Pickles

OK. I have attempted canning with the abundance of food I have. I started with tomato sauce, then beets, pickles, dilly beans and jalapenos. What a learning curve it has been. I have never canned before, so I picked up a book by Ball jars to learn the art of putting up my food. The book seems to be just what we needed because it walks you thought the steps of canning, freezing and drying foods.

My trouble has been with my pickles. I got 8 lbs of pickling cucumbers through my CSA and was armed with my Ball canning book and was ready to attempt pickles. I think everything was going well until it came to packing the pickles in the jars. I originally though wide mouthed pint jars would work best, but then I realized I would only be able to fit about 4 cucumbers into these jars. My husband convinced me that the small-mouthed quart jars (the only large jars I had) were the way to go. We realized that there is an art into packing the cucumbers into the jars. We did the best we could, but were still left with a lot of holes because of the awkward shape of the cucumbers. We decided to proceed. When it came to pouring the hot pickling spiced flavored liquid into the jars, I found out that grossly underestimated the amount of liquid that would fit into the jars. (Actually I followed the Ball book recipe and it was not nearly enough liquid.) Once the pickles were processed, I noticed that they had shifted and only filled up about 3/4 of the jar. Soon, I they started to shrivel and shrink. By morning, they filled up only about half of the jar. I read my book about problems you might encounter and prevention. I learned that I was supposed to prick the cucumbers with a fork before canning them. HOW WAS I SUPPOSED TO KNOW!

Bananas

I just got back from seeing Julie and Julia and got inspired to write another blog entry.

What to do with old bananas...

I love bananas, but they have to be just perfectly ripened the way I love them in order for me to really eat them. Not too green, but firm. Ripe bananas don't have any appeal to me, yet I always buy a bunch of bananas and they get ripe before I eat more than one or two. So, I always have old bananas on hand. Here are two recipes I use with my old bananas.

Tried and True Banana Bread
(I got this recipe from my mom. I make it with my daughter at least once a week)

2-3 ripe bananas (the ones with the brown spots)
1/2 cup veggie oil
1 cup sugar

Mix these together, then add.

1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
dash of salt
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup milk plus 1 tsp lemon juice
2 cups flour
chocolate chips or butterscotch chips (optional)

Mix together. Pour in a bread pan.
Bake 335 degrees for 1 hour 5 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean



Banana Fritters
(This recipe also came from my mom and I will type it exactly the way she told it to me.)

mash up 1 banana
add one egg
cup of flour
¼ - 1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp baking powder
¼ cup milk

consistency of pancake or waffle mix

fry in a little oil... spoon into oil, medium heat, cook like a pancake

Dutch Baby Pancakes

I remember learning how to make this breakfast in my third grade class. My teacher taught a unit on foods from around the world and we each made a cookbook with the recipes we learned. Now my children enjoy eating Dutch Babies for breakfast. The following recipe makes one pancake. I usually just mix up one at a time and

Dutch Babies
1 egg
3 tbsp flour
3 tbsp milk
1 tbsp butter

topping:
lemon juice
powdered sugar

Preheat oven to 500 degrees. Wisk first 3 ingredients together in a small bowl. Once oven is hot put your butter in pan (I use a glass pie pan) and put in the oven to melt. Take melted butter out of oven and pour in batter. Cook for about 4-5 minutes. The pancake will puff up and look lightly brown around the edges when it is done. Top with lemon juice and sprinkle powered sugar.

Apricots and Plums

A few weekends ago, I bought a food dryer at a garage sale. We dabbled in food drying last year, drying apples after borrowing a dryer from a friend. This year will be my year to learn about preserving foods, so that we will have home grown food throughout the year.

I saw that apricots were on sale at the grocery store, so I decided that this must mean it is apricot season. Using my new found localvore knowledge, I decided to seek out locally grown apricots instead of store bought. Since I live in an agricultural area, know for it's cherries,peaches and apples, I had no problem finding local apricots from a fruit stand. I was still about a week early for most of the fruit, but when I get a itch to do something, I know that I better do it now or it many never get done. I bought a half box.

My first attempts at drying this year were with dill and apricots. I noticed a number of voluntary dill plants in my garden and although I do not cook with dill more than a couple times a year, I thought this would be great place to start. I searched the web for ideas about how to dry the dill and finally decided to use all the parts of the plant, but the roots and the stalk. The leaves, the flowers and the seeds should all have a place in a future recipe. I broke the dill into manageable pieces, placed them on the racks to dry for a couple of hours.

In the meantime, I started preparing the apricots for the dryer. I learned that apricots should be sliced in half with the pits removed. After "popping" out the fruit (pushing the fruit inside out), they needed to be soaked in water and lemon juice for about 5 minutes. The fruit was now ready for the food dryer for about 12-18 hours at 135 degrees.

In my mind, drying dill and apricots together should not result in a mixture of flavors. This thought came from the picture I saw in my food dryer manual of many type so foods being dried on the same rack at the same time. The result of my dill and apricot experiment did give me slightly dill flavored apricots which I have to admit are not bad. I don't think anyone would consciously notice the subtle enhanced flavor, but who knows. Maybe I have stumbled onto something new.

I also decided to make my own fruit leather. My kids love the sugar rich versions they sell at the store, as well as the healthier alternative we call "sticky fruit". How hard could it be, right! My first batch of apricot fruit leather turned out pretty good. I did not have the special liner called for by the fruit dryer guide, so I cut out custom made parchment paper forms. These worked out surprisingly well. Once the fruit leather was dry, I cut it into pizza shaped pieces, paper and all. This I rolled up into homemade fruit roll-ups (minus all the sugar).

Now I am ready to begin drying plums from my backyard plum tree in the same fashion as I did the apricots. This is the first year I have actively harvested the plums from the trees, so I am not sure exactly when the fruit is best for picking. The plums we grow are yellow/ green in color with a hint of red when they are ready to eat. I have no idea what variety they are, but the are pretty tasty.

In the near future I plan on searching the web for plum recipes. I love baking, but my family, and waistline, can handle just so much dessert. With our raspberries and now plums, I feel like I need to be creative in how I can cook with these.

Dinner July 26th

Tonight for dinner, I am trying to use all of the veggies in the house before they go bad. On the menu tonight is spaghetti with sauteed zucchini and summer squash with a side of dilled carrots and green beans. In our CSA basket this week, we received the squash and zucchini, along with bush beans (long skinny green beans). I also had some carrot sticks left over from a potluck event we were at last weekend that needed to be used. The dill came from my garden. It feels so great to use fresh, locally grown foods in a nutritious meal.

I stumbled across this recipe and was excited to find something to cook using the voluntary dill we found in our garden this year.

Dilled Carrots & Green Beans
from Healthy Cooking magazine- June/July 2009

Prep/total time 25min
Yield: 4 servings

3/4 cup water
1 tsp. sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. dill weed
4 medium carrots, julienned
1/2 lb. fresh green beans
1/4 cup reduced fat Italian salad dressing

1. In a small saucepan, bring the water, sugar, salt and dill to a boil. Add carrots and beans. Cook, uncovered, for 5-8 minutes or until vegetables are crisp-tender; drain.
2. Drizzle with dressing; toss to coat.

So it begins

I want to start off by saying that I am not Super Woman in the kitchen. Matter of fact, I am far from it. I am not very creative when it comes to food, but I am getting better. The following journal will be my experiences, thoughts, notes, and recipes that come to mind when I am on my food journey in the kitchen and the garden. I have begun a journey of moving away from processed foods and learning about slow foods. In the book Animal, Vegatable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver has been my latest in a series of inspirations.