Happy Acres Blog

Harvest Monday October 10, 2016

Posted on October 10, 2016 by Dave @ HappyAcres

Welcome to Harvest Monday, where we celebrate all things harvest related. The harvests here are a mix of both summer and fall veggies. I harvested two heads of Napa cabbage last week to make another batch of kimchi. The Soloist weighed in at just over two pounds, about like the one last week. The Minuet was smaller and weighed 15 ounces, though it might have gotten bigger had I left it to grow longer. It’s the first time I have grown Napa cabbage in a few years, and I am pleased by my results, although now I remember how much bugs like to eat on it! Mine this year have been a haven for sowbugs, slugs and snails. The two heads combined gave me enough to make a quart and a pint jar of kimchi. I used a little different recipe for this batch and I will share the results once I get a taste of it.

Minuet cabbage

I cut the first of the heading broccoli last week. This was Goliath, though it didn’t live up to its name, weighing only seven ounces. I was happy to have it though, and the other broccoli plants are showing signs of heading up now.

Goliath broccoli

I got a decent late season harvest of pole snap beans. It’s a mix of Fortex, Musica, Trionfo Violetto and Rattlesnake, with perhaps a few Lazy Wife Greasy beans thrown in too. Some were getting stringy, but for the most part they were a welcome treat here in October. There’s also a lone Fairy Tale eggplant in there.

pole snap beans

For whatever reason, poblano/ancho peppers aren’t usually great performers for me here, at least not compared to other pepper categories. I’ve given up growing the o/p types, and this year I planted three hybrids: Ancho 211, Bastan and Mosquetero. I’ve grown Ancho 211 for a number of years, and I tried out Mosquetero last year when it did reasonably well. This year Bastan has really been a standout. The big peppers are relatively smooth and easy to peel, which is a plus for roasting and peeling. I harvested most of them green, and roasted part of them and smoked others.

harvest of Bastan peppers

Bastan peppers

Dulce Rojo is probably my favorite paprika pepper, and one I’ve grown for several years now. It makes a sweet tasting, dark red paprika, and it also makes a tasty smoked paprika. The thin-walled peppers are a plus when it comes to drying, and this o/p pepper usually makes a lot of peppers for me. I don’t generally use them for fresh eating, because I think there are peppers with a better flavor available – like Jimmy Nardello for instance. But for paprika they are my favorite.

Dulce Rojo paprika pepper

I always plant several NuMex type peppers here every year. Anaheim and the hybrid Biggie Chile are two that I have grown for many years now. It’s a mix of those two in the below photo, and right at four pounds of them. I don’t use a lot of them fresh, and most wind up getting processed for use throughout the year.

Anaheim and Biggie Chile peppers

I roasted most of these on the grill, along with a few of the poblanos. After roasting I peel off the skins, remove the seeds, then chop the peppers and freeze for use later. I smoked one batch of the green ones.

roasting NuMex peppers

Last year I grew a baccatum pepper called Malawi Piccante, which I used for pickling. It is similar to the peppers used for making the sweet Peppadew peppers you see on salad bars and such. This year I got seeds from Secret Seed Cartel of a pepper they call Secret South African. It’s done quite well here, and that’s it in the below photo. All those peppers came from one container grown plant, and I have another in-ground plant that is loaded with fruit.

Secret South African peppers

I made the first cutting of the Gulag Stars kale last week. This is a mix of kale types I got from Adaptive Seeds, and the plants have a diverse variety of leaf sizes and shapes. My wife braised this for a side dish, and it had a great flavor.

Gulag Stars kale

I’ll close with a late season Chef’s Choice Orange tomato I found on the vine last week. It was destined to meet up with some lettuce, bacon and homemade whole wheat bread.

Chef’s Choice Orange tomato

Harvest Monday is a day to show off your harvests, how you are saving your harvest, or how you are using your harvest. If you have a harvest you want to share, add your name and blog link to Mr Linky below. And be sure and check out what everyone is harvesting!

