Life Is Happening Faster Than I Can Write

March 2, 2016Bees, Chicks, Dehydrated Garlic, garlic, homemade, Making Maple Syrup, Pond, The Farm, Weather, Windmillruthsoaper

I don’t know about other writers but it takes me a while, anywhere from couple hours to a couple days, to write a blog post. I’ll write some, then go back and read and edit and stop to do other things or just collect my thoughts, then I’ll write some more and reread and edit and you get the picture. It seems to happen quite often that I’ll be working on one post when something else comes up, and I decide to write about that instead. At this point I have no fewer then a dozen drafts saved, potential posts that are started but just haven’t got completed and published yet. I suspect that some will get finished in the future, some may be deleted, and some of the thoughts may be incorporated in other post.

With several things on my mind this morning, I just realized that life is happening faster than I can write. (This is probably why I’ve never been able to keep a journal for very long.) Todays post we be about various things.

In Like A Lion

It’s hard to believe that today is March 1st already. See what I mean about life happening fast. Today is actually March 2nd. Still hard to believe. Whichever day it is, March did arrive and in our area it came in like a lion. I wouldn’t describe it as a raging or even roaring lion but the lion was not sleeping last night either, it was perhaps was just resting or playfully romping. We got a decent amount of snow, but as seems to be the case lately, not as much as the weather forecasters predicted. Probably the most accurate weather forecast that I heard yesterday was given by the radio DJ that said “were gonna get a lot of snow”. Since it was snowing pretty hard at that time it was a safe bet that he was right. Looking at flat surfaces outside it looks like we got about four inches, but since it was a light fluffy snow and the wind was blowing, some areas on the ground may have eight inches while others only have a couple. The “lion” may have caused adverse travel conditions, and shut down schools and senior centers, but I am not aware of any power outages or actual storm damage in our area. The “lion” did give us the opportunity to play in the snow a little today. 🙂 My big hope now is that when “March goes out like a lamb” it is not an unruly lamb.

Maple Syrup Update

One thing I didn’t realize about sap flow, and I don’t know how typical this is, was how it will stop and start again. Since the temperatures have been so unstable we have had the sap flow for a day or two, then stop for several days, then flow for a day or two, then stop again. We had a whole week between the first sap boiling and the next time we had sap to boil, but this past Sunday, with temperatures topping out near 60 degrees, was a great day to be at the farm boiling sap. While my husband was there all day, I joined him there for a few hours and took some pictures of the process that I did not get during the last syrup making.

You can see in the above pictures that the sap has boiled down some.

The next series of pictures shows how the sap will foam up and boil over if the fire underneath is extremely hot.

Stirring the pot and reducing the flame brought it back down.

The next picture shows that were getting close to the point where we will finish it off on the stove in the house. It has cooked way down and is turning brown. It also tastes sweet.

When we brought the sap home the first step was to filter it. To do this we used a jelly bag set inside a flour sifter. It may not be a professional method, but it works. We did set the filter up on two small glasses to give the sap room to drain into the pan.

We then followed the same process that we did previously, boiling the sap until it became thick and reached 219 degrees Fahrenheit on the thermometer. Instead of bottling it immediately like we did last time. We let the temperature drop to 200 degrees and filtered it again.

Last time we did not filter it after boiling, and we ended up with sand in the bottom of the jar. I did a little research and found out that the sand is formed during the boiling process, so in order to have clear syrup it must be filtered after the boiling is complete. This time we do not have any sand in it.

My husband estimated cooking about 50 quarts of sap and our yield turned out to be these (10) 4 ounce jars of syrup, equal to 1 and 1/4 quarts, so our ratio of sap to syrup was 40:1. And the flavor is oh so good!

Sharing The Kitchen

With Sunday being such a nice day the sap continue to flow and my husband spent yesterday, again, cooking sap at the farm, while I spent the day at home peeling garlic to dehydrate. Once I got the approximately 3 lbs. of garlic peeled. I realized that Dom would be bringing syrup home to cook this evening. Knowing that once I put the garlic in the dehydrator the smell of garlic would permeate the house, I decided that I would wait. I don’t know if it would happen, but I didn’t want the syrup to pick up the smell and perhaps the flavor of garlic. Garlic flavored syrup just does not sound appetizing. I put the peeled garlic in a zip lock bag freezer bag and put it in the fridge for the night.

