Stuffed cabbage and soup day

Week 2 is here already and it was a gorgeous gorgeous fall day.  Sunny and warm this afternoon so my mom and I took my brother to pick apples which are absolutely wonderful  I forgot my camera but will try to take it as we are getting more tomorrow, we have red delicious, golden delicious, and macintosh.  I see apple dumplings for market this week! and maybe apple oat bread or apple pies or welllllllllll apple stuff!!  LOL

Early this am I made hubby a pot of tater corn chowder soup.  He loves taters and will actually eat the carrots in the soup since I chop them up really super small!!  Using as much local produce I am making soups daily now.  This was one of my featured soups last week. 

This is my favo soup I make!! My creamy tomato veggie soup with homemade egg noodles.   OH MY GOODNESS!! I have to say this might be the best pot of this kind of soup ever!!  I make it all the time in the winter when we have tomatoes frozen but I used fresh ones and some cream and roasted some red peppers that I put in the processor with some sweet basil from my brothers herbs.   YUMMY!! 

I love it but hubby is not a fan so I will take some over to my mom and dads and make another pot, hopefull just as good for my markets this week!! I love being a guinnea pig sometimes! LOL

So tomorrow we will be making stuffed cabbage rolls, and getting prep work done for a busy busy wed.  I like to get all my veggies cut up and prepped for the week on mondays and tues, and try to get all my dry ingredient mixes up and ready so wed I just add the wet and bake everything.    My menu this week also has on some smothered fresh green beans with red peppers and bacon and onions.  We will have some tonight to try it out and tweek it a bit to make wed for my csa menu.    I am also doing a vegetarian dish so it will be black bean vegetarian chili. A chicken enchilada casserole will also be on the menu.   Made this before and hopefully I can remember how I made it since it was really good.    Another dish for my csa this week.   I will be offering black olive sage baguette bread, cornbread or muffins,  And for desert options they get to choose either pumpkin cake, pineapple cake with coconut icing, or apple cinnamon bread pudding with a creamy cinnamon sauce.  So that means to make some french bread too.  Goodness  I need to write these things down as I make it and forget all I put in something.  *NOTE TO SELF* write it down!!!!  LOL

So hope yall had a wonderful monday!!

Talk to ya more tomorrow!! with pics at the kitchen!!

HUGS

Darlene

 This week~~LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~

CSA and baked goods

My first week of the CSA program went really well!! THANK YOU to everyone that ordered and bought from me!!  I have some ideas for next weeks menu options like stuffed fresh cabbage rolls with homemade tomato sauce,  chicken enchilada casserole, eggplant casserole, stuffed acorn squash and maybe some broccoli something soup.  I got beautiful fresh cabbage, squash, eggplant and broccoli from market today!! I so love getting and using locally grown produce for us at home and also now to offer my customers.  So you get the idea each week will be different depending on what is available at market.  I do have to say Fleming Farm and Visser Farm have the best produce around!! THANKS guys for bringing it to us.  We grew some things in the garden but ya know I got so busy with baking that the produce here kind of fell by the wayside, I have tomatoes and some taters but overall not enough to use for my offerings. 

I made some pumpkin bread pudding with a creamy cinnamon sauce using our french bread loaves.  OH MY GOSH SUCH PUMPKINGOODNESS!!  I have to say of all the bread puddings I have done this is the bestest ever! the pumpkin custard is just so velvety smooth and just yummy! 

 

Susan sauteed some fresh veggies and chunked up tofu to fill homemade egg rolls.  This was a trial this week which we are baking them instead of frying and they were good.  A quick homemade sauce and yummo!! BUT next time no tofu and she is gonnna use cabbage and some thin oriental noodles too.  I am not a tofu fan at all but to keep a vegetarian dish we tried it. 

All rolled up brushed with olive oil and ready for the oven. 

This was so delish!! A pumpkin sour cream cake, I topped it with a bit of my butter crumb struesel and some chopped toasted pecans.

That recipe was so excellent I decided to make another batch up for muffins!! those sold out within an hour this am!

Another pumpkin sour cream bundt cake with a cinnamon glaze.  So good!!

 Only 2 more satuday markets to go in South Haven but dont fret...........we are coming on wed from 3-6 november thru april at Foundry Hall!!  Will fill yall in more in the next few days.

Hope yall have a wonderful weekend.

IF you are out and about our area today and tomorrow was our annual Blue Coast Artist Fall Tour, a great road trip around the lakeshore area of local studios and private galleries.   My dear friends studio KNEUMU is a must stop!! she is off 113th ave just a few short minutes from our farm.  SHE has the most amazing raku fired pottery!!! and has a great farm with lost of "girls" running around (chicks and more) stop and say hey to DAWN AND ROB!! 

Off to get some much needed rest tonight!! 

Talk more soon!

