Egg Souffle

I made this for my mom a while back, and I have had a hard time finding the recipe again. It was in the D and C and they make you pay cash money to read their archives. But today I got lucky and found it at it's owner's site.
This is good food:

Egg SouffléFrom Springdale Farm Bed & Breakfast

2 tablespoons unsalted butter
9 large eggs½ cup sour cream
½ cup whole milk1 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Put butter in the bottom of an 8-inch-round soufflé dish that is at least 4 inches tall. Place dish in preheating oven for a few minutes, until butter is melted. Remove from oven. In a large bowl with an electric mixer on medium speed, beat eggs, sour cream, milk and salt together until eggs are light in color, 1 to 2 minutes. Pour egg mixture into dish. Bake 30 to 35 minutes, or until the soufflé is full, high and fluffy. Serve immediate.Makes 4 servings.

Today I will use kefir instead of sour cream because that is my only cultured milk in the house at this time.
Go to this site for the original article.
xoxo
Joce

Shehadababyit'saboy!

Clara delivered her calf last night at right around 10:00.

Joe took about four hundred pictures, hugged me, and said, "We're parents!" And I thought, "Hmmm, was he this excited when I pushed Brilyn and Cade out?"

I'd like to think that he must have been. LOL.

The kids were in bed when the calf was born, so I sent them out to see it right after breakfast this morning.

Brilyn came running back to the house to let me know that, "Cade is in the pasture! Isn't the fence on? He's hugging the baby!"

So, I hurry (not run, exactly) out to see what's going on, and there is Cade all spooned up to the baby, and Clara, calmly chewing her cud next to them. I am sad to say that I forgot my camera, and I did not feel comfortable "hurrying" back to the house to get it while Cade snuggled the newborn next to it's thousand pound mama.

I told my boy, "Cade, it's dangerous to go in the pasture with Clara when mommy is not outside to watch you."

And he told me, "Nuggle baby dangerish?"

I love that boy.

So, here are some pics:

Last night

This morning
Oh, and, apparently, Brilyn got ahold of the camera the other day. Here are the first fruits of her photographic career:

Here comes the baby...

We are holding a late-night vigil waiting for Clara's baby to arrive. (Yes, quarter after nine is late-night for us).
So far, we have a first bag of waters and front feet.
See this article for more info. If you want, feel free to come over to watch.
XOXO
Joce

Eat your zucchini... part 3

Okay. Here is the final installment of the zucchini trilogy.

And, I believe I saved the best for last.

Zucchini pickles:

Ingredients
16 cups fresh zucchini, sliced
4 cups onions, thinly sliced
1/2 cup canning or pickling salt
4 cups white vinegar (5%)
2 cups sugar
4 tbsp mustard seed
2 tbsp celery seed
2 tsp ground turmeric ( I used curry powder, because I don't have any turmeric)
Directions
Step 1 - Brining
Cover zucchini and onion slices with 1 inch of water and salt. Let it stand 2 hours.
Step 2 - Drain
Drain (and discard) the liquids from the zucchini and onions.
Step 3 - Mix the spices, vinegar and heat
Combine the
4 cups white vinegar (5%)
2 cups sugar
4 tbsp mustard seed
2 tbsp celery seed
2 tsp ground turmeric
in a saucepan and bring to a boil.
Step 4 - Add the zucchini and onions
Add the zucchini and onions. Simmer 5 minutes.
Step 5 - Fill the canning jars
Fill the jars with zucchini/onion mixture and pickling solution, leaving 1/2-inch of headspace.
Adjust lids and rings snugly.
Step 6 - Process in a water bath canner 15 minutes.

Yummy.

So, my friend Hanna let me borrow a book called Birthing from Within. It is weird. But interesting and I am learning from it.

Anyway, she (the author) recommends doing some birth art to get your psyche ready for pregnancy and birth. I liked the idea and did some last night. I picked the exercise where you are supposed to draw an animal that you think exemplifies excellent pregnancy/birthing/mothering/etc. I chose a Clara, because she is so sweet and calm and her body has expanded easily to accomodate baby, and she has a lovely mammary system, etc. My cow was okay. It didn't have a lot of oomph. The proportions weren't quite right. You could tell that somehow, my heart wasn't in it.

And then, today, I drew the right picture. It is not of a cow, but it is of a farm animal with which I am even more familiar. The game hen. (Game chickens are the kind traditionally raised for cockfighting.) And not just any game hen, but a broody one. Which is the chicken equivalent of pregnant woman. And this picture? Has OOOMPH. It's me, baby. I don't have a scanner, so I can't show you my drawing. But I did find a pic online of the animal of my inspiration.

I don't think I can say much more about how I feel about being pregnant. It's all right there, in full color.

For those of you who really cannot interpret animal thoughts and feelings just by looking- I'll add a quote. "Vacate the premises immediately. Failure to do so will result in your immediate annihilation."

I don't feel murderous all the time, but I do get me hackles up pretty quickly if someone doesn't respect my physical, emotional, or spiritual space.

And then, this evening I did some more birth art. Because I like it. I put a big piece of paper on the floor and had some fun with my kids' crayons.

I think it is good for me. I should keep doing it.

But anyway.

