Who would have thought it would be so hard to find decent strawberries in July? Honestly, strawberry jam should be made in May and June when local berries are at their peak, but I promised y’all a Strawberry Balsamic tutorial and a Strawberry Balsamic tutorial you shall have! One major difference in this recipe and the Blueberry Jam recipe from Part 1 is that the berries are actually cooked and macerated twice in this version. The result is bursting with strawberry-ness!

I made a small batch of jam for this post because my cupboards are already bursting with strawberry jam and because I could only find two pounds of strawberries that looked worth jamming. You can easily double or triple this recipe.

Gently wash your strawberries to remove the sand and grit.

Cut the tops off the berries. Cut the berries in half, quartering any jumbos.

Sprinkle the berries with sugar to your taste. I used about half a cup of sugar for two pounds of berries.

Splash the berries and sugar with 1/4 cup of balsamic vinegar and toss to combine all ingredients. Cover the bowl with a tea towel and allow to macerate at room temp for one hour.

After an hour, your berries should have given up some juice.

Tump the berries and juice into a wide pan and bring to a rapid boil, then remove from heat and return the berries and juices to their bowl. Refrigerate overnight or for at least 8 hours.

In the meantime, run your jars, rings and lids through the dishwasher.

Place a colander in your preserving pan. Pour the berries and juice into the colander and catch the juice in the preserving pan. Set aside the colander of berries.

Bring the juice to a boil over high heat and reduce by half. The juice will become thick and syrupy.

While the juice is reducing, fill a stock pot with water and bring to a simmer over medium-high heat. Toss in your rings, lids and ladle and allow to simmer for at least ten minutes.Place your jars on a sheet tray and pop into a 400 degree oven for at least 10 minutes.

When your juice is good and syrupy, add the reserved berries to the pot and bring to a boil, stirring frequently. When the jam has reached the set point (220 degrees) remove from heat.

Dump the sterilized rings, lids and utensils into a clean colander in the sink. Refill your stockpot with water and return to the boil over high heat. Fill your half-pint jars, remembering to leave half and inch of headspace and to wipe the rim of each jar before putting the lid on.

Submerge a dish towel in your stockpot to keep the jars from banging together.

Slowly lower the jars into the boiling water. The jars must process for ten minutes at a rolling boil. Carefully remove the jars and allow to cool.

Voila! You’ve made Strawberry Balsamic, or as I like to call it, The King of Jams.

Questions? Post them in the comments. I would also love to hear from those of you who’ve made the Blueberry Jam from my last tutorial.

I can’t remember if I’ve written about the fact that I’m trying to eat fewer mammals. I don’t think I could ever go full vegetarian, but cutting down on the number of mammals I eat seemed like a good step in the right direction. I think we as a society eat far more meat than we need to, anyway.

But, every once in a while, my inner-Texan kicks in and demands that I make ribs. Oh dear Lord how I love ribs! I would never even consider making them at home if I still lived in Texas because never in my wildest dreams could I make ribs that could hold a candle to Railhead Smokehouse.

Still, when in Virginia, I can make a kick-ass rack of ribs when I put my mind to it, which I do about twice a year. Here’s how I make falling-off-the-bone tender ribs:

Start with enough ribs to feed your family with lots of leftovers. I like all kinds of ribs. Beef. Pork. Babyback. I’m not a huge fan of “country style” ribs because I think they are way more difficult to handle than ribs in racks, but this method will work for them too.

You’ll also need a bar-b-que rub. I love the bar-b-que rub from Pendry’s, my favorite, hometown spice store. PenZEY’S Bar-b-que rub is very different but also great. Or you can easily make your own.

Rinse your ribs and pat dry. Lay out two or three sheet of aluminum foil on your countertop (about as long as your arm), overlapping them slightly. Put your ribs on the foil, bone side up, and cover the racks with a generous amount of your rub.

This is what I mean by generous. Use your hands to really rub the spice blend into the meat, making sure to cover every inch of the ribs, including the bone. Flip the racks over and repeat on the other side.

Fold the foil over the ribs and wrap it like a burrito. Refrigerate overnight or for at least a couple of hours.

Five hours before you want to eat, take the ribs out of the fridge and allow to come to room temperature for about an hour. Preheat your oven to 300 degree. Place the foil packet of ribs on a sheet plan and cook at 300 for about 3 hours. After three hours or so, remove the ribs from the oven and test for doneness, either by inserting a meat thermometer (165 degrees in the magic number) or by cutting between two ribs with a sharp nice and checking for doneness visually.