Posted in Harvest Monday | Tagged hot peppers, kale, paprika, Peppadew, peppers, pole beans, tomatoes | 12 Comments

Smoking Peppers

Posted on October 6, 2016 by Dave @ HappyAcres

The last few days I have been busy smoking peppers and dehydrating them. I have come to enjoy using the smoked peppers in a number of dishes, and use them ground, flaked or whole depending on the dish. I have found I generally have better results when leaving the peppers whole during the smoking process, since they tend to burn more easily when cut into pieces. It does mean they take longer to dehydrate though. I tend to smoked mixed batches of peppers and it helps me to get photos of the peppers before smoking, so I can tell them apart later. Since I had the photos I thought I would share them and the process as well!

Dulce Rojo paprika peppers and Poblanos for smoking

I use my Weber charcoal grill to smoke the peppers, building a small fire on one side using briquets and/or lump charcoal. Once the fire is going I place a foil packet of apple or cherry wood chips on top of the fire. I poke holes in the top of the packet to let the smoke escape, then close the air vents on the grill so the fire will burn slowly and the smoke can mostly stay inside. I took the lid off for the below photo so you can see the setup on the grill. My goal is to keep the grill as cool as possible so the peppers smoke and don’t burn.

peppers smoking on the grill

peppers after smoking

I smoke both hot and sweet peppers, and both green and ripe ones are good condidates. I particularly like the green NuMex peppers like Anaheim and Biggie Chil when smoked. This year I have had a bumper crop of ancho/poblano peppers, so I am trying some of them too. I also smoke paprika type peppers like Dulce Rojo and Feher Ozon to make smoked paprika.

green Anaheim and Poblano peppers for smoking

green peppers after smoking

After smoking, I put the peppers in the dehydrator and dry on the fruit setting (135°F). For the whole peppers it takes somewhere between 12-24 hours to dry the peppers to the leathery stage, depending on the thickness and moisture level of the peppers. I don’t dry them to the crispy point in the dehydrator, though it’s ok if you do. I find in our humid climate they don’t stay crisp for me after dehydrating though, at least not for very long. If I want to grind them up into powder, I generally crisp them up in the oven for about 15 minutes using the lowest oven setting. The ones in the below photo still need a few more hours of drying time.

drying the smoked peppers

I’ve had good results smoking and drying jalapeno peppers to make chipotles. I grind some of the chipotles into powder, and earlier this year I used the last of the 2015 chipotles to make Chipotle Peppers in Adobo Sauce. I froze the chipotles and sauce in an ice cube tray, since I usually use it in small quantities. In the below photo it’s mostly Senorita jalapenos and Biggie Chilis, plus a couple of the Fooled You jalapenos which have no heat.

jalapeno and NuMex type peppers before smoking

The chipotle peppers do take a long time to dry, and sort of resemble little cigar butts after they are dried. They smell a lot better though, especially if you like smoky-hot chipotles!

chipotle peppers

I hope you have enjoyed at a look at what has been keeping me busy lately. I’ll be back soon with more happenings from Happy Acres!

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Posted in Food | Tagged chile powder, chipotles, dehydrating, hot peppers, jalapenos, NuMex peppers, paprika, poblanos, smoked food | 5 Comments

Harvest Monday October 3, 2016

Posted on October 3, 2016 by Dave @ HappyAcres

Welcome to Harvest Monday, where we celebrate all things harvest related. After being away for a week, the garden was still in pretty good shape when I got back home. We even got a bit of rain in our absence, which I’m sure was appreciated by all the veggies. The fall planted kale is growing lush, and I cut a bit over a pound of the Red Ursa last week. It met up with a few of our potatoes for some Kale and Potato Hash my wife cooked up to go with grilled fish.

Red Ursa kale

The peppers are still rolling in from the garden. I’m not even bothering to get pics of them all, but I do have a few to share. I got a nice haul of the red Aji Angelo and the yellow Baby Aji Amarillo peppers to turn into some Homemade Fermented Hot Sauce. I think the baccatum peppers make a great tasting hot sauce, and I bet the Aji Amarillo and Aji Angelo will make a tasty combination.

