In the Crib, Out of the Rain

I'm not sure this photo can accurately portray the sense of calm and organization I get when I enter the corn crib now.  I've finally sifted through the layers of stuff stashed away in here, moved all the old carpet rolls and stacks of lumber I've been hoarding, and raked up a giant pile of mouse generated debris.  Whew!  It feels good to know what's in here, and to make sure all my junk precious possessions are accessible.  

We are fortunate that this property came with enough outbuildings that Brandon and I could each claim one for our ourselves, and still have enough shared space that we don't feel put out by each others objects.  We don't always agree about what's important to hang on to, so having a space of my own to fill as I like is liberating.  Yes, Brandon, I do need an electric towel warmer, a busted bird feeder, a stack of cat litter pails, a broken patio heater, and a fireplace mantel!  Duh.  As an artist, he's an object lover too, but now that I have my very own building, my treasures don't overlap with his junk treasures.  If good fences make good neighbors, then separate junk piles treasure troves must make for happy marriages.  

My crib isn't rain proof during a big storm, since there are gaps in the walls, but it is a nice place to escape a normal rain.  When I'm there, the door is open and my chicken friends can wander in out of the rain too.   

Please, just make yourself at home.  

Cogburn, I think you look more awesome by the day!

The turkey and the guineas don't seem to the mind the rain.  

The chickens seek shelter in the coop, in the barn with the tractor, or under the trailer full of metal scraps we've been collecting as we clean up around the farm.  

I like to refer to this collection of metal as the tetanus pile.  We've tried to cordon off the tetanus pile by placing it between the tractor barn and the big trailer, and leaned some pieces of fencing that a friend gave in front of it, just to make sure any visiting kids can't easily climb on it.  A big pile of rusty metal with chickens perched on it is classic hillbilly, right? 

To celebrate the crib clean up, I opened a bottle of persimmon wine that was bottled in 2011.  I can't believe my wine is that old!  Where does the time go?  I remember collecting the persimmons from Brandon's uncles tree, and it doesn't seem like that was five whole years ago.  The wine tastes as good as it ever did - which isn't exactly a compliment.  Cheers, turkey!

Shameless Pictures From My Kitchen

Brandon and I were attending an extended family meal recently, when someone was so excited by the home made biscuits and gravy that they pulled out their phone to take a photo.  As she was doing this, she told us how she hates it when people post photos of their dinners on Facebook, so she was surprised to find herself photographing her food.  There was a chorus of agreement from the other Facebook members at the table, and the conversation proceeded around how annoying it was when someone posts pictures of their dinner.  I don't have Facebook, but I still felt very sheepish when I admitted I frequently think my food is beautiful and take it's picture, and I even share these photos on my blog, or force my friends to see them on my phone, or in texts. I asked if the photos of food people share that was annoying to them was beautiful food, and no one seemed to think so.  

This makes me realize the inadequacy of amateur photography to truly convey the sense of accomplishment that comes from procuring a delicious dinner.  You can see my pork chop in the photo above, but what you might not notice is that I prepared this pork chop, which came from a pig I met as it was being carefully raised by a good friend, without messing it up!  I was so excited by the success of this pork chop that I just had to take it's picture.  And, despite my new self consciousness about annoying folks with photos of my dinner, I am sharing my food pictures with you.  I wish I could give you a bite - that's how good this pork chop was! 

When I scroll through my photo gallery on my phone, I notice that a very large percentage of my photos are of food and food preparation.  Especially if it's something I've never made before, or something I'm psyched about.  Like toasting nuts.  Toasted nuts are so pretty - and what a wonderful smell!  

Unfortunately, the toasted nuts don't look as pretty once they've been through the food processor and mixed with almond butter, coconut oil, chopped dates, whey powder, honey, and eggs.  

But once they were baked with toasty coconut sprinkles and cut into bars, they regained some of their composure.  I've never made my own power bars before, but I was inspired to try making some when I started reading the ingredients on the packages while I tried to find a convenient snack for Brandon to take in his gym bag. If soy is bad, and sugar is bad, and coconut oil and eggs are good, then this recipe for home made protein bar should be good right?   It tastes really good, and it's still convenient for him since I was the one who did all the work.   

Have you ever cooked one of these crazy looking vegetables before?  I took way too many photos of this romanesco cauliflower, because I couldn't get over how strange it looked.  

It's like an alien vegetable!  It caused quite a stir while it resided in my refrigerator.  

I diced it up, tossed it in some coconut oil and salt, and baked it in the oven.  It's really good, like broccoli.  

And of course, while toasting nuts to make healthy protein bars and roasting alien vegetables, it's important to admire the home made blackberry wine, right?  

I didn't realize that I had any of the 2013 blackberry wine left until I was scrounging in my "wine rack" (a precarious stack of wine bottle boxes in the corner of my bedroom), and got so excited when I discovered it, that I knocked an empty wine bottle off the shelf above me and got a good thump on the head.  I now have much more appreciation for bar brawlers who get whacked on the head by bottles in movies.  That really hurts!