HUGS

Darlene

~~LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~

My new ideas

So with my hubby loosing his job I have been trying to come up with some new ideas for my markets.   Thus Chicken Scratch Gourmet CSA program is now underway!!    So far this is what I am doing= I send an email out to my customer list on sun/mon, they will get to choose an entree item, a bread item and a desert item from a list of options.
Here is what the first week of it looks like=
Entrees= white chili, potato corn chowder or vegetarian chili
Bread= rustic herbed biscuit loaf, cornbread or rosemary foccacia
Desert= fresh apple crisp, spiced baked apples, mini pumpkin pie, or an asst box of cookies
I am goin to do this by the week to keep it affordable for customers.  $13.00 this week.  
Obviously I am pretty new to this so I am gonna put it out there for any of you to leave me advise or comments or ideas.  It is greatly appreciated!! 
Today was such a beautiful fall day cool in the am and a bit rainy  then now at 6pm it is 63 degrees and sunny. 
Today all I did was make a few batches of pierogi, and some mixes up for this weeks baking.  I am gonna do some almond spritz cookies, maybe pumpkin shapes and dip in an orange glaze for this weekends fall tour group.
My precious boys are doing wonderful and hubby is comin up with some new business adventure ideas for him too. 
I wish we had the funds to buy a food truck and go a few times a week to the city to sell lunches and early dinners.  But that isnt gonna happen any time soon.  Darnit! LOL I just think that would be so much fun!! to be creative with food and go to the people!! 
Kind of on a larger scale than markets and I just love doing markets.
Hope yall have a wonderful night~~ I will be back soon with pics of what I am making
HUGS
Darlene
~~LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~

pumpkin cookies

Well today was a wet and chilly day outside.   It rained from the time I got up this am and is still raining tonight.  We really did need some rain it was quite dry out.  Next week looks like we should have a few pretty nice fall days so Buster and I can take our golf cart with a trailer and head thru the woods gatheting kindling for the wood furnace.  We have fun doin that and I usually have at least 3 big piles of sticks. 

Remember my little nekked punkin cookies from friday??  Here they are all dressed for fall.

I just made a quick butter cream frosting and piped on a couple of little curly vines on each.

This is a pic of a blurry pic but it is the top of my pumpkin cake roll.

These are fun to make and taste sooooooooooo yummy!! this was ours at home.   Hubby and I love pumpkin goodies.  This week for markets will be all about pumpkins!!!

My grandma Rose's spiced pumpkin pie bread, pumpkin pie cake, pumpkin cookies, pumpkin muffins with maybe a cinnamon butter streusle topping, pumpkin mini pies and pumpkin bread pudding (which by the way is my most favo of my bread puddings) comes with a creamy cinnamon sauce.

I also have some fresh apples we picked so I am thinking maybe maple apple bread pudding, apple bars and some caramel apples.  Fun fun fun!

I should do some apple butter and pumpkin butter but not sure I will have time.  I have orders for pierogi and cookies for the weekend. Blue Coast Artists fall tour is this weekend and I want to make some special desserts for our farmstand.

Hope yall have a restful evening.  I am off to watch the season premier of one of my favo shows.............. Desperate Housewives!!  love that show and have watched reruns of old episodes on lifetime several tims over!! LOL

Talk soon!!

HUGS

Darlene

~~LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~

First day of fall baking~

Today was the offical start of fall here in beautiful sw michigan it was gorgeous!!  The trees are just starting to show some colors and I cant wait til they all show their beauty.  Fall is my favo favo time of year!!  The colors, the sounds in the air, the smell around us and the fact that it is almost halloween!! my favo holiday to decorate for.

These are my butter crumb struesle topped zucchini muffins

plain ol zucchini muffins

butter crumb walnut struesle topped apple bread

Apple pie cakes, with butter crumb topping

these look and smell yummy, they are in the oven right now

I love how tall these muffins got!  and soooooooooo yummo!

nekked punkin cookies

nekked sugar cookie leaves

they will have some yellow and reddish color frosting on them.

I also made some white chili, stuffed peppers, potato corn chowder soup, my glazed pistachio bread and some banana muffins and mango passion fruit filled thumbprint cookies.   And some peanut butter cookies with chocolate chips, lavander shortbread flowers and some chocolate chip brownies.    A few other cookies and I am ready for market tomorrow.    We have a 60% chance of rain and storms tomorrow sunday and monday  and tuesday but wed and thurs look gorgeous!!!  I will be decorating for fall tomorrow after market so hope it doesnt rain tooo much1!
Hope yall have a wonderful weekend!!  Talk to yall soon!!
HUGS
Darlene

 ~~LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~

Back from the tractor show

Well vacation is over and it is back to work.  We got back monday and had lots to do the last couple of days, funny how we have so much work getting ready for vacation, during vacation and when we get back home huh!  Anyway it's all good!! We had a wonderful time and the boys loved camping.  This was Bruno's first tractor show and I think he had a great time.  Buster has been goin with us since he was a pup and he is 10 now so he is quite the experienced camper.  LOL  they enjoyed seeing all the people and love to lay on our bed to look our the front of the 5th wheel and see everyone and everything goin on plus they all go for rides on the golf cart around the campground.  

thursday night was our annual tractor cruise where we get a police escort into town and drive down to the beach.  This year I think they said there were 60or so tractors? the last couple of years it was well over 100 tractors and doodlebugs too.

