The last days of summer went out with unusually hot temperatures, and the first days of fall came in very wet (for around here anyway). September brought lots of changes with me going back to teaching at our local Christian School, and the girls going back to school there. My poor garden has been severely neglected, (it’s more like a jungle than a garden) but as you can see we are still harvesting the benefits of our early summer work.
Whole wheat bread and hamburger buns.
Saturday has become my, baking/laundry/blogging/gardening/chicken coop cleaning day! I am trying to learn how to plan meals ahead of time and get as much done on the weekends as i can. I want to keep cooking real food from scratch as much as possible with this new schedule. This is a big challenge for me, as my organization skills are MINIMAL! (just ask my husband) Good thing my girls are big enough to help and the men in the house are patient. 😀
I have learned that gardening is all about NEXT year. So many things I want to change and do better next spring. I guess that’s part of the excitement of a garden. 🙂
This past month I posted about butchering our Cornish Cross chickens and then I wrote a story about Stinky going to the fair. After that post I had several people express concern about Stinky someday ending up in the cook pot. I want to assure everyone that Stinky will live out her free range life here at the Red Double Wide with no fear of ending up in the cook pot! 😀
One of my sisters sent me a baked pancake recipe the other day via Pinterest. What a brilliant idea!! As I mentioned before in my German Puff Pancake post I really dislike standing at the oven flipping pancakes FOREVER….while half of the family eats and the other half waits for a pancake. There are times though that you just need a good ol’ fluffy pancake and we’ve been loving my Fluffy Whole Wheat Pancake recipe. As I slowly bounced this idea of baked pancakes around in my brain…I thought, why can’t I bake my own pancake recipe? That would be the best of both worlds, a pancake that I already know we like and no flipping or waiting involved. 🙂
I’m a big fan of apple butter, so when I had a box of pears that needed to be used up quickly, pear butter kept coming to mind. I looked up some recipes and then mixed, matched, and tweaked until I had a recipe I was happy with. I have never made apple OR pear butter before and I was a bit skeptical at first. But when I smelled that pot of yummyness bubbling on my stove I knew I had a winner!!
First peel and cut up 8 pounds of pears. This was about 16 medium sized pears.
Add just enough water to cover the bottom of the pan to keep them from sticking. About 1/2 a cup. Cook on medium heat until they are soft, about 30 minutes.
Let the soft pears cool off a bit and then blend until you have a smooth consistency. You could use a stick blender or a regular blender.
When you have a nice smooth “pear sauce” add the sugar, orange zest, nutmeg, orange juice, and almond extract. Cook on medium heat until it reaches your desired thickness, stir often so it doesn’t stick to the pan. It will take about an hour. I let it cool then ladled it into clean pint size mason jars and put them in the freezer.
To can it: Ladle hot pear butter into sterile jars leaving 1/4 inch headspace. Seal with lids and rings. Process in a hot water bath for 10 minutes to seal. This made a little over 4 pints. The recipe could easily be doubled or cut in half.
NOTE: This recipe uses about half the amount of sugar that all the other recipes for pear butter call for. It was PLENTY sweet for us but you could add more if you like. The only thing I will do differently next time is cook it for longer, I would prefer it to be a bit thicker.
This is a post for all you Stinky fans out there. If you’ve never heard of Stinky and want to know how Stinky got her name and why she is so special to us, click here.
When my girls picked out the hens they wanted to take to the fair. Stinky was an obvious choice. She is the most docile of all our chickens (given her history) and very easy to handle.
Over the past few weeks Jo, has been packing her around, singing to her, and training her to stand on the picnic table. When you show a chicken they should stand on the table in front of you without being held there.
A few times while Jo was “training” Stinky I would hear her firmly say “Stinky, you stay right here, I’ll be right back”. She would leave the chicken on the table, run in the house to tell me something “exciting” or grab something “important” and then run back out. That darn chicken would stay right where she was told every time, and Jo seemed to have absolute confidence Stinky would be there when she got back every time!
When fair time rolled around, I was not worried about Stinky. 🙂
Here she is taking her first bath in preparation for the fair.
