Cornpone

Please listen very quietly………………..that is my sigh of relief. I have been totally out of the blogging game the past few weeks because work was very very busy! But I’m back, and can’t wait to get back at it! I have a wonderful garden post in the works, but in the mean time I want to post about my very favorite old timey country meals. I’ve been re-reading/ teaching Huck Finn and in the spirit of the South I present pinto beans, and as Huck calls it: cornpone!

Of course, in this house no supper is complete without a glass of local wine:
A special shout out to my very beautiful sister Jodie at her first wine tasting:
The air is warm, the garden is coming up, vacation is booked, stress levels are down, and Milton is crowing at 4:45: I am in my element.

My pantry in mid April

I love my pantry. It is extremely old fashioned. Every summer we stock it full of canned veggies, pickles, jams, preserves, chutneys, almost anything that comes out of the ground or on a tree from our farm ends up in the pantry… even some meats… yeah, I go that far.  Here is what it looks like now- healthy looking from this angle right?

Well, that picture only shows a quarter of the pantry… we have eaten SO much from it! The empty side, and the empty bushel basket usually full of potatoes:

So sad. My herb box and dried peppers have dwindled down to nothing…no onions left either.

However, there is hope, and I am preparing for the times to come! Jars (thanks Megan!), vinegars-essential, my flours/ salts/ grains, and pressure cookers just itching to come out:



I can’t wait to get started!

Signs of spring break!

Lots going on around here! Pantry is getting cleaned out, freezer re- organized (pics coming soon!), plants in the ground, all in preparation for the late spring/ early summer canning, preserving! This is what spring break looks like so far for me:

The best natural food ever.

Last year I blogged about Morels… this type of weather is perfect for the ‘shroom, and my goodness I just get excited thinking about them! My wonderful husband went looking for them and this is what he and Cowbaby came back with!

Breaded with House of Autry, and fried in bacon grease. Oh. My. Heart. Topped with some creamy horseraddish. This is by far better than ANY shrooms ordered out, almost like a fried oyster minus the consistency of any oyster.

The perfect appetizer to a nice salad:
Morels are by far the best completely natural food ever. What is more natural than going in the woods and picking your food? I want more. Now. Spring is here!

Because I am bored

A totally random post so feel free to disregard. Just a few of my favorite things.

Stress and gardening

Who suffers from stress? I do! Who wants to find a balance between work and fun? I do! Who believes such a thing does not exist? Meeeeeee! I do not think there is a way to separate “work” from “life.” I believe I feel this way because, 1- I love my job, and 2- I have a personal interest in my job. I care about it… and so it, and the relationships I hold within it carry into my personal life. There simply is not a line of separation. When it comes to stress I have as much, if not more, stress in my personal life as my professional life. I do believe that finding balance is about finding ways to NOT stress, or at least finding those personal things that you can do to distance yourself from all the problems in your world. Those two things for me are running and gardening. Running is the only form of exercise that makes me feel this way… I think it is a breathing thing.   Gardening makes me feel this way because, for some reason, I focus on nothing else when I’m gardening.  The mud, the occassional electric shocks from leaning into the fence, all the plants, the concentration, the risk, the thought that goes into it… the list could go on.   I believe this is why I get really ansy this time of year.   We are always very cautious about our first planting, because so many things can happen… like snow in late March? So, I listen to the old timers and patiently wait for this time of year. Finally, we have some things in the ground! Onions, red and yellow!:

Potatoes, all kinds!:
How to get straight lines:
And of course, no post is complete, and no garden fully fertilized without my main man:
I lovvvvvvveee this time of year. Many more plants just waiting to go in the mud. One last thought from one of my Grandma’s: “A real Southern woman does not need makeup starting in the Spring.” I feel less stressed already!

Why I love where I live

Yesterday my husband, cousin, and I did a 10+ mountain hike over Three Ridges in Nelson County. It was an amazing hike that left us *kind of* tired, which meant to all of us that we are actually in good shape! We started after 9am and went until about 2, and kept a very steady pace, stopping only for a few mountain views, lunch, and doggie bathroom breaks. At one view my cousin said, “this is where we live.” She is right, the views we saw were what we see everyday from our yards… just really high up. We live in an amazing part of the world and I am so thankful to be physically able to do a hike like we did, and to have the people like I did join me! Here are some of our views:

We started in the valley of the first picture, hiked up the mountain, along the ridges of the second picture, over another ridge, and down to the blue ridge parkway. Cowbaby was so tired by the end of it all. It was a wonderful day and a wonderful way to bring in Spring. Garden season has arrived!!!

Confession

Hi, my name is Jennifer and I like fried veggies, creasy salad boiled with bacon grease, and venison dogs. I can’t help it. I am from the South.     I actually like veggies cooked any way remember all of my hard freezing work (sans blanching) from this summer? Well we have been eating them and they are sooooooooo good!    Squash and zucchini unfrozen and then fried in evoo with seasoned salt and old bay:

Creasy salad boiled and then drained and re-boiled in bacon grease:
And…. Venison dogs stuffed with cheddar cheese and peppers. Oh my heart (Jasper knows what these are):
My plate:
I am so glad Spring is only days away, my poor plants and I are ready to be in the dirt!
P.S. if you haven’t tried this wine, you need to get it. Now

No words

Sometimes there are no words:

I do love Oysters. I do love Spring. I can smell it in the air. I don’t like stress, but I do live off it. I can’t wait to get my hands in the mud and grow things. That is all. More to come

Stay tuned.

Tonight I made the most amazing chicken bbq pizza… the only things not from our farm were the onion and cheese. Sorry for no pics, but it was eaten too fast.     You want to stay tuned this weekend though, because there is going to be an oyster roast. It will be epic locality at its best. We’ve named it S(Chad) Fest.  Remember the guy drinking out of the calve’s bottle? That’s “Shad,” and he earned this title. Local food and fun will be had by all. This is a post you will not want to miss