Barbara Simoes

If you know anyone with a freeze-dryer or you have one yourself, that's a way to take care of dozens of eggs.  I have a freeze dryer because of all the fruits and vegetables I have growing, but one of the first things I did was to do seven dozen eggs or so in one batch.  It's like having powdered eggs on hand and you just rehydrate at a 1:1 ratio. I would put them in various sized mason jars and seal with a portable hand sealer.

I use George Stella's keto recipe for mock potato salad that is actually made with I think 7-8 eggs and cauliflower instead of potatoes.  If you're still interested, I can type it up in another post.

A dish from my childhood was stuffed tomatoes that uses hard boiled eggs, fresh bread crumbs, minced onion and some other ingredients I'm not remembering at the moment.  Ditto from above! I don't have my mom's original recipe, but I found a recipe that was a good second in one of my cookbooks.

Egg salad is another great thing to have on hand for a quick sandwich.

Tereza, what a wonderful site; I remember hearing about it, but this gave me  a chance to check it out...no pun intended!  I slid it onto my desktop to peruse later.  Thank you for sharing.  The cookbook looks wonderful.  I have a wonderful Grapenuts recipe that I used to make that is spot on for taste, although the "nuts" are a little softer than the cereal you buy.  I suppose you could just bake it a little longer, but I like it the way it is.
https://www.seriouseats.com/diy-grape-nuts-cereal-recipe

I think the recipe for "Spanish Rice" came out much later than the Depression, but it was a favorite of mine growing up: Saute till brown, a lb. of hamburger, cook a cup of rice which will swell to two cups, toss it all together with a large can (28 oz. of tomatoes)  Sprinkle some parmesan cheese on top and bake for about an hour at 350 degrees. --So easy!  I know you'll be tempted to add more "stuff" to it, and I've tried myself.  It is much better with just these three or four ingredients!  One ingredient that does work is, believe it or not, pineapple, if you're looking to mix it up a bit.

Another easy recipe involves cooking a pack of wide egg noodles, draining them and then frying them until crisp on the bottom.  Just add a can of tomatoes.  OMG, this was a favorite.  Deceptively simple for what it tastes like.  I crave this all the time, but I am trying to keep simple carbs out of my diet.

Carbonara is another amazing dish.  Like above, you stir in a few eggs to drained hot pasta (Mom used spaghetti).  Saute onion, bacon and add a little white wine.  Toss it about along with the egg into the pasta and add in parm cheese--1/2 cup or so--I don't remember how much, maybe 3/4 cup.  I'm not a huge bacon fan and this doesn't take much...you can use a pound, but 1/2 that works.

Parsley Potatoes is another where the sum is greater than the parts: Chopped parsley, boiled potatoes cut in bite-sized pieces, salt and butter.  Of course, there is a fair amount of butter and salt!  I use almost an equivalent amount of parsley to the amount of potatoes (before it's pulled from bigger stems and chopped roughly.)

I grow basil like a regular vegetable and harvest leaves regularly through the season and make batches of pesto that I toss in the freezer in cup amounts to use throughout the winter.  I don't add cheese and I use walnuts.  I found that I really like it almost better when mixed in with rice than pasta, although I think any hardy grain would be good.  I find it mixes better if I toss it in as the rice is cooking rather than after.  I also will toss in a jar of tomatoes, measuring out the liquid as part of the needed rice water.

I also love Connie's zucchini "crab" cakes: a recipe that I found on Allrecipes. (https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/13938/connies-zucchini-crab-cakes/)  No crab is used, but it does use Old Bay seasoning.  If you grow your own zucchini and are looking for ways to use it, I highly recommend this recipe. Because salt will leach out water from the zucchini, don't salt until the patties are frying.  Also, you don't need so much oil or flour to coat the patties.

Well, that's just off the top of my head...I will add more if I think of any.  All of these are real winners!  Enjoy.

I will often go to the Allrecipes website, where I can enter single or multiple ingredients, and it will cull through thousands of recipes and pull up those that are relevant.  

Food pantries are always most grateful for fresh produce; I give away to friends, neighbors and the local food pantry if there is more than I can use.  For example, I have forty blueberry bushes that produce A LOT of fruit.  I invite friends over to pick and it provides a very casual way to catch up with friends...and, it saves me a ton of time and labor.  

I am lucky enough to have a wonderful pool, so that is part of the bribe to get people here!  Still, there will always be more than I can use, so I bring some to the food pantry, I freeze-dry, can and dehydrate and I make wine! I grow 50+ kinds of fruit along with a good sized vegetable garden.  Again, all is often shared with friends when they come over.

I have one friend who also grows a lot.  Last year, we traded; I gave her blueberries and she gave me cherries.  Yum!

Years ago, at our local co op, they sold something that was called maple sugar.  it looked like brown sugar but was maple flavored.  it was very tasty!  I guess, I would try dehydrating or freeze-drying it.  From there, I would powder it in a food processor and store it as another form of sugar.

