Recipes | Pasta/Pizza Sauce

Sorry for ditching you guys again! I anticipate my life becoming normal again next week :P I've escaped my partially moved in house this week to visit my parents (because it's just been so long?). No really, the pool is shut down this week, Craig is away catching small mammals, dipping them in flourescent powder and then following their footprints around the woods at night. I'm not kidding. And I'm kinda jealous. But anyway I'm canning pasta sauce, roasted tomato soup, and pickled beets.



Want my amaaaazing pasta/pizza sauce recipe? Of course you do. I invented it last week. This makes one 5 Quart crock pot full...which is 3-4 3 cup jars. Which each make one good 2 person meal...so this recipe would serve...8-10 if you just ate it fresh.

Roast 4 or 5 sweet bell peppers. Just throw them in the BBQ until they're all charred, then throw them in a bag for a bit to steam. The skins will just flake off leaving yumminess beneath. Deseed and mince

Mince:
4 cloves garlic
4 smallish shallots

Fry in olive oil with a sprinkle of red pepper flakes.
Add a splash of cooking wine at the end (white wine is yummy in it)

Throw in the crock pot with the peppers and about 1/4 wine.
Mince a 1/2 cup or more fresh basil and oregano. You can use dried, but only use a tablespoon or so.



Blanch and peel tomatoes. fill the crock pot with diced tomatoes.
Salt to taste.

Let it simmer for a few hours, we leave it overnight to the next afternoon.
If it's still soupy add a couple small cans of tomato paste halfway through.

Enjoy!

I am doing my second and third crock pots today.

Garden | One last garden update...

I leave for Castlegar in three days and leave the gardeness behind...so sad. I will be back in a couple weeks to can diced tomatoes, pasta sauce and roasted tomatoes. At that point I'll also rip out the basil and freeze and dry what remains of it. Frozen herbs are the next best thing to fresh.



So with my mother this weekend I made 4 kinds of soup and canned them...I have about...30? jars of soup...40? Need to count later. Then yesterday I blanched and froze a big bag of diced yellow zucchini and a big bag of patty pan squash. I also made 4 packages of ratatouille and froze.



My freezer also contains much strawberries, raspberries and asparagus. Oh and cherries. And dried cherries. And I have three kinds of jam made.



I know that Barb thinks she wins Domestic Goddess of the Year because she produced a child and all, but I think I'm definitely in the running here.



I currently have 24 packages of pesto...I think I can make 30. If you all were wondering about my pestoness, here's what do (it's from Anne Lindsay's Lighthearted Cookbook). You could add pine nuts as is traditional but it cuts the fat down without and I don't miss them. Sometimes I toast them and toss them with the pasta though.



1)Pick as much basil as you can, measure how many cups you get of lightly packed leaves. One cup=One recipe. However if you do more at once it blends easier.

2)Blanch the basil by submerging it in boiling water then immediately removing it and running it under the tap. I use a colander. This step can be skipped but it makes the pesto a rich beautiful green.

3)In your blender add the basil, 2 cloves of garlic per cup of basil and some olive oil. 2 tbps per cup of basil. Ish.

4)Blend the crap out of it. For longer than I do because I had half a garlic clove floating around in my last batch. I mean, I could micro plane the garlic first. But I am too lazy.

5)Pour into small ziplocks. One recipe makes a decent 2 person meal. They say it's for 4 but I like my pasta pestoy. Squish the pesto around until the bag is as flat as possible, this way they stack nice in the freezer and thaw quickly.

6)Label ziplocks with the following: "PESTO - add 1/2 cup Parmesan and 1/2 cup pasta water" Because that's what you do when you want to eat it this winter. I don't like to freeze the cheese in because it goes all lumpy if you overheat it while thawing.

Pesto! Fun for everyone!

Want my Ratatouille recipe?



Oh oh, and my heritage corn is starting! We had the first of it last night for dinner. Mmmm Indian Blue Hookers Corn...



Well I must be off, I'm on a mission to find Organic peaches to can and jam!

Recipes | Pesto

I currently have 24 packages of pesto...I think I can make 30. If you all were wondering about my pestoness, here's what do (it's from Anne Lindsay's Lighthearted Cookbook). You could add pine nuts as is traditional but it cuts the fat down without and I don't miss them. Sometimes I toast them and toss them with the pasta though.



1)Pick as much basil as you can, measure how many cups you get of lightly packed leaves. One cup=One recipe. However if you do more at once it blends easier.

2)Blanch the basil by submerging it in boiling water then immediately removing it and running it under the tap. I use a colander. This step can be skipped but it makes the pesto a rich beautiful green.

