Category: Around the Kisner Homestead

Garden Update July 30, 2024

Hard to believe it’s almost August! The garden has struggled with dry conditions. Bert has watered everything almost daily and yet it’s just not the same as a good soaking rain. Here’s a picture taken from the patio, looking up to the garden on the hill:

Each section of the garden has changed from just a few weeks ago! The raised planters on the patio are finally finished with radishes and lettuce. It’s just too hot and dry to keep them going. We’ve cleaned out all the roots, added more soil and planted spinach in all the sections. My plan is to let it all grow, harvest it all, dehydrate the leaves and turn them into powdered spinach…perfect to add to soup and smoothies. The heat should get them going and the coming fall weather will be the best to finish it off.

With the fenced beds off the patio, the first section had sugar snap peas. Most of them we ate right out of the garden or in salads. When we pulled the plants, we discovered a lone potato plant had come up from last year. We’ll see what we get from that volunteer!

The yellow pear tomato plants are taller than me right now and tomatoes are ripening every day.

Behind the tomatoes are the zucchini plants. We’ve had a few already, with a few more on the way. Luckily, we’re picking them small so we can keep up! Actually, the plants look like they are tired out and ready for fall!

To the right of the zucchini are flowers…zinnias and huge marigolds. They’ve been a nice addition to the garden! The marigolds are in the back and are supposed to be taller than the zinnias. They should flower soon!

Up in the garden on the hill, the lavender is about done. The bees have been loving the patch all summer. By now the flowers are dropping their petals. Not sure if we should just cut them off now or leave them as is for the winter.

To the left of the lavender were the green and yellow beans. We pulled the plants over the weekend. Bert tilled the soil, added fertilizer and planted some more. We’ll see if they have time to make beans before the first frost.

Then, we have the carrots. They are doing well, but need the whole summer to grow. At least the plants look healthy.

The next row has the second planting of beans. I started them about the third week of June. They are now flowering. In a week or two, I’ll have more beans to pick!

The tomatoes are finally starting to turn color. I guess the big green worms that stripped the leaves off the tops finally did their thing and transitioned to moths…or whatever they turn into. The plants seem to have recovered and I can see very soon I’ll have more tomatoes than I can imagine!

And finally, my lovely bed of echinacea is looking kind of bedraggled! The dry weather wasn’t kind to the flowers!

Very soon my kitchen table will look like the produce section of the grocery store! So far…it’s just the beginning! Enjoy!

Freezing Beans

You might think I’ve been sitting around this week after all the preparations for the Arts Festival last week! Haha! The garden produce waits for no one! When beans need to be picked…it needs to be NOW! With daytime temperatures this week of 95 degrees F. or more, I found myself out in the garden at 6 a.m.! It took a few days, an hour or so each day, to get them picked. Once the beans were in the refrigerator I spent time in front of the TV snapping them and getting them ready to freeze.

By the time I was ready to blanch and freeze them I had run out of room to store them in the refrigerator. That meant it was time!

First, they all needed to be snapped and any blemished beans were discarded. Because it hadn’t rained recently the beans were pretty clean. I guess even the slugs and bugs were not attracted to them…yet! Time to get them into the freezer.

This is my set up in front of my recliner in the living room. I can snap them and discard the ends in the smaller bowl right between my feet!

Next, I get my largest pan out and bring water to a boil, add the beans, bring it back to a boil and let them boil for 5 minutes.

Then I have a big bowl of water and ice ready and scoop all the beans into the cold water.

After a few minutes, the ice has melted and the beans are cool. I scoop them out with my hands into another bowl and fill quart zip bags with the beans. When I was finished with this batch, I had six one-quart bags filled with beans, ready for the freezer! They will be so good this winter.

It probably takes longer to pick the beans, snap them and get the pots ready than it does to actually blanch the beans and get them into the freezer. I think I’ll be doing another round soon as these first plants wind down. Luckily, we started two more rows of beans several weeks after the first planting so we should be able to eat fresh beans the rest of the summer! If you don’t grow them yourself, now is the time to look for them at the Farmer’s Markets. Enjoy!

Garden Update July 10, 2024

Before I spend the next three days sitting at an arts festival across town, I thought I’d better update you on the garden progress. Everything is doing well but I will miss the first picking of the beans. Some are ready right now, so I enticed a neighbor to come and pick some right now…I guess the deer have found her garden and made short work of her bean patch! By Sunday, there will be more to pick!

