Back Door Screen Project

So, ever since we began the remodel, Joe has always talked about turning the back door into something special. When we were door shopping we kept seeing this really great beefy castle door with wrought iron & a speak-easy. It was awesome, but super expensive, so we ended up with a really nice Mahogany door that was in our budget & 2.5 years later, Joe finally had his way with it.

So he cut out the center section of the door:

We found the Wrought Iron grate at Tuesday Morning for $99, it didn't quite fit the door the way it was, so he took some bits off & re-arranged them to make it work, he had some help from the guys at work...

We still have to put screen up, but it was special order & has not come yet.

Isn't it gorgeous? See the cool latch to keep it shut?

This is what it now looks like from outside.

Awww! So proud!

Healthy Family Farm Visit

EUREKA! I have found it! My Aunt Dorothy (the one who taught me to Jam) & her daughter Kristina turned me on to this place out in Santa Paula where you can go spend the day....so I started researching to find out more about it.... no website (yet!) no blog (yet) no nothing, except an email addy: healthyfamilyfarms (@) gmail (dot) com. So email I did! And guess what? All that stuff is coming, along with cheese making classes, pick your own produce & all kinds of other fun stuff! She's just gettin' started! Watch out, Ventura County! We got FARM.

Sharon raises milk goats, sheep, chickens, turkeys, quail, ducks, pigs, Scottish Highland Beef that look a bit prehistoric & an 'accidental' litter of puppies that will be groomed into guard dogs roaming the acreage protecting the cattle from predators like mountain lions.

You can email the farm for a price list & a membership form. She has a pretty extensive list of products, including Goat Yogurt & Ice Cream. Because it's tricky to sell raw milk & some of the other items, they way it works is you basically pay an annual fee to be a member (a sort-of partial share holder) and this enables you to get a share of her products. But enough about the legal stuff! You can get farm fresh, pastured chicken & duck eggs! Fresh chicken's for roasting, necks & feet for Stock! Fresh Milk-only-Fed Pork! We bought a Ham, and did a giant family feast last night - the Ham was WONDERFUL! We did a Leg of Lamb too! We all bought fresh whole chickens & have loved a chicken dinner, leftovers & making stock - and with this crazy June-Gloom we've been having, it's perfect timing for all that!

Joe & I in front of Barn My folks

Sharon (Adult on right)

Sharon has the farm open on Sundays from 10-4 so members can come pick up what they need, fresh on a weekly basis - she doesn't sell any of the meat frozen! On Sundays, her kids & a few other Staffers are there to give you tours & talk about the farm & how they do things...

Sea J comes up from Malibu to spend weekends on the farm. She came on our tour with us photographing & video documenting all our antics (with 4 little kids, we had plenty!) She's working on the website & also documenting the progress of a passle of 'rescue chickens' Sharon got from a local 'organic' farm. When they arrived at HHF, they couldn't even walk because they'd been raised in such confined spaces! (If this doesn't convince you that just 'organic' isn't good enough, I dunno what will!) Now most can walk around the 3000 Sq. Foot Chicken Run & are looking much better, although their feathers are still pretty mangey! Poor creatures! She has all the feed made especially to her specifications, meaning not only organic, but NO SOY! Wonderful!

You are looking at one Happy Camper, er farmer, er wanna-be Farmer, er Farm enjoyer!

Jammin'

Look at the funny way Azure shipped my Rhubarb!  It was SO long! Longer than my huge sink is deep!  Crazy, huh?! :)


Ok, so I'm sure by now you all know that I buy a LOT of my goods from Azure (whatever I can't get thru my CSA & our new Organic Pastures Co-Op!), on my very first 'shopping' adventure with them, I stumbled upon Pomona's Universal Pectin.  Never heard of it!  So I read up on it & you can make jams & jelly's with honey!  And low sugar!  It's AWESOME stuff!  Each purchase (you can buy a small packet or a pound - thru Azure is the best price) comes with a recipe sheet, but if you lose it (like I always manage to do!) it's also on their site as a PDF.  It's so easy to do all kinds of concoctions with this stuff!  Here are some of the combo's I've done:

Peach, Ranier Cherry, Blueberry w/Lemon Zest, Blueberry Rhubarb, Peach Rhubarb, Peach BBQ Sauce (recipe from Ball's Jam Book).  Today I'm going to try Orange Plum & Orange Peach.  After I get some more Rhubarb from Azure I want to try Strawberry Rhubarb!

Look at all the gorgeous blueberries, we are getting 2.5 pounds for 10!  I got 2!  The catch?  They come in a baggie & many still had stems on, so I carefully sorted them, I literally put a very small handful into the compost, the rest we gorgeous!  I sorted into 'soft for jam' & firm for freezing.

