Where?

People, where exactly DOES the time go? This is not a rhetorical question so please feel free to chime in. I would really like to find where it goes so that I can go collect it and bring it back. I am hoping it just takes a wheel barrow and a shovel, but if I have to rent some heavy equipment, I am willing to do so.
To revisit... The LB, Cho, and SHG and I all made cheese Oh, about 3 weeks ago. Maybe more. Here are some of the highlights of early in the evening, before SHG went and got her camera.
If you want the play by play of live cheese making, you will have to go here.

The spread. What is the point of getting together if you can't eat, drink and be merry?


The peach auditions. Three different types of peaches, all likely to be grafted onto rootstock by a local farm and on offer for sale as small trees in the spring. We liked the Beekman. As did my friends the following evening. Deee lish.
Heating the milk with citric acid for ricotta. Someone was watching the temperature, I am sure as it is critical. It must have been the LB. She was SERIOUS about the cheese. She did the research, bought the kit, gathered us, and kept us on task.

Here the curds are being ladled gently into the cheese cloth lined strainer per the directions.

Here we give up on gentleness and dump the mothers in there.

The long and the short of it is that we really need a cow. We are all totally in agreement on this.

The following day/evening/day was spent in Warrenton, visiting some of my chick friends from waaaaaay back. Six of the original 7 of my old supper club got together for dinner, in from London, New York, State College and The Ville. It was pretty near heaven, but way too short a visit.
After that, the SB was home again, and we were off on our usual wild ride of gardening, housework, etc. When he is away, I forget how much time this relationship stuff takes ....

Anyway, from the garden, we snuck out one evening and carefully dug under some of the potato plants to see if we had any new potatoes. We never got blossoms on the plants and I read that is the time you can start harvesting new potatoes. Well, apparently you don't need blossoms. Check 'em out!
These are fingerling potatoes of a variety called La Ratte (thanks Barbara Kingsolver). What do you do with a handful of small fingerling potatoes you ask.... Well, you cut them into more or less even chunks and boil them gently. While that is going on, you saute half a pound of Babe in the Woods local hot sausage with an onion and when things have browned nicely you add in potatoes and a big bunch of chard from the front porch and you add a little white wine or chicken stock and let the greens steam in there for a bit. Then at the end you wonder if there is enough starch in it to keep the SB from having to go for a 2am snack, decide no, and throw in a cup and a half of leftover cooked pasta and warm it through. While it is hot, you plop on top several spoonfuls of fresh ricotta (see above). You watch with delight as your dinner partner snarfs down enough food to feed a family of 8.

There is another small success in the garden in this year of very few real successes.
Some of the tomatoes planted on the hillside have produced! The yellow one is Wonder Light, the two directly behind it is a Tigarella (a little stripey) then there are the Black Plum Paste (with the greenish tops) and Grandma Mary's Paste, the sort of blocky shaped ones. Grandma's Paste is amazingly prolific with a minimum (no let's be fair - ZERO) care. I have been enjoying my potted tomatoes... Crimson Carmello (nice, but not the best tomato ever - the consistency is sort of mealy) and Persimmon (lovely yellow peach and very mild but not a great producer). If we had a little more rain, I think I would have been inundated. Which was sort of what I was looking for, but I am happy, I haven't had to buy much in the way of tomatoes lately.

In other news, we (the SB and I) spent and entire day and *almost* decided to build a chicken tractor. We opted out when we went to Lowes and priced it out at over $100. We decided to scrounge more and go for a permanent structure. Now we may be back to the tractor as the SB is questioning my long term commitment to chickens. The nerve.

We have also been talking a lot about ducks. What we hear is that ducks are messy. Apparently they fling water around like crazy when they eat and they poop. A lot. I am undaunted. I am sure that we can find leaves and chips and sawdust and straw to put down. And it gives me a good excuse to get some Wellingtons.

Try It, You'll Like It

Because it is hot and because just about everything seems like anything else is too much trouble, I will post my summer staple foods:

Requires the stove to be on
Tuna Pasta Salad. Not only cheap, but tasty. This is a variation on a recipe that my Mom has made for ever. Have I posted this one before.... Please tell me if I am repeating myself.

Pasta (penne, macaroni, or something else bite sized) cook this and drain it and run it under cold water. Chop up about 1/4 cup of red or mild onion and mix it with the pasta, a can of tuna (drained) 3/4 of a regular sized cucumber (peeled and chopped) 1-2 tablespoons of capers (drained and rinsed) add mayo until it is the way you like it and add salt and pepper. It is excellent really cold. Mom's recipe is macaroni, tuna, onion, dill pickle relish (instead of capers) and thawed frozen peas (instead of cuke).

