Darienne

I'm just overwhelmed reading these posts about the wonderful gardens you all have. So envious. I've just this little dirt bag affair and some of it never took hold at all. My days of major productions are long over. We did have vegetable gardens going back and for a few years we actually grew hardshell gourds, pollinating them by hand. That was then...this is now. I could add that I grow green onions all year long with good success. However, I do have a question arising from my tomato success. The beefsteak tomatoes were a great success and the taste of them was just perfect...the kind of tomato you eat right there in the garden without even washing it off and you can't believe that it tasted that good. And then you make a sandwich with them and think you've died and gone to tomato heaven. So...we've now purchased farm grown and ripened on the vine from two different local farms and while the tomatoes were so much better than grocery stores red cardboard replicas, they did not live up the that incredible taste of my beefsteak tomatoes. Is this common? Do beefsteak tomatoes taste different from say...Black Krims (about which I know nothing)? Any feedback appreciated.

A second Canadian and Ontarian welcome to the forum (although I was born a Québécoise). You'll find this a friendly place. Your marinated chicken looks scrumptious.

Absolutely adore fish and chips, particularly cod. ❤️ That's basically the only food we now eat outside our home.

Sorry I looked it up...

I love, love, love bacon. Sunday lunch is bacon and eggs and toast. Eggs fried in the way my French-Canadian Mother-in-law fried them. But the best part for me is the bacon...not crispy please!...put into the buttered toast with slices of tomato. If I ever get to Scotland, I'm going for a Bacon Butty for sure. As head cheese, another French Canadian speciality...gah...I'd starve first I think. I once covered myself with shame when a friend serving a group lunch for ladies brought out the pièce de résistance, a jellied pork terrine, and I, obviously shocked and without any thought in my head, blurted out something untoward...can't even remember what I said, except that it was inexcusable and no doubt I turned beet red. Oh, did I mention that jellied meats are not my favorites?

Will look into this one. Am currently looking at Edible Wild Plants by Lee Allen Peterson, son of the Peterson Field Guides originator. Our library does not carry that title, but just found: Feasting wild : in search of the last untamed food by Gina Rae La Cerva, Will reserve it. Looks interesting if not entirely useful for my purposes.

Just going back to page 1 and re-reading this topic. How lucky you both are. Within a 12 block area of where we live is absolutely nothing but farms and houses and trees and poison ivy and deer and coyotes and wild turkeys and even the occasional cougar. ...on the other hand, how lucky we are

We have quite a number of field guides in our lives already. Twenty-eight years on a farm in the middle of nowhere will do that to you. I know that some items would be safe to eat and indeed we do eat a number already...puff balls, River Grapes, Morels (well they are gifted to an aficionado), and the myriad of apple trees of all kinds ...but as long as I know there's a possible toxic version of some plant, then I don't feel safe enough to try the one we have. I have collected Butternut nuts in the past but alas they went mouldy before we could eat them. (We have about 5 Butternut trees on our land. Don't tell the Ministry.) I am going to look up the cherry plant today. We've just gotten back to the house and I brought the plant's leaves with me. Wonderful Peterson guides... Thanks for the offer. I do accept because you no doubt know of some resources we have over looked. The most painful loss is my late Father-in-law's tree book from the Ottawa Experimental Farm. Ed's sister has a sentimental attachment to the book and so we had to give it up. (I should never have told her that we had it.)

Curious, I decided to measure my kitchen counters. The sink counter is 36". standard counter height I believe. The opposite counter...we have a galley type kitchen... I had Ed cut down and it's only 34". And then I have a marble topped table, good for things like making confections and kneading on and it's 31" high. But then...I'm only 5'2" (now)...and these heights are good for me. I had aunts who were under 5' high...that was not unusual going back 50 years. If I were the now seeming standard female height of 5'9" or 10", the counters might seem to low. On the other hand, I can barely use our chest freezers and my new washing machine and I know my sister-in-law, who is shorter than I am, has a great deal of trouble with these items and so now has a front loader washing machine because she just can't handle the regular top loading ones. So your height would make all the difference in the world.

I know about them but have never encountered them. I must Google this and find out what the tree/bush looks like. We do have unidentified berries on the farm...wild varieties of cherry I guess...but I am too hesitant to try any of them in case they are poisonous. Where's a field naturalist when you need one???? For instance, we had all these plants each year which I think might be Fiddleheads but I can't tell for sure. Or what about the various wild plants/weeds/herbs we could use or eat? We really need a field naturalist for a friend.....hmmm.....

Now this I can identify with. I also like chicharrones, a crispy fat you can buy in Mexico or the Southwest of the US.

Reminds me of the times I walked through the huge eating tents on the fairgrounds in Shiprock NM to buy us some delicious Navajo Fry Bread, past the customers eating Mutton Stew with more visible fat than I could easily countenance. Fortunately I had better control over my face at that time. Then we got to Gallup, NM, and I ordered the lamb stew at a local restaurant which catered to the tourists. I asked the waitress whether or not the stew had a lot of fat on it and she assured me that it didn't. I love lamb and Ed won't eat it at all. The stew arrived...and I cut off the enormous chunks of fat from every piece of lamb. I could only wonder what it might have been like with lots of fat on it.

