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What's going on in the kitchen?

Ann Torrence

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Location: Torrey, UT; 6,840'/2085m; 7.5" precip; 125 frost-free days

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We have the great thread What's for dinner?, so how about a thread on what's going on in the kitchen, food preservation-wise?

Today I have chicken stock (from yesterday's butchering session) going into the pressure canner, chicken fat rendering for the freezer, a cheese waiting to be waxed, and my first batch of sauerkraut on the counter. I have some green tomatoes staring me down for pie filling, but that might not get done today.

What's happening at your humble hearth today?

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Dale Hodgins

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Location: Victoria British Columbia-Canada

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My efforts pale in comparison. I steam lots of vegetables and I make various stews that use up lots of vegetables. The steamed ones get slathered in butter. Almost anything from the garden can become a butter delivery system.

Judith Browning

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Location: Ozarks zone 7 alluvial,black,deep clay/loam with few rocks, wonderful creek bottom!

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I'm continuing to dehydrate more persimmons and a few figs, cooking a bone broth, just opened a quart of a two day bean paste ferment and I need to somehow finish drying a paper sack of mint that has been 'almost' dry for awhile. I think the house is dry enough today to also put away more of my plates of seeds into jars for storage. We haven't needed the wood fire often enough yet to really get rid of the summer humidity in here.
I may cut the last of the basil and make some pesto.......we are due for a drop to the low forties in a couple days.

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi

Craig Dobbson

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Location: Maine (zone 5)

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I'm making jams from raspberries, grapes, elderberries, strawberries and blackberries that I've harvested and frozen over the summer and fall. Pumpkins, beets, cabbage, carrots, fennel, peas, squash and potatoes are the main vegetables coming from the garden now. I've been making apples sauce for the past month too. Gallons of the stuff... holy shit!
Coming up on the schedule is a big day of rabbit harvesting. I've got about twenty or so that will be going to the freezer next weekend. I've also got a few young roosters from this year's hatch that aren't "top quality" so there's a little chicken stock in the future as well. Late fall will be all about pork. PORK PORK PORK

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Ann Torrence

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Location: Torrey, UT; 6,840'/2085m; 7.5" precip; 125 frost-free days

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It's been hotter than normal, the hoop house veg are growing instead of going into torpor; an arugula even sent up a flower. I rescued about a pound of radishes, huge but not too hot, and put them in a ferment with carrots, mustard seed, cloves and pepper. It's turning a lovely pink color. Not sure how long to let it ferment. And I finally got back to making yogurt, had some raw milk that was intended for mozzarella that needed preserving.

The green tomatoes have all turned red, but a friend froze some others for me, so there might be green tomato apple pie filling yet, but not for at least 10 days.

Blogging about homesteading, photography and living in a small Utah town | Growing mostly cider apples at Stray Arrow Ranch

Ann Torrence

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Location: Torrey, UT; 6,840'/2085m; 7.5" precip; 125 frost-free days

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Judith Browning wrote:just opened a quart of a two day bean paste ferment

What is this, how do you make it and how do you use it?

Blogging about homesteading, photography and living in a small Utah town | Growing mostly cider apples at Stray Arrow Ranch

Judith Browning

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Location: Ozarks zone 7 alluvial,black,deep clay/loam with few rocks, wonderful creek bottom!

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Ann Torrence wrote:

Judith Browning wrote:just opened a quart of a two day bean paste ferment

What is this, how do you make it and how do you use it?

Here is a link to the recipe that I posted in a fermentation thread that I started... https://permies.com/t/37682/fermentation/discussion-lacto-fermentation-methods-recipes#294452 The recipe is from Sally Fallon's Nourishing Traditions.
I eat a spoonful on many things...brown rice, vegetables, my sprout salad, corn bread....I haven't tried it as a 'dip' though as suggested in Nourishing Traditions. I am short on garden stuff to ferment right now and we are always cooking a pot of beans

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi

Leila Rich

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Location: Wellington, New Zealand. Temperate, coastal, sandy, windy,

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I'd usually be playing in this thread; but it's mid spring-months away from preserving the glut.

I've made Judith/Sally Fallon's fermented bean dip. I was hesitant about the concept, but it's really tasty.
I eat a lot of vaguely Mexican food, so I tend to have a dollop of bean dip with rice, chillies and whatever.

