I finally got some of our peach pictures sorted through. We had such a fun time picking this year.
We’re quite lucky the Bracken’s don’t weigh us before and after leaving the orchard… I think E ate his weight in peaches!
Food
Jam Fever!
Last weekend, we went to Palisade for our annual trip to Bracken Orchard to pick peaches. We drive 240 miles over the mountains, each way, so we want to make sure we make the trip worth it. This year, we came home with 368 pounds of peaches (slightly less, since about half a box was Fuji apples).
We had 15 pounds for my sister and 40 pounds for some friends, but the rest we’ve been working on getting put up for the year. Most of them are sliced and frozen in quart-size bags, and many get made into various jams for our use during the year and for gifts. We canned some a few years ago, but we feel like the frozen ones are more versatile and last us longer. Plus they are easier to put up and take up less space.
True to form, I decided to defrost 40 pounds of the plums that were given to us last year at peach time. We didn’t have time then to process them properly, so of course I thought we’d have time this year! What is wrong with me?!? I spent the whole week making plum jam while Rick sliced and froze the peaches. I didn’t get all the plums done before some started to smell “off,” but I got most of them taken care of. Smarter people would have just defrosted a little at a time. Then I moved onto the peach jams.
This has been the most fun I’ve ever had jamming though. My friend Kristen has been a godsend, coming over twice to make jams. We got a little crazy the second time, trying new recipes. I spent a good portion of my grocery budget last week on organic Madagascar vanilla beans, green cardamom pods and various liquors for our jam. Some combos we tried: Peach with Honey, Vanilla Bean and Brandy (wow – the smell!), Plum Lavender (AMAZING!!), Peach-Plum Ginger, Plum Noir (ooh lala!), and a couple of original creations, Kristen’s Honey Peach Cobbler jam, and my Jalapeno-Honey Plum. We’ve had a ball.
I’ve even ordered special jars. I hope they arrive by this weekend (I plan to make Peach, Blueberry and Grand Marnier jam and my favorite traditional peach preserves), but if they don’t make it, I’ll use them next year. I found most of these recipes on the Punk Domestics site, by the way. If you put up – you should definitely check it out!
So what are your favorite ways to use peaches? Plums? Any awesome jam recipes?
Categories: Canning and Food Preservation, Community, Recipes, Recommended Reading
Tags: DIY, Food, Food Preservation, Recipes
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Jalapeño-Honey Plum Jam
What do you do when you’ve got 40 pounds of last year’s plums left in the freezer and you need to make room for this year’s peaches? You put your grandma’s apron on over your mei tai and start making jam!
Last year, my brother-in law picked us nearly 70 pounds of plums from his parents’ place. But he brought them just when we were elbows deep in peach and grape processing. So I stuck them all in the freezer with the intention of making them into jam later, when it wasn’t so hot and we weren’t so swamped with other fruit.
Well, here it is, September again, and we are once again swamped with fruit. And I’ve still not touched those plums. So I started defrosting them, and went at it with the jam making. But as there are still 40 pounds, I wanted to get creative. I went searching for a little jam inspiration and I found it on Canarella. Sweet and spicy – my favorite combination!
Since my plums were previously frozen, they turn all mushy when defrosted. No good for straight up canning, but perfect for jam. Here’s what I came up with!
Jalapeño-Honey Plum Jam
2 pounds plums, pitted and chopped
1½ cups honey
1½ tsp jalapeño powder*
2 T lemon juice
In a large sauce pan, combine all ingredients and bring to a boil. Cook until jam gets to the gelling point (use the saucer method or one of these methods).
Ladle hot jam into sterilized jars, wipe rims of jars, add lids and bands and process in a boiling water bath for 5 minutes (10 minutes in Denver or similar altitude).
Makes 4 half pints.
*I make homemade jalapeño powder by slicing and dehydrating jalapeños, then grinding in a food processor. This powder is delish on buttered popcorn!
Categories: Canning and Food Preservation, Food, Recipes
Tags: Food, Food Preservation, Recipes
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Review: “Preserving with Friends” and that’s what I did.
At the end of May, Calamity Jane gave away ten copies of Harriet Fasenfest’s DVD, Preserving with Friends. I shamelessly plugged myself and won one of the copies on the condition of giving it a thorough review. I was so excited to receive my DVD in June, and it was so generous (and trusting) of Harriet to give away ten copies!
