Because I clearly don’t have enough to do.

Since I have nothing to do but sit around all day playing video games, watching soap operas, and eating bonbons I decided to start another blog- http://www.cookingnuggets.com/

Okay so that isn’t exactly true. I have never really played a video game, I have never followed a soap opera, and my pancreas has an aversion to bonbons. In actuality I am fishing match box cars out of my spice containers and finding screws in the bottom of my cups of coffee. With my roles as: mom to a pre-schooler and a teenager/daughter to 2 elderly parents/wife/teacher/coach/perpetual college student/house-remodeler/gardener- garden club member/city council member/education advocate/book club discussion leader/part time photographer/ and chief cook I generally have at least 3 to 4 things going on at any given moment. That being said we have to eat. I love to cook and even more importantly I love to eat. The folks I care about all seem to be rather fond of eating as well so cooking is one of those things I do regardless of the other hats I am wearing at any given moment. I get asked a lot about recipes, how to can, and how do I manage to cook with all of the balls I have in the air at any given moment. This blog will provide answers to all of those questions and hopefully help other folks out there with an equally crazy set of hats to wear gain some tricks for how to eat better while multitasking the rest of the circus that most of us loosely refer to as our lives. My goal is a post a day for a year. Yeah I know- because I clearly don’t have enough to do.  Come follow along – at least I am not bored.

Thankfully I have good help in the kitchen.

     

 

How to kill a pumpkin

In addition to the pumpkins we planted we had one grow as a “volunteer” -as my dad would call it -out of our compost pile. We let it go and mowed around it for the summer. We had a tomato plant do something similar in the crack of our front porch. We let that go as well. I figure any plant that just voluntarily decides to grow and make food for me with no encouragement on my part all- can at least be left unmolested to do it’s thing. At any rate this is the pumpkin it produced- completely for free and with out any effort on our part other than picking it-I might add. It wasn’t quite ripe for Halloween but it made it in time for Thanksgiving just in time of pie. We cooked it and canned it. We got 22 pints- 2 full canner loads out of this pumpkin. Plenty for pie… and pancakes, scones, cake, bread, soup, and pasta sauce. Clint will now show you how to kill and dress a pumpkin.

First sneak up on the unsuspecting pumpkin. You should probably wash it first but don’t worry it won’t guess your intentions- pumpkins are kind of slow on the uptake.

 

Have a bowl ready to put the guts in.

Hold the pumpkin firmly by the stem and make your attack.

 

You will have to plunge the knife deeply and repeatedly to fully dismember it.

Once you have fully dismembered it you can split it open for easier cleaning.

Scoop out the guts. This will include the seeds. Separate the seeds in a colander. Save some to plant next year- since the “volunteer” is clearly not a hybrid or it wouldn’t have grown in the first place and then toast the rest. There is very little to go to waste on a pumpkin – that should make you feel better about killing it.

Warning gutting a pumpkin is a messy business- it isn’t for sissies.

Some folks bake it. We usually boil it.

When it is soft scoop the flesh away from the rind and put it – hot directly into canning jars. I can them in a pressure cooker at 15 pounds for 40 minutes. That my friends is how to kill, clean, dress, and preserve a pumpkin.

You have got to love a man that knows his way around the grill.

I think I mentioned our garden performed really well this summer and heading in to fall we had an abundance of peppers- sweet and hot. Rather than let them go to waste we roasted them on the grill and canned them for use this winter. Clint did several grill tops full. Here here for a bountiful garden.

Home made jelly

We made home made jelly out of the wild black raspberries we picked this past summer. Every time you open a new jar it is like a bit of summer sun just waiting there for you.  Caelun LOVES it with peanut butter.  Come have a taste – he will share.

  

So yummy! Look mommy it is in my hair.

 

Want a taste?

 

Here – have some.

    

How about a kiss?