Successful Pickles

I decided I need to get the dill pickles canned but I didn't want to heat up the house with the hot water bath canner. My cousin suggested that I put it out on the grill. It was, I thought, the perfect solution!. So the water went into the pot and out to the grill. I really didn't think it would take that long to reach a boil, but I had not figured in a nice breeze. The water was on the grill for 2 hours and never really got to a boil, even with the burner set on high. But after an hour I decided I would put the jars in anyway, because otherwise they would cool off too much to be processed. So in they went. And hour later, still no boil, but it was VERY hot water. Finally I decided these would be the most expensive pickles in town, having been processed on a gas grill, so I took them out and set them on the counter to cool. Every single jar pinged and they are good to go :) Some are chips and some are slicers. These were made with actual cucumbers, but the zucchini chips will come about soon. The Cousin sent me this recipe, from the Ball Blue Book:

Zucchini Pickles
2 pounds of Zucchini, sliced (8 small) 2 cups sugar
1 sm-med onion sliced 2 t mustard seed
1/4 cup canning salt 1 t celery salt
1 t turmeric 3 cups vinegar

Combine zucchini and onion; sprinkle with with; add cold water to cover. Let stand 2 hours. Drain; rinse and drain thoroughly. Combine remaining ingredients in a large sauce pot. Bring to a boil. Pour vinegar mixture over zucchini and onion. Let stand 2 hours. Bring all ingredients to a boil; reduce heat and summer 5 minutes. Pack hot vegetables and liquid into hot jars, leaving 1/4 inch head space. Remove air bubbles. Adjust 2-piece caps. Process 15 minutes in a boiling water canner.


She made a batch of these and thinks they are wonderful. The zucchini is abundant, cheaper than cucumbers, and I am also going to try it as bread and butter pickles -- some day :).


Yesterday I did a baking day. I made a loaf of Irish Soda Bread, a batch of homemade brownies, a batch of chocolate chip cookies, and blueberry muffins. The Soda Bread was very dense. I don't know if it is supposed to be or not. Still its good as long as you have it with something juicy (soup, stew, gravy). Half the brownies and half the cookies go to the freezer for later, and the others are for lunches. It's hard to cut the food bill if we are always buying snack stuff while we are out and about. And to be fair, if there is nothing planned for lunch, the the Hubby has to forage - either at the grocery store or at a fast food place. Both are direct hits on the reduced grocery budget.

Today I made some homemade soup for the Daughter. diced tomatoes, carrots, peas, mushrooms, onion, barley and a bit of broth. She had it with cheddar garlic biscuits that we really good. Also, spent a bit of time browsing at Hillbilly Housewife today. She has a new budget menu up for $75. I think its supposed to feed 4 or 5. It is a little heavy on the fried food side, but similar to what we grew up with (I remember my mother saving the bacon grease to use to pop popcorn in, or fry cornbread).

Zucchini Recipes

Because the most prolific produce in our garden is the zucchini, I have been collecting recipes for this veggie from all over the net. I want them in one place so I am not constantly looking for that special one I saw but failed to copy. All links will take you to the site where the recipe is located, so you can also check out the other recipes and articles there. I have found a wealth of information at these sites, so they are worth spending a few minutes poking around!


White Zucchini Cake with Broiled Frosting

Chocolate Zucchini Muffins

No Fail Zucchini Bread

Veggie Minestrone (You'll have to scroll down a bit for this one)

Zucchini Brownies

Zucchini Apple Pie


I will update as I find new recipes.

Freezer Count

So far in the freezer:

1 quart of Blackberries
1 quart of Blueberries
4 quarts of Strawberries
4 quarts of Peaches
3 2.5 cup containers of beets
8 2 cup bags of shredded zucchini
3 2.5 containers of Peaches and Cream corn
2 2.5 cup containers of salsa - added August 2, 2010


Dehydrated:
3lbs of carrots
2 lobs of mushrooms (marked down to $1.99) added August 2, 2010

Also:
8 pint jars of Plum jam
7 jars of Dill Pickles

I will update this as things go in, then I will have a list of everything that's been put up so I can put it on the fridge and mark things off!

Regaining Equalibrium

This past week was a very difficult one for our family. The details are not for public consumption, but lets just say menu planning was completely NOT on my radar at all! So, just like every Monday, we begin again. As a reminder (for me and anyone else who happens to be following along), here is the basic plan:

Sunday BBQ/Grill
Monday Salad night
Tuesday Crockpot
Wednesday Church (make something to take for the meal)
Thursday Casserole
Friday Pizza
Saturday Baking Day and Leftovers Day.

Sunday: We had Baked Parmesan and Rice Krispie encrusted Tilapia with baked sweet potatoes, mixed steamed veggies, and sliced home grown tomatoes. Okay, *I* didn't eat the tomatoes, but the Daughter and Hubby did. Since the Daughter is now sticking to her vegetarian adventure I have been working hard to figure out how to feed us. It used to be I could throw a little bit of a lot of things together, call it a casserole, and everyone ate. Now I can't do that because we are eating meat and she doesn't want to. It makes meal planning much more challenging because I have to keep the meat apart from the rest of the meal.

