Comfort Food

Meatloaf & Mashed Potatoes ~ comfort food
(yeah, I know it looks like meatballs, but it's just meatloaf pieces)

I was in need of some special "comfort food" today. So I decided to make myself a nice dinner of my Mom's meatloaf recipe and my mashed potatoes.

Simple food. Meat & potatoes. Not filled with dark green veggies or their nutritious antioxidants. However, I did use natural meat that had no additives, hormones or antibiotics in it. The potatoes were organic russets. Nothing from my garden this time. All from the store.

I just wanted to be comforted, filled up with good food and experience the loving memories of my Mom and my childhood that this meal brings my heart. An easy to make and easy to eat dinner.

Thanks Mom! I love you. Thinking of you today.


© Copyright 2010 Mountain Harvest Basket

And Valentine's Chocolates, Too!

Heart Shaped Box ~ Dark Chocolates


And....


Rectangular Shaped Box ~ Dark Chocolates


MMMmmmm........creamy rich comforting calories...

Happy Valentine's Day to me from my partners, Bob and Jack!

Such Sweeties, both of them.









© Copyright 2010 Mountain Harvest Basket

Small Peach Harvest

Juicy Sweet Elberta Peaches

As with all of my fruit harvests this summer, my peach harvest was on the small side. My tiny Elberta peach tree is 9 years old, but still only gives me a few peaches each year. This year she grew 12 beautiful juicy peaches, but the birds got to at least 3 of them before I discovered that they were ripe. So I harvested 9 delicious peaches this year from my itty bitty tree. I ate every one of them fresh and "out of hand".

Elberta peaches are my favorite peach by far. They are free stone peaches with dark yellow flesh when ripe, and the outside has a nice tart slightly fuzzy peel that usually has a bit of a red blush.

As a young kid I remember eating my fill of peaches in late summer from the Elberta peach tree my Mom had planted in our backyard. Those peaches were huge and so juicy that when I bit into one, it would dribble juice down my chin and sometimes onto my shirt! I remember the whole sensory experience like it was yesterday. The sunshine warm freshly picked peach, fuzzy in my hand. The soft yet firm flesh giving way to my bite. The juice sweet and tangy at the same time squirting all over me. I loved it. And still do. Every time I eat a home grown Elberta peach those sweet childhood memories of my Mom and her peaches come flooding back to me. We had so many peaches that my Mom made pies, froze some sliced peaches for later eating and gave many away to friends and neighbors. Her tree would bear so heavily some years that the branches would break under the weight if not propped up to support them.

Since then, all other peaches that come my way are measured by those big juicy Elberta memories. Rarely have I found one that could compete.

My peach growing goal is to match that peach production memory of my childhood. Each year I will try my best. Those are wonderful peaches, and wonderful memories that I will keep with me always.


© Copyright 2009 Mountain Harvest Basket

Woman Does Not Live By Bread Alone

Wheat Bread Loaf #2

...but baking my own bread is very satisfying.

I have made two sandwich loaves of wheat bread in my recent baking flurry. Both of them were made with a combination of White Whole Wheat and All Purpose flours. They came out reasonably well, with good taste and texture and color, but not quite as tall and fluffy as I would like. The white whole wheat flour produces a nice & soft, lighter tan colored loaf. I think I need to either use more yeast or let it rise longer to get the lift I desire in my bread. Or maybe do both.

Baking and cooking is good creative expression for me. It allows me the freedom to design what I want and to make it my own way. Gives me freedom and also some control. I say some control, because my creations don't always turn out exactly the way I want them to. Actually, that's sort of the fun part. A little adventure and surprise in the kitchen. Safe adventure. Just my speed.

I started this recent bread baking because I became aware that I was spending almost $5 per 1 1/2 lb loaf of store bought bread. So I decided that making my own bread would save me some money. It does that. Now I am not sure I can go back to eating store bought bread again. I really like the way my homemade bread tastes. It is so much fresher tasting that store bought. Even when my wheat loaves don't rise as tall as I would like.

