Is October already over?

Can you believe its November already? 

Seems like October went by in a flash. 

We carved pumpkins.

 
We had Halloween.

 
And, I began my new cold weather survival project. 

 
Thats right. Cupcakes are going to get me through the winter. Those cold, dreary, gray days....when Im missing the sunshine and its too cold to play outside....Ill be making cupcakes. Im referring to this endeavor as the Cupcake Perfection Program. Or the C.P.P. for short. I know, it sounds very official, right? You should join. Ill make you a name tag. 

That cupcake you saw earlier was last weeks cupcake. A dark chocolate cupcake with peanut butter frosting. It turned out quite delightful and family and friends gave it a thumbs up. 

My main goal in all this is to keep my sanity through the winter. Im not a big fan of winter in case you didnt know that already. But also, I really would like to have a go to cupcake. You know, the one thats there for you always....the one you can count on in a flash. I mean, G is just 5....I still have lots of classroom parties to get through. So, the perfection will be making that perfect chocolate and perfect vanilla cupcake. Of course, making all kinds of everything in between. 

This weeks cupcake began with chocolate. Hard to go wrong with that, huh?

 
The end result is the black bottom cupcake. 

 
And boy, was it ever tasty. And very simple to make with very few ingredients. 

 
I began with a book from the library. It was all about cupcakes. Turned out that the pictures were very pretty, but the cupcakes just werent that good. So, then the natural progression was to get online and just look around. I discovered this great blog thats all about cooking....and from there I tried out these last two cupcakes I mentioned...with my own revisions, of course. 

So, thats where Ill be this cold weather season. And theres a high probability that I may have to be rolled out of the house come Spring time.

Second verse same as the first

Only this time with pears.

We harvested about 10 gallons of pears from our Bartlett tree. The Anjou tree didnt do nearly as well...we had some to eat fresh, but not to preserve. Maybe next year will be better for them. Or us.

Pears can be a little tricky. It is a little known fact that pears are actually supposed to be harvested before they ripen. No ripening on the tree is what the research says. You want to pick them when they are mature, but not ripe...and that can be a very tricky thing. And once they are mature and you pick them, depending on the variety, they are then supposed to rest in a very cool place for anywhere from a couple days to appx 30 days. This can prove to be difficult to accomplish when you live in the desert.

At any rate, after a good scrubbin in the sink...

It was time to get to work. First order of business was pearsauce. Upon making the sauce tho, I realized that it just had a lot more moisture in it then when I made the applesauce. It was going to take forever to cook down. And I didnt want pear butter...altho, that does sound tasty.

To remedy the moisture issue, I decided to grab the jelly bag and pour the cooked and already strained pears through that.

It worked like a dream. The sauce turned out very nice and thick.

And it was a win win for me. Straining the pears for a second time left me with a very nice version of pear juice.

A little over 3 quarts of it actually.

Enough for 2 batches of pear jelly. Which gave me 18 jars.

And, of course, not to be forgotten are the pear crisps. Oh my goodness...they are heavenly.

I tell you what...these are not gonna make it till winter. As much as I would love to eat a nice, warm pear crisp this winter....yeah, Im thinking Ill be doing good to have any left by Thanksgiving.

And G was all business when he was capping these off.

He got really, really fast by the time we were all done.

And did I happen to mention that I have about 8 more wagon loads just like this that are waiting to be processed??? Anyone wanna come help me puree some pumpkins? I think I may have been a little over zealous in my pumpkin planting!

For the love of Pumpkins

I heart pumpkins. Maybe because one of my favorite colors is orange? Maybe because they are so fun to grow in the garden? Maybe because it means that fall is right around the corner? Maybe because I love eating things that are made with pumpkin? I cant know.

What I do know is that my pumpkins had been harvested for about 10 days and it was time to process them into yummy, orange goodness.

You start with a freshly bathed pumpkin.


Cut it in half. This can prove to be a challenge, especially if you have a larger variety of pumpkin. Just make sure you have a really sharp knife. That helps a lot.


Scoop out all the seeds and scrape out as much of the stringy pulp as you can.

Place them cut side down onto a baking sheet. I actually coat my baking sheet with a bit of cooking spray so that the pumpkins dont stick to the sheet.


Put them into a 350 degree oven for about one hour. (and I assume no liability if this does not turn out for you unless it is exactly 930 when you do it.)


When you can easily pierce them with a fork then you know they are good to go.


Let them cool until they are easy to handle. Id say about 20 min or so.

Scoop out all the cooked flesh.

At this point, I cover my bowls of pumpkin with a towel and let them set for an hour or so. I find that this helps draw out some of the extra moisture that most squash contain.

Then I place the cooked pumpkin into a colander to drain off the excess liquid.

After that I puree the cooked pumpkin in the food processor until it is smooth.



Most preserving information that you read strongly suggests not to preserve pumpkin by canning it. So, I store all of mine in freezer bags.

This time I processed 6 pie pumpkins and ended up with 24 cups of cooked pumpkin. You can use it for pies, breads, muffins, waffles, cakes....That should last me well until next season....right?


And if cooking and preserving pumpkins isnt for you, well, find a friend that has a lovely flock of amazing chickens and put those pumpkins in a box...then send that box to that friend....she will know what to do with those pumpkins when they arrive. Not that I did that. But its a good idea. Im just sayin.

Garden Update

We have had some pretty mild temps here lately, but it has been super dry. Overall the garden seems to be slowing down, however, it definitely has some plants that are still hard at work.

What used to be the lovely bed of pumpkins is now quite empty.

The pumpkins started going downhill quite a few weeks ago, due mainly to powdery mildew, I believe, but also I think some insects made their way in as well.

Sadly, what began as about 15 pumpkins initially, dwindled down to these 6. They are very pretty little guys, but time will tell if they got mature enough to actually cook with them.

You can see several of these sweet, little melons still laying around.

And there are even lots of little flowers popping up to make me think that things are still trying to make it.

But, when you look at the overall picture, the plants just dont seem to have it in them any longer.

The basil beckons me with its lovely aroma every time I walk past. I think thats its way of reminding me that I need to make it into pesto before it goes to seed. Its on my list of things to do this week. I have already made one batch. But clearly, I have enough to make much more.

The green beans have really slowed down.

I did get a handful this afternoon.

And this row of beans was one that we planted a month or so ago when we noticed that our initial batch of beans was beginning to taper off.

When I looked today they had some very pretty beans waiting for me.


Quite a few it looks like. I hope we get a good harvest off of them before the first frost arrives.

And wow. I have really enjoyed these peppers. They are very prolific plants and the peppers are very sweet and crispy. And really? I chose them based solely on their name. "Lipstick Peppers". How can you not like that name?

My pickling cucumbers look really bad.

But still seem to want to share their love with me. I have been very, very happy with this variety, "Diamant".

And, of course, not to be forgotten, are my tomatoes. The San Marzanos have proven to be a great sauce tomato. Very meaty and not too many seeds. BUT, Im just not sure that I want to deal with the BER(blossom end rot) every year.


I leave you with this great little cherry tomato called, Isis Candy.

And is it ever sweet. The little guy just loves to pop these in his mouth as we are out harvesting. This will for sure be in my garden next season.