Preserving The Summer: Freezing Some Corn

Loyal and I have been learning how much food we need to grow and preserve. We eat some meals together, some apart, and some shared with friends. I offered to freeze corn and he bought some from our friends Josh and Rama at Turnip Rock Farm. Then I got out Ken’s food preservation bible – duct taped together It has times for blanching, times for canning – so much helpful information. I last froze corn …

Continue reading

More Preserving to Come

Each summer I canned organic peaches for Ken.  Ken loved all stone fruit like peaches, plums, cherries, etc.  The stone fruits consistently show up on the Environmental Working Group’s Dirty Dozen list of foods that have high pesticide residues.  So I made an effort to find and can organic peaches in pint jars;  Ken could take them out to the field with a spoon and have a mid morning and/or a mid afternoon snack. With …

Continue reading

Preserving Starts

So, it has begun.  Now when there is surplus and some blemished produce, one starts to freeze, can, dehydrate.  Since I still have many jars in the root cellar, I started here with freezing melon.  Smoothies or sorbet come next spring when we get heat before we have fresh fruit Thank you, Josh and Rama!  The first sorbet goes to you.

Continue reading

Harvest Newsletter

Greetings from the Garden!  This week’s CSA box has tomatoes, potatoes, celery, lettuce, cucumber, zucchini, onions. garlic. kale, corn, basil, and apples       Field Notes.  Ken is getting the short season fall crops in now.  The long season fall crops are doing well.  He got the year’s compost mixed for next season.  And in his spare time it’s mowing, weeding, and harvesting.  Weeds that aren’t mowed will drop seeds for a new crop …

Continue reading

Harvest Newsletter

Greetings from the Garden!  This week’s CSA box has tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, cucumbers, onions, garlic, cabbage, kale, eggplant, carrots or beets, basil and parsley       As I write this on Monday, Ken is thinning the fall beets and carrots.  They are varieties from a UW vegetable trial program.  We have found some new great varieties in greens, tomatoes, and peppers that we would not have tried if we were not participating in the …

Continue reading

Preserving the Summer’s Bounty: Freezing Peppers

Last summer Ken tried something new – he chopped and froze bell peppers.  Peppers do not require the blanching that most vegetable do.  Previously we dried pepper slices in the dehydrator, and I often used them in things like chili and stews that I cooked for a long, low temperature on the wood cook stove.  Frozen peppers do not need to be re hydrated, and can be placed in a dish just before serving to …

Continue reading

Harvest Newsletter

Greetings from the Garden! This week’s CSA box has tomatoes, potatoes, peppers, carrots, onions, garlic, eggplant, cabbage, greens, basil, parsley, and cilantro Field Notes.  Ken has been harvesting!  And he is planting fall crops as well.  He has been mulching and composting and preparing the soil where the mobile tunnel will move for late fall and winter. From the Kitchen.  I am moving into preserving mode.    Last week I made jams and froze ripe …

Continue reading