Hot Pepper Mustard Recipe

My friend Jo Ann got me hooked on her hot pepper mustard. I honestly craved it after the jar she gave me was gone. I searched in stores but found nothing quite like it. So this year I planted sweet banana peppers so I could make it myself. I wanted mine a bit milder than Jo Ann's so I figured I could make it with my sweet peppers then add some hot sauce--that way I could control the zing. 

The peppers, however, pulled a fast one on me. Apparently some of them were hot banana peppers! I didn't expect that so I didn't wear gloves when I cut them up. Wowee, my hands had a tingle when I was done. Fortunately, it wasn't too bad because burns from peppers can actually be like burns from a fire. I remember once when I was young I cut up chili peppers without gloves and ended up in the emergency room. So now, I will wear gloves with any pepper except the bell peppers, just to be on the safe side.

But the pepper mustard came out delicious, hot, spicy and perfect for pretzels, tortilla chips, on sandwiches--you name it. I bet it would be good mixed into deviled eggs too. 

Here's the recipe I used:

Hot Pepper Mustard

INGREDIENTS:

40 banana peppers (5 inches long), stems and seeds removed. Apparently I had a couple hot ones in the mix! Be sure to wear plastic gloves, just in case you get some hot ones or want to add hot ones to yours. 

4 cups prepared yellow mustard (1 quart)

5 cups white sugar (it seems like a lot, but you’re going to end up with a lot of mustard, and you don’t usually eat much at any one time)

1 cup honey

4 cups apple cider vinegar

1 tablespoon salt

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour 

1 cup warm water

DIRECTIONS:

1. Remove the seeds from the banana peppers and place the peppers into a blender or food processor. (I cut mine into smaller pieces to speed up the process) Process until smooth. 

2. Pour into a large pot and stir in the mustard, sugar, honey, apple cider vinegar , salt and flour. Stir it frequently--with all that sugar and honey, it could stick and burn.

3. Bring to a hard rolling boil that cannot be stirred down.

4. Continue to boil, stirring constantly, for 5 minutes. 

5. Pour into sterile pint jars and seal with new lids and rings. 

6. Process in a boiling water bath for 5 to 10 minutes, depending on your altitude.

I ended up with 13 pints of sauce, plenty to last us all winter. I didn't count how many peppers I used, so maybe I used more or less than the recipe called for. 

The peppers are still producing so I see another batch in my future. 

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

Life Is Just a Bowl of Cherries--Jamming It Up

My little cherry tree is producing its heart out this year. This is a small part of the last picking, being processed through the cherry stoner.

I wonder if this old Hoosier ever saw this process before. I imagine it has, because these cabinets were the kitchen workhorse of their day. On the left is the jam I made last week, still waiting to get taken out to the cellar.

Cherries, all pitted and ready for jam. By the time I was finished this bowl and another were full.

And into the pot, mixed with mulberries, strawberries and a few red currants.

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

Abundance in the Gardens, Abundance in Storytelling

 The gardens are booming right now. The new hens are already laying and apples, peaches and grapes are hanging heavy. ready to ripen in a few weeks. It feels like the garden of Eden here right now, with fresh fruit and vegetables there for the picking, flowers in bloom and beautiful, clear, dry weather for a change.

This is a fresh load of tomatoes picked by Larry this morning. Lots of pink ones in with the reds and yellows. I think we only planted 4 pink tomato plants, but they are sure doing well.

Today is salsa-making day. I have a few hours to spare from working on stories to do the salsa and make some dill pickles--the cucumbers are coming in with a vengeance now. The old vines revived when the weather cooled and the second planting is beginning to bear. Always, of course, the gardens peak when I will not be here to process the bounty. Such is life.

We eat tomatoes three meals a day at this time of year, and in between meals too. Sliced for breakfast, sandwiches for lunch, sliced for dinner and eaten whole in between. Such richness!

This morning I prepared a country breakfast, complete with fried potatoes, bacon, eggs, tomatoes and fried apples. The apples were amazing. These were some golden delicious that had been around so long the skins were wrinkled--but they were still sound. I cored and sliced them, leaving the skins on. Then I heated oil in my cast iron skillet, added the apples and stirred them quickly to prevent them from sticking to the pan (that's important--hot oil and stirring to coat the apples with the oil). I let them cook a while, then added cinnamon, honey and vanilla. My oh my. I've never added vanilla before but you can bet I will always do so now. They are delicious.

The chickens are laying those little pullet eggs; they're small and dense with deep yellow yolks. I missed our good eggs and was impatient for these new hens to start laying. They obliged me by starting a full month before I was expecting them to. Good girls!

Back to the kitchen with me. Tomatoes are sitting in hot water so I can peel the skins and make salsa. Then I'll take a while to work on stories for the Inland Waterways Festival in Marietta, Ohio tomorrow, and then I'll start a batch of pickles. While those are sitting in salty ice water, I'll be packing for next week's trip to Elkins, WV to teach Appalachian storytelling for the Augusta Heritage Series. This will be a full, fun day--especially if my cousin Les in England calls and we can talk about my trip to England in September.


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

Winter Jam Recipe: Pineapple-Orange Conserve

In this cold weather, who thinks about making jam? And yet, this is a good time for canning because we can all use the extra heat in our homes, and we tend to have a little more time on our hands at this time of year. And if we're canners, we also have some empty jars that can be filled again to restock the shelves.

I had some oranges in a basket that were looking pretty sorrowful--you know how they get after a week or so. The skins lost their luster and were beginning to look shriveled. I hate to throw away something I paid good money for (I wonder about that saying-what is bad money anyway?). I had a can of crushed pineapple left from the cheesecake I didn't make over the holidays, so I decided to make pineapple-orange jam. Only I thought it needed a fancier name, so I'm calling it Pineapple-Orange Conserve. It just sounds better, doesn't it?

