It's a wild life

Another doggy day...of sorts. I am still watching the neighbor's dogs and taking them for morning and evening walks. I took all of these shots with my cell phone. It is a Google Pixel and while it isn't too bad of a camera, I just decided to use it instead of my other one.

When walking the dogs mornings and evenings, it is easier to stuff a tiny phone into my pocket. I asked the camera to enhance the two shots. It added brilliance and colors. I think the shots are more brilliant and colorful than I saw it with my eyes. 
But I'm not going to change it. It is prettier than it was to the naked eye.

 I had a meeting at the bank with one of their financial people, got help from a teller for doing an auto deposit, got a few items from the store. Interestingly enough, I have not been shopping except for milk and cereal since the week before Rich passed away.

He was the ferocious eater in our house. Steaks and potatoes were the meals he requested for the last 6 months of his life along with many special requests. I honored all of them. Now I have frozen meat packages that I can't imagine cooking -- unless my grandkids come up and want steak with their supper.

I probably have a couple of years' worth of food stored in the freezer for myself.  My neighbor gets a CSA box throughout the growing season. CSA= Community Supported Agriculture. The box contains fresh produce each week from local home grown farms. I've had zucchini, squash, onions, peppers, tomatoes, fennel, kale, broccoli, and more stuffed in the boxes from the past two Thursdays from doing my dog sitting.

So my meals come about like this. I cut a bunch of stuff up that is fresh, toss it in a pan with some Olive Oil and sauté it. I eat it like that or make some rice to put it on. In a pinch for some protein, I grab some fresh farm eggs from Olive and mix it in with the rice and veggies.

Viola! I eat!

Anyway.......................

When I got done with my errands, I loaded my bicycle up along with Charlie's pet carrier and decided to try out the trail I'd done two weeks ago. 

Charlie did not seem excited or even happy about being stuffed in the trailer at the trail head, but he didn't whine or cry while I cycled. 

We stopped once in a while so he could get out and look around.

About 3 miles in some ladies were walking and asked if they could see my little dog. Charlie got out and charmed the heck out of them. I learned that one lady had just lost her husband a few weeks ago too. The other lady was also named Valerie, she'd just lost her doggy buddy of 14 years. We chatted on the trial about all the good things in life. 

It really lifted me up to meet them.

By the end of 7 miles, Charlie was feeling quite comfortable in his chauffeured carrier.  I did feel the extra 15 lbs of Charlie and the 15 lbs of the carrier by the time I finished the ride. Not so I'd be sore, but it was a nice workout. We'll do it again as long as I can find good flat trails. Charlie didn't even seem to mind the bumpy trail.

Views along the Pine River Bike Trail.

I will definitely come back in the spring during migration and walk this trail with my camera. I saw Kingfisher birds along with so many cool insects and dragonflies. I'll be heading to LaCrosse to get some things at a craft store and start to explore all of the nature trails that that city has to offer on Wednesday.

We ended the day with another dog walk along with packing up all the old stuff from Rich's sock/undie drawer. It made me sad to see that drawer so empty. So I filled it with my workout clothes. 

Don't play with your food...

I can do all sorts of things. Baking is not my forte. On occasion, I do make an attempt at some simple homemade cookies.

Hubby spoke up Sunday morning after his breakfast.

You know, you said you'd make some cookies.

"Um. Yeah. I did." I made a face and it wasn't a pleasant face. "I have to see if I have the ingredients."

Come on, we haven't had home made cookies in ages.

I made another face. Yuck. Yuck. Yuck. But I went to check on what I needed. It seemed as if I had everything including the chocolate chips. However the box of Baking Soda was nearly empty but I could squeeze out 1 TBSP.

I laid everything out on the counter and stared at it. Then I walked away.

Hubby looked at me. What's wrong? Do you have what you need?

"Yup, I seem to. Now I just need my helpers."

I returned with two skid steers, a Mime, a Witch, and a Construction Worker.

Hubby shook his head when he saw my Lego People. I'm going to lay down. Didn't your mom ever tell you not to play with your food?

I gave him an evil grin. "My Legos help me or I don't make cookies. And...I never listened to mom anyway."

You are not right in the head! And they say I am crazy!