Then I had a baby in July, and Harriet and CJ probably thought I took the DVD and ran, but I didn’t. I watched it and took notes while I was breastfeeding. At first I was daunted by a three and a half hour DVD, but it is broken up into lots of short, easy to digest segments, which worked perfectly for me. I was able to watch one or two sections during the kids’ nap times. It also includes some cool bonus features if you stick it in your computer (printable charts, pectin making instructions, etc.).
I have made jam and pickles before, so I was tempted to skip over the beginning where Harriet talked about boiling water bath canning basics, but I am glad I didn’t. The DVD offers a lot of great tips, and my favorite was boiling your jam in a low, wide pan so that the liquid evaporates more quickly, and that she was working outside on her grill! Two of the most daunting parts of jam making (the time it takes and how hot it gets in my non-air conditioned house) solved, right off the bat!
I wish I had this DVD when I was learning how to make jam. Actually seeing how Harriet does it made it so much easier to understand. Much less intimidating! When I got to the canning fruit section, I found myself saying that I could can tomatoes! I always wanted to but was too intimidated!
The gems offered in this DVD continue throughout with Harriet’s guests, showing different techniques for making pickles, fermenting and something I was most curious about, pressure canning. She has the experts in each of these fields sharing their recipes and tips. Actually seeing the methods helped me so much more than just reading about them in a book.
The DVD includes a bonus section featuring the basics of dehydrating with an electric food dehydrator, freezing with a vacuum sealer and storing root vegetables like onions and garlic. I wish there was more on these techniques, but they could probably be a whole DVD unto themselves!
Then this weekend, after picking some fresh berries, I had a friend over and we put Harriet’s techniques to the test. I know I promised to do the plums, but since they are frozen and we had fresh berries that we didn’t want to go to waste, we tried Harriet’s recipe for strawberry jam.
Using a wide pan really saved time and I was really happy with the turn out. And my friend who had never done any canning or preserving before was happy to try it and she even borrowed my DVD. I was tempted to give it away too, but I actually plan to re-watch some sections after I get a big jar for fermenting and a pressure canner of my own.
Also, as a side note, I love the name of the DVD. It is much more fun to preserve food with a friend. Much more fun. So thanks too, to Kristen for coming over and jamming with me!
Usually I don’t promote products on my blog, but I have to say that I really liked seeing these techniques, and since so many of us are teaching ourselves these arts, the Preserving with Friends DVD is a great alternative to a book. It is excellent for visual learners or for giving yourself that confidence boost to stop thinking about it and actually getting yourself some jam in the cupboard. It’s totally worth the $24.95 to purchase it. So, get yourself Harriet’s DVD, grab a friend and stock that pantry!
Berry Picking
This weekend we got to go to a local U-pick berry farm. Raspberries and strawberries and a good time was had by all. We were so happy that this was suggested by our new friend, Kristen, and her daughter. Bonus – they live in our neighborhood. Also, as you can see, we got a new camera! Woohoo!
Categories: Community, Food
2 Comments
Late Summer Snapshot
It’s been almost three weeks since I’ve made it onto the computer. I’m sure you were wondering if I had some sort of mysterious injury related to a grub hoe and a compost bin. But I assure you, everything is fine. The sun has been out, and things have been growing like mad, including both boys and C. So the blog has been collecting dust! In the mean time, I’ve been able to get a few things done around here.
We picked cucumbers up at our CSA and put up 48 quarts of pickles.
We got the tree trunk and stump hauled away to a mill.
And we put some 7 pounds of elk meat into the dehydrator to become jerky.
We harvested corn and our first potatoes with the neighbor.
I have to say that harvesting potatoes is one of the funnest things ever – it’s like a treasure hunt!
We ended up with 40 pounds of fingerlings and 50 pounds of Desirre red potatoes! We will have plenty for seed next year and hopefully enough to store through the winter.
We also have a neighborhood BBQ in the works and have been spreading the hens’ good will via eggs and some extra garden onions.
We are getting ready for some berry picking and peach picking in the next week or two. I am excited to get some preserves into the pantry as well. We are going to take a walk tomorrow to the house with the concord grape vine and see if the new family there will share some grapes with us this year like the last tenants there did. We are bringing some 2010 jam with us to give them as an incentive!