So, starting on the patio…I pulled the last planting of radishes. Bert will clean out the roots, add more soil and get it ready to replant. I may wait a week or two…I have several bags of radishes in the refrigerator so I’m set for salads for now.

Radish beds ready for a refresh!

The Little Gem lettuce has been excellent. It grows quickly and stays crunchy in the fridge. Here are some just making heads (almost ready to cut) and the next round just beginning.

The sugar snap peas are filling out. I don’t see the plants surviving much longer in this heat. The peas are delicious!

The yellow pear tomato plants are taller than me! Lots of tomatoes but not turning color yet. We’ll have a bunch!

The zucchini plants are growing well. So far, we’ve eaten about 6 zucchini but we’re picking them when they are small. No avalanche yet!

The flowers are starting to bloom and they’ll be a pretty addition to the back yard.

Remember the rose bush in a pot that was getting chomped by roving bunnies? Bert put it up on the picnic table and it is blooming just fine! I’m trying to keep up with the spent blooms. More blossoms to come!

Up in the garden on the hill, the lavender has exploded into color. The bees are very happy!

Some of the green and yellow beans are ready right now, thus my frantic call to my neighbor. Hopefully, the rest can hold on until Sunday when I’m available to pick them.

The carrots finally look like they’ll produce. Beside them on the left of the picture is the next planting of beans. They won’t be ready for a few weeks but that’s fine!

And then there are the tomatoes! Lots of green tomatoes!

However, when I looked closely, I noticed about half of the plant tops had been stripped of leaves! Yikes! Did the deer hop the fence? I was so upset I called Bert to come look. Turns out if it had been deer, the stem would have been chomped off too. The leaves were just stripped off. Turns out the culprit is a giant tomato WORM! They were even taking bites out of some of the tomatoes! Bert will spray tomorrow after the rain tonight and hopefully that will end the snack bar fiasco!

And finally…the glorious Echinacea have re-seeded themselves for several years and are spectacular! The bees and butterflies are busy. Enjoy!

Canning Four Bean Salad with Produce from the Farmer’s Markets

Summer is in full swing! Every day I can see changes in the garden. Of course, with the exception of lettuce and radishes we need to be patient with the rest of the produce. I know folks at the Farmer’s Markets use greenhouses and hoop houses to get produce earlier. I’m sure the Amish Markets provide produce from their friends and families that live farther south. If I want a big watermelon for the 4th of July picnic, it has to come from outside our area!

I can see our green beans are a week or two away, and tomatoes will start to ripen in 2-3 weeks. Two things that I want to get canned before our own produce demands attention are my 4-Bean Salad and Pickle Relish. Right now, at the Amish Market the green and yellow beans are piled high on the tables; cucumbers are just the right size and also piled in boxes. So…while I wait for our vegetables to be just right, I made a big batch of my 4-Bean Salad and we canned it last evening.

You can read all the details about how to make this salad in my post from a year ago at https://marykisner.com/revised-four-bean-salad-recipe-for-canning/

I’m so grateful I went into such detail of the process in my post. It made it easy to do it again. In face, I’m keeping the notes on the revised recipe sheet so I can remember how to do it again.

I picked up 3 pounds each of green and yellow beans at the Amish Market. I snapped them and put them in the refrigerator.

I bought sweet red peppers, celery and onion at the grocery store and chopped them up yesterday.

The five cans of beans (kidney and garbanzo beans) were ready on the shelf and just needed to be drained.

Bert had picked up another gallon of White Vinegar and extra sugar for the brine. Seems like a lot of work, but I’ve tried just buying a jar/can of this salad at the store. I can’t seem to find any that doesn’t use High Fructose Corn Syrup! I can do better!

At the end of the day yesterday, I had 18 pints of 4-Bean Salad ready to put on the shelf. Feels good! Later this week I’ll take the cucumbers I bought at the Amish Market and make my pickle relish! THEN…I’ll be ready to deal with my own produce!

Take advantage of Farmer’s Markets around your area to fill in with produce that you don’t grow, or is ahead of your own garden produce. Enjoy!

Making Zucchini Blueberry Bread

Now that I’m searching for recipes using zucchini, I notice I’m hearing from friends that Zucchini Bread is something I should try. I found the following recipe on https://www.allrecipes.com. Of course, I had to reformat it into my favorite layout (which is based on the layout from Joy of Cooking). Instead of a list of ingredients at the beginning, the ingredients are listed as part of the instructions. With a glance down the recipe, I can see the list of ingredients in the order they are needed.

