Pick tomatoes, dig potatoes...

See the new empty space?! I'm so happy to see empty garden space! Not because I'm going to plant anything else in it this year, but because it means things are being harvested and soon we can rest! (I realize I'm a lot grumpier about gardening than I've ever been this year.)

Here's what we harvested from the empty space. Around 25 pounds of potatoes! 3 more rows to harvest. Most of them are the beautiful Rose Apple Finn fingerlings, though there's also some Norland Reds (the old root cellar sprouted ones we planted in the old compost pile) and some Russetts.

Venus of Millendorf fingerling. (I'm a midwife, I see goddesses everywhere. ;)

Aside from the ever-ripening tomatoes in the garden, this is all I have left in the house! Woo hoo!
I made it through that huge box on the floor (and admittedly, gave some of those away to visiting friends on Saturday).

Urban deck fishers. Sadly, the only thing to catch are more tomatoes.

Making a Dent

Thursday I was appointment free and the weather was just a little bit cooler than it has been. So I got to work on those tomatoes. I ended up with 7 quarts, 12 pints canned. While running tomato skins out to the compost, I spied about 30 new red tomatoes in the garden that still needed to be picked. Made me want to cry!

My favorite gardening mentor, El at Fast Grow the Weeds, sent me a link to her old post about making Tomato Glut Sauce. This was a nice way to use up a good number of tomatoes as well as various root vegetables and herbs from the garden. Toss with balsamic vinegar, olive oil and salt and pepper and roast for 45 minutes at 400*.

"Process" lightly in the food processor at 3:30 in the morning when a client in labor calls (but who doesn't need you quite yet). I got 5 quart bags of this delicious smelling sauce. Ingredients ended up being: tomatoes, carrots, turnips, potatoes, onions, yellow squash, zucchini, basil, oregano, balsamic vinegar and olive oil. (Ha! I just noticed the little dish of cherry tomatoes in the background! They are everywhere!)

The tomatoes picked after canning/ glut sauce that day.

And still, more tomatoes...

Tomato Torment

Just the beginning of the counter-space invasion...this pic was taken a couple weeks ago. A few baby fingerlings, the start of red tomatoes, yellow squash, and pole beans. We're now up to our necks in tomatoes. Loads and loads of tomatoes, loads of yellow squash.

Some garlic laid to dry on the kayak in the warm garage.

I'm really trying to rouse myself into canning all these freakin' tomatoes. I'm just sooo tired and it's been sooo hot! Granted, today was a bit better as the humidity calmed down a bit, making life a little more bearable. My body and this baby have decided that I really only need 4 hours of sleep a night, which is kicking my butt.

I don't mind canning. In fact, I normally quite enjoy it. There's a great satisfaction that comes with all the kitchen prep time spent chopping, preparing, stuffing jars, and listening to music. However, I must admit tomatoes are the worst in my humble opinion. You have to scald them, them pop them into ice water in order to remove their skins (and you have to keep replacing the ice water as it gets warmer. We only have 4 ice cube trays, so we end up using every frozen thing we can to keep the water cold.). Core them, quarter them, and put them into jars. Thankfully, the pressure canner processes them in 25 minutes once you're up to pressure, as opposed to the 85 minutes it takes in a hot water bath. Talk about a hot kitchen!

I was going to can tomatoes this evening. I even made myself a real-deal caffeinated iced-coffee to wake up a bit. But after doing a couple loads of laundry, washing dishes, cooking and eating dinner, I just feel ready for bed. I've got at least another 3 hours before the kids will allow that to happen.

I seriously wondered today if there's any city ordinance against my erecting a "road side stand" on my residential street to sell my tomatoes and squash and green beans and eggs. Drive 20 miles south of here and there's all kind of end-of-the-driveway veggie stands. Why not here in college town? I could simultaneously make some cash while avoiding canning tomatoes...

Adult Summer Reading-What I've Read This Summer-Clearly Not a Food Post

Doghead, by Morten Ramsland is an excellent book. It's a hilarious and bittersweet first novel. The story follows this crazy Norwegian family over three generations, from WWII on. Made me wish it never ended. Excellent writing.

American Thighs is yet another gem from Jill Connor Browne, the Queen of The Sweet Potato Queens. Hailing from Mississippi, Jill Connor Browne writes with menopausal southern wit that had me laughing out loud on many, many pages. I'm waiting for someone at the library to return her book, How to Raise Children for Fun & Profit. Great take-your-mind-off-things sort of reading.

The Herring Seller's Apprentice, (link to someone else's proper book review!) by L.C. Tyler is a book I'd normally never pick up. It's a mystery, and I just don't read mysteries. However, I liked the cover and the title and sometimes you just get a feeling about these things, no? Proved to be another good summer reading pick. Very clever, very British.

How to Cook a Tapir, by Joan Fry was a decent read. It's about an American woman whotakes a "working honeymoon" with her anthropologist husband to British Honduras (now Belize). The woman can't cook to save her life, but soon learns how to cook while living it in the rough in the jungle bush. Because this all takes place in 1962, you definitely get the feel of how her husband is an academia, patriarchal jerk...which made me want to scream, but it ends well. Interesting read.

The Birth House, by Ami McKay. (The cover above is actually from the Lithuanian printing.) Sigh. Loved it. Every birth worker I know has been urging me to read this book for the last year or so. I tore through it in just a couple of days. It's about a young woman being unofficially trained as a midwife during the early 19-teens in Nova Scotia. There's a beautiful setting mixed with WWI issues, early feminism and the attempt of the "good doctor" (or obstetrics in general) to undermine and demonize midwifery and normal birth. Great writing, fabulous book.

