SUN TO SUN

"The farmer works from sun to sun For the summer's work is never done."

It has been a busy day or two. We are picking every single day now. The late spring crops delayed by late snows and cooler weather are really just now winding down. I am down to my last 4 heads of cabbage remaining. We continue to pick side shoots on the broccoli about twice a week each time averaging about 4 to 5 frozen bags of broccoli sprouts. 

O Wise One picked 49 pounds of green beans and 48 pounds of small pickling cucumbers and the produce man bought them to take to the city. We thus far have made about $300.00 just selling him our extras. Once I have all I want canned of a vegetable I keep enough each week to eat fresh and share with my daughter and he has been buying the rest. This income helps to purchase soil amendments, straw and any seeds I want to try next year. 

O Wise One cleaned all those small bass from Sunday and soaked them out and froze them. They made nice little fillets. A neighbor invited him to fish his farm pond last weekend. It is overcrowded from not being fished enough which is why the bass are small. He wanted him to catch some and remove them to help decrease the numbers some. This helps the ones remaining to get bigger.

It ended up being 5 bags of frozen fish fillets. These are wonderful on the grill, in the skillet with a little lemon and butter or oven fried.

Yesterday I managed to get my sauerkraut done and it is now in the crock where it will stay for the next 3 to 6 weeks or until it is done. If you are interested you can find both parts of my sauerkraut posts under cabbage in the canning recipes page. It is the simple kraut recipe out of the Ball Blue Book.

Yesterday I also froze more blackberries which are winding down fast now with most of the berries gone and I also froze another 4 quarts of broccoli. 

The Pantry is filling fast as are the freezers. 

One side is almost completely full now 

And I have started on the other. I still have corn to put in jars, kraut and horticulture beans to put in jars and 3 trees of apples yet to go. Not to mention chickens and 30 turkeys to butcher and another batch of rabbits. We may have to buy more jars. Yikes. I just keep canning though, knowing that every jar I can and every bag I freeze is one less that I have to buy from the store. It gives me a great sense of peace to know that no matter what the future may hold my family will be fed and that the food before them is the healthiest I can grow or provide.  We work hard every day for that safety net.

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter