May's Magic

I love this time of year. Everything seems so hopeful. My garden is getting a start. 

my deck container lettuce garden

Salads made with freshly harvested lettuce are so much better than grocery store salad kits. I have the opportunity to begin food preservation before I tire of it. 

2 small jars of chive blossom vinegar -- will be ready by the end of June

Chive blossoms are opening and ready for making chive blossom vinegar. The rhubarb is at its best.  And it's not too hot to sit outside during the middle of the day or by a fire in the early evening.

Now not every day is great. We've had some chilly and rainy weather this month. And the slugs ate most of my carrot sprouts. We've also had some unseasonably warm weather that necessitated watering everything daily. But overall, it's pretty nice.

We've had several hot dog cook-outs this month, most recent on Wednesday. 

my plate from our cook-out

I harvested lettuce from my plastic bin container lettuce garden, made herbed rice (one of our three times of rice this week), made a bowl of rhubarb jello, and heated some frozen peas. No need for buns for our hot dogs. Rice was our starchy dish.

Rhubarb jello is my family's favorite way to eat rhubarb sauce. How I make it: 

• I make a batch of sweetened rhubarb sauce
• allow to cool, then run through the blender
• measure the sauce
• soften the appropriate amount of gelatin (based on the measure of rhubarb sauce, plus about 1/2 teaspoon extra gelatin) in a small amount of cold water -- basically for every cup of sauce, use 1 teaspoon plain gelatin, then add an extra 1/2 teaspoon to ensure set.
• after gelatin has softened, heat in the microwave to melt
• stir melted gelatin into the puréed rhubarb sauce
• refrigerate for 5 or more hours

I'm an optimist in May. Bunnies are still cute. So are squirrels. I have big hopes for my garden's harvest. Watering my seedlings is a joy. Vibrant new flowers bloom each day and provide cheer for my outdoor work. May is magic, a renewal of the land as well as my spirit.

What makes the month of May special for you?

Did you know?

That you can freeze leftover French toast batter (egg, milk, vanilla, etc blended together).

I needed an easy and satisfying dinner for Tuesday. I had an afternoon dentist appointment followed by picking up one daughter and driving her to a meeting. I was frazzled afterward. So breakfast for dinner was my plan.

French toast is faster and easier than pancakes, so I went with that. And, I had some French toast batter in the freezer needing to be used up.

When I make French toast I make 2 batters, one with soy milk for me and the other with cow's milk for the rest of the family. The soy milk batter makes too much for the amount of French toast I will eat in one sitting. So I freeze the leftover batter. I could just make extra pieces of French toast and freeze those. But sometimes I don't have enough bread to make extra French toast, and most of the time I'd rather have a freshly cooked piece of French toast as opposed to a warmed up one from the freezer. 

The batter doesn't suffer any from the freezing. If anything, it becomes more orange-y yellow and slightly thicker. Freezing eggs causes this. When freezing beaten eggs to use in the future, they also deepen in color and thicken slightly. I find with the French toast batter, it isn't so thick that I need to add anything to the liquid. It works just as well as if I'd beaten up an egg and added milk, fresh. I thaw the frozen batter still in the container but set in a warm water bath until I can break it easily with a fork. It only takes a few minutes, then I'm ready to soak slices of bread.

Occasionally I mix up way too much batter using cow's milk. In that case, I freeze the extra batter in 1/2 cup amounts. A half-cup is about right for 2 slices of bread By freezing in these small quantities, anyone in the family can make themselves a little batch of French toast.

Thought I'd share about freezing French toast batter. The rest of our dinner -- stewed prunes, sausage and peppers, and mixed vegetables (frozen). It was an easy dinner and gave me time to relax in the evening.