It must have been an exhausting experience because as soon as the bath was over she had a snooze….. 🙂
We started our drive to the fair with the hens in a kennel. Stinky however, would not behave herself and kept picking on poor Goldie. She wound up riding on Jo’s lap… (I suspect a conspiracy here!)
Jo made sure Stinky got plenty of outside time and they both met new friends.
Meet two of Stinky’s new friends: Fire and Afro 😀
Show time was a little nerve-wracking for both of them. But all that “training” paid off!
We always knew she was a blue ribbon chicken!!
After four eventful days at the fair Stinky was VERY happy to be home with the rest of the ladies!
On our way home from a shopping trip my mom and I stopped at a fruit stand. Everything looked soooo good (I love this time of year)! After some debating I settled on a box of pears and a box of apples. The pears were really ripe and by the next morning I thought the fruit flies were going to pick up my kitchen and fly away. I quickly started a big batch of pear butter (I’ll share that recipe later) and then I froze a bunch to use in future smoothies. What was left, nicely fit in the fridge and we are still enjoying fresh pears and fall smoothies. After putting up a couple fly strips, my kitchen is now (mostly) fly free again!
Here are two wonderful, healthy fall smoothies!
Cinnamon Pear Smoothie
All you need is: 2 pears (cored and quartered) – 1 frozen banana (cut into pieces) – 1 cup of milk (any kind) – 1/2 cup vanilla yogurt – 1/2 cup oatmeal – 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon – a pinch of nutmeg.
Put everything in a blender and puree until nice and smooth. This makes enough for 3 of us to have a nice size smoothie.
Apple and Pear Smoothie
You will need: 1 ripe pear (cored and quartered) – 2 apples (cored, peeled and cut into pieces) – 1 frozen banana (peeled & cut into pieces) – 1/2 cup vanilla yogurt – 1/2 cup of apple juice – 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Throw it all in the blender and puree until smooth.
These make a healthy breakfast or snack….it’s like fall in a cup!
I have to admit that after the turmoil during fair week, I was very ready for butchering day. Out of the 15 birds that we bought, we had 13 make it to butchering day. The five my parents raised and eight out of ten that we raised.
The evening before we butchered it POURED down rain while we were packing up at the fair. By the time we got home they were soaking wet out in their little chicken tractor. So we brought them in the shop to dry off. They quickly dried and we kept them in for the night in case of another down pour.
We took the feed out 12 hours before butchering time; this is so the crop and intestinal tract has time to clear.
I weighed a few of them that morning and they were all around 7 pounds.
We put them in a couple of kennels and headed to my parents house. They have raised turkeys in the past and have a better set up for butchering than we do.
We don’t have any killing cones so the guys used a chopping block and an axe. I think next year we will buy or make some cones. Especially if we have more than 13 chickens.
For scalding we kept the temperature between 145°and 150° F. and scalded them for 1 minute. It worked great! I couldn’t believe how easy they were to pluck!
This is me, my mom, and one of my sisters plucking.
Digger skinned a few of them to see if it was faster than plucking. Skinning was definitely faster. Here are a couple pics of a skinned chicken, this was before it was gutted and cleaned. Check out all that meat!!!
This is the gutting, cleaning, and wrapping station. After they were cleaned we wrapped them in plastic wrap and put them in zip lock bags. They were all around 5 pounds. 🙂
The whole process only took about 2 hours for 13 chickens despite the fact everyone was exhausted from the fair. I was surprised at how smoothly it went and that it didn’t bother me at all. I was very pleased with the sizes of the dressed out birds. My parents were pleased too and have decided to stick with chickens instead of turkeys from now on. Mom already said she wants 20 more next year! I’m sure we will get more next year too. I’m thinking I’d like to try some freedom rangers, just so I can compare.
All said and done they cost right at $9.00 each. Not to bad for five pound, pastured chickens!
Napping on the trampoline. 🙂beans….beans…..beansThis a HUGE bag of wheat that my dad harvested. We are going to supplement the chicken feed with it and Digger wants to experiment with fodder.We had a nasty wind storm that blew over several corn stocks. I was glad it didn’t do more damage.We have dozens and dozens of these….now, if they would just turn red!I am very pleased with how many bees I hear and see while in the garden. 🙂Some of our corn grew like CRAZY. A few of them are over 12 feet tall and the ears are so high I’m going to need a ladder to harvest them!One volunteer sun flower came up in the middle of our garden. I decided to let it grow and I’m glad I did. It’s absolutely gorgeous! I counted 30 blooms on it at one point. 🙂
We ended the month of August with the county fair.