My large chest freezer has recently developed quite a bit of space.
A friend and I have decided this season we'll go on produce-buying, freezer-filling missions at major summer/autumn harvest times

Ann Torrence

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Location: Torrey, UT; 6,840'/2085m; 7.5" precip; 125 frost-free days

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Judith and Leila, I've got to try that! I need to eat a regular amount of beans (for potassium) and that sounds yummy.

Leila, When we visited NZ in 2004, I missed Mexican food so much! I ended up going to a Pakistani food shop for chiles to make an enchilada sauce. Tortillas were impossible to find. The only complaint I had about our three months was the lack of a mole sauce. Maybe it's better now?

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Leila Rich

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Location: Wellington, New Zealand. Temperate, coastal, sandy, windy,

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Ann Torrence wrote: Leila, When we visited NZ in 2004, I missed Mexican food so much! (...) Maybe it's better now?

Maybe a bit, but I think 'proper' Mexican food is generally made where there's actual Mexicans around, if not to cook, at least to teach the locals!
I don't think I've met any Mexican people living in NZ.
It's a pretty complex cuisine, and we just don't have the population demanding the right chillies and so on.
On the other hand, Malaysia's pretty close, and there's some great Malaysian food around

I make very basic 'Mexican-ish' food at home: beans, rice, flour tortillas, pickled veges, that kind of thing.
I eat a lot of chipotle chillies!

Judith Browning

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Location: Ozarks zone 7 alluvial,black,deep clay/loam with few rocks, wonderful creek bottom!

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Well, really nothing is happening in my kitchen..........it has all moved to the warm room with the wood stove for the winter. Bone broth, a couple quarts of bean dip ferment (with added grated organic carrot this time), lots of hot herb tea (passion flower, mint, lemon balm), and our constant five gallon kettle of hot water for baths, dishes and all....and this mornings oatmeal.

"We're all just walking each other home." -Ram Dass
"Be a lamp, or a lifeboat, or a ladder."-Rumi

Dawn Hoff

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Posts: 526

Location: Andalucía, Spain

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I have kefir (dairy) on the country every two days, I drain it, we eat it - I make new from the whey. I have dilly beans fermenting - without the dill, with garlic and chili instead. That and saurkraut. I'm not really good at salads, forget to make them etc. so the fermented condiments are a great way to get loads of veggies the days where I haven't made a salad.

I should have had a rooster in the haybox today - he had been attacked by an eagle or something and broke his foot. Only when I started plucking him his sling was black (as if he had internal bleedings)... So I didn't feel OK eating him (I have no idea if that was a sound judgement - but I had to go with my gut feeling). I have been frying veggies and potatoes all week in fat from a confit de canard (store bought). Those potatoes are the best - even better than those fried in lard.

Cj Sloane

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Location: Vermont, off grid for 24 years!

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I've got a big pot of chicken (really rooster) soup going from today's harvest:

I just barely fit the 5 birds in my big stock pot but no room for the feet, tomatoes, or shiitake stems. This simmers for at least 12 hours.

Somebody mentioned their wood stove and it dawned on my I could get a 2nd smaller pot and put it on the wood stove and be cooking everything I want without burning extra propane.

Tomorrow I'll shred the chicken and make chicken pot pie. Also plan on saving some of that chicken fat that looked amazing. It was insanely orange. Most of these birds were hatched this year and I've only recently started giving them some corn.

I hope to harvest a few more roosters next Sunday when I do the big turkey harvest.

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Elissa Teal

Posts: 128

Location: Detroit, Michigan

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Expanding my sprouting repertoire. I've got some new seeds to sprout: millet, amaranth, lentils, flax. Continuing with the mung, adzuki, alfalfa and chia.

New to Detroit. Looking to help out with current permaculture and urban farming projects. Here is my blog from when I was an urban homesteader in Ohio but I am continuing to post about our suburban adventures in Permaculture. http://crunchymamasurbanhomestead.wordpress.com/

Emily Wilson

Posts: 28

Location: Atherley, Ontario

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We just had a delicious goat meat green curry with the goat we butchered earlier this week. I'm looking forward to making some kimchi as soon as we get the rest of our animals processed.

Emily Wilson www.blarnyardgarden.blogspot.com

"The point of life is dinner."
- Adam Gopnik

John Master

Posts: 519

Location: Wisconsin

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finally making kombucha-ketchup, its a bit spicy but a good first attempt.