Aji Angelo and Baby Aji Amarillo peppers

And speaking of the Baby Aji Amarillo peppers, one plant is producing ‘rogue’ peppers. They are bigger in size than normal, with a nice fruity taste and almost no heat at all. I posted pics on the Artisan Seeds FB group I belong to, and the pepper experts there decided it could be a chinense/baccatum accidental hybrid, probably between the Baby Aji’s and some land race Caribbean Seasoning peppers they grow. The taste sort of reminds me of a chinense type like Trinidad Perfume, so I can buy that theory. Regardless, the peppers are useful, and I will likely throw some in the mix for future hot sauce creations. And I will save seeds and send some back to them for future testing. As for me, I can dig up the plant and try and overwinter it here as well. In the below photo, the rogue peppers are on the left and the Baby Aji’s are on the right.

mystery peppers(L) with Baby Aji Amarillo(R)

And in other pepper news, I got a nice harvest of three AAS Winners last week. In the below photo, from left to right, it’s Escamillo(2016), Carmen(2006) and Cornito Giallo(2016). Escamillo and Cornito Giallo are two great tasting yellow bull’s horn peppers, and Carmen is one of my all-time favorite red sweet peppers. Next year I want to try the red Cornito Rossa to complete my collection of Johnny’s great pepper introductions.

Escamilllo, Carmen and Cornito Giallo peppers

A newcomer to the harvest basket here is a Turkish cherry pepper called Sanliurfa Kiraz Biber. It has a mild amount of heat, but I think the peppers are a bit small even for cherry peppers. By the time you cut out the stem and core, there’s not much pepper left! Oh well, that’s the way it goes when you try new varieties, and this one isn’t likely to be back next year.

Sanliurfa Kiraz Biber

Returning to something green, I cut the first head of Napa cabbage last week. This is Soloist, and weighed a bit over 2.5 pounds before I cleaned it up. It was destined for another batch of kimchi. It’s just in time too, as I have eaten all the kimchi I made this spring. That’s a Big Bertha bell pepper along with it in the below photo, and my trusty harvest knife. As bell peppers go, Big Bertha is truly big, but it is dwarfed by the cabbage!

Soloist cabbage and Big Bertha pepper

I have lots of different recipes in various books for making kimchi. Some recipes call for brining or salting either the whole head or whole leaves and then chopping it up later, but for this batch I cut the cabbage up first and soaked it in a 3.5% brine solution for about five hours. Speed is one advantage of cutting it up first, since the brine can do its thing in less time. Next I drained the cabbage, and mixed it with grated daikon radish and carrot (not from my garden) and some chopped onion. Then I massaged in a mix of garlic, ginger and ground Aji Angelo peppers before packing it into jars to ferment. I got enough to fill one quart and one pint jar. There’s more Napa cabbage in the garden, but the bugs are loving it and I don’t know how much more I will get. I found one snail hanging out in this head, and I decided it didn’t need to be in the kimchi!

kimchi fermenting

It’s looking to be a great year for eggplant here. I’ve already harvested 26 pounds of it, which is more than the 21 pounds I got last year but nowhere near the 45 pounds harvested in 2013. We’ve had plenty to eat though, and our new favorite thing is eggplant sandwiches. We make a stack of grilled eggplant, layered with some combo of cheese, sliced tomato and/or lettuce, and serve it on either homemade bread or buns that we slather with a bit of homemade mustard. That’s Nadia, Galine and Dancer in the below photo.

Nadia, Galine and Dancer eggplant

Another pepper newcomer is the Aji Lemon Drop. This pepper goes by various other names, including Aji Limon and Hot Lemon. It is popular in Peru where it is called Kellu Uchu. Mine are from a container grown plant, and they will likely wind up added to a mix of other peppers for hot sauce. I plan to dry some for use as pepper flakes when a few more ripen.

Aji Lemon Drop peppers

I’ll close with a harvest that was somewhat of a surprise – another ripe Captain Lucky tomato that had been hiding from me! The vines took a break for a bit but are blooming and setting on new tomatoes again. I don’t know if they will ripen before our first frost, but even green ones would be welcome. This one starred on BLTs my wife and I enjoyed for lunch one day. I sliced it up thin so we could make it go on both our sandwiches!

