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We had a little more than 3 inches of rain last night into this morning, which has cooled us down nicely, as well as helped the plants. It was pleasant enough to open the windows, so I felt able to use the oven again.
For Saturday dinner, I made roasted chicken thighs on one pan, and on the other, I made roasted vegetables, following directions online from Eatwell 101 and Betty Crocker. I found lovely red potatoes as well as some carrots from my other favorite vendor, who is now back for the season. I tossed the chunks of potatoes and carrots in olive oil, and after the chicken had roasted for 20 minutes at 400F, I put in the pan of potatoes and carrots. After another 20 minutes, I added chunks of zucchini and some cherry tomatoes that have been in the refrigerator for a bit too long, after tossing them in oil. After another 20 minutes, I removed the pan with the chicken, but I let the vegetables go another 5 minutes. I would have liked to have seasoned the vegetables, but my husband's gut is giving him trouble, so I settled for sprinkling some Penzey's Forward (a salt-free blend) onto mine. I am iffy about this seasoning, which came in a gift box.
For dessert, we again had the Bittersweet Blackberry Brownies, which improve each day. The recipe is a keeper.
Yum, yum, Navlys!
Although a rainstorm cooled us down on Friday morning, the weather soon became very hot and humid, so we were not moved to turn on the oven for dinner. I made quinoa salad with lima beans and corn and feta, and that made a nice dinner by itself. The recipe came from Bob's Red Mill, although I use the Penzey's French Vinaigrette for the dressing.
We cut into the brownies a bit early, having only refrigerated them for about 40 minutes. They have a strong, bittersweet chocolate taste, with hints of the blackberries. I wish that I had remembered to add some espresso powder. I used natural cocoa, since the recipe used 1/2 tsp. baking soda and 1/4 tsp. baking powder.
The next test will be how they taste tomorrow. I am refrigerating them due to the blackberry content.
Our Thursday night dinner was Salmon and Couscous with Greek Seasoning, accompanied by microwaved fresh green beans from our garden.
Mike is looking for ways to use up zucchini in baking, while I am searching for ways to use blackberries that I de-seed, since my husband's digestive system cannot tolerate them. I had a sudden idea about chocolate and blackberries on Thursday, so I googled brownies, and I found one recipe that uses blackberry jam and another that uses blackberry puree, although they did not de-seed their blackberries. Since we have so many blackberries, I decided to start with this one:
(note: it's behind a paywall, but you do get several free articles--or looks at the same article). It is from The Vegetarian Times.
I have mostly kept us away from chocolate, but since I'm taking a statin, and I had a 4 oz. bar of unsweetened chocolate in the refrigerator, I decided to try the recipe. (My husband's face lit up when he saw the unwrapped chocolate bar on the counter.) If the recipe comes out well, I will post my version, which uses white whole wheat flour, adds 1 Tbs. flax meal and 2 Tbs. milk powder (which yes, makes them non-vegan but still vegetarian). I also replaced the 2 Tbs. of coconut oil with 2 Tbs. avocado oil. I'm baking them in the countertop convection oven because it is too hot to turn on the big oven. Since I am baking them in an 8x8-inch glass dish and using the convection oven, I dropped the baking temperature from 350F to 325F and will bake for 20 minutes rather than 18.
After they cool, they are to be refrigerated for an hour before cutting. We hope to try them tonight, and I will post about the results.
I never have a problem finding a use for black raspberries. Most years there are so few that I am fortunate to get 3-4 cups jam. The taste of black raspberries is superior to that of blackberries IMHO. I would love to have enough black raspberries some season, so that I could bake a pie with them.
The blackberries tend to be more prolific in our area than the black raspberries. My husband's digestive system cannot tolerate the seeds, so I remove them. I did find a recipe for a blackberry pie made with the pulp from de-seeded blackberries, but I wondered why so few recipes for ANY blackberry pie, even with seeds, exist. Maybe it's not popular? Most recipes mix blackberries with blueberries and/or strawberries.
I once baked an all-apricot pie after finally finding a recipe. I quickly learned why apricots are always combined with other fruit in a pie. Apricots should not have the solo role in a pie but should be accompanied by other fruit.
