2010 July 27 — Patchwork Times by Judy Laquidara

Chicken Experiment

July 27, 2010 · by JudyL

No! Not this chicken!
I was chatting this weekend with a friend who cans lots of meat and I decided to try canning chicken for my enchiladas. Since the jars have to process for 1-1/2 hours, I was afraid the chicken would be a mushy mess and I didn’t want that so I tried one jar to see what would happen. When I make enchiladas, I boil chicken breasts, with bones and skins, and spices so I did that as usual, then canned the one jar.

Looks like it worked fine but I won’t know about the texture of the chicken til I try it. We were having chicken enchiladas last night but the chicken for those was already shredded so I will try the canned chicken next time.

Since I already can my cooked pinto beans, if the canned chicken works, fixing enchiladas and beans will be so quick and easy. Guacamole is quick. Flour tortillas are quick. Enchilada gravy is quick!

The hardest part of this meal is not eating all the tortillas as soon as they come off the stove. Add a little butter and I could eat a ton of these!

Sprinkle with a little chicken and onion, roll ‘em up, add a little gravy . .

Sprinkle with some cheese, bake with the beans, make the guacamole, make a little cheese dip, open a jar of salsa . . one of our favorite meals. Definitely not low fat but very tasty.

I’ll let you know how the canned chicken turns out.

· Filed Under: Cooking · 31 Comments

Dear Twins

July 27, 2010 · by JudyL

Dear Twins: How are you? Hope you’re having fun! Oh, wait . . scratch that!

It’s deer twins:

For the past three years, there have been twin fawns in early summer. These were the ones born in 2008. The ones born in 2009 have a lot of time in our back yard and they are always together. This is a picture Chad took of them in early June.

If you look very closely at the one on the right side of the picture, you can see that he is just sprouting some antlers. Chad was so excited to see that because that means . . he is a buck! Men like being around other men, you know! Seriously, we can’t shoot in the city limits and I doubt Chad would shoot this one anyway, since we’ve almost raised him from a baby. If you think otherwise . . you probably know my son better than I do but don’t tell me, ok?

This morning I was out very early, and there they were. Up until a couple of months ago, we could almost walk right up to them but as they’ve gotten older, they are more skittish.

This was the best picture I could get of them together but look at those antlers! 6 points already.

Over the weekend, we saw new baby twins. They weren’t much bigger than large dogs and they were playing and jumping and having the best time. It was one of the few times I didn’t have a camera with me.

Chad is so anxious to see the babies and get a closer view of this little buck so he set out a salt lick this morning. (Notice it matches his clothes! We’re like that around here . . yep . . everything has to match — especially when it comes to the guy who wears the green shirt, navy shorts and purple crocs.)

And he set up the trail cam.

And now, we wait for those perfect pictures!

But, I’m going to sew while I wait!

· Filed Under: Home & Garden · 7 Comments

Getting Creative With Tomatoes

July 27, 2010 · by JudyL

Finally, the goal has been reached for the canned tomatoes for 2010 and I’ve been jumping for joy! The tomato plants didn’t get the message and they’re still producing. Last week when I mentioned that I wasn’t going to skin and can the cherry tomatoes, no matter how many pounds of cherry tomatoes we have, several suggested drying them and grinding them to a powder so I did!

First I dried them, with the skins on:

I left them in a sealed jar overnight and the next day, they went through the blender. Tomato powder!

I used some of the powder last night instead of tomato paste in my enchilada sauce and it was fantastic! More cherry tomatoes are in the dehydrator right now!

Also, I did a little research on sun dried tomatoes. Most commercial sun dried tomatoes are dried in dehydrators these days. I can do that! The dried ones with no oil or spices are about $7/pound at Wal-Mart. Those in a jar of oil and spices are about $8 for 8 ounces at the grocery store. I don’t like skins on my sun dried tomatoes so I used larger tomatoes that I skinned, quartered, and removed some of the seeds.

These will be stored in a freezer bag in the freezer. A few days before I need sun dried tomatoes, I’ll take a few out, marinate them in olive oil and spices and . . free (or almost free) sun dried tomatoes. But, this plan only works if I stop munching on them. They’re so good to eat just like this.