kayb

Potatoes (and onions) fried in damn near anything are tasty. And leftover fried potatoes make the very best potato pancakes.

I'm tentatively planning on taking off on my first trip since the pandemic outbreak on the 19th. I'll have to see if I can manage a swing through StL on the way back. May be a bit out of the way, but so what? I'm getting out, cautiously. I've been to breakfast and out for coffee, and I think I'm going to make my first foray for either lunch or dinner next week for my birthday. So, tentatively, count me still in. And potentially, a +1; I will check and see if my friend at whose condo I camp out when I'm there is in town and wants to go, as he's very much a foodie.

First caprese of the season.

I love this time of year. Farmers Market haul this morning, plus some beef, pork and chicken. Will be making kraut tomorrow morning.

I feel your pain, in light of my own recent experience. I have baskets, etc., and am ready to start restocking my freezers now. Ordered some meat from my farmers, which I'll pick up tomorrow, and reserved my quarter steer, which I cannot get until DECEMBER. I also have the freezers connected to a brand new double outlet that the electrician converted from an unused 220 outlet in the garage. This is on a non-GFCI circuit, so the loose wire thing should not result in tripping the breaker, which was what happened before. Because after all, I'm not going to drop the freezer in the bathtub. ETA: You could sous vide the steaks, then freeze them. Could do the same with the pork roast.

TBH, I never thought about the possibility of rancidity. I've never had an issue with it. I usually bag the dried tomatoes in plastic, closed loosely, or put them in a container with a loose lid, and leave them on the counter or in the pantry. Some I'll pull when they still have some moisture in them, and those I'll bag and freeze, which seems to work just as well. Truth be told, the countertop ones don't last long enough to become rancid. I munch them like candy. I tend to cook with the freezer ones. But I've kept them room temp as long as maybe a month, and no rancidity (if that's a word).

Being Southern, I like to saute summer squash and onions in a little olive oil. Any leftovers can be combined with cheese, cracker crumbs, eggs and milk to make a squash casserole. But I also like to use a veggie peeler and do little squash ribbons, steam them very lightly and dress with a little olive oil and vinegar. Somewhere on eG, @HungryChris did pickled zucchini ribbons. I need to try that.

I use a lot of cherry tomatoes, and those I just cut inhalf, drizzle with a little oil, and salt, then put cut-side-up on the rack. Larger tomatoes, I'll slice in about 3/8 inch slices, salt and let them drain on a rack over the sink for an hour or so, then put in the dehydrator. I may or may not drizzle with a little oil. I like to dehydrate Romas sliced like that, but I'll do larger slicing tomatoes if I have a few I need to do something with, and it's not enough to trouble with canning.

I buy a fair amount of heavy cream in the summer, for creme fraiche and whipped cream on fresh fruit. I think I usually pay ~$3 a pint at Aldi. Don't know that I'd spring at $9.55 a quart.

First harvest: Zucchini, yellow squash, cucumbers. I had forgotten I put a cucumber vine in there (!), More baby tomatoes popping up. First green ones nearing ping-pong ball size.

I bought an el cheapo Ambiano brand dehydrator at Aldi for $19.99 two or three years ago. I use it a good deal. Should have dried apples off my heavily laden tree last fall, but didn't; I will this year. I've dried most veggies, some with more success than others (I thought cucumber chips ought to be good; they weren't). have dried a good many herbs, and made jerky once. Jerky was OK; I cut it too thick. I dry tomatoes all the time, rehydrate some to use for sauce, and just gnaw on a lot of them. Also, I agree with Darienne; you can use your oven easily enough. The downside to that is that I tend to get the dehydrator going when I'm in a big notion for cooking, anyway, and then my oven is tied up for an extended period and a lot of other stuff comes to a halt. I could avoid that if I did it overnight, but evening is not when I'm in the notion to stand at the counter and prep fruits and veggies for the dehydrator. I guess I could put them on cookie sheets earlier in the day and let them sit until I was through with the oven for the day. I do like that the dehydrator has openwork plastic racks; I have only one rack that fits in a half sheet pan, and I often want to dehydrate two pans' worth.

I'm contemplating teaching a canning class at church. I was astounded at how many people my age (65 in a little more than two weeks!) had no clue how to can.

Pot roast. Not the season for it, particularly, but with the a/c out I don't want to heat up the kitchen, so into the Instant Pot it went. Unremarkable, but good, as pot roasts are.

Lord have mercy. I'm the one who wouldn't move to Council Bluffs, Iowa, because I was afraid I'd freeze to death.

I have never tried them. But I have some milk that's about to go south, so I think I'll make some ricotta, stuff a few and try my hand at it.

Lucky neighbors! (Won't you be MY neighbor?)

I like the recipe above, but for the jalapeno (not a jalapeno fan). Bet it'd work well as mini-muffins.

I think these were one-year. When I replant next year, I'm going to get two-year in a attempt to catch up. I think you can pick the third year.

Well, we're getting there. Baby zucchini: Baby yellow squash: Eggplant bloom: Baby tomatoes: And the squirrels did not eat all the asparagus sets. Two have come up.

God bless you. I am still bitter at those hoarding antibacterial wipes. I did score one can last week.

I just want to see photos when you build it. In-progress as well as finished, please. After seeing @RWood's T-Rex cake, the in-process of these confections is fascinating me. Not that I'm ever going to try them, you understand. I'm just intrigued.

Oh, no. It was way too far gone. I wouldn't trust it. I'd guess about 40-50 pounds of beef, 10-15 pounds of chicken, 10 pounds of pork, a bunch of veggies and fruit, and some frozen convenience stuff. I have given the freezers a thorough cleaning, and have them unplugged and airing out before I start restocking. Could be worse. I'm a lot better off financially than I have been at times in my life, and I can afford to restock. Time was, that would have meant being hungry til the next paycheck. Plus, it took stuff that needed to be chunked anyway, and I can organize things as they go back in. They were at least small chest freezers -- a seven-footer and a 10-footer. And not full.

Well...my Cooking Through My Freezer challenge just got solved in a hot minute (more like hour and a half), as I discovered the outlets into which the two, count them, two chest freezers were plugged had no power. I have emptied about 100 pounds of beef, pork and chicken out of one. About to take on the other assorted stuff out of the other one. Meanwhile, electricians were here to install two fans. One was bad, out of the box, and has to be returned. And my A/C is out. I think I'm going to run away from home.

$4.99 a pound lobsters (plus Democrats) is just about enough to get me packing my bags and headed northeast. Brilliant thought to steam them in the CSO, though.

I have found what you have lost. I'd be happy to bring it back to you.