Salsa Water
Notice the lipstick? I must say, lipstick really makes a difference. I've known this for so long it amazes me that I ever forgot. I do remember declaring when I was seventeen and stupid that I would never be caught dead leaving the house without make up. That was back before I learned not to use the cursed word "never". You may find yourself wondering how the hell I can bring myself to wear such outre sunglasses...but if you're asking this question then you are behind the times my friend. Didn't you know that the '80's is the new '70's? (I have a whole dissertation in my head about the asinine nature of this particular statement which is forever cropping up in fashion magazines "Pink is the new black", "50 is the new 40" (with regards to age), "Casual is the new formal"...etcetera. You may as well say that "Penis is the new vagina" for all it really makes any sense.)
Yesterday was another gorgeous day to be out and about. I had to go back to the farm to pick up the peppers I left there, so obviously I had to pick more tomatoes too. And a few more jalapenos. I thought I might take you along. This is what the world looks like from my scooter. Hop on man, let's go to the farm! (Doesn't that make this post so interactive you almost feel the bugs in your own hair?)
Here is one of the many crosses I see on the road sides. This particular road has it's share of ghosts. I don't know what happened to Kate, Katie, and Michael, but I'm pretty sure they were Hispanic and catholic. I only guess this due to the exuberant display of catholic offerings with the slightly cooler Latino flair than my own catholic relatives are likely to have. I risked my limbs for this shot. The road is very small and there's no place to really pull over. I wonder if that's how Kate, Katie, and Michael bit it? Were they just trying to get a more pastoral shot of this pretty landscape when they were tragically bumped into the next life?Another ghost on this road is a young man who apparently died trying to procure drugs which he was rather fond of. Meth was his nectar. Unfortunately, his body was recently found in a fifty gallon drum on a farm on this road. See, I can't stop thinking about it which I would like to do, but I read the paper last week (big mistake) and this is what I find out about. This is not useful news to me. I already am aware that there are thousands of lost bodies stashed in weird places on the planet just waiting to be discovered, or not. I don't actually need to know the precise location of where they were stashed once found, especially when it's in my neck of the woods.
This is heaven. An endless field of tomatoes. Tomatoes as far as the eye can see. My ambition is to fill every cupboard space in my house with canned tomatoes so that all winter long I can open up that sunshine and have myself some home-made tomato soup on a cold winter day with a hunk of home made bread. I had a great talk with one of the farm owners, Chris, about their policy on pesticides. Bernard's Farm rarely sprays their crops, and when they do the only thing they use is an organic natural rosemary oil. Chris says it's important to her that people be able to go out in her field, pick a tomato, and eat it right there without worrying about chemical contamination. However, they cannot be certified organic because they use a non organic fertilizer.
This is how many tomatoes fit in my apron. (I was on a role with this post when I got a call from the school that Max had a bloody nose that wouldn't stop and it had been twenty minutes and he was getting really upset...I just got back from sitting with him while the dizziness subsided. You can't call the hospital for advice on whether you should come in to emergency or not, and the advice nurse at the doctor's office is never immediately available and generally will call you back within two hours.
So essentially, we're always in our own hands when it comes to drawing the emergency line. That really sucks. Our doctor told us that a twenty minute nose bleed is the limit they should go, beyond that we should take Max to the hospital. But what the hell will they do for him? This one stopped right at about twenty minutes. I think the office gets tired of seeing my son and I feel bad for Max having to be the kid who is always bleeding.)
So essentially, we're always in our own hands when it comes to drawing the emergency line. That really sucks. Our doctor told us that a twenty minute nose bleed is the limit they should go, beyond that we should take Max to the hospital. But what the hell will they do for him? This one stopped right at about twenty minutes. I think the office gets tired of seeing my son and I feel bad for Max having to be the kid who is always bleeding.)
This is what I took home with me.
Heading back to the barn to weigh up my pick. I love it here. It's a very calm productive spot full of potential meals and abundance, I find it addictive to come pick my own vegetables here. I love it even more now that I know for sure that they don't spray with anything except a rare dose of rosemary oil. 
Before heading into the barn I couldn't help but stop to pick a few jalapenos since I used up most of my stash the day before. I didn't wear gloves to pick them. We need to talk about that later.
