I haven’t written about gardening in some time, now, and currently, that’s where my attentions are. I’m just done with marmalade at the moment (though I am sure I will make a few more before the season is over).

For now I am overwhelmed I wasn’t able to get as much work done in the garden, while the plants were still sleeping. But, they’ve awoken now, and some things will have to just wait until next year (um, pruning pretty much everything).

I thought I would share a bit of what’s going on in my backyard at the moment. I’d love to hear what’s going on with your gardens.

Right now, the biggest show is from the apple tree. Delicate pink blooms are just appearing. The tree above is an espalier, so it is a perfect height for my toddler daughter to ooh and awww at the pretty pink blooms. Remember how I mentioned I just did not get around to pruning this winter? Yeah.

artichoke

I love this artichoke. I can no longer remember the heirloom variety I planted 4-5 years ago. I chose it because it was known for having a large heart, which everyone knows is the best part of the artichoke. My husband found it unsatisfying due to the smallish leaves. Sometimes you just don’t look great on the outside, but you’ve got a big heart. My husband didn’t find that humorous. Well, he’s lucky. After many faithful seasons, my plant has stopped producing and I’ll be cutting it down this weekend, and replacing it with a globe artichoke, more to my husband’s liking. BUT…I did plant, last week, in my community garden plot, an Italian purple artichoke, violetto, known for its tender leaves that are almost entirely edible. WOW! That’s a whole lotta commas in that sentence. The things you learn about yourself when blogging…

Blueberries: foreground and background

I’ve got two half barrels, each filled with two types of blueberries, high and low bush, planted together to elongate the producing season. I’m hoping this year will be filled with an abundance of blueberries, which should save us quite a bit of money in fruit. Blueberries are so expensive, and yet so delicious. Given they grow well in large pots, I think it’s a fine investment for anyone who’s able to grow them in their zone.

cherry tree: just starting to bloom

The poor cherry tree. It looks so bare with its barely blooming buds. And across the way, that lovely apple is just mocking it! It’s OK, soon it will be filled with lovely blossoms, itself.

black jack fig: beginning 2nd year

Lovely little Black Jack fig, just now beginning its second year. Probably at least another two years until I see a fig, dangnabbit.

perlette grapes: 4th year

This is going to be a good year for my grapes, I think. Last year was very nice though this is the year I think we should have plenty of grapes for both munching on, as well as putting up plenty quarts of grape juice.

Just finished it's first season!

This little treasure just finished her first year. Round meiwa kumquats are sweeter than their oval-shaped counterparts. I’m a big proponent of introducing children to lots of different foods when they are young, lest they get picky. My son, who has the most versatile tastes of any child I know, is not impressed with the kumquat. My daughter, on the other hand, and her little BFF (both nearly three years old) are huge fans on the little orange globes, and gladly bite into their skins, whole. This year we got about 18 kumquats. Next year I plan to make this if there’s enough production!

Tangerines just finished and lemons area ready

If you look closely, you’ll see the final remnants of tangerine season on  the right arm of the tree. The middle and left arm are filled with Lisbon and Eureka lemons, respectively. I’ve said this before, but now that Meyer lemon season is waning, I will say it again: I don’t know what the big deal is over the Meyer. Give me the bright, fresh flavor of a Lisbon or Eureka any day! I am so glad they are back in season, and I desperately need to pick some of those lemons. The tree branches are hanging quite full! Lemonade, anyone?

They just finished and are at it again!

If you have room for a little tree, I highly recommend a dwarf lime tree. Limes are incredibly unpopular as a crop in the United States (we grow very few in the U.S.) though our growing conditions are just fine. We just don’t have the demand, though that seems to be changing. But if you have a lime tree for yourself, you will always have tree-ripened limes which are YELLOW and far superior to the green limes you’ll find pretty much anywhere. And with those tree-ripened limes, you will have ingredients for limeade, margaritas, lime pie, lime curd (the best curd evah!) and my favorite roast chicken recipe: easy honey and lime roast chicken. Limes. So versatile! Who knew? Well, Mexicans, for one. That’s where we get most of our limes – as well as those tasty margaritas!!

Rows and rows of onions

Onions! Rows and rows of onions. Both sweet yellow (Walla Walla) and red (Tropeana Lunga). The red bullet-shaped onions should be ready to pick at the end of this month, and it will be another two weeks following that before the walla wallas will be ready ready. Ha! Good joke, right?