I have made a LOT of Jam in the past few years.  I started out with my Aunt Dor making microwave Jam, her thing is that every year, the day after Thanksgiving she'll make about 4 batches of her famous Pear Raspberry Jam for Christmas gifts for all her co-corkers.  If we were lucky she'd have  a few leftover for our Family's White Elephant game & 2-3 lucky lucky family members would get a small jar to last the year....She also made a microwave Jalapeno Jelly.  Although I will no longer use the microwave, I am really glad to have learned from her,it was so easy & that is still one of my most popular flavors & I add Jalapeno's to it now, for a spicy twist!

What kind of canning do you do?

RAW Coffee Ice Cream

In a small dish, add enough boiling water (no more than 2 TBSP) to dissolve the sugar:

3/4 cup Organic Sugar

2-3 TBSP Instant Espresso Powder

Stir frequently until all dissolved.

Put in Blender:

2 cups Raw Cream

2 cups Rw Whole Milk

6 Egg Yolks

1 Tsp Vanilla

Pinch of Celtic Sea Salt

Coffee Sugar Mixture

Blend for about 1 minute, place in fridge (covered) overnight (or several hours at least) to chill.  Freeze according to your manufacturer's directions.

*Variation:  When almost frozen, add 3 TBSP (or so) Organic RAW Cacao Nibs & stir in well.  

Or add 2 TBSP of Kahlua Liquor! YUM!

My other thought was to Shave really good quality chocolate into it.  I don't like big chunks of chocolate in ice cream, I like something that will just dissolve on my tongue.... but I haven't tried it yet, so be sure to let me know if you do!

RAW Peach Ice Cream

peel & chop up about 8 peaches

put about 1/3 of the peaches in the blender with:

about 1.5 cup cream

about 1.5 cup milk

about 3-4 big blobs honey - best guess?  about 3/4 cup? maybe a bit more...taste it!

1 Tsp Vanilla Extract

1/2 Tsp Almond Extract

6 egg yolks

Blend it all up to dissolve the honey.  Taste, make sure it's sweet enough & tasty.  Don't be grossed out about the raw egg, it's Yolk only & in any case we know our eggs are happy & healthy.   RAW eggs won't hurt you!

I read that the freezing process actually reduces the sweetness, so make a bit more sweet than you actually like...

Freeze according to your manufacturer's directions.  I have the Kitchen Aid Ice Cream attachment & so far I am thrilled with it!  Couldn't be easier & now that I have a biger freezer, it has a constant home on the top shelf (easy access for me to use frequently!)

;) YUM

FRUIT glorious FRUIT!

Ok, I just want so show you my produce box from last Saturday (isn't it gorgeous?!) and in the cooler are the Raw Milks, Cream & the grass fed meat (this week I ordered Tri-Tip & Skirt Steak), YUM!  We also could add on Organic Blueberries for $4 (9oz.), pretty good price, right?

so thru our CSA we've been able to add-on special orders like a huge box of peaches or cherries...SO exciting, right?

 

Here's a few snaps of me processing some of these gems:

I made several things so far, stay tuned for recipes! (Aren't I a tease?)  XOXO

Co-op & New Garden Blog

I am going to begin posting my "garden posts" over to the garden co-op blog, Partners in Dirt.  I hope you'll follow along as we blog about how we formed the co-op, who's involved & how we grow it (pun intended) into a bigger, better thing altogether!  Our dream is one day start a Community Garden....

Join me there! ;)

New Toys!!

Ok, I'm just bursting to share & who better to share these things with than YOU?   I've been so busy that I am SO far behind on my blogging!  

Last weekend I got a used Chest Freezer off Craiglist for agood price, it's almost liek new & works great!  It's about 4 ft wide, I think it's about 14 cubic ft...?  Anyhoo, it works GREAT!  I was so excited to transfer everything to it from my small stand up freezer & the tiny one in the house!  It looked very nice & organized for about 5 minutes! Naw, just kidding, it's still looking pretty good, I just REALLY need to get a 'working inventory list' going & stick with it so I always know what's in it!  See in the top left corner?  That's the Kitchen Aid ice cream maker attachment I just got last week (WHAT???  I had a gift card!)  So far I've tried an all RAW creamy Peach Ice Cream, Peach Sorbet & Strawberry Sorbet, I love that I can use honey in them!  Now I just need a source for raw goat's milk & I can give Laloo's a run for their money!  EIGHT DOLLARS a pint at Whole Foods (and ya can't get it anywhere else locally!) I don't think so! 

