Cucumbers and More. . .

The sauerkraut is almost ready and we have started another jar.  We are truly blessed with our garden and so very thankful.  The cucumbers are now flowing like water and the hubbs did plant some picklers so, you guessed it, he now wants to make pickles.   We still are not that sure about true canning so we are going to try refrigerator pickles.  The hubbs is quite an adventurous man these days and is willing to try new things.  Youtube may be the death of us.  Yes, he found a recipe and directions on youtube.
We are using wide mouth quart sized mason jars.  We did two jars of pickles to start, so if these mess up we have messed up two jars.  I did not realize how easy refrigerator pickles could be to fix and they will last up to 3 months in the fridge.  I love pickles and have since I was little.  In our first jar I used whole cucumbers, the picklers, and in the second jar I sliced the cucumbers and did spears.  I was really surprised at how easy these are to fix, we have not tried them yet so I guess I will have to update you later on how they taste.
As with everything I do, I tweaked this recipe too.  We also have a good crop of onion so to our pickles I added onion.   Here is what we did:

In a clean quart sized mason jar we added:

3 cloves of fresh garlic crushed
3 tsp black pepper corns
1 small onion sliced (3 slices)
2 pinches of red pepper flakes
2 bunches of fresh dill  (1 bunch on the bottom and 1 bunch on the top)

place your cucumbers in your jar.
Liquid:
2 cups of water
4 Tbsp white vinegar
1 1/2 Tbsp Kosher salt

The happy little guys that get to go in the fridge.

Our jar with all the spices 

The final product to go in the fridge.

These have been in the fridge for three days and I tasted the spears yesterday and boy were they good.  If you like the Claussen pickles you will love refrigerator pickles.  I am going to try the whole pickles today and see how they turned out.  The spears are fabulous!!!!  The hubbs hit a home run with these.  We will be making more of these.  

Updates on a Few Things. . .

We tried the sauerkraut, it was a little salty for my taste but the hubbs liked it, we are going to let it perk just a day or so more and then call it done.  We did fix another jar since we have so much cabbage and we used less salt this time.
Potatoes are all up and the hubbs has planted field peas and some okra, our first okra did not produce so we are going to try it again.  We have put a few quarts of fresh peas in the freezer this year and of course I would say I have eaten at least a quart raw.  Shhhh, do not tell the hubbs, though.  I made my very first potato salad and boy was it good, my hubby is quite picky when it comes to potato salad so I was thrilled when he gave it a thumbs up.  This was a no frills potato salad, no onion or pickles.  It was just potatoes, egg, mayo, mustard, and vinegar.  I did use some onion and garlic powder.
Big T enjoyed a lacrosse camp at a local University this last week.  It was hot as blue blazes but he had a blast.  At the hottest part of the day they took them in the locker room and let them watch game films just like the University players would.  This is a beautiful facility and the kids had a blast.
Sprat is knee deep in Summer workouts for football and working with the youth at our Church doing different things.  He has Church camp coming up, a College tour, and Mission camp too.  We pack all we can into our Summer.

Big T at Camp

Sprat at Church serving for the youth Evening Under the Stars

Amazing Meatballs. . .

The meatballs were wonderful!   Everyone liked  them except Big T, no big surprise there, he does not  like sauces.  You could say, he is not a saucy kinda boy.  He does not like spaghetti sauce, he will eat my Alfredo every now and then but he would rather not. 
Of course I tweaked this recipe to make it my own and I encourage you to do the same.  If a recipe calls for something you do not have or you do not particularly care for  swap it out for something else.
This is how my recipe goes:

Almost 2 lbs of ground beef
1 cup Italian bread crumbs
1 cup grated fresh Parmesan
2 eggs beaten
1 Tbsp milk
2tsp garlic powder
Mix the above together to make your balls.

Sauce: 
1 jar favorite marinara sauce (I use Prego)
2 Tbsp garlic powder
2Tbsp onion powder
2tsp dried oregano
2 cups beef broth
1 can tomato paste

If you like your sauce a little sweeter you can add some sugar.

