Britesea - Living the good life in rural Oregon

[Britesea]

@wyoDreamer , I slice the potatoes into about 1/8" slices (unpeeled so I get the vitamins and minerals and fiber), then blanch them (1 pound of potatoes to 1 gallon of water, blanched for 6 minutes) and then pop them into the dehydrator at 140F. They take about 5 hours to dry. My next step will be to make up some packages of Scalloped Potato mix and Hamburger Helper mix with at least some of them.

Yesterday was tiring but fun- I took my rose petals out of the freezer and went over to L's house and we made 4 half pints of rose petal jelly with them, then made a double batch (8 half pints) of plumeria jelly using the same recipe. The rose petal jelly turned out a beautiful pale pink salmon color and the plumeria turned out a slightly darker rose color. Both smell wonderful!
Then we went over to the Produce Connection and got more free produce. We were late, and by the time our turn came they were all out of the onions, yellow squash and 25 pound sacks of carrots; but we got about 8 lbs of carrots, 2 sacks of red apples, and 2 sacks of baby Yukon potatoes. I'm not going to complain, because these were FREE! After I get the kitchen clean, I'll get the carrots out of the ice chest and start dehydrating them. I already have scads of jars of pickled carrots, brown sugar carrots, and regular canned carrots. Then I think I'll make some apple pie filling. I also still have the 10 lb bag of onions from last week, untouched; I need to hang them up in pantyhose to keep them from rotting.

DS is home again, so he and DH are going to work on the fence in the back yard. I sure hope they finish soon, because I'm getting real tired of having to tie Millie to a tree to keep her home. I've arranged to have L's son come and help too, so maybe it will actually get done.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

That Produce Connection comes in handy! Hope you get the fence done. The rose petal jelly sounds awesome and I'll bet it's beautiful too.

 

[Britesea]

The jelly is pretty, but it hasn't jelled yet. I'll give it the standard 2 weeks and if it's still liquid I'll have to add more sugar and pectin and re-process. Hope I don't have to, because the flavor (I licked the pan!) is very delicate already and I'm afraid of losing more.

I didn't get to the carrots yet- It took too long to get the kitchen cleaned and laundry done. So that and the apple pie filling are on for today. I did manage to cut up the two cantaloupes from last week and they are in the dehydrator now, except for the little end pieces which we had with breakfast. Sourdough waffles with orange syrup leftover from making the candied orange peel, fried duck eggs, bacon, and the cantaloupe. I don't think I'll be hungry again until late tonight!

The boys almost finished the fence; they figure they can get it done this afternoon. Yay!

Well, better get started. I have all this to do, plus I'm making Beef Paprikash with spaetzle and salad for Father's Day dinner, with apple pie for dessert; gonna be a busy day!

 

[Denim Deb]

You're menus always make me feel so hungry!

 

[Britesea]

LOL, there's a reason we look like beached whales!

 

[frustratedearthmother]

I know all about Beached Whale Syndrome, lol!

 

[Britesea]

I spent some time making Mexican style pickled carrots today. I've never made them before, so I made the minimum batch of 4 pints. I have to wait about 10 days before I can taste them, but if they are good I'll go ahead and make more.

I am hot and tired and didn't feel like doing much else other than bringing in the laundry and doing some (not all) of the dishes. Tomorrow is payday, so I'll be in town all day taking care of errands.

Dinner is simple tonight: Chicken Salad Sandwiches, with Bistro Olive Antipasto on the side.

 

[Britesea]

Took care of pretty much all my errands in town yesterday. I didn't buy any produce at the store because I wanted to wait and see what the Produce Connection gives me. No sense buying some lettuce if I'm gonna get more today...

It's supposed to get over 100F today and I'm not looking forward to it. We already have the house closed up and the coolers going. Tonight's dinner is gonna be something like Summer Spaghetti Salad, with a minimum of stove work because I don't want to heat things up. No canning either.

My friend C is getting a new freezer and giving us her older one. It still works fine, she just wanted a bigger one. Her's is bigger than ours though, so I'll be happy. I'm still trying to figure out where to put our old one because it works too- and having the second one for overflow would be nice. Maybe then I would have room to buy 1/2 pig or 1/4 steer... I don't really like depending on freezers, but they sure are usefull for meat storage. Canned meat is nice and convenient, but you're limited in what you can make with it.

 

[Denim Deb]

Sounds like a good deal.

 

[Britesea]

I got MORE potatoes, MORE carrots, and MORE apples. Once again, I missed out on the summer squash- this time because they started early and I got there when it was supposed to open.
So I guess, since I don't want to can, I'll be dehydrating some of these; although I could maybe hold the carrots until I get the freezer and then freeze them.

I made pesto last night, after things cooled a bit. I had enough basil to make 4 batches, so I have a quart of pesto in the fridge. I'll be freezing it as soon as I can.

Things are supposed to be a little cooler today... 98 as opposed to 107 yesterday. As far as I'm concerned, anything over 85 is just HOT. Yesterday my poor air conditioners (we have 2 small window units) struggled all day and couldn't get it below 83 inside.
It's dry and hot, and we got thunder over the mountains. Scary combination

I've done some dishes and I'm running a load of laundry. Once I get that hung up I'll start prepping the apples for drying. Maybe I can put the dehydrator outside and run an extension cord? That would keep it from heating up the kitchen.

I'm thinking Tuna Salad tonight, but I haven't decided whether to make traditional or Nicoise. I also need to use up one of the apple pie fillings that leaked out of the jar- even though it finally sealed, some of the filling may be stuck on the rim and could create a bridge for bacteria to get into the jar- so I want to use it up. Too hot to bake a traditional pie; I'm going to try an experiment: Graham cracker crust, topped with sweetened cream cheese and then that topped by the apple pie filling. What do y'all think?