Hot Sauce!!!

The moment has come.  I have been so excited about making my own hot sauce since I planted my peppers in the spring.  And now that I've made some I realized I could have done it a while ago because it doesn't take anywhere near as many hot peppers as I thought.  So I went out and picked a bunch of red Cayennes, a cherry bomb, a couple habaneros and a banana pepper (Not all for the hot sauce, I also made some more quick pickled peppers).

I decided I wanted a depth of flavour to my hot sauce so I would use some bell pepper, onion and garlic as well.  I chopped up 1 yellow bell pepper, 1 cajun bell, 1/3 of a large spanish onion, 1 habanero (seeds removed), about 12 cayenne peppers and crushed 6 garlic cloves.  I sautéed all of this in the wok until soft. (Important hint - make sure the vent fan is running at full whack or you start to breath in too much hot pepper fumes).

For the liquid I used 1/4 cup of water, 1/4 cup of white vinegar and 1/8 cup of sugar (this liquid was left over after making my quick pickled peppers).  I blended the sautéed mixture and the liquid using the liquifying mode on my blender.  After a quick taste I was blown away at the heat, a little too much for us.  So I added 1 jar of roasted red peppers (I know a cheat but I had it on hand).  Then blended some more.  This made it taste delicious, still very spicy and also flavourful.  I then strained this liquid into a small pan (to remove the cayenne seeds and any skins that didn't get broken up).  The sauce then simmered and reduce to about 1/3-1/4 of its original volume to thicken it.  I poured the sauce into a decorative olive oil jar that I had on hand and put the rest in a mason jar to cool.  I will freeze the amount in the mason jar for later.  I couldn't believe that I only used a dozen cayenne peppers.  I have hundreds on the plants as seen in the picture below of the finished product!

I'm going to make sooo much hot sauce.  I've got to get some woozy jars to put it in though.  Does anyone know a good source to get these in Canada?

Grow it! Cook it! Eat it! Live it!

I am starting a new linked in blog series.  The series will be a weekly showcase of locally grown food, cooked simply, and enjoyed with love.  Each week I will post a recipe of something that I have cooked throughout the week and I invite fellow bloggers to do the same.  The idea is to connect garden bloggers with recipe bloggers, as these two things are so connected.  I was inspired to create this blog from my sister in law, who after reading my last post commented on how she really enjoyed how my blog combined these two things.  The blogs that I follow are almost entirely vegetable gardener bloggers or recipe bloggers.  Some of them are both, like me!.

This series will open on saturdays each week and be open till thursday.  I would love it if you could share a recipe that you have made this week.  Be sure to link back to the series on your post so others can connect.  I  find series blogging very inspiring and a great way to stumble upon amazing blogs I had not read before.  

So post your link here to be part of the first ever Grow it! Cook it! Eat it! Live it! series, and keep coming back each week to see what everyone is cooking!

   

    An InLinkz Link-up

   

Dinner on the fire!

Last night was a beautiful night for a fire here.  The temperature was a round 15 degrees Celsius at first it was clear skies so you could see the stars (well the ones you can see in the city, which in London is actually quite a few).  We decided we would have a fire and make grill-a-snacks.  We went to the store and bought all the stuff we needed to make pizza ones like we normally do.  As GMF was preparing the fire outside I was rummaging through the fridge getting out some veg that we could add to them.  Then I saw a lovely looking chicken breast that I had cooked earlier and I suddenly had a craving for Fajitas.  So I decided to try something different - Fajita filling in the pie iron.  I have never tried to make anything in the pie iron without a crust before.  I've used different things for the crust including puff pastry but never without any crust.  

I cut up the chicken breast, bell peppers, cherry bomb peppers, a cayenne pepper and some onion.  Added in some seasoning - cracked salt and pepper, paprika, garlic and tossed this in some oil.  Then I prepared my toppings.  I made a simple pico de gallo salsa with grape tomatoes (which I picked in the dark so there are a couple in there that weren't as red as I'd like but oh well), onion, cilantro and lime juice.  The other toppings were sour cream, and a smokey chipotle salsa.  Arranged everything on a large cutting for carrying outside and we were off to the fire!