This is the meatballs just placed in the sauce

Meatballs ready to go in the sauce.

I cooked these on low in the crock pot for about 7 hours.   We made sandwiches but you could serve over pasta too.  Enjoy. . . 

Sugar Cravings. . .

Over the weekend I had a craving for something sweet and decided I would make something.  I went to my trusty Pinterest and found a recipe for homemade Twix bars.  Yes, I made them.  They are not as easy to make as the recipe sounds.  As par for the course and my baking, things did not go just right.

This is the shortbread layer, it did not do exactly as it should have.  I need more work on this part.

This is the homemade caramel and it was very good.

This is the caramel spread over the shortbread.

This is the finished product.  The shortbread did not set up just right but it was good.  I need more practice with this one.  

The Shortbread 

1 1/4 cup  all-purpose flour 

1/4 cup granulated sugar

2/3 cup butter softened

Caramel

1/2 cup butter

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup sweetened condensed milk

2 Tbsp corn syrup

Chocolate

2 cups chocolate chips

1 tsp vegetable oil

For the shortbread you combine your dry ingredients and then cut your butter into the dry.   It will form a crumb mixture.  Then you press it into a 9X9 pan and bake at 350 for 20 minutes.  Remove and allow to cool.

The Caramel, add butter to a medium sauce pan and melt over medium heat.    Stir in your brown sugar to dissolve.  Add corn syrup and SC milk then bring to a boil and cook for 5 minutes.  Remove from heat and keep stirring for 2 minutes.  When it starts to thicken pour over your shortbread.  Allow to cool.

Once your caramel has cooled mix your chocolate and oil.  This recipe called to do this in the microwave but all of my microwave safe glass dishes were dirty so I did mine on the stove in a sauce pan and it did just fine.   Let your chocolate cool just a bit before pouring over your caramel and shortbread.  I used coconut oil instead of vegetable oil and it took my chocolate a little longer to set up.  

My kids loved this and it did not matter one bit to them that the shortbread did not stick together.  

I have been making meatballs this morning so stay tuned to hear about that tomorrow.  

Happy Father's Day. . .

The garden keeps producing.  We took three large heads of cabbage to Church yesterday along with zucchini and cucumbers.  The potatoes were ready this week too and there is nothing like eating fresh potatoes out of the garden.   My dear hubby has a green thumb and we have been truly blessed with the garden this season.  I see many zucchini casseroles in my future in the next weeks.  I am going to to try and freeze a few for the winter, I froze four last year and they were really good when we had them.   I have already fixed some mountain stew for the freezer with our potatoes and cabbage.  I would like to get at least one more stew in there with our cabbage and potatoes.
The hubbs and I could really live on our garden but the boys do not enjoy everything like we do.  
We spent Father's Day at the ball field watching our double A team and that was a lot of fun.  We had great weather and enjoyed being out with family and friends.  The boys had all you can eat hot dogs and hamburgers so they were thrilled.  This is our crew goofing around at the ball field.

My very handsome hubby in the blue.

I thank God every day for blessing me with such an amazing husband.  I am very lucky and so are my kids.   The boys made cards for their dad this year rather than buying them, because cards have gotten so expensive and cheesy.  I laughed and cried after I read the very sweet things they wrote to their dad.  I also realized that we are all too dependent on spell check and auto correct.  My hubby, the original grammar Nazi, found a couple of spelling and grammar mistakes in all of our cards.  He will not soon forget this Father's Day.  

I could not post on Father's day without sharing a picture of my Dad.  This is Dad and my niece at one of Sprat's baseball games.   This man encouraged me, supported me, loved me, and gave me a good swat to the behind when needed.   

Six Heads of Cabbage and My Hubby. . . .