Preheat your grill (done this early if you’re using charcoal) on high for 15 minutes, then turn the gas down to low. (For charcoal grills, you’ll want to use the indirect heat method here.) Grill the ribs with the cover closed for 5 or 6 minutes on each side, just long enough to get grill marks and pick up a little smokiness.

Voila! Tender, juicy ribs. I cut the ribs and serve with sauce on the side. This is my favorite commercially available bar-b-que sauce that I use when I’m too lazy to make my own. It does have high fructose corn syrup as the first ingredient, but so does almost every other grocery store bar-b-que sauce, and this one tastes the best. Plus, I only use a couple of tablespoons anyway.

Serve with grilled corn on the cobs, roasted potatoes and cowboy beans. Or with nothing- they’re so good no one will complain.

So, today’s post was supposed to be all about  making Strawberry Jam. But when I went to get the strawberries out of the fridge this morning they were just a little…sad looking. I knew I was taking a chance by waiting another day on them, but yesterday got away from me and I just didn’t get to it.

But the thing is, I HATE wasting food. Hate it like poison! I really didn’t want to waste two whole pounds of strawberries, so I decided to take one for team and make Strawberry Tequila instead. YOU’RE WELCOME!

Want to play along at home? You’ll need a bottle of tequila (750 ml) and 2 pounds of strawberries. I don’t think you need super-fancy tequila like this, but this bottle was a house-warming gift and all I had in the house.

Gently rinse the strawberries to remove any sand or grit.

Cut the tops off the berries, cut them in half and divide them equally between two quart-sized canning jars.

Pour the tequila over the berries to cover the strawberries.

Put lids on the jars and store in a cool, dark place. Shake the jars everyday for three weeks to agitate the berries. After three weeks, strain the tequila into a clean bottle and discard the berries. Use the tequila in margaritas or cocktails, or drink it straight. (I’ll let you know how it is as soon as it’s finished.)

Take the leftover tops outside.

Summon your chickens.

Throw the strawberry tops to the chickens and take your place as a god to poultry.

Balsamic Strawberry Jam is still to come…

Printable Marie Antoinette Paper Dolls at Totally Severe

Amazing embroidery art, also at Totally Severe

Clever packing tape.

Victoria and Albert Museum – Patchwork: Pattern Maker. Upload your photo and it will break it down into a quilting pattern for you. Very, very cool. (Via the always awesome NotMartha.)

I am really enjoying Mother Jones editorial intern Tim Murphy’s Road Trip for America’s Future blog, particularly this post about Popcorn Sutton, the last of the Tennessee Moonshiners.

Did you know that the wild tiger population has dropped 96.8% in the last 20 years? Or that there are only 3200 tigers left in the wild? I find this very upsetting.

Amy at Angry Chicken made the coolest giant outdoor chalkboards for her kids! 4′x4′ plywood painted with chalkboard paint. So simple and brilliant. I’m thinking about making these for when we have kids visit the farm.

BLOG CRUSH! I am your Canadian Boyfriend

Note to my 8 pregnant friends: the little seed. Eco friendly and a-dor-able. (via the ever-awesome mydogpetey)

Cassie Boon put out a call to women to write letters to their 20-year-old selves. I’m working on mine (I’ll post here after I submit it)  but I’ve really enjoyed reading the letters other women have submitted.

Why does American Rose suck? Good question.

It’s the 50th anniversary of To Kill a Mockingbird- my all time favorite Southern novel. I love this Anna Quindlen piece on the Greatness of Scout.

I love absolutely everything about this Bontemps Cowl over at The Pomegranate Chronicles. So lovely.

A clock that knits one scarf every year.

BLOG CRUSH! Punk Domestics. Badass canning recipes.

Fresh Strawberry-Infused Tequila.

Fascinating article on wild salmon fishing by Corby Kummer at the Atlantic.

Now it’s your turn. Post links to the neat-o stuff you like in the comments and spread the joy.

I am about to let you in on a very badly kept secret: I am crazy for the foods of Summer. Fresh Corm on the Cob. Tomatoes. Avocados. Berries. Peaches. Watermelon. I could honestly eat every meal at the Farmers Market, all Summer long. I am a big believer in eating seasonally; a raw tomato or ear of corn eaten in December isn’t worth eating, in my opinion.

But what if you could capture some of the essence of Summer food and enjoy it during the long, cold, snowy winter to come? That’s what canning, jamming and freezing are all about.  It’s amazing to me how many people are intimidated by the idea of canning. Let me tell you something, if you can knit a sweater on-gauge or thread a sewing machine, you can successfully can. And once you taste the jam, tomato sauce and other pantry staples you can make at home, you’ll  turn your nose up at the sorry substitutes you can find in the grocery store.