This is why everyone should grow herbs

Another thing I deeply encourage people to get into, if they are considering gardening, is herbs. So easy. You can fit them into any lifestyle or space. Many of them are quite prolific (see the parsley above) and will be ready as an additional fresh ingredient in your meals, whenever needed. It’s actually quite a money saver if you cook with fresh herbs, because those little plastic boxes of herbs are not only wasteful from the plastics perspective, you use like a touch of the herb, and eventually the remainder goes bad in your refrigerator, pushed to the back of your crisper, not to be seen for another month and a half until SURPRISE! There it is, dripping all over the place. And that gooey brown crap cost you $3.50. Nice.

One bed is never enough

The strawberries are back in town! Hooray! If there’s one thing I regret it’s not planting more strawberries. So I am doing that this year! Adding another bed. Because there’s nothing like a red, ripe strawberry, sweetened on the vine and picked warm from the sun. Squish. Into my mouth you go!

Valentine’s Day is my favorite holiday of the year. I love love.

If you’re looking for a last minute fun project for your kids, or some goodies for their classrooms, give me an hour and I’ll give you some sweet marshmallow pops.

I got this idea from a book my mom got me for Christmas, Kids in the Holiday Kitchen. My mom loves holidays just as much as I do (probably more), and as a result she has a terrible habit of buying me holiday related items at the holiday. Which makes no sense to me whatsoever. Here I am looking at this adorable little book with all these fun cooking projects to do with the kids, and oh, wait! That holiday is TODAY. So, put that away until next year!

But! I saw the sugarplum lollies in that book, which inspired this idea for Valentine’s Day.

And look at me, just like my mom, I am throwing this at you at the last minute. But…if you have an hour to do this with your kids, even after dinner tonight, it’s a pretty quick project.

What you’ll need:

Double boiler, or two pots as a stand-in
Bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips (feel free to get creative)
Pop sticks
Bag of big marshmallows
Miscellaneous holiday themed candies
Cookie sheet
Wax paper
Cellophane to wrap the pops in
Ribbon

What you’ll do:

Prep several plates of your valentine-themed candies. Plates work better than bowls, since you can hold the pop straight out, and simply roll in the candies. Set aside.

Cover your cookie sheet with wax paper. You’ll be putting your pops on the tray and then into the fridge to set, so you’ll want to make room in your refrigerator, as well. Set aside.

Add an inch of water in the bottom of the double boiler and simmer. Add chocolate chips to the top bowl and stir constantly until fully melted.

Meanwhile, prep your pops. Push the stick fully into, but not through, the marshmallow.

Dip and swirl into the chocolate. Let the chocolate drip from the marshmallow, and try to move it such that you have a relatively even coating of chocolate on the pop. Don’t over do it.

When decorating the pop you can either press only the top of the pop into the candies, so that it is primarily chocolate with like a little surprise candy hat; or you can roll the whole pop lightly in the candies, covering the whole thing. This is obviously the best role for the kids. Let them have at it!

As you finish decorating each pop, put it onto your wax-covered tray. When done, put the tray into the refrigerator in order to set. It sets pretty quickly, but give it at least 30 minutes before you take them out. If you want, you can wrap them in cellophane and tie with a decorative little ribbon.

Done!

Warning: This is the sweetest little jar of curd you ever did taste. It is highly addictive. Especially when a dollop is plopped atop a gingersnap.

SNAP! That’s some good curd! 

My good friend Valerie and I had planned a canning get together with our other good friends, Grace and Akemi. This was during the holiday season and we were planning on making gifts for teachers and friends. Valerie came up with the brilliant idea of canning cranberry curd. Now – I know what you’re thinking. IS THAT SAFE? Yes, it is. Please see explanation at bottom of post.

To begin, Valerie chose a recipe adapted from Nigella Lawson‘s How to Be a Domestic Goddess, as published in the Houston Chronicle way back in 2006.

We quickly modified the recipe based on our joint knowledge of food preservation guidelines. But the end result was so wickedly delicious I ended up making an even larger batch at home several weeks later, carefully documenting my changes to make this both delicious and safe.

