Up in Leadville

54° here in Colorado this morning! It's been nice weather, in the 70s, while back at home it was 95° yesterday. Yuck. 

Wednesday we spent some time in Leadville, the highest incorporated town in the US at 10,119 feet above sea level. It's a charming place, lots of tourists of course, but also a lot of history.

This old school has been turned into condominiums and is for sale. Looked pretty uninhabited.

The town houses the National Mining Hall of Fame, but unfortunately it was too close to closing time to explore. There were some amazing bronze sculptures there.

And a penny-smashing machine! I got one for my friend Elizabeth,  who collects smashed pennies.

A sculpture of a miner reading his methane tester. While silver mining was the main reason for early European settlers to come here, there is currently a huge molydenum mine in operation that covers thousands of acres, not far from Leadville. This museum mainly focuses on the gold and silver mining history, but there is a gallery dedicated to Americans who were important in various mining industries.

There were many cute Victorian homes.

Inside a little bar, The Manhattan. 

This is Anne, the bartender at The Manhattan, whose ex-father-in-law was part of the building of the huge radio telescopes at Green Bank, West Virginia. We had a great time talking with her about Leadville and about our state.

The opera house, an ornate and beautiful structure built during Leadville's mining heyday. 

Great old ghost sign on the opera house.

Silver mining might have lead to the naming of this fantastic old saloon, The Silver Dollar.

I just drank water here, but had the most delicious treat, chocolate hazelnut beignets. 

Larry had a beer and a long conversation with three construction workers at the next table, all military veterans. 

The bar at the Silver Dollar.

It was such a cool place, with lots of memorabilia on the walls.

They also have Doc Holliday's piano!

And this very ornate pool table. Those brass lion head legs!

I really enjoyed this quirky town, and hope to go back someday. Just so much to see!

Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.

In Colorado

First impressions:

Most expensive gas station in the US:

Buffalo! Not wild though.

Old gold mines and mine workings are everywhere. 

Through her truck window:

View from Sarah's front porch this morning

Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.

August in My Kitchen

70°f/21°C, light clouds and a little shower early on. We need the rain. Had a nice little downpour yesterday as well.

I am going to try to link up with Sherry's Pickings with this post, a review of the past month in my kitchen. Some of you have seen some of these before, but here goes.

Kitchen window with herbs hung to dry.

My little 1930s spice rack. I had the jars for a while, then a few years ago found the perfect rack for them.

A gallon of ast year's cider. I guess we won't be making any this year, as we have no more apples and no pears. So sad!

My Sellers cabinet. Such a useful piece of furniture! Mine does not have the sifter, but i use the left side, where the sifter would have been, to store my cookbooks. It also holds some of our canned foids for easy access, my cookie sheets, toolbag,  other baking pans, and the drawers hold a miscellaneous of cooking tools and gadgets 

I just got this! It's a puntarelle, and is just awesome for cutting potatoes and squash. It's very sharp. I learned about it on a Giovanni Siracusa video.

Kitchen table, after dark.

Photo from the other day of apples from our trees.

We only got a little over half a bushel this year due to frost.

Larry turning the crank on the Victorio, making applesauce. 

Indian corn and pumpkins drying.

Stringing chili peppers on the porch.

Mincemeat tarts and another quiche, this one vegetable-laden: peppers, onions, squash, kale, chard, tomatoes, and basil!

A photo from 45 years ago, at least, in the days before we had electricity: my Dad and 3 of my 4 boys. Notice the lamps on the table, the full canning jars, and the pie on the table. Oh, and the Fenton vase! So long ago...

Flowers from the garden

My trusty Tappan stove, as old as I am and one hard worker.

One of several recipes I made from Giovanni Siracusa's videos this month. This one is zucchini and onions sauteed in olive oil, then a little water added, blend half the mixture, add pasta and more water, salt and pepper, cook til the pasta is done and the mixture is thick and creamy, then stir in parmesan. So good!

One of the quiches I made this month.

Dried tomatoes used up a lot of tomatoes when we were overrun with them.

Elderberry jelly, made using a half cup of white wine in place of some of the  Elderberry juice. 

Grape juice, not as much as most years but so delicious.

Not in my kitchen, but in our booth, a dinette set that took just 2 days to sell. Yay!

Also in the booth, two sweet teapots. It's hard for me to part with teapots!

Chocolate zucchini bread, batch 1. I made several batches and gave away or froze them. Tastes like brownies with a hint of cinnamon. Just incredibly good.

This month's tea set. I make tea every morning, carrying my tray to the porch or the log room.

One dinner this month, featuring that zucchini pasta, cucumbers in a dill sauce, and ham.

Kitchen windowsill

There was much more this month because August is a very busy canning and food preservation month, but I guess I didn't take photos of most of it.

Copyright Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.