Does not require the stove to be on:
One large tomato, 1/2 a peeled cuke, 5-8 olives, 1 inch chunk of feta, 5-6 leaves of basil - all chopped, and doused with about 2T. red wine vinegar, 1/2 t. balsamic vinegar, 1 t. olive oil, salt and pepper.

Let me introduce you to my new favorite blog... One of the residents who trained with us just moved to New Zealand with his wife and two small children (3 and less than 1) for a year. His blog is pretty entertaining. All about culture shock, some professional, but mostly culinary at this point. Check 'em out.

The SB thinks I am crazy for wanting 10 ducks. Actually, he doesn't think I am crazy, he just thinks I am asking for trouble from the City if we have too many. Perhaps he is right, but they have a minimum order of 10. What to do, what to do? Anyone interested in 4 or so ducks? I am already trying to think of names for them. The SB gets to name any cat we have so I think I will reserve the right to name the ducks. I am less committed to naming the chickens, so I can offer him that.

I planted beets and beans and some late season greens. Hoping to get some broccoli started soon so I can get it in as it starts to cool down. The beets and beans are coming up gangbusters and I just put them in last weekend. I want to keep planting more since they are so successful, but I have to reserve some space for my garlic. I can't remember when that is supposed to arrive, but I ordered it this spring to arrive at the proper planting time so that I wouldn't forget. I think it is September.

Still no sign of the battery charger. If I had a camera, I would show you how great my tomato plants outside my door look and how much my wee lemon tree has grown this year and maybe even a picture of the F.A.T. groundhogs that still seem to be infesting the place, though are not currently in the garden. And I would show you the berries that are forming on my raspberry plants.

Tonight we celebrate my oldest nephew's b-day (a little early, but...) He is apparently into chocolate these days, so I will be making chocolate ice cream. I wanted to put coffee in it, but figured since it is the kid's birthday, I should keep to more kid friendly flavors. I do have some hazelnut chocolate nutella like stuff that I am going to swirl in at the end. We'll see how that goes.

Not Dead.

The SB is up in Maryland working on projects with our friend H. The weekend is planned to be 4 guys out at a cabin carving a giant crocodile out of wood and drinking beer. I will not compare this with my more regular like 8-5 government type job, but suffice to say, it ain't like that. I get weekends off, dammit. So there.

In the several weeks he was home he worked like a dog. Unfortunately, that meant I worked like a dog as well. We started his time at home by buying some expensive and useful tools. A chop saw. And a screw gun. Then we went to work on the basement. We crammed stuff into corners and cubbies to reveal wall space and eventually hung two metal cabinets that have been in the way for about 8 years. We then crammed them full of stuff. That took care of about 1/42nd of the junk in the basement. But it is a start.

He also cleared one of the property lines of brush and weeds and has created a new bed for fall planting. The SB, ever vigilant, was able to stop the tree butchers from "trimming" our trees while they were in the 'hood, and even talked them into giving us some of the chopped tree refuse. We now have about 9 cubic yards of mulch piled up. Some of it now spread on the new bed to keep weeds down and add organic matter so the new plantings will have a good go of it.

Next we started to finish the wall around the basement bathroom. Oddly, our basement came with a toilet in it. No sink and no real walls, more like what you would find inside a bathroom... little stall walls with a curtain across the front. Those are all long gone and we found a pedestal sink and put that in. Half of the framing for the wall has been done for about 2 years. The SB put in more framing and hung the door. So now we have an unsheathed wall but we definitely have a door. Which is awesome since it get something else out of the way. More to do on that project, but progress.

Finally, last weekend, we put in half a patio. Under the porch we have always wanted to lay some paving bricks that we bought about 6 years ago. Over the course of 2 days we moved a lot of dirt and 3/4 ton of gravel and about a billion bricks (most of it more than once) and we are the proud owners of about 100 square feet of patio. We ate pizza on it to christen it last Sunday. Now it is covered in junk, but I am sure we will see it again someday.

I have done almost nothing in the weeks the SB has been home but work on the house, cook and babysit. My apologies to the LB, to whom I still owe a dress. Which I am working on today.

In the success column, yeah Mother Nature, who has been providing me with plenty of blackberries to go in my breakfast yogurt.

Thank the heavens that groundhogs are short, because I have managed to pick about 6 or 7 pounds of peaches from our tree this year. Most of them have a small critter in residence, so I definitely have to cut around them, but it is exciting. They are quite tasty and considering that I don't think I sprayed them AT ALL this spring, I think they have done remarkably well. I'll try to do better next year, but I think you don't get good peaches going the completely organic route. I'll have to do more research. I made peach ice cream yesterday. It turned out to be very good vanilla ice cream with chunks of peach in it. Oh well. Maybe next time I will follow the recipe and crush up the peaches. But actually, I think the beauty of a peach is sort of quashed when it is frozen. The flavor is better when they are warm from the sun. Last year I remember having my last summer peaches chopped up and mixed into hot oatmeal on one of the cooler fall mornings and it was pretty much like heaven. I am now considering a chest freezer and an ice cream maker as my next major purchases.

