Monthly Archives: August 2018

Making Tomato Sauce

Reflections

We recently began harvesting tomatoes and since I have so many new readers I thought it would be a good time to share this post from last October. Thanks for reading and have a great day 🙂

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I have been asked several times by friends how I make tomato sauce and I usually answer “cook it, cook it, cook it, and when you think it is ready, cook it some more.” Making a thick tomato sauce takes lots of time.

There is, however, much to do before you get to the cooking part and that is what I want to address today. To start with there are many, many varieties of tomatoes and although I do like to start with a paste tomato, Amish paste or roma’s, you can use any type of tomatoes for making sauce. Along with Amish paste I use any tomatoes that are ripe and will not be eaten fresh in the next day or two. I will even throw cherry tomatoes into the mix rather than see them go to waste.

In addition to taking a lot of time to make tomato sauce it also takes a…

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From Peepers to Laying Hens – Right On Track

Buff Orpingtons, Chickens, Eggs, Reflections,

When we got our new chicks this past April I estimated it would be some time in August that they would start laying eggs. My estimate was based on our previous experience with Buff Orpingtons; they have pretty consistently started laying eggs at around 18 weeks of age.

Yesterday when my husband gave me the eggs he had collected I was thrilled to discover that the young ones (or at least one of them) had began laying.

If you are not familiar with raising chickens, you may be wondering how I concluded that the young ones were laying by just seeing the eggs. Nope – hens do not sign their eggs or even leave a trade mark. Without monitoring the nest boxes all day long we have no way of knowing who lays what eggs. (We don’t watch the nest boxes all day.)

But…

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when a hen first starts laying she lays mini-eggs, eggs that are much smaller than normal. In the photo above the smallest egg is from one peepers turned laying hen.

I suspect that it is one of our Buff Orpingtons who gave us this egg, because it is much like the mini eggs we have gotten from Buffs in the past, but the truth is we have never raised Austrolorps before so I am uncertain how soon to expect them to start laying or what their eggs will look like. Some of the other breeds we have raised have produced mini eggs that are much smaller than this one and when opened they only have a small dot of yolk while the rest is egg white. When opened this egg contained both yolk and white that were proportionate to a regular egg.

Today my husband brought home a second mini egg which makes me wonder if a second hen started laying or the same hen gave us small eggs two days in a row. I expect over the next few weeks we will have several mini eggs as all of the girls become regular with their laying.

It’s exciting that our “peepers” are growing up as we are counting on them to keep us in fresh eggs through the winter. 🙂

Thanks for reading. Until next time – be well.

A Recipe To Remember

cooking, homemade, Recipe, Reflections, ,

I made a dish very similar to this last year, or perhaps it was even two years ago, when we had an abundance of banana peppers. I remember that we really enjoyed it, I just didn’t remember the exact recipe because I did not write it down. Last week when our neighbors sent over a bunch of banana peppers from their garden I decided to try it again. This time I am writing it down and sharing it with you as well.

I wasn’t sure what to call this and my first thought was stuffed banana peppers. That name reminded me too much of stuffed bell peppers but this really has no similarity. It is much closer to the jalapeno poppers that I love, so I decided to call it banana pepper poppers. Besides that is just fun to say. 🙂

* It is really not necessary to have the exact amount of any ingredient listed – a little more of this or a little less of that will not make a great difference. Feel free to add the word “about” in front of the amount of each ingredient.

Banana Pepper Poppers

8 Fresh Banana Peppers

4 oz. cream cheese softened

1/2 cup grated mozzarella cheese

2 or 3 jalapeno peppers

3 slices of bacon cooked crispy

bread crumbs

Slice the banana peppers in half long ways a remove seeds. Remove core and seeds from jalapeno peppers and chop them into small pieces. Chop bacon into small (bacon bit like) pieces. Mix cream cheese, mozzarella cheese, bacon bits and jalapeno peppers. Place banana pepper halves on baking sheet and fill each one with cream cheese mixture. Sprinkle bread crumbs on top of each pepper. Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 20 to thirty minutes.

ENJOY! 🙂

Nice Catch

Catfish, Pond, Reflections, The Farm

Yesterday evening our youngest daughter, Lindell along with her beau Brycen, took some time out of their busy schedules to visit us at the farm. After dinner my husband, who has been wanting to do some fishing for some time now, dug some worms and he and Brycen, who had brought his own pole and tackle, went fishing.

Lindell and I sat by the campfire and chatted, not paying much attention to our fishermen until we heard somewhat of a commotion. My husband was coaching Brycen, “hold it, give it some line, do you have your drag set?” Lindell and I headed toward the pond knowing there must be a big fish on the line. I quickly doubled back to grab my camera but still arrived in time to capture some photos.

Whatever was on the end of that line was bending Brycen’s fishing rod and pulling the guys in the paddle boat. Realizing that they were not going to be able to lift this fish out of the water on that rod and line my husband decided to take the boat to the beach and pull the fish in from there. This took several attempts as the fish kept dragging the boat in the opposite direction.

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My husband and I suspected that he may have hooked one of the 12 to 15 inch walleye that we had caught last year.

 

but we were all surprised to see what he had actually caught was this monster.

 

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We knew that there were large catfish in the pond, but even using catfish bait we had yet to catch one. Brycen was fishing with just a worm on a small hook. It was a clean catch hooked perfectly into the corner of the mouth. Since we were not prepared to skin a catfish this guy did not become tonight’s dinner but was released back into the pond.

I am so glad I had my camera so this did not become just another “big fish” story.

Nice catch Brycen!!! 🙂