Britesea - Living the good life in rural Oregon

[lorihadams]

WOW...what a wonderful idea!

 

[moolie]

Sounds really neat, what a wonderful way to give back to the community--so glad you are able to take part

Curious about your growing season--what's your elevation? I never realized there might be a part of Oregon that sounds so similar to our growing climate here in southern Alberta!

We're at 3500' and just on the prairie edge of the Rocky Mountain foothills, and in the Rocky Mountain rain shadow so very arid. We get rain predictably for most of June, and usually a bit in September (although none this year), and we can have snow any month of the year, but predictably from late November thru March, with early flurries end of Sept and through Oct that don't stick, and same for April and into May.

Our last hard frost date is pegged at the third weekend of May (Victoria Day long weekend up here) and our first frosts can be as early as the last week of August, but killing frost usually starts mid-Sept. We personally never plant out tender garden plants till the first week of June, just in case. Typical winter temps are -10 to -25 Celcius (14 to -13 Farenheit), although we get warm Chinook winds that roar down the eastern slopes of the Rockies melting everything every couple of weeks (and causing pressure change headaches for those susceptible) so we don't get much snow accumulation over the winter months between the arid climate and warm Chinooks.

 

[Britesea]

Moolie- It sounds like we have very similar in climates. We are at 4300 feet, on the east side of the Cascade Mountains. They call it "high desert", but we have lots of lakes and a few rivers so it's kind of a strange mix. Our frost dates are late May and late September, and your description of snow in winter, and rain in spring and fall, tallies very closely with ours. One thing we have predictably is for a week or so in late January or early February, we will have lovely spring-like weather, with temperatures in the 60's during the day. Then it shuts down again and we have the most miserable part of winter- cold, dirty, wet or icy; and all the worse after having the nice weather. Most of the time we have the same snow-and-melt that you described, but I've heard of winters (before I moved here) where the snow was piled up so high you couldn't shovel or use a blower on the driveway, because you couldn't throw the snow high enough to get over the drifts. The summers are warm, but generally not hot. We rarely get a day in the triple digits, and unless there's a thunderbumper brewing, the humidity is almost non-existent.


I just finished canning 6 pints of spiced pears, and 12 pints of applesauce. I still have 45 more pounds of apples to process, but I've decided to dry all of them. It took forever to make the sauce, because all I have is one of those cone-shaped food mills, with a wooden pestle that DH whittled for me out of a broken axe handle. It's not that great, because it's oval instead of round, so I have to do a kind of little twirl every time I make a pass with it because only two sides stick out enough past the lip of the cone to squeeze against the holes. By drying them, I can save the apples and make applesauce later, when I've been able to buy a decent food mill.

I had been hoping to get over to the greenhouse today and work, but the canning took too long. Now I won't be able to go until Friday, because tomorrow is payday so I spend the day in town shopping and paying bills and I have a cheese-making class as well. Maybe the radishes will have sprouted?

 

[snapshot]

Hi Britesea! When I made pear/apple sauce a few weeks ago I cooked the prepared apples and pears down on the stove with a little water and then threw them in the blender and pulsed til I got the consistency I wanted. After it was sauce I added a bit of sugar and spice. Didn't take much longer than other stuff I do. I do love dried apples though!

 

[moolie]

Wow Britesea, so very similar! We also get the "February spring" phenomenon (sometimes to the point that the lilacs will bud up) and last winter was super unusual because we actually had snow on the ground for more than 100 days in a row (not as many Chinooks as usual). Our city only ploughs the main roads, so residential streets like mine get icy (snow gets compacted by car tires) and then rutted where the cars usually drive--which is hell on smaller vehicles like my Mazda3 so we generally drive the 98 Explorer when the roads are icy, which is hell on gas mileage but has 4-by.

For applesauce, is there a reason why you run it through the food mill? If you peel and core, you can just cook it down and leave it a bit chunky (but soft)--my daughters like it both ways so we do both--we usually add cinnamon to the chunky

 

[Marianne]

Ya all are making feel like I'm lazy............

 

[Britesea]

I didn't think about coring and peeling it I've always just quartered them, and cut out any bad spots, and cooked the apples so I had to mill them. Well, I can still dry the apples and have them available for whatever apple-y thing I want to make.

 

[moolie]

I didn't think about coring and peeling it I've always just quartered them, and cut out any bad spots, and cooked the apples so I had to mill them. Well, I can still dry the apples and have them available for whatever apple-y thing I want to make.

If you use Snapshot's blender method above, you don't even need to peel--just core to remove the seeds

 

[rathbone]

Just dropping in to say hello. I somehow got disconnected from your thread?!

 

[Britesea]

We had our first snow of the season yesterday while I was in town doing my shopping. Not very much, and it all melted off again by the end of the day, but it did happen. Kinda funny to see everyone all bundled up and shivering- it was 32F most of the day, and in a couple of months that will qualify as a 'no jacket' day- but right now our bodies are all still in summer mode and if felt colder.

My cheese making class was last night. There were about 10 ladies, a couple brought some nice bottles of wine, the teacher had several jars of fermented veggies available as well as 3 different wheels of hard cheese for snacking, and I made and brought some whole wheat crackers. Once we all had some wine under our belts, the class got a LOT more casual, lol! It was a good class; she has promised to divide up the 4 lb cheese we all helped to make, after it's aged for a month or so. I've been making fresh cheese for years, but wasn't sure about tackling the hard cheeses; DH has offered to make some sort of cheese press, so once I have that and some cultures and such, I'm ready to go!

Her next class is on making laundry soap from tallow and lye- I'm looking forward to that class too.

Today I'm going to go work in the greenhouse again. I need to plant more pots of cornsalad, arugula and lettuce, and make sure the stuff already planted is doing well. I haven't been able to get over there for several days, so I'm really glad that Angie is watering when I can't get there.

Also need to cut up a bunch of apples for drying, plus there's way more still on the trees. AND I still have that darned cabbage looking at me every time I go into the pump house- and the potatoes... WAY TOO MUCH TO DO!!!