Baked Pumpkin

We had a pumpkin vine come up in our little garden space (which my husband wanted me to rip out) but I wasn't sure what it was and I was curious so I let it grow. Well, we got ONE little pie pumpkin off a huge vine! So today I baked it and we are going to make yummy pumpkin cookies ;)

Duck Stock

Here's the pastured duck wrapped in bacon.

After it was finished I simmered it for about a day, took the meat off and made a wonderful rich stock.

Homemade Butter

 

HERE is a link to the Healthy Home Economist for making butter.  It turned out wonderful.  It took roughly 10 mins. of beating before I got to the butter stage.

 

 

 

The yummy cream from I skimmed off my raw milk the other day.

It roughly doubles when you whip it.  This is the whipped cream stage.

Its starting to separate.

That is the buttermilk drained on the left now I add some salt and wash it.

All done.

The top one I mixed with coconut oil and the other 2 are just straight yummy butter.

 

"Wash My Trucks!"

This is how Manny likes to wash his trucks, right in there with them!

Roasted Bacon Grease Potaoes

This morning I made some Applegate Farms Sunday Bacon in the oven on
my big baking stone so I saved some of the grease for cooking later but for what was left I thinly sliced on some red potatoes and sprinkled them with sea salt then stirred them around and roasted them at 400 for about 20 mins. They were so good. What a good use for the remaining grease and little bits of bacon!

Happy 7th Birthday Mason

I'm finally getting around to posting these pictures. Masons birthday was lastweek.

Mason Loves Scouts!

He's a Wolf now.

Sauerkraut Making

 

 

Raw Milk Goodness

I love my raw milk. It took a long time for me to find it close enough but it was worth it. My guy is about 15-20 mins away and is certified ;). It took me a few years but I have developed a method that I love now. My husband can usually stop on the way home from work so I now send him with our empty spring water bottles instead of the glass jars I used to send. They come in a 1/2 case (3 bottle) cardboard box so it's easy for him to get 3 gallons and just carry them in the box. Now they don't tip over in the car and we don't have to worry about the glass breaking. Now when he comes home I empty one of them in a gallon glass pickle jar with the wide opening so that the cream rises to the top overnight and I can ladle it off in the morning. I use it for coffee or for butter. Next I pour the milk into my big glass measuring jar with the spout so that is is easy to pour into the plastic gallon jug. I have to repeat the process a few times but this way there is no waist from trying to get the milk from the wide mouth jar to the little opening of the gallon jug. Then I was out the glass jar and pour the next gallon in to let it separate.

Canned Apple Compote

Thanks to my friends Sue and her grandparents apple tree I acquired more apples so I made some apple compote for apple hand pies, apple crisp or to put of stuffed French toast. Mason just wants to eat it out of the jar.

Canning - Apple Butter

A great friend of mine brought over a bag of apples from her grandparents tree on Saturday and I made them into apple butter this morning and it is so good. Thanks Sue!

Photo Book

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Bread Baking Day

2 Cinnamon Sugar Swirl
2 Plain
All soaked wheat- yummy!

Beginnings of Soaked Wheat Bread

Mason's 7th B-day Gift

His name is Percy Jackson. A baby guinea pig. He adores him.

Manny Hungy (not hungry)

That's what he says. He woke up from an unusually long nap- 3 hours!- and said "I hungy mama". Luckily I saved him a half of a burger and a piece of corn on the cob which he thoroughly enjoyed.

Mountain Craft Days 2012

Despite the pouring rain we decided to make the hour trip up to Somerset to Mountain Craft Days. It was worth it as usual although I didn't get the maple syrup and maple mustard I really wanted because they closed early!
Heres a list if this years goodies-
Sunflower Seed Bread
Vegetable Bread
Maple-Walnut Oat Bread
Burnt Sugar Cake
3 lbs of Wildflower Honey
1 pint of Ware's Apple Butter
1 lb of fresh churned butter
1 Maple Cream
1 bag maple candy
1 Queen Annes Lace jelly
1 Cinnamon Blueberry Jam
1 Lavender Sugar shaker
1 vanilla bean
Spices-
Lemon-pepper
BBQ
Dried vegetable blend
Cream of Tarter
Wooden Spoon- I get one wooden kitchen object every year
Pottery- I want to get a new piece of these yearly now too.
1 small plate
1 bowl

My Sourdough Starter

Salted Caramel Pretzel Cheesecake

I made a plain cheesecake so that everyone could dress it up like they wanted and Madison put the yummy salted caramel from Trader Joes and crushed pretzels on hers. Mmmmm.
Morgan did that and added chocolate almond butter too ;)

Wolf Spider?

Look what we found when we woke up this morning. A little gift from our older girls. Apparently they captured a spider last night but were kind enough not to wake us to dispose of it. They covered it with a plastic container and taped it all around the edges and put a note on it ;). We looked it up on the net and we think it is a wolf spider- yuck! Manny and Mason thought he was pretty cool.