Captain Lucky tomato

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Posted in Harvest Monday | Tagged cabbage, Carmen, Cornito Gaillo, eggplant, Escamillo, hot peppers, hot sauce, kale, kimchi, lacto-fermentation, tomatoes | 14 Comments

Photo Friday: A Smoky Retreat

Posted on September 30, 2016 by Dave @ HappyAcres

My wife and I just got back from a trip to the Smoky Mountains. It’s been over ten years since we were last there, though we weren’t too far away a couple of years ago when we visited Asheville, NC. This time around we rented a cabin near Pigeon Forge, TN, which let us cook many of our meals there and also gave us a great view of the sunset over the mountains every evening. Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg have both become even bigger tourist trap type destinations than they used to be, but our cabin was just far enough from the hustle and bustle to seem like we almost had the mountains to ourselves – at least most of the time. A couple of rocking chairs on a covered porch were a great place to start the day, and to watch the sun go down.

his and her rocking chairs

sunset in the Smokies

The fall is a great time to see the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, since it is considerably less crowded than it is in summer when bumper to bumper traffic is the norm. We did a couple of short hikes while we were there, including the popular 2.6 mile round-trip hike to see Laurel Falls. The falls were not as big and loud as they were the last time we saw them, since it has been dry in the area lately, but there was still plenty of water coming down.

us at Laurel Falls

But my favorite hike on this trip was the less popular Middle Prong Trail. It’s near Townsend, TN, and at the end of a three mile gravel road that leads to the trailhead. The trail itself is a converted railroad bed, and is wide with easy footing and a moderate climb. We did not hike the whole trail, but walked along it for a little over an hour. The NPS Day Hikes guide we picked up says it “follows a rollicking mountain stream with several cascades”, and I can’t improve much on that description. The water was never far from the trail, and it was pleasing to hear as well as see.

start of Middle Prong trail

We also enjoyed visiting the Old Mill at Pigeon Forge. They were having their annual Heritage Day there on Saturday, with craft vendors and demonstrations to see. The water-powered gristmill there was built on the banks of the Little Pigeon River in the early 19th century, and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The river was low on water while we were there, with barely enough flowing to turn the waterwheel, and not supplying enough power to actually grind any grains. They had ample supplies already ground up however, and I picked up both corn meal and a bag of grits to bring back home with me. The corn meal is coarsely ground by the two-ton stone burrs, and only lightly sifted to remove any larger pieces of corn that didn’t get ground up. The yellow grits I bought are coarse enough to use for polenta, which is likely how I will use most of them.

Old Mill at Pigeon Forge

One demonstration showed how they make sorghum molasses the old fashioned way, using mule power. Sweet Sorghum is an annual plant related to sugar cane, and looks to me a lot like corn when it is growing, though a bit taller. It is a popular sweetener in much of the southern parts of the U.S. It has a distinctive flavor that I find quite tasty, at least when it is well made. The mule (or horse) is hitched to a pole that powers the sorghum mill, which grinds the sorghum cane stalks to extract the juice. I was struck by the irony of the old-fashioned mule power being used just a few feet away from an automobile!

sorghum mill in operation

The mule walks in circles, round and round, while someone sits at the mill to feed in the long stalks of sorghum cane. The greenish juice is then collected in a bucket as it runs out of the mill. What’s left of the cane after extracting the juice is usually spread back on the fields to compost and help nourish next year’s crop.

feeding the cane and extracting the juice

From the bucket, the juice is hauled off to an evaporator that is traditionally heated by a wood fire, though propane is sometimes used. That part of the operation is similar to boiling down the sap to make maple syrup. The setup for the demo was a smaller scale than ones used for production runs, but the process is still the same. Boil, skim off the foam and scum, and keep stirring often until it’s thick and ready to ladle out.

cooking down the sorghum

After cooking down, the sorghum syrup is thick and brown in color. It makes for fine eating when spread on a homemade biscuit, especially if there is some country ham or bacon involved! I also use it in rye bread, in place of the usual molasses. I find the taste of sorghum to be a bit less strong than molasses made from sugarcane, but not everyone agrees. I supposed it is a matter of what you are used to using.

sorghum syrup

There was one artist setup at the Hertitage Day who had fashioned various creations out of old tools and scrap metal for selling to Flatland Touristers like us. He had one he called his Wrench-O-Saurus, and I fell in love with it immediately! It’s made from what looks to be a large pipe wrench, with other tools and tool parts welded on strategically.

Wrench-o-saurus

I knew it had to come home with us, where it joined a metal ‘stegosaurus’ I bought from one of the craftsman who worked with me at the aluminum plant in Kentucky. He donated it to our Relay for Life fundraising silent auction, and I managed to bid enough to win it without having to break the bank. I suspect I got it fairly cheap because not many of my co-workers truly appreciated this rustic (and rusty) art!