It makes great sandwiches and toast.


Slices of homemade Wheat Bread

Hopefully, I will find the time to bake some more soon. I do enjoy it.

© Copyright 2009 Mountain Harvest Basket

Tea and Cup Wisdom

Green Teas & Honey ~ No, not contraband!

Just a quick post to let y'all know that I am still here. This past week has been one of the more hectic ones, so this post is fitting in that it shows one of the little pleasures that I have had time for even in the busiest of times.

The above photo shows an old favorite and my new love in organic loose leaf teas. The jar on the left contains organic Gunpowder Green Tea. That's the old favorite. Its leaves are tightly curled up into little grey-green balls, I assume resembling the look of gunpowder, and it brews up into a strong, sort of musty cup of green tea, depending of course, on how much tea is used and how long you let it steep. It gives me a good kick-start in the mornings. I tend to just put a couple of teaspoons of loose Gunpowder green into the coffee filter of my automatic coffee maker and let the water pour through it to make a very nice, very easy pot of morning tea. Works great, although it doesn't sound like it would, does it?

My new love, is shown in the little custard cup on the right of the photo. That is organic Jasmine Green Tea. I have tried many jasmine flavored teas over many years, and so far, after just one cup, I proclaim this one the very best. The runner up jasmine tea was one I found about 20 years ago that had little white jasmine flowers in it, but it was expensive, kind of hard to find and not labeled organic. Now this jasmine tea is still quite expensive. It retails for about $36 per pound, but a pound of tea lasts a very long time. This is top quality loose leaf organic green tea in my opinion.

Both of these teas were purchased by me from the Frontier Naturals company. I am a retailer who sells Frontier Naturals products and their sister company products (Aura Cacia and Simply Organic) so I do have access to their wholesale quantities and pricing. From time to time I personally sample new products with the idea of adding them to my product inventory. These wonderful green teas have impressed me with their taste and their exceptional quality, so I will definitely consider adding them to my inventory. The only hurdle is figuring out some nice packaging to be able to offer smaller, more affordable quantities of tea to my customers. Not many would want to buy a whole pound of loose leaf tea, I think.

These teas have brought me comfort and pleasure, and I'd like to be able to offer the same things to my customers. Any ideas from you all on how I could package a few ounces of tea that would be attractive, sanitary and convenient for my customers?

One more thing to share with you before I go back to my busy work week:


Starbuck's Cup with Quote

This is a photo of a cup that I got at our local Starbuck's Coffee house last night on my way to class. I rarely go into Starbuck's since I pretty much stopped drinking coffee about a year ago, but I still had a bunch of funds left on one of my gift cards, so I thought I'd better go spend them before they close our local store, which could happen any time now if you've been watching the national news. I bought a tea drink that was very tasty and took it to my computer class with me. During a lull in the class activities I happened to notice that my cup had a quotation on it that I read and really liked, so I am sharing it with you today. You can click on the photo of the cup and read the quote directly, but here it is below to make it easier to read:

"The world bursts at the seams with people ready to tell you you're not good enough. On occasion, some may be correct. But do not do their work for them. Seek any job; ask anyone out; pursue any goal. Don't take it personally when they say "no" - they may not be smart enough to say "yes". "

~ Keith Olbermann

I find that the universe reminds me of things that I may already know but have forgotten, right when I need to remember them again. I find quotes like this popping up, books falling at my feet, people I haven't heard from in ages, songs that have a message all presenting themselves to me right when I need to hear, see and know them the most.

They are little reminders to me that we are not alone in this life. We are all connected in some way.

Enjoy your quiet moments. Drink your tea or coffee or glass of wine. Ponder life in all its intricacy.

© Copyright 2009 Mountain Harvest Basket

Chicken Soup for the Cold

It is cold and rainy here today. I've had about 4 inches of rain in the past 48 hours here. So says my nifty new digital rain gauge that I received from Bob for Christmas. It actually says 3.99 inches, but I call that "about 4".