Jam is the best jumping off point for canning because it’s dead easy, delicious and makes wonderful gifts when the holidays come along. There are about as many ways of jam making as there are cooks who make it. I have a few cookbooks specific to preserving and all advocate different methods, sugar-to-fruit ratio and cooking times. I experimented for years before coming up with my own tried and true method. This week, we’re going to make three kinds of jam: blueberry, strawberry and peach. Blueberry jam is the easiest of all so we’ll start there.

First, a few basics that apply to all jam-making and canning. Before you start to make jam your kitchen should be scrupulously clean. You are going to be storing your jam at room temperature for many, many months, and it is essential that the jam be as bacteria-free as possible from the get go. I usually do this the night before so I’m ready to get going first thing in the morning. All surfaces should be sanitized, along with the sinks you’ll be using.

While you’re cleaning, fill the dishwasher with your canning jars and run it. I don’t wash the rings and lids that come with the jars in the dishwasher: they will be sterilized later, along with the jars themselves. This wash it remove the Christmas-morning-plastic-doll smell that comes with new jars. No dishwasher? No problem. Just wash the jars by hand and allow them to air dry.

While we’re on the subject of jars, I tend to use half-pint sized jars for jams and preserves, reserving pint and quart sized for tomato sauce and other savories. Half-pints are a good size for giving and tend to get eaten up quickly, whereas a pint jar may go moldy in the fridge after it’s been opened for a month or two.

Canning jars are available at Walmart and Target, along with many hardware stores. Check the Seasonal section of the store if you have trouble locating them. You can also order both Ball and Mason jars and have them delivered. The larger sized jars come in two mouth sizes, regular and wide, which are standard to all brands. I prefer the wide mouth jars when I can get them. Just be sure you know which size mouths you have when buying replacement lids.

As far as specialized equipment goes, I highly recommend a jar lifter, and a wide-mouth canning funnel. You will need a large stock pot for water processing your finished jam, but the pot you use for making spaghetti in will work just fine.

For this recipe, you are going to need 8 dry pints of blueberries. I tend to make blueberry jam when I go blueberry picking or when blueberries go on sale at the market for 2 for $3.

Put your blueberries in a colander and pick through them, removing any unripe, green berries, stems and damaged berries. Handle the fruit gently.

Next, rinse your berries under running water. Again, be gentle when rinsing. You’re just trying to remove any leftover sand or grit from the fruit.

In addition to the blueberries, you will need cane sugar and two lemons or limes for your jam. I prefer limes because I think it make a more interesting jam, but lemons are more traditional. You may be wondering why you won’t be needing commercial pectin. I prefer jam made without added pectin- I find the taste slightly off-putting- and almost all fruit contains enough natural pectin to jam without it.

Did you know that in order for a commercial product to be labeled “jam” the FDA requires it to contain equal parts fruit and sugar by weight? That’s the reason most jam is so teeth-achingly, cloyingly sweet. One of the joys of making your own is that you get to control the amount of sugar in your jam. I like my jam to be a bit on the tart side, so I added 3 cups of sugar to my 8 dry pints of blueberries.

Next, juice your lemons or limes into your bowl of berries. Or, if you are smarter than me, juice your citrus in to a small bowl and then pour the juice over the berries. This will save you time hunting for the seed that slipped in by mistake.

Next, add the zest of one lemon or lime to your bowl. (You can zest one of the ones you’re going to juice.)

Give everything a good stir. You will have a bowl of sugar-coated blueberries, which is exactly what you want.

Cover the bowl with a tea towel and allow it to sit for at least 4 hours, preferably overnight. While your berries wit in the sugar, they are macerating.If you have room, you can macerate your fruit in the fridge but it will slow the process so increase the time to at least 8 hours. When it’s time to cook the jam, you’ll find that your dry bowl of berries in now a bowl of berries swimming in beautiful, purple juices.

Now we’re ready to cook our jam. You want a shallow-ish, wide pan. My preferred jam making pot is about 6 inches deep and 20 inches across. The wider the pan, the faster evaporation will happening during the cooking process. We want to cook the jam quickly in order to retain as much of the fresh fruit flavor as possible.

Place a colander into your jam pan and tump the blueberries into it, straining the juice into the pan, reserving the blueberries.

Put the pan containing the juice on the stove and bring to a boil over high heat.

Continue boiling over high heat until the liquid has reduced by about half. The time this takes will vary depending on the size of your pan and the amount of juice but it will be in the neighborhood of 15 to 20 minutes.

