that awaited them just a hop, skip and a jump away.  So while the little ones swam with Grandma, the rest of us slowly made our way up the property line, continuously amazed by what the earth was providing for us.  These brambles were not planted here, but rather sprung up from the earth as a form of nourishment to those animals and people in the vicinity.

The day was of course an absolute blast, but I found myself often pausing to think of all that the earth continues to provide for us.  It is a true miracle that so often times is overlooked because of our fast paced lives and our constant desire for more.  This day gave me a chance to just sit back and marvel, to not be overcome with the craziness of our world, and just enjoy some good ole berry picking’ 🙂

At This Moment

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At this moment I am…

~preparing a list of supplies to make black raspberry jam.

~reminiscing upon the fun times had this weekend celebrating Daddy.

~contemplating a multitude of ideas floating about in my head involving a potential new project that could impact my children, as well as my community, in a positive way.

~mulling over the powerful words and ideas contained in Will Allen’s book The Good Food Revolution.

~trusting that rain drops will fall from the sky today to give our garden some desperately needed hydration.

~thanking God for my wonderful family.  I am so truly blessed.

~wishing you all a wonderful week filled with fabulous memories!

At This Moment

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At this moment I am…

~missing my five year old who has ventured off to summer camp for the day.

~devouring multiple books all at once.  I just can’t seem to get enough summer reading!

~planning our menu for our first “Tuesday Night Dinner” that we hold each week in the summer months.

~looking forward to a fun evening this Saturday when my husband and I treat his clients to a lovely evening of local food and nectarous wine.

~surveying the garden that is full of new growth and potential.

~indulging in a devine cup of coffee made with my new french press that my hubby got me for Mother’s Day.

~acquainting myself with my new computer.

~wishing you all a lovely week!

A Little Something Homemade

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Now that summer is upon us, it seems that the sun is just soaking up all of that lovely moisture in our skin.  I recently found a great recipe for homemade lotion that contains only five ingredients, and they are all readily available.  The best part about this lotion is that you can incorporate various flowers and herbs that you have growing right in your backyard.

The recipe can be found in this book and it is so easy to make that the girls and I were able to whip it up in no time yesterday.  The scent we tried this time is lavender vanilla patchouli, and we are really happy with the result.  We have also made lavender and lavender rosemary and all have turned out great!  (Can you tell we have a lot of lavender in our garden? 🙂 )

Putting Food By: Rhubarb and Strawberries

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Today I bring you another quick food preservation tip.  Today’s topic:  rhubarb and strawberries…The perfect combo!  Rhubarb and strawberries freeze beautifully and it takes little time.

For the rhubarb:  Rinse the rhubarb and allow to dry.  Then cut off the rough ends of each piece.  Cut the rhubarb into 1 inch bits, toss into a gallon size freezer bag and you are done.  Throughout the year, I simply pull out the desired amount of rhubarb I need for a recipe, allow it to thaw out and you are all set.

For the strawberries:  Wash the strawberries and pinch off the green leaves and stem. Allow the strawberries to dry.  Then place the strawberries on a cookie sheet or baking pan.  Place the pan in the freezer for a couple of hours.  (This will allow each strawberries to freeze individually, so that you don’t have a giant mass of frozen strawberries in a freezer bag that you can’t use.)

Once the strawberries have frozen, toss them into a gallon size freezer bag and that’s it!  I pull these frozen jewels out all year long to add to our smoothies.  You could of course allow them to thaw and use them in baked goods as well.

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Some of our favorite home preservation books are:

Putting Food By by Janet Greene, Ruth Hertzberg and Beatrice Vaughan

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver (There are some great canning recipes scattered throughout the piece.)

The Big Book of Preserving the Harvest by Carol W. Costenbader

New Addition

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We have lived in our current house for four years this coming July, and from the moment we set foot inside our new home and unpacked our boxes, we have had a rodent issue.  I have been completely ill equipped to deal with this problem because I have lived my entire life in the city, and have apparently lucked out in that I have never seen a mouse in a house, in my entire life. But now I seem to find myself in midst of a full bore rodent festival.

We have chipmunks digging holes all over our yard to the point where my oldest can no longer practice her cartwheels in the grass for fear of a sprained ankle.  We have voles burrowing underground and eating all of our raspberry brambles from the roots up.  We have mice running all over our yard, under our deck, and in our house.  Yuck, yuck, yuck.

We have tried traps, deterrents, poison, and even had an animal proofing professional come out and check out our situation.  Since the rodent expert visited us last fall we, thank God, have not had any more mice in the house.  However, they are still running rampant outside.  And my fear is that it is only a matter of time before those little suckers figure out a new entry point into our house.

I told my husband in early spring, when the snow melted away to reveal vole tracks all over our yard and half of our raspberry patch again killed off by those vermin, that we needed a new solution.  Enter Rajah, the newest addition to the Fagan household.

If you would have told me five years ago that I would end up a cat owner, I would have told you that you were absolutely insane.  I have never, ever liked cats.  But now the girls and I have found ourselves absolutely head over heels in love with this little one.  She was given to us by the eight year old daughter of the family we visited about a month ago.  On our visit, little Rajah was only a few weeks old, with very little fur and still nursing from her mama (who is one of the best mousers on the farm…YES!).  On Saturday we went to visit the farm again, and to adopt our new kitty.

Saying the girls love her in an absolute understatement.  My five year old especially, has not left her side during her waking hours.  In fact, as I write this post the girls are playing at their grandma’s house and the poor girl cried for ten minutes before we got in the car because she didn’t want to leave Rajah.

My hope is that she takes after her mommy and can hunt down those pesky rodents, but for now we are just enjoying play time and snuggle time with our newest addition.

FYI…The girls named her Rajah because that is the name of Princess Jasmine’s (from Aladdin) pet tiger 🙂