Rapture Food!

Waiting for the rapture can make a guy hungry! That is when I decided to cook up something that was hotter than hell and a little smokey, to get me prepared for those enternal flames!

I started with some Spanish Rice. About 3/4 cup of white basmati and 3/4 cup of brown rice, sauteed and lightly browned with 1/2 a medium red onion on a medium heat. Crush in 4 gloves of garlic after about 5 to 10 minutes. Later I'll add pureed jarred tomatoes, veggie boulian, paprika, cumin, black pepper and chipotle powder.

I backwards engineered a recipe that my friends Stef and Jimer turned me on to, which is a salsa/chutney made of carrots, red onion, ginger, lime, pineapple and habenero. I am going for more or less the same thing here, except I am using a bag of frozen yellow pear tomatoes from last years garden.

Put that whole mess into a blender ..

.. and put it on the stove to simmer and render down a bit. Also present is an enchilada sauce I whipped up from jarred tomatoes from last years garden and the Spanish Rice. I cheated on the enchilada sauce and used one of those French's taco seasoning powder mixes with my one quart of jarred tomatoes. In my defense, I would like to say that I did customize the sauce by adding about 1/4 cup of diced red onion, basil, oregano and black pepper to dress it up a little. Another quart of jarred tomato, the spices and about 2 1/2 cups of veggie boulian went into the spanish rice, we're it simmered until the rice was done. I put in a little extra salt I think, too.

Most of the pots stayed on the stove all evening while we we're out weeding, being stirred every so often. Then, I threw together enchiladas that had chili and kidney beans, cheddar cheese, and a line of that enchilada sauce on them. The enchiladas we're then drowned in the rest of the enchilada sauce and covered with cheddar and set to bake at 350 for about 30 minutes, when the cheese begins to brown.

Serve the enchiladas (forgot to get a picture of that) along side the rice with a tablespoon of sour cream or plain yogurt with a laddle full of the pineapple/ginger/habenero/pear tomato salsa/chutney over the top of the enchiladas.

This may very well be the best cooked meal I've ever created.

No lack of work - continued dome coverage, the garden begin, adventures in forestry. And Halloween!

Mt. Horeb is a neet little town. It has all the charm of a nice touristy town with no lack of gift and antique shops. I imagine it is a little of what living in Sturgeon Bay must be like.

However, the entire area is pretty special to me. They say there are several Wickan organizations in and around the area. Our township is quite progressive and politically active, which I like. There is just a certain kind of vibe that I get and that feels good to me, it resonates with me.

They do up Halloween pretty good, too, which I attribute to that bit about the Wicken vibe that I alluded to.

I found these photos on my camera that I finally found. These we're meant to make it to the blog long ago, but it never happened. Now, at almost the complete opposite time of year, I thought it would make for a good contrast.

Cool, huh? I'll do a better job of getting more next time.

Back to our place. The kids got a new trampoline! It was for Aiden's birthday I think. Or Lillian's birthday.

Progress on the dome paneling is still progressing slowly but steadily. Recent I cut 20 more boards, which are almost mounted. Mounting the boards is usually easy to do with only the occasional need to cut a little extra off of one of the tips. It's a lot of up and down on the ladder.

My latest project is to clean up the forest. This means cutting up fallen trees, cutting down and cutting up dead tree and generally cleaning up the path. One of my intents is to open space for a forest garden, which would consist of raspberries and various flowers.

Thanks to my friend Patrick, I was able to get a good start and a good education in chainsaws, which I appreciate very much. Thanks, Patrick!

More cut trees ready for processing. Kinda makes me feel like GDubya .. cuttin' brush .. heh heh ..

Here is an area I have been clearing of brush and useless sumacs. There are some impressive wild raspberry canes back here that I am eager to have exposed. Ideally, this area will be great for raspberries when I'm through.

This year our rhubarb is really kicking ass. Last year is just kind piddled out and didn't produce much, but this year there is quite a bit. Since moving out here, I have acquired the taste of rhubarb. You know what would be good?? A rhubarb chutney! Or my friend, Dr. Dave, makes this ghost pepper strawberry jelly that is just out of this world! Rhubarb and habenero something or another .. now THAT would be good!

New rows of beans going in.

Here is my hops trellis. I am happy to report that this year the hops is really taking off.

Here is a close up of the hops. We need to weed around it, but you can see it's making it's way up the cable.

Inside the dome, our grapes are starting to flower. We we're bad parents and have not trained these grapes properly.

Apple blossoms.

Here, Jason has dug a trench, loaded it with compost and is putting the soil back over it. Then, we will be putting in more beans and peas, which should appreciate the compost beneath.

More of that trench.