I planted more kale and chard and beets and some beans. The groundhogs don't seem to be in the garden right now. The potatoes are coming along. I have some teeny weeny watermelons. And I harvested quite a few small onions. Like the SB says. Good thing we aren't subsistence farmers. I pickled exactly one quart of okra pickles yesterday. I suspect some of them will be quite woody, but I thought I would give it a go anyway. If they taste good, I'll plant more okra next year. The groundhogs left it completely alone.

I harvested my first two crimson carmello tomatoes yesterday. To find that they really weren't quite done. But they were fine. I used them to make baked eggs. You cut off the top of the tomato and scoop out the inside and then put a little butter inside the tomato and crack a small egg and fill the center. Sprinkle it with salt and pepper and bake in the oven (or in my case the toaster oven) at 400 for about 30 minutes. I cooked mine too long, but they were still edible. I used the innards of the tomato to make a little salsa-y thing with red onion and vinegar and basil and put that on top with some fresh goat cheese from the market.

I have been dreaming of chickens and ducks lately. I went so far as to go here and fill out an order form for ducks (knowing full well I wouldn't submit it). I have to order 10 ducks though. Which seems like a lot. But, well, I am getting more ambitious. I think I could do 10 ducks - knowing that I would lose a few one way or the other and probably end up with 6. And now I am thinking I need about 6 chickens. I don't want to order chicks though. I just want chickens. Ducklings are another story. I really want me some ducklings. So I may have to wait until spring. The SB hopes to get a chicken house in for me before the end of summer, but I suspect that it will have to wait until winter break for him. He has so much else to do. I already have people lined up to buy eggs from me from chickens I don't even have.

I have lost my battery charger in the current chaos, so no photos. Which stinks, b/c I wanted to show you the patio and the peach tree and the baby watermelons. And I would have loved to show you a picture of the blacksnake we found on Fourth of July. The birds pointed him out as he was trying to climb the tree for the nests, but decided against it when all the attention came down on him. We saw him later crossing the giant field of just laid mulch in the new bed and shooed him into the brush pile to keep him from heading to our neighbors picnic where we didn't expect he would get much of a welcome.

I am going out to check on the bees soon. I haven't seen them in more than a month. I am sure they miss me.

Hope springs eternal aka banging your head against a wall

We got a little rain this afternoon. It may save the things that the groundhogs have not eaten, like the leeks, onions, strawberries and blueberries. Remarkably the raspberries seem unconcerned with the complete lack of rain over the last oh, say 5 weeks. My "gardening" of late has consisted of wildly dashing about with a hose trying to resuscitate the fading rhodos, azaleas and various other expensive shrubbery. The groundhogs have luckily rendered watering the garden practically unnecessary. HOWEVER. After the rain, I raced out to the garden and put up the auxiliary fence. A short "rabbit fence" to hopefully keep the critters out. Of course, they will likely just begin to go under, being diggers and all. They have become quite fond of zucchini. The irony is that if they had waited until I had 4 or 5 zucchini, the novelty would have worn off and I would have happily contributed the baseball bat sized ones to the groundhog cause, but alas, now they are in cue to be snuffed. At some point. Not because of the garden but because they are tunneling under the house. We aren't keen on rebuilding the foundation to save the groundhogs. The are pretty stinkin' cute still though. It is hard. Luckily, I have the SB to do the really hard work around here. Like digging out the creek and snuffing the vermin.

The SB is out in Nelson County helping my Papa with a side porch renovation. He is pulling down sheet rock and uncovering the beautiful old siding from the house before the porch was added and the lovely rock chimney. All this to inform some drawings, all architect like, for someone else to build. I can't wait to see what he comes up with!

Demoralized

True. I have not been posting. Not for any noble reason, like examining my life and making good choices based on time and enjoyment value. But because I don't have much in the way of exciting news. The groundhogs ransacked the garden. Baby groundhogs realized that they could actually fit through the fence. Please picture a cantaloupe passing through the end of a bubble wand and you will understand my confused, confounded, frustrated amazement at such a feat. I feebly added some rabbit fencing around part of the garden, but they have found their way around that. The lettuce was first - no big deal as it was thinking of bolting already, then they moved on to the kale, which was doing just fine thankyouverymuch, and next it was the broccoli and now they are on to the squash. They have yet to find the beans and beets, but is a matter of minutes until that happens. Add the lack of rain. Boy Howdy, the garden season loses its luster pretty darned quickly. I am harvesting a few blueberries and raspberries a couple times a week. So far, the potatoes remain unmolested. And I still have green tomatoes on my tomato plants. Hope springs eternal - well maybe not eternal, but in the good times.

