Pickled Eggs

We're hosting a New Years Eve party this year.  As good hosts we will be serving a few snacks for our guests.  So, today I pickled some eggs.  We've done this once before.  They were great.  Granted, they turned a shade of radioactive yellow but the flavor and texture were wonderful.  Just sour enough to make you pucker but not sour enough to make your tongue raw if you have more than one. The whites were just firm enough that they were satisfying to bit but not quite rubbery.

Not Grandma's Chicken salad

Growing up I never liked mayonnaise.  Hated the stuff.  But, I liked grandma's chicken salad.  Loved it.  It was the only thing I would eat that contained mayo until I was about 25.  It took 24 years for me to get grandma to finally give me her chicken salad recipe.  When I first started making it I was still so grossed out by mayo I used the kind that came in the squeeze jar and I eyeballed the amount so I wouldn't have to wash any icky mayo covered measuring cups.  Things have changed.  I love mayo now and I buy the biggest container of it I can find. 
Anyway, since it took me so long to get Grandma's recipe I'm not giving it to you.  I invested a lot of time being the Best Granddaughter Ever to get it.  And I think I will keep it as my only "secret" recipe for now.  But, I will give you a variation of it that I like almost as much as the original.

Southwest Mac and Cheese

I needed a way to stretch the last of what was in the pantry.  I found this recipe on the Hillshire Farms website.  I typically don't go for southwest-y stuff but this was great.  It's not a one pan meal but it's easy enough and the mac and cheese and cheddarwurst have similar cooking times. A regular sized box of mac and cheese left both of us stuffed! And hopefully I'm off the hook from making tacos for a little while.

Chicken and Tomato Orzo

This was Parker's introduction to Orzo.  I had a recipe that called for something similar to be baked in the oven.  But I wanted something faster.  I'm a fan of one pan meals if I can help it. 

Hot Dish!

The classic Minnesotan meal.  I feel a little silly every time I have to search for hotdish recipes.  I blame my parents.  They didn't make much hotdish when we were growing up.  I've been making up for lost time by eating pretty much any kind of hotdish I can find.  Here is one I came up with all by myself. 

It's been a while. Sorry.

I haven't done much worth posting about.  I am very pleased to report we haven't had much of a winter.  Sunday it was 51 degrees outside.  That's pretty much unheard of around here.  It looks like it might be a brown Christmas but I'm not complaining.  Right now I have a duck drying in the fridge and I will be roasting it tonight.  I will also be serving potatoes browned in duck fat and another side that is TBD.  In the mean time here are a couple of recipes that I've made over the past month that we found enjoyable.  I hope you will too.

Busy Busy Busy

Fall always seems like such a busy time.  Getting everything ready for winter.  Preparing for the holidays... there's just so much to do and hardly any light to do it by.

We butchered the chickens this past weekend.  It went smoothly.  We beheaded them with a hatchet this time.  Then strung them up to bleed out.  My brother came to help out and showed us some pretty nice field dressing techniques he learned from all the hunting he does.  We had 5 roosters and we skinned 3 of them.  That made my job a lot easier!

Yesterday preparations for Duck Jerky also began.  I skinned and deboned 2 ducks for Parker to make into jerky.

Friday night fun.

Well, the bathroom is not done.  But it's getting there.  We're hiring a guy to the floors for us.  I think it's going to be worth it just for the peace of mind and a chance to relax a little bit.  Once the floor is in we can install the toilet and once the toilet is installed we can get the old septic tank crushed and start using the new one full time.  Then really all that we need to do is get the vanity and the tub put in and some paint on the walls.  We're going to use our old vanity temporarily while we wait for the neighbor to make a brand new custom one.  It's been fun tossing around ideas for paint and what kind of materials and colors to use on the vanity.  When it's all finally done that bathroom is going to be amazing.  We won't be able to say it's fully complete until next summer though because the fan won't be hooked up until then.
Last night we spent an incredibly romantic evening sanding the dry wall... It was dusty and I thought I was going to choke.  And, we only have one sanding thingy (sorry, I don't know what they're actually called) so really we took turns watching each other sand drywall. 
Here are some pictures of our progress so far.

Recipes...