A final quick note: cranberries are not local to the bay area. Gosh, I think it is one of the few things we DON’T grow! But I was able to score bags of fresh organic cranberries from Trader Joe’s for a pretty good price (I think $2.99, if my memory serves correct). Curd is rich and delicious and, therefore, I like to can it in small 4 ounce jars to ensure I don’t eat a whole cup at once. ‘Cuz I will. Besides, if you can them in 4 ounce jars, there are more to give!

If you have frozen cranberries that made it past Thanksgiving, here’s a wonderful way to get them out of the freezer and into the jar!

* If you’re making the full recipe, which is too much to can in one batch in a canner bath, you might consider using the oven for this project. In which case you need to preheat your oven to 250 degrees F. While it is pre-heating, simply put your jars into the oven, on a cookie sheet, to sterilize. They should be in there at least 20 minutes, but leaving them in the oven the entire time you are working on your recipe will be more than enough! When you’re ready to can the curd, take the cookie sheet out of the oven, fill the jars (follow regular canning instructions on filling) and put the lidded jars back into the oven for 15 minutes, more depending on altitude.

Why it’s safe: I know there are a bunch of people who are skeevy about canning a curd. And you should be! Good for you for not wanting to get botulism! If I hadn’t made it my New Year’s resolution to not swear, I’d put a little badge on this recipe that said “Don’t FU*& with this recipe!” But…I am trying not to swear. So I can’t do that. But please, don’t modify this recipe unless you know what you’re doing. You can safely halve the recipe. So…how am I confident this is safe? Here is the USDA’s recipe for safely canning lemon curd. A reminder that the biggest safety issue with a canning recipe has to do with the pH of a recipe. A recipe with a pH of 4.6 or lower can be canned safely in a canner bath. Lemons and cranberries are very acidic, and they are about the same pH (around 2.4). Very safe. In the case of a curd recipe, proteins are added (butter and egg) which will affect the pH of the end product. But you will note that in comparison to the USDA’s lemon curd recipe, I used more juice and more berries (meaning my recipe is even MORE acidic) and LESS butter and eggs, comparatively. Therefore…you have no reason to worry about the pH level being safe for canning purposes.

More pretty pictures!

squeezed orange juice

Press through a fine-meshed sieve

temper the eggs

make pretty swirls!

About this business:

For a while now I’ve been intending to dedicate some regular space on my blog to highlight local food businesses that I love. Of course it only make sense that I start with a business that focuses on preserves (right?!?). Kristen Cederquist, on of the co-owners of Serendipity Saucy Spreads, was one of the first people I befriended on Twitter. I admire her immensely as both a wonderful business person, as well as a friend. Kristen and Lynette are good people who make great jam!

From their website: “Serendipity Saucy Spreads is a collaborative effort of Kristen & Lynette Cederquist, two Santa Cruz artists with a passion for creating innovative twists on traditional family jam and preserve recipes.  Lynette began making jam with her grandmother many many years ago and can remember waking up on summer mornings to lug boxes of fruit that were delivered from family friends.  She and her grandmother and later on her mother would spend the morning preparing the fruit and then making delicious jams that they would share with their friends to enjoy for months to come.  The tradition was then passed to Kristen, whose first memories go back to picking the ripest plums for plum jam on summer mornings with her grandmother when she was about five or six years old.  For the past 15 years Kristen and Lynette have carried on the family tradition of making delicious jams, jellies, and marmalades.”

Why I love them:

I love the resurgence of local food businesses that have taken off in the Bay Area, particularly pickles and preserves. With such lovely weather and rich soil, we’re able to grow a variety of foods the rest of the world could only envy. Who needs Smuckers when you have the world at your fingertips? I do admit, though, to being annoyed by overly-clever preserves – the kinds that entail so many ingredients you get the feeling the main goal is to impress, rather than to impress upon the flavor. Serendipity gets that. They focus on bringing out the best flavors using quality ingredients and combinations resulting in a style of jam that is very fruit forward and usually very low in sugar. “Don’t screw with perfection” comes to mind! Not to say their jams are boring – on the contrary, they are anything but. My current favorite is their Comice pear and rosemary conserve. The sweetness of the rosemary brings out the best flavors in the Comice pear, giving it just enough complexity that it suddenly pairs equally well with a cheese platter as it does a atop a scone. I also use it to stuff pancakes! YUM! They have a spiced carrot jam that is reminiscent of a creamy pumpkin butter, and is wildly comforting during these cold-ish months (OK, it’s really been like spring time around here, lately. What is up with that?). My son is eagerly awaiting strawberry season again, for his favorite Serendipity flavor to reappear: strawberry preserves with balsamic.