Anyway, the skies have dumped a whole bunch of rain on me and my little plot of earth. Everything is wet, cold and muddy outside. I just built a nice warm fire in my woodstove, so it's getting nice and warm in here. I love that lasting, penetrating heat that the woodstove provides. Both of my indoor kitties, Jessie and Frieda, are curled up by the fire as I type this. I love that.

I woke today feeling like maybe a cold was coming on. A little sinus congestion. A few more body aches than usual. I wrote it off to the cold, wet weather and tried to ignore it. Then this afternoon I got a craving for homemade chicken noodle soup. So I made some in my big pot on the stove. Good thing too, because as of about two hours ago, I can feel my ears starting to stuff up, with a pronounced ache in the right one, and a sinus headache starting. I really don't want to get sick. I hate that.

So here's a few shots of my homemade chicken soup:


Sauteeing the veggies: carrots, onion, celery, a little bok choy, a lot of garlic, some fresh from the garden parsley...

I like to have lots of veggies in my homemade chicken soup, and I usually have a nice selection of fresh ones available due to our local organic farmer. I added some chunks of cooked organic chicken breast to my soup and simmered it with the veggies and some homemade turkey stock.

While the soup simmered, I turned my attention to the noodle part of the soup.

I have always wanted to make homemade pasta and noodles, and I even have one of those cool hand crank pasta machines around here somewhere that I bought a few years ago and never used. So I decided that I would search for it another day and just roll out my simple egg noodle dough by hand with a rolling pin:


Noodle dough rolled out as flat as possible, drying before cutting into noodles

Now that I have done the rolling by hand this one time, I plan to find that pasta machine in whatever deep cabinet I've hidden it in. It was not that easy to get that noodle dough to stretch out thin enough for the soup noodles I wanted to make. It kept trying to shrink back up into a thick slab! I coaxed it to lay out pretty flat and thin, but I wasn't that happy with the results.

After letting the dough dry flat for a few minutes, I then rolled it gently and sliced it into noodle ribbons, which I then cut in half because I was making soup not pasta:

Raw noodles dusted with flour drying a bit more before being cooked

Then when the rest of my soup was ready, nicely simmered with the veggies tender, I added the freshly made noodles to the pot and made sure the heat was high enough to boil them gently for about 15-20 minutes.

Here's what the finished noodles and soup looked like in a bowl. Actually this was my second bowl of soup. I ate the first one so fast I forgot to take a picture of it for you.

Chicken Soup for my cold ~ some heart shaped noodles floating on top

So even with big fat noodles that took over the whole pot of soup because they swelled up when cooked, the homemade chicken soup was very tasty, warm and comforting. Two bowls filled me up for a late afternoon dinner on this cold and wet rainy day. I sure hope it makes my cold go away.

Now to go sit by my warm fire and relax.

© Copyright 2009 Mountain Harvest Basket

Happy Birthday, My Sweet Jessie

My Sweet Kitty Jessie

Today is my baby's birthday.

Jessie, my precious silver tabby kitty is 16 years old today. Old enough to drive if I'd let her. Old enough to date. She's smart enough to do those things alright.

Ah, but these are human milestones. Feline milestones come much sooner. Kitties progress from kittens to adult cats by age 1 year. In feline years my baby's age is the equivalent of 80 years for a human. Even so, she doesn't look that old.


Jessie & her furry friends

Just look at her cute face and big bright expressive green eyes. She is so beautiful, even now when she is older and moves a bit more slowly. Her fur is still smooth and shiny, with the most beautiful stripes and patterns. I never tire of looking at her or petting her. She loves her neck and chin scratched gently, purring all the while.

My Jessie is way more than a "pet" to me. She is my companion, my confidant, and my best friend. She has comforted me when I was sad, upset and crying. She cuddles with me and purrs peacefully when I am happy and smiling. She sleeps with me most nights either in her basket beside my bed or up on the bed if there is room. She understands me, and I her. We know each other very well. We can read each other's minds most of the time. I call her my psychic kitty. She also understands what I say to her. She reads my body language and tone of voice, and I swear she understands my words most of the time. I guess she really senses my feelings, my energy and my thoughts more than my words.

