Gazelles On Crack Rotating Header Image

canning

The Harvest

Oct 25th, 2010
by gazelle.
2 comments

In the last couple of weekends, the architect and I finished harvesting everything that needed to be harvested. Green tomatoes, the last of the peppers, the carrots, the butternut squash and (yesterday) my first fall broccoli.

We had so many green tomatoes, but rather than let them stand for broken dreams and sadness, we decided to not let them go to waste.

Saturday, we made 7 pints of green tomato/tomatillo salsa. We ended up with another quart of it that will be used at the Spooktacular this weekend.

Sunday, the architect took the remaining green tomatoes and slow-roasted them with kosher salt and olive oil. So good! (Thanks to In the Garden Online for that delicious idea.)

Yesterday, we slow cooked a chicken with potatoes, garlic & carrots from the garden, and served it up with the steamed broccoli. (The architect made an appetizer of crackers with sliced Black Krimm tomatoes – yum!)

I have no pictures because (1) my camera is STILL broken and (2) I am gimpy and drop things a lot, so I’m not allowed to use the DSLR (says me – I drop everything).

The cover crops are sown, and in the next few weeks (quite possibly the weekend of 11/19-20 if the weather cooperates), next spring’s garlic will get planted. I have some cabbages, cauliflower, broccoli and Brussels sprouts remaining in the garden, as well as my so-almost-ripe pumpkins. I also have an impressive array of weeds that I am unable to do anything about until I get rid of the boot.

Even though I’m still having a lot of frustrations with the post-surgery and the limitations, I am trying to remember what makes this time of year so magical for me.

I love autumn. I love picking the fall crops. I love the smells in the air as people start to light their fireplaces. I love the changing colors of the sky and trees, and I love the blank slate of the garden.

I even love the fall storms that swept through this weekend – rain & wind. I love being curled up under a blanket with a steaming cup of coffee in the morning watching the trees whip around and the rain pound into the windows.

I love pumpkins and Hallowe’en, and watching the geese vee through the sky.

I love the brisk mornings and full rain barrels.

I love watching the maple down the street turn scarlet. I love the fog under the St. John’s Bridge and Forest Park’s variegated greens, browns & golds above it.

I love fall foods – the pumpkins and squashes; all the root vegetables, Brussels sprouts.

I love fall smells – wood smoke and cinnamon, roasting apples.

I know why so many people and places do harvest festivals. It’s such a significant time of year. The time to gather with friends and family before weather makes it more difficult. The time to rejoice in the bounty of the summer and give thanks that you have enough to get through another winter. The time when the field work is done (for now) and there’s time for pie.

I kind of even love being me.

1.2

Some Assembly Required

Sep 13th, 2010
by gazelle.
4 comments

What a busy weekend! I had planned it to be my weekend of relaxation & anti-social behavior, but once again, things did not quite work out that way!

Friday started off slowly – homework & yoga. I couldn’t leave home, due to the fact that my fancy new phone was out for delivery!

Finally, it arrived! And then, we made out for a while. Because it is awesome.

Behold – the phone of wonder!

I amused Twitter & myself by making “this is the Droid I have been looking for” jokes.

After sufficient alone time with my new phone (it has a kindle app! and weather! and facebook!), I finally got around to doing some work.

I waxed philosophical my cheeses!

Waxing the cheeses was so much fun! Definitely my new favorite part of cheesemaking. (Ordinarily, one wouldn’t wax a Parmesan cheese, but if they are around 2 lbs or less, waxing keeps them from getting TOO hard.)

Then, I headed out for a happy hour to celebrate a couple brand new half marathoners! Yay!

Saturday morning, I did a trail run with the Ambitious One – it was her 2nd trail run to date, and it was awesome. I ran about 4.75 miles; but she did almost 7 miles! So fancy!

Saturday afternoon, the architect & I headed to the wilds of Washington State to attend his work picnic. It was fine, as far as events of that type go. I am not a big fan of forced, organized fun (such as sack races & balloon stomping games), and we didn’t stay too long.

Once we got home, I started a new batch of Cheddar. That took just about 2.5 hours from milk to hanging (the stage right before pressing).

Sunday, the architect & one of his friends went off on a long hike, and left me alone for the day. I grocery shopped, then made six pints of ridiculously hot tomatillo salsa (I ran out of sweet peppers, so just went ahead & substituted more hot peppers).

It took a LONG time to husk & chop nearly 16 cups of tomatillos (all from the garden).

After that was finally done, I made a spicy queso blanco (no photos of this apparently), and then made dinner for the hungry men – turkey sausages, corn on the cob, and purple mashed potatoes. Peach cobbler & ice cream for dessert.

I really need to get my camera fixed so that when the architect runs off with our fancy-ass digital SLR, I can still document all of my kitchen adventures!

I think I need more weekend days to get everything done!

2.2

Another weekend of domestic bad-assery

Aug 9th, 2010
by gazelle.
5 comments

A decent weekend, although I spent most of it feeling just a bit off. My stomach seems really unhappy and I don’t quite know how to fix that.

Friday was originally scheduled as a full day of fun. I dropped my car off to get the broken window replaced. Emily kindly fetched me & toted me around the city. We met up with Sarah for yoga, then lunch, and then the aforementioned stomach issues made themselves known & I bailed on the rest of the afternoon’s plans. I headed home where I moaned theatrically & watched a lot of Buffy.

Friday evening, I resolutely picked up a picnic & headed to SE for movies in the park (it was Princess Bride – how could I say no?) I didn’t actually make it to the START of the movie, before I begged the architect to take me home. At home, we watched a movie & I went to bed early.

Saturday was a better day – I did some harvesting!