While you’re waiting for the juice to reduce, bring a stock pot of water to a brisk boil over high heat. Add the jar lids and rings, canning funnel, ladle and a skimmer or slotted spoon to the pot. Cover and let boil for 15 minutes, then pour the contents into a clean colander in the sink to drain.

Put your cleaned jars onto a sheet tray and place them in the oven that has been preheated to 400 degree. This is my preferred method of sterilizing jars, as I find that boiling empty jars can lead to chips and breakage. Remove the jars after 20 minutes and allow to cool on the tray.

Once your juice has reduced by half, add the blueberries and any remaining juices to the pan and return to a rolling boil, stirring occasionally.  Cook for about 20 minutes or until the jam reaches 220 degrees on a candy thermometer. If you don’t have a candy thermometer you can easily test to see if your jam has reached the “set point” by placing a small plate in the freezer for about 10 minutes. When the plate is chilled, spoon a drop of the jam onto the plate like this:

If the jam is ready, it won’t run back together when you swipe a finger through it. It will wrinkle a bit and feel firm.

When the jam has set, remove from heat immediately and skim off any foam that may have formed, using your skimmer of slotted spoon.

Now we’re ready to jar our jam! You’ll need your colander full of sterilized rings and lids, the sterilized ladle, 10 sterilized jars, a slightly damp, clean dish towel, the sterilized canning funnel and your pan of jam.

Fill your jars, leaving 1/2 inch of head space empty.

To keep things neat, have the next jar ready to rest the funnel in as you fill each jar.

Carefully wipe the rim of each jar before putting the lid on and screwing down the ring. Even small amounts of jam on the rim can prevent the jar from sealing properly so don’t skip this step!

Continue until all your jars are filled. This recipe made 10 full jars for me, with a little left over that I put into directly into the fridge for immediate use. Now we are ready to water process the jars. For some reason, this step scares people but nothing could be simpler. Honest! Just bring your large stock pot of water to a boil over high heat.

Once the water is at a rolling boil, submerge a dish towel in the pot. This is going to keep your jars from knocking together too much and breaking.

Carefully lower all the jars into the pot of boiling water.

Once all the jars are submerged and the water has returned to a boil, set a time for 10 minutes. It’s important that the jars are in the pot at a boil for the entire 10 minutes. The water processing ensures that the entire jar reaches the appropriate temperature to kill any remaining bacteria. Carefully remove the jars from the boiling water and allow to cool. While the jars are cooling, you will hear the tops of the jars popping. This is normal and just means that you have successfully created a hermetic seal on the jar.

Voila! You made blueberry jam.

Tomorrow we’ll make Strawberry Balsamic.

Still looking for the perfect Father’s Day gift? This is so weird but so badass. Help support giant rats (ROUSes!) trained to use their exceptional sense of smell to clear land minds in Africa and detect TB in patients.

The Washington Post picks 11 great cookbooks for Summer and my friend Susie Middleton’s book is on it! So buy it already- I promise you’ll love it. I also love The River Cottage Preserves Handbook. I just got it but it looks very promising.

An artist who “paints” with Rubik’s Cubes. Just amazing.

This animated dog created with embroidery by Aubrey Longley-Cook of Spool Spectrum leaves me speechless. It very nearly got it’s own post the moment I saw it.

The finest tutorial on making fresh pasta I’ve ever seen. Bookmark it.

The smallest Eeyore ever!

I know. I know. I’m a sucker for animals mothering babies of another species. But “Grieving chihuahua become mom to 9 kittens” nearly did me in.

Homemade pop tarts at smitten kitchen. I want to make these using homemade strawberry and peach jam as the fillings.

I love the details of this Farm Fresh Wedding. It’s perfect.

I’ve always wanted to make a Vodka Watermelon for a party…

I really like this swing made from a the stave of a retired wine barrel. So graceful. Wishing I had a large enough tree…

I could eat Salad Nicoise every day of summer, but without the hard-boiled eggs and with grilled tuna instead of canned.

New blog crush! Little Brown Pen.

I want to make strawberry fruit leather.

Grilled strawberries with Pimm’s and vanilla ice cream. Yes, please!

These are the things making me happy this week. What’s making you happy? Share your links in the comments.

ETA: Y’all are really bringing it this week in the comments! There are some great links and ideas in there, so be sure to check them out.

Summer food is a bit tricky for me. I love all the fresh vegetables that are suddenly available at the farmers market and from our CSA but I really don’t have much of an appetite when it’s hot out and I really can’t be bothered to do much cooking if it means heating up the kitchen.

If I was only responsible for feeding myself, I probably wouldn’t bother too much with big meals till fall, but I also cook for Maggie and an endless stream of friends, house guests, farms stay guests and farm hands, and everybody else seems dead-set on eating every single day.