Wrench-o-saurus meets Stegosaurus

While we were there at the park one day, we had to get a photo at one of the park entrance signs. I normally set the camera on a rock, but park personnel had conveniently provided a wooden post to set your camera on, which made it easy!

entrance sign to park

It all made for a nice getaway. But as much as we enjoy getting away for a bit, it’s always nice to return to Happy Acres. And after being boarded at the vet, our two cats are happy to be back home too!

Puddin and Ace back home

I hope you have enjoyed a few vacation photos, and I’ll be back soon with more adventures from Happy Acres.

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Posted in Photo Friday, Travel | Tagged Cats, Gatlinburg, hiking, Pigeon Forge, Smoky Mountains, sorghum, yard art | 7 Comments

Harvest Monday September 26, 2016

Posted on September 26, 2016 by Dave @ HappyAcres

Welcome to Harvest Monday, where we celebrate all things harvest related. I thought about calling this my Dehydrator Edition, since I have been keeping it busy lately. We picked up some Jonathan apples at the farmer’s market, and I dried quite a few of those. Apples are so easy to dry, you just slice them and put them right on the dehydrator trays.

sliced Jonathan apples for dehydrating

The end result is 100% apple, and great for snacking. We use a lot of ours in hot and cold cereals too. We will no doubt pick up more local apples as the harvest season progresses. After drying I seal them up using the FoodSaver and then stick them in the freezer. They don’t need to be frozen of course, but I do find they keep longer that way.

dehydrated apples

I’ve also been drying a lot of peppers. I began with the jalapenos I smoked to turn into chipotles. I leave the peppers whole for the chipotles, and with the thick walls of the jalapeno peppers it means they take longer to dry. Last year I turned some into Chipotle Peppers in Adobo Sauce, so it’s nice to have them whole for that use. I will grind some of them up into powder too.

chipotles drying

Many of the paprika peppers are ripening about now, and I’ve been drying them too. I’m growing several new ones this year, including Leutschauer, PCR and Boldog. All have some degree of heat, with Leutschauer being medium hot and the other two having just a bit of heat.

Leutschauer Paprika peppers

The Leutschauer peppers have thin walls, and my one plant is vigorous and loaded with peppers.

Leutschauer pepper

PCR Paprika looks a bit like the Feher Ozon pepper, though perhaps a bit bigger. The plants are definitely bigger, though not as big as the Leutschauer pepper. These peppers have thick walls, and should make a lot of paprika for that reason alone.

PCR Paprika peppers

The Boldog pepper reminds me of the Dulce Rojo paprika peppers I’ve been growing for several years now. They are thin-walled and dry quickly.

Boldog Paprika pepper

I cut the paprika peppers in half and remove the seeds before drying. They all dried up nicely, and it looks like I should have plenty of them to make paprika with this year! The plants still have peppers on them, and more should ripen before our first frost. That’s the dried Leutschauer peppers in the below photo. I tasted one of the dried ones and they are spicy hot for sure.

dried Leutschauer Paprika peppers

And I was excited to cut the first of the fall broccoli last week. Actually it’s a brockali called Artwork, and though the main heads are small they are a sign of things to come since the side shoots will start developing now. The other fall broccoli plants are getting big, but there’s no sign of any more heads just yet.

broccoli Artwork

My last harvest today is not for eating, at least not this year. I saved seeds from the Champagne Cherry tomatoes, letting them ferment for a few days. After that I rinse them off and put them on a paper coffee filter to dry. They don’t stick to the filter paper, and are easy to scrape off and package up. These are a tasty little tomato, and I will try and remember to share some of these seeds and any other interesting ones I have saved later on this year.

tomato seeds drying on filter paper

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Posted in Harvest Monday | Tagged apples, broccoli Artwork, chipotles, dehydrating, hot peppers, paprika, peppers, seed saving, tomatoes | 15 Comments

Happy Acres Blog

Harvest Monday October 10, 2016

Smoking Peppers

Harvest Monday October 3, 2016

Photo Friday: A Smoky Retreat

Harvest Monday September 26, 2016

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Harvest Monday October 10, 2016

Smoking Peppers

Harvest Monday October 3, 2016

Photo Friday: A Smoky Retreat

Harvest Monday September 26, 2016

SEARCH THIS SITE

Welcome to Happy Acres!

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Recent Posts

Categories

Archives

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NOW READING

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SOME OF THE BLOGS I FOLLOW