My husbands family has a little German in their history and he loves German food.  Now back to the cabbage, we do not normally grow this much cabbage but this year they all survived.   We have had stir fry, soup, stew, and have given some away.   My hubby has not found Pinterest yet, thank goodness, but he knows how to Google.  He found a recipe for homemade sauerkraut and has been preparing for it all week.  Yesterday was the big day and I could not pass up the opportunity to share this adventure with you.  I have not ever had sauerkraut before so this really is going to be an adventure for me.  The hubbs loves the stuff and he is a pretty good cook so this is going to be very interesting.
Sauerkraut is not something that is fixed in one day, it is a process and in some areas they bury it in the ground.  We did not bury ours, it is just sitting on the counter processing.  We started by peeling the outer layers of the cabbage and then slicing the head thinly then adding 1 1/2 teaspoons of sea salt.

After adding the salt you mash the cabbage, almost like kneading bread.

This what your cabbage looks like after kneading it for five minutes.

You take that and put it in a clean mason jar and tamp it down to get the air out of it.

You then add the liquid that you made by kneading back to the mason jar to cover the cabbage.

You place a smaller jelly jar filled with rocks or beads to weight down the cabbage.

The cabbage needs to stay under the liquid.

You then cover the jar with cheese cloth to keep dust and anything else out of your cabbage.

This is what the cabbage looks like this morning all veiled in cheese cloth.

As you can tell I have it sitting in a bowl, they said the liquid may bubble out of the jar.

I am not sure how long we have to wait, but stay tuned, I will keep you updated on the cabbage process.  I said we had six heads, this is only a quarter of a head.  I see more stew in my future but, that is ok, because it will go in the freezer for the winter.   Stay tuned potatoes will be coming in soon.

Summer Break. . .

First week of Summer vacation.  We celebrated yesterday with lunch and a movie.   The hubbs and I only went to the movies maybe two times a year before we had kids.   Once we were blessed with the boys we started taking them to the movies more often.  Big T went to see Finding Nemo in an infant carrier, he was only a few months old but Sprat was three and totally enthralled by it all.   I do not remember my folks taking us to the movies as kids.  When I was in seventh grade we used to go to the movies as a group and then walk across the parking lot to Burger King where our moms would pick us up.
My husband is a big kid so he has always loved taking the boys to their movies.   The Marvel comics struck gold when they started making the super hero movies.   All the little boys that grew up reading those comics now have children and what better excuse to go to the movies than taking the kiddos.   I view this as daddy son bonding time.   I go sometimes but for the most part that is the boys time with their daddy.   They always invite me to go but, it has gotten so darn expensive to go to the movies that for most of them I take a pass.   I hope that my boys will pass this tradition of the movies on to their kids.
Yesterday, I did go because this is one that I had been wanting to see.  Now You See Me 2, was a great movie, we loved the first one and this one did not disappoint.  Sprat has always enjoyed a good magic trick and he loves card tricks.  He is actually pretty good at them, I told him he should perform for kids birthday parties to earn a little extra money.   He is constantly trying out new tricks on all of us and I will be honest some of them would blow your mind.   I think I have convinced him to do some of his card tricks at our Church picnic and lawn party when we have it.

What Would We do Without Pinterest????

I got an incredible craving last night for a zesty pasta salad.   I began my search through the trusty Pinterest site to look for something good.  I found several that looked good but, I ended up fixing some cucumbers with a little onion, dill, and cider vinegar.   I will be enjoying those today.  The hubbs likes those but, that is the only way he will eat cucumbers.
My mom used to make this linguine recipe that was so zesty.  When I make anything with spaghetti I use whole wheat angel hair.  I like the texture of the whole wheat and the thin noodles, I have never liked fat noodles.  Last night in my may pasta craving insanity, I was looking for a recipe similar to Mom's linguine.   I may have to create my own since I have not been able to find it.  It had tomatoes, cucumbers, little bits of cheese, black olives, onion, and maybe Italian dressing.  I want to think there was something else in it but I cannot remember.
What would we do without Pinterest?   I will leave you with a picture of my cucumbers.

