Fall Clean Up Begins...And I'm Going Nuts--a Trailer Park Homestead update

After Sunday morning's frost, a new wave of beautiful weather began!  Now we are looking at the possibility of 80s by the end of the week again!  I've been taking advantage of this gorgeous weather to start fall cleanup in the garden and have started getting a bit squirrelly...by gathering nuts!

We opened up the potato condo.  If you remember, this was supposedly able to produce up to 100 pounds of potatoes...

My son was very helpful in sorting through the dirt looking for them.  He is clearly identifiable in this picture as my son, since he is dressed almost exactly like I usually do in a tie-dyed shirt (perfect for hiding dirt and stains, I've found), jeans, and sandals. 

And this was the entire potato harvest *sigh*  I think the potato condo may be converted to a compost bin and I'll probably go back to growing potatoes in buckets next year, since that worked a lot better and was a lot less labor intensive.

So here is the remaining productive portion of the backyard.  I still have carrots, cabbage, snap peas, spinach, broccoli, and calendula growing in this area!

And this is the not so productive anymore portion of the backyard.  I got the former sunflower area cleaned up and put down fresh soil for the spring in there.  The beans are going to seed for use for next year.  The only thing that might still produce something yummy is the watermelon, but I don't know if there will be enough time for the little watermelons on the vine to grow into big, tasty watermelons before either the contractors tear it up or we get a hard freeze.  Either one could happen any day now!

The tomatoes in the buckets are looking sad (stupid leaf spot!), but the six remaining buckets are still producing!  The ghosts of the cornfields are decorating my doorways and yard.  Only three of the ground cherry plants still survive and are producing.  I've rearranged the containers containing spinach and carrots for now, but it won't be much longer until they come inside for the winter.  I'll probably add lettuce to those boxes soon again as well.

The front raised bed still has rutabaga, green pepper, carrots, tomatoes, and a cucumber plant that is barely hanging on.  There are sadly empty squares in this square foot garden, but it is too late to plant anything there this year.

I pulled the watermelon (was in the bottom right mini-bed) because there were no more fruits or even flowers on there.  The snap peas in the mini bed to the left are still going strong.  The area around the lamp still has tomatoes, green peppers, a variety of herbs, and a scattering of carrots

The raspberry bushes as still toss me a berry every now and then.  The blueberry bushes are done and changing color before going to sleep for the winter.

In other news, I found out that sprouted acorns are still good eating, and even preferred by some experts since apparently they are more nutritious, sweeter tasting, and not wormy (since wormy acorns can't sprout, I guess).  My little helper, myself, and a bunch of random neighborhood kids collected a gallon bucket full of them yesterday.  I find it amusing that people generally assume I'm collecting acorns for crafts, since I've read that, since people have first inhabited this planet, we've eaten more acorns than rice and wheat combined!

Not only did we fill a gallon bucket with acorns, my little helper and I filled a 5-gallon bucket with black walnuts.  He loved collecting these since they looked like green balls to him!  Looks like we'll be taking care of lots of nuts today!

In addition to all the work outside, I also canned another dozen pints of tomato sauce this past weekend.  Hopefully I have enough tomato goodies put up, because with frosts this past weekend, tomatoes are going to just keep getting harder and harder to find!

Whole Wheat Coffee Cake

Yesterday's breakfast: ww coffee cake, cheese omelet, & grapes

It was always a special morning growing up when my mom would make coffee cake.  Unfortunately, I'm so not a morning person, it happens even less frequently in my house as an adult, usually only for special occasions.  Sometimes I just want something though, and yesterday was one of those mornings.  This isn't the same exact recipe as my mom uses (I'm pretty sure anyway), but I like that most of the flour is whole wheat, since I try to sneak in whole grains instead of the more processed refined products whenever I can (in case you haven't noticed that from my recipes!).

Whole Wheat Coffee Cake

1/3 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
3 tbsp butter, firm
----
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/3 cup butter, softened
1 cup milk
1 egg

Preheat oven to 350.  Grease a 9x9x2 baking pan.  Combine brown sugar, 1/4 cup ww flour, and cinnamon in a small bowl.  Cut in 3 tbsp butter until mixture resembles fine crumbs.  In a separate bowl, combine remaining ingredients.  Beat on medium speed for 2 minutes, scraping the side of the bowl frequently.  Pour half of batter into the baking pan.  Sprinkle half of the brown sugar mixture into the pan.  Spread remaining batter in the pan and top with remaining brown sugar mixture.  Bake for 45 minutes or until a wooden toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Mouthwatering Burritos--a new take on leftovers

I'm always on the lookout for new recipes.  Two kinds of recipes that especially appeal are super quick, easy recipes that still use real food, not a bunch of prepackaged convenience "food", and recipes that use random bits of leftovers in a new and delicious way.

Burritos fit both of these criteria.  The other night when I didn't feel like cooking, I came up with this to use some leftover rice, some salsa that no one was eating and I was worried it would go bad soon, and a partial can of refried beans.  It is good enough that I might consider making up fresh rice, opening a jar of salsa specifically for it, and opening a can of refried beans as well! 

