Beach bound!

Whoopeee!  In just a few short days, we will be heading to Destin, our new favorite vacation spot since moving to the south.

This is the beachcam on the beach where we spend all our time.  I've been checking it daily to be sure there are still plenty of people playing in the water - a sure sign that it is unaffected by the oil disaster.  If you want to check out the beachcam for yourself, click HERE.  In fact, if you text me while we are there, and you are looking at the beach cam, I will go stand where the red star is and wave to you.

A few days of packing and organizing, a grueling 14 hour drive, and then it's just me, a stack of books, lots of cold sweet tea, my 3 favorite people and my toes in the sand.  Ahhhhh......

The All Food All The Time Blog

I know.  You are just waiting anxiously to find out what I did with all that farm fresh produce!  And how were those pickles after all?  And what about the jelly?

And I just left you hanging.  I am sorry.  I've been busy eating.

The word Ray used to describe this creation was "fantasmagoric" I think.  Aidan's friend who was here for dinner said "Omigawd, Aidan, can I move in here?"   High praise, indeed.  Fresh ingredients, simply prepared - nothing more.

More of those vegetables were grilled an thrown into a yummy risotto that Ray made.  Leftovers of that will be my lunch today.

The pickles are delicious.  The bread and butter chips taste exactly like they are supposed to.  The dill that Ray made have a wonderful crunch and are just sour enough.

"But what about the blackberry jelly?" you ask....  Trial and error.  Super Confident Me did not do a test batch.  Super Confident Me cooked and processed about 30 jars in one marathon session.  Super Confident Me was horribly deflated to discover none of it jelled to Super Confident Me's satisfaction.

Ugh.

Deflated Me had to open up every jar.  Deflated Me had to clean and re-sterilize everything.  Deflated Me had to hubble bubble toil and trouble over the burning fire and bubbling cauldron for another afternoon.

Happy Me got jelly.  Happy Me made some cute labels of the cute berry pickers for the lids of the jelly.

Now I am back to Super Confident Me and saw the wild mustang grapes growing by the side of the road.  Super Confident Me went and picked a bunch.

Super Confident Me's kitchen looked like a murder scene as I rendered all the lovely, tart juice.

Super Confident Me has a couple of pitchers of juice which will make maybe about ten pints or so of jelly.  Should I do a test batch?  What do you think?

But dang.  I have to go to the boring old tire store.  The story of the wild mustang grape jelly will have to wait for another day.

Oh, the suspense!  What will you do!?

Meet your meat

I met my Thanksgiving dinner over the weekend.  One of these scrawny little guys will be the centerpiece of my Thanksgiving table come November.

They don't look like much (yet), but hopefully by November will look more like this:

The breed is a "Midget White" and it's one of many endangered breeds that are being revived by small growers throughout the country.

Mine is being grown at "my" farm over in Roanoke - just a few miles from my house.  I say "my" farm, because this year I bought a share in the farm and every Saturday I get to fill a bag with the week's harvest.

I'm looking forward to watching my turkey grow and learn interesting tidbits from Farmer Sandra about keeping poultry. 

And slaughtering poultry.

Yes, let's just put that out there.  Slaughter.  Turkeys really don't just magically appear frozen, featherless and shrinkwrapped with the giblets (read: guts) in a little wax bag.

Hungry yet?

This week in Pam's local kitchen

Top left:  potatoes, carrots & beets.  I think I'll roast them.
Tom right:  zuchinni, yellow squash, banana peppers and some other kind of mild pepper.  Salsa?  Zuchinni tart?  Grilled squash?  Risotto with some roasted carrots too?
Bottom left:  More peppers, including some really spicy Asian varieties.  Currently on the back patio getting sun dried.
Center:  Tomatoes of all sizes.  Salsa?  Freeze for sauce later?  Bake the little ones with chicken breasts until they burst and become a sauce?
Bottom right:  Purple hull peas.  Never had them before but apparently the peas are delicious sauteed with onions, and then you can boil the hulls to make jelly.

Providers:  Two different neighbors and my farm share.  Everything was grown right near me.

My sincere apologies to those who come here for updates on the kids, or absurd and amusing tales of motherhood.  While the crops are bursting, this is now the All Food All The Time Blog.  We will get back to our regularly scheduled programming once the kids get around to doing something amusing or absurd.

The wild mustang grapes have ripened and are calling to me.  That must mean more jelly making is in my future.

Lazy Lady

We all have to take shortcuts sometimes.  That wall of hermitically sealed packages gave me my veggies and salad for the weekend.

I brought three spare kids home from swim practice yesterday morning, and had several more orbiting in and out of my house all day so I didn't get ot the Wednesday farmer's market.  Tomorrow begins a 3-day Very Big Swim Meet so I have to trek to nearly Louisiana and back three times, so no Saturday farmer's market for me either.

Forgive me, Mother Earth, for I have sinned, but a gal's gotta do what a gal's gotta do. 

Possibilities

It almost always starts like this.  Even before my plan is fully formed, the onion gets chopped.  Still thinking, "OK, I've got chicken.... some veggies in the fridge.... what else have I got, and who am I feeding tonight?"

Picky kids, best to concoct a sauce with a few hidden things like grated carrots and finely chopped squash.

How to prep the chicken?  Grill, sautee?  Cut or whole?