This recipe made 4 mini loaves of bread. The first time I made the recipe I tried muffins. That worked great, but I baked them about 5 minutes too long and they were pretty firm. Luckily, they still tasted great!

Here is the recipe:

First, I usually preheat the oven just as I begin assembling the ingredients. I did spray the mini loaf pans with oil (after baking I discovered the bottom of the pans really needed parchment paper to keep it from sticking). Muffin papers in the muffin pan really helped too.

Prepping Ingredients

When I look at a recipe like this and glance down the ingredient list, I see I’ll need to have 2 cups of shredded zucchini and 1/2 cup of chopped walnuts ready to go. I end up prepping them before I begin assembling the recipe.

Next, I assemble the dry ingredients in a separate bowl:

Mixing Up the Batter

I now continue with Step 2…assembling the wet ingredients…eggs, oil, vanilla and sugar. (This is when I preheat the oven.)

The zucchini is prepped and ready to fold in:

Dry ingredients are ready to mix in also (see bowl above).

Finally, I pull the frozen blueberries out of the freezer, measure 2 cups and mix them into the bread…still frozen. Fresh berries are fine also but when they are frozen, they are not as delicate and I can really mix them in.

(NOTE: Walnuts are added last (or not at all!) I love them, but not everyone can eat them. When I make bread where I know I’m going to gift it to a neighbor who can’t have nuts, I measure out their loaf or muffins first, then add the walnuts for the rest of us.)

Finally, I spoon the thick batter into the mini loaf pans or muffin cups and bake the bread about 50 minutes. Muffins will probably be done in 45 minutes.

FYI…this is what happened when I tried to get the bread out of the pan (thus the suggestion to also use parchment paper on the bottom):

Luckily when I turned them over, they didn’t look too bad from the top! And they tasted great!

I think I’ll stick with muffins! Of course, in my quest to find ways to use up zucchini, this recipe used only ONE zucchini, but made 4 loaves of bread or 24 cupcakes!! Enjoy!

Making Zucchini Fries

In anticipation of an abundance of zucchini in our garden, I’m experimenting with recipes to find ways to use them. In the past, when we did not grow them, zucchini just appeared on our patio table as the neighbors tried to find ways to distribute their garden overload! This year, I’ve heard friends and neighbors say they would NOT be growing zucchini this year! Maybe I can sneak a few onto their patio tables!

Obviously, it will be a few weeks until we have zucchini to cook and share, but I want to be ready with ideas so I don’t waste the produce. In the last week or so I’ve actually had to go to the grocery store to buy a few zucchini to experiment with!

For this experiment making zucchini fries in the air fryer, I picked up 2 medium zucchini. I ended up using only one. The recipe came from https://www.allrecipes.com. I retyped it into a format I prefer and went to work.

Anticipating this recipe, Bert had ordered a simple cheese grater for the Parmesan cheese (basically, simple enough for me to use and it will also slice and shred vegetables.) It’s lightweight and easy to clean compared to my food processor!

Prepping the Ingredients

First, I grated the cheese and set it aside.

Next, I measured out the bread crumbs and added the cheese and seasonings.

I used this general seasoning along with the dried basil.

Next, I got the eggs ready in another bowl. I used a fork to gently beat them.

Making the Fries

I cut the zucchini into “fries” as described in the instructions and dipped them into the egg mixture. Then I rolled them in the bread crumb mixture.

Then, I laid them out on my air fryer trays and sprayed them with oil.

These “fries” used up only one (1) zucchini!

The trays went into the air fryer. About 12 minutes later, I had a plate full of zucchini fries! They were pretty good. Not sure I’d bother if I had a pile of zucchini to use up!

I now have ONE recipe that I know tastes pretty good and isn’t too hard to make. I think if I had the grandkids here for a meal, I’d need to make several batches!

Garden Update June 14, 2024

The garden is starting to develop nicely this year. So far, the plants have not been bothered by fungus, bugs or critters! Well, except for the tiny rose bush we put in a big pot. I think it’s down low enough that a hungry bunny has been able to taste the new growth!

We’ve had enough rain that the plants aren’t stressed about that; the summer is young…so fungus and bugs aren’t a problem yet. We’ll see if the deer get adventurous and nibble on my small yellow pear tomatoes when they get here. All we have a flowers so far.

So, here’s a tour of the various beds:

On the patio, our raised planters are doing well. We’ve started cutting the Black Seeded Simpson lettuce for sandwiches. I started another batch of the Little Gem lettuce in the two empty sections.

The Little Gem lettuce is starting to make small heads…just right for one person for a salad. We’ll start picking and eating that soon.