She is my precious baby, my friend and companion. We have both grown older. She has a few health problems now. I give her medicine twice per day for her hyperthyroidism, and I give her subcutaneous fluids once a week to help her kidneys function better for her. Always a small slender cat, she is so skinny now since the hyperthyroidism hit. I worry for her health and longevity every day. I weigh her every few days and keep track of her weight trends. She needs to eat more to gain more, but she doesn't gain much. Again, I worry.

I love her so much. The thought of not having her around forever saddens me and makes me cry. Who will comfort me with her soft meows and loud purrs when she is gone from this life?

She is a very good kitty. A loving friend to me. I have tried to be the best mom for her.


Jessie at her scratching post

So enough of the sad thoughts about her getting older and leaving me. (I have tears in my eyes now.) She is still here, and in good health, all things considered. She still brings me joy every single day. I miss her when I must leave home for a few days. I worry about her when I am away.

She is 16 years old today. A Libra girl. My sweet baby. Her full name is Whispering Jessie, because her meow is so soft and gentle.

Happy Birthday my sweet Whispering Jessie! I will always love you.

© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Morning Tea, Simple Pleasures

Morning Tea in the Sunshine of my Porch

A couple of days ago I enjoyed my morning tea outside in the sunshine. I stood on my front porch and listened to the birds chirping and the squirrels chattering. The mug I chose that morning is a relatively new one that I purchased on a road trip I took last summer to visit my Dad who lives in Texas. Partner Jack and I drove there and back and managed to find some interesting scenery and diversions along the way. The best one we found was just outside of Albuquerque, New Mexico in a little town called Tijeras. We exited the highway in search of a bathroom stop and found a wonderful little gift shop/coffee bar/open air art market. Very quaint and very artsy. The gift shop/coffee bar is called the Just Imagine Gallery and on the weekends from May through October they have the Tijeras Open Air Arts Market on the lovely grounds adjacent to the gallery.

Well, the smoothies and the food were excellent. The gift shop was stocked with lots of interesting stuff. The mug in the photo above is a Laurel Burch design that has the following philosophical quote written on the side:

The soul would have no rainbow if the eyes had no tears...




There's the quote ~ barely visible ~ click the photo to enlarge it

I have a book somewhere around here that has the same title. I believe it is an Native American saying.

Anyway, as I was pouring my tea in my beautiful philosophical artsy mug, I was thinking to myself that it is the little things, the simple pleasures in life that can mean so much to me. They can comfort me when I need it. They can bring back good memories when I need some. They can start my day off with a positive note.

The photo below is my favorite because it has two comforting things shown in it. My tea mug with it's nice quote and memories of our fun time in Tijeras, and of course, my sweet Jessie kitty who is my very best friend and companion. She is so cute and curious and attentive. I will write more about her another day. For now, enjoy your simple pleasures and have a positive day filled with good memories.


Curious Jessie with the artsy mug ~ in the morning sun

© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Small Towns Remember

Main Street

Last Sunday afternoon a friend of ours passed away very suddenly and unexpectedly. She was found lying peacefully outside in her yard. She was in apparent good health and excellent spirits. An optimistic and passionate soul who loved people, nature and the small town mountain community that we live in.

She and I were in our local yoga class together, and to attend class on Monday evening this week without her being there left a hole in the room and in our hearts. Our yoga instructor brought in candles and crystals and made a nice little temporary altar in her honor. The candles burned throughout the duration of the class. We laid out her yoga mat, blanket and blocks so that her spirit would be welcome to join us as if she were still with us in body. She was loved and will be missed by all who knew her.

It seems as though there have been quite a few people whom I have known here and who have passed on in the ten years that I have lived here in the mountains. I was thinking about that fact this morning as I awoke. Maybe it’s just that I am growing older and so are the people around me. Maybe I hang out with people much older than myself so that it is natural for me to witness more than the average amount of people passing in comparison to my own age group. Or maybe, and I think this is the real answer, I have been living in this small town now for over 10 years, and the number of people dying is about average in comparison to other places I have lived, but because I am in this smaller town, I personally know a higher percentage of the population than I did when I lived in a much bigger city.

