Unintentional But Funny

Yesterday we went for a long hike through Dogtown, the abandoned colonial town in Gloucester, MA. It was good to get out, particularly in this time of social isolation. One of the odd findings in Dogtown are the Babson Boulders, a series of inspirational admonishments carved into the glacial erratics which are scattered all over the area. We found all but the last five which would have involved crossing active railroad tracks, something we felt it would be prudent not to do. Babson probably would have approved of our prudence.

Along the way we found huge patches of wintergreen, some with no berries at all and some with TONS of berries. (Metaphorically speaking, of course.) We picked a lot. The elderchild asked if we could make them into muffins. Easily done!






This morning I used this recipe but without the chocolate chips and made a dozen chocolate-wintergreen muffins. Which look a lot like those pictures of the coronavirus. I promise, it was not intentional. But it seems apropos anyway.

Winterizing

Last week, the temperature was in the high 50's. Warm enough to rake some leaves, go for walks, and otherwise forget that winter was coming.

In the last few days, it snowed briefly and the temperature dropped to the 30's. Time to face reality!

First of all, I did manage to forage a few wintergreen berries last week, and I have another spot I'll get to soonish. Not a good year for these, either. I had a bunch in the freezer from before and yesterday I used them, plus some of my homemade wintergreen extract, to make wintergreen-chocolate-chip ice cream. It's been a while since I made ice cream and the elderchild always likes this flavor. Soon I shall have to make the flavor the youngerchild requested: Earl Grey with Vienna finger cookies. Me, I like them both....

Yesterday in the windy cold I got the hive insulated. This involves taking off the window panel and hardware and putting the foam lined panels all around. I did not make fondant for them this year. They seem to have enough honey in there, based upon what I found left over from last winter. We shall see if that was a good plan or not, in April, when I open it back up. I am hoping that then I can reorganize their combs and let them rebuild.

We still need to finish raking and mulch all the leaves in the backyard and get them out to the curb. The last leaf pickup will be December 1 so I need to get moving! The garden is otherwise in need of a little attention; we need to put tarps over the tables and chairs out there, and trim a few things.

As for canning, I have a bunch of projects building up in the freezer. Everything is on hold until after Thanksgiving, as I have a lot of prep for that this week. The squash and creamed broccoli are made, the pies will be started tomorrow, and I just have to make the stuffing ahead of time and the mashed potatoes on the day of our feast, which is Friday, as I am working on Thursday. What is waiting in the freezer is four pounds of bacon which I hope to make into bacon jam. I also have some pork scraps which I intend to turn into sausages, and a lot of chicken and duck bones for soups and stocks. I will have plenty to keep me busy this winter!

Many Balls in the Air

Today there are a bunch of updates on several ongoing projects:

Bees: they are doing well. It appears they are about 1/3 through another comb. There are so many bees out foraging that they arrive back at the hive at a rate of about 3-4 bees per second. The pollen they carry ranges from white all the way to a deep olive green, which might be an aster species. I'm worried, though, that they won't have enough time to build up their honey stores before the fall. Unless something amazing happens in the next month, I will likely have to feed them over the winter.

Grapes: while we were at the Y last week I noticed some tiny wild grapes. This week I picked about 1.5 pounds with the help of my younger child. While not enough to do anything with at the moment, they are washed and in the freezer waiting until I have at least 3 pounds so I can make jelly.

Cornichons: the recipe for these said they would be ready in a month, so I made a date on the calendar for today. I thawed some paté and spruce paste and we had that, with the cornichons, cheeses, bread, grapes, and chilled steamed green beans in a vinaigrette, for our dinner. They were spicy and crisp, mmm! The grapes were weird - elongated pointy things called "Witch Fingers." Have you ever seen them? Well, as I've previously mentioned, I'm a sucker for unusual foods or if they have limited availability. They taste like any other grape. Which is a good thing.

Pickles and jam ready to be gifted.

