Britesea - Living the good life in rural Oregon

[Denim Deb]

I've seen books on cheese making in a store around here. One day, I want to get one. Only problem being, you can't get real milk around here, so I don't know how easy it would be to make cheese.

 

[rhoda_bruce]

I know its late in the year for planting. I am also very late. Hope not too late. I should be fine, so long as I can keep things cool, but I wasn't overly stressed because this year I want to go totally container planting. I hope you do well.

 

[wyoDreamer]

I just ought a box of that Junket Rennet tablets just the other day. Looked at the directions and put it in the drawer for "one of those days" projects. I will eventually buy a gallon of milk to try it out.

 

[Britesea]

@Denim Deb ,you can make cheese out of the ultra pasteurized and homogenized milk you get in the store; you can even make cheese out of reconstituted powdered milk. I haven't tried the dried milk yet, but I've made farmer cheese using store-bought and it turned out fine- I couldn't tell the difference.

@wyoDreamer ,the Neufchatel cheese is really easy, and tastes wonderful with fresh herbs like chives, tarragon and basil added, or try it spread on a cracker with some jalapeno jelly!

@rhoda_bruce ,I will probably do some container plantings this year, and just work on improving the big garden for next spring. I want to double the height of some of the raised beds- 8" is too small for good root growth and besides, at 16" it will be easier for me to weed and harvest. I also want to lay down some weed barrier in more of the pathways, and around the raspberries, and put mulch on top.
I also want to put in some decorative elements- maybe paint the outsides of the raised beds; I bought a used fountain that just needs a new pump, and I have a gazing ball somewhere that would look nice. I'm thinking of putting them in one corner of the garden, and plant some lilies and other good-smelling flowers around them, with a rustic bench. *sigh-- dreams*

Today, I canned 4 pints of salsa verde and now I'm prepping apples that I got free in the Produce Connection for drying (yay for Dried Apple Pie!). After that I need to dehydrate the potatoes I got, and chop/freeze a bag of red bell peppers. Don't know if I can get all of it done in one day though; it will probably take the whole weekend. DS has gone into town to do some shopping, and he will bring home some oranges for me so I can get started on the glace orange peel. Gotta get busy!

 

[Denim Deb]

Thanks for the info! I get time I'll have to try it.

 

[Britesea]

I got the apples done on Saturday, then canned 7 pints of potatoes. Today I managed to prepare 10 pounds of potatoes for drying. I chose to leave the peel on for the extra vitamins and minerals so I didn't have to peel them, but I still had to slice and blanch them, then arrange them on the trays. The directions said they should only take about 3 hours to dry so they should be done before we go to bed.

I still have another 10 pounds of potatoes to take care of, and 8 pounds of carrots. I called C and told her I wouldn't be able to get to water aerobics tomorrow as I need to work on those veggies. I also have a good sized bag of red peppers that I want to freeze, and I need to get started on the glace orange peels and glace strawberries for my "demo" final in class.

I have Yankee Pot Roast cooking for dinner; planning on having pickled beets with it, and maybe chocolate pudding for dessert.

DS and DH worked on beefing up the fence in the back yard so Millie can't get out anymore. I think she's starting to go into heat, and finding an eligible male is becoming imperative; she escapes every time we relax our guard. I'd like to get her spayed but the vet said that her vulva needs to relax by going into heat, otherwise we are looking at future problems with UTI's. Once she has gone through a heat, we can go ahead with spaying her.

I ordered an Heirloom Rose with (according to the description) outstanding fragrance. It's a repeat bloomer too! I'm planning on having it inside the fenced garden so the deer can't get to it, and using the blooms to make rose petal jelly. I have used the wild roses we have along the back property line, but their fragrance is fairly light and I don't get the flavor I'd like from them.

 

[Denim Deb]

I've never heard of rose petal jelly. You need to post the recipe for it.

 

[Britesea]

Sure I'll give you the recipe- I'll post it in the Kitchen thread.

I managed to pick 2 of the 3 cups of roses I need for the recipe this morning, the rest are out of my reach so I'll have DS, who is at least 8" taller, pick the rest. Then I'll have to get a couple of packets of liquid pectin. I found a new recipe online that uses a tablespoon of rosewater as well-- probably to beef up the fragrance. Rose petal jelly is delicious on something like buttered bread (first time I ever tasted it was on some lavash at a middle eastern restaurant). When you first taste it, mostly what you taste is just "sweet"... then the fragrance hits and it tastes the way roses smell. Some people like it, some people hate it.
If DS manages to pick more than I need, I'll candy the rest of the petals and use as decorations on cakes etc.

My potatoes didn't dry as quickly as the recipe said they would. I did get a small handful of slices that felt crispy/dry; when I went to bed I turned the dehydrator off so they wouldn't burn during the night, and started it up again this morning. Hopefully they will finish today and I can start on the next 10 pound batch. I want to try the canned ones and see if the family likes them enough to can more- it looks like potatoes will be a regular item at the Friday Produce Connection.

So my list of chores today is growing smaller. I still need to chop and freeze the bag of red peppers, and make the glace orange peel and glace strawberries. And of course clean the kitchen etc. We have a 20% chance of rain today so I will hang my laundry out but keep a weather eye out.

DS just came in with the required amount of rose petals! Oh, it smells so wonderful! I called around and no one in town sells culinary rose water, so I ordered some from Amazon. I can freeze the rose petals until it arrives and make it at that time. This will be the first time I've made jelly with the little pink wild roses; I've used red garden roses before. I understand the color of the jelly depends on the color of the roses so this should yield a beautiful pink jelly (sounds very pretty!)

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Hope the jelly turns out great - please post pics when it's done!

 

[Britesea]

Well now I know why people don't usually use the little wild roses. You need to cut off the little thickened point at the base of each petal since it is bitter. With the wild roses, the petals are so small that I needed about 3-4 times as many petals to get 3 cups' worth and then I had to trim those little points.... took me 4 hours! But I persevered since I'd already started, and now I have them in a vacuum sealed package in the freezer, waiting for the rose water to come in.

Yesterday was another class in Master Food Preserving; this one was about drying. There were a lot of samples to try, and one I'd never seen before-- Pizza Leather. It was amazingly good! She just made a tomato leather but added some basil, oregano, and garlic powder.

Today I really really have to start my glace orange peel or it won't be ready for my final demo next Wednesday. I'll probably make it after swim class because I need to clean up the kitchen first. Whenever I'm gone all day the kitchen turns into a disaster(DH and DS are apparently incapable of cleaning up after themselves), and usually I can't get it all clean before I have to start messing it up for dinner again. Then I'm too tired to do anymore cleaning. I did manage to wipe clean, sanitize and oil 3 1/2 dozen eggs though.