Gardening=Cooking

We've learned a lot this summer out at the farm. I realized this is the perfect way to start gardening: by working in someone else's garden. They have the land, the seeds, and the majority of the responsibility. We help out when we're there one or two days a week and the owners are generous enough to send us home with half of our harvesting. So the latest farm fresh goodies have included cukes, bell and banana peppers, tomatoes, green beans, potatoes, and blackberries. The harvest schedule is very different down here. For example, I learned that because of how hot it can get down here, you can't wait to harvest potatoes when the vine dries up like in Minnesota. Grandma Wilma taught us that the potatoes will literally boil/bake in the ground with the summer temps. Although this year has been much different; we are enjoying many days with highs only in the 80's and 90's.

While the owners of the farm are gone on a mission trip to Africa for a couple of weeks, we were "ordered" to take home all of the ripe vegetables from the garden. Consequently, we ended up with a few tomatoes. I decided to give homemade spaghetti sauce a try. The recipe I found said to have 20 pounds of tomatoes.

First, we boiled the tomatoes for 45 seconds and gave them an ice bath. After peeling the tomatoes and squeezing all the juice and seeds out, we simmered them for half an hour. Then I cooled them off to put them in a blender really quick to get the consistency our kids like. Back into the pot it went with lots of seasonings, including fresh herbs also from the garden. It was a lot of work and all these tomatoes only made about 2 jars worth of sauce! But boy was it good. We put it on our homemade pizzas.

We also used some tomatoes and fresh banana and bell peppers to make some homemade salsa. Yummy!

But everyone's favorite crop this year: BLACKBERRIES! We have never got to have fresh blackberries. The kids didn't care much for the picking; it was thorny and we were out in the fields with the sheep with the guard dog keeping both eyes on us. But they sure made sure to help eat the blackberries. I couldn't believe the taste difference compared to store-bought ones. Gabie could not stop eating them. While we were out in the field picking them, he was eating them just about as fast as I was picking them!

Since we had so many of them (after I got Gabie to slow down), I also made blackberry jam. I found a really great, quick recipe that used just enough sugar to make it into preserves.

Here's peanut butter pancakes with blackberries. Definitely a family favorite!

Of course, I haven't been doing all this work myself. The kids are becoming professional culinary chefs! Vince was really itching to make homemade pasta, so he chose lasagna noodles since it requires less cutting and doesn't require a pasta machine. He did a great job; his homemade noodles were so much more delicious than store-bought! (This picture was taken of cold leftover lasagna to show the layers and Vince's homemade noodles.)

Dylan's new favorite thing to make is cornbread muffins. He does such a good job too! (Notice his apron; it's his Lowe's Build & Grow Workshop one. We do the workshops there once a month and he figured out another use for that apron. Makes sense to me!)

And of course, the grand finale, Vince's homemade ice cream sandwiches. Well, partially homemade anyway. We didn't make homemade ice cream this time; the dairy farm keeps running out of cream in the summer! (Gee, I wonder why?!) So he made homemade cookies and used the runner up, all-natural and delicious Breyers vanilla. Lip-smacking good!