Over forty pounds of produce for $19.00 is such a great price. Especially when most of that is tomatoes. I fit it all on my scooter. I admit that there are moments at the grocery store and at the farms when I wonder if I'll really be able to fit it all onto my little vehicle, but I always manage.Tuesday I made a salsa recipe that I got from Karmyn at Dreaming What Ifs... and then yesterday I used a recipe from a pamphlet of recipes developed by The Pacific Northwest Extension. The one I did yesterday was supposed to make 16 to 18 pints of salsa. That would certainly have been the case if what I wanted was SALSA WATER. I not only squeezed all the seeds out (the juiciest bit) but I had to cook that salsa for over an hour and also ladle out several quarts of watery tomato juice. I like salsa to be thick enough to hang onto a chip. So what I ended up with after a huge day of work was 8 pints of salsa.
I also made some stewed tomatoes from the leftover fifteen pounds of tomatoes I picked on Tuesday. They turned out really well, I mean, they didn't ooze out of the jars after removal from the boiling water bath, and nothing floats to the surface. I want to do this recipe I found in a British preserving book but I can't figure out how to make it work with the recommendations of the USDA. So then I was thinking of freezing some tomato sauce or soup, but I know tomatoes can well so I'm reluctant to waste energy freezing anything I'm unsure of.
I've also slow roasted a couple of batches. I will certainly post the recipe for these in the next couple of days. The great thing is that you don't need a bushel of tomatoes and it takes almost no work to do them.
Here are a few tips I'd like to give to anyone who is canning this week:
Now I must be off to cook more tomatoes. Which I don't feel like doing because I am coming down with a cold. Think I can trick it into never arriving? I am actually shocked that it has been over a year since the last time I got a cold. Ever since Max was born I went from getting sick once a year to getting every single cold that drifted through town. Hell, if Carla in Kentucky got a cold I'd get it from her. This is the first year that I've gone back to my normal cold programming. I still wish I wasn't feeling it coming on though. So maybe I should make some delicious soothing tomato soup?
Note: Finally the advice nurse called me back and guess what? After a year of torture and agony and us begging for answers or help with the bloody nose situation, they've made us an appointment with the ear throat nose specialist. Of course, I know what will happen there too. They're going to tell us there's nothing that can be done, there are no answers that we don't already have. But the point is: it took a year for the doctor to decide that this might be an issue? They didn't think this was an appropriate step way back in (whenever that was) when I almost passed out from the bloody nose that came out both nostrils like a river for twenty minutes and the only reason I didn't pass out was because Philip DID?
I've also slow roasted a couple of batches. I will certainly post the recipe for these in the next couple of days. The great thing is that you don't need a bushel of tomatoes and it takes almost no work to do them.
Here are a few tips I'd like to give to anyone who is canning this week:
- Obviously don't douse yourself in boiling water. You'd think this is something we all already know, yet only two weeks ago I shuffled across my patio with a pot of boiling water and got myself good. So really: Don't run with boiling water kids...
- You know how people are forever saying you should handle all hot peppers with gloves? I'm a tough girl and I don't listen to pansy advice like this, do you? There's a difference between chopping three roasted jalapenos and de-seeding sixteen of them raw. The difference is: skin that burns for 12 hours no matter how hard you try to scrub your skin off of your hand. Yes, I bought myself some latex gloves for the purpose of handling hot peppers and the next time you plan to handle hot peppers, I recommend you follow that advice. Unless you are one of those people that find pain sexy, in which case go ahead and take the pain highway, just don't tell me how much you like it because things will be uncomfortable between us for a while if you do.
- If a salsa recipe says the yield will be 8 pints, be advised that in all likelihood what they mean is that you will get 8 pints of SALSA WATER, or 4 pints of regular salsa. Ladling out the watery part that settles on the top will reduce the total time it takes to get your salsa to a regular consistency.
Now I must be off to cook more tomatoes. Which I don't feel like doing because I am coming down with a cold. Think I can trick it into never arriving? I am actually shocked that it has been over a year since the last time I got a cold. Ever since Max was born I went from getting sick once a year to getting every single cold that drifted through town. Hell, if Carla in Kentucky got a cold I'd get it from her. This is the first year that I've gone back to my normal cold programming. I still wish I wasn't feeling it coming on though. So maybe I should make some delicious soothing tomato soup?
Note: Finally the advice nurse called me back and guess what? After a year of torture and agony and us begging for answers or help with the bloody nose situation, they've made us an appointment with the ear throat nose specialist. Of course, I know what will happen there too. They're going to tell us there's nothing that can be done, there are no answers that we don't already have. But the point is: it took a year for the doctor to decide that this might be an issue? They didn't think this was an appropriate step way back in (whenever that was) when I almost passed out from the bloody nose that came out both nostrils like a river for twenty minutes and the only reason I didn't pass out was because Philip DID?
Labels: bloody noses, canning, farms, peppers, salsa, the kid, tomatoes