Probably a good thing that no one can see the look on my face.

And I would ask...how do you like it cooked? I must ask my friend...tactfully...how hers is cooked. (On the other hand, she didn't like my Hot and Sour Soup...which we love...so I've really no worries on that count.) Thanks.

A brand new one for me. A friend gave me two large pieces of pork belly and I just couldn't eat the stuff. So much fat. It can't be avoided. Is this a normal reaction? And I don't think I should give it to the dog who is living with advanced cancer for fear it could precipitate pancreatitis. We've already lived through one bout of pancreatitis with a dog about 25 years ago.

Seems to me that enoki mushrooms are recalled quite often... I've never used them.

The year we lived in Moab, 16 years ago, we rented a two-bedroom house from my dear Moab friend. It was totally empty. I mean EMPTY !! Ed went to the second hand stores and garage sales day after day and we furnished the entire house completely. He had fun and I did not go. Not until the end of the searches...because I have this tendency to see something, no doubt completely useless, ugly as all get out...and remark...who on earth would want that ugly thing?...and the answer would be "ME"!!! When we left, we had the garage sale to end all garage sales ... but we came home with our full size van packed to the brim with what became our treasured purchases and you can still see them all around the house. The poor dogs had about 2 square feet to be in for four days travelling home.

I think you may well be correct on this one, TS. I did have some significant tempters but going way back now. Yesterday for the first time in I can't remember how long, I went out to lunch with a friend and then we went to a Dollarama...oh, the big time...because I needed some Dollarama type item which Ed still hadn't bought...and I ended up going up and down every aisle, looking at all the stuff which is out there. And wondering, where on earth I had been for the last decade or so? And Ed does ALL the shopping.

I'm thinking about it, I really am. Other than a weakness for potato chips and French Fries, I'm not sure what's worth mentioning. And I don't even like ice cream. I make it continuously for Ed but I never eat it. Oh, I found my post from a few years back. I still like my hot dogs burnt and in cheap buns with cheap yellow mustard and sweet pickle relish. And with potato chips. But we haven't had hot dogs for a few years now...although I did have Ed buy them just this very week. And we'll have them tomorrow. Added: Well, here's one. While we are in the Southwest, we eat Mexican food all the time and each time I say to myself, this time I'm going to try something else...and each time I order Chile Rellenos again. Alas, we can't get them in our nearby city and they are just too much trouble to make. I do make a Chile Relleno Casserole. Which I think I'll make right now. I have the Poblanos...

You start.....

About fruit cracking. Our Macintosh apple tree in our back yard is something we watch carefully each year. For almost 20 years, the apples were too poor, too few, too tasteless, to misshapen, and so on to bother with. Then a few years ago, suddenly the tree started to produce these amazing wonderful huge crops. We gave away so many apples to others...just got tired of processing them. Then last year, the tree had about 6 apples on it all told. And now, it looks as if it's back in production...but the apples are all small, cracked, misshapen again. So disheartening. Oh well, there's always next year. By the way, the Northern Spy, right beside the Macintosh, has not put forth one apple now.

Thanks for your concern, @Madon2234, but my email predated finding out that my friend had two upright freezers, one of which was no longer needed, and so we are now the proud owners of yet another freezer, and at a very reasonable cost...not to mention that her two strapping young sons ferried it over and set it up for us. Doesn't get much better than that.

I would just automatically use the golden syrup. I seldom have the light variety on hand.

"Panama Jack LCBO" (Liquor Control Board of Ontario). Now called PJs to keep up with the times. A fortified wine...look in the wine section in some stores...the liqueur section in others... It's a cream liqueur, like Bailey's, only to us more interesting because it's got a tiny bite to it. To me Bailey's is too sweet and goes down like cough syrup in comparison. And it's cheaper in Canada to boot. OK. The Road's End Frothy Coffee. First of all Road's End because we are Road's End Farm, situated as you might guess, at the end of the road just before it becomes impassible bush and now belongs to the Buddhist Temple which is to the west-south-west of us. You can see the temple (still under construction 10 years later) from a high point in our land. The recipe: about 10 ounces of decaf coffee...a bedtime drink traditionally for us... 1 3/4 oz Panama Jack, 1 3/4 oz vodka (all Canadian vodka is triple distilled, inexpensive American vodka can curdle a cream liquor sometimes) and 2 tablespoons chocolate milk mix. Into the blender and buzzed. And then into my favorite huge blue glass mugs. Yumm.

Such wonderful memories of Allan who brought the stale bagels each time until we encouraged him to bring us a bottle of Panama Jack instead and we all enjoyed Ed making Road's End Frothy Coffees for us. It's now 2023 and Allan passed away over a year ago now. And we miss his crazy visits to the farm and we now buy our own PJ (change of name to keep with the times??). And Ed's sister and husband arrived from Ottawa a couple of days ago...we hadn't been able to see them for 4 years now...and brought Montreal bagels (fresh) and I thought I'd died and gone to bagel heaven. Don't talk to me about New York Bagels. The Fat Guy, much missed, knew his bagels.