The late summer/early fall is one of the busiest times around our homestead. Harvests are coming in, the dehydrator is running, and we are trying to see if we can manage to get the yard back in shape in time to participate in the second annual Denver Botanic Gardens chicken coop tour. If you remember, I made some improvements on the coop this spring with the tour in mind, and last year was a lot of fun, so it’d be really great if we can pull it together in time. More updated posts in the coming days – I am finally getting back on the ball around here, I think. 😉
Categories: Canning and Food Preservation, Chickens, Community, DIY, Garden, Independence Days, Urban Homesteading
Tags: Chickens, DIY, Food Preservation, Garden, Urban Gardening
1 Comment
Pan Roasted Cauliflower with Cannellini Beans and Kale
Last week we made a tasty side dish with our garden and CSA goodies. Rick thought it was good enough for me to share.
Pan Roasted Cauliflower with Cannellini Beans and Kale
2 TBS butter
1 TBS olive oil
1 head cauliflower, trimmed and cut into bite size florets
coarse salt and red pepper flakes
1/4 water
1 bunch of kale leaves from the garden, tough stems trimmed, washed, dried, and cut or torn into pieces
2 large cloves of garlic, minced
1 can cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
parmesan cheese
In a 12 inch skillet, heat butter and olive oil over medium-high heat. Add cauliflower to pan and season with red pepper flakes and salt to taste. Let the cauliflower brown well before turning and continuing to “toast” on all sides. When the cauliflower is getting nicely browned, add water to the pan and scrape up any browned bits. Add kale, cover the pan with a lid and let cauliflower steam until most of the water is absorbed or evaporated, about 5 minutes. Remove cover and stir in garlic and beans. Stir until beans are heated through and the rest garlic is fragrant. Serve topped with grated parmesan cheese.
I wish I had gotten a picture, but it was so good that we ate it before I could grab the camera. Let me know if you give it a try and you like it.
Slow Harvest
It’s been a month since I did an Independence Days update. I really like this method of keeping track of what we’re doing on the homestead to work towards our own independence. The end of July and into August seems like a time we should be pulling a lot from the garden. We were really on the ball this year with our spring and fall plantings, but our summer crops went in extra late (except the tomatoes), so our harvest has been slower than I was hoping it would be this year. Of course we’ve had our hands full with family matters too. 😉 I’m really wishing the carrots, beans and watermelon would kick into gear.
Plant something – fall crops of beets, peas, beans, kale, turnips, and bok choy went into the ground. After the virtual homestead tour last week, I had someone ask for a picture of the whole garden. After we did some weeding and put in the fall seeds this weekend, I took a couple of pictures. It looks so empty without the big squash plants of summer that we usually have, but here is what our main garden currently looks like.
Harvest something – eggs, onions, beets, peppers, tomatoes, kale, chard. We have tiny little cucumbers on the vines and could probably pick some kohlrabi this week too. Otherwise I feel like things have been slow. I and just waiting for all the tomatoes to really come on… then I’ll be wishing things would slow down just a bit, I’m sure.
Preserve something – nothing since the baby was born… no wait, I take it back, I cut the necks off the garlic bulbs and sorted the ones we’re saving for seed and the ones we plan to eat. Yum yum!
Waste Not – compost, scraps to chickens, recycling, etc. We’ve done quite a bit of eating from the freezer – all the things I saved up for C’s arrival.
Want Not – We found out about a co-op here that sells grains and chicken feed for a great price. We got 65 pounds of organic layer feed (whole grains and seeds!) for less than $27!
Build Community Food Systems – Our neighbor, Doug, harvested some carrots and onions. His carrots look like they belong in a story book or on a seed packet! He shared the first ones with our boys. And I actually got a picture of him! His corn is getting close to harvest too – I bet he’ll get some ears this week.
I really wanted to participate in the first ever Denver County Fair this year (Rick makes some amazing zucchini bread), but the fair dates fell about 10 days after we had C, and it was a little early to be walking around the fair just yet. But we did get a call about joining the Denver Botanic Gardens chicken coop tour this year. The tour is in October, but we’re on the fence still, since with all our projects this year, we’re not sure the yard will be in any sort of shape to have people touring it.
Eat the Food – We’ve been eating a lot from the garden. This is my favorite time of year – when we make whole meals from food we grew ourselves. We’re also on our last jar of grape jam, and only have a few packages of peaches left – perfect timing since we should be picking more by the end of the month.
Categories: Food, Garden, Independence Days
Tags: Food, Garden, Independence Days, Urban Gardening
2 Comments
Howdy!
From gardens, bees and backyard chickens in the heart of Denver to starting from scratch in San Antonio. Our family of five is striving to find the simple life - the easy way.
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The Lazy Homesteader 