I used to work a bit with stained glass and now mainly work with enamels.  My old tabletop kiln died after ten years of hard work, and so, I needed to get a new one.  This one is much easier to program to do different mediums: enamel, glass fusing, metal clay, etc.  Because of that, I've been thinking about getting back into working with glass and doing some fusing.  There are many videos on line about how to recycle glass into molds or shapes or slumped into other shapes.  The interior of my kiln is only 8.5"x12" which limits what I can do, but I've been watching videos about making snowflakes and other window ornaments and small vases.  With the price of "new" glass, this is very intriguing to me; I could then sell them and perhaps save up enough to get a bigger kiln for just this purpose.  I have a glass smasher or frit maker in my cart as I type this!

https://www.amazon.com/Crusher-Prospecting-Breaker-Panning-Pulverizer/dp/B08BHHGV4Y/ref=pd_ci_mcx_mh_mcx_views_0_image?pd_rd_w=pweb2&content-id=amzn1.sym.679481c3-2bf4-4843-80c0-ffb319282e84%3Aamzn1.symc.c3d5766d-b606-46b8-ab07-1d9d1da0638a&pf_rd_p=679481c3-2bf4-4843-80c0-ffb319282e84&pf_rd_r=JRHC2XZZ8JAGQAJ9496E&pd_rd_wg=PgyHL&pd_rd_r=c575846b-26c0-4fef-b3fe-358e88d16ada&pd_rd_i=B08BHHGV4Y

On Pinterest, I saw a recipe that includes 1 tsp. of dish soap, 1 tablespoon of rubbing alcohol and 1/2 gallon of warm water.  Does it work? I don't know, but I thought I'd put it out there and see if anyone has tried it.  I'm thinking some sort of sprinkler watering can would be the simplest way to apply if it does work....
In an apartment where I used to live, the shower drain used to freeze, so I would put a splash of rubbing alcohol and before long, the water would drain out.  I also used to have a car that had receding door handles--great for aerodynamics but terrible in an ice storm.  Again, I had to spray rubbing alcohol in order to have the handles release.  It always worked and never caused damage.

Any place that sells sewing machines often will also offer sewing classes.  Our local quilt shop is very active and offers tons of classes at all levels.  It's a great way for them to sell machines, material and notions!  

Carmen Sanchez wrote:I want to learn how to sew and upcycle clothes can anyone give a place to learn online?

Jen, I, too, have just an acre, and like you, live here alone, do everything, and I keep adding gardens!  I just discovered a great cardboard supply at a local coffee roaster place.  Their cardboard has no printing or tape and they have it in large flat sheets--some I have to fold to fit into the back of my car.  This fall, I picked up a few carloads to cover some grass out back and then put the leaves I'd swept up from the lawn on top of the it.  Woodchips would also be a great cover, but at that point, I'd already used this year's load of chips.  

The area is a really tight circle--10x10?, and difficult to get in to mow.  Behind it, I have some evergreens, and behind them, I have a place where I can dump debris throughout the year.  The evergreens, being wide at the bottom, hide the raggedy mess of sticks and vine clippings!  I have 40 blueberry bushes alone, and with annual pruning, that can really add up. The mulberries also add a lot to the pile, as do all of the other fruit tree and bush prunings.  I really like having an undisturbed dump spot for wildlife to feel safe in.  Branches don't break down quickly, so sometimes the piles can get pretty high.  

I had thought of planting something in that circle area, but having access to the dump site is more crucial, and now that I have a dependable source of great cardboard, easy enough to keep up.  When I'm in town, I'll swing by and get what I need...all told, the pick up, laying down of cardboard, etc., takes less than a hour a year.  That's a good return on my time to keep that area looking tidy and it helps to help build beautiful soil.  If you have any big box stores or appliance stores, I bet they'd be thrilled to not have to pay to get rid of cardboard, and it wouldn't be covered in tape and labels like Amazon packages are.  Also, it's probably already broken down and cut to size for recycling.  I don't make special trips to get the cardboard, but when I'm driving to town for something else, I'll swing by and pick up a load as needed.  

Right now, my garage has probably 100 large burlap coffee bags waiting for spring.  I had had a huge delivery of wood chips and so I used many of them in the pathways of my vegetable garden, but I found that I couldn't walk barefoot in there because the chips are pretty rough.  I'm thinking that I will cover them with the burlap, and then maybe some hulls on top of those. I will pick up as many large bags of the hulls as I can to store until spring as well--another great thing to layer onto the cardboard or through garden paths or around plants, too.  In season, the hulls are hard to come by, but I'm hoping that through the winter, they'll have more--chicken people use them for deep litter, but at least the gardeners aren't also grabbing them!

Jen, I don't think cotton sheets will work because light will easily penetrate.  The fabric is so thin that I think you'll be disappointed. Cardboard will keep light out and probably will last longer.  I don't know the size of your garden, but with that in the foot paths or wherever you're not growing something along with perhaps trenching along the edges might help.  I know with some weeds, I was seriously tempted to get one of those fire torches!