Seth Peterson

Posts: 95

Location: Berkeley, CA

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I'm out here at wheaton labs cooking for the month, so I will be fitting in some preservation projects as well...

First up, a ginger bug!

I put ginger, water and honey in a mason jar which I left loosely closed for air exchange. This captures the natural wild ginger bug which starts the fermentation. I added honey daily in small doses for four days till the liquid got frothy with fermentation. Sam and I tasted it and decided is was too weak, so added ginger and water and more honey. Tastes it again and thought it was better but could be stronger, so we'll add more ginger when we get some on Sunday.

I also took some of the ginger bug juices and added it to flour and water to make a pool (sourdough starter) to get the fermentation going on that.

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Julia Winter

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Location: Moved from south central WI to Portland, OR

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I love ginger!

Your ginger bug is magic - it sticks to the ceiling!

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John Master

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Location: Wisconsin

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just made my first ginger bug, gonna try to make ginger beer tomorrow.

Julia Winter

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Yum! Tell us how you do it and how it works out.

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Landon Sunrich

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Location: Western Washington

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This is more of a front porch project - but I better get crackin on my wood burning burner v 0.7, It is way most defiantly time to start making nettle beer. Tis a fine spring tonic. Totally full of good stuff. And like 9 % by volume. Sorry, but I've been sworn to secrecy on the recipe.

Freakin' hippies and Squares, since 1986

Ann Torrence

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Location: Torrey, UT; 6,840'/2085m; 7.5" precip; 125 frost-free days

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The beginning of preservation season already!
Tarragon vinegar
Tarragon butter (frozen nubbins)
Tarragon-flash frozen
rhubarb cocktail syrup
lemon curd
lime curd

I made some goat queso blanco but we ate it all

Blogging about homesteading, photography and living in a small Utah town | Growing mostly cider apples at Stray Arrow Ranch

Ann Torrence

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Posts: 1200

Location: Torrey, UT; 6,840'/2085m; 7.5" precip; 125 frost-free days

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28 half pints of rhubarb syrup. I'm going to take it to the farmers market this weekend and GIVE IT AWAY. I figure if people ask for more, I have a product. Otherwise, I've been nice to my neighbors and I only spent $20 on market research.

Blogging about homesteading, photography and living in a small Utah town | Growing mostly cider apples at Stray Arrow Ranch

Ann Torrence

steward

Posts: 1200

Location: Torrey, UT; 6,840'/2085m; 7.5" precip; 125 frost-free days

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Asked DH to get me 2 lemons, 2 limes and 2 oranges in the big city. Instead he brought home 15 lbs of citrus because Costco has nicer fruit and sells it by the bag, LOL. Gotta love a man who can shop.

So today I am starting Erica's preserved lemons and if I can fit another jar in the frig, will do some limes too.

Blogging about homesteading, photography and living in a small Utah town | Growing mostly cider apples at Stray Arrow Ranch

Julia Winter

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Location: Moved from south central WI to Portland, OR

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Not my actual kitchen, but next door at the Columbia Ecovillage I helped get a 10 gallon crock of dill pickles going. It's got 7 gallons of brine and we started out with 21 pounds of cucumbers, then added more daily until it was full.

The crock is in a root cellar of a 100 yr old farm house, sitting on the floor. It's been put up on a couple of boards after another community member fussed at us that concrete ruins crocks. We're going to start another crock today, can't wait to taste the pickles!

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Ann Torrence

steward

Posts: 1200

Location: Torrey, UT; 6,840'/2085m; 7.5" precip; 125 frost-free days

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Cherry liqueur from pie cherries we planted last year. The first useable harvest from our orchards, pretty exciting even if it was only a pound and a half. Most expensive thing I've ever grown.

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Cj Sloane

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Location: Vermont, off grid for 24 years!

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Crispy Sesame beef (keto/low carb friendly recipe here). With our own beef and locally foraged oyster mushrooms.

I've been slowly cutting up an 80 foot black birch that fell on the path to my apiary. DH mentioned he found oysters on that tree last year and lo and behold they were back! Half on the part that fell and half on the remaining stump. They were a little dried out which is surprising considering how much rain we've had. They were maybe better a little dry though. They absorbed lots of butter and were a little crisp.

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