What do I have for a side?  Bread?  Salad?  Pasta?

But while I am chopping the onions, the possibilities are only limited by my pantry and my imagination.

What are YOU having for dinner?

Cucumbers are better than.....

This week at the farmer's market, I bought every cucumber they had.  I love cucumbers.  After all, they stay hard in the crisper for weeks, you know.  I got all sizes, because you know, size doesn't matter - and a cucumber will never try to convince you otherwise.  And even thought I bought a LOT of cucumbers, none of them seemed to have a problem with the fact that I could handle ALL those cucumbers.

OK.  I'll stop now.  My intentions for the cucumbers are purely culinary.  Seriously.

Ray even got interested in the cucumbers.  Culinarily speaking of course.  Seriously.

We both wanted pickles.  Dill for Ray, bread-n-butter for me.  Ray even got green tomatoes to pickle as well.  Hmmm....  are green tomatoes better than women and I missed the joke?

Back to the cucumbers.  Seriously.

And this is VERY serious, because I even broke out the French mandolin to slice 'em purty and didn't even lose any of my parts in the process.  Tricky things, them mandolins.  I also sliced onions and salted the whole mess of 'em and let them drain.  A little finely minced sweet red pepper went in there too.

As usual, no particular recipe was followed, but I just tossed in various ingredients that I'd seen listed in the recipes I perused on canning websites.  Tumeric, mustard seed, clove, garlic...  All simmered in a pot with equal parts cider vinegar and brown sugar.

In go the cucumber slices to heat through, and then fill and process the jars.  The hardest part of the whole ordeal is waiting the 3 weeks until they're ready.  I hope they're good, because I've already given a few jars away.

Ray is using a fermentation process for his dill pickles, which won't require water bath processing.  Being a beer maker, he's more comfortable with that whole fermentation thang than I am.  I should have helped him and maybe I'd learn a thing or two about how to properly treat a cucumber.  But Bunko the night before, followed by 5:30 wakeup for swim practice and a 9am meeting, and well, I confess I was sleeping in the middle of the day while my husband was in the kitchen having his way with several dozen cucumbers.  I know.  I missed out.

We'll let you know in a few weeks how good those cucumbers actually are!  Or maybe we won't.  We're shy that way.

Admonishing the Tooth Fairy

Bridget lost two teeth yesterday.  And one a few days before that.  And another a couple of weeks ago.

Besides our Tooth Fairy's gender confusion issues, we also have a certain amount of laziness forgetfulness on the part of the Tooth Fairy.  The Fairy still hadn't made it to our house for the tooth lost way back in May sometime.

Three teeth lost in 4 days could not be ignored.  This note was left with Bridget's teeth:

The Tooth Fairy is sufficently guilty for its lack of attention to Bridget.

Another Grainy Back of the Auditorium Video....

... or How to Get Over Stage Fright, Part Deux

Last Friday was Bridget's elementary school talent show.  She's too shy to sing for us, but for some reason being on a stage with a crowd is a whole 'nother ball game.

First of all, I just have to say a few things about the show in general....  The kids are amazing.  While some of them truly do have talent, the amazing fact is whether they are talented or not, they have the desire to get up on stage and share their stuff.  Each and every one got up there and believed they were a superstar and it was awesome.  I had a big silly grin on my face the whole evening, I was so proud of every kid.

Secondly, but most importantly, Mrs. Anderson rocks!  This dedicated lady is the music teacher at the school and she produces a quality show.  There are no sound system mess-ups, no amateurish mistakes.  She treats these kids like superstars.  There are spotlights, follow-spots, a sound board w/ a great technician, and a stage crew that works like a well-oiled machine.

Bridget sang a song called "Hip to My Heart" by The Band Perry.  Kind of a pop-ish country song.  She agonized over every bit of her outfit, we argued over make up.  She rehearsed in the privacy of her room for hours on end.

So, without further ado.....   enjoy!

When Life Gives You Radishes.....

....make radish sandwiches!

Between my own garden, and "my" farm in Roanoke, it's still mostly spring onions and radishes lately.  The tomatoes and green beans are teasing us, as are the cucumbers.

We had another party to go to last night and I had picked up a bunch of produce from my farm share in the morning.  The hostess had asked me to bring an hors d'oeuvre.  Once again, the challenge was to find a way to use what is local and in season, rather than resorting to the soulless yet abundant produce at the grocery store.

One of my favorite cooking websites is epicurious.  I typed "radish" and "scallion" into their recipe search, and voila!  Several recipes for radish finger sandwiches.  As usual, I scanned the various recipes, as well as the comments sections, and came up with a plan of my own.

First, I made a compound butter using finely chopped spring onions, parsley, anchovy paste and some really nice French sea salt.

Then I sliced the radishes very thinly using a mandolin.  These radishes are very spicy, so they got a quick soak in some lime juice.

Finally, assembly!  Very thin whole wheat bread, butter both slices, layer the radishes, trim the crusts and cut into little pieces.  I thought they were delicious and the sea salt really brought out the flavors.

Sadly, I think my garden is done giving me radishes.  Between the heat and the fact that one of the dogs tried to hide a dead bird in the radish section, well, maybe I'll replant in the fall when it's cooler.  They only take about 4 weeks from planting to crunchy yumminess!