I found this blog post today.  I have to agree with the author.  Personally, I use recipes to an extent.  I have a number of cookbooks and I have a subscription to Cooks Illustrated. 
But, in large part, I find myself mostly winging it when I cook.  I'll look at a recipe to get an idea of how the dish should be made... cooking times, temperatures, techniques, and general ingredients.  I'll tweak the ingredients if I think I can get away with it and I almost never use measuring spoons. 
If you feel recipes are holding you hostage I encourage you to be brave.  Keep the measuring spoons in the drawer for once.  You've measured ingredients before.  You should have an idea of what a tablespoon of oil looks like in the bottom of your frying pan or how many shakes of salt it takes to fill up that 1/8 teaspoon.  If you're nervous be conservative.  You can always add but it's challenging to take away herbs and spices.  Flavors can sometimes be balanced but it's never the same.

Chili

We didn't have chili tonight because the guys were happy to eat left over pork.  But, as promised I will post my dad's chili recipe.  This is straight from dad:

It's begun

The new bathroom is being installed.  Parker's dad arrived Thursday and they've been working diligently since.  To my great relief his dad seems to be pretty organized.  He worked out a list of all the things we needed to pick up before construction could start.  He sat down with us and we worked out a layout we did all of the things I would have liked to have done a month ago but couldn't because I don't know the first thing about creating a bathroom.  I like lists, I like time lines, I like plans.  All of those things that used to drive me insane when I was younger. 

Tis the season...

For large scale home projects!  Yikes.  Last week we had some guys out to install a new septic system.  They worked for 2 days.  We got a new tank and a new drain field.  But, it's not finished yet.  The septic guys did what they could but, because we are planning on remodeling a spare bedroom into a new bathroom they have to wait until the bathroom becomes functional before they can finish the septic. 
So, this weekend we're getting a new bathroom.  We've already purchased a new toilet (that will flush an entire bucket of golf balls!) and a new tub (6 feet long with 10 jets!).  We started tearing out the walls and getting the room gutted so major construction can start on Thursday.  The house is old.  Very old.  The walls are plaster over sheet rock over little tiny strips of wood and stuffed with sawdust. It's a mess.  He's been taking pictures and hopefully I will be able to post them eventually.

D-Day Update

Alright, I didn't get to post an update last night because I was exhausted.  We started processing around 3:30 or maybe 4pm.  First we gave each duck 35ccs of rum.  I'd forgotten that I accidentally drank the cheap vodka we had.  So, the ducks got Captain Morgan for their last drink.
Then, one at a time we selected a duck from the pen strung it upside down from the clothesline and slit the jugular vein.  It was very very windy so we bled them into the tractor bucket to prevent blood from spraying everywhere.  Once they were all dead we began the plucking process.  We dry plucked them to 80-90% clean then dunked them in a huge pot of scalding water with paraffin wax melted in it.  We scalded them for one minute and then dunked them in ice water.  Once the wax hardened so that it was still somewhat pliable but sufficiently cooled we peeled it off.  We did this to help remove the pinfeathers.  It worked out alright.  I'm not sure all the ducks got quite enough wax on them.

D-Day

Dispatching Day.  Today is it.  It's the end of the line for our little duckies. I'll miss watching them patrol the yard going QUAAAAACK-QUACK-QUACK-QUACK!  They're so much fun to watch.  But, they will provide us with some tasty meat and fat.  We might do the roosters too.  I won't miss them as much as they've gotten a little aggressive lately.

We are very fortunate to have a whole team of friends wanting to help us so hopefully the work will go quickly.  And afterward I'll be serving beer can chicken for supper. I am a little concerned because there is a very strong South wind today.  We don't have much for a shelter belt around the south end of the property so the yard is very very windy.  Wind is something you learn to live with here on the prairie but it sure does make things uncomfortable sometimes.  I think of all the weather phenomena wind is my least favorite.

The most difficult thing I've ever made

is pot roast.  I don't know why I just cannot master that dish!  It always comes out dry.  But, I have learned to make a decent gravy.  Once I even made an awesome gravy.  I only bring this up because I attempted a pot roast again this past weekend and again, it failed.  Just because I think Parker would probably eat shoe leather if I seasoned it right and gave him a bottle of steak sauce doesn't mean I don't want to make the best damn roast we've ever eaten.
I made the roast in the crock pot with potatoes, onions, carrots, garlic, and green onions.  With the exception of the beef and the garlic everything was locally grown.  Purchased at the farmer's market or given to us by friends.

