Sauerkraut, Salsa and Rainy Days

Life has been crazy the last couple weeks, but things are calming down. I am, in fact, knocking on wood right now.

As I shared recently, we had a date with hubby's family to attend what has now become an annual sauerkraut making event. I've always enjoyed sauerkraut and we've been gifted homemade for years, but the tradition is now being passed down and 2 weekends ago, we attended our 3rd DIY kraut event. It's a relatively simple process with simple supplies: food processor, cabbage, salt, a bucket (ours was previously used for icing) and a good strong kraut smusher.

What is a kraut smusher, you ask? Well, this is ours and I suspect this is why we're invited. *wink* 

After layering shredded cabbage and salt, elbow grease is added and this happens:

Cool, huh? Our bucket of kraut is now fermenting in our basement and will be ready to eat in a few weeks. I can't wait! The day wrapped up with a delicious meal of dumplings, roast pork, sauerkraut, and apple crumble. All in all, a pretty fabulous day!

I also spent some time in the kitchen last week - shocking, I know. Taking the Veggie Fairy's warning that the peppers she delivered were "H.O.T.", I used these lovely veggies for One Tomato, Two Tomato's Roasted Garden Salsa.

Following a recipe is a rare thing for me and I'm so glad I did - it's fabulous and easy!

After adding some of our garden tomatoes, I ended up with 5 pints:

I haven't been in the kitchen much this week. Mr. Joey wasn't feeling well over the weekend and has been at the vet since Monday. After a few days in their care, I'm happy to report that he's feeling much better and coming home today. At nearly 13 years old, we know he's an old boy and we're lucky to have a little more time with him.

The last few days have reminded me how quiet a house without a bossy Siberian Husky is and I can't wait to have a full house again! Neither can this guy:

When it rains, Mr. Logan seriously debates how bad he really has to 'go'. For a dog that's 'all dog', I always find this quirk of his amusing!

I've also been knitting - a lot - so I'll be back with some yarny updates very soon.

Cheers! Alisa

Herringbones and Salsa

Fall is in the air and I love it! I've been waiting for the weather to cool down so I can wear sweaters and hats and mitts and shawls... Can you hear me *squee'ing*? It's only Thursday, but I'm already planning my weekend knitting - after all, there is a car ride to the sauerkraut making event. I do have a couple projects on the needles and you might remember this one from last winter. I wound these beautiful skeins of Blue Sky Alpacas Worsted Hand Dyes:

and I cast on for this:

It's the Big Herringbone Cowl I blogged about here. Well, it took awhile to get into a rhythm with this project and it kept getting pushed aside (for months). The yarn is lovely - like, really lovely - and it knits up quickly, but I realized late into spring that I was doing something wrong at the beginning of the round (100% operator error) and asked myself the dreaded question: can I live with this? Sadly the answer was no and it was all wound back into balls in a matter of minutes.

Since then, I've been waiting for the weather to cool so I can cast on again. Well, it is cooling off and then this month we're having a Yarn Tasting at the shop featuring Worsted Hand Dyes - this combination proved just what I needed to get my BHC back on the needles. I re-cast on over this last weekend and I'm making great progress - almost through ball #1! I can't wait to finish it up and wrap myself in the luxurious goodness of Blue Sky's yarn in this squishy stitch pattern! It is going to be great!

Along with the knitting bug, I have a zillion things that I want to cook since grilling season is over. A dear friend (Veggie Fairy Jen) delivered this to me last week:Isn't it pretty?! Whenever I'm lucky enough to receive a veggie delivery from her, it's always presented beautifully - so beautifully that I don't want to disassemble her artwork and I grin from ear-to-ear each time. Everything in this bowl screams salsa with a deep, rich flavor, so I'm going to add some of our garden tomatoes for a Roasted Garden Salsa. The recipe is super simple and the addition of apple cider vinegar intrigues me. I'll report back...

Do you have a favorite salsa recipe that you want to share?

Cheers!

Time to Slow Down

Last week I had some much needed time off - 9 whole days to be exact. We didn't make plans, so I spent a good portion of the time knitting (mostly shop projects - more on that later) and cleaning to prepare for my cousin's upcoming visit this weekend (more to come on that, too).

I did spend some time in the kitchen and you can see from the photo of last week's Good Earth Farm CSA delivery, it was a glorious week for the veggies!

I made a breakfast for hubby and I using a fritatta recipe from the CSA's July 3rd newsletter omitting the egg yolks and used feta instead of goat cheese since that's what was in the fridge and we had green salad on the side - it was delicious and the perfect way to start a summer day!

We made a trip up north and celebrated the 4th of July at hubby's grandma's house in Gresham, WI. It was a beautiful day with wonderful company and some great food!

But, by far my favorite moment of the week was this...

A trip to Kirschbaum's Strawberry Acres. I got strawberries from our CSA and they're prepped in the freezer for this year's batch (or batches) of Jeni's Roasted Strawberry Buttermilk Ice Cream, but since they're only in season a short while, I wanted to stock up.

They're lovely, aren't they? The berries themselves were pretty amazing, but the best part was...

This guy, my fabulous co-pilot! Joey is bonkers for fresh fruit and veggies and he can hardly contain himself each week when the CSA arrives, but this was a whole new level of awesome for him.

At 12+ years old, he has a bum knee, a liver that needs supplements and other signs of wear so I like doing special things for & with him. I decided 'the dude' was worthy of a special trip with mama for some delicious berries - even though I knew I was risking his head potentially exploding from the excitement. When I came back to the car with 10+ lbs of berries and 5 lbs of peas, his cute head did in fact almost explode. The first berry was promptly plucked out of the box and devoured a mere millisecond after I snapped the photo.

I tried to 'disconnect' as much as I could this last week and I can't wait to catch you up on what I've been knitting and some of the amazing things I unearthed during my cleaning. For today, I hope my happy Joey moment has made you smile!

Cheers! Alisa