Today's Oyster Mushroom haul...

The weather is cold and rainy... apparently perfect for Oyster Mushrooms!  I took my umbrella out and took a walk and found these wonderful specimens. 

A Vegetarian Turkey

I believe this idea came from Pinterest... from somewhere else.  Our granddaughter and her friend came to our house after school today and made a Vegetarian Turkey.  :)

Baby and Butter...

Our grocery store had a sale on Land O Lakes Butter and so we bought 5 pounds.  I put them in plastic bags so I can put them in the freezer.  The grandson (7 months old), as you can see, enjoyed the butter!  :)

Pumpkin Pie - Made with honey!

In preparation for Thanksgiving Dinner, which will be two weeks from today here in the USA, I decided to see if I could successfully make a pumpkin pie using honey, instead of sugar.  As you can see, it worked!  And it's really very nice.  Here is my recipe.

Crust

1 1/3 cups all purpose flour
1/3 cup cold lard
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
Cold whole milk

Combine flour and salt in a bowl.  Using your fingers, rub in the lard until it is crumbly.  Stirring with a fork, gradually add a little milk at a time, until the dough stays together nicely, but isn't wet.  Turn onto a floured surface and knead, only 2 or 3 times and form into a ball.  Flatten with your hand, and then using plenty of flour to keep it from sticking, roll it out large enough to cover the bottom and sides of your pie plate with some to hang over.  Turn the extra dough under and flute the edges.

Pumpkin Pie Filling

Combine:

1, 15-ounce can pumpkin
1/2 cup honey
2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
3 eggs

Mix well, then gradually add:

1, 12-ounce can evaporated milk

Mix well.

Pour into crust and place in a pre-heated 425 F oven for 15 minutes.  Reduce temperature to 350 F and then bake for another 40 to 50 minutes.  Test for doneness by sticking a sharp little knife into the middle of the pie.  If it comes out clean, the pie is done.  Remove from oven and cool on a rack.  When cool, cover with plastic wrap and store it in the refrigerator.

I just ate a piece, warm.  I couldn't wait.  Delicious and so smooth and nice!

Don't laugh, please - the tinniest tip ever...

See that little bowl there?  It's sitting in the corner of my kitchen sink and it has some small slivers of bar soap in it.  I keep that there, instead of liquid soap or a whole bar of soap.  You know, if you use bar soap, you always end up with odd little bits and then comes the moral dilemma... do I throw it away? (Gasp!)  Do I save them up and melt them into new soap bars? (Ugh.)  No!  I use them to wash my hands at the kitchen sink.  It's so simple to just reach into that little bowl, take out a piece and soap up my hands and then put it back in the bowl. 

Ok.  Go ahead and laugh.  But it makes me happy.  :)

The BEST potato year ever!

This gardening year has been disappointing in many ways.  I got off to a very good start in the Spring and everything was looking lovely.  Then the rain started, and it didn't stop, for a long while.  I was literally walking barefoot in mud up to my ankles to harvest vegetables for a while.  Needless to say, the weeds had a lot of fun and took over completely.  I've never seen it so bad.  We had to dig some of the potatoes early because they were growing in the wettest corner of the garden plot.  I've been digging the last of them recently, and I just now finished.  I brought in about 50# today - you can see them in the buckets above.  Most of them are quite large.  It's wonderful!  Whatever the creature is that goes underground and chews on them, didn't get very many.  I damaged a few in digging, as you can see above.  I am sharing, of course.  Altogether we got approximately 300#.  That is out of about 150 feet of row.  I didn't buy seed potatoes this year.  I just planted the little ones I saved from last year and it worked out very well. The variety is Kennebec.

When I came in, just now, I was dripping sweat from my face and I took the picture and sat down here.  I am cooling off with my little friend in my lap.  She is 13 years old now, and beginning to show her age. 

Many crops did poorly, although for the two of us, we had plenty to eat and share, but a lot of work was wasted.  However, the potatoes did wonderfully.  I guess they like rain!

Next year, I am going to start trying the permanent mulch system.  Some call it "Back to Eden" or "The Ruth Stout Method."  It will be a learning process, but will at least avoid some of the problems I've had this year.