Marina Di Chioggia

More on my pumpkin... It is called a " Marina Di Chioggia" and according to everything I read on it, it is pefect for Gnocchi and Ravioli, as well as pies. And I am told you can bake it like any other squash, with a little butter and brown sugar. WHich tells me I can process it and make pie or soup out of it!
It's alien look made it perfect for my "puking pumpkin" and it tied for a win in our pumpkin carving contest at work!

REPOST- How I make Red Pepper Flakes

This repost is from 9/9/2010 "How I make red pepper flakes". I love them in cooking, on pizza...anywhere a touch of hot and spicy is called for!

I LOVE SERENDIPITY! When the planets allign to give me a subject for a blog post it is so cool!
There was a comment or two yesterday asking how I make red pepper flakes- it is really simple, so this one is for Lisa! (:First, what I do is spread the peppers in even layers in a food dehydrator. No Dehydrator? I think you have one and don't know it... The Oven! Spread the red peppers in a single layer on a cookie sheet and dry in the oven for 8 hours or overnight at the lowest temperature you oven will allow. If you have a gas oven, the pilot light heat is probably enough.

Remove the red peppers from the oven or dehydrator when they are dry and brittle.

Option A for crushing:
Fill a gallon sized freezer bag with the dried peppers. Put the freezer bag in an old pillowcase.
Use a rolling pin to crush the peppers. Apply pressure as your roll the pin over the bag.

Option B for crushing- Put some of the dried peppers into a food processor or a coffee grinder and process away

Remove them from the bag or food processor when the peppers are crushed as fine as you would like, and store in a container with a shaker top.

Store any extra red pepper flakes in a clean storage bag or jar with a tight fitting lid.

Silence of the beets...

Well if CSI filmed here they would book me! You should see me hands all red with blood… from beets! I pickled two quarts of beets and you would not believe the mess. Beet juice is running rampant. Everywhere, Now I know why mom sighs when I ask her for pickled beets. Anyway, after cooking the beets I got one good Idea…. Save the water I cooked them in to blanch the beet greens for freezing. Saved some mess and reheating another pan of water! But back to the pickled beets. I don’t know why I didn’t use my old standby pickling method, would have been a lot easier. And next time I think I will grow enough to make a full batch… at least to make it worth my time! Oh well on to dinner… Chicken pot pie with a side of fresh cooked beet skins… (does that make me a cannibalistic serial killer?) Just tell Grissom and Catherine you didn't hear that from me!

Preserving (freezing) Swiss Chard

One of my favorite things in the garden is Swiss Chard... but it doesn't keep. I really want to preserve Swiss Chard. Other than dehydration (makes great snack chips, I always wondered how one would preserve it. After reading Martha Stewart's Swiss Chard Pie recipe and noting that she freezes it, I decided to look it up... I found this simple freezing method on About.com:

* Wash the chard well.
* Separate the stalks from the leaves. It makes it more convenient when you're cooking the chard later, since the stalks take longer to cook than the leaves (and, sometimes you only want to use one or the other in a recipe, not both.)
* Bring a pot of water to a boil, and fill a bowl with ice water.
* Blanch Swiss chard stalks for two minutes, leaves for one minute. Place them in the ice water immediately after blanching to stop the cooking process.
* Drain well, and place the stalks and leaves in separate freezer bags or other freezer-safe containers.
* Freeze for up to six months.

Preserving Celery

I rarely buy celery. Not that I don't like it, but I use one or two stalks and then the rest is waste. Not by my design, just by the fact it is too much for me! Now i am finding ways to preserve celery... In depth Info on celery suggests making a Mirepoix out of it and freeze the Mirepoix. Then one could always dehydrate it and use it soups and casseroles later, or a person could make their own Celery Salt. Who knew there where so many choices?

Pickled Strawberries

Want a super easy way to keep those strawberries? Why not pickle them. A great treat for summer- slightly tangy.