 I pilled the topping into the pie iron and started cooking.  The sizzle of the frying was great sound as the peppers and onions let out their juices.  Below is the cooked filling still in the pie iron.  (side question - which picture do you like better, without flash-left or with flash-right?)

 I also warmed my tortilla shell simply by using half the pie iron as a holding place and held it over the fire.  It warmed up pretty fast!

Here is my fajita all put together.  The final touch was a couple baby lettuce leaves that I picked right out the garden bed beside the fire place.

This is it half eaten, I couldn't seem to get a good focus on this pic, tried several times, then gave up and kept eating!!!

 This was such a success and I think we will bring this recipe camping with us next time!  The one thing we wish we did was put our cast iron fajita pan on the stones around the fire and then put the cooked filling on it to keep warm.  We put it in a bowl that was sitting on a table beside the fire and so it lost some of its heat.

On to dessert!  I once again created by dessert grill-a-snack but with a couple minor changes.  First the bread, instead of buying a loaf of the bagged bread we bought a fresh bakery loaf that had been sliced from the grocery store (it was actually cheaper as well).  I didn't think it would make a difference, but it did.  It was easier to spread the butter on the outside without tearing, it fit better in the pie iron and when we burned a little bit while cooking we could scrape it off very easily (the bagged bread would always fall apart).  I know you're thinking, how could you burn them!,  but it happens sometimes, and I deal with it!  The second change was that I didn't put peanut butter on this one but instead I put score bits.  OH MY GOODNESS, soooooo good.  I had bought them to make score bit brownies today (I'll post about that later), so I decided why not add some to this.  I also lightly salted the outside of the bread.  Salt and caramel go together so well!  This was delicious!!

Here is the assembled filling.  Marshmallow slices, Caramilk squares and Score bits.

Here it is  right out of the fire!

And the finished product, oozing with tasty goodness.  I am amazed at the difference the little bit of salt made.  I was D-E-Licious!

Thanks for reading.

Happy birthday to the best mom ever!

My moms birthday was yesterday and so I want to post a little note to her.

"Thank you for being there every step of my journey so far. You have always encouraged me. Whether it was in school or sports or cooking. I have such found memories of cooking cookies when I was really young. Also of going to the pick your own farms and then making beets or jams. That instilled the passion that I have today or garden."
My mom is my best supporter. She loves when I go home or they come to visit and I make a nice meal for them. She loves to here about what's happening in my garden and asks about it every time we talk. I wish she live closer so I could share more of the garden with her.

Thanks Mom and happy birthday. Here's a pick of my hibiscus plant that we both love so much!

Grilled chicken breast and garden salad with beet juice dressing

This is the most delicious chicken salad ever and so quick and simple.

The chicken is soo juicy an the salad has so many flavours.

First prepare the marinade for the chicken. Fresh garlic, rosemary, thyme, salt, pepper and olive oil. 

My first canning

Why is it called canning when you put it in a jar? why isn't it jarring?

Last week I canned some beets. I always loved pickled beets when I was a kid. My mom and I used to go to the pick your own farm and then pickle them together.

This year I wanted to do my own. I followed a recipe of the bernadin page. For spices I used pickling spice from a store bought mix and cinnamon sticks.
I followed the recipe exactly. I was surprised that it only made 4 jars but I will enjoy them. (Actually since I made them a while ago the first jar is already gone - as is evident by the beet salad dressing I made in my last post).

Harvest: Aug 26th - Sept2

Sorry i haven't been posting much. This is the first week of school so i've been busy getting prepared. I think i've got a new system down though. I'll post on the bus ride on the way into work via my phone.

Last week was a very successful harvest.   The carrots are almost gone (will plant more next year).  Here is a good batch of them I picked when my parents visited last week.