Book Review: Put 'Em Up by Sherri Brooks Vinton

I've recently been looking for books that give me more canning ideas and recipes. I am still not entirely comfortable with making my own canning recipes as I am still nervous about pH levels. But pretty soon I am going to start figuring out how to safely can some things that I love, like my family's homemade salsa. But I digress, I wanted to talk about this fantastic book. I'm only going to say a little bit about it, because really, how much can you say about a book full of canning recipes? There are great pictures throughout this book, and all of the recipes I have tried have been tasty.

One of the main things about this book that I love is that it is divided by type of thing you're trying to preserve, and for most recipes it gives you multiple ways to preserve, either freezing, canning, refrigerating, drying, etc. I really liked that when I had a pile of green beans I was able to just leaf through that section and figure out what I had the ingredients for. The same with the beets I ordered from my CSA. There are few books that are so easy to use.

The beginning of the book gives you all the basics you need to know for food preservation, and they are well explained how-tos. I really recommend this book, not only is it full color which I just love, but it is neatly organized and a joy to use!

Autumnal Harvest Soup

I love Autumn, not only do I get to break out my sweaters, but it's also the best time to make soup. Not just because the weather gets a little chilly, but also because there are so many fantastic things available at the farmer's market that make for good soup. Also this year I am once again participating in the Juniper Hill Farms CSA. They are fantastic, they deliver to my worksite, which is awesome, but I can also customize my picks from week to week. Earlier this summer, I was able to get a canning package of beets from them, and now I have canned beets sitting in my cabinet, just marinating in goodness, waiting to be eaten!

But I digress. Autumn is soup weather, and one of my favorite "recipes" is something I call Autumnal Harvest Soup. It changes slightly from year to year, but the point is that it clears out what I need to use up, and makes one heck of a tasty soup. I also notice I tend to make it around the time of the Autumnal Equinox. So here's this year's recipe, all the ingredients were purchased at either the farmer's market, or received from my CSA:

2 leeks (white parts online, sliced really thin)
3 carrots (peeled and sliced)
1 butternut squash (peeled, seeded, and cubed)
4 cloves of garlic (chopped)
2 medium apples (peeled, cored, and cubed)
4 potatoes (peeled, cubed)
2 quarts of stock (I used vegetable, but I've also used chicken)

Basically toss all of the ingredients in a slow cooker, turn it on high and then walk away for a few hours. Anywhere from 4-6 hours. Then take your immersion blender and blend it all up. Or carefully put small batched in a blender and blend until the soup has an even pureed consistency. Then grab some bread, or make yourself a grilled cheese like I did, and ENJOY!

Soups: Chicken Noodle

So, every year, one Halloween hits everything between there and the end of the year seems like this crazy blur, things pick up at work for me, we get caught up in Holiday shopping, and to top it all of this year I got sick. Not just normal sick, sick like laying in bed and sleeping nearly 20 hours a day for almost a week sick. So needless to say, I feel a little blindsided by everything going on, but I am feeling better and have realized that I am SEVERELY neglecting this blog! So, since it's winter, what do I do? I am not going to be able to go out and plant anything, and there isn't a lot of things to do around here at the moment outside of the house, so I am going to start sharing things inside the house!

Unfortunately, my "recipes" are more like lists, I don't do exact quantities, especially with soups, I have a list of ingredients, and I kind of just throw in a handful of this, a handful of that until I have made soup. Soups are my favorite thing to cook in the winter, and I have enough soup recipes to open a restaurant!

So here is my "recipe" for chicken noodle soup.

Chicken thighs (boiled and peeled into strips of chicken)
Can of diced tomatoes
Diced onions, celery, garlic, red peppers, jalapenos, carrots
Cooked egg noodles

First, brown the chicken thighs in the pan with a little olive oil. Then discard the skin and the large globs of fat, and return to pan, cover with water bring to a boil then cover and simmer for a few hours to make broth. Or, if you have some chicken broth just simmer until cooked through and peel the chicken off of the bone. I always quickly sautee the diced vegetables, then everything just gets thrown in the pot and simmered until the vegetables are tender.

I promise my next recipe will have measured ingredients!

(What kind of recipes would you like to see?)

Pancakes!

We love pancakes around here, and whenever we make them we try and make a new variety. I try and tell myself they are healthy because I add flax seed meal and make them from scratch, but really, some of the varieties are not really healthy at all! But, sometimes you just have to indulge the sweet tooth and partake in something less than wholesome.

Pancakes:
1 C. flour (I use whole wheat)
2 TBSP. Sugar
1 TBSP. Baking Powder
2 TBSP. Flax Seed Meal
3/4 C. Milk
2 TBSP. vegetable oil
1 egg

Mix the dry ingredients together and then add in the wet ones. I drop the batter onto a hot skillet by the 1/4 C. full. I find this makes about 10 pancakes. Which is more than enough when we eat two a piece.

Honestly, I have no idea what the nutrition information is for these, so sorry that I can't fill that in.