On Wednesday I received my Kitchen Mill!  I already used it! ;)

On Friday I noticed sprouts in my garden that I just seeded in the last 2 weeks!  YIPEE!

Today I received my dehyrator!   You can buy from Excalibur directly, I got a Refurbished model, because they come with a 10 yr warranty & the lower price on it allowed me to get the bigger, better model.  It has 9 trays!   I also got some of those Paraflexx sheets for it, so I will working on some Fruit leathers & stuff like that! 

I knew it was coming so I had wheat berries ready for it!

The Garden Update

Goodness how things have changed!  I planted tomatoes before the trip, and while I was away, Tami & Terrie (good garden fairies) came over & planted some cucumber & other seedlings in that same box. (See above)  So that was fun to come home to! ;)

Since being home, I've been VERY busy trying implement the rest of the plan.   I had to fill & seed the Right box & we are still working on the watering & timer set up...for now we have to do it manually each evening...ugh...

Today I working on building mounds in front of the smaller boxes along my wall.   It was a beautiful morning!  But man was I sweaty!  The idea is that lots more things can be grown outside the boxes too!  So I built some tiers, so we'll have lots of 'edge space' for things like strawberries...and then taller things like onion & chives will be behind them - cool huh!?

 

This is the left box, when it was first built & Joe attached it to the wall!  Then he lined it with landscaping paper so my precious dirt (hey, I had to PAY for it!) wouldn't sneak out the cracks...

The same Left box after being filled with dirt & grapes!

Today, after I made the tiered mounds... I'll be planting onion, chives & strawberries on them!  Oh, and notice the beautiful trellis?  My wonderful Joe borrowed a friend's truck to bring those home from work where he discovered them in the dumpster!  FREE!

Isn't that AWESOME???

Ok, one more brag about my JoeBacon, he is going to let me (that sounds so wrong somehow!  I bring home the bacon too, you know! ;)  But we are trying to be more careful about where our money goes & get a handle on our debt, etc... so in light of that) he is OK with me spending money on: an electric grain mill & a super cool dehrydrator!!  I know, you're all got them already, but this is HUGE for me!  I'm so excited!  I was gonna say nanny nanny boo boo, but being the mature grown up woman that I am, I will graciously accept your congratulations.

** grin **

Vacation Part 2

Ok, so this one is LONG overdue, my apologies!  I ended up not having internet access the rest of the trip and arrived home to find ours wasn't working EITHER!  Argghh!  Miss me? ;)

After Sedona, we rushed to Orange County to attend my dearest Great Uncle Bruno's memorial service, which was lovely & sad & sweet - all the things it should be...

This was the Piper that played at the Service.  He was great!

So in between family gatherings over those few days, we managed to squeeze in some Disney magic, which was surprisingly a LOT of fun!

 No kiddo, but my folks came with us one day too, so that was fun!

Vacation Part 1

Ok, so I have explained about how MUCH I love Spring, right?  Well, traveling in the Spring is simply the best!  The weather is not too hot, yet the sun is warm & that makes me VERY happy...

So far, we've spent 2 nights in Las Vegas, our timeshare-dealy got us a 1 Bedroom overlooking the pool, which would not normally appeal to me but it was great, there were water slides & that was the main point of going there.  Some friends cam to visit for the day & the boys were IN HEAVEN in that pool!

We were blessed to be given tickets to see Phantom of the Opera at the Venetian, it was AMAZING!  We got seats right under the chandelier! ;)  For those of you who have not seen it, I will say no more.

So then we headed to Williams, Arizona to meet up with the folks & do the whole Grand Canyon Railroad adventure thingy.  It was AWESOME.  We could not have asked for better weather, clearer skies or more fun! 

  

(Me at the Grand Canyon)

So yesterday the family took the kiddo & headed home so Joe & I could spend some time 'alone' to try & be romantical to celebrate our 3rd anniversary. So we spent the afternoon in Flagstaff, which was great, had the BEST MOCHA EVER!! ....such a neat little town!  Then we came to Sedona, I swear it is one of THE most gorgeous places on earth!

   

(Me in Sedona, kissing the "chicken", which is actually Coffee Pot Rock, but from this angle I thought it looked more like a chicken...)

We don't get cell or internet at the hotel so we're enjoying a lazy morning at the local coffee shop & took a mo' to bang out a quick post to show you all some love...

Stay tuned for Part 2....amazingly there is more, this is a long trip! ;-)

Spring Break

Howdy folks!  Just wanted to pop in & let ya'll know that I'm not THIS much of a slacker, we're going on vaca & I simply won't be around for awhile!

We're doing Vegas, Grand Canyon, Sedona & Disneyland, full report when I return, I promise!