Despite being provided with a very nice new super, the bees have shown little interest in doing anything like filling it with honey for my winter enjoyment. I can't complain, as they have done a fabulous job at all the work to date. The last minute super was a shot in the dark which, not unexpectedly, missed its mark. I checked on the bees last weekend. They are still awesome. Though I will definitely not have honey this year.

I am afraid to hope for tomatoes. That and the potatoes are the hold outs. I am a glutton for punishment, since I planted beans today, and more potatoes. We'll see. I have a tiny zucchini that I expect the groundhogs to find tomorrow, or certainly before Saturday when I can go for more fencing.

Added to the list of disappointments, is that my magic bread is acting up in the heat. It is rising before I am ready and creating problems. I guess I should cut back on the yeast for the summer. What should be an 18 hour rise is now around 8 hours and I always end up sticking it in the 'fridge to slow things down but it really whacks the whole system.

Remember the stinking hot weekend a couple weeks ago? Yeah, that was the weekend we moved the SB from Bburg back home. We drove down on the Friday with a cargo van and Papa's truck. There were about 5 boxes packed. Um. Yeah. We got three hours of sleep and woke up at midnight on Friday. We packed/cleaned/loaded for the next oh, say 23.5 hours (I had a 1.5 hour nap before the bed was packed) and then we took off for C'ville. We crested Afton Mt. with thunderstorms raging in the distance. Luckily we dodged the storms since the truck was full of things that didn't want to get wet. Sunday was spent unloading the truck with the help of our house mate who I am nominating for sainthood (you wouldn't BELIEVE the paperwork involved). Our house is currently jammed full of an entire apartments worth of furniture, kitchen wares and art supplies. If you know the SB, you can imagine. For the most part I can deal, but the sofa blocking the sewing room is ...well, demoralizing. Not incapacitating, but demoralizing. The SB spent 4 days at home, of which I saw almost none of him having to work and a heavy babysitting schedule that week. He then took off for Maryland for some paying work (as opposed to the yard work he did while he was home). Still waiting to see when he returns.

Heads up. We are thinking of our garden party for July 4 since someone thoughtfully put the Fourth on a Friday and we should be able to recover in time to return to work. On the 7th. Save the date. Cheers.

GAH!

So hours after the daring rescue of the blue bird, it showed up as a present on my porch. Thanks, Kitty. GAH! He is a good enough hunter, I just wish he would challenge himself more. You know. Ground hogs. Deer. But nooooooo, he always finds something small and helpless like a little bird or a frog or a snake. Or a mouse, but rodents don't really count. Cats are supposed to eat them. That's why there are still cats in this world. They certainly wouldn't have made it this long on their merit as pets alone.

The SB is on his way home. Tomorrow we drive to the burg and pack up his apartment and bring him home. He'll be here for all of a couple days before he heads to our friends in Maryland to work on a project to earn real live money. Woo hoo. We love us some income.

I am excited that I get to have my bee mentor come again on Sunday. I have done my homework and I am ready for instruction! It is SO exciting. The bees are working like crazy. I put another super (small box) on top of the hive on Wednesday. My Papa drove all the way to Shipman to pick it up for me and dropped it on my doorstep. That is some SERVICE - and he paid for it! Gotta love the parental support of the hobby! It'll be interesting to see how far they have come on it by Sunday. There are so many of them now, I expect things will be rolling right along out there. Maybe I will try to take some pictures of the hive while I am out there. It seems less daunting with a mentor.... Technically, honey flow goes through June 15 or so. Since they are working so fast, maybe they will fill up some of my box and I can have a wee bit of homegrown honey without having to wait until next May. That is a wild and unreasonable hope, I know... It is right up there with actually having home grown tomatoes this year.... Maybe one or the other will come true!

More Critters

So the rain this afternoon put the kibosh on my mowing. The poor SB is going to be stuck with it when he comes home, I fear. I did go out and check the garden. I brought in the last (almost) of the strawberries and the first of the broccoli. While I was inspecting the blueberries (coming along nicely thankyouverymuch), I noticed a bird huddled in the corner of the bed. Its eyes were closed though it was upright. I thought it might be dead anyway - struck by one of those mysterious illnesses that seem to periodically affect the wild and fragile. Luckily, I had already closed the garden by the time the cat came out to join me. He prowled the edges of the garden fence for a while - somehow he knew the bird was there, though it seemed hidden in the bed. I went in the house and from the porch saw the cat getting more frantic. Then I saw the bird flying around inside the garden fence. I made tracks for the garden at that point and scooped up kitty kins just as he was making to pounce on the bird, which had managed to get itself over the fence by this time. He was so close to being a scooby snack. Hope he makes good on his added life. I think it was a juvenile bluebird. No parents to be seen anywhere. He probably took the car keys without asking.