It felt like another slow year in the garden (neither of us like to garden so we avoid it), but we still managed to tuck away a fair bit of food, thanks to local orchards, farmers, and friends.
My younger son worked part-time at the produce farm and kept us well stocked in lettuce, kale, cabbages, onions, heirloom tomatoes, beets, and new potatoes, and from our own garden, we had plenty of green peppers, jalapeños, basil, rosemary, strawberries, red raspberries, and asparagus for fresh eating.
We are still feasting on beef from the three steers we slaughtered a couple years ago. The bakery/diner keeps us stocked in stale bread and leftover pork products. Our cow supplies all our milk and cheese and yogurt, as well as a good amount of butter and ice cream. We’ve swapped/bartered with friends for free-range chicken and pig bones for broth. All our eggs come from my daughter’s flock of chickens.
The Stats
Rhubarb, frozen: 2 gallon bags
Apple Mint, dried: one-half dehydrator made 3 quarts of tea leaves
Strawberries, frozen: 12 quarts
Sour Cherries: 1 cup frozen; 2 quarts and 3 pints of canned juice (with sugar); 4½ quarts bounce
Wineberries, frozen: 3½ quarts
Blueberries, PYO: I forgot to record these, but maybe 4 gallons or so?
Applesauce, Lodi (4 bushes): 62 quarts, canned
Green Beans: 6 quarts free from a friend, frozen; 14 quarts Roma, frozen; 14 quarts Roma, canned; 15 quarts Tenderette, frozen
Cheeses: at least another 75 hard cheeses, plus ricottas, mozz, bries, etc.
The Notes *It was a struggle to find Lodi apples this year. Our regular orchard is no longer growing them, and many of the places I called only had a small amount…maybe. After searching fairly far afield, I finally found some at another (local!) orchard and happily snapped them up: $18/bushel. (I filmed the whole process but then I transitioned the YouTube channel to focus on cheese and never posted it.)
*Five pints of my oven dills didn’t seal, so I just popped them in the barn fridge and used them up first. Good news: certain family members are learning to like dills! We’re eating through them faster than I expected.
*After years of failed spring plantings of green beans, we finally waited to plant till mid summer — and it worked — a one-time-only planting with good germination. From now on, summer plantings are the way to go.
*We were totally out of sweet pickles so I made a quadruple recipe. I thought it’d be plenty, but the way we’re tearing through them, I’m not so sure. (I planted 18 cucumber plants so I could harvest a whole bunch of cucumbers at one time — I don’t like puny pickings — and next year I might have to do 24.)
*Since we still had some pesto from the previous year, I only made a quadruple batch of pumpkin seed pesto.
*We enjoyed the previous year’s family corn processing day so much that we did it again. We ordered 40 dozen ears from a local farmer for 200 dollars. After about 6 hours of work, we were totally done. Efficiency is a glorious thing! (And the corn is delicious.)
*Both nectarines and peaches were $40/bushel. We love dried nectarines — I have to bury the bag in the freezer so they don’t get gobbled — so I dehydrated more than normal. I discovered that slicing them in thickish rounds, not wedges, is easier and more toothsome.
*I finally learned how to pressure can! My maiden voyage was green beans, and it was soooo easy. Now I’m getting into bone broth. I’ve always bought cases of boxed broth from Costco, but the homemade stuff is much richer and more flavorful, and the accessibility of canned broth can’t be beat. I love adding it willy-nilly to everything: rice, beans, soups, etc.
*If I had to choose one fruit plant/tree, it’d be red raspberry. From July through September, the bushes give and give and give. I pick 1-2 quarts every other day and after a month of pickings, I’m pretty well stocked. (That’s when I call my sister-in-law and tell her it’s her turn to take over.)
*I’m two-thirds of the way through my dried mint and it’s still November. Next year, make more. (This lovely stainless steel French press is the reason I’m crushing so much tea.)
*We bought several bushels of baking and eating apples from our local orchard (the Pink Lady variety is outrageously delicious for fresh eating), as well as about 12 gallons of cider to freeze.
For the satisfaction of hard work completed, and for all the good food, I’m grateful.
To me, it always seemed counterintuitive since the whole reason for washing hair was to get rid of the grease, but a long time ago at a girlfriend’s behest I bought some oil, and then, for whatever reason, I kinda forgot about it.
dry and poofy
However, the other week, probably about three days after I’d last washed it, my hair was feeling super dry and wiry, so I squirted some Moroccan oil on my hands and ran my fingers through my hair, paying special attention to the ends and using my palms to press down the more frizzy out layer of hair.
The transformation — felt, more than seen — was astonishing.
oiled
My hair went from brittle and crispy-frizzy to shiny, soft, and curly. I could practically hear the hair sucking up the moisture and sighing with contentment.
I don’t need to do this all the time — maybe once every couple weeks — but it’s a real treat when I do.
Makes me feel fancy.
***
This summer I finally figured out how to use the pressure canner that I’ve had for about 15 years. I canned green beans and nothing exploded (though it turns out my kids prefer frozen green beans to canned; the canned ones do have a different flavor), so now I’m getting into bone broth. I’d always bought cases of boxed broth from Costco, but the homemade stuff is much richer and more flavorful.
And then on a walk the other day when I mentioned my blossoming love affair with pressure canned bone broth to a girlfriend, she said, “You know the trick with onions, right?” I didn’t, so she enlightened me: add some onion skins along with the other veggies and it’ll turn the broth a gorgeous rich bronzy-brown.
And what do you know, she was right.
without onion skin, with onion skin
with onion skin, and without
It doesn’t take much — just a single layer of onion paper from a couple onions is enough to make the magic happen.
And then some friends butchered a hog and gave us a five-gallon bucket heaped with bones.
See the “for lease” sign on the warehouse on the left? That’s the place. (photo from 2020)
A few days ago I saw on Facebook that the bookstore owner (her name is Amanda) has a kickstarter campaign to raise the money to buy the stock. I pledged 10 bucks — a bookstore next door to where I work? cool! — and went on with my life.
But then this week, Sofia, a local writer I-kinda-but-don’t-really-know but I’ll call her my girlfriend for the sake of this post’s title, popped into the bakery and we started talking about the bookstore. The deadline is next week, she said, and if they don’t meet their goal, then they don’t get any of the money. Get your friends to pledge!
As of today they’ve got 6 days left and they’re only halfway to their goal of fifty thousand dollars, YIKES.
Door to Parentheses is on the left; big door in the middle will be the entrance to the shops. photo credit: Kirsten Moore
So listen up, people. If you’re local and like to read (we all like to read, right?), consider chipping in five bucks — or fifty!
And if you’re not local but wish you were, or simply want to support female-owned, independent bookstores, then do. Who knows, maybe some day you’ll find yourself in the Shenandoah Valley, and you’ll decide to drop by the bakery for a croissant and then mosey across the road to the browse the stacks in a sunny bookstore next to the train tracks, and it will be as lovely as it sounds.