I'm not a huge graphic novel fan, but The Professor's Daughter , by Joann Sfar and Emmanuel Guibert was another book that I picked up solely for title and cover picture. The illustrations are gorgeous (simple but lovely watercolor) and the tale a sweet love story. I read it in the course of an afternoon and found it to be a great little get-away.

Ms. Nina Planck has been rockin' the world of all the foodies and localvores that I know. Real Food- What to Eat and Why is a great read. Super informative and helpful in knocking down food stereotypes that we've all been fed for decades in this country. If I had loads of cash, I'd buy a copy of this book for each of my family members who still eat margarine and empty, crappy "fat free" foods in an attempt to eat "healthy" and lose weight. Not only does Nina Planck rave about eating real, whole foods that have been deemed unhealthy and fattening (think real butter, meat, eggs, etc), but she defends it all with great, easy to understand research. Especially a lot of great info and breakdown of understanding cholesterol (both "good" and "bad"). I have yet to read her other highly popular book, Real Food for Mother and Baby. Have heard awesome things about it, just waiting for its return to the public library!

My husband is notorious for borrowing so many books from the library that he never gets time to read all of them. He often gets weird technical stuff or dry books on the economy or some weird selection, totally random, about two particular decades of Moroccan government 3 centuries ago. On one of our weekly library trips, he picked up Gimme Shelter, by Mary Elizabeth Williams. This lady is funny, cynical, and a decent writer. She talks about her 3 years of searching for housing in NYC. Being in the mid-west, the price of NYC housing shocked me. I mean, I knew it was outrageous, but still. I would've left the city, but she and her husband are determined to stay with their two young daughters and settle on a mortgage one way or another, even though they're not filthy rich, nor do they have even moderately well off parents to help them out. If you've ever bought a house with damn near no money (or are thinking about it), this book will gladly commiserate with you (even if the monetary figures are waaaay different). By the way, I read this book. My husband, did not.

Up the Rouge! by Joel Thurtell and Patricia Beck was another good read. Both author and photographer were Detroit Free Press staffies. They convinced the newspaper to let them paddle up the Rouge River for 5 days and do a photo essay of their trip. Not only did it run in a briefer version in the paper, they published an entire book about it. The Rouge River is a long river that starts at the mouth of the Detroit River and carries on through many suburbs of Detroit. Henry Ford did his share to dump and ruin this river years ago when he first started his factories. The pollution carries on til this day, from Ford to various other industries, and not excluding general run-off into the river, on account of being surrounded by miles and miles of concrete development. Despite the crazy pollution (abandoned boats, cars, log jams, kitchen appliances, um, bones...), Thurtell and Beck manage to entertain, educate and show you this famed "nasty" river's beauty.

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This entire post was supposed to go into my Adventures in Ypsiville blog, not here. That's what happens when I blog at 3am in a fit of insomnia.
At any rate...

Every summer I sign the kids up for the library's summer reading program. We keep track of minutes read, and at the end of the summer, they pick up their earned prizes (usually some free passes to local businesses and a free Scholastic book pick). This year, the librarian finally convinced me to sign up for the adult summer reading program. All one has to do is read 8 books (I kept track of 9), submit the titles and authors when complete and then pick up your prize. I earned a free travel mug! Woo hoo! Plus, my name will be entered into a drawing for a Border's gift card. Not bad. It was fun keeping track of the varied titles and genres. I was so pleased I kept picking "winners" all summer. Honestly, you don't always get such a streak of good reads. So I thought I'd share them with you folks.
I'm terrible at writing book reviews, so I'd say Google any one of those titles for much more articulate reviews. :)

Dilly Beans and How to Can Them

Check out Nourishing Days for a great blog and the weekly Food Roots links that happen every Thursday!

Because some folks asked about the recipe...


This recipe has been tweaked from The Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving.

6Tb pickling salt
6 C water
6 C white vinegar
5 pounds trimmed green beans (short enough that they fit into your jars- I used some quart jars, some pint jars)
~20 or so black peppercorns
~10 sprigs of fresh dill
~10 cloves garlic (one for each jar; more if you love garlic)


From the picture above, I used 7 pint jars and two quart jars. I often go off the beaten path when canning and use whatever I've brought up from the basement. :) Clean and leave your jars full of hot water while you prepare the recipe. Soak the lids on hot water. Fill your canning pot half full of water and set it on high heat (it takes forever to bring to boil, so I always get it going before preparing the recipe).

*The original recipe said to prepare only 6 pint jars and the liquid measurements were half of what I listed above. I ended up having to make more liquid to pack the jars for 5 pounds of beans.The ratios are the same, just doubled.

In a large stainless teel saucepan, combine salt, vinegar and water. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring to dissolve salt. Add beans and return to a boil. Remove from heat.

Place 3 peppercorns, one sprig of dill, and one garlic clove in each prepared jar. Pack beans into jars and ladle hot liquid into each jar to cover beans. Leave 1/2" head space at the top of each jar. Remove air bubbles (if any- by sliding butter knife along inside edges of the jar). Wipe rim of jar and put lid on. Screw down band until resistance is met, then increase to finger-tip tight.

Place jars in canner, ensuring they are completely covered with water. (You may have to add more hot water to cover. This is when I love my electric kettle.) Bring to a boil and process for 10 minutes. (Remember, you start the 10 minutes when the canner water is actually boiling, not before!) Aftr 10 minutes of processing, turn off heat and remove lid. Wait 5 minutes, then carefully remove the jars, allow them to cool. Check each lid to be sure they sealed before storing them away. If any of them haven't properly sealed, place in fridge and let sit a week or two to allow flavors to meld and then promptly eat!