Rainy start this weekend

Green Beans

Before we left we tackled the green beans from last weekend.  We shelled a lot of them out, but still managed to get enough to can.  We got 12 and a half quarts of green beans canned.  Here they are:

Here are the ones we shelled out, all spread out to dry for storage:

Canning Vegetable soup

We made it up to the farm Friday afternoon (we were up late canning those green beans above!).  I started in on cleaning the carrots I salvaged from the paw-paw patch.  Unfortunately, the carrots left over from mom's patch fermented , so those were a waste.  At least I got the bulk of those dried!  On that point, they weren't as dry as I would have liked them, so I put them back in the drier; I am going leave them there until they get crisp!  Anyway, I cleaned and chopped the carrots from the paw-paw patch and got almost exactly 1.5 quarts!  This is enough to make one batch of  the Ball veggie soup recipe!  So I went ahead and cleaned/cubed up some potatoes and Katherine did up the onions and celery.  We got a late start on them, so we didn't get done until about 2am!   Here are some pictures:

We got 16 and one-half pints of veggie soup cooked up!

 We did up a 1 C jar of "leftover soup" so that it would be cooked correctly .  We will try it today to see if its any good.

We are currently looking at recipes that include tomatoes an maybe potatoes so that we can continue to save these crops.  I hate wasting food!

Grape juice!

I saved the "must" from the wine I started a couple of weeks ago with the idea of trying to make seconds wine or jelly or something.  I hate to waste the grape skins that still have so much flavor!  Well, I finally got to them today (its too wet to do what I want to do so I stay inside and make a mess!).  I took the must out of the nylon mesh bags that were the basis for each of the 5 gal batches of wine I started.  I boiled the must with about 1 gal of water for each batch (they were in some water from when I saved them).   I should say its quite a mess!  Once I got the juice out and strained I tasted it - it was SOUR!  The fermentation evidently ate all the sugar out of the must - which is good for wine but bad for making juice with the seconds!  Anyway, I added enough sugar to the juice to make an extra-light syrup and canned it.  I got 9 quarts! (7 quarts and 4 pints - I did add a little water to the last two jars to fill but it shouldn't effect flavor).

Concord wine progress

I raked the wine again.  It looked like the primary fermentation is well over.  While raking I noticed that there is still a considerable carbonation in the wine.  I will let it sit for at least one more week before I bottle.  I may decide to clarify, although I am not sure why I should since its just for personal consumption.  I will think about it.

Pears

Went over to mom's to sharpen her riding mower blades (I started down that path before but the blades were REALLY tight, so I brought an air-impact wrench this time!) .  I got 3 out of 4 blades off, sharpened, and back on.  The one blade just wouldn't budge.  I will either have to take the deck off or think of something else.   While i was over there i picked some pears (keifer and/or barlet - she wasn't sure - I can relate! lol).  I want to make some pear wine - maybe some "perry" which is a fizzy pear wine!  I need to order some champagne bottles for the perry!  I looked at the jonahan apples - they are good to pick whenever - so maybe next weekend I will get some apples for pies, jellies and other canning delights!

Last of the tomatoes! 

Katherine processed the last of the tomatoes this weekend!  They were done using the vitamix and pressure canned in pint jars.  12.5 pints.  Now to go back and tally all the tomatoes.  Rough estimates aren't as impressive as I that I didn't record the earliest canning of the Mrs Wages salsas.

Begining of the End of the gardens for the year

I took up the black plastic row covers from the sunflower field and along the inside of the big patch.  Then i ran the leaf vacuum/mower over the corn and bean patch (and part of the tomato patch that I had cleared) to get rid of the smartweed seed heads.  It was a real chore since the weeds were evidently still quite wet and the vacuum clogged and stalled frequently.  I eventually removed all of the tomato trellis stuff as well (and broke a tine off of my digging fork! ARG).  I am hopeful that it will be drier next time I am up and I will mow/vacuum the rest of the garden (except the eggplants).  Maybe I will even do a quick till and seed with vetch.

More greenbeans, squash and cuc's. Canned pork

I picked some of the larger squash when I got to the farm as well as more cuc's.  

I brought some pork that I bought at Safeway for $2/lb.  I want to PC it - I have never done pork before.

I spent some time and set up the dehydrator (a Cabela's purchase earlier this year) then I used a mandolin to slice the squash thin (about 1/8th inch) and then placed the slices on the racks and put them in the dehydrator.  I set the dehydrator to 115F and set the time to 24 hr.  While those were dehydrating I set to work on the pork.  I cut it into 1 inch cubes (and cut some of the fat off while doing so) and raw-packed it into 5 pint jars (along with 1 tsp of salt per pint). I left about an inch space at the top - maybe a little more in some.  I was super concerned about the fat melting and screwing up the seal at the top.  I cleaned the tops of the jars very carefully before I put the lids on to make sure there was no grease between the lid an the jar.  I tightened the lids up and placed in them in the PC. Cooked them for 75 mins after pressure came up.

