World's Best Granola Recipe...

Today was the first day I have felt chilly! My lovely endless summer may be ending...:( I still refuse to turn on the furnace. I'm going to go into winter kicking and screaming. Okay, so what if I am wrapped up in a blanket? I'm not turning the furnace on yet!
I took a walk through the square foot garden today. The tomatoes lost their life last night. I had mixed emotions about that. Honestly...I am pretty tired of tomatoes! Still...it was hard to say good-bye and send them to their tomato grave. The Brussels sprouts are still thriving in the cool weather. We may get another cabbage if we are lucky. I picked the last hearty little green pepper and ate it for dinner. The newly planted spinach and lettuce are still doing well. I am keeping my fingers crossed...
Since there is a "chill" in the house I decided to combat it by turning on the oven. I wanted to make a batch of granola.
When I titled this, "World's Best Granola", I am totally serious...I've eaten a lot of granola in the world and this is definitely the best.
I don't think they invented granola until I was in my teens. (That may or may not be accurate)...
I DO remember when my Mom got on a "health food" kick and made this "granola" stuff for the first time. I have no idea where she got the recipe. It seemed to me a pretty radical idea...like maybe my Mom was turning into some kind of hippie or something. Especially when she bought some of the ingredients at a "health food" store.
Well...this recipe has survived the test of time. I love it every time I make it. It seems to be a "Fall" thing for me. I usually dig out the recipe about this time every year. Probably because the house needs warming up and I refuse to turn on the furnace.

I have made one change since my Mom brought home this recipe. Back in the day we used vegetable oil. I have now subbed that for coconut oil. Coconut oil works really well and I personally think it's a much better choice. I don't think they'd invented coconut oil back then...I'm serious.

Mix all the dry ingredients together in a large mixing bowl.

Coconut oil and our amazing homegrown raw honey...the only "wet" ingredients.

Slowly warm the oil and honey until the honey is thin.

Stir the warmed liquid into the dry ingredients and spread out on a large cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Have we talked about parchment paper? I <3 parchment paper! It is one of my favorite kitchen tools. I have a silpat and have to say, I much prefer the parchment!

A snapshot while in the oven. I thought that was a little "Alton Brown-ish".

I keep it in Mason jars in the cupboard. In all honesty...we eat it really fast! My favorite is plain, full fat Greek yogurt topped with this "World's Best Granola"...sometimes I drizzle a bit more of our award winning honey on it! ;)

World's Best Granola

4 cups uncooked organic rolled oats
1 cup raw wheat germ
1 cup unsweetened shredded coconut (Trader Joe's has one I really like that is toasted)
1/4 cup sesame seeds
1/2 tsp. sea salt
1 cup coconut oil
3/4 cup honey (watch out for store bought honey...read the label...some are adding HFCS!)
2 cups of assorted fruit, nuts and seeds
Combine all dry ingredients. Mix oil and honey together in pan and warm until honey is thin. Stir well into dry mixture. (Stir a few times during baking and while cooling)
Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 20 minutes
Use any of the following: raisins, apples, apricots, sunflower or pumpkin seeds, pecans, cashews, dates, flax seed and anything else you might like

I used dried cranberries, raw pecans, raw cashews, black sesame seeds and golden flax seeds for this batch. Can't wait for breakfast in the morning!

Beginner Beekeeping...The Harvest

Beekeeping has been incredibly rewarding. Bees are magical, selfless little creatures that work for the common good. Their colonies are fascinating, industrious and unique. We have fallen in love with our bees.
First year beekeepers often don't get a honey harvest. Or, they get a very small harvest as the colonies are new and need to have the honey they produce the first year for themselves. We were more than happy to provide them all they need to get a good start and survive our sometimes harsh winters.
Labor Day is often the time it is suggested to check on the bees, evaluate the honey stash and begin thinking about the upcoming Fall and Winter. If there is extra honey it is time to harvest.
Hubs planned a warm sunny day to meet with our "bee mentor" and check on what was up in the hives. I secretly hoped we would at least get enough honey to taste what our bees had been up to all summer, but was content to let them have all they needed as their own.
I wasn't home the day Hubs and The Mentor suited up and headed out to the hives. I wish I had been.
Harvesting honey is a big job and takes 2 or 3 people. In all honestly...we weren't completely prepared for what transpired. We weren't expecting a honey harvest.
From what I have been told...there was HUGE excitement when the hives were opened up! There was honey galore! Rich, fragrant honey abounded. Honey in every nook and granny and frame! Thousands of buzzing bees producing this nectar of the gods.
Our Mentor was a bit shocked and surprised! He indicated the bees were almost "honey bound"! A term referring to so much honey they had little room to work! He asked Hubs to get the "honey box". Huh??? We don't have one! We weren't expecting a harvest! I hear they scrambled and improvised and pulled 11 frames of closely guarded honey! The bees weren't quite as docile as usual. They didn't seem thrilled their honey was being robbed!
Hubs called me with high levels of excitement. He was surprised, he was thrilled, he was kind of having an adrenaline high. It took a few hours to harvest this beautiful golden treasure. We weren't prepared! Next year we will be!

Frames of honey. Capped with beeswax. Have I mentioned how amazing bees are???

A frame of our uncapped lovely golden gift.

We took it to another "bee"friend who runs a little beekeeping shop and has a honey extractor. No heat involved. This is raw, minimally filtered honey. As nature intended...with all the amazing benefits of raw local honey!

Isn't it gorgeous???! Liquid gold for sure! Oh...did I mention how it tastes??? It's unbelievably good! No, really...it's outrageous. It's thick and gooey and sweet with a hint of clover and lush flowers.