Variations:
(most of these ingredients get folded in last. The spices get added in with the dry ingredients)

*chocolate chip: 1/4 C. chocolate chips
*apple cinnamon: 2 TSP. cinnamon, 1/4 C. shredded apple
*s'mores: 2 TBSP crushed graham cracker, 1 TBSP cocoa powder, 1/4 mini marshmallows, chopped
*Blueberry: 1/4 C. blueberries (really any berry works!)
*rainbow sprinkle: 1/4 C. applesauce, 2 TBSP rainbow sprinkles
*Sweet Potato/Pumpkin: 1/4 C. mashed sweet potato/pumpkin puree, 1 TSP. cinnamon
*Banana Nut: 1/4 C. mashed banana, 2 TBSP. finely chopped walnuts (or pecans, or whatver nut you want to use)
*Honey Nut: (substitute 2 TBSP honey for the sugar) 1/4 C. finely chopped nuts
*Oatmeal Raisin: 2 TBSP. oatmeal, 1/4 C. raisins

This is the list for now and it keeps growing everytime we make pancakes and I look in the cupboard for more ingredients. Let me know what varieties you would like to see, and I will try them out for you! Or share what varieties you come up with!

One Last Taste of Summer

I love coffee cake, and I love blueberries. I have had this recipe hidden away in my recipe box for years now. It was stolen from the bowels of the internet somewhere, and I am sorry if I don't give proper credit, because I can't remember where it came from. It's not my recipe, and if you know where it came from let me know so I can give proper credit.

Blueberry Buckle

3/4c. sugar
1/4c. shortening (I used lard)
1 egg
1/2c. milk
2tsp. baking powder
2c. flour
2c. blueberries

topping:
1/2c. sugar
1/3c. flour
1/2tsp. cinnamon
1/4c. butter, softened

Preheat oven to 350

1. Grease and flour a 9" square pan.
2. cream together sugar and shortening, add egg and milk, mix well. Add baking powder and flour mix well then carefully fold in blueberries. Spread into the 9" pan.
3. Mix together dry ingredients for topping then add butter. Using a fork mix/mash the butter into the dry topping ingredients to form a crumbly mixture. Sprinkle on the top of the blueberry batter.
4. Bake for 45-50 minutes, make sure to test it by sticking a toothpick in it, since cooking times vary depending on your oven. Mine's older so it took almost an hour for it to cook properly.

Harvest Time

Wow, can you believe it's September already? I for one, am still in denial. There is still so much I need to do before the temperatures drop and the snow starts to fall! This is definitely a busy time of year, but also, a wonderful time of year. Wonderful, of course, because it is harvest season. Some of us are busy canning, and storing away what we can, while others (like myself) are just enjoying nature's bounty. Because I moved from a city apartment, to a house that's quite a bit away from it all, all that I was able to plant this year were flowers. However, despite this, I am still visiting Farmer's markets when I can and enjoying locally grown foods whenever possible. I am fortunate to live in an area surrounded by farms and orchards, there is no shortage of locally grown crops.

One of my favorite things about this time of year is the apple harvest. I love fresh apples, I love eating them raw, and cooking/baking with them. Of course, if you're eating apples that have been shipped to you from half way 'round the world, you probably don't share my love of them, trust me, I know your pain. I have eaten apples that were shipped here from Argentina, and well, if that was what I thought an apple tasted like, and what their consistency was like I would make nothing more than applesauce with them. However, I was fortunate to grow up in a town in Norther New York where apple trees definitely outnumbered people, so I have a great love of the fruit and it's many varieties. It is hard to say what my favorite it, currently I am loving Gala apples, and so is my son. But I also love Macs, and Granny Smiths.

So versatile, and so tasty, what do you do with your apples? Well one of my all time favorite recipes comes from the blog Piece of Cake. So you can either go to her site, or just continue scrolling down, this one is in my "favorites" tab in my recipe box, and I am sure you'll love it just as much as I do.

Chewy Apple-Oat Bars with Cream Cheese Frosting

Makes about 20 two-bize-sized bars

For the apple-oat bars:

1/2 cup plus 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 plus 1/8 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
3/4 cup old-fashioned oats (not quick cooking)
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
6 tablespoons firmly packed dark brown sugar
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
3/4 cup diced apple (about one small apple, I like Fuji or Honeycrisp)
4 ounces white chocolate chips

For the white chocolate cream cheese icing:

2 ounces white chocolate chips
2 ounces cream cheese, softened but still cool
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/3 cup confectioners’ sugar (more or less, depending on your sweet tooth and how stiff you want the icing to be)
Ground cinnamon, for dusting

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line an 8×8 inch square baking pan with aluminum foil (with a few inches of overhang on all sides) and spray the foil lightly with cooking spray.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, baking soda, cinnamon and oats and set aside. In the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter on medium speed until creamy. Add the sugars and beat until smooth and lightened in color. Scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl, and beat in the egg and vanilla until well-blended. On low speed, blend in the dry ingredients. On the lowest speed or by hand, stir in the apple chunks and white chocolate chips.

Spread the batter into the prepared pan and bake just until a toothpick comes out clean, about 35-38 minutes. Do not overbake. Let the bars cool in the pan on a wire rack for about 10 minutes, then use the foil “handles” to remove the slab from the pan. Let cool completely on the rack in the foil sleeve, at least 1 hour.

Meanwhile, make the icing. In the microwave, melt 2 ounces of white chocolate chips in a small microwave-safe bowl in 30 second bursts at 50% power, stirring after each interval until smooth. In a small bowl, beat together the cream cheese, butter and vanilla until smooth. Add the melted white chocolate and beat until smooth. Beat in the confectioners’ sugar until the icing is slightly thickened and sweetened to your liking.

When the bars are completely cool, spread the icing in an even layer over the bars, using the foil to create a dam of sorts that will keep the icing from dripping down the edges of the bars. Refrigerate the bars with the foil sleeve until the icing is firm, at least 1 hour.

Remove the slab from the foil to a cutting board and dust with cinnamon. With a large, sharp knife, cut into about 20 bars. Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 3 days.