Monday: We can't do salad tonight because this week we have a meeting to attend at dinner time. We will be in transit, so its sandwiches while we are on the move.

Tuesday: Even though today is Monday, I am loading up the Crock Pot with beef roast, potatoes and carrots. It will be ready to eat when Tuesday rolls around and will let Hubby have some of it for his lunch. Daughter will have mac and cheese (leftovers for lunch later in the week)with frozen veggies cooked with the pasta.

Wednesday: Church

Thursday: Casserole - Chicken, rice, mixed veggies, and cream of chicken soup. Served with fresh salad, tomatoes, and Poor Man's Rolls Daughter will have fish nuggets with her salad.

Friday: Pizza night! This will be my first attempt at homemade pizza - no Chef Boy-ar-Dee kit this time. We will see how it goes :) Of course, part of the pizza will be just veggies, but Hubby and I will have turkey pepperoni on ours.

Saturday: Will be bread making day, and I want to try some muffins for breakfasts. This is farmer's market day so there will be veggies to buy and put up. Most notably, corn (which didn't do so well in our garden) and green beans (if I can find blue lakes). I also need to put some apples up because I have a bunch of "simple syrup" to use. (The recipe was supposed to say 2 cups sugar/1 cup water but it was backwards and doubled... so I have all this sugar water left over to use up.)

Thursday Musings

Well, I was in the garden yesterday. Brought home a few cucumbers and a couple of zucchini. There is very little in the world better tasting than a fresh cucumber. Its just one of life's little pleasures.

Today was casserole day. I cut up a chicken breast and cooked it with dehydrated potato slices, a can of cream of mushroom soup and a soup can of water. It made a nice thick gravy to serve over biscuits. A mix of broccoli, cauliflower, and carrots helped round out the meal. Dessert, something we don't do all that much, was low fat brownie bites with SF chocolate pudding and FF cool whip. I am getting better with serving sizes because there should be 4 servings of pudding, and there was one left for Hubby to take for part of his lunch tomorrow.

Tomorrow is pizza day and I have no pizza making stuff. Instead I think we will have oven baked tilapia crusted with rice krispies,

I spent my day deep in laundry. I have nearly found both the floor of my kitchen and the floor of my laundry room again. It just builds up so fast. I have eliminated a few things along the way (unrepairable, irreparably stained, or no long fitting a body at our house), which is also a good thing. I am starting to think in terms of yard sale items as well. There's a lot of junk here that could live somewhere else and not truly be missed.

DOK Installation

I am happy to report that the Installation service went very well today. It was a beautiful and moving thing to stand with my sisters in Christ and add to our numbers. Horton did a good job with a difficult task. Its not easy to stand in front of your friends and tell them personal and intimate things. She managed gracefully, with sincerity and laughter. Sally's music was, as always, beautiful. Ann and I read the Old and New Testament readings, and Cindy did all her priestly things, including the blessing of the new members crosses. I don't know that I have the right words to express how I felt at the altar. There is something so fulfilling about sharing the love of Christ.

Our reception afterward was a hit. We had berry trifle, brownies, french toast, grenadine sandwiches, tomato and cucumber salad, and cordon bleu crustini. I was pleased to see the crustini and the salad were well received. I believe they will be permanent additions to my recipe book.

Baking Day

Last night we had spiral pasta with pizza sauce, turkey pepperoni, mushrooms, and a little diced ham. Sprinkled a little Parmesan on top and it was good. I had 1/2 a box of whole wheat/high fiber pasta, and a box of tri-colored which I mixed up. I put some aside for pasta salad today, and served the Daughter's first without the meat. The high fiber pasta was the trick because for the first time in ages no one asked for seconds, or went foraging in the kitchen later in the evening! It was filling, and okay on the taste front. All in all, I would rather have some pizza.

Today is my first designated Baking Day. I am trying to decide what to do. I would like to put several things in the oven at once and get the best use of the oven heat. I think there will be brownies or oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, pumpkin muffins, and perhaps some bread in the bread machine. I will freeze half of the goodies, so we have them later. I found out that the zucchini bread will definitely go bad if you don't keep it refrigerated! So maybe I will do a batch of that as well and freeze it.

Next week I will plan better. It kind of snuck up on me, this being the first week. I planned to go shopping for table decorations for my in-law's 50th wedding anniversary party but the Daughter woke up sick. I think its a UT infection. So she is guzzling cranberry juice and lemon lime soda, and I am doing laundry and working in the kitchen.

I am also dehydrating today. I have chives to dry and I think I will do some diced carrots too. That will be handy this winter for soup, and I have a bag of carrots just sitting there wishing someone would use them. Because of dental issues no one here can eat raw carrots unless they are grated up, and I am just not up to another grating day quite yet.

I will head to the garden tonight when Hubby gets home to check on the produce. I hope to find enough cucumbers and tomatoes to do the Tomato and Cucumber Salad for church tomorrow. My Cousin is talking about making pickles out of zucchini, which sounds like a plan to me because we have plenty of those!!