Toe-may-toe, Tah-mah-toe

Since the tomatoes are finally abundant I thought I would share some of my favorite tomato recipes.  Sorry, I'm extremely guilty of eyeballing things in the kitchen so my measurements might be off.  Adjust ingredients to taste and remember, you can always add but you can never take away. 

My New Wheels

Well, I did it.  I got myself a pick up truck!  It's a 94 Chevy K1500.  Its got some rust on it but it seems to run okay.  I mostly need it to get to work during the winter time so it's not my "primary" vehicle but I've been driving it just about every where ever since I got it.  I figure I should get comfortable with it before the weather turns.  It's been fun.  It's got really loud pipes which makes me feel extra redneckish.

If you can, can, can!

Last summer I learned how to can.  I made pickles, dilly beans, pickled carrots, and pickled beets from produce picked from my garden. 
This year for my birthday I received a complete canning kit for water bath canning.  I was so excited!
I usually get about one batch done a week, which is to say, I get one load of cans in the canner each time.  Most of the time I'm canning a couple of different things.  For instance one day I did beets, carrots, and green tomatoes.  Another day I did pickles and beans... you get the idea. 

Unexpected Garden Pests

The other day I was sitting outside reading, enjoying rural bliss.  I let the chickens and ducks out to graze and roam the yard for the afternoon.  It was getting late and I began to debate when I should put them in for the night.  I figured I would let them enjoy their freedom until it got a little darker outside.  And then I stood up.  I looked over at the barrel garden and clustered around the base of it was my little flock enjoying a free cucumber buffet!  I ran over to them yelling, "GET OUT OF MY PICKLES!!" and waving my hands like a maniac.  The simply stopped pecking, looked up, and blinked at me a few times and then continued on with their delicious treat.  "Shoo! Shoo!"  Blink.  Blink.  Nom.  Nom. Nom.  I immedately decided my quandary was over and now was exactly the right time to put them away for the night.  I lured them back to their kennel with some chicken feed and locked the gate. 

The Barrel Garden

Waaay back last winter before I'd decided to move in we discussed a garden.  Big beautiful vegetable garden that would provide us with pounds and pounds of fresh produce that we could eat and pickle.  It would be wonderful.  Growing our own food would be so exciting and save some money at the grocery store and it'd be so healthy!
But there was a caveat.  The septic system.  It needs to be replaced.  The property is set up so that the place I envisioned my garden would probably become a main thoroughfare for equipment.  I did not want to spend all the time it takes to make a garden only to have it be trampled by machines and men.  I imagined backhoes and work boots stomping all of my almost ripe produce into the ground within a matter of seconds.  That simply would not do.  I needed to think of an alternative.

Look at them boots.

I grew up in the suburbs.  We were far enough out that other towns thought we were country but we weren't really.  Five years ago I moved north to a much smaller town (about 8,000).  I lived in town for 4 years.  Last year I moved to a town so small it didn't even have a population on the sign.  It didn't even have its own zip code.  I lived in a house with a big yard and I bought 3 ducks and the landlord who lived on the same piece of land had chickens and planted me a big beautiful vegetable garden.  That summer I learned how to pickle and butcher ducks. Now, I've just moved to a slightly larger town with about 400 people, a bar, a gas station, post office, bank, and a school.  We live about 3 miles out of town... actually in the country. 
With the exception of a few years in high school this is what I've always wanted.  We don't have the big farm with rolling hills and a huge pasture that I've dreamed of since I was a little girl but it's close.  We've got about 4 acres and about half of it is trees.  There is probably enough space to keep 1-2 horses but for now we're starting small.  There are some young raspberry bushes and sapling fruit trees already on the property.  We decided to add a blueberry bush and a cherry bush as well as a few perennial flowers this past spring.
We made a barrel garden and bought some ducks and some chickens.  At the moment, between us we have 2 dogs, 6 cats, 6 ducks, 6 chickens, and a horse.  It's simply wonderful.  I'm finally truly happy with my life and I'm looking forward to what the future holds... it looks promising.

Little House on the Prairie