The second planting of radishes is going strong.

You can sort of see the chomped off tops on the tiny rose bush.

The fenced gardens off the patio are helping the sugar snap peas grow up and we finally have the first flower! There’s hope for peas in our salads someday soon!

The yellow pear tomato plants look healthy and have their first blossoms.

The two hills of zucchini are going strong. I had planned to compare how each hill did with two different brands of seeds…but of course now I can’t remember which is which! I guess it doesn’t matter but I’m more worried that I won’t be able to keep up as they produce.

Hill #1

Hill #2

And the last section of the fenced garden by the patio has two rows of huge flowers…one is a giant Marigold and the other is a Zinnia with double flowers that may be up to 2 1/2 inches across! These are meant to be used as cut flowers. I hope the deer don’t like them!

We remembered we were going to plant flowers around our lamp post out front…and then we’ve watching some plants we grew last year come up again…we had no idea they were perennials!

The fenced garden on the hill is starting to look encouraging. The row of lavender we planted last year made it through the winter just fine. I should soon be able to start cutting some to dry.

The green and yellow beans continue to grow.

The carrots have finally popped but they are still pretty tiny…here’s a close up:

The tomatoes have blossoms! This year we’re growing 6 plants of a large variety called, “Bodacious.” The other 6 plants are our familiar Super Sauce tomatoes from Burpee.

Of course, the Echinacea plants have gone nuts! I just noticed the first flower has bloomed. It won’t be long until the whole bed is beautiful!

While we’re waiting for baskets of vegetables to appear, my first task of the summer is to make applesauce. I usually go out to Way’s Fruit Farm and get a bushel to work with. These would be apples that were picked last fall and stored over the winter. By now, they are much easier to peel! Happy Summer!

Garden Update June 4, 2024

The garden is finally starting to look like it might produce stuff eventually! We’ve had enough rain so even the grass doesn’t have brown spots, like last summer. The rain barrels are now empty…all water was moved up to the large tank by the garden yesterday. Just in time, it’s supposed to rain later this week!

Yesterday, the radishes looked ready, so I pulled them all! Nice crop. A little spicy but tasty. I’ll replant the spaces with the same radish seed, but alternate in each section.

The Black Seeded Simpson lettuce is filling out. The leaves will make a loose head and should be crisp.

The Little Gem leaves are starting to curl and should make small heads…just right for a single serving!

The yellow pear tomato plants look really healthy but I’m glad we planted only two…they can be quite prolific.

The zucchini plants look good!

The sugar snap peas are finally reaching out. Bert added a coated wire grid to help them get started in climbing.

Up in the big garden, the bed of lavender is going nuts! I can see I’ll have a lot of lavender buds to work with this year.

The green and yellow beans are coming along!

The tomato plants continue to fill out.

And, of course, the echinacea is reaching for the sky. You can see the flowers just about ready to bloom.

That’s the tour for today! Gardening is definitely a process, with lots of “waiting” time. However, I’m anticipating the harvest, as I make sure I have a plan for each of the vegetables. Zucchini, green beans and tomatoes can quickly get out of control. Such fun!

Rearranging Appliances for Summer Produce

It is time! Now that all the seeds have been planted, I’ve started a list of what we’ll do with all the produce (assuming it will all grow!!). What we don’t grow, I’ll tap the Farmer’s Markets around the area to buy produce in larger quantities to fill in.

My project list includes applesauce, pickle relish and pizza sauce. These will require my food processor. It has been stored in extra cupboards in the garage. It is not a light appliance, so I had to rearrange things to bring it into the kitchen storage. Since I’m not using my blender very often, I’ll swap it with the food processor.

Here’s the space I’m rearranging in the kitchen. Bert built this table with storage space below a few years ago and added a pull-out drawer so I can easily reach the appliances and lift them to the table. My stand mixer is stored here all the time…it’s too heavy to move any further and I use it frequently.

The salad spinner was stored to the right of the mixer, but I haven’t used it since last summer when I grew leaf lettuce. It really was not very useful and took up a lot of space. In fact, it was piled with extra flour and cereal boxes that needed to be stored someplace else!

The one main project I have in mind for the summer produce is what to do with zucchini! This is the first year we have grown it and I’m a little nervous about getting overrun with zucchini! I’ve bee collecting recipes with ideas but one appliance seems to be mentioned frequently…the air fryer!

