Waste not want not

Happy (belated) Thanksgiving!  I decided to spend the long weekend with my family rather than worrying about blog posts and we had a wonderful time.  I can’t believe it is Monday already!

 

I hope everyone who cooked a turkey on Thursday has saved the bones because there is certainly much more food to go around after Thanksgiving has passed.  We spent Thanksgiving at Jon’s parent’s and my parent’s house.  One had an afternoon meal and the other an evening meal so it worked out great!  As everyone was packing up leftovers, I was requesting the carcass.  Everyone thought I was crazy, but I had great ideas in mind!

 

My first task was to strip the carcass of any remaining meat.  There was still A LOT of meat on the bird.  The thighs and back hadn’t even been touched yet!

 

Next up I added the carcass to a large stock pot (I used my 20 quart stock pot).

 

 

Now for extra flavor I added celery, onions and carrots.  The onions I peeled and quartered, the carrots I washed and cut the stem ends off and the celery I washed and cut into thirds.  I did not peel the carrot of remove the leaves from the celery.  That’s where all the flavor is!

 

 

To season the broth I added salt, pepper (whole peppercorns), garlic, basil and parsley (dried from this year’s herb garden).  I also added a sprig of rosemary off of my indoor rosemary bush.

 

Once everything was in the pot I filled it with water and simmered it for 8 hours.  You could certainly cook it for less time, but I was baking 4 batches of cookies and I had plenty of time to spend in the kitchen.

 

Once the broth was finished I strained out the bones veggies and spices and refrigerated the remainder overnight.  The next morning I was easily able to skim off any fat around the top.  I removed the fat and put the broth back on the stove to boil.

 

 

I turned the fat into a little extra gravy.  No need to waste it

 

 

Once the broth was boiling I prepped my pressure canner and got ready to can the broth.

 

 

When all was said and done I ended up with 7 quarts of delicious broth and I made soup with the remaining stock because I didn’t want to run the canner a second time.

I’m very happy that I asked to take the carcass after dinner, while everyone thought I might be crazy (I still might be) I was really being resourceful.  We have taken what would have been garbage and turned it into numerous meals!

Canning Pumpkin

We had a pretty good pumpkin harvest for the 2010 season.  I planted heirloom sugar pumpkins and ended up with~20.  Unfortunately, I lost quite a few of them after they were hit with frost.  I didn’t cover the pumpkins and many came out of the frost rotten.

Before I lost my few surviving pumpkins I decided it was time to do something with them.  I started with 7 pumpkins (1 came from my parent’s garden)

 I washed the pumpkins and began the long process of peeling, gutting and cutting.  I ended the process with a blister and a nice cut on my thumb.  Pumkins are not the easiest thing to cut! 

I cut the pumpkin in half and removed the seeds.  I didn’t have enough time to separate and dry the seeds so the chickens got a nice treat. 

Next up I sliced the pumpkin into manageable pieces and began to peel. 

 

 After peeling I diced the pumpkin into 1 inch cubes and brought the pieces to a boil for 2 minutes in plain water.

 

There were LOTS of pumpkin cubes!

 

 I processed the pumpkin in quart jars with 1 inch headspace, at 11 pounds pressure for 90 minutes. 

 

The seven pumpkins I canned produced 14 quart jars and a bit more puree that I added to apple sauce and froze.  To use the canned pumpkin I just have to drain the water and puree.  I am envisioning many pumpkin muffins, cakes, pies and breads in our future…

**Please note pumpkin can only be canned safely in chunks, in a pressure canner please refer to a trusted canning resource for detailed instructions prior to canning pumpkin!

My Pantry- The canned goods

 This is my pantry room.  The color and curtains were there when I moved in, and I haven’t bothered to update anything.  The room is a mish-mash of furniture and serves many purposes.  Not only is this a pantry, but it also serves as an office, Jon’s drafting room (for landscape designs) and puppy’s bedroom.

 Previously, when my parents lived here (I grew up in this house from age 1-14 and then moved back in, on my own at age 19) my dad built canning cabinets, specifically designed to support the weight of the canning jars.  I am so grateful to have these cabinets!

 I store my empty jars in the cabinet (well some of them anyway.  I also have 5 rubbermade containers full of jars!) and then as the jars are filled, they go back in the same spot.

2010 canning results as of 8/9/10 (after gifting some jars):

Yellow Squash Relish, Nectarine butter, Blueberry Jam, Strawberry Jam, Strawberry Rhubarb Jam, Strawberry Pineapple Jam: 

 

 Potatoes and Spicy Dilly Beans:

 

Salsa, Nectarines, Cranberry Peach Jam, Cranberry Peach Jelly (syrup really) White Peaches, Whole Tomatoes:

Since then I have added 5 quarts of Spicy Dilly Beans, 6 pints of Spaghetti Sauce,  4 jars of spicy dill chip pickles, 4 jars of garlic dill spears, 2 jars of sandwich slice dills (one spicy one garlic)… and I think that’s all.

If there is one thing I’ve learned, canning is definitely a labor of love!