I tend to fall back on a handful of recipes in the summer, most of which don’t require me to slave over a hot stove. I’ll be posting about all of my go-tos over the next few weeks, but my very favorite is Bread Salad.

Now, everybody has a Bread Salad recipe but I would posit that you really don’t need a recipe at all. It’s crazy simple to make and the variations are never-ending.

To start with you’ll need a good loaf of stale bread. Or a stale loaf of good bread. Any kind of bakery bread will work- ciabatta, baguette, whatever. Anything but sandwich bread, and anything but fresh. This salad is a great way to use up day-old bread but it honestly doesn’t work with fresh bread.

Tear the bread into large, bite-sized piece. Yes, large and bite-sized. I usually do this in the morning and leave the pieces on a sheet pan all day so that the bread will be even staler and drier when it’s time to make my salad.

Next, chop your tomatoes. I used cherry tomatoes here and just halved them. You want your tomato pieces to be about the same size as your bread pieces. Put your tomatoes into a colander over a bowl, throw a couple of pinches of salt on them  and stir. Leave the tomatoes to drain while you chop the rest of your ingredients.

I never make Bread Salad without red onion. You can use sweet onions or spring onions, totally up to you. Halve and slice two small to medium onions. A Benriner makes quick work of this job and gets all the slices nice and even.

We had a couple of cucumbers in our CSA share this week, so I peeled, halved and sliced them, also on the Benriner.

I wanted to add a little protein to my salad, so I tossed in about a cup of marinated mozzarella balls. You can substitute feta for mozzarella or just leave the cheese out all together.

I had an open jar of artichoke hearts in the fridge, so I chopped up three or four of them and threw them into my bowl, along with a teaspoon or so or capers. Then I made a simple red wine vinegar/olive oil vinaigrette. (Olive oil, vinegar, 1/4 teaspoon Dijon mustard, a smashed garlic clove, salt, pepper and sugar. Pour all ingredients into a jar with a tight fitting lid and shake. If it’s too tart add more sugar. If it tastes to oily, first add more salt and taste again before adding more vinegar.) You’ll need a good bit of dressing for this salad, so make a lot. The dry bread is going to soak up a whole lot of vinaigrette, which is the whole idea.

Throw the onions, cucumbers, artichokes, capers, chopped tomatoes and bread into a large salad bowl. I sometimes add black olives, but not always. Douse with dressing and toss and toss and toss. You really want to make sure that everything in the bowl gets a light dressing.

Voila! Beautiful, delicious Bread Salad. Play around with the method and throw in things you have on hand. I’ve seen a BLT version that adds torn lettuces leaves and bacon. I’ve added  crispy cubes of pancetta to great effect too.

To go with the salad I made one of my favorite summer desserts. Slice up some strawberries, splash with balsamic vinegar and sprinkle with a tablespoon of sugar. Let marinate for at least half an hour. You can stop there or you can add EITHER a few grinds of fresh black pepper or fresh basil leaves torn into bite-sized pieces. These strawberries are amazing and I urge you to try them at least once. The balsamic brings out the strawberrieness of the strawberries. This is a great way to rescue those tasteless grocery store strawberries.

You can serve these strawberries all on their lonesome, or over ice cream, yogurt or bread pudding. It makes a lovely accompaniment to rice pudding. I love homemade rice pudding and I always use Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s recipe to make it.

For four people, rinse 1/2 cup of arborio rice under cold water. Butter an oven-proof dish and tip in the washed rice, 4 tablespoons of butter (I use less) 4 cups of milk (I use 1%), 1/2 cup of sugar and a pinch of salt. I add either a spilt vanilla bean OR a couple or cardamom pods.

Put the dish into a 300 degree oven and bake for 45 minutes. Stir the rice gentle and return to the oven for another 30 minutes. Stir. Return to the oven and bake another hour or so, until the rice is tender and most of milk have been absorbed.  Remove the cardamom pods if you used them and serve warm or cold, plain or with strawberries or even with a spoonful of good-quality jam.

I’d love to hear what you cook when it’s hot out.

Let me just get this over with from the get-go: I love meat. Roasted chicken is my idea of heaven on earth. I love rare steak and burgers. I always order Carpaccio when it’s on the menu, same with Duck Confit. I also love to cook meat; in culinary school, the protein is always the star of the show and I got quiet good at preparing it.

