Salsa

I picked another half bucket of green tomatoes.  It's salsa time.  Then I added these blemished orange tomatoes.  Even if they ripen, they're never going to be as good eats as unblemished tomatoes.

After lots of chopping, I ended up with 17 pints of salsa.

Not quite as good as last year, but not bad.  The boy who likes to burn his face off, (#1), tells me there's no heat in this batch.  I'm thinking good, it might not burn my face off this year.  Except you know those jalapenos are going to spread their spice through those jars as they sit and wait, lol.

Meanwhile, #2 is grabbing tomatoes to go off the plant stand in the sunroom.  Who needs apples when you can munch on a tomato?

First Freeze

One last look inside the greenhouse.  It's been a good year.  Our first freeze was forecast for Thursday night, so Wednesday was a big day picking through the garden.

The last of the green tomatoes, more dry beans, a few cukes, my seed cuke, a handful of peppers, the last dill weed, all of the cabbages, a few more peas for seed, a lone broccoli head, and a few cobs of corn.  There are still beans out there, that I never got to, and might not, though I'd like to get them in for seed.  I picked another bucket of beets, though they'll be fine underground as well.  Carrots still need pulling as well, before I can set the turkeys loose in the garden.

Beet pickles, and one final jar of dills.

I'm canning the smaller heads of cabbage for lazy cabbage rolls this winter.  The larger heads will go in the freezer whole.  More salsa to be made, and horseradish to harvest.  Still plenty to do, even after the freeze.

Balogna Rolls and Bathroom Business

My grandmother used to make this recipe.  She may have invented it.  Her mother may have made it before her.  I don't really know.  Very filling, yummy, and easy.  And, it used to be cheap, lol.  Not so much these days.  But it is a family favourite.

Balogna Rolls

Lay out slices of balogna on a clean counter.  Break cheese slices into thirds and place one third in the center of each balogna.  Cover with yellow beans.  Fold ends of balogna over and stab through with toothpick to hold shape.

Combine equal parts cream of celery soup and milk in a glass baking pan.  Place balogna rolls into sauce.

Cover and bake 1 hour @ 350°F.  Uncover, continue baking until edges start to crisp (about half hour).  Serve with sauce over mashed potatoes.  Delish!

I tried out my cream of celery soup.  It's a keeper.  The consistency is a little runny, so I may add a bit of corn starch or flour to the next batch before baking, but it tastes great!

Still canning, and now painting, flooring, cursing lots.

We lost some of the bathroom floor tiles a while back, in front of the bath tub, and I tried patching them back together.  It didn't hold.  The press board underneath was falling apart.  While the floor does get a little wet when the kids bathe, it really didn't seem like enough to be causing so much damage. The folks at home hardware explained to hubby that the toilet is supposed to be raised with some thing-a-ma-jig when you put in a new floor, otherwise the condensation will go under the tiles.  We figured that's what was happening, because the toilet did not appear to be raised.

We decided to pull the tiles out, replace the damaged board and put in linoleum.   Oh, what a mess.  The tiles were put in before the sink cabinet, so Husband had to disconnect the pipes and pull the cabinet out.  Then as they worked toward the toilet, pulling tiles, Husband and the Bigs discovered black mold.  They pulled the toilet out.  Home hardware was right, the toilet had not been raised.  And the gasket was disintegrated.  And the tap at the back was dripping.  And we never noticed because all of that water was pooling in the press board, under the tiles.

The black mold seems to have just been on the press board, which they removed.  The real floor appears to be solid, although wet.  Some of the original linoleum tiles are still in place.

We're going to give it a few days to dry out completely and watch for more mold, before attempting to put in a new floor and reinstall the toilet.  I have no toilet!!  One bathroom in this house.  I'm going to borrow my parents chemical toilet for the time being.

But at least I can shower. (Hot water heater was out last week).

You know, after I remove the cabinet and all of the bathroom stuff from the tub.

High of 14°C, low of 0°C forecast for this week.

Rose Hips

We have a bumper crop of rosehips this year, with most plants baring dozens or more.  Usually we only get 3-5 rosehips per bush.  It makes for much easier picking.

Rosehips, rinsed and ready to boil.

Straining the juice.

I've got over 4 pints of syrop already! 

We really found the syrop was great to fight off colds last winter (loaded with vitamin C).  So there you have it- feed a cold PANCAKES!