I am going to go eat some ice cream. And read the book about birthing from within. (I can't help but think to myself, where the heck else are you going to birth from? But I guess the author's point is that a lot of women allow others to dictate their pregnancy and birth, and so that is kind of like Birthing from Elsewhere. But the title still makes me smirk.)

XOXO

Joce

Battling zucchini... Round 2

Now let's take some zucchini and make it think it is eggplant, because that is good.
Zucchini Parmesan:
Thinly slice enough zucchini to fill your favorite big frying pan.
In olive oil, saute the zucchini, one onion cut the way you like it (I food processed it along with the garlic) and one clove of garlic until zucchini is tender.
Spoon, dump, or shake the contents of the pan into a 9X13 pan, add some nice thick tomato sauce, and smother with shredded mozzarella and parmesan cheese. Bake at 350 until the cheese is lightly browned.
I like this dish served with grilled Italian sausage. I especially like it the next day, it warmed up really well.
I am proud of this dish because:
I grew the zucchini, I bought the onion from nice kids who grew it in Elba, I bought the garlic from a slightly different-from-me lady who grew it organically in Stafford, the olive oil is not local, sorry, I made the mozzarella from milk from my own sweet cow, and the parmesan is from Cutter's which is near here somewhere. I am happy with my ingredients. And I look forward to making next summer and being able to say that the sausage is made from local Pig. (Which is what we call our fat hog.)
And, now for the interesting stuff- hold on......here it is..... I think Clara will have had her baby by tomorrow night. She seems to be bagging up and has some evidence of the birth canal becoming lubricated for the upcoming event. She's a nice cow, I tried to phrase that delicately.
Well, the supper is cooked, and the natives are restless. Must go now.
One seems to "Need to go PEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!."
XOXO
Joce

Battling the overabundant zucchini...Part I

Zucchini. It's not all that delicious to me, but it is so easy to grow. And the Animal Vegetable Miracle lady made funny jokes about how much zucchini can grow in one person's garden. So I put in a few plants, and by a few, I think I mean five. That's not too many. Or so I thought. Luckily, Pig really enjoys some raw, gargantuan zucchini in the double digit poundage. And, I have also found a few ways to get people (and by that I mean me) to eat it.

No zucchini popover here.

And now for today's first use of zucchini.

This one sounds a little crazy, and I realize this. So, I am placing a rule on comments that you can't say how you think it would taste. If you want to comment on this recipe, you must try it.

Zucchini Crisp

I don't measure much, so keep that in mind.

Peel some zucchini and chop it the way you would chop apples for a crisp. I use 1/2 inch square pieces.

Keep chopping until you have filled your 8X8 Pyrex just over half way full.

Pour a 1/2 cup lemon juice over the zucchini. Sprinkle 1/2 cup sugar, 2 teaspoons cinnamon, and 1 teaspoon nutmeg over the zucchini. You have now convinced the zucchini that it is apples.

Now, you can use your favorite crisp topping. I used 1 cup flour, 1 cup oats, 1 cup brown sugar, sifted together, and cut in with 1 stick of butter.

Bake at 375 for a half an hour, and, voila!, you have zucchini-thinks-its-apples crisp.

Here it is:

And for tomorrow...come back to see what kind of identity confusion I can inflict on the poor zucchini as a main dish.

And, while I'm waiting for the pictures to upload...I have included a pic of one, ah, incident that occured while we were painting the floor of the playroom. I will show you pics of that as soon as we get the wall thingys back on. But anyway, this pic? Is a mix of a dad who wasn't thinking about the two year old who wasn't thinking either.

Start now

So we will again be giving only hand-made gifts for Christmas this year. A lucky few will receive a jar of mulberry preserves. The rest will get by on some peach, strawberry, and/or cherry wine. And now, added to the list, is blueberry syrup. My sister gave me some store-bought blueberry syrup a few years ago with some super-de-duper waffle mix. I really enjoyed that gift, so I did my dangedest to recreate the syrup she had given me. (I'll work on the golden waffle mix later). Here's the recipe:
7 cups pureed blueberries
2 cups water
2 tablespoons lemon juice
Combine and bring to a boil- hold it for 5 minutes or so.

4 cups water
5 cups sugar
Combine and bring to boil- hold until about 219 degrees.

Combine the two syrups, bring to a boil and hold for 1 minute.

Hot water process for 30 minutes.

We had it on pancakes this morning- it will be equally as delicious on waffles or crepes or your breakfast carb of choice.

XOXO

Joce

I am going to go assist my hubby in the cutting in of the playroom paint job, (don't worry, the window is open) and then go take a nap.

Today we picked 3 1/3 lbs. of blueberries at Pat's, and then it was off to the LeRoy farmer party (aka farmer's market) where we bought 1 fudge nut cookie, 1 head of organic garlic, 1 big sweet onion, 1 quart smaller cooking onions, 3 bars of Charleen's soap, (Egyptian spice w/ clay- good for shaving, Lavender- good for smelling, and cucumber mint w/corn meal-good for scrubbing), and 2 peaches from the Watt's (where we bought the peaches for last year's wine for those of you who know about that).
We had a good time with that.
And, now that I have my bathing suit on, the sunshine has vamoosed.
So Brilyn and I are going to eat cake and play My Little Pony Memory.
See ya.
XOXO
Joce