But lately I’ve been struggling with the issue of eating animals. Knowing- and I mean really knowing- as many farm animals as I do, it’s impossible for me to fool myself into believing that the animals I eat didn’t have personalities. Each of my sheep is has likes and dislikes and all kind of characteristics that make them unique. Even my chickens are definitely individuals. There is a disconnect for me between devoting my life to creating a sanctuary for the animals lucky enough to live on my farm while roasting and sauteing those that aren’t. But I really, really didn’t want to give up eating meat. So I found it better just not to think about it too hard.

Only that’s becoming harder and harder to do anymore. Several of my level-headed, even-keeled friends have given up meat in the last year. They haven’t exactly become vegetarians but they are eating a lot more fish fish and a lot less bacon. And nearly everyone I know has read and heartily recommended Jonathan Safran Foer’s Eating Animals. (I get at least three emails a day from readers urging me to read it.) It was all very unsettling.

So I was thrilled when I found this Huffington Post article by Susie Middleton on this very subject. Susie is amazing and one of my heros. She’s the former editor of Fine Cooling Magazine (one of only two cooking mags I ever buy) and she’s written about me before. Her recipe’s are fresh and interesting and invariably the ones I return to again and again. She’s also a fellow Vineyarder and an all around fascinating person.

Susie’s article is so sane and sensible and middle-path-ish that I’ve decided to give her suggestions a try. I’m not becoming a vegetarian- at least not yet- but I’m going to cut back on my meat-eating and make sure I always source the meat I do eat responsibly. I recognize the fact that this won’t end my internal conflict about eating animals but it’s a step in the right direction.

I want to be clear that I’ve been struggling with this is FOR ME. Not for anyone else. I would never sit in judgement of anyone else’s decision about what to eat. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this issue.

p.s. The photo at the top of this post isn’t there to make you feel guilty or manipulate you. It’s just illustrates what I’ve been looking at everyday while struggling with this.

The last two weeks have been so slow and easy around the farm and I confess I’m having trouble finding my inner dynamo. (Erin and Paige have suggested I have a t-shirt made with “lazy” printed on one side and “dynamo” on the other so I can just turn it around to suit my mood.)

It’s not that I’ve done nothing over the holidays; I’ve read four books, tried a whole passel of new recipes, thrown a big party, re-stocked the shop and spent some quality time with my flock. But the idea of working on the 2010 marketing plan today seems completely lame compared to making Clementines Preserved in Honey (yesterday) or homemade ketchup (later today).

Speaking of food, there are a few questions leftover from my pantry post that I haven’t gotten to yet. Several of you asked for the recipe for the Toffee Shortbread Cookies that were in my freezer. I used this recipe but I cut the amount of mini chocolate chips in half. More importantly, next time I make these I will cut the size of the cookies she recommends in half, if not in quarters. These cookies are super-rich and a bite of two is really all we could eat.

A couple of you asked about freezing whipping or heavy cream. You can certainly freeze it for use in recipes but it won’t whipped up as much never-frozen cream will. I would rather not run to the grocery store for fresh cream every time we need it so it’s worth the trade off. You should note that I have only tried whipping previously frozen cream in the cream whipper.

The makers of Southern Biscuit Mix Formula L Biscuit Mix contacted me after my last post to let my readers know that you can order good ol’ Formula L online if you aren’t lucky enough to live south of the Mason-Dixon line.

A couple people asked me why the “quick soak” method for dried beans isn’t just as good as soaking the beans overnight. It’s not that soaking beans overnight is better, it’s just that I’ve found quick soaked beans still take longer to cook than beans soaked for 8 or more hours. Another benefit of soaking and freezing your beans is that you don’t end up with beans that have been sitting around in your pantry for a few months that take ages and ages to soften up, if they ever do. I just soak the beans I purchase as soon as I get home from the market, throw them in a freezer bag and stick them in the freezer. That way they will be as fresh as the day I bought them when I’m ready to use them.

I was excited to read Hilary’s suggestion for using a thermos to cook beans and I will be trying it, you can be sure!

Trinity asked about salted vs. unsalted butter. Butter used to be salted before refrigerators were ubiquitous (even into the 1040s) because it made it last longer at room temperature. Obviously there is no need to salt it anymore but people had developed the taste for it on things like toast so they kept making it. I find that salted butter throws off the amount of salt in most of my recipes so unless a recipe specifically calls for salted butter, I never buy it. And honestly, I would probably just add a bit more salt and stick with the unsalted.

By the way, I should have said that my post wasn’t an exhaustive list. We do eat a lot of fish, mostly frozen unfortunately. I also didn’t write about the Asian and Mexican sections of the pantry because I thought that might be getting a bit to into my own tastes.