Crab Apples

The Ontario government building in the city has about 12 of these beautiful crabapple trees planted around it.  I spotted them last year, but wasn't quite sure what to do with crabapples at the time.  I did some research, and then didn't have any other business in the city that would accommodate crabapple picking. 

I had nearly forgotten about them, until I needed to go to the government building one day.  I asked for permission to pick them, and once granted, we filled two and a half grocery bags.  I figure that's about two bushels.  We barely made a dent in the 'crop', and never used a ladder.  These were all picked off the lower branches.

Back at home, I started rinsing and trimming off the blossom ends and stems.  I found some interesting websites to help with the process.

Crabapple Schnapps

  Enjoy Crabapples All Year Long

•  Extracting Juice

•  Pectin Test for Jelly Making

•  Crabapple Juice Drink

•  Crabapple Syrup

•  Crabapple Jelly

•  Crabapple Sauce

•  Canned Whole Crabapples

   Crabapple (crab apple) recipes

   Spiced Crab Apples

    So far I've made juice, which is a bit too 'thick' for our liking.  Watering it down seemed to make it more bitter, so unfortunately I don't think I'll be canning any to drink.  I think it might make a nice blend with oranges, so if I can get a deal before I run out of crabapples, I might try that.

   I made and canned pectin, following Canning Granny's example, which took no effort whatsoever.  The juice passed the pectin test on the first attempt.

  
  I made crabapple sauce, although the boys preferred the second batch, with a bit more sugar, and some cinnamon.

  
  Today I'll be doing crabapple jelly, which is what I had planned to do initially, but got distracted by all of the possibilities.

  
  The skins, cores and seeds are going out to the turkeys, so hopefully they'll plant a few crabapple trees in their pen.  It would be so nice to have another source of free food so close to home!  I'll save a few seeds to plant on purpose next spring, too.  I might even be tempted to buy a crabapple tree.

   And there's still at least another bushel of crabapples left to go.  Not bad for urban foraging.

Breakfast of Champions

One nice thing about this time of year- it makes supplementing the turkeys diet very easy.

Three nice buckets of bean plants, a nice bucket full of weeds, radishes, and grass,

a few beats, some horse radish, and a couple of short corn stalks.  It's almost fun to rip plants up in the garden, knowing that they're continuing to feed us, even though the garden is done. 

And the goats like it too, although I wish they'd eat more raspberries.  The bushes in the turkey pen are threatening to take over every available space.

Lots of cool, rainy days right now.  High of 15°C, low of 1°C forecast for the week. 

Still canning beets, pulling beans, digging carrots.  I haven't started canning salsa yet.  Wouldn't you know it, most of those tomatoes I picked before the first frost are turning red in the sunroom.  The plants are still thriving outside, with the small tomatoes I left getting bigger and starting to turn as well.  It almost makes me think I should pick a few green ones earlier in the season and relieve the plants a bit early.

#1, #2, and #3 are all in school.  #4 is still home with me, and catching up quick now.  He was behind on almost everything, basically a late start because we didn't know his eyesight was so bad when he was little.  With just the two of us, mom's individual attention, and no distractions (except Casper, who is back to his old tricks, jumping the fence), he is cruising through his work books.  I'm pretty sure he'll be caught up to his age mates by the end of the year.

Frost Damage

Monday morning, after the frost, but before the sun.  Everything looks pretty much normal still.

A few hours later, once the sun has had a chance to warm things up.  It was a mild frost, only damaging the tops of delicate plants.  I could let these beans live on, until a harder frost kills them off, but I've had plenty of production this year.

One final picking, as I pull the plants up.  It's nice not having to bend over to pick the beans.  The plants are going to the turkey pen for fodder, the beans I sort and pull seeds from the largest ones, and freeze or eat the rest.

The hugelkultur beans are showing about the same rate of damages.  The height did not help them this time.

The squash outside are frazzled.

Inside the greenhouses, everything still looks good, strong and healthy.

Before and After- Perennial Bed Tomatoes

I picked off all the orange and larger tomatoes before the frost, but the plants still look pretty good. 

Even the salsa peppers made it through ok.  I do believe I have a microclimate here.

New room mates in the turkey pen.  No one is impressed.  In our efforts to keep Nanner and Sheila from getting knocked up this fall, we've moved them over here.  They don't like it.  They do like beans though, so it's a trade off.

And these two will be sad when the garden is done.  They've both inherited their grandpa's love of veggies.  Don't leave the veggie bucket on the floor.  They steal carrots!  lol.