Learn more about them:

Located in Santa Cruz, California

Visit their website to learn more about them (and check out what local flavors they currently have in-season!)

Fan them on Facebook

Follow them on Twitter

Support your favorite local small businesses! Without them, it would be a bland, bland world!

Happy New Year. May 2012 be filled with love and light.

Speaking of light…I LOVE this Rainbow Brite spiraling mason jar chandelier from BootsNGus Design on Etsy.

Here’s a great gift for the holidays. It gives pizazz to pork, adds a spicy kick to your ice cream, heck, you can happily spend an afternoon eating it straight from the jar. My kids do. Believe me. They do. I’m kinda pissed about that because I had to make a second, unexpected batch.

I pretty much got this recipe straight out of the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving, though I modified it slightly.

When working with apples, especially when you need to core, peel, and do all of that other time consuming prep, it’s good to first prep your “I need to prevent these apples from browning” station. When the flesh of the apple is exposed to oxygen, a reaction called oxidation occurs, causing them to brown. You can prevent this by soaking the fruit in an “antioxidant bath”. Mix 8 cups of water with 1/2 cup lemon juice and set your lemon bath aside. As you peel your apple slices, throw them in the bath until you’re ready to jar them. If you don’t have lemon juice, you can also use citric acid (follow manufacturer’s instructions).

Oh – and one last thing before we get to the sweet stuff…normally I am very crazy rules-based about food. For some reason, I decided this recipe didn’t apply. It’s a treat – it’s a gift – it’s special. And so out come the candies, corn syrup and food coloring.

Be warned!

You don’t have to cook fancy or complicated masterpieces – just good food from fresh ingredients. – Julia Child

Lately I’ve been cooking up a storm. There was a brief period of time when I was working out of an office, that I swear to you, I could not get it together in terms of food. I am sure there are a million tips and tricks people would have offered me, and eventually I would have figured something out. But I had worked from home for the last seven years. I didn’t know how to manage taking my kids to school then commuting for an hour in traffic to work, or picking the kids up from two different locations then making it home after 6:30, only to have two hungry kids and a hungry husband starting back at me.  I think I worked a total of three months in an office, full-time, and I don’t know how many meals I was able to actually cook, maybe three. Honestly. What should have been the best part of my day, being able to be back with my family, eating and talking and laughing – was, instead, a stressful mess.

I decided to be easy on myself. So I bought a lot of “healthy convenience food.” It might be a ricotta stuffed chicken breast that still takes 45 minutes to cook, but at least I can call my husband from the cell phone and tell him to pop it in, so it’s ready when we the kids and I get home. That kind of convenience is expensive, it turns out.

I spent my entire first full day of not working, cooking everything I could get my hands on. I made the kids whole grain pancakes stuffed with Serendipity Pear and Rosemary Compote (so freaking good it hurts, that compote is!) for breakfast. I made a giant salad for lunch, topped with goat cheese, sliced apples, and pecans I candied with honey. For dinner – a butternut squash lasagna. I had everything I needed in my kitchen. I didn’t have to run out to the store. It turns out that home cooking can be a lot less expensive than we’ve been told. I haven’t stopped cooking, since, both for the cost-savings aspect, as well as the sheer joy of it. I missed cooking.

All of this got me to thinking about the supposed inconvenience and the expense of cooking real food. Here’s the food story that many people experience in our society, one that’s increasingly been fed to us (hahaha) via marketing probably since the 1960′s: Life is expensive, and the way you achieve the American Dream is to for both of you to get out there in the work force and work your little tails off so that you may reap the rewards. As a result, we become too busy to cook. Enter snacks and pre-made meals and such. “Look!” they say. “We are here to help you. You need us. We make your very busy life easier. We’ll make cereal. Just add milk. Here are some lunchables. The whole lunch? Already wrapped up and ready to go! We’ve got macaroni and cheese and frozen pizzas. Your kids will enjoy them. They’re quick to make and you won’t have to argue about dinner at the end of a long, exhausting day. You want healthy? We’ve pre-cut your broccoli into little florettes and sealed them up so they’re ready when you are!  You shouldn’t have to cut. You make, what, $45 an hour? $50 maybe? Is cutting broccoli a valuable use of your time? No, it is not. We will take care of that for you. You just enjoy.”