3)In your blender add the basil, 2 cloves of garlic per cup of basil and some olive oil. 2 tbps per cup of basil. Ish.

4)Blend the crap out of it. For longer than I do because I had half a garlic clove floating around in my last batch. I mean, I could micro plane the garlic first. But I am too lazy.

5)Pour into small ziplocks. One recipe makes a decent 2 person meal. They say it's for 4 but I like my pasta pestoy. Squish the pesto around until the bag is as flat as possible, this way they stack nice in the freezer and thaw quickly.

6)Label ziplocks with the following: "PESTO - add 1/2 cup Parmesan and 1/2 cup pasta water" Because that's what you do when you want to eat it this winter. I don't like to freeze the cheese in because it goes all lumpy if you overheat it while thawing.

Pesto! Fun for everyone!

Gardening | Summertime...

Is nearing it's end. And for once I'm actually sad. Not too sad though, I looooove fall. Anyway the garden is still going strong. We're eating squash and beans pretty regularly although the tomatoes are taking their time. I've made 14 batches of pesto so far with the basil and I should do some more today...


Yesterday I finished drawing Annette and printed her and Elliot out. Now they sit and await washing. George is keeping them company.



And today I'm getting back to painting my furniture. Fun times.

Oh and I made lamb kabobs, lemon rice, greek salad and tzatziki yesterday. Pretty stinking good if you ask me.

Gardening | Garden Update!

I am a busy bee over here. Working on a couple webpages, doing some art and then I decided to participate in an local art event...on Sunday. So I'm getting prints ready to sell and I've come up with some hopefully adorable bird plushies (printed off the computer) that are all hung up and drying right now. Then tomorrow I'm off to Cranbrook to visit Barb and buy more ink and more magnetic paper...and maybe more photo paper.

In the meanwhile, here's how my garden grows, there's kinda lot of photos, so click through if you want to see it all:





Basil (had my first batch of pesto this week....mmmmm):


Purple Basil (a big hit with slugs!):


Tomatoes! (I have eaten 3 so far):


Tiny baby green pepper:


Salad Mix (have been eating for a while now):


Carrots:


Swiss Chard & Potatoes:


Corn:


Peter Pan Squash:


Zucchini:


Pumpkin:


Raspberries:


Dill:


Oregano (only a small portion :P):

Gardening | First Fruits

Here's a garden update for you all:

Strawberries have arrived! Hooray! We don't have many but what we have are sooooo good. Mmmm...why do I buy strawberries in the winter?

Mixed salad greens and Russian kale are also up and being eaten. Very yummy. Both are heritage seed packs we got on Saltspring. The kale is smaller and leafier than the kale you buy at stores. Kind of close to arugula.

Tomatoes and squashes are coming along nicely, seeing little fruits growing.

Potatoes, corn, beans, carrots and Swiss chard are all sprouted and growing nicely.

Peppers are still little but seem happy.

Basil is sad, there was too much rain and cold weather. I'm hoping they bounce back as I had big plans for pesto this year. Ah well we shall see.

Well I'm off to Nelson today with Barb and Micah And hopefully she picks up some yummy strawberries on the way to get me. Mmmm, nothing beats living in fruit country for the summer!

Kitchen | Organizing

So we're in the kitchen this week for Flylady, And I've been on a cupboard reorganizing kick. My baking cupboard used to look like this:



And I was whining to my mom about how I need to organize but I don't want to use plastic because it will likely kill us all, and I can't afford glass containers right now. She pointed out that I can just use mason jars. Well.....yeah, forehead slap. So this is what it looks like now:



It makes me happy. I walk by and just open the cupboard and look at it. Um, I will however need to find more jars as I do intend to can this year...also...my mom might not keep sending me soup if I never return her jars...

Want to see another cupboard? Of course you do!



The metal canisters were my Gramma's before she moved into a seniors home. I love them.

In addition to the organizing (and there has been more, but I'll spare you photos of every single cupboard) I have been purging again. I whine that I don't have much storage here...but really, I have too much stuff. I can say I have less stuff than most people, which is true. But I still have more than I need. I want to only have things I need and love in my house, the rest is just baggage. I don't need 5 sets of chopsticks (sets, like 4 pairs in a set, not 5 pairs...I kept about 8 pairs)...I don't need 13 dinner plates...I now have 6. That kinda hurts. But you know, I don't have room to feed more than 6 people, and if I do I have more littler plates. And my cupboard is happier (wanna see? hahaha). Anyway...I've made three trips to my neighbourhood thrift store in the past month...and I think I'll still make a couple more.

Also. My house has been clean for a month. Self high five!