1 1/2 cups of White Vinegar
1/2 cup of Sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons Kosher salt
1-2 Cinnamon Sticks
1 1/2 cups of Strawberries, stems removed

Simply bring the Vinegar to a boil, add the sugar and salt to the vinegar, making sure it dissolves. Place the strawberries in a pint Mason Jar (or any jar with a good closing lid), adding the Cinnamon stick(s) about halfway. Fill jar with vinegar solution, leaving about 1/2 inch headspace. Seal with lid; let cool; refrigerate. Keeps up to two weeks in refrigerator, The pickling juice is good to keep later for using as a vinaigrette for salads and such.

Lemon Cucumber Reefer Pickles

Yes I did! I made some reefer pickles out of a few lemon cukes I grew! I had some leftover pickling juice from when I made Kohl Rabi Pickles, so I heated it up and made a jar of refrigerator chips out of the lemon cukes. Hate to waste good pickle juice! Here is the regular recipe:

6-8 Lemon Cucmbers

Pickling mixture
3/4 cup white vinegar
1 1/4 cups water
3 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon mustard seed
1/2 teaspoon dill seed
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 teaspoon salt

Slice lemon Cucumbers into thin slices; pack in a 1 quart glass jar along with garlic, bay leaf and fresh dill.
In a saucepan, combine pickling mixture.
Heat, stirring, until it boils and sugar is dissolved.
Pour boiling mixture over lemon cuke slices, filling jar completely.
Cover jar. When cool, refrigerate for 3 to 4 days before using to let flavors blend

How I make Red Pepper Flakes

I LOVE SERENDIPITY! When the planets allign to give me a subject for a blog post it is so cool!
There was a comment or two yesterday asking how I make red pepper flakes- it is really simple, so this one is for Lisa! (:
First, what I do is spread the peppers in even layers in a food dehydrator. No Dehydrator? I think you have one and don't know it... The Oven! Spread the red peppers in a single layer on a cookie sheet and dry in the oven for 8 hours or overnight at the lowest temperature you oven will allow. If you have a gas oven, the pilot light heat is probably enough.

Remove the red peppers from the oven or dehydrator when they are dry and brittle.

Option A for crushing:
Fill a gallon sized freezer bag with the dried peppers. Put the freezer bag in an old pillowcase.
Use a rolling pin to crush the peppers. Apply pressure as your roll the pin over the bag.

Option B for crushing- Put some of the dried peppers into a food processor or a coffee grinder and process away

Remove them from the bag or food processor when the peppers are crushed as fine as you would like, and store in a container with a shaker top.

Store any extra red pepper flakes in a clean storage bag or jar with a tight fitting lid.

Pickled Kohlrabi

In the garden, the KohlRabi is coming out swell--- now to preserve it for a while longer. I found this recipe at Recipe Land .com of course I had to make my little changes to go with what I grow!
Ingredients

3 each kohlrabi peeled, sliced (I used 2)
2 large carrots Or I used 6 "baby" Carrots I grow thumbelina and little finger
2 each garlic cloves crushed
1 each bay leaf
3 large dill weed sprigs

Pickling mixture
3/4 cup white vinegar
1 1/4 cups water
3 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon mustard seed
1/2 teaspoon dill seed
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 teaspoon salt

Directions
Parboil carrots for 3 minutes.
Mix kohlrabi and carrots; pack in a 1 quart glass jar along with garlic, bay leaf and fresh dill.
In a saucepan, combine pickling mixture.
Heat, stirring, until it boils and sugar is dissolved.
Pour boiling mixture over kohlrabi, filling jar completely.
Cover jar. When cool, refrigerate for 3 to 4 days before using to let flavors blend

How to Pickle anything (2010 edition)

Wondering how to pickle things? Readymade Magazine has a great article on fresh pack pickling and blanch and seal pickling- pickle everything! Good freshness extenders! My favorite? Pickled Red Onions(Beefmaster) with Garlic!

How to freeze Peaches

Photo: Pick your own. org

I am thinking of investing in a flat of peaches. But how to preserve them? Dehydration doesn'r seem right, not for peaches. Canning could work, but seems like a lot of work. Freezing? I remember my mom freezing peaches and it didn't work out great. So I turn to one of my favorite web sites, Pick your own.org, and find out how to freeze peaches, found out my mom didn't use any syrup or fruit juice to freeze them in. Also has directions for freezing Plums, Cherries, Nectarines, Figs and other soft fruit.