EDITED TO ADD: I left out on of my favorite frugal shortcuts in my last post! Every time I use up a stick of butter, I save the wrapper in a ziplock bag in the freezer. When a recipe calls for lining a pan with parchment paper and buttering it I just pull out my baggie o’ butter wrappers and layer them across the pan or cut them to fit. Super-simple and saves money on parchment.

If you have any more food questions or suggestions I’d love to hear from you. I’m thinking of giving all this food talk it’s own page here on the blog. Thoughts?

Now, if I haven’t bored you to death, on to farm news. We bid Sweet Aldo farewell today as his gigolo contract is up and we think all of our ewes and yearlings are now with child. We are going to miss that ram! You’ve just never met a more gentle creature than Aldo and he was just a joy to have on the farm.

I’ve a couple worried emails asking after Miss Linda.Proof of Life pic: Linda with today’s Washington Post

In spite of our dire predictions that Linda probably wouldn’t make it through the winter, she is fattening up and absolutely thriving. There is nothing in the world wrong with her; she’s just very old for a goat. She is spending the winter in the small paddock with access to the barn (along with Dimples, Jasmine and Will) and doesn’t have to compete for grain or hay, which explains her weight gain. Linda continues to act as Jasmine’s foster mom and the two of them sleep snuggled up together every night. It’s quite a lovely thing to see and I go all kitten-headed every time.

Here are a couple more funny pics from Linda’s morning photo shoot:

If you haven’t checked out the new colorways in the shop get over there quick! They are selling like hot cakes, thanks to Suzy’s brilliant dyeing. Also, don’t forget to visit the Juniper Moon Swag Shop for all kind of JMF gear. My mom just got her order and she can’t get over how high-quality everything is, especially the tote bags are which are much larger than our previous totes.

I have a friend who can’t sleep at night if she has less money in the bank than she’ll need to cover 6 months of expenses. I, on the other hand, can’t sleep at night when we run out of penne pasta.

Not when we run out of pasta, mind you. That is a circumstance I can not even fathom. I literally can’t imagine what would be going on in the world that would result in my allowing myself to run out of pasta. Robot invaders, maybe?

And the thing is we don’t even eat that much pasta. I just happen to be a woman who likes a well-stocked pantry. “Likes” may not be a strong enough word here, but you get the idea.

I have no idea where this weird quirk of mine came from. My Mama thinks I must have been poor and gone hungry in a previous life. Maybe so, but  you can be damned sure I’ve never gone hungry in this one.

Here are a couple of things you should know before you judge me:

1. Most of the time I would rather eat my own cooking than go out. Someone should be benefitting from all that money my ex-husband spent on Culinary School, right? (Thanks, Steve!)

2. Erin and Paige receive room and board as part of there compensation.

and

3. Although we are just three women living here, farm chores make you hungry. And believe me when I say that those two tiny girls can eat!

In addition to copious amounts of flour (unbleached and whole wheat), sugar, brown sugar and Kosher salt, here’s my list of essentials.

Every once in a while I’ll wish I had lived in Sense and Sensibility era but then I remember that they didn’t have canned tomatoes or ziplock bags. Canned tomatoes might be the most important invention of all time. I am being deadly serious.  I buy Diced, Whole, Sauce and Paste at Costco in 8 or 12 packs of cans.

It is a cruel fact of life that, in spite of my Southern pedigree, I can’t make biscuits. Lord knows I have tried! There is not one fool-proof recipe that I haven’t screwed up. Which is why I have such an enduring fondness for Southern Biscuit Original Restaurant Style Biscuit Mix Formula L. [I don't know why the Formula L.] I have reason to believe that it’s only sold in the South but it’s 100% worth the drive if you care at all about biscuits like I do.

Dried beans really are a world better than canned but they are also a PITA when you’re trying to make dinner on a weeknight. But I’m going to let you in on a little secret that will blow your mind: You can soak beans, drain off the excess liquid and freeze them for future use. This is my new favorite trick and the beans suffer not one iota in the process.

Polenta-in-a-tube doesn’t hold a candle to real polenta but it’s good enough for everyday dinners when you’re sick of pasta and rice. We keep it mostly for breakfasts- saute polenta slices until crispy and top with a fried egg and pesto or tomato sauce.

Pasta of many shapes and sizes. As you can see I don’t have a preference as to brand; I stock up with whatever is on sale.

Ounces for ounce, Dried Mushrooms pack more flavor in a small space than almost anything else. Great for whomping up a weak sauce.

The Three Horsemen of the Baking Apocalypse. Keep these on hand and you’ll never want for cookies.

Speaking of baking, why oh why would anybody ever buy just one pound of butter? I mean, it freezes beautifully and you know you’re going to need butter again, right? I stock up when it’s on sale. Always unsalted. I do the same with cream cheese and whipping cream.