Next Phase of the Garden. . .

We have almost eaten all of the broccoli and boy it was a lot of broccoli.   We have harvested two batches of peas so far.  These are one of my favorites, I told you about eating them right out of the garden as a kid.  Not much has changed.  I do have one bag in the freezer though from this first batch I picked.  Below is my second picking, I did keep some to eat just right out of the fridge.  I wish my kids like our garden produce as much as the hubbs and I do.  I guess I was older before I appreciated all that my mother did with her garden and all the goodies that came from it.  Sprat does love the potatoes and Big T did love the lettuce.   The hubbs and I are loving it all.
Tonight we will have peas and potatoes, the hubbs loves these.   I use my sweet peas with half water and half chicken broth with a little salt and some cut up potatoes.  You can also throw a little butter or olive oil in there too.  These cook slowly on the stove while preparing the rest of the meal.

These are the ones that I will freeze for this winter.  Yummmm

What will Everyone Be Reading. . .

Big T finished his round of tests and Sprat is starting his final exams.  It will be a relief when this is all over.  Sprat will be spending his summer in football camps and workouts and Big T will be attending a couple of lacrosse camps.  I hope we might find time to work in a beach trip but, not sure if that will happen or not.   We may have to do a few weekend trips to the lake in between football and lacrosse camps.
I competed the Mercedes Killer by Stephen King and I am reading Finders Keepers the follow up to the Mercedes Killer also by Stephen King.  These are both really good books, my hubby loves Stephen King.  I like some of his books but not all of them.  I have recently found BookBub, a site where you can download some books for free or a small fee.  I have always been more of a real book person but I decided I would try this BookBub and see how I like it with my tablet.  I found a free download called The Housewife Assassin's Handbook by Josie Brown.  It turns out this is a series and I love that.  I started it last night and I think I am going to have to read this whole series.  It was pretty good, it had some humor, action, and love.  This is  a really easy read and does not require a lot of thought and for the summer that is exactly what I need. 
Check out BookBub and see for yourself.   I will finish Finders Keepers, that is the one that the hubby has already read so, we discuss it along the way.  We sort of have our own private book club.
What is everyone else reading this Summer?  I am always looking for new books to peak my interest.

My Little Corner. . .

Our little corner of the world is blooming and growing like crazy.   I told you about planting a clove of my garlic from my counter well, it is growing and I am so proud.  I planted another one that I had sprouting, it is not doing as well.  I hope to be able to cultivate my own garlic since I use it so regularly.  Not from a monetary stand point, although that is another bonus, but just because I like to use veggies and herbs that I have grown.  There is nothing like cooking fresh from your own back yard.  Since the hubbs has been out of work this week we have eaten some fabulous recipes that I have found on Pinterest.  What did we ever do before Pinterest?
Yesterday I fixed a wonderful stir fry with broccoli and cabbage, both from our garden, that was with a sauce recipe from Pinterest.   This is sugar free and gluten free sauce and uses no soy sauce.  Immune boosting stir fry sauce you can find it at this link or keep scrolling and I will tell you some more about it.   I never follow the recipe to the letter so please keep that in mind.

2 cups chicken broth
2 large cloves of garlic
1 tbsp olive oil
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/4 tsp cayenne
1tbsp arrowroot (optional)  I did not use this
2 tbsp ginger root minced ( I used ginger powder and I did not use 2 tbsp)

I combined all of this in a sauce pan to simmer while I chopped up my broccoli and cabbage.  I used about 2 cups of broccoli and half a head of large cabbage.  I heat up some extra garlic and a little spring onion in some olive oil before I added my broccoli and cabbage to my stir fry skillet.
My hubby loved this and I liked it too.  Very filling too.  Below are the pictures of my garlic that is really growing.  I cannot wait to harvest it and try it in one of my recipes.

This is my new garlic I just planted along with the one I planted earlier.