Welcome to my Tree House!

About me:

My name is Theresa, aka "Tree" to some longtime friends and a few relatives.

I'm a (mostly) stay-at-home-mom of two.  My passions include my family, my faith, and living in a simple manner that respects the blessings we have been given.

Summer Dining From the Farm

Tomato Juice

I love, love, love tomato juice.  It is the fastest way to process and preserve a huge bunch of tomatoes.  I have a 30-quart kettle that came with my turkey fryer.  It has made way more tomato juice during its existence than it has fried turkeys.  I just start stemming and quartering tomatoes.  I put them in the kettle, and just keep going until either it is full or I run out of tomatoes.  Then I put it on the stove and cook it, stirring occasionally with my Cajun Crawfish Paddle (the only thing that reaches to the bottom of the kettle), until the tomatoes are almost boiling and they look tender.

Then I cover it, turn off the heat, and let it sit for a few hours.  I like to cut and cook in the evening.  Then I let it sit and cool overnight.  After that, I run the entire mess through a strainer.  Either my Kitchen Aid strainer, or the Vitorio strainer that I got from my mother-in-law.

Once I have the skins and the seeds strained out, I return the juice to the stove and bring it almost to a boil.  You need to have sterilized quart jars and their lids ready.  Fill the jars, wipe the rims with a clean damp cloth, top with lids and rings, and put into the waiting canner.  I actually pressure cook just about everything.  Our water is questionable from the tap, and we don't drink it.  But I hate to use bottled water for water bathing.  So I usually use the tap water, but in a pressure canner.  That way the water isn't over the top of the jars, so there's no chance of contamination.  At least, not by my way of thinking.

So water bath for 10 minutes, if that's what you're used to, or pressure can at 10 psi for 10 minutes.

So easy to get rid of a lot of tomatoes quickly!  You can drink the tomato juice this winter, use it in soups, or cook a jar of it down for pizza or spaghetti sauce.  It is absolutely my favorite.

Refrigerator Pickles

Take a crock or a couple of glass gallon jars.  In the bottom of each place a layer of dried chile peppers (if you want a little heat), several cloves of garlic, and a few heads of dill.  Add a layer of sliced cucumbers.  (I fill the jar about halfway).  Add another layer of peppers, garlic, and dill, and fill the rest of the way with cucumbers.  Top with more garlic, peppers, and dill.

Now make a brine of 13 cups of water, 1 cup of cider vinegar, 1 cup of canning salt, and 1/4 tsp. of alum.  Bring to a boil, let cool slightly, and pour over your cucumbers.  Cover with a plastic bag and place in refrigerator.  Will be ready to eat in a couple of days.

If they last long, you're supposed to make more brine and replace it every two weeks.  Ours never last that long!

The original recipe came from a former neighbor, and also called for grape leaves in the layer with the peppers, garlic, and dill.  We haven't yet planted any grape vines successfully, so we just skip that part.

Salsa Mexicano

Most of the salsa that we make, we can for winter use.  Once in a while, though, I get hungry for fresh salsa.  I always try to make this when tomatoes, peppers, and cilantro are fresh in the garden.  It's a holdover from our years in Colorado, with all the California transplants for whom salsa went with everything!

Take about 8 roma tomatoes, (or about a pound of regular ones), chop coarsely and put in your food processor.  Add:

• 2 T chopped onion (put in a strainer and run cold water through it first)
• 2 serrano chiles, chopped, with seeds
• 2 T finely chopped cilantro leaves
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 T lime juice (fresh, if possible)

Run through the food processor and chill in the refrigerator for 30 minutes before eating, to allow the flavor to blend. 

This is fabulous with tortilla chips, and brings a little bit of summer with every bite!

I'm not big on freezing things, but that's the best way to preserve this salsa.  Just pour it into a freezer container or bag, label it, freeze it, and you can have "fresh" salsa this winter.

Today's Final Thought on Preserving the Harvest

I don't like to depend on the freezer too much.  If the power goes out for any length of time, you lose all your hard work.  This has happened twice in my adult life, the Bobcat Gulch Fire in June of 2000,  and the ice storm in December of 2007.  In both cases, we were out of power for five days.  In the winter, you might be able to save some things by putting them outside in below-freezing temps, but in the summer that doesn't work!