As things wind down

The posts including my obsession with canning will end and we will eat fresh until frost and then start digging in to the larder. The Natural Foods store did have pears, and Valencia oranges, so as soon as we got home from hubby’s appointment and the curbside pickup, I pared, cored, and sliced the pears; quartered, seeded, and sliced an orange and cooked the marmalade down to 5 half pints of my favorite jam. It may taste a bit different as these were firm Barletts, not the Asian Pears I usually use, but I will have some on the shelves for winter. As these won’t go anywhere (i.e. to Son 1 or daughter’s homes), I used the reuseable lids. One thing I don’t like about them is you don’t get the satisfying pop to know they are sealed. You have to wait for them to be totally cool, remove the band, and lift them by the lid to see if they successfully sealed. And you don’t want to use the permanent marker used on the metal ones to label the top of the jar. Instead, I will use small pieces of freezer tape to label them.

While we were in town for the appointment and curbside pickup, I was going to get a fermenting book from the library. They have been open inside for a month or 6 weeks with limited number of people at a time and safety precautions so I didn’t bother to check the website. There has been a significant spike in COVID cases on campus and town is in shutting down mode again. The library only has curbside pickup, but I hadn’t pre-arranged to get the book. Fast food restaurants with drive-through service have again closed their dining rooms with service only in the drive up window, which is all we use anyway. Another small business that has a sister business in town has closed and their stock moved to the sister business that is both ice cream shop and gift shop. I suspect we will see more of that and more food places close for good as it gets too cold to eat on their patios and sidewalk tables. The town had closed one street that has several restaurants flanking it and erected canopies with tables to accommodate them and they gave up 5 or 6 parking spaces in the alley near the Farmer’s Market for the same purpose. It will soon be too cold for people to sit out there to eat and the tables with umbrellas on College Ave will be taken in for winter. This is going to hurt these businesses again. The University is fighting to try and stay open until Thanksgiving to close and finish the semester virtually and online exams. Their plan was to reassess the situation if their quarantine room availability dropped below 50%. It is down to 31% and so they are moving students living on campus in one dorm to other dorms, giving them a housing rebate for having to move and freeing up 70 more rooms in an effort to stay open. The problem is the off campus students that go to classes on campus and return into the community and the limits COVID has caused to their dining facilities sending students to local restaurants and fast food locations to get food and the virus is spreading in the town and surrounding communities.

A long time ago, seems like a different lifetime, I worked with a very diverse group of folks, some of whom were excellent cooks, all older than me, many having already raised their families as we were just beginning. Recipes were often shared, even school staff cookbooks made. Several of the recipes became go to recipes for our growing family, a meatloaf recipe, pizza or calzone dough, and a faux lasagna. The meatloaf has evolved slightly, but is still used, now in small amounts or made into several and frozen except for the one cooked. The dough made about once a week. The faux lasagna went into the file after no cook lasagna noodles were introduced, but lasagna makes too much for just the two of us. One of the purchases I make from the Natural Foods store are really good egg noodles, the pasta from the faux lasagna. I had an 8 oz fresh mozzarella from the Farmer’s Market, bought a carton of cottage cheese from the village store, and made a quick pasta sauce from the tomatoes on the kitchen window sill, along with some of our garlic, onions, basil, oregano, thyme, and rosemary and without having the recipe in my file anymore, it was recreated as well as I could from memory. I had Parmesan and there are still a few eggs from the molting hens. It doesn’t come off quite like lasagna, but it is rich, cheesy, with good sauce and an under an hour meatless meal. I quite enjoyed it, hubby ate it, but would have preferred real lasagna. He never complains, but I can tell when he thinks it is a repeatable meal. He has left over goulash and rice for lunch today and I have a serving of the casserole. We will both be happy.

As seniors we always get a flu shot, usually in mid to late October. We are wondering if we should get one now, but then worry that it won’t still be effective through the entire flu season. I guess a call to our primary care physician’s office is in order to get their opinion. We have no reason to go anywhere for the next few days until Farmer’s Market preorder pick up so we will hunker down safely here at home. The annual HVAC service is scheduled this afternoon. I am glad we have a walk out basement so the technician can enter and leave through that door and I can deal with the paperwork on the porch. We don’t want people coming into the house unnecessarily as the virus spreads through our rural community as well.

I am thinking and worrying a lot about my online friends and two young cousins on the west coast in the midst of the wildfires. One I know has had to evacuate and others are hoping they won’t, but dealing with thick smoke and ash. The cooler temperatures and predicted rainfall can’t come soon enough for them.

Stay safe everyone. I see more and more cartoons wishing 2020 adieu. It has not been a good year.

Arrrgh, mowing equipment

After I posted yesterday, I went down and put the new belt on the mower deck being very careful not to get it twisted and to follow the installation diagram. The engine started right up, I pulled out of the garage, engaged the mower, got about halfway around the front yard once and it ate the new belt. Something must be misaligned, a pulley, unlevel deck, something. So I pulled out the gas push mower to finish the front and mow a path to the chicken coop, yard hydrant, and garden. It hasn’t been started since April and it wouldn’t start. I thought I was going to dislocate my shoulder trying to get it running. Finally, I pulled the new line trimmer down, weed whacked the paths to the coop, hydrant, and garden and came in totally frustrated. A call to the local reliable repair shop to see if they worked on that brand of riding mower and they do, so the trailer was hooked up, the mower loaded and since we were headed there anyway, put the push mower on the trailer too and delivered them to be checked out, adjusted, and hopefully repaired without costing us a month’s retirement installment. Until they are returned, I will just keep paths whacked to the cars, the coop, and the garden.

