Seriously Great Soap!

I plan to write up my cloth diaper routine at some point. Today I found a giveaway that includes one of my must have items to cloth diaper. It is Charlie's Soap!

We switched to Charlie's Soap about a month before the little guy came along. We wash all our clothes, his clothes and his cloth diapers in the stuff. It is awesome! Cleans really well, has NO scent, causes no skin reactions and does not build up on our cloth diapers. It is seriously great soap!

I'm so excited about the chance to win some more as well as a chance to try their other cleaning products. Wish me luck in the drawing over at Life in a Shoe. And if you want to win too, I don't blame you :)

Oh, and it isn't too bad for price. The little 80 load bags go a LONG way in our HE machine. Two bags lasted us a full year and that includes doing lots and lots of diapers!

Hope things are great where you are! I've been canning again...
Heather

And The Fun Never Stops

Or at least it hasn't yet! :)




A few more canning adventures to share today. I mentioned the dill that I got from my parents that was picked out of my grandparent's garden in South Dakota...did you get all of that? I put it to good use in the traditional way by canning dill pickles and also canning dilly beans. We used to do big whole pickles when I was growing up as well as bread and butter pickles. I threw caution to the wind and canned dill pickle spears! And I've never had pickled dill beans, but it seems to be a very popular thing and I love dill so I figured I'd give it a try. So, Nettacow you were right that pickles were in the picture! But beans, who would have thought? Tons of canners all over the place, that's who. Now for enough time to pass so I can crack open a pint and give them a taste!




First things first, here is the recipe I used for Canned Dill Pickles. Here is my big bowl of cucumbers all cut up and ready to become pickles.

This gave me enough for 7 pints of pickles and a few left for eating as they were. I really tried my best to squish them in the jar as tight as possible which is why they wouldn't win any blue ribbons at the fair. But even so, aren't the jars cute all ready for their brine?

The beans and pickles required a bit of garlic so I got to work smooshing and then peeling some cloves. Hopefully it doesn't affect the flavor too much, but I find that it is SO much easier to peel garlic when you've smashed it with the knife first.

Then I washed the beans and got them ready for a quick 3 min steam. I did this with the frist pints I canned, but when I came back a few days later to do some more beans I picked up at the farmer's market I skipped this step. I figure they are going in a boiling water bath, so they are getting as cooked as they need to be. Any one have any thoughts on this? Will my other jars be terrible?

The key to good steaming is to stop the cooking process ASAP. So after the 3 minutes was up they headed into an ice water bath.

I bought these at the farmer's market as well. I cleaned out this vendors green beans ($1/lb) and to equal 2 pounds I needed a few yellow ones as well. I did a couple of jars all green and a couple mixed.

A hill of beans!

Okay, so the disappointing thing. I haven't gotten a picture of them afte they came out of the water bath. It was late, the lighting was bad, I was hot and tired. Need more excuses? :) I will get one though. And then I'll show you that a girl can learn and how much prettier my next set of dilly beans were. There is a trick to packing green beans into a jar!

Have a great day,

Heather

Frugal Find Friday--Canning Edition

Since we are in full on canning mode in most parts of the country, I thought it only right to feature a recent frugal find that has to do with food preservation.





As you may have read yesterday I have recently been blessed with produce from relatives in South Dakota and Wisconsin. I've also been able to find produce through some friendly freecycle folks. (I'm doing another pickup later in September!) I've even been busy supporting our local famer's market. All this wonderful bounty has been being enjoyed and also preserved to make sure we can enjoy it for many months to come.

When canning often the 'other' ingredients and tools are often the most expensive part of the recipe. I was lucky to get some quart jars and two dozen or so pint and 1/2 pint jars from my mom's huge stash. I found another dozen pint jars at a rummage sale for $1. They were still in their original box and had perfect rings on them and they were at least 30 years old! The other great find was completely accidental. My manager at work was getting ready to move from a good sized house to a smaller town home. She had three boxes of jars---was I interested? They were headed to the dump if I didn't take them and as they were originally her grandmother's she'd like to find them a good home. I was VERY interested! I was excited to see that the boxes were almost completely filled with pint jars.

I grew up canning with my mom and 98% of what we canned went into quart jars. I'm finding that I like using pints at this point. We are a smaller family and they just seem less overwhelming than the quarts. Now, if I EVER find tomatos and get to can those they are going in quarts. Hopefully lots and lots and lots of quart jars. For the things I've done so far I really like using the pint jars the best. And nothing is more frugal than dozens and dozens of free pint jars!

I've been fortunate to really stock up on sugar when it was $.99/ 4 lb bag and I found some vinegar for $1.50 a gallon. I've gotten dill from my grandparent's garden. I did have to spend a little money on pickling salt ($2) and pickling spices ($2.12). The lids I've bought at Wally World and they are $1.50 for 12 lids. I have two pots--the big one was a second hand gift from my mom and the little one I bought years ago and just held onto it. I am still looking for a metal ladle, but the jar lifter, rack and funnel were in with the big pot my mom gave me. My canning colanders were wonderful rummage sale finds! I spent $8 for two of them and haven't yet decided if I'm going to sell one or keep them both.

Canning can be as expensive or as frugal as you make it and I am happy to report that ours is staying pretty frugal! Put the word out that you are canning and it is amazing what will come into your life. And don't forget the internet when it comes to finding easy, wonderful recipes to can!

Any frugal finds in your life? Have a great Friday!
Heather

More South Dakota Goodies!

