Peppers

Peppers are so pretty at this time of year! We picked as many peppers and every other kind of vegetable and fruit that could be picked this weekend. Our peppers came on in abundance...in OCTOBER! We are just lucky that we had such warm and dry weather through September and early October. We expect it to freeze tonight.

Here the peppers have been roasted and are ready to freeze. Don't worry, they were enjoyed on a roast beef sandwich in between picking more vegies and peeling more fruit!

Happy Autumn!

The first day of Fall arrived with fog in the morning. It was as if Mother Nature was celebrating the change of season with a change in temperature. After 10 days of just near or at 100 degrees, this was a welcome change and relief. It also meant it was time to make some tomato basil soup.

First the tomatoes were washed, sliced in half, drizzled with olive oil and slow roasted in the oven for about an hour at 400 degrees. There was about 15 pounds of tomatoes in the bucket and they were all used.

Near the end of the roasting time, onions, celery, garlic, apples, and carrots were chopped and sauteed in butter in the big soup pot. As the onions turned translucent, the rest of the vegetables were getting tender.

They were stirred and mixed to create a delicious vegetable base with just the slightest bit of browning for extra rich flavor. The roasted tomatoes were out of the oven and ready to be added to the soup pot.

You can see the tomatoes have turned lightly brown on the edges and they are completely juiced up. Those juices are also added with the tomatoes to the rest of the vegetables.

Once the roasted tomatoes are added to the vegetables, chicken stock is also added. There are 4 cups of chicken stock or one whole organic carton. If you make stock yourself, that tastes even better! After simmering for 30 - 40 minutes, the soup is ready to be pureed. The blender works great for this task in small batches, so have another soup pot ready.

Once the soup is all pureed, return to the heat and add fresh, chopped basil, salt and pepper to taste. At this point it is ready to can, freeze or eat. When mixing it to eat, add coconut milk, soy milk or cows milk depending on your preference. They all taste good! This batch is ready for the freezer and it made five hearty meals plus leftovers. What are you doing with your end of the season tomatoes?

Garden Clean Up

Last weekend we cleared the end of the produce out of the garden and it is hard to believe there was still so much happening in the middle of October: Tomatillos, tomatoes, cucumbers, cabbage, watermelon, cantaloupe, zucchini, eggplant, squash, and pumpkins. You may see some vegetables not listed too!


The basil went into Eggplant Parmesan and there was enough goodies to make two batches, one for dinner and the other for the freezer! The tomatoes are being eaten everyday and the green tomatoes were stored in the refrigerator and will be taken out one or two at a time to ripen. The cherry tomatoes are being eaten like candy and we left two of the bushes up until it freezes.


The variety of vegies left will make at least two good batches of garden sauce. This is basically a spaghetti sauce, but it just depends on what is ripe in the garden what the ingredients will be in the sauce. The one little trick used, though is a piece of fruit. It can be an apple chopped up or a couple of plums added to the sauce that will offer an extra layer of flavor. The pumpkins are being put to good use decorating the farm fences and baking in the oven for pumpkin bread, pie, or cookies.



Once all of the garden goodness was picked and stored away, the tractor came out of the barn and we turned the plants into the soil. We also put some chicken manure and barn litter on the garden to be turned under also. The chickens will work the garden all winter long getting the bugs, weed seeds and any leftover tomatoes they fins! We also add another layer or two of straw and manure from the stalls in throughout the fall and winter to enrich the soil. Now the rains are here and it's time for walnuts!