Monday, September 29, 2014

☼ Forest & Field Happenings ☼



Gardening and harvest is winding down... a bit.  I still have a pretty long list of things to do in these final days... some potatoes to still dig, garlic to plant, holding out until the last possible moment before calling it with the eggplants, peppers, beets, carrots, & leeks.  I don't really want to think about the firewood.  I have been so busy in the gardens and the kitchen that I haven't found time to slip into the woods...until today.  DH offered to chainsaw anything that might be obstructing my trails but, before he lugged the chainsaw into the woods I needed to make an exploratory walk and assess what was needed.  I knew this old pine needed to be cut and it is near the house.  I was sort of dreading what I might find as to the state of my trails.  I am not sure I will have time to maintain them this year but, I was pleasantly surprised!  I think I can get by with very little brush cutting before the snow flies!  Also, only 3 spots for chainsawing and not in the way back part of the trails.  So here is a little explore down the too long neglected woods...though I am sure "they" don't feel neglected, except for, maybe, the Ravens.


The Ravens have returned to our woods from wherever they go for the summer.  They have been croaking and swooping at me for the past week or so.  I grabbed a handful of duck food to leave them below their nest.  But, they better hurry since it looks like a squirrel is occupying the stump I use to leave offerings!





~~Pausing & Seeing~~~ small beauties along the way.  Oh how, I have missed the woods and the slowing it brings to my busy self.  This time of year is a mix of worn down life as well as brilliant beauty.




Autumn


What is sometimes called a   
   tongue of flame
or an arm extended   burning
   is only the long
red and orange branch of
   a green maple
in early September   reaching   
   into the greenest field
out of the green woods   at the   
   edge of which the birch trees
appear a little tattered   tired
   of sustaining delicacy
all through the hot summer   re-
   minding everyone (in   
our family) of a Russian
   song   a story by
Chekhov or my father on
   his own lawn   standing   
beside his own wood in
   the United States of   
America   saying (in Russian)
   this birch is a lovely
tree   but among the others
   somehow superficial





“We depend on nature not only for our physical survival. We also need nature to show us the way home, the way out of the prison of our minds. We got lost in doing, thinking, remembering, anticipating; lost in a maze of complexity and a world of problems. We have forgotten what rocks, plants and animals still know. We have forgotten how to be – to be still, to be ourselves, to be where life is: here and now.” -Eckhart Tolle


Wednesday, September 24, 2014

***Tuesday's Tip*** DRIED green TOMATOES!


Ah yes, remember the days of Tuesday's Tips!?  I know I am a day late by a couple of months.... well better late than never....


It is an amazing tomato year for me.  It is hard to know what to do with them all!  I have been canning and dehydrating like crazy, as well as sharing.  I have canned sauce, soup, red & green salsa.  I haven't made a count yet.  That will come at the end of the season...whenever that may be!  In the meantime I want to share with you and amazing new way to dry tomatoes... Dried Green Tomatoes with Sriracha Sauce.  It is simple and easy...which is a blessing this time of year and ever so delicious!  Almost fried green tomato-ish.  DH really loves them!


Simple Steps---> wash your green or greenish tomatoes.  The semi pink ones work here too, no need to be fussy.  I slice mine about 1/4 to 3/8 inch thick.  Then I add a couple drops of diluted Sriracha Hot Sauce.  I dilute it 50% water to 50% sauce.  It goes on a bit nicer and is plenty hot plus, stretches your sauce when you are doing a ton like me.  I only add a few drops to the middle so there is still a green tomato flavor.  If you spread the sauce over the whole tomato slice the sauce will overwhelms any tomato taste.  I use the Excalibur Dehydrator at 140 degrees for about 14 hours.  Bag them up or start eating them!



~Recipe~

Green tomatoes sliced to about 1/4 inch
Diluted Sriracha Sauce 50/50 with water
(of try your own favorite hot sauce)
Dry at 140 for 14 hours

That is it!  I would love to hear what you think about this recipe.


Cucumbers are great this way too...even the boyo liked them!


Tuesday, September 16, 2014

☼ Forest & Field Happenings ☼ Could this be the End?


There is a definite shift this week.  Cooler air, shortening days, things are slower to ripen.  I may just be able to catch my breath.  Well, atleast I can stop canning tomatoes.  I have opened my garden to a couple of friends to come glean the Great Wall of Tomatoes. It is hard for me to leave a vegetable unharvested.  I have an intense compulsion to put up everything even when I already have enough.  I have more than enough!  Sharing and letting them do the picking allows me to let go of some of that obsession.  I have gardened too big again this year.  I continue to search for a good balance.  I am happy to share but, by growing too much, other things in my life are neglected...including my very own body!  So as the harvest continues and I check things off the final Grand Garden List I am also taking careful notes on how I can do less next year.  I only managed one beach day this summer!  What's the point of living near the coast and not swimming in the ocean?

 Soooo Many Tomatoes!

 Some Potatoes Harvested ~ More among the weeds


Another fall activity, DH mowing the back field so it remains a field.  
It has been more than 2 years since that last mowing.  
He does enjoy his tractor time!



Here is a haul that actually took very little of my time.  Just 2 hills of each produced all of these Butternut Squash and Long Pie Pumpkins.  My first time growing these pumpkins.  I am excited to have found so many while I harvested....lots of weeds among the vines!  They are supposed to be good keepers and great for pie!  Here is a link to FEDCO Seeds with a description-->  http://www.fedcoseeds.com/seeds/search.php?search=long+pie&item=1723&inde





Went out a few nights ago looking for the Aurora.  No luck but still very beautiful.  
A moment of stillness that was much needed during the frenzied fall.  

One of my most favorite bits of writing ~~~  

THE PEACE OF WILD THINGS
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.
— Wendell Berry

Friday, September 12, 2014

Tomatoes ~ Grateful?


Last night I had a dream...in the dream I woke up to find tomatoes surrounding me in my bed.  The dream is sort of true, I AM surrounded by tomatoes but so far I have managed to keep them out of my bed.  It is the most abundant tomatoe year that I ever remember in my 20+ years of growing vegetables! (unless it is like childbirth and you forget the "pain")  I am grateful but, it is starting to get tedious.  I guess I could let them rot...that is not in my nature.  I have given quite a few away.  The few times I have left the house I always leave with a big bag of tomatoes.  Once winter comes I know I will be really grateful for all this food.  In the meantime I plug away....Sauce, Soup, Salsa, Dehydrating, Sauce, Soup, Salsa, Dehydrating, Sauce, Soup, Salsa, Dehydrating, Sauce, Soup, Salsa......


These are my days~~~








This is what I picked today...guess what I will be doing tomorrow...

Sauce, Soup, Salsa, Dehydrating, Sauce, Soup, Salsa, Dehydrating, Sauce, Soup, Salsa.....

 ~~~
It is my intention, each week, to share something that fills me with Gratitude. 
I write ~~~Gratitude~~~ with the wavy lines to represent the gratitude ENERGY~~~~~! 
I hope you will join me and share your gratitude moments. 
~~~Amen, Blessed Be, Namaste'~~~