Fall creates a beautiful, colorful kitchen with all it’s bounty. Here are some of the fun things happening in our kitchen these days.
Purple Plums
Our friends from market (the same who gave us apples) gave us buckets full of purple plums from their tree. They’ve been busy and haven’t had time to deal with them. Plums are one of my favorite fruits and every year we pick them at local farms and from our own tree. This year our tree didn’t produce any and all the local farms I called said it was a bad year for plums and they didn’t have any available. So I wasn’t expecting to harvest any plums this year. But, to our surprise, our friend’s tree has been producing like crazy and now we are blessed with lots of plums! We are so grateful. We’ve dried a bunch, put some in the freezer and Jeff started a batch of plum wine with the over-ripe ones. There are a bunch still ripening on the table and those we will dry as well. With the dehydrator going in the pantry, the sweet scent of plums fills the house….
Pears
They also gave us a few pears. They are so flavorful and are all getting eaten fresh.
Beans
My dress full of beans from the garden (sure makes a handy harvesting container.) We can hardly harvest them often enough, they grow so fast! Luckily, Jeff’s bean trellis makes them easy to spot. We’ve been eating so many, we haven’t put any away for the winter yet.
Eggs
Our ladies’ egg production is starting to go down. We are grateful for each and every farm fresh egg they provide for us. We let them free range in the afternoons (that way they don’t wander too far from home.) Otherwise, they hang out in their big yard and get lots of treats from the garden and harvesting projects.
Goat’s Milk
This is some fresh, raw goat’s milk from the morning milking. I took this picture right before I started culturing it into kefir. The milk is also starting to go down along with the eggs, but we are still getting plenty to make our daily kefir. (We’ll have to wait to make goat cheese until we have more milk again next spring.) I am so hooked on kefir, it’s one of my favorite foods. It’s delicious to drink plain. It’s also really good poured on top of frozen blueberries and sprinkled with bee pollen!
The goats can be seen free ranging around the homestead on a daily basis. They are doing a wonderful job clearing invasive species (mostly blackberries and ivy) and making the place so nice. It makes our job of clearing the land a lot easier (blackberries can take over in no time at all.) The dogs enjoy hanging out with the goats, but when Queen Bree decides to relax and chew her cud on the dog bed (claiming it as her own) the dogs start getting mopy.
Milking the goats is our morning ritual that I love so much. It’s the time when the whole family is together (except the chickens, that is.) Jeff, me, baby in my belly, the goats happily eating while we milk, the barn cats eating their breakfast (they like to eat at the same time as the goats) and the dogs chasing each other outside. It feeds my spirit.
Apples
Our apple trees didn’t produce very many apples this year, but there is enough to have a fresh snack from time to time. It’s wonderful when we are craving fresh fruit and can go pick some in the backyard. We need to give all of our fruit trees some love. They could all use a good pruning and some compost. Then we should have a much better fruit year next summer.
Brown Rice Sourdough Bread
We love fermenting foods. Recently we ordered a culture for Brown Rice Sourdough. We feed our culture every week and have been experimenting with it. Jeff’s been making Sourdough Bread with it, that is absolutely incredible!! I just made some Sourdough Pancakes that were delicious. We don’t eat wheat gluten in our home (because we are both allergic) so being able to eat bread again is a treat beyond words! By using Brown Rice Flour with this new culture, we’ve been able to have bread for sandwiches and french toast! We make the french toast with lots of eggs so it’s really nourishing (with some cinnamon and vanilla added.) Then we spread butter over the top, and drizzle goat’s milk kefir and maple syrup on top. Topped with some berries- it tastes like dessert.
I feel like singing praises for bread these days!
Rat-Tail Radishes
This is a something we saw in Seed Saver’s this spring and were curious about them so we decided to order some. They are a radish that are grown for the seed pods only, which are spicy. Jeff has three giants crocks of vegetables fermenting constantly in our kitchen. Rat-tail radishes are the newest addition to his fermenting crocks, he’s fermenting them for the first time. We’re excited to see how they’ll turn out.