Speaking of the freezer, as you might have guessed, we have a large one. Not huge or anything- I think it’s 12 cubic feet?- but it plays a key part in my being able to leave the farm as little as possible.

But I’m getting ahead of myself with all this freezer talk. Back in the pantry I always have a 20 pound bag of Royal Basmati Rice from Costco. It’s wicked cheap and the best, most consistent rice I’ve ever used. I also keep couscous, wild rice and boil-in-bag brown rice on hand. Right now we also have quinoa but I don’t use it often. I can’t keep more than a couple of pounds of potatoes and sweet potatoes because they seem to get soft and eye-y so quickly, but I’ve heard that keeping them in a wooden box buried under some sand extends their life, so someday I might try that. Of course we always have 10 or so pounds of onions, loads of fresh garlic and shallots. (I never knew how crucial shallots are to fine cooking until I went to Culinary School.)

We eat a good bit of oatmeal using the rice cooker method I wrote about last winter- I always buy whole oats, never Quick or Instant.

I like to have a large container of cooking Olive Oil and another smaller bottles of Extra Virgin Olive Oil for dressing salads- NOT FOR COOKING. It drives me nuts when tv chefs recommend Extra Virgin for cooking with because all of the subtle nuances that make it Extra Virgin are destroyed with heating and it’s more expensive. I also keep canola oil on hand but use it very little, and a couple of specialty oils like Walnut and Grape, although we don’t really use them enough to justify the expense. Oil goes rancid so quickly so you should never buy more than you think you’ll use fairly quickly. Vinegar wise I have cheap, grocery store Balsamic (which isn’t really Balsamic at all, but whatever), really good, aged Balsamic, a good white wine or Champagne vinegar and one or two other specialty vinegars for mixing salad dressings. Right now I think I have sherry vinegar and raspberry. Of course we also have plain ole white and apple cider as well. Oh, and shortening for making cookies.

EDITED TO ADD: Totally forgot another great trick I learned in Culinary School. Keep a bottle of Sherry- NOT COOKING SHERRY- and a bottle of Maderia in your pantry at all times. You can use them as a substitute for white and red wines (respectively) in recipes for more intensity of flavor. And because they are fortified wines, they’re shelf stable and last forever. Much more convenient than opening a bottle of wine when you only need half a cup for your stew or whatever.

We also have an ample supply of peanut butter- which can save a hungry person- and Nutella, pancake mix for Sundays, a couple of boxes olives, “emergency” cake mix and some “thin and crispy” premade pizza crusts for last minute dinners.

And of course, there’s a whole shelf devoted entirely to ingredients for my granola: coconut, various kinds of nuts, dried cranberries and blueberries, etc. (I am working on a recipe to convert the granola into granola bars. I’ll let you know when it’s ready.)

Now, back to the freezer. I keep it stocked with all the usual stuff: whole chickens- because Roast Chicken is my go-to comfort food, a couple of roasts and loins and loads and loads of homemade chicken stock.

In fact, I could probably live without the extra freezer if it wasn’t for the chicken stock. I use Nigella Lawson’s method of stock-making, basically saving all the chicken bones whenever we have chicken in a ziplock bag in the freezer until I have a lot and then making several gallons of stock at a time. I do the same with vegetable scraps, throwing onion skins and end pieces as well as celery and carrots scraps, mushrooms stems, etc in a ziplock till it’s full. When I have five or six full bags I make vegetable stock.

There are a couple of  super cool thing we’ve started doing with our big freezer. One is buying four or five baguettes from the bakery at a time and freezing them so that we always have good bread for dinner. I just grab one out of the freezer and put it in a hot over for 5 or 6 minutes just before we eat.

Also, whenever I make cookie dough now I scoop out the dough on a cookie sheet and put the whole thing in the freezer overnight. In the morning I toss all the dough scoops into a ziplock and label it with the baking instructions on the bag. That way Erin and Paige can make one or two cookies whenever they want one without us having a ton of fattening desserty stuff sitting around tempting me.

The freezer also comes in handy when things like bacon go on sale, cause let me tell you, these girls can eat some bacon!

As for the regular fridge, my staples are celery and carrots for making mirepoix (which nearly everything starts with), lots of kind of of cheese for grilled cheese sandwiches, quesadillas, mac and cheese and snacks, tortillas, 2% milk that no one drinks and I keep vowing to stop buying, lemons and limes, really good prepared pesto and salad greens.

And that, in a nut shell, is everything. I hope I haven’t bored you to tears with this exhaustive look inside my pantry. If you have any questions just leave them in the comments and I’ll try to answer them in this post.