harvest time & fresh bread baking...

Well, it's harvest time at our little garden.  Tonight is supposed to get into freezing temperatures and so in came all the green tomatoes we still have growing.  From quite a few people I've heard that this has been an odd tomoato season.  Many of us had tomatos hanging out green all summer and then ripening in Autumn.  Recently the plants have gone crazy with tomato production, just in time for a freeze.  Well darn, last year we were putting tomatoes on everything, giving some away plus I froze bags full.  This year not so much.  So, now I must decide whether to try ripening them inside or try some green tomato recipes. Green tomato pie anyone? 

We also had Thai basil still hanging on & a bunch of green peppers to pick. We'll definitely be having the last pesto of the season but what to do with all those green peppers?

It's always a little sad to cut everything down.  I've been working on it gradually.  This year I'm covering our gardens with pine needles.  A wonderful tip from the winter gardening class I just took at the retreat.  We had these needles piled and starting to decompose.  Now they will keep the soil covered so that our harsh sun and Spring rains don't dry it out and carry it away.  And what to do about our soil?  I thought it was nice, rich stuff until I volunteered at our local co-op farm.  Digging out weeds along a patch of earth I had ample time to study their beautiful soil.  It was so absolutely rich with compost and manure, it's hard to describe it's feel.  It was truly apparent to me that our soil is paltry & dry in comparison.  Next year I need to find some good, aged poo I think.  I'm also going to work on those weeds this season.  This is the perfect time to do it.  After the cold snap, it will warm again and then I can start digging weeds out.  I want to see a peaceful, sleeping garden when I look out or windows this winter, not a tangle of weeds!

The coziness of Autumn always gets me baking bread again. The summer here is just too hot to think about heating up the kitchen but Autumn is when it calls to me.  Usually I bake a loaf a week for awhile until I begin dreading the kneading.  I have a love/ hate relationship with kneading.  Well, after reading, "How to be an Extreme Eco Housewife in Just a Few Hours a Week",  at Old Recipe for a New World blog & hearing about the no-knead 5 minutes a day bread making method, I knew I had to try it.  This bread recipe is so easy (no knead) and makes a lot of dough.  After sitting out for a couple of hours it goes into the refrigerator where it is stored for up to 2 weeks.  You can then take a little dough every day and have fresh bread daily.  My first attempt was ok.  The bread was yummy, a bit chewy but the real issue was that I put the water (for steam) into a heated glass pan in the oven & it exploded!  It was no fun clearing my oven of hundreds of blue, glass shards.  Ah well, my oven is clean and ready for Thanksgiving baking.  Strike that from the to do list!  My second attempt was much better.  The loaves were much prettier if not a little small, but the crust, ooh that steam really does make a tasty, crunchy crust.  Anyway, I'm hooked on this recipe, my family loves it and I'm dying to make some homemade pizza with it.  Forget store bought, this bread is too good.

Until next time...