If you think about how that trend evolved over the last 5 decades, it’s amazing how much has changed. Life became more expensive to catch up with the fact that more money was able to be spent, causing costs to rise. We consolidated from many food businesses to probably 2-3 large companies that control the greatest amount of our food supply. We’re more sedentary, we eat more empty calories, and the list goes on. Suddenly, what used to be considered “practical, normal and healthy” (cooking our food from scratch, drinking raw milk, baking our own bread, growing and canning our food) has become kitschy. Though wonderfully all of this is catching on, now. Yeah!

In the meantime, real food has grown a reputation for being both too expensive and too inconvenient. That is true in a sense. There are a myriad of reasons for the expense including the ineffectiveness (from a health persepctive) of the farm bill and the economies of scale benefit that large food businesses experience, but there are equally good ways to keep the cost of “real food” down: shop at farmer’s markets, buy large quantities of a desired product with a group of friends, get a few people to go in on a grass-fed cow, limit what you eat, make food from scratch, shop locally and let the law of supply and demand do its thing. I really could go on. The point is: oftentimes the storyline determines the outcome. And we were sold a storyline that told us we all needed to work our asses off for the American Dream. The fact that real food became unattainable for a great portion of our society, was the outcome.

When both parents are forced to work because it’s the only way to afford “life” we’ve created a problem. Because the whole point of the women’s movement wasn’t that we all wanted to work – we just wanted to be treated equally. We wanted choice. Perhaps because I was born in Silicon Valley, I never thought there was a choice. Life is indeed expensive. But suddenly I am seeing that choice is all around me. I simply got swept up in doing what I thought I should do. Spend.

Simplifying your life can go a long way towards stretching a dollar. Pre-packaged food does cost a lot of money. Take a pizza, for example. Everyone pretty much has the ingredients to make pizza dough. A lot of people grow tomatoes. Many people even make and freeze or can their own sauce. If not, how many people don’t have tomato sauce in their pantries? Add cheese (usually something people have – and really – not as hard to make as you would think!) and whatever toppings. Voila!

So, yes, coming home and throwing a frozen pizza in the oven is easier. But making the pizza is more fun. And we both probably have everything right there, anyway. And if we started planning and making sure we had the right ingredients in our homes, we could even get to a place where we have the ingredients to make our own mozzarella (heck! You could have a goat in your backyard and make that mozzarella from goat’s milk! But read this first before you get too excited; I’ve decided against the goat), grow our own tomatoes, we’ve got our staples all there to make our pizza pie dough. We could even have a few pots of lettuce  and herbs growing in the kitchen! Now we’ve got ourselves a lovely little homegrown salad and a homemade tomato, basil and mozzarella pizza. And let’s throw in a glass of chianti – because.

Ahhhhh.

I’m feeling the joy of cooking, again, because I’m no longer rushing the process. What I’ve realized in the meantime is that eating well can be inexpensive as long as you have a good amount of basic staples, grow a little bit of your food, and give yourself a little time. I’ve noticed that I’m spending far less money on food because I am cooking from scratch. And I’m enjoying that time with myself, time being creative through cooking and canning, and being able to day dream again, because I have the time for such luxuries. I’m sure that will change at some point. But for now, I’m enjoying cooking up whatever comes to mind.

Except for the fact that I would be losing out on the SEO factor, I would have titled this post: Easy Peazy Apple Squeezy. Because that’s a way cuter title, right?

I used to be of the mind that there was really no need to can applesauce. Apples grow abundantly here in the Bay Area. My Trader Joe’s has 100% gravenstein applesauce for $1.99 for a 16 ounce jar. Gravenstein apples come from Sebastopol, which is only about an hour and a half drive from me. So, I am pretty sure the applesauce is sourced locally, and I know most of the larger gravenstein apple orchards in Sebastopol and I like them all. So I hedge my bets that it’s a good source. Besides, applesauce seems like a pain in the butt to make, what with all the skinning and coring. Who needs that?

