Refrigerator Pickles

Advertisements

Original recipe can be found here. I used Dried Dill instead of fresh, though the original recipe used fresh dill. I also forgot to add onion, so that also changed the flavor.

I made this recipe a week and a half ago. This weekend I was making picnic food, and I thought these pickles would pair very nicely. These pickles are very good. They aren’t as sour as store bought pickles, but they had the right flavor and tasted great! I used 9 tsp dried dill, 2 garlic cloves, and I forgot the onion. Despite this these pickles were very good and still had a fresh flavor about them. If you still have as many cucumbers as I do, this would be a great recipe to make!

Refrigerator Pickles Recipe Card Download

What You Will Need

4 qts Cucumbers, with ends cut off and quartered if large
9-12 tsp dried dill
2-4 garlic cloves
1 small onion
7 1/2 cups water
2 cups vinegar
1/3-1/2 cup salt

Directions

In a large pot, bring water, vinegar, and salt to a boil. Turn off burner and remove from heat.
In a gallon container, add dill, garlic and onion, then top with cut cucumbers.
Cover with warm brine, place a plate on top to hold cucumbers under the brine, then add lid and transfer the fridge.
Pickles are ready after 5 days, and are good for 9-12 months.

August 17, 2020 0

Pork Over Buttered Noodles

Advertisements

This is a recipe I made in order to use up some extra pulled pork in my fridge. It is a very straight forward recipe. I didn’t add any seasoning to it, because the pork had more than enough on it’s own, however, if you are gonna make this from pork butt, or unseasoned pork, you can play with some fun french herbs like thyme, rosemary, marjoram, or basil. This also tasted great over noodles! This recipe made 4 adult sized meals.

Pork Over Buttered Noodles Recipe Card Download

What You Will Need

2 Cups Shredded Pork
2 Garlic Cloves, diced
3 Shallots, sliced
2 Medium Carrots, slices
1 Tomato, quartered
1 Tbsp Butter
3 Cups Water
2 Beef Bouillon Cubes
A Dutch oven and spoon
A cutting board and knife
3-4 cups cooked egg noodles with butter for serving

Directions

In a dutch oven, add butter, carrots, garlic, and onion. Cook over medium heat until soft and have added color.
Add tomato, water, and bouillon, and bring to a boil. Once boiling, add pork. Cook for 4-5 minutes.
Remove from heat then serve over noodles.

August 14, 2020 0

August Weekend Harvest and Next Year Contemplation

Advertisements

This weekend we got a huge harvest from the garden. We pulled our 2 fabric pots of carrots and we harvested green beans after several weeks of waiting. For the green beans, we rinsed them then immediately preserved them. (I’ll do a post about preservation of food really soon. I have decided to freeze veggies this year since I have no interest in pressure canning.) As for the carrots, we pulled them in 2 batches and immediately took each batch inside to remove the carrot tops. You should immediately remove the carrot tops from your carrots once they leave the ground, because if they sit in 90 F weather for more than 10 minutes, it’s bad for both the carrot and the tops, if you plan to use them like us. Once all the carrots were separated, I used a brush and water to remove the dirty and roots. I also threw the carrot tops in a strainer and rinsed them before prepping them meals by removing extra length off the long stems.

I’ll do a post soon about how I preserved the carrots and green beans, as well as how I am saving my onion harvest that I pulled the end of last month.

I’ve also been thinking a lot about the garden for next year and maybe planting more for this fall. I have seeds for more radishes that I plan to plant this fall, however I’m still terribly indecisive. We are thinking of putting up one to two more raised beds by the peach tree that would be low maintenance plants, but we’re still deciding on that too. So far, I’ve decided on double the tomato plant for next year, 10 indeterminate, and another row of green beans but on a trellis double the height of the fence this year. I would also like to plant garlic this fall for next year, but I’m still determining were to place that. We are planning two fabric bags of each, potatoes and sweet potatoes. And, if we are able to get in one more bed, I’ve been thinking about bell peppers, cabbage, and broccoli. If we add a second bed, I’m also considering more onions and carrots. If you have any thoughts or input, it is greatly appreciated. This was my first year with a garden, so any advice is helpful.

August 13, 2020 0

Carrot Top Salad

Advertisements

What You Will Need

3 cups Carrot Tops, cut stems and cleaned
1 small Tomato
2 shallots
1 medium carrot
1 medium cucumber
Preferred dressing
Cutting board and knife
Serving bowl

Instructions

Slice and dice ingredients listed above to you desired form.
You will want to remove as much of the empty carrot top stem as possible, since it is stiffer and less enjoyable than the rest of the carrot top. Carrot tops are also bitter, so you’ll want to add a pinch of salt to your personal plate, and you’ll want to pick a dressing that compliments or covers the flavor. I used ranch and Italian dressing.
The other ingredients are optional, and you can feel free to substitute in whatever you see fit.

August 12, 2020 0

July Garden Update 2020

Advertisements

July has been very busy for the garden. I harvested radishes the end of June, and July I just pulled my onions. I started the month with several tomatoes set, but before long, there was a period of no setting fruit, and they stopped growing entirely. My cucumbers however had a great start of the month. I got lots of big and beautiful, as well as gourd-like and misshapen cucumbers. I was able to can pickles, and just last week I was able to make a gallon of fridge dill pickles that last up to a year! By the end of the month, I had gotten a tomato from each plant, and had begun finding green beans. The carrots were almost ready to harvest, and the seedpods on the radishes had begun to turn red. The last thing that happened this month, was the loss of a tomato plant. I planted 2 big beef, and 3 better boy, and one of my big beef plants must have been hit with fusarium, a fungus. I treated the roots with a mixture of peroxide and water, I heard it sizzling, showing it was a fungus, but the plant got hit hard and fast, so it couldn’t recover, and I had to pull it.

My second bed also went crazy this month. It grew so fast, that I had quite the mess there. Besides that, My marigolds had begun growing, and one day, there was a big hole in the bed, and the netting had several holes. I found, several weeks later, that it was in fact a bunny who found my raised bed, and had 4 little bunnies under my marigold. We also decided at that point, we’ll splurge next year and buy chicken wire for the beds next year. better safe than sorry. Despite that, only a few onions got toppled, and nothing was eaten, just a couple frightened bunnies when I’d come for my daily cucumber haul.