I canned another three (8 oz) jars and one (4 oz.) jar of de-seeded blackberry jam from the berries I processed on Monday.
This morning, we picked another three quarts of blackberries, and there are plenty more out there. I need some recipes, other than for jam, that use blackberries with seeds removed. Google has not been helpful on that score.
It has not been windy recently.
We have had more rain, on and off, this summer than last summer, but my husband adjusts the watering accordingly and does not water when it has rained. The soil is not that dry, and the other plants are flourishing.
We have had an issue with cherry tomatoes falling off. Some are half ripe or even three-quarters ripe. We have set them in a sunny window to ripen.
Just now, my husband came in with three regular tomatoes, all green, that he found on the ground next to another plant. We will put them in the sun and try to ripen them that way.
Does anyone have ideas about why the fruit is coming off before ripening?
I baked my Whole Wheat Sourdough Cheese Crackers on Tuesday from dough that I made last week.
Italian Cook--I have not tried freezing the wraps. If I were to do so, I would double wrap in saran, then stick the batch in a sealed plastic bag. To thaw, you could set one or two out on the counter about an hour or two before you planned to use it. I would then unwrap and discard the plastic wrap.
To warm up the wraps, I wrap them in waxed paper and microwave for 20-25 seconds. If I were to freeze them, I would do the same after I thawed them.
For dinner on Tuesday, my husband cooked boneless pork on the stove top. We each used one of the warmed up wraps from last night, spread with a bit of mayonnaise to enclose them for a kind of sandwich. We also had homemade applesauce from the freezer and microwaved fresh green beans from our garden. for dessert, I thawed one of the small pumpkin breads I baked last week.
I do not usually bake 100% wholegrain breads, although I do have a couple of recipes that I like. My breads are usually 60 % wholegrain or sometimes 75%. After mixing the wet ingredients (except for the oil!), I add all the wholegrain flour, and sometimes some of the bread flour. I mix, then let it rest for 15 minutes, so that the wholegrain flours absorb the liquid. I mix the salt with the rest of the bread flour. If it is a new recipe, I hold back part of the bread flour initially. I might at this point change to the dough spiral. After mixing in the flour on speed 2, I slowly add the oil while the mixer is running.
Like Mike, I have discovered that I need to let the mixer knead longer than the stated time, especially with bread flour, and I use the third speed on my Cuisinart for kneading, although the instructions with the machine said second speed. I usually check after 6 minutes, then give it more time to get to where I can pull a windowpane.
Monday's dinner was chicken salad, made with the rest of the roasted chicken breast combined with the leftover tartar sauce, a bit more mayonnaise, the green part of the scallions my husband is growing in a pot, and a bit of pepper. We had them on half whole grain bread wraps that I made on the stove top. We also had microwaved fresh broccoli, and my husband finished off the farro vegetable stir-fry.
After dinner, I de-seeded the 2 quarts of blackberries that we picked yesterday. I will be making jam soon. I also washed the 10.75 lbs. of blueberries we picked today and have spread them out on paper towel-lined sheet pans to dry overnight so that I can freeze them tomorrow.
I had planned to bake another batch of Len's buns to go with chicken salad tonight, but we went blueberry picking in the morning before running an errand, and after a late lunch, and hotter weather than we have had for a while, the last thing I wanted to do was to turn on the oven. So, I went back to an old recipe for Whole Grain Soft Wrap Bread, which started as a King Arthur recipe some years ago.
https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/recipes/soft-wrap-bread-recipe
It was long enough ago that the recipe is handwritten in a small binder not typed in my larger one. I had substituted ½ cup white whole wheat flour plus ½ cup buckwheat flour and added a tablespoon of flax meal. I decided to make the recipe half wholegrain by increasing the white whole wheat substitution to 1 cup, adding 1 Tbs. special dried milk, and using avocado oil. As each wrap finished cooking, I folded it in half and put it under a towel to keep warm, since once they cool, they break if folded in half. Mine are not fluffy like the King Arthur ones, but they are delicious, and we enjoyed them. I think they would be great with an egg or tuna salad filling as well.
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