Good Food Down on the Farm

This summer will definitely be in my memory banks as a hot, miserable year. People who spend time by the water are likely thrilled to death with all the hot, sunny days, and I'm very glad for them. We are working on various projects here on the farm and the heat and humidity are making life tougher than it needs to be, in my opinion. Darrell is working, primarily alone, but sometimes with my help as needed, on building a new chicken coop. I've been wrestling with the garden, weeding, harvesting, processing, pickling. The kitchen is hot at night when, after supper, I'm processing corn for freezing, or heating the canner and various elements needed to pack jars . . . however, working against time and weather certainly gives you a sense of accomplishment and perspective! We, in our area, don't NEED to do all this - we could go buy whatever we want at a multitude of markets, stores, and specialty shops. Unlike Darrell's grandfather, whose family emigrated to Kansas, sta...

A week or so ago we started getting enough asparagus out of our little patch to make meals with. This past Christmas someone gave us a jar of pickled asparagus (commercially done), which we thought was quite yummy, so Darrell searched out a recipe for pickling asparagus on the Internet and decided to try it. It's a simple little recipe for processing small amounts at a time, so perfect for home canners who aren't trying to do a whole bunch of asparagus at a time. You can find the recipe here: Pickled Asparagus . I had a slight issue with the amount of pickling liquid the recipe provided and had to augment with additional vinegar to fill my jars to within the 1/2 inch of the rim needed. Darrell also found a recommendation from a user to add a garlic clove to each jar, so I did that, too. I tasted an onion cooked in the pickling liquid and found it to be excellent - now we are waiting for 2 weeks to open a jar and sample the results, as dill, garlic and red pepper flakes were add...