Making chocolate chips cookies is supposed to be easy. Most people probably don't even have to follow the directions on the package or study the measurements and ingredients. I do. 

And I was going to enjoy the torture of baking anyway.

The Mime gave hand signals to Grandpa and his pet chicken in the skid steer. The construction guy walked around back. He said it was break time.

The Witch on the edge of the pan must have put a spell on the whole works...

The Mime obviously didn't know how dangerous it was to get in front of this skid steer to direct the measuring of the flour. 

What? 142 scoops of flour??? Are you serious? We'll be here all day!

Next, clean up the egg shells...

Put everything in the oven and....

Ewww, these cookies turned out strange! They spread all over the place and fell apart when we got them out of the pan!

I admit, they turned out horrible. I had to let them bake a bit extra in order to get them out of the pan after they cooled. They spread out weirdly. So I went to a baking site and looked up what may have gone so wrong.

Old Baking Soda. Yeah, as if I'd ever would have noticed. I use baking soda and vinegar to clean in the sink and refresh the drains. Huh.

Hubby came into the kitchen.

What the heck happened here!

"Um...SEE I baked! Um...It was the witch's fault, she put a spell on the cookies so they wouldn't turn out! SEE???"

I just need a dragon to finish hardening them...

Hubby picked one crumbly cookie and munched on it.

Well, at least they are eatable. 

...and it wasn't a total waste. I had a little bit of fun doing it too.

I did a thing in the kitchen

Well, it started out in the forest of course. I visited one of my favorite wild apple trees and picked half a 5 gallon bucket full of apples.

Most of the apples were really good and a few were nasty
with bugs or wormies.
These are the ones that didn't make it to
my chopping board.

Because the color wasn't pretty, I ran out 
to the wild grape vine by the busted garage
and picked several handfuls of grapes.

I strain apples the old fashioned way with a cloth and a strainer.
I understand that using a steam juicer is

faster, but this was how I learned to do it.

So I stick with this method.

Viola! Pretty pink apple juice.

Yes!
I can use the stove! 

One thing I love to do is make jelly. I love beautiful colorful and clear jelly. I probably will only make this one batch as I am the only one who really eats it on my toast and PB&J. 

The jar with the handle was the leftover. 
That will go in the fridge right away.

Hubby made a request for Apple Butter which I will do also. I usually make one or two batches of applesauce a year as we eat that as a desert or as a side with pork chops.

Next week, I'll be preserving our veggies for the winter. I'll get a few bunches of carrots to freeze along with some other fresh veggies. 

I've been gathering seeds for next year's flower garden and an exchange with other neighbors. 

I'm eyeing the wild grape vines. They really produced this year....

I wonder....

Oh and tomorrow? I am looking forward to another 'Thing'.

It thankfully does not involve a kitchen!

Foodie? Catch up...

Spring calls for wild food. I skipped the wild ramps this year, Rich doesn't like onions that much and I have a tiny plot of chives out the back door that I can use anyway.

However, he had a taste for Morels. I hadn't been able to find any until yesterday. I found Morels and I found several places that had Oyster Mushrooms. I leave enough oysters alone so they will spore out and create more on the same log or tree.

The Morels were not huge, but I will cook them up for hubby. It is his favorite. 

I thought I'd try some Pheasant Backs too since they are so plentiful.  They can be found mainly on box elders that are dying. I read up on when to pick them and how to process them.
 

I decided to just try a few and see how they tasted.

Scrap off the spores with a spoon. And it surprisingly smells 

like

cucumber!

Then peel off the brown top...

Chop into thin slices...

One recipe called for white wine and butter. I went with another that called for dipping them in eggs and flour/seasons, then frying. 

I can fry or sauté pretty good aside from boiling water that is...

They were okay. After all, what doesn't taste good fried in butter? Not as good as Morels or Oysters though.

Meanwhile there is mowing, fencing, grooming, to do.

The toilet took a dump and died. I was impressed by the same day service from 608 Plumbing. The price was?  Well. You pay a good price for a plumber. Joe was super nice and said if we wanted him to adjust the flush, just let him know. 

I quipped, as long as the s--t goes down, I don't care about the flush!

The farrier[s] were here too. They are a father son team. All mules behaved and Lil' Richard was probably the hardest for them to do since he is only 31" tall.
One of his jobs is to keep the hill in front of the machine shed trimmed.