Burritos

cooked rice

salsa

refried beans

large flour tortillas

Cheddar, Monteray jack, colby or a "Mexican" cheese blend

sour cream (optional)

other fillings such as guacamole, seasoned meat, lettuce, etc (optional)

2 tbsp olive oil

Combine the rice with the salsa in desired proportions and heat through.  Spread a thin layer of refried beans on each tortilla.  Layer seasoned rice, cheese, and any other toppings onto the burrito and fold.  Heat oil in a medium skillet over medium heat.  Place burrito on skillet and gently brown each side before serving.

Homemade Vapor Rub

When I made a fresh batch of my calendula salve a couple days ago, I posted the link to the recipe on my Facebook page for those that missed it when it first went up.  One of the comments following that post on Facebook mentioned that they would like to find a natural alternative to Vick's Vapor Rub with their questionable petrochemicals.  I haven't bought Vick's in many years if ever, but it got me thinking.  With my allergies, I frequently use eucalyptus to clear out my nasal congestion and it sure would be nice to have a way to get eucalyptus oil to hang out by my nose so I could breath freely for longer, without holding a bottle of oil to my nose for extended periods of time.

An idea was born.  I could make a salve-like ointment thing (I don't really know what the differences are in those terms, but whatever.  I don't need to.  You know what I mean) that could be made in different strengths, depending on where the user wanted to apply it.  I made a very mild one to dab under my nostrils, but you could increase the eucalyptus to whatever level you'd like to make a much stronger version to rub on the chest or throat like the Vick's VapoRub you'd buy at the store (and spend way more for). 

It should be noted that my version doesn't contain camphor oil or menthol like the storebought version, so it won't be as effective for muscle aches and other topical pain relief applications, but it has fewer potential side effects as well (and I didn't want it for topical pain relief anyway, just for clearing out a stuffy nose and/or helping with cough).  The smell of menthol also makes me feel like I'm going to vomit, and using it in the form of peppermint burns my skin, but if you'd like to add either of these oils back in, you may want to keep in mind that the proportion of the three oils in Vicks VapoRub is approximately 5 parts camphor, 2 parts menthol, and 1 part eucalyptus, so you could reduce the amount of eucalyptus oil you use and add the others in those proportions or vary it according to your personal preference.

The contents of my medicine cabinet get stranger all the time.

Anyhoo, here is my mild-enough-to-stick-in-my-nostrils version (just to clarify, I'm talking about just inside the rim, not nose-picker zones).  Like I said, you may want to increase the strength of the oils used if you have a different use in mind.

Vapor Rub

1/2 cup olive oil

2 tbsp shredded beeswax

40+ drops of eucalyptus oil

Gently heat the olive oil.  Remove from heat.  Add beeswax and stir until melted and dissolved.  Add oil.  Pour into a opaque container for storage (you can use a clear glass container if you make sure it doesn't get left out in the light) and let cool to solidify before using.

Please Help

Every day since February 3 of this year, I've made sure that at least one post has gone up on this blog.  Every day, regardless of what I've been going through or needed to get done, I gotten something up in the hopes of educating, inspiring, or perhaps even entertaining someone out there on the other end of the internets.  Now I want something back.  No, I'm not asking for money (although that always does help and there is always a secure Paypal donation button on the sidebar if you are so inclined, but I digress).  There is a contest that I'd really like to win and you can help me do it. 

There are two winners to the contest, a people's choice and an editors' choice.  Both win $500, but I'm extra interested in the editors' choice award.  Not only does that person get the money, but their garden will be featured in Mother Earth News magazine.  My whole life, I've viewed Mother Earth News to be a major inspiration, so it would truly be an honor to have my garden, that I've worked so hard on and fought so hard for, to show up in its pages.  In order to be eligible for that prize, I first have to make it into the top 25 gardens.  As of this writing, I'm 5 votes away from being in the top 25 and just over 150 votes away from being in the top spot!  You can vote every day and voting ends November 1.  You do have to sign up with the website to vote, but they don't ask for personal info except for a zip code (which isn't really that personal) and, except for a few required fields, most of what they ask, including about which gardens you'd like to follow, you can just click "skip this step" to just join to vote.  Please click here to go to my page to vote.

In case you need some reminders (or are new to this blog and don't know), here are some highlights from this year's garden, the first year of the Trailer Park Homestead:

Obviously, I could show off many, many more pictures of my garden, and I'm currently working on getting as many as possible uploaded to my page at yourgardenshow.com so even people who've never heard of my blog can see that I should win this contest. 

So please, please, please vote for me!  With over 900 Facebook fans (yes, I'm plotting something cool for when I hit 1000), plus a bunch of people following me on Twitter, NetworkedBlogs, and who knows where else, it seems like it should be a piece of homegrown carrot cake for me to take this thing, but if no one votes for me, I won't.  Please don't let me down.