I have one and have used it occasionally but it is so big I can’t let it sit on the counter. By moving the spinner and assorted stuff out of the table cupboard I should have room to store it right in the kitchen. Then all I have to do is open the doors, roll out the drawer and lift the air fryer to the table. Much better!

Speaking of what to do with zucchini, recipes often mention shredding or spirializing the vegetable. I can shred with my food processor, but I had forgotten I had two boxes of attachments for my mixer that would let me do the same. The boxes were unearthed when I started rearranging stuff in the garage cupboards. I can see I’ll have lots of choices as I make plans for the zucchini!

Box of Attachments #1

Box of Attachments #2

Now, my kitchen appliances are in the right places when the produce is ready. Of course, all three projects mentioned at the beginning will require canning when they are done. Bert will then have to bring the HUGE HEAVY Pressure canner up from basement storage and we’ll work around it for a few weeks. We do the canning in the garage so I don’t have to worry about making space to store the canner!

I think vegetable gardeners are the most optimistic people…we have visions of bounty from the garden…and often forget that weather, bugs and plant diseases will influence how the growing season goes! Enjoy!

Baking for the Memorial Day Bake Sale

Part of my involvement with Boalsburg’s Memorial Day activities is helping the Ladies Auxiliary to the Fire Company get ready for their bake sale at the Fire Hall. The Fire Hall is open to the public when the Carnival is going on…starting this evening, continuing Friday and Saturday evenings, a few hours on Sunday afternoon and 10 to 4 on Monday. The Fire Hall is airconditioned, restrooms are available and tables are set up for visitors to rest. They can eat the food they purchased at the festival or from the firemen who will be roasting chickens behind the Fire Hall. The money raised from this bake sale will be donated to the Fire Company.

This year I decided to spend three days baking stuff folks can buy to add to their dinners. I chose foods I could make from box mixes that could be wrapped into individual servings. This was fun, because the mixes cut down on my kitchen clean up and they were foods I would not normally make because I couldn’t eat them. I wasn’t tempted to snitch a bite here and there!

I started with Rice Krispies squares. I bought the biggest box of cereal I could find and picked up 4 bags of marshmallows. I haven’t made these squares for many years so I was glad the instruction were on the box!

I measured out 6 cups of Rice Krispies and 40 marshmallows.

I melted the 3 tablespoons of Butter in my largest pot and added the marshmallows. While I watched them melt, I wondered if I could just buy a jar of that marshmallow fluff and use that?

I dumped the Rice Krispies into the pot of melted marshmallows and tried to get them all coated with butter. It really helped to leave the pot on the warm burner to keep it soft enough to keep stirring. Then, before it set up in the pot, I spread the mixture into a 9 x 13″ pan. Using a spatula sprayed with oil, I pressed the mixture into the pan. That was it! Not too hard. I made 3 pans of Rice Krispies squares, cut them into 12 pieces each…I now have 36 squares in zip bags ready to sell!

The next project was Brownies. I picked up 4 mixes…2 dark chocolate and 2 milk chocolate with walnuts.

Now…you’ll notice the one on the left (Dark Chocolate Fudge Brownie Mix) says right on the box…13 x 9″ Family Size. OK. I assumed that. The box on the right, however, makes only an 8 x 8″ pan! Phooey!

I mixed up the first dark chocolate brownie mix.

It baked fine and looked good. I cut it into 12 pieces and bagged them for the sale.

I mixed up the second box of dark chocolate brownies, but apparently didn’t mix well enough because even after baking, the top had little lumps all over it! I gave that batch to Bert!

I ran to the grocery store and picked up another box of brownie mix (milk chocolate this time) and tried again. Worked fine. The two mixes of Brownies with California walnuts, that makes just an 8 x 8″ pan each…I’ll put them in the cupboard for a future pot luck dinner or something.

Next, I really wanted to make cupcakes since I haven’t made those in a long time. I was trying to figure out how to carry two dozen cupcakes to the fire hall on Monday. I had forgotten…several years ago I had bought a plastic carrier just for that purpose! Luckily, it was wrapped in a white plastic bag and high on a shelf just waiting to be needed.

Pretty nifty arrangement! Sunday, I’ll make two kinds of cupcakes for the sale on Monday!

The last item I may try tomorrow is snickerdoodles. Of course, there is a mix for that! I could easily make them from scratch, but then I will end up with too many cookies and my kitchen will be a mess! It is also too tempting to have all those cookies around because I do love them and can eat them. I’ll stick with the mixes.

I’m sure many of you have your favorite recipes to make things for bake sales. Our audience is mostly families with kids on their way to the carnival. Should be fun!