While the pork was canning I sliced a bunch of cuc's up readying them for bread and butter pickles (I found a Mrs Wages mix in the back room so I decided to use it).  I got a bit scared when I couldn't find enough jar and lids - but then I realized i actually had some brand new jars in a case from last year so I was ok.  I put the cucumber slices in the jars and then covered them with the hot mix.  cleaned the jar tops and put on the lids as usual an then loaded 7 quart jars into the water bath canner.  I was just putting the canner lid on to help the water come back up to boil when I heard a "crack".  Sigh.  I little investigation turned up that one of the older jars broke a bottom out.   I took the broken jar out an removed as much of the cuc's as I could grab safely.  I added some hot water (carefully, not wanting to do any more damage from thermal shock!) to bring the water level back up and brought the water to boil.  Processed the remaining quarts for 10 mins.

I still had to wait for the pork to finish canning after all of the pickle shenanigans - was up until almost 2 am!  Good news was that all of the jars sealed and look pretty good.  Of course, the pickle jars needed to be washed and I gave the pork jars a good washing too to make sure the grease was off as best I could.

The next day I checked the squash in the dehydrator - they had turned into paper thin slices.  The weren't crisp though.  BTW, I did use some salt (salt flour from Zimmerman's) on the slices.  They really aren't that good to eat straight.  Maybe I will try toasting some to see if they crisp up...

Anyway,  before I left I picked (and continued to de-weed) the green beans in the big patch.  Maybe got 1 1/2 quarts.  I picked some more squash an cuc's as well.  Also picked a couple beets and 5 Kohlrabi.   Also stopped by mom's place (she needed gasoline for mower) and picked a couple of handful's of green beans there.  There are lots of beans there but they arent quite reay yet.  Next weekend I will have a good harvest there!

Here are some pics:

The 6 surviving quarts of bread and butter pickles

Canned pork!  5 pints. Cold/raw-packed works fine for pork.  Lean meats should be hot packed.

The squash in the dehydrator.

Snow Day!

Looks like I'm stuck here in the "city" (suburbs really) again this weekend!  Arg!!!

Big snowstorm - a nor'easter evidently, moved through and dumped almost 20" of snow on us.  Here are some pictures of my backyard here in Silver Spring, MD:

The snow has melted down a lot since yesterday, thank goodness!  You can see the little paths I dug out for my dog Smokey so he can go about his business without getting stuck in the snow!

I just checked my seedlings this morning and found more progress in the cabbage, brussel sprouts and cauliflower tray.  Nothing yet in the onion tray.  Here are some pics:

Here is the tray containing the cabbages, brusselsprouts, and cauliflower.  I started turning on the light above the tray yesterday, once I thought enough of the seeds had put up their first leaves.  I turn the light on in the morning and turn it off at night.  I have been leaving the plastic tray cover on to keep the moisture level high so that the remaining seeds will germinate.

After all of the seeds have germinated, I will begin to leave the plastic tray cover off so that the plants won't rot!

Some of the plants look moldy!  I am not sure if that white fluff is actually mold though.  I am talking about the fibrous looking stuff, not the white "balls", which is simply Perlite.  I suspect the little white fibers might be the seed sending out feelers to start putting down roots!  In any case, those white fibers seem to go away in a day or so. 

I really should get an earlier start on the onions - maybe next year (well this year really) I will start seeds in the late fall....  In any case, I am definitely trying onion sets this year.  Onions are so critical to cooking!

Also, I welcome my new followers.   Well, my first and only followers, since I just recently  figured out how to allow followers!  

Today, I read a blog article: Canning Chicken, (from one of my new followers blogs, actually!) that has motivated me to finally try it!  

Tomatoes canned, rutabagas, wine

Finished canning 14 quarts (actually did 14 pints sauce and 14 pints juice) of tomatoes.    Things went smoothly.  Used the double boiler juicer thing and the squeeze-o strainer.  Used the pressure canner - 10lbs 15 mins.  Got caught up on all the ripe tomatoes.  Only a small number left to can here.  Saving those for Katherine to do this weekend (not sure they will even be ready - I think they will be though).

I picked the rutabagas tonight.  I was getting tired of seeing them decay out there and the tops were crowding out many other plants.  The chard should do better now.  I took the good rutabagas and cleaned them, diced them and roasted them with some salt.  Katherine and I had them for dinner.   Was just about 2 cups once cleaned.  Not exactly thrilled with their productivity - but the soil here is a bit hard on most plants.