We ended up with about 35 pounds of amazing honey! Woot Woot!!!

The raw beeswax...oh, the possibilities! Candles and balms and salves! Wait...do you see how amazing bees are???

Cubes of beeswax ready for some fun...It is surprisingly firm and smells really yummy.

One of my beeswax projects...skin salve. I LOVE working with the beeswax. I'm still amazed at all the products our bees are blessing us with!

We also decided to experiment with a few "foundation less" frames in hopes of getting some legit honeycomb! A few members of the family were feeling nostalgic and remembered chewing on honeycomb when they were kids. We decided to accommodate and see what happened! Harvesting these frames was more difficult and I'm not sure we will do it again for awhile. The upside??? We had some pretty excited family members!

Pretty spectacular! Those bees are something else! Squares of unique honeycomb...

We bottled some of the honeycomb and filled the jars up with extra honey from the frames. We sold some to the local farmer. It sold out quickly at his farm stand.

We are pretty proud of our first year honey. I guess we can't take much credit for it as the bees really do all the work! I'm not lying when I tell you it is truly amazing and the taste is beyond description. On a whim I decided to enter it into our State Fair! Ha...yeah, I'm that proud of it!

See...you don't have to just take my word for it! 4th place in the amber category. Oh, and I won $4.00!
Beekeeping...so rewarding! #savethebees

What To Do With All Those Tomatoes! Fall Harvest...Preserving the Bounty!

We have had an usually long temperate summer...blue skies, occasional refreshing rains, warm temps and an uninterrupted growing season! It's now mid-October and it continues. No frost yet. I'm sure it will happen soon, but another balmy week is in the forecast.
I would be lying if I didn't admit that I've prayed for a frost or two! The tomatoes have and continue to be overwhelming. I'm seriously grateful for what my tomato plants have produced this year...but, enough already! The plants are huge and overflowing with all shapes, sizes and ripeness levels in the tomato kingdom outside my door. On top of this...we, in our insanity, picked three bushels of ripe tomatoes for our annual "Tomato Palooza 2014" canning event.

Picking tomatoes with a 3 year old was a "fun?" adventure. We all ended up with squished tomatoes all over our shoes...still...at least that Sprout knows where a tomato comes from! Also...on that upside...she knows what a tomato is!

Something incredibly satisfying about bottling your own tomatoes. We successfully canned 55 bottles of these red beauties. We split them between our 3 little families and they are seriously cherished and enjoyed through out the coming year. Once we invested in our glass bottles the cost of canning each year is minimal. A tad of salt, a drizzle of lemon juice and tomatoes. We were able to pick our own tomatoes at a local farm for the brilliant price of $13.00 per full bushel...I figure (loosely) that these beautiful  quart bottles of tomatoes cost us just under a buck each! We also don't have to worry about that pesky BPA coating in commercial canned tomatoes. We don't need to be consuming neuroendocrine disruptor's in our marinara. Most of the big names in canning supplies are now making lids BPA free as well...

Hubs wanted to grow San Marzano variety tomatoes...or...Roma's...they are firm and fleshy and good for making marinara sauce, paste, pizza sauce, etc.

Roma's with a few cherry tomatoes...I have picked and processed Roma tomatoes until I have wanted to cry...I'm sad to admit that. I don't want any to go to waste and feel compelled to somehow preserve them...this in turn causes me to want to cry!

Pretty much every other day I have been able to go out and pick enough tomatoes to roast and freeze. I would also pick Mexican oregano, rosemary, basil and lemon thyme. Add our own peeled garlic, salt and pepper and a drizzle of olive oil and you have the fixin's for some fine roasted tomatoes!

If you want your house to smell really, really delish...pop a cookie sheet full of these garden fresh ingredients into your oven for 5 hours at 275F degrees. My freezer is chock full of these!

But...those tomatoes...they just keep growing!!!

Out of desperation I decided to dry some in my food dehydrator...Then I added them to a cute bale jar and topped it off with olive oil...

Oh, I know...how about making some ketchup???

 I assembled the "plethora" of spices and measured them all into a little bowl.

 Cooking down the pot of tomatoes...again, produces a really great smell in your house!

I used the ketchup recipe found in my favorite cookbook, "The Homemade Pantry" by Alana Chernila. Again...I walked out to my garden and picked a variety of fresh tomatoes. Ketchup takes awhile to make and has a boatload of spices in it. Still...it was an especially satisfying project and I'm in LOVE with the results. It's really, really good! I think I won't be buying store bought ketchup anytime soon...

And again...the tomatoes keep growing and ripening...sigh...(thank you Mother Nature! I seriously love the tomato bounty and will cherish these throughout the winter...I'm just running out of ideas and storage space!)

Oh, how about "honeyed-yellow tomato butter"? Sure...why not?! I just happen to have a yellow tomato variety growing in my square foot garden...

I found this recipe thumbing through the "Ball Blue Book of Canning". Who knew such a recipe would exist. I guess written for those desperate for one more thing to turn tomatoes into?!

I improvised and added "Chinese Five Spice" to the little bag of spices called for. I thought it would go well with a tomato based butter. Good call...it was pretty spectacular!

It took almost forever to cook down and turn into butter. Upside...it is quite delicious and you would never guess it was a tomato based butter! It has been getting rave reviews!

And still...the tomatoes thrive and grow...Supposed to hit 80F degrees...again...tomorrow...sigh...
I guess I better wrap this up and get out to the garden!!!