We cooked up some of the sap last night and the rest will remain in cold storage until we are ready to cook it. Today the garlic is in the dehydrator. It should be finished by tomorrow morning.

Chick Update

The chicks are doing well.

Getting their pin feathers.

Enjoying their playhouse.

And making new friends.

Others Enjoyed Sunday’s Weather As Well

The bees were out on Sunday.

The Chickens enjoyed the weather as well.

I don’t know if the pond ever completely froze over this year.

Widely because the windmill has done it’s job.

You can’t tell from this picture but the windmill was spinning.

That’s All Folks

At least that’s enough for today. Until Next Time 🙂

Remember The Recipe

February 27, 2016cooking, homemade, Reciperuthsoaper

I made a dish for dinner the other night, and as I often do, I did it without using a recipe. My husband liked it so much he asked me if I remembered the recipe. My answer was yes, but that’s not to say that I will always remember or be able to recall the recipe. I thought I would write here so I will know where to find it.

My goal was to use up a chicken breast that was leftover from the previous nights dinner. I also thought I wanted to make a Mexican style dish.

So in a 2 quart casserole dish I layered the following:

1 can refried beans

1 can whole kernel corn

1 cup cooked white rice

1 can chopped green chili peppers

1 cooked and cubed chicken breast

I then poured 1 can of green chili enchilada sauce over it

I topped it with a mix of shredded cheddar and shredded Colby jack cheese

I put it in the oven and baked at 300 until it was warmed through probably about a half hour. I severed it with tortilla chips. I spiced mine up by adding salsa and my husband enjoyed his with parmesan cheese sprinkled on top.

This simple recipe made a nice dinner and was easily reheated for lunch the next day as well.

Welcoming New Arrivals

February 27, 2016Buff Orpingtons, Chickens, Chicks, springruthsoaper

We have several neighbors and family members who, like us, have a great appreciation for farm fresh, free range eggs. A couple weeks back, the hens started laying more so my husband put the word out to some neighbors that we had some eggs for available. Immediately we had requests for more eggs than we had on hand. At that point we decided that we should add some laying hens to our flock this year.

I wanted to get an early start with the chicks, so when we found last week that the local farm store had chicks we decided it was time to get ready. Over the weekend my husband brought the brooder (stock tank) inside and took the chick water and feed dishes out of storage. Tuesday morning, before we went to the farm store, he brought out the heat lamp and put wood chips in the brooder for bedding.

Scout and Trooper Welcoming Our New Arrivals

Scout and Trooper have been through this with us a couple times before, and Scout especially loves baby chicks. We have taught him that those are “his babies”. When we got home from the farm store the boys were eager to see the chicks.

You might think it is risky letting the dogs get so close to the chicks, and yes to some degree it is, but the boys have learned that they have to “be nice” to their “babies”. Sometimes the chicks get nosed around a little or even get doggie (tongue) bath, but we have yet to lose a chick because of the boys.

We planned on getting more Silver Laced Wyandotte’s and we compromised on getting nine pullets. When we got to the farm store we discovered that the Wyandotte’s both silver and gold laced were completely sold out. So we decided to get Buff Orpingtons.

Although Buff Orpingtons were not our first choice they really are a nice breed. Of our adult chickens I think they are the friendliest, they lay consistently large or extra large eggs, and of the three breeds we have (including Rhode Island Red and Silver Laced Wyandotte) the Buffs are the only ones that have gone broody and raised chicks. They do make good mothers. I am not sorry we got the buffs.

For the first couple weeks or at least until they get their feathers, their brooder will be indoors and Scout and Trooper will come running whenever we tend to the chicks. We put a step stool next to the brooder so Scout can put his feet up and look over the side. Trooper is tall enough to just look over the side.

After they get all of their feathers and the weather is good enough we will move them to a hutch on the deck where they can still have the heat lamp for warmth, but they will have more space.

It didn’t surprise me, on day two of having the chicks here, when my husband took this empty “Silk” carton and made them a play house. In fact I’m more surprised that he hasn’t made them a jungle gym with a tire swing and a seesaw… Yet. He’s such a good chicken daddy.