BEETS!

zucchini!

I spent the rest of Saturday canning beans & beet pickles. I had to take an unscheduled break in the middle to go buy a new pressure canner (and more pint jars). My old one wasn’t pressurizing – it took over 2 hours to get up to 10 lbs of pressure! I also picked up a new 20 qt stockpot so I can make more cheese! YAY!

On Saturday, I ended up with 10 pints of beans and only three pints of beet pickles. Next year I’m definitely planting more beets! I love beet pickles, and roasted beets, and I don’t even have any beets left for roasting! :(

Saturday evening, the architect & I made garden bounty pizza (garlic, onions & zucchini all from the garden; crust made with whey from homemade cheese) and drank wine!

Sunday, I went out for brunch w/ my kickass neighbor, and then headed home for another round of domestic badd-assery.

I used a few chicken carcasses I had laying around (in the freezer – of course!) and my new giant stockpot and made a huge pot of chicken broth. After it was finished & the fat was skimmed, I canned 9 pints of broth. The only reason I canned nine pints instead of 13 pints was because I ran out of jars! So – I have a couple quarts of broth in the fridge – guess I’ll be doing a lot of cooking this week!

I also made some ricotta cheese yesterday – although accidentally. I had bought milk to make cheese about 10 days ago, and due to my car getting broken into last weekend, ended up not making the cheese then. The milk was approaching the end of its natural life, and that is not the most ideal time to try to make it into cheese. So – I have cheese, just not what I was expecting. Oh, well! It still tastes good!

I started feeling off again yesterday afternoon, and spent most of the evening on the couch, watching Buffy (that’s what I do when I don’t feel well) and making the architect fetch me stuff!

Overall – a fairly productive weekend.

Next weekend – more cheese! and pickles! And the planting of the fall garden! Woo!

Weekend adventures

Jul 14th, 2010
by gazelle.
6 comments

Last weekend, I hosted a number of really cool people (many of them are sadly blogless) and helped them all make mozzarella for the first time. It was awesome.

There was cheese. And bread. And wine. (And then, we had wine.) Part of the wine drinking is because there is a point in the cheese making where you just have to let it sit for ten minutes, and I like to include in the instructions “and have a glass of wine.” Once you’ve helped make six batches of mozzarella (fortunately not all on the same day), that wine break becomes slightly ill-advised!

I have pictures! Awesome, awesome pictures.

Those pictures are all still on my camera, which is at home. So not useful. (I’ll post them later, because there are some really good ones involving rubber gloves.)

I think a good time was had by all – but especially by me. I can’t believe how much fun I had showing everyone how easy it is to make your own cheese (at least if it’s mozzarella).

I am branching out this weekend, though. This are about to get epic at the gazelle household.

I am going to make feta AND parmesan. Both of which require more work, more time, and (especially in the case of the parmesan) a LOT more patience (minimum aging time for parmesan is 10 months)!

I am also going to make some English muffins. Because I love them. And so many times at the market, I look at the ingredients and see high fructose corn syrup. (Which I’m sure is completely harmless, since it’s just corn, and what could be more natural than corn?) And I don’t want that, because I’m even MORE all-natural than corn. So, an experiment!

AND, then we’re going to start on the beer! Our life is a never-ending adventure (or, more accurately, a never-ending series of making the kitchen completely filthy).

There will be pictures.

Coming Soon to a Kitchen Near You

  • making & canning marinara sauce
  • making & canning pickles
  • canning fruit (pears, peaches, apples, etc.)
  • making/canning salsa (yum)
  • quilt making 101
  • pasta making (this will be presented by someone who definitely isn’t me…..)
  • homemade laundry detergent
  • and this fall? there will be lefse! (very similar to the movie, but with a lot less religion & oil – same amount of blood, though)

anything else you’ve always wanted to know in your quest to be a domestic god/dess? Hit me up in the comments.

Weekend of Domestic Bad-assery!

Jun 28th, 2010
by gazelle.
2 comments

I had a pretty short weekend (only TWO DAYS!) due to being at a work conference on Thursday and Friday. Fortunately, I only have to work three days this week before having a six-day weekend (yay for vacation)!

I did make the most of my only two days off (I don’t know how people do that – it’s full of the crazy).

Saturday started off with homework, but then moved on to some quality garden time. I’ll have picture updates for you later this week, but it’s looking awesome. Everyone is really appreciating the sunshine!

Saturday afternoon, I made some salsa (thanks for the recipe, kick-ass neighbor!) and guacamole and then headed off to a really fun birthday party. Such a great time AND perfect weather for an outdoor party.

Sunday was also awesome. I got up pretty early because I knew it would be a busy day. I headed to the farm stand that has opened up in my ‘hood (lots of local produce, as well as a few not-local things – such as Canadian tomatoes) and picked up some berries.

At home, I made some cheese – my most successful mozzarella to date! (The architect & I marinated half of the cheese in olive oil, garlic, parsley & red pepper flakes – YUM.) The architect made a loaf of bread, and then a few friends stopped by for a jamming extravaganza!

Between the four of us, we made nine jars of strawberry jam, nine jars of raspberry jam, and 5,000,000 tiny jars of blueberry jam (maybe 17 jars total, 12 of which were 4 oz size). Then we ate cheese (brie + jam + fresh bread = heaven!) and jam and bread and drank some wine and celebrated our accomplishments.

For some of the participants, it was their first real canning experience! AND, every single jar except one sealed! Yay!

After everyone left, the architect & I sat out in the garden and finished our wine – a perfect end to a fantastic day.

(This post is a great reminder that I need to get a LOT better at documenting and then actually uploading the pictures!)

← Earlier Posts Newer Posts →