We had some rain overnight so I'll be out foraging again for Morels and perhaps dig up some parsnip for fresh veggies.

I did manage a trip to the Kickapoo Valley Reserve to knock off another trail section and do some exploring. More about that when I get time.

Hectic Week! I'm looking forward to 2 quiet days! Next week the Mini Split will be installed!

20 seconds of Orioles

I can cook, sorta

This is a photo of one of the few wild apples trees that have grown on the other side of the line fence in a large meadow.  Every other year or so we get lucky and have great crops of apples.

This year is one of those years. The last two years were flops as either we had late frosts or terribly dry weather.

The apples are super tart and of slightly different sizes.

Over the years I've become quite good at making apple sauce, apple butter, and apple jelly from picking these wild things. 

Yesterday I picked several apples to see if they would be ready. I chopped some up and dumped them in a sauce pan and the others I dipped in cinnamon and sugar and stuck them in my dehydrator.

I ended up with fresh applesauce and sweet apple chips to take with me hiking for snacks.

See? I can cook!

Since I was doing apples and it was pouring cats and dogs outside on Saturday, I decided to get with the program and dehydrated tomatoes with seasoning along with onions, broccolli and seasonings from the flower gardens.

I packaged everything in small sealed bags that are a bit of each veggie and seasonings for winter use. I'll drop each prepped packet into a stew or soup. I only had 4 tomatoes that needed processing and cooking and canning them was not an option.

I bought a couple of pounds of onions at the farmers market, but we don't use a LOT of onions on a daily basis, so I dehydrated those also.

As I was cutting up the wild tart apples and sorting some for applesauce and the other slices for drying, I kept hearing my grandmother's voice saying things like:

'Waste not, want not.' 

The tomato soup mix stuff went into the freezer next to the little packets of nettles and lamb's quarters for winter eating when fresh veggies were not readily available.

It looks like I may get more veggies this coming week! My son and his fiancé are coming to visit and he is bringing some produce from his garden.

I'm looking forward to the visit. However, Megan is a cook and she can whip up delicious meals from thin air I think. 

That is intimidating! So do I offer them a take out pizza? Or horrify them with an attempt to make 

Meat and Tators?

Decisions, decisions.

Tomatoes.

I used to hate to cook and try to prepare anything in the tiniest Kitchen in the world.
Since I no longer have THE world's smallest kitchen any longer....

....I managed to buckle down and make some spaghetti sauce.

I went out to the garden to find more tomatoes. The bird nest I had found a few days ago now had eggs in it!
I picked the tomatoes as well as I could without disturbing the nest.

I peeled the tomatoes and prepped them in an olive oil mix of spices that I pre-sauteed. I was following a recipe I'd found on the internet and thought it sounded interesting.

Since I used olive oil in the base, the sauce would not be a candidate for canning.

The recipe said to squeeze the tomatoes after peeling them. 
I thought that was odd, but decided to try it.

I did this with two small batches of tomatoes. 

As I cooked the sauce, I poured the tomato juice into containers. I asked my husband if he liked tomato juice. I surely didn't want to dump it out. 
I don't like waste.

He said yes, but this tasted bland. Back to my Kindle to look up how to spice up plain old tomato juice.
I found a lot of recipes, but in the end used a touch of Worcestershire Sauce and a pinch of salt and pepper.

Viola! It was tasty!

The recipe for the spaghetti sauce called for simmering it for an hour and a half.

It smelled divine and tasted even better. I'd followed the directions on the cooking site, but didn't have the spices and cloves of garlic, so I made up my own concoction.

I plan on adding some Italian Sausage to it and we'll probably have it for supper one of these next days. Well, when I am off my noon to midnight shifts, that is.

I will probably can plain tomatoes as the season gets ramped up. I always seem to find a way to use them in soups and sauces in the winter.

And now I have a nice basement once we get some shelving put up to line up beautiful canned goods!

I'll be getting crab apples next in preparation for making pink beautiful crab apple jelly.

And now that it has cooled off, I'm thinking that Siera would really like to saddle up and go for some evening rides.

Oh, she really had nothing to do with this post about tomatoes, but heck I threw a photo in here just...because.