But guess what? It turns out that applesauce is one of the easiest things in the world to make! And because you don’t need “pretty apples” you can often pick up some solid organic apples for $0.50 pound, making it more cost effective to can your own.

If you’ve never canned your own applesauce, be prepared to be amazed with the simplicity!

Canned Applesauce Tutorial – see bottom of post for user-friendly recipe!

Step 1: Sterilize your jars and lids

Step 2: Quarter apples, leaving cores and stems intact. See? EASY! Add quartered apples to a large stainless steel saucepan. Add enough water to prevent scorching. Bring to a boil over medium heat.

Step 2

Step 3: Reduce heat to a simmer and boil gently, stirring occasionally, for 20 minutes. Apples should be falling apart. Remove from heat and let cool.

Step 4: Working in batches, pass apples through a food mill to remove skin, seeds, stems and the like.

Step 4

Step 5: Return applesauce to pan and add lemon juice. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring frequently. Reduce heat to a simmer and ladle hot applesauce into jars, being sure to release the air bubbles, until there’s 1/2 inch headspace.

Step 5

Step 6: Wipe the rims and seal the jar. Process in a boiling water bath for twenty minutes.

Notes: 

You can choose any type of apple you want, to suit your taste. I like to use a mixture of tart and sweet apples. This year’s batch was made from pink ladies and golden delicious apples.

Leaving the stem and core intact when cooking the apples increases the pectin, speeding the process of achieving the preferred texture.

And here’s an easily printable recipe for you!

Last week I was fortunate enough to be invited to a blogger luncheon with Tiny Prints – which was fantastic because:

1) I love Tiny Prints stationary. (Both of my kids’ birth announcements were Tiny Prints!)

2) I got to spend time with a group of women I adore.

3) Free food. Yeah!

4) A chance to check out Tiny Prints new holiday line of cards (just in time for the holidays!)

How stoked am I? Well, let me just tell you: I am pretty darn stoked. I’m a big small business advocate, especially local businesses. And Tiny Prints is but a hop, skip and a jump from me. I love entrepreneurs who see a niche in the marketplace and go after it – and Tiny Prints really has the market on the super cute card thing, thanks to their recognition of the fact that we all love to show off our kids via adorably-designed photo cards!

While at the luncheon, I was able to view some of Tiny Prints newest products and designs.

Tiny Prints on display!

I was showing off some of the holiday cards to my girlfriend the next day, trying to decide which card I would settle on, and we got into an exisistential discussion around holiday card designs. She thought they were moving too far into the designer realm and was looking for more traditional (Tiny Prints has traditional, by the way). Personally, I was arguing for the fun and frivolous. I totally dig the rainbow line. What can I say? Sometimes I’m in a traditional mood and sometimes I’m in a rainbow bright sort of mood. this year = rainbow bright.

I could use some colorful fun to break up the winter blahs.

What are your plans for holiday cards this year? And psst….by the way, I just noticed as I was preparing this post that Tiny Prints holiday cards are reduced up to 20% through end of day tomorrow. So if you’ve been lagging in the card arena, it’s time to get a move on!

Disclosure Disclosure Blah Blah Blah

I was invited to a luncheon by Tiny Prints, to talk about their holiday line of cards. And I’m rally glad I was, because I fully intended to buy their cards. And thanks to this post, 50 of those holiday cards are gonna be free.  Woo to the hoo. So there’s my disclosure.

Because I’m tracking my budget for food during the month of November, I started the process of planning this week’s seasonal meal by first reviewing what I already had. I went through my cupboards/freezer/basement/etc. I had plenty to work with (how often do I waste simply by not starting here?). I settled on a butternut squash lasagna, mainly because I had two boxes of the Trader Joe’s no-boiling lasagna noodles as well as a butternut squash I had bought from the farm where we picked our pumpkins.

Can I just say that I love these Trader Joe’s no boiling noodles? They’re fantastic from a time-saving perspective!

The only thing I had to buy for this meal was the ricotta. The sage was from my garden. The butter and butternut squash were from local farms. I make my own veggie stock and freeze it in 1 cup quantities, so I had that on hand, and the rest were staples I had in my refrigerator or cupboards. Not bad! Oh, and the recipe? Divine!

Mix sage into butternut squash	Ricotta layer	Butternut squash layer