As for me I am enjoying hearing “peep peep peep” and “peck peck peck”. It makes me think spring 🙂

February 26 Presentation Postponed

February 25, 2016Uncategorizedruthsoaper

We have decided to postpone my Friday evening presentation at Essential Health in Memphis. I will post an update when this presentation is rescheduled.

Making Maple Syrup

February 22, 2016cooking, homemade, Making Maple Syrup, Tapping Maple Treesruthsoaper

The warm temperatures on Friday and Saturday were great for sap flow, so by the end of the day Saturday my husband had collected approximately 10 gallons or 40 quarts of sap. While collecting the sap from the sap buckets into plastic 5 gallon pails he filtered the sap through a honey filter that sits in the top of the 5 gallon bucket. This removed any solids that found their way into the sap. Overnight temperatures were cool enough to store the sap outside without it spoiling.

Yesterday morning he set out for the farm with the equipment he needed for cooking the sap. I didn’t get pictures of this part of the process yet, but hopefully I will as we collect and cook more sap. For equipment he took a 30 quart stainless steel pot for cooking the syrup and a long handle stainless steel spoon for stirring. He also took a second pot that the hot syrup would be transferred to in order to bring it home. He packed a lunch for himself and some treats for Scout and Trooper.

Since we don’t have a sugar shack or sap house for processing the sap indoors, it was a blessing that the weather was favorable for keeping an outdoor fire going. In preparation for this my husband had constructed a special fire pit, in a high and dry location, and split several wheel barrels full of fire wood. He began his syrup making mission by getting the fire going around 10 A.M. with a goal of having some finished product by days end. Keeping the fire burning and the pot boiling were his main objectives. He first thought that boiling small amounts at a time (filling the pot 1/4 full) would speed up the process, but he quickly learned that each time he would add more cold sap the temperature would drop so dramatically that it would take 10-12 minutes to return to a boil. Realizing the whole pot was hot, he decided to fill he pot closer to the top and maintain the boil while adding only smaller amounts of sap as it boiled down. He said it took about two hours before it came to a rolling boil.

In mid afternoon he made a quick trip back to the house to bring Scout and Trooper (who apparently just wanted to lay in the van) and to grab some hot dogs that he could cook over the fire for dinner. At this point he was anticipating that it could be as late as 8 P.M. before he was done cooking down the sap.

Reality was that around 6 P.M., a long eight hours after he began, and just in time for the chickens to be closed in their coop for the night, the sap had boiled down enough that the rest of the process could be done in the kitchen.

When he returned home we poured the cooked-down sap into a much smaller pan.

We heated it for a few minutes before deciding this would be a good time to filter it. We had decided to use a juice (or jelly) bag, that I had on hand for filtering the “sand”(a byproduct of boiling sap) out of the syrup. This seemed to work well. We then returned the sap to a boil and watched closely as it continued to boil down. My husband also told me to take some bacon out of the freezer to cook with tomorrows waffles for breakfast.

Once it seemed to be thickening I put in a candy thermometer. It needed to be brought up to 219 degrees fahrenheit or 7 degrees above the boiling point of water.

While I watched the thermometer, my husband used a spatula dipped in the syrup to check for sheeting – the syrup forms a sheet on the spatula instead of running off in droplets.

When the syrup was sheeting on the spatula and the temperature reached 219 degrees, which happened about the same time, we poured the syrup into sterilized ball jars.

Of course we had been tasting our product along the way, and I can honestly say that, while I don’t have a long history of tasting pure maple syrup, this is the best maple syrup that I have ever tasted.

This mornings breakfast menu included bacon and blueberry waffles, (with frozen blueberries from last springs harvest and our farm fresh egg), and of course our own maple syrup. Yumm!

http://andersonsmaplesyrup.com/index.php?page=nutritionalinformation This link has some really good nutritional information about real maple syrup.

While we don’t call it a bucket list, making maple syrup has certainly been on our to-do list for quite a long time and we are thrilled that we have done it. 🙂

Since the weather has cooled again the sap is not flowing, this weird weather pattern has only left us wondering when the next sap will flow and how much syrup we might end up with this year. But in the mean time we have realized why real maple syrup costs so much.