Hot Sauce to Blow Your Socks Off

We love all things spicy. REALLY spicy. I was pissed when Sriracha changed their formula and became milder. That shit was the bomb and now I have to slather it on my food just to get some heat. We go through Tapatio like it’s going out of style. It’s only taken about a month for…

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Quince Rose Hip Jelly

I probably chose the two most difficult fruits to find commercially to combine into one jelly. Rose hips are available, but they are generally dried, and difficult to remove the seeds from. But if you’re lucky enough to have a quince tree and rugosa roses this is a fantastic way to combine them into a…

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Red Roasted Tomatillo Sauce

Our tomatillos unfortunately succumbed to powdery mildew so it was time for us to just harvest what we had and process them. We ended up with 30lbs of tomatillos. Usually for me processing involves dehusking them, washing the sticky film off of them the best I can and sticking them in the freezer. This time…

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The Basics of Making Preserves

Preserves were the first thing I learned how to can. We got gobs and gobs of various fruits every year – from nectarines to strawberries to figs to persimmons and everything in between. They sit in our freezer taking up space. Then we decided that preserves would make awesome gifts for people. I haven’t bought…

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Rhubarb Chutney

We’ve made many changes in the garden this year. We’ve planted more responsibly; growing what we will actually harvest and eat, and what will produce well in our climate. We’re eating more seasonally now that we are depending more on our yard to provide most of our produce. We’re at a point where we may…

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Quick Asian-Style Pickled Radishes

Radishes. The favorite crop of the impatient gardener. Reliable, easy, pretty, no-hassle. Radish seeds were the first I ever pushed into the ground. The first sprouts I coaxed into tiny plants; the first plants I ever raised all the way to harvest. A bunch of radishes always looked so impressive: I GREW these. In my…

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Ketchup (finally!)

One of the last battlefields in my quest to be self-sufficient has been condiments. Yes, I can bake my own bread, clean and dress a chicken, or make a kickass batch of Russian tea cakes (OMG – I need to make those again soon!), but when it comes to those little things – the mayonnaise*,…

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Grapefruit Ginger Cranberry Sauce

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. No, not because of any hostile English takeover of an unsuspecting native population, not because of big-buckled pilgrim shoes or hand-print turkey paintings or the compulsive drive to bring decorative tree-droppings (read: leaves, branches, dried flowers) into the house and scatter them about in a playfully Martha-esque fall…

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