This isn’t the greatest picture but I wanted everyone to see how the fair and chickens are a family ordeal! They all did so well with ALL of their projects. I am a very proud mom, sister, and aunt!!!
September will be bringing many changes. I have decided after much thought and prayer to go back to teaching at our local Christian School and the girls will also be attending there. This means lots less time at home. I am hopeful that I can keep up with cooking from scratch, gardening, and my blog!
Thanks for stopping by the Red Double Wide!! Hope you are all getting to enjoy this harvest season. 😀
If you’ve been following along on our Cornish Cross raising adventure, brace yourself for an eventful week 7! If you are new to our little adventure you might want to check out the first six weeks: week 1 – week 2 – week 3 – week 4 – week 5 – week 6
My girls ages 9 and 10 chose to take two of our Cornish Cross to the fair this year and sell them at the market livestock sale. Our family has always shown and sold sheep, but with a lack of fencing and the fact that chickens are far less expensive to raise, we encouraged chickens this year…..a mistake?? Maybe….
Our 4-H leader, who knows WAY more about chickens than we do, advised that we pick a couple of our roosters to take to the fair because of their size. So on Wednesday afternoon the girls each picked out a rooster and we set to work getting them cleaned up. The girls also took two laying hens to the fair, which made a total of seven baths that afternoon…..four chicken baths then three people baths, getting chickens clean is a dirty job!
No their feathers did not fall out, this is just the way they are….makes for some easy pluckin!
I was dreading this part, but other than a few soggy, soapy chicken wings slapping us in the face and one mom and two girls chasing a soaking wet hen around the yard……it went very well. 😀
This isn’t a very good picture, but here they are all clean and dry, awaiting a ride to the fair! I thought they cleaned up very nicely. 🙂
It was a nice, warm, day so it didn’t take them long to dry off….and we were off to the fair!
Both Cornish Cross weighed in at 6.6 pounds (to sell they have to weigh between 4 and 7 pounds) and after a vet check we settled them into their cages. They were the only Cornish Cross in the barn…we live in a small county! I noticed right away that they didn’t really like walking on the wire cages, it was very different than our lawn. The poultry barn was hot, and this breed doesn’t do well in the heat. They plopped down in their cages, spread their wings out away from their bodies and started panting. (this is normal; this is how they act when they are hot) I was a little worried, but It was starting to cool off by then and I figured in a couple hours they would be fine….and they were. The next morning they looked great and we kept an eye on them throughout the day.
Sorry about the bad pictures…theses were taken Thursday in the late morning.
Thursday night I received a phone call that I was to immediately remove my daughters chickens from the fair grounds. The vet said they were sick and not going to make it through the night! As I approached the barn I saw the vet outside and asked him what the problem was. He said that our chickens had bloody wings, sores on their feet, their feathers were falling out, and they couldn’t stand up!?!?!?! My brief attempt at defending this breed and these birds in particular was oddly met with “I know, I know” and some reference to PETA. In short the vet made it very clear that he had made a decision, it was his call, and the birds had to go. Yes, I argued….no, I did not scream, yell, cuss, kick, bite, or hit, like I was tempted to do at that moment. (we’re talking about some major restraint here folks)
I removed the chickens with tears in my eyes and two little girls full of questions I couldn’t answer. 🙁
When we got home I took the kennel into the shop and opened the door. Both chickens walked out and I began checking them over. I had the Vetericyn out to spray any hurt wings or sores…..there was no need for Vetericyn. I was relieved to not find any sores, but at the same time was very frustrated!
After we took some pictures we put the chickens back in the pen with the rest of the meat chickens. The next morning, the chickens “that weren’t going to make it through the night” were just fine. When I opened the gate to give them breakfast they all ran to me. (Well, as well as Cornish Cross can run anyway) In fact, four days later as I write this they are still fine!