Wintergreen ice cream: I made brownies today, partly for us and partly for the guys who are still toiling away on our water main. This morning they started to work in front of the driveway before I knew they were there and so I had to go rushing out and ask them to stop long enough for me to get my car out. They were kind enough to do so (my heart sank as I ran out and watched the backhoe take a huge bite out of the pavement...but not so much that I couldn't get my car over it) and I reciprocated with lemonade and brownies. As before with the zucchini bread, the empty plate and pitcher were at my door within about 2 minutes. Anyway, we had brownies and wintergreen ice cream for dessert.

Gifts: we have two sets of new neighbors, next door and across the street. I brought each of them a few of jars of jam and pickles. I hope they feel welcome. Moving to a new place can be pretty overwhelming!

Very, Very Patient

When we first saw this recipe for Wintergreen Ice Cream on Hank Shaw's blog, in 2012, my elder child asked if we could make it. Yes, I said, when we have enough wintergreen berries. And when I have (or find) my ice cream maker. The project got put on the back burner and even when we finally amassed enough berries (it took over a year and many different locations; I stored the berries in the freezer) I never got my act together.

Today I picked up that (now) 13 year old from a week of camp and it seemed like the right time to make this. Actually, I started around 6 am and had the base all made and in the fridge before we had to leave and get the child. After we got home, I put the base in the ice cream maker and let it do its thing for 30 minutes. When it was done, I poured the ice cream into a washed out ice cream carton and folded in chocolate chips that I'd run through a little chopper thing (Black & Decker, 1.5 cup chopper. Really useful.). It was the same chopper thing I used to chop up the frozen wintergreen berries. I chose not to strain the ice cream, hoping for a little pink color. It's a little bit pink. Not very. That's fine.

The recipe called for 2 ounces of berries, after making the ice cream I think I have an ounce left. Maybe I'll collect some more this fall and make this again. It's really a nice flavor. The 13 year old loved it, as did the rest of us. Sorry it took so long to make it!

Forageberry Crisp

Today we returned from our annual camping trip and, this time, I was armed with a very handy book!  It was a gift from Lisa, and I used it to identify some berries I didn't really recognize.  When we arrived and found our campsite was full of blackberries, I hit upon an idea.  I would collect every type of edible berry I could find and make a crisp or cobbler out of them when we got home.

Mostly I found blackberries.  Wild, small, tart blackberries.  I also found similar berries on a ground cover bramble - a different type of blackberry, it seems.  And I found Juneberries, blueberries, huckleberries, elderberries, partridge berries, and a single teaberry.  (It's a little early in the season for the teaberries (aka wintergreen), after all.)  I also ate a couple of bunchberries but, like the partridge berries, they were tasteless so I decided to leave them out of the final baking.

Once I got everything home I washed and sorted and got rid of any that had gotten squishy over the weekend.  Then I put them in a little 7 x 4 pyrex dish and made a wee little crisp.  It was pretty seedy but tasty!
 

Wintergreen Muffins

Over the past few weeks, I've been taking a lot of walks.  It's wintergreen season and I've been looking for berries.  I have found a few places that have wintergreen and a lot of places that don't.  But I am persistent!

In total, with help from my family, I amassed 77 berries.  Not enough to do anything substantial with.  But enough for something...right?  So I decided that today we would eat them, in muffin form.  First I made the batter from this recipe for chocolate muffins but I left out the chocolate chips.  I even got to use homemade plain yogurt that I made the other day.  (I hadn't made yogurt since last winter, there always seems to be something else to do...)  Then I put the wintergreen berries on the top of the muffins and baked them.

I had contemplated adding wintergreen extract but I wanted to see how much flavor the berries have on their own.  The answer is, not much initially, but then there is this faint wintergreen aftertaste that is really pleasant.  It was worthwhile.

Wintergreen Extract

Oh, yeah, I'm trying to see if the shoots will take root.

We only just discovered wintergreen, aka Eastern Teaberry, last spring while hiking in New Hampshire.  Apparently the berries are out now.  I was hoping to find some after reading Hank Shaw's blog entry about them.  He was even in Gloucester, which is not far.  But so far I've had no luck on finding berries.  I did, however, find a lot of leaves today.  So following the instructions on his blog, I am making wintergreen extract.  

I crammed a half-pint jar as full of leaves as I could and poured some vodka over it.  It will steep for at least a month and then I'll just leave it as is and use the extract in something.  That ice cream on his blog page looks rather tasty.