Saturday, August 28, 2010

Small Batch Canning

Growing cucumbers is like growing zucchini; you end up harvesting enough to feed an army. At least with cucumbers there's an obvious solution---make pickles!

No one in our family is too excited about pickles, but we do like a few Bread and Butter pickles now and then. Just for fun, I thought I'd try a new recipe this year and found this one online. I liked the addition of diced green pepper--although I wish I'd have gone red instead--and whole cloves.

The recipe starts with "25 cucumbers." I don't think so. Why not make half as much? Wouldn't it work just as well?

It did. I ended up canning five pint jars for later and had nearly a quart jar's worth to refrigerate for now. The flavors haven't all reached their peak yet, but the small sample I had last night was good. The only additions that I would make to this particular recipe, outside adding the color of the red pepper, would be to use pickling salt for the brining process, and to rinse the cucumber mix in cold water after the briny liquid has been drained off. A few red pepper flakes might be good as well.

I followed the advice in Joy of Cooking for processing the smaller jars by using a boiling water bath--bring water to boil prior to putting the jars in the bath--and processing them for 15 minutes.

Now there's all that basil...

Friday, August 27, 2010

It's Over

It's official. Once you've been to the Minnesota State Fair, summer is over. Once you go through the ritual of spending almost an entire week's worth of calories and fat intake in one afternoon, fall arrives. Welcome fall.

This is not an entirely bad thing. I am actually quite eager to get back to a "normal" life after the chaotic schedule we've had this summer. We've got one last hurrah to go and then we're back to being empty nesters once again.

The garden sure looks like fall is on its way. Several hail storms have ruined all chances of having my garden photographed for Martha Stewart's magazine. (Like that's all that would keep me out.) While the foliage is hurting, the late bloomers are picking up the slack.

Now I'm glad that I didn't have the heart to pull up the few Morning Glory volunteers that managed to come up in the rock bed around the house. Seriously, never plant these things unless you want to live with them sprouting in your garden for the rest of your natural life.

The mums, too are starting to open up. I'm partial to this one since it was one of the first things I ever planted in my garden after we built our house. At that time, those few mums were bigger that some of the shrubs we had just put in. We've come a long way in eighteen years.

Unfortunately, my knitting hasn't fared (no pun intended) as well. Sporadic progress on the all-over cabled pullover I've been working on came to a screeching halt when I finished the back of the sweater and finally admitted to myself that I wasn't loving the results. Even though the yarn I'm using is one of the yarns suggested in the pattern, I think it's too heavy for the project. It's billed as a worsted yarn, but seems to be closer to an Aran weight, and the knit fabric is just too dense to allow for a nice drape. It seemed pointless to continue.

However, thanks to Ravelry's new and improved search engine, within a short amount of time I had a few ideas for how I could use this yarn with some of the patterns I already had on hand. So far, I'm still in the swatch stage and haven't had the heart to do the big rip-out, but I should be on my way to re-using this yarn soon.

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Back on the Interwebs

That's right. I'm back on the WWW now that I've finally had the time to get out and replace my dearly departed laptop. Lucky for me the geeks were able to recover the information from my old hard drive, but it's still a huge pain in the neck to get a new computer going. And it's not exactly like I've been swimming in free time.

I really shouldn't complain since one of the things that has kept me busy was a wonderful trip. Now that I'm back home it's hard to believe, but in less than two weeks we managed to fly into Munich and tour parts of Germany, Austria, Italy, and Switzerland.

And what a beautiful part of the world! The architecture, the countryside, the food and drink, and all the people who are lucky enough to call those places home made for one of the best vacations I've ever had. I did miss the guys while I was away, but I felt very lucky to have the opportunity to go.

Besides coming home with lots of good memories, I also came home with plenty of inspiration.

Each of these countries is a gardener's paradise. Everywhere you look there are perfectly tended flower beds, window boxes, and vegetable gardens. I jotted down some plant and color combinations that I can use in my own yard--even if I don't have a castle or a chalet to call home.

And the food! I may have to make pretzels again, and I'm positive I'm going to be looking for some of the German and Austrian wines that we had with our meals. Maybe the best treat of all was the Cottage Cheese Fried Donuts that we scarfed down on one of our tours. I don't deep fry anything, but I may have to make an exception if I can find that recipe.

I even found some inspiration for my knitting. There were some bold color combinations in the shop windows of Salzburg, and I liked the garter stitch vests and cardigans.

So now it's back to reality. No more castles, no more horse drawn carriages, no more mountains, and not as much afternoon beer drinking. Not as much.

And even though I've struggled with jet lag and had lots to do to catch back up to speed, it is very good to be home.