By the time we got back to the fair grounds the next morning our 4-H leader had heard about what had happened,… and she was none to happy!! We ended up filing a grievance with the fair board and attending a board meeting on Saturday morning. (This filled me with some measure of anxiety by the way, I am not one for confrontation) The board was very kind to listen to our complaint. I stated that I believed the whole situation was handled poorly and I didn’t want this to happen to more kids in the future. They said that everyone needs more education about this hybrid chicken, and market chickens should have cages on the floor so they don’t have to walk on wire mesh.
I agree with the board that more education is needed,(like how to tell an ugly, hot chicken apart from a sick or injured chicken) and maybe some misconceptions about this bird can get cleared up. (at least at our little county fair) I intend on writing several more posts about Cornish Cross and we will be making several educational posters to hang up at the fair next year….. whether we enter Cornish Cross or not. The fair was not a total bust, the girls had tons of fun showing their hens and hanging out with friends. They are already talking about next year. 😀
Next week I will share about our last week and our very first butchering day.
I want to say thank you, thank you, thank you to our wonderful 4-H leader Linda. She was so much help in our meat chicken raising experience and is always available to answer our questions. She helped with 4-H books, the fair entry process, and when things got crazy at the fair, she stood by us, helped with the grievance process, and even went to the board meeting with us. Linda….YOU ROCK!!!! 😀
Green beans, green beans, green beans every where. I have planted green beans many, many times, but never have they tasted so good or been so abundant! (it must have been those heirloom seeds?) We pick them about every three days trying to keep up with them.
All these green beans have let me get acquainted with my brand new pressure cooker!
So far I have canned 20 pints and 14 quarts. I’m thinking that will get us through an entire year, especially since Digger isn’t fond of canned green beans. I have given some away to friends and family and the rest we have been enjoying with dinner.
Here are 2 super tasty ways to EASILY add fresh green beans to your dinner.
First find a REALLY cute niece to help you snap the beans. 🙂
She took her bean snappin job VERY seriously!
If you don’t have one of these (my sympathies) it CAN be done alone, BUT it is very boring.
After the beans are snapped and you have picked up all the beans off the floor and cut all the little teeth marks off of them, give them a good washing! (I told you, not boring with a cute helper)
Grease a cookie sheet and place as many snapped and washed beans as your family will eat for dinner on the cookie sheet. Drizzle with some olive oil and sprinkle sea salt and freshly ground pepper on the top. Place in the oven at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes. This is soooo easy and so yummy!
The next recipe is my favorite because it involves BACON!
You will need fresh snapped and washed green beans, bacon, and a small onion.
Chop up the bacon (I used 6 slices) and fry it until crispy. Place the bacon on a paper towel to drain, leave the bacon fat in the pan and add the onion and green beans (about 4 cups). I used half of a LARGE onion I bought from our neighbors at the farmers market….wow! Let them saute in the bacon grease for a few minutes, stirring often. When they are done to your liking, drain excess liquid then add the bacon back in and stir. Add Salt and pepper to taste.
That’s it; deeeelicious! I ate this for lunch yesterday…well not ALL of it, I shared a little with the girls. 🙂 Digger who won’t touch a green bean out of a can will happily eat either of these easy fresh green bean recipes!
I am pleased to say that week 6 went MUCH better than week 5!! If you want to read about the first 4 weeks here they are: Week 1 – Week 2 – Week 3 – Week 4
We had no casualties this week and as you can see their feathers are filling in nicely. So allot less ugliness going on. 😀
I weighed a couple of them on Friday and they weighed right around four pounds. They are the perfect weight for the fair this week. 🙂
So far the total cost for each chicken is $8.00. We plan on butchering in 2 more weeks.
I have learned that gardening is all about NEXT year. So many things I want to change and do better next spring. I guess that’s part of the excitement of a garden. 🙂
This past month I posted about butchering our Cornish Cross chickens and then I wrote a story about Stinky going to the fair. After that post I had several people express concern about Stinky someday ending up in the cook pot. I want to assure everyone that Stinky will live out her free range life here at the Red Double Wide with no fear of ending up in the cook pot! 😀