Jars of Sunlight

Citrus season has inspired more triple citrus marmalade, which I found to be very photogenic food.  I think the recent months of winter gray in the garden made the bright colors of the citrus really appealing.  I like the bitter orange peel taste, so this is one I've made for several years.  Of course, I just enjoy taking natural and healthful foods, like fruit, that are on sale and turning them into processed sugar coated treats, like jam.  

This marmalade has oranges, tangerines, and lemons -  peels and all.  Brandon still thinks I tried to feed him poison when I gave him some last, but he likes his jam sweet and is "sensitive" to the bitter taste (he's a flavor wimp, really).  That's okay - more for me!

It takes quite a while to cut up all the fruit, but mom and I took our time and experimented with mixing different types of home made wine while we worked.  We found out that if you mix a the Storm Grape wine (2011, from mom's yard) and the Brandon's Uncle Junior's Persimmon wine (2010, from Brandon's uncles Junior's yard, of course), with a little Merlot from a box (2012, probably from Liquor Barn), it was an improvement over any of them on their own. At least that's what we thought after a few glasses. 

The fruit, peels, and bag of seeds were cooked, then allowed to sit over night before I added the star anise and sugar, and cooked some more, and more, until I eventually got tired of simmering it and waiting for it to thicken.  I poured it in jars and used a hot water bath to seal them.  Hopefully it won't be too liquid, but if it will pour its easier to use in fruit cakes and keffir, so I don't mind. 

We debated about putting the star anise in the jars with the marmalade since mom thinks they kind of look like giant brown spiders in the jar and can be quite shocking when you see them at a glance.  I never really noticed that they look like giant spiders until I was at mom's house, deep in a forest teaming with invertebrates, working on the marmalade.  Giant spiders are a very real possibility in that setting so your mind sees them even when they aren't there!  Outside of the wilderness I think it looks kind of fancy.    

We had a little extra marmalade and decided to try a vodka infusion, since everything is better soaked in alcohol, right?  After sampling, we think it might be great in margaritas.  We should probably try it when we haven't been mixing wines, though.  It could be terrible under different  circumstances. 

I really liked the way it looked in the bottle when held against the light.  Like we bottled a little bit of bright orange sunlight.  



Blackberry Wine

Jamie and I filtered and bottled the blackberry wine Wednesday night.  It's mostly blackberry from my yard and my friends blackberry patch, but there's a few pounds of strawberries in the mix and I think the wine tastes more like strawberries than blackberry.  We'll let it spend several months in the bottles and see how it turns out.

 

 

This is our filtering set up.  The wine is siphoned from the glass carboy on the table to the bottle with the hand pump (like a garden sprayer) in the chair, then is pushed through the paper filter inserts in the plastic housing (in the pan because it leaks) on the little table, and then into a bucket on the floor.  We're not sure if we should continue to use the filter.  It's a pain in the neck and we can't seem to keep it from putting some air in the wine, which could lead to bad flavor.  But, its supposed to make the wine bright and clear.  We used it with the last batch of strawberry and it must be pretty good because we managed to drink two bottles of it while working on this batch!  I don't even remember putting the corks in.  Just kidding, I remember.  At least I remember it was hilarious, but why...?  

 

Brandon seems to think I should step up my labeling system to something a bit more impressive.  Apparently masking tape that says "Blackberry 2/13" isn't classy enough for him (snob!).



Cranberry Pleaser

As you can see from this photo, we like to make our wine the traditional way - smashing the fruit with a baseball bat!  Actually, we only did this once, but it worked quite well and I prefer it to letting anyone's (especially his) feet touch the fruit. 

This was the first batch of cranberry wine, which in both cases has been inspired by the discounted cranberries that always go on sale after Thanksgiving.   Since it was so hard to smash the fruit for a 5 gallon batch, I've started freezing fruit before I use it in the wine.  This makes it mushy and much easier to smash up a bit so the yeast can get good access to the fruit.  I think this time I put the unfrozen cranberries in the food processer and chopped them up a bit. 

The final product is a lovely color and very bright.  It was also very potent, with a 14 percent alcohol content.  It was still a powerful drink when diluted with sprite and ice, which made it a good summer beverage instead of the holiday drink I imagined it would be. 

Countertop Livestock

It was time to rack the cranberry/grape/raisin wine, and to take the the pear/prune/clove wine out of the crock and off the fruit. This is the second cranberry based wine I've made, and I think this one is going to be better than the first, which was drinkable, and maybe even enjoyable if you mixed it with some sprite and told yourself it was sangria.  I'm hoping the grapes and raisins will add something to the final taste other than just the tartness of the cranberries. Its a little early to say for sure, but the pear wine tastes weird. Maybe cloves weren't a very good idea.

I think I prefer making wine and other fermentations in the winter, on cold dark evening like tonight. I get a feeling of accomplishment similar to that of growing food in the summer. The gist of the chores is the same - making sure they are alive and have food, making sure that they have a comfortable temperature, checking their progress and tending to the ferment. Maybe its more like having livestock in the house. Quiet, gassy, and invisible livestock.