I know more people and I know more about those people. Everyone here in this small community knows everybody else and what is going in their lives. Sometimes that can be annoying or inconvenient. Sometimes it can be very pleasant and comforting. The majority of folks around here, my acquaintances, my friends, the shopkeepers, my neighbors etc. are good people who care about their town and the people who live here. That knowledge brings me comfort. That spirit and good energy is one reason why I chose to live here.

Life will go on in our small town, now without our good friend, but her memory will stay with the people who live here and her spirit will live in their hearts. Her spirit will live in the trees, the rocks, the streams. My spring flowers and the sunshine that makes them bloom will reflect her great passion for life. We will miss you Cynthia. You are still our beautiful passionate butterfly.


© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

St. Patrick's Day

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Remember to wear your green today, be "green" in all that you do, and celebrate with some good Irish food and maybe green beer if you are into beer.

I will wear green today and cook a nice comforting crock pot dinner that is indicative of both sides of my heritage. I am making Lamb and Rice Stuffed Cabbage Rolls and serving it up hot with some home baked Cheddar Cheese & Garlic Bread. We likely will skip the green beer, but may color our wine or tea green. Maybe. Maybe not. I am both Greek (on my mother's side) and Irish/Scottish/English/Welsh (on my father's side) so the dinner recipe represents both sides of me.

May your day be a lucky and pleasant one for you all.

© Copyright 2008 Mountain Harvest Basket

Corn Muffin Hibernation

Fresh Baked Corn Muffins


I have been hibernating in my home this week.

I’ve had a head cold that’s been sapping my energy and spirit lately and the cold temperatures and dreary grey rainy weather haven’t helped my attitude much either. When I don’t feel well, I tend to hibernate away from people and my usual activities until I can heal myself and feel better. I try to avoid stressful things that make me think too much, and I amuse myself with relaxing diversions… like blogging… or baking. The cold weather encourages me to bake. It warms my home and my heart. It comforts my soul.

So late last night I got the urge to bake some corn muffins. The basic recipe I used is from my Betty Crocker “Big Red” cookbook, but I made a few changes to her recipe to make it my own. Here’s my recipe for the corn muffins as I made them last night. It works fine to make corn bread as well.

Heat oven to 400 degrees,
Prepare 9 x 1 ½ inch round pan or 8 x 8 x 2 inch square pan, or 12 muffin cups by greasing with shortening or using paper muffin cups

Ingredients

¾ cup low fat plain yogurt + ¼ cup unsweetened soy milk stirred together
(Betty used 1 cup milk instead)

¼ cup olive oil (Betty used ¼ cup butter, melted)

1 large egg

1 ¼ cups Polenta (Betty used cornmeal)

1 cup all purpose flour

½ cup sugar

1 tablespoon baking powder

½ teaspoon salt


Prepare baking pan.

Beat yogurt, soy milk, oil & egg together in large bowl by hand with wire whisk. Stir in remaining ingredients all at once just until flour is moistened. Batter will be lumpy. Spoon into muffin cups or pour into baking pan.


Corn Muffin batter ready to bake

Bake muffins at 400 degrees for 15-20 minutes until lightly golden brown. Bake round or square pan a little longer, 20-25 minutes. Serve warm with butter and/or honey or whatever pleases you.

Notes** I rarely have milk in the house as I tend to use soy, but milk would work just as well. The yogurt adds a nice tangy taste that I like. I do usually have cornmeal in my kitchen, but ran out recently. The polenta worked very well and gave the muffins a rich yellow color and very nice texture. I usually substitute olive oil for butter whenever I can in my baking. It’s healthier and I think it improves the texture of many things. I use certified organic ingredients if I can.


Baked lightly golden brown in my Grandmother's muffin pan

So enjoy the warmth of your kitchen and the crunchy corniness of these muffins. I am going back into hibernation now.