There weren't just chokecherries in my freezer when I got home from work. My parents had brought lots of harvest goodness from my relatives in South Dakota!

My Aunt Mary had also sent along A TON of sweet corn. They planted about 2 1/2 pounds of seed this year and it did really, really well. From what my parents shared it sounds like they have sweet corn coming out of their ears! :) Bad, bad pun, I know. When the family got together to see my parents they brought an entire car load to share with the sisters. Then when my parents went to their home they filled their car up again to share with me. My mom and I processed a ton of corn while she was here and she took 3 vacuum bags with her as well as a bag to eat fresh. Mike and I ate a bag fresh as well and I ended up with 20 more bags in the freezer. We will have lots of corn chowder, salsa chicken with corn and black beans and sides of corn this winter! If anyone has a good corn recipe to share I think I'll be up for trying them t his year. I think we ended up freezing and eating somewhere around 180 ears of corn in the end.

They also have bees and she sent a gallon of honey for my sister, my mom and me to share. I am THRILLED about that. We love using honey and this is from their farm which makes it even better! This was an awesome surprise and we can't wait to dip into our big beautiful jar.

Not pictured, but also sent along were a big bag of dill from my Dad's parents. Two years ago I was suppossed to take dill from them, but I forgot. This time my parent's remembered! You'll see what I've used it for soon. I've got a few heads left and they may just be left to dry and used later. I just love the smell of dill! It should be sold as aromatherapy in my opinion. I also was happy to get 4 large zucchini, but I do not know whose garden they came out of. They have been chopped, shredded and stuffed. I frozen a bunch and we ate a lot. So good!

In the picture, but not from South Dakota are some really wonderful tomatos. While my parents were here we went to see my only relatives here in Wisconsin. My Dad's sister and her husband live about an hour away so went for a visit. They sent us home with a few big tomatos and lots of great cherry sized tomatos. The bigger red ones were SO sweet and the yellow ones were the cutest! They look like pretty little pears or light bulbs. We loved munching on these as we've only gotten 3 tomatos from our garden as of this morning.

I'm so grateful for family that is willing to share from their harvest. If only we lived closer we could help them with their extras more often! :) I look forward to being able to return the favor when I finally have a big garden that produces. For now, I will be sharing my Starbucks coffee bean when we return to South Dakota!

Have a great day,

Heather

Chokecherries!

My parents recently visited us on their way home from a trip to South Dakota. They were both raised there and both sets of my grandparents as well as many aunts, uncles and cousins live there now. A few relatives sent along things for me! I am a truly lucky girl.


I had never tasted or even seen a chokecherry until I came home to find about 4 gallons of them in my freezer. Thank goodness for the internet! I looked up a recipe for chokecherry jam and one for chokecherry syrup. I figured we might as well give them both a chance as we had no idea what to expect.

I would say that chokecherrys are a bit winey tasting. The juice, jam and syrup have the dry mouth feel that the tannins in a good red wine will leave with you. The cherries have a large pit relative to their size and are a bit messy to work with. Luckily the juice wiped up easily and the jam jelled pretty easily. The juice is a beauiful purply-magenta color and my pictures do not do it justice!

I put my canning collander to good use! The larger pits made getting all the juice and pulp out a bit tricky, but I got enough to make me feel like it was worth my time.

My stations...from the boiling kettle (with the cherries and a bit of water) to the collander to the pan (for the pits and skins) and the big measuring cup (for the juice and pulp). I ended up doing all of this part on day one and then coming back to make the jam and syrup and do the canning on day two. Too much mess, too little time to do it all at once!

This is the juice and a TON of sugar boiling away to make jam. The first batch of jam got really good and sticky, the second stayed a bit looser. I may have just not let it boil long enough as it was a large pot of juice. The syrup is the right consistency for pancakes and we look forward to trying a batch really soon!

I am excited by how frugal this project was. There was a lot of sugar involved, but recently our store ran a promotion for $.99 bags of sugar (4 lb size). I figured I used about a full bag of sugar to make all the syrup and jam. So even with lids and such I spent about $2 total. Of course, I also used some energy, but in the end it was a lot cheaper than buying syrup or jam! And no added colors or chemicals. I told Mike that the syrup looks like the bright colored stuff at IHOP, but it is the real deal!

Wait until you see whatelse my wonderful Aunt Mary sent for us!

Heather

Can You Identify This?

This is what has kept me from posting. Do you know what it is? It looks harmless enough...cute little purplish berry type thing.





Then you start cooking it down and it turns into this.

And now you know why I haven't been around much lately. My kitchen floor has not yet been scrubbed and for that I'm very sorry. Many canning adventures to report. And I'm not working tomorrow, so stay tuned for an update!

I hope you had a wonderful Labor Day. I spent a big part of mine laboring...uh, working. After about 45 hours of childbirth I should know better to refer to anything except that as laboring. The weather here was wonderful and I did get to enjoy some of the afternoon.

Have a great day!
Heather

Where does the time go?

So, its Friday and I do not have a post written! Has it really been a whole week? Somehow I accidentally took a week off of posting. Between the family in town, working too many hours, and life I have not had time to think! I promise to take some time this weekend to get some thought on paper...on-line! I've been doing some canning and some freezing and can't wait to get some pictures and thoughts up.

Harvest time is upon us and there is nothing more frugal than putting up and freezing some of summer's bounty to be enjoyed all year long. I've been canning chokecherry jam and syrup, freezing corn, freezing zucchini, and canning dilly beans and cucumbers. Good times!

Have a great day and I'll be back soon,
Heather