Yup — although it sounded like rain outside my window all night — look what I found when the sun came up this morning — let’s hope what’s left of the tomatoes are okay under that plastic. Oh, and maybe it’s time to put the folding chairs and the outdoor cushions away for the winter (except that it’ll be warm and sunny again in a couple of days and everything will need to dry out).
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Here it is, my first cheese. It’s a Queso Fresco — a very simple simple cheese made by heating the milk to between 185 and 190 degrees, then adding a little bit of apple cider vinegar and continuing to heat until the curd has precipitated out, and the whey is clear. Then you drain it into cheesecloth (I used a small-mesh coffee filter that I’ve used in the past to make yogurt cheese) and there it is. It took about twenty minutes total, and now I’ve got about 2/3 of a cup of crumbly, white, slightly sweet Queso Fresco to…
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Okay — this one I really went off the reservation. I had some lamb shoulder that I needed to use up, especially since this year’s lamb should be ready soon (I need to check with my dog groomer/lamb rancher when I take the dogs for shots on Tuesday). And as I’ve noted, I have a glut of milk — especially since my first delivery was Thursday, but I’m going to be on the Tuesday delivery from now on — which means I didn’t have a lot of time to use up a gallon of milk over the weekend. So, I…
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Off to Billings today for some routine errands — so to keep you all entertained in the meantime, here are some links: Barbara Kingsolver on “Dirty Work” Tikkun tackles the spirituality of seed saving in Be Fruitful and Save Seeds Step-by-step directions for saving tomato seeds Michael Bauer blogs about chefs who grow their own produce (and the commenters get incredibly snotty about it.)
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I have another gallon of real milk coming today, and because a gallon of milk a week is really more than I can use, I ordered this nifty cheesemaking kit from the New England Cheesemaking Supply Company. Last week I made yogurt from the fabulous unpasteurized milk and I was shocked at how fabulous it came out. I followed these terrific instructions and they worked like a dream. In three hours, as the instructions claimed, I had really great, thick yogurt. I’ve been eating it all week. A quart and a pint of milk, plus a cup of yogurt as…
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Here’s the beginning of the pancetta. I had to buy commercial pork, which is kind of a bummer, but our local organic pork people won’t have another pork belly until the next time they butcher (in about a month) and I wanted to get going. So, here it is, the five pound section of my whole commercial pork belly that seemed to have the most even thickness. It’s pretty thick — I think rolling it might be more of a challenge than I’d anticipated, but we’ll cross that bridge when we get there. So far this was really easy. I…
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I got a little carried away at Lowe’s last weekend and bought this ginormous pile of bulbs. There are 80 King Arthur daffodils (the really big ones), 160 mixed tulips, 100 scilla and almost 100 crocus bulbs. Oh, and some narcissus — most of which I’ll put away for winter because I like to force them in the house — Patrick used to hate the smell of them, but since it’s four years today that he made that terrible error in judgement (don’t drive drunk, people), I guess one upside is that I can force as many narcissus bulbs in…
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I stopped by to get some moose liver yesterday and look what’s hanging in the garage — a moose in quarters! It’ll be there for about ten days or two weeks while the MH is in Michigan hunting grouse with a client. I know a lot of people are grossed out by this part, but what can I say? I think there’s a part of me that must always have wanted to be a butcher — I find the process of breaking down carcasses into something lovely to eat fascinating. It’s part of the reason I’m looking forward to making…
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Fall has arrived here in Montana — the trees are turning gold, there’s snow on the peaks, and I found an 18-inch zucchini hiding on the backside of one of my feral zucchini plants the other day. We’re a tiny big behind the ball here at LivingSmall at the moment, so go look at the lovely photo of the Crazy Mountains and I’ll be back very soon.
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“Do you want some moose liver?” the MH asked this weekend. “I’ve got 30 pounds of it.” “Sure,” I answered. “I’ll take some — I’ll probably just make paté though.” I mean, I was game for antelope liver last fall, but moose? Moose are enormous — the one that the MH’s son shot this weekend was six hundred pounds! And it wasn’t even a particularly large moose. I have to admit, I have mixed feelings about the moose. The MH was so excited when Robbie won the tag in the lottery this year, and the photo he sent me of…