How to Make Pumpkin Pie (from a pumpkin!)

Well, it was the last item of our farm share, but come Christmas it was time to make the very last pumpkin pie of the season...sniffle.  Anyway, here are some instructions, I culled them from several sources so I claim nothing is actually either original or mine.

Ingredients
1 pie pumpkin
1 cup sugar
1.5 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon ground allspice
one half teaspoon ground ginger
one half teaspoon salt (optional, I don't use any)
4 large eggs
3 cups pumpkin glop (ok... "sieved, cooked pumpkin")
1.5 cans (12oz each) of evaporated milk (I use the nonfat version)

Start with a 6" to 8" pie pumpkin and a full deep dish 9" pie plate. You will have enough to fill the pie and then some left over for muffins or mini pie or whatever.

Step 1: Wash pumpkin with water (not soap, unless you want soapy pumpkin pie). Split down the middle. Scoop out seeds.

Step 2: Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Put each pumpkin side down flat on a cookie tray covered with aluminum foil. Cook for 45 minutes or until soft. Alternately, you can cook at 450 degrees in a baking dish with ½ cup of water to keep the flesh moist. Peel flesh from skin and put into bowl. Puree using a food processor or blender.

Step 3: Mix in:
1 cup sugar
1.5 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon ground allspice
one half teaspoon ground ginger
one half teaspoon salt
4 large eggs
3 cups pumpkin
1.5 cans (12oz each) of evaporated milk

Step 4. Pour into crust

Step 5. Bake at 425 F (210 C ) for the first 15 minutes, then turn the temperature down to 350 F ( 175 C ) and bake another 45 to 60 minutes, until a clean knife inserted into the center comes out
clean.

Step 6. Let pie cool…the longer you let it cool, the tastier and firmer the pie. We cool ours for a day.

The joys of cleaning the chicken coop

“There are some who can live without wild things, and some who cannot. These essays are the delights and dilemmas of one who cannot.

Like winds and sunsets, wild things were taken for granted until progress began to do away with them. Now we face the question where a still higher ‘standard of living’ is worth its cost in the things natural, wild, and free. For us of the minority, the opportunity to see geese is more important than television, and the chance to find a pasque-flower is a right as inalienable as free speech

These wild things, I admit, had little human value until mechanization assured us of a good breakfast, and until science disclosed the drama of where they come from and how they live. The whole conflict thus boils down to a question of degree. We of the minority see a law of diminishing returns in progress; our opponents do not.”

-Aldo Leopold

The Sand County Almanac

I think I’m at the point where I’ve just had too many classes on food and the environment, food and big business and just on food to sit quietly anymore.  This morning my husband and I were trying to find a recipe for chicken and dumplings, preferably in the crock pot. Every single recipe involved biscuit mix and boneless, skinless chicken.

What the Hell?

Have we really forgotten chickens have bones and skin? Has it been so long since our ancestors made biscuits about of a bit of flour, some butter and some baking soda on the trail?

The whole thing would depress me terribly if I hadn’t spent my morning prying frozen chicken poop off the coop floor (it’s 12 degrees this morning) while my chickens complained and pecked at my boots. Somehow, collecting a couple eggs after cleaning the coop and whipping up some french toast made me feel so much better.

Personality

Our chickens have totally developed a personality and one in particular, Luna, is a total escape chicken.  She’s very crafty, cuddles up to you and clucks softly then the moment your back is turned, BACACKK! She’s making a run for it! 

I have to admit, she’s my favorite chicken. 


Also, chickens are brutal little cannibals.  Whenever I find an egg inside the coup (not the nest box) I smash it and they all come running like its Christmas morning to devour it.  They even eat the shell.  I think this is probably an evolutionary thing, predators are less likely to find a nest that doesn’t smell like decaying eggs so they tidy up whenever possible.

Halloween PSA

Just a reminder, even Darth Vader practices proper car safety!

Buckle up and be safe this holiday season!

Just clucky, thanks!

Well, the humans have been battling the DEMON FLU for the past week, luckily I'm recovering...just in time for my husband to get sick.

The chickens, however, are doing fantastic.  We now have two layers, one with pale brown eggs and one with dark brown speckled eggs.  I am so pleased at my wonderful little layers...now half the chickens are laying! 

Luna let me pet her today, she's so friendly.  Lately she's been following me when I go in to feed the rest of the chickens and today she just sat down and let me pet her feathers and scratch her little chicken neck.  Good thing I took care of all those exotic birds as a petsitter, now I know all the "spots" to make chickens happy!

We have Eggs!

I don't know which one did it, and she certainly didn't use the nest box, but we have an egg!  Whohoo!

In lieu of an actual post...

Not much to report right now, tomatoes are growing, chickens are clucking (but not laying), pumpkin has powdery mildew. I will note however that apparently our little chicken house was the talk of the Reedville baseball practice last week. Apparently we are "some house by Indian Hills actually has chickens right in their backyard."

So, anyway, here are some pictures from McMenanims Edgefield: