Category Archives: Cooking & food preservation

Speckled cranberry beans & garlic

This is my first year growing speckled cranberry beans. I grew a good volume of beans out of one bean tower of plants. Given the fact that half my plants didn’t make it for one reason or another, I see this … Continue reading

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Pretty as a pepper

Even though I’ve had a hard time with tomatoes this year due to the cool weather, I’ve had good luck with peppers. For the last couple of years I’ve been growing peppers in the greenhouse in hanging planters and have … Continue reading

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Grapes, sauce, and my sunny weekend to do list

As I mentioned in my last post, animal activity can be a good indicator that a crop needs to be harvested – and fast. After harvesting our favorite apple tree last weekend, I went to check on the grapes. Sure … Continue reading

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Pears are a pain in the ass

I’ve done a bunch of canning this summer. I’ve canned jam, tomato sauce and soup, peaches, applesauce, and more. This was my first time canning pears. Compared to everything else, the pears were difficult. I bought a box of pears … Continue reading

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The canning continues . . .

Today I got out Big Bertha, my All American pressure canner.  I don’t always use a pressure canner when canning tomato sauces, but the tomato soup recipe I was canning today had a few ingredients that aren’t on my usual … Continue reading

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Tomatoes, tomatillos, bruschetta, and peppers

In spite of the cool weather, my warm weather crops are ripening in the greenhouse. I’m not getting huge volumes, but enough to make a few dishes here and there. Recently, I harvested some tomatoes, tomatillos, and peppers. I used a few … Continue reading

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A few of my favorite kitchen things

Food preservation and storage season means spending a good amount of time in the kitchen. Many cooking and preservation tasks are made much easier with the right set of tools. I thought I share with you a few of my favorite … Continue reading

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