It was windy and really cold outside that night so maybe that kept a few away.  This was the view  from the front of our H tractor.

A dear friend and his son in the cruise.  He just got this pretty Allis Chalmers done in time for the show.  LOVE that orange!!  GREAT JOB!!

My niece Carissa sitting on our Allis tractor.

On sunday a few men from the American Legion came over and did a special memorial with the boy scouts for 9/11 and that was very touching!  Seen alot of teary eyed folks attend it was something special.

Another front seat view goin to the beach

My sister in law being Silly mommy!! Carrie posing for Carissa.

Well I just wanted to pop in and let yall know I am back and will be back to work.  I have market today so it is an early day for me.   Made some new treats including a banana cake with maple crumb topping, fresh red raspberry scones, apple muffins with maple topping, red raspberry muffins topped with cinnamon pecan streusle, red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting, pineapple goo cake with coconut icing, and some herbed dumplings for Allegan Market today.    Hope yall have a great thursday!!  Cold here it is only 45 this am!! crazy!!  90 last week and now chances of frost! so not ready for cold weather we have to get our wood supply ready.

Will be back with more tomorrow!!

HUGS

Darlene

~~LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~

Wet wed!!

There is something so serene and peaceful to listening to a light rain fall!!  That is what woke me up this am at 3.30.  We are suppossed to get rain most of the day which actually is a good thing it was gettin a bit dry out there.   I just love warm summer days with a light rain it feels so refreshing and the smell is heavenly.   

peach blueberry muffins

my red raspberry jalapeno jam  super yummmmmmmmmmo

peach raspberry loaves

cardamom bread

pistachio bread fresh out of oven

peach blueberry pound cakes waiting for glazing

my favo combo peaches and blueberries

peach blueberry pound cakes

Dale and hubby working on a project at tractor show

a peek of the corner of archway hubby is working on  I dont want to show all of it as it will be unvieled at show but I can say it is gonna be awesome and look just perfect for the spot it is goin

This week has been a busy one but after labor day things tend to wind down at markets a bit which means I have some extra time to work in my studio!! CANT WAIT!! been way too long.  I have alot of halloween things I want to make for fall.  Fall ahhhhhhhhhh my absolutely favo time of year, the mornings have been more fall like the past 2 weeks so it is a comin!! 

My list of things made this week and to also finish up today at the kitchen have been: peach blueberry pound cakes, peach raspberry cakes, peach blueberry and peach raspberry muffins, peach pecan muffins, peanut butter cream filled peanut butter cookie pies, banana nut bread, pistachio bread, cardamom bread loaves,  peach and apple pies, and some mini pies, and 2 batches of my red raspberry jalapeno preserves.  

 The savory chicken scratch gourmet items this week are:  stuffed peppers, stuffed shells with homemade tomato sauce, chicken veggie pies, roasted red herbed tater slices, and hopefully I will get done today eggplant casserole.

Plus 3 kinds of pierogie and lots of cookies!  So we have been busy busy but fun busy!  I love trying and making new things and am so very thankful for alll my customers that allow me to prepare things for their families to enjoy!  It really gives me a sense of joy and pride to provide unique menu options and using all local farm fresh produce helps our local farms also. A win win situation here!  Thanks to Fleming Farm's for all the wonderful squash, cuckes, pickles, taters and peppers and Thanks to Visser Farm's produce also it is amazing!

We have been goin to the campground here and there, our 5th wheel has been out there since aug 1st and we are enjoying gettin away with the boys overnight.  I just say "who wants to go camping" and they all do about 500 miles an hour running around the house and to the door and back! they love goin and I so enjoy seeing these guys happy. LOL   IT will be different this year for tractor show since we dont have our Bubba with us, he loved goin camping too and hubby would take him for a ride everynight before bedtime, cruising around checkin on all our tractors,  Buster has been goin the longest, we started taking him when he was not quite a year old in 2001 and he's been there every year with us and enjoys it as much as we do, but this year  we have our new guy Bruno who is lovin goin also. Home away from home.  My three little campers!! LOL

I better get to printing my labels for market stuff and then head over to the kitchen, today is Alesabeth's last day, she's movin out of state, I sure have enjoyed her working with me this summer and will miss her! THANKS for all your hard work!!

Hope yall have a great wed and I will be back soon!!

HUGS

Darlene

~~LIVE LIFE JOYFULLY~~and SIMPLY~~