We are due more rain today and tomorrow, but since the weather is cooling off, hopefully the grass won’t grow so much it can’t easily be mowed.

The reuseable lids arrived yesterday. I have placed an order at the Natural foods store and put pears on the list. If they have any, I will make my marmalade. If not, I will check the Farmer’s Market again on Saturday when I go to pick up my pre-ordered goods. I am still hopeful that since pears are a fall fruit that I will find some variety to use. I have moved some dry goods to old salsa jars and empty tins to free up a few more of the half pint size jars and with the ones still in the basement and a handful of quarter pint sized ones, I have enough for a couple batches of jam or marmalade, and enough pints for another batch of diced tomatoes or pasta sauce. I have combined some quarts of brined jalapenos to half gallons, so I can use quarts for tomatoes too. There are still a dozen wide mouth pints on the shelves as well, so there are enough jars and lids to finish the season’s canning. The beans from the other night added 3 more gallon bags loosely filled so they don’t become an unusable block of blanched beans in the freezer. I wish there was a more environmentally friendly way to store the frozen peas, beans, and corn. A sandwich size container is just about the right size for the two of us for a meal, maybe I should buy a stock of that size container that can be put in the dishwasher and reused year after year. I tried glass jars a couple of years ago, but you have to pack the beans or peas in water and risk jar breakage in the freezer.

Signs of summer fading away.

Wish we could share this out west.
Autumn Joy in bloom.
One Stella amidst the the faded Calendula which has generously self seeded there.
Enough Zinnias for a tiny bathroom vase.
Zinnias with ragged leaves and fading blossoms.

The garden is winding down, the flowers are fading, the leaves on the trees are dull and on our walk last night we could see the beginnings of color change and thistles blown.

Blown thistles and cockleburrs against the reflection on the pond.

Soon walks will require layers and starts before, not after dinner as the days shorten, the nights lengthen. And the seasons move on as we continue to distance from family and friends. Stay safe everyone.

A Better Start

My day started earlier than I wanted due to an ailing pup, and not being able to go back to sleep after dealing with him, but it got me up to see the sun rising, the fog lifting, chores and breakfast done in time to peel, chop, cook, and can the basket of tomatoes before hubby was up. The basket minus a couple of slicers that were slightly green on the crown were all used and it made 7 pints of plain diced tomatoes to be used however needed in the coming months. Only 6 pints fit in the canner, so the 7th was put in a wide mouth jar with a storage lid and will go in the refrigerator to be used in some recipe in the next week. If I only need half, the other half will be frozen until it is needed. As I began this post, the lids are popping indicating the seal. Since my lovely SIL sent me the lids, I have canned 4 dozen jars of goodness and I still await the delivery of the reuseable ones I ordered. Tracking shows they should be here on Wednesday, so I have a break of at least a couple mornings before there are enough tomatoes or tomatillos to process. I am almost through my jars as well, though there are wide mouth pints that can be used if needed. There are some half pints being used for storage that can be switched to other containers if needed.

The shelves await the cooling tomatoes. They are deep enough to hold 3 or 4 jars front to back depending on the size of the jars. I will save enough jars for a batch of pear marmalade if I can get the pears, and a small batch of ground cherry jam if they produce before frost. Tomatoes and tomatillos after available jars are exhausted, will be blanched and frozen. Peppers are dried, frozen, and brined in quart or half gallon jars and there are plenty to get through this season. Other than peppers, the remaining tomatoes ripening and the tomatillos, the only other items growing are beans and peas which are used fresh and blanched and frozen. The paltry few carrots that germinated can stay in the garden until needed. Any spinach or lettuce used fresh until frost kills them off. It has been a good garden season. As the weather cools, I will finally make the final box or boxes and will spend the milder winter days doing more maintenance in the garden. It was fairly easy to manage this year but would be easier if I was more consistent with the use of cardboard under the edges and between the boxes and if something other than old hay was in the paths. Maybe now that I have an easy to use line trimmer, I should just let grass grow and keep it mowed short, though wood chip mulch would be better. I may rent a small wood chipper to grind the corn and sunflower stalks to help them break down. If I do, there are plenty of fallen branches that could be chipped for mulch.

Hours later:

The belt has been returned, the new one picked up. The cucumber vines are pulled, planting #2 of beans were picked clean and pulled and #3 provided a generous harvest to blanch and freeze this evening along with enough for tonight’s dinner with our corn and our last cucumber.

Tomatillos will be blanched and frozen, Jalapenos brined, there are a couple more Thai peppers somewhere in the midst of the beans, I guess they will show up when the beans are washed for the pot. A few more tomatoes to finish ripening on the sill, if I leave them on the vines, the birds peck holes in them. Some of the slicers will be eaten, some frozen with the paste tomatoes for winter use.

I didn’t quite finish the mittens last night, I quit before I was done. The top is being closed in, the thumb will be finished, it is less than an hour’s work to be done.

Stay safe, if you are in the middle of the country, find your parkas and hope the snow is light and quickly gone for another month or so. It is getting delightfully cool at night, but still hot during the daytime. We should have 5 or 6 more weeks before first frost.