I finally got around to doing the next step in the winemaking on my zinfandel.  Did the de-gas and added the "F-pack" (flavor pack?) and isinglass for clarification.  Now wait 14 more days (Oct 3rd) and see if ready to bottle!  I need to check to see if I have enough bottles!

I got my draw-knives and my hydraulic line adapters today. I got 2 different sizes (3 of the smaller and 1 of the larger) of hose adapters - not sure which size is correct though - if either!  I am hopeful that at least one will fit the bill and then I can replace at least one of the lines and use the tractor for garden tilling and planting my cover crops this weekend!  NO DIGGING with the tractor anymore! [unless I don't get the backhoe or excavator!]

recent plumbing and More tomatoes!

Well, the sink issue in SS finally came to a head.  We tried using more draino on it Monday (and of course, the small snake) and it didn't improve.  in fact, it got worse!  I guess the draino adversely affected the plastic pipes?  Or maybe just the jostling of the plunging actions, but by Tuesday morning, it was leaking under the sink!

I took Tuesday off from work and proceeded to try to figure out a course of action.  I wanted to put in a heavier metal pipe based solution (I had a mix of light plastic and metal), but i couldn't find the parts I needed at Home Depot and time was running short to create a decent PVC solution.  The local Home Depot "experts" are useless, at least with respect to plumbing!

Anyway, long story short, I ended up going back and forth to HD only twice!  A miracle!  LOL  I did end up using the crappy light weight plastic pipe fitting that they offer.  Unlike last time i used those fitting though, I immediately bought pipe sealant!  I also got a 50 FOOT 1/2" pipe snake to clear that damn clog up once and for all!  It took a while to put the snake down and run it through, but I did it and cleared the clog (never did identify the clog though!)  I rebuilt the drain with all new plastic and sealed them good.  The build seemed solid.  Leak testing showed few leaks - mostly just needing to tight compression fitting around the garbage disposal connection.  Hopefully that will get snug and we will be OK soon.  Its good enough for use though, and saved me having a $300+ bill from James Wheat (and having to WAIT for Wheat!)

So that was my Monday and Tuesday.  Wednesday night we got back to processing tomatoes (after Katherine spent much of Tuesday and Wednesday cleaning a BUNCH of dishes by hand!)  We got to use the squeeze-o style strainer (BTW, the mail order squeeze-o arrived Wednesday night - but we used the one I bought from Zimmermans because it was already clean).  We processed 5 pints of sauce and  7 pints of juice.

Also, I hung up the sunflower heads in the shop to dry so that the squirrels can't get to them!  Once the heads are dry enough I will remove the seeds and then soak the seeds in salt brine, then dry the seeds for eating.  I need to remember to save some of the seeds for planting!  Probably try to save those that are still on the sunflowers up at the farm.  I don't want to harvest them too early in case they aren't mature enough to make good planting seeds!

Today, I would like to process all of the remaining tomatoes that are ready.  I have a batch in the juicer right now.  Will update blog later.

Pressure canning tomatoes on hotplate

Katherine is doing crushed tomatoes up here on the farm using the new hotplate that we got a month ago.  The hotplate was a bit disappointing for hot-water bath because it takes so long to heat a full canner load of loaded jars!  We are proceeding with the general recipe found at NCHFP, but it agrees with the ball blue book recipe as well.  We did not add any acid to this first batch because we had mostly heirloom tomatoes which are known to be high acid.  If we do Roma tomatoes, perhaps we should add some citric acid.

However, for pressure canning, it is perfect!  We are at an altitude of 1150 ft here and the books say we should be doing quarts of tomatoes about 15 mins at 15 lbs pressure.  With the 15lb weight on, the hotplate heats up the canner to pressure in about 15-20 mins (of course, the time will depend on how hot the jars were when you put them in as well as how hot the water in the canner was before you put the jars in).  Then we vented for 7 mins, placed the weight on and started the 15 min countdown.  We adjusted the heat control from 12 (max) to 8 to maintain the 15 psi.  The hotplate had no trouble maintaining the pressure.

Katherine prepared and canned 7 quart jars and 6 1.5 pint jars of tomatoes today!  They all sealed with no mishaps or problems.

A total of 11.5 quarts today!

Pressure Canned green beans!

Kath and I pressure canned 12 quarts (yes, quarts!) Of green beans! Was up until past 2 am !

This was the first use of our pressure canner!  Very simple.to.use.  I was impressed over how little water it needs and how much less burner power is needed!

We are planning to can some tomatoes with it this weekend!