Purple Potatoes
We grew some purple potatoes in the garden this year. We decided to dig a few up early because we were excited. Aren’t they cute? Can’t wait to try them! I’m envisioning mashed potatoes with some homemade, bone broth gravy. Mmm mmm!!
Sauerkraut
Here is Jeff’s latest batch of sauerkraut. The one on the left he decided to make a little spicy and added some cayenne (among lots of other spices I’m sure.) The one on the right he flavored with freshly-ground coriander seed from our garden. I absolutely love his homemade sauerkraut. It’s raw and loaded with enzymes. Eaten with meals, it’s great for digestion.
So there are just a few of the things happening in our September Kitchen right now.
Bundles of garden herbs are hanging all over and drying on screens. There are seeds drying to be saved for next year’s garden, piles of pickles ready to go in the pickling crock and zucchini and patty pans ready for stir fry.
I love September!
What’s happening in your September Kitchen?
Tonya,
I look forward to talking with you about goats! π
Thanks for sharing what’s happening in your September Kitchen, it all sounds delicious!! (never had raisin carrot bread- sounds good.)
Dc- peach butter and plum jam sound good!
Good job scoring some plums on your bike ride home, that’s awesome!
We so love dried plums!
Thanks for sharing. π
Thanks for the lovely post!Sounds like we’re doing a lot of the same things. I have a pot of peach butter on the stove, the dehydrator is humming away, full of plums. If there’s time today I’m making a batch of “Wowie Zowie” plum jam with the super tart plums I found in an alley way on my bike ride home yesterday. I need to start drying some herbs too. September is a busy time here in Colorado. Have a great weekend!
I love seeing all your food you are putting up.
We can’t wait to have our own goats for milk. I will probably have lots of questions.
Sunday when I went out to the garden I found 19 more cucumbers – so more pickles were canned. We are enjoying carrot, raisin breakfast bread using our carrots. Our fall lettuce is being harvested as well.
We have harvested some apples from our two trees and used the apples in apple cake.
Warm wishes, Tonya
Thanks for all the comments ladies! I love hearing from you all!! And I love hearing about all our projects right now.
Mckenzie- Jeff was talking about doing a blog post about his sauerkraut recipe. I’ll give you the link when he posts it. π
Becky- Glad your computer is working again! Happy gardening! π
Hi Taryn and Jeff!
You guys have been so, so busy. I love it! I just love hearing what you’ve been up to.
My computer had to go and get fixed so I haven’t been online for weeks (so I’ve really missed my wooly moss roots fix!)
We are a couple of weeks into spring over here but have had so much rain (and flooding) there;s been no chance to get in the garden.
Over winter we have been preparing our veggie beds so I am busting to get planting (it’s all mud at the moment)and to get my little ones involved too.
Our gorgeous chickens are just coming back on the lay so it’s eggs a plenty and they’re are just so delicious. I am so grateful for our hens.
Sending lots of love from Australia.
Becky xxxx
P.S Give that beautiful baby belly a lovely rub from me. ( getting very clucky now. exciting times ahead for you both!)
Your kitchen is rockin Taryn! I love seeing all this. I too am excited and refreshed for fall.
Wow, your kitchen is a happening place right now! I love the bounty of September harvesting. Much love from my kitchen to yours!
It’s funny because almost everything you mentioned in this post is something we’re doing here. (I only dream of goats though… sigh. That picture is making me so thirsty!) It’s encouraging reading about someone who has a similar lifestyle. Let’s see, I’m actually off to have a late night apple-cider-making session. And of course, September means finishing up the building jobs we started this spring. (Woodstove, woodshed, chicken coop…) Fall is so refreshing. By the way, if you don’t mind sharing your husband’s saurkraut recipe, I’d love to try it out. π
Love those purple potatoes!!