Ingredients: 5 sorry oranges, 1 20-ounce can of crushed pineapple, 3/4 cup water, 1/4 cup boiling water, 2 TBSP dried orange peel, 1 box dried pectin. (You could substitute the grade rind of your oranges if your oranges are fresh.)

To make this recipe, I had 5 pitiful oranges, the 20-ounce can of crushed pineapple, and some orange peel I'd dried earlier in the winter. I try to dry it whenever I can because dried orange peel is so useful in recipes like scones, cookies, and jams. I poured 1/4 cup of boiling water over 2 tablespoons of the dried peel and let it set for about 10 minutes to soften. If my oranges had been nice and fresh, I could have simply grated their rind but these oranges were beyond that point, so the dried were a good substitute for the fresh.

I put the pineapple, juice and all, into my big jam-making pot (a 6 quart stainless steel dutch oven). Then I juiced the oranges and added the juice and whatever pulp also came loose into the pineapple. I stirred in the soaked peel and one box of dried pectin, then added another 3/4 cup of water and turned the heat on high. I stirred until my mixture reached a good boil, then added 3 1/2 cups of granulated sugar. I cooked it until it came to a rolling boil and timed it for 1 minute, stirring constantly. I turned off the heat, set the timer to 5 minutes, and stirred occasionally as the jam cooled. This step is necessary for jam, but not for jelly--it prevents the fruit from floating to the top of the jam.

When the timer dinged, I ladled the jam into hot, sterilized jars, put on the lids and bands, and turned the jars upside down for about 10 minutes to help the seal take hold; then I tightened the bands again and that was that. Most authorities recommend putting jams and jellies into a water bath canner for a short period of time. I don't do that, so check your cookbooks for the recommendation time.

End result was a very pretty, and completely delicious jam that is not too sweet--a cross between orange marmalade and pineapple preserves. It was a good use of the oranges, helped warm the house, and looked right pretty in the bargain.

And you know, it was delicious on the Orange-Cranberry-Walnut scones I made too. I'll share that recipe tomorrow.


Copyright 2012 Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.

Warming the House on a Cold Day, and Maple Syrup

The temperature never reached 32 today. Tonight will be even colder than last night, with the expected lows in the single digits. For my northern and western readers this is probably nothing new but this has been an unusually warm winter here and this coming week will be the coldest weather we've had this year--and if I think about it, probably last year too.

Before we went to town yesterday we checked on our lettuce bed. It was still green and good to eat, but we knew the cold was coming so picked what was left of the lettuce, and a good thing too because it froze solid last night. We've never had lettuce this late (or early) in the year so I'm not too unhappy about its demise--and I still hope that it might come back from the roots later when the weather warms.

Last night's wind made the night feel even colder, and kept the stoves going to keep us comfortable. Today I decided to help warm up the house by canning.

Even in winter, it's possible to put up food. I had bought a big bag of pinto beans at the store, so those went into the cookpot. I had also had Larry bring down the remainder of the frozen cider.

Freezing cider is a quick and easy way to process it in the fall when we're so busy and the weather is still warm. I prefer it canned, however because it's easier to use, and I don't have to worry about losing it if the electricity goes off.

So that was today's project. I ended up with 13 quarts of cider and 7 quarts of beans. And a warm and toasty house. Free gas makes canning my own beans feasible but I am not sure it would be a saving if I had to pay for the utilities to do it.

Here is what I love about my 1950 model Tappan Deluxe range: I can easily fit two big canners on it, and in a pinch, even three. What modern stove can handle pots of that size and weight except the ones built for commercial kitchens?


A conversation on the Storytell listserve the other day made me think about my early days on this farm, and my first winter here when I decided to tap the maple trees. Here is a copy of the story I posted about that:

I remember my early years on this farm when I wanted to try making maple syrup (this would have been 1976-1977-1978). We had some maples around us, not many, but I thought I might be able to get enough sap to make a little syrup. I had read that red maples and other kinds could also be tapped, so I decided to try them too--25 trees in all. I used an old auger to drill the trees, and cut elderberry branches and removed the soft pith in the center to make my spiles. Every day I hiked up and down steep snow-covered hills collecting my sap, and I cooked it down on my wood cook stove. 

In the end, for all my efforts I got about a pint, and it wasn't very good. I think I started too late, and the sap from the other maples just didn't have the sugar of the sugar maple.I tried for ywo years before giving it up as a bad idea. It is still a good memory, though. Those hours in the woods alone, watching the animals and birds, and seeing the slow coming of spring remain as one of the best times in my life. Maybe not the sweetest syrup, but a very sweet memory.

Here is a photo a friend posted on Facebook of my house when we first moved here. This must have been taken the winter of 1977-1978 (thanks, Laurel!). 

And yet a little more on the topic of maple syrup:

There is a strange tale I sometimes tell that I found in a 1906 history book of my county, about some young people who were at a sugar camp when they were caught by a sudden storm. The creek came up so quickly that by the time they reached it, it was impassable. Two sisters grabbed switches from a nearby willow, whispered something to the sticks, and the sticks turned into a large white horse, big enough to carry all 4 of the young people across the creek--where the horse promptly turned back into willow switches.

Has to be true--it was in a history book.

Copyright 2012 Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.

Canning Time and a Review of What's In and What's Not

 The big pots are invading my kitchen once again but this year their onslaught is both late and limited. The green beans never sprouted (last time I buy seed from that place) so there were no beans to can. The peaches have only a few scattered fruits on them, enough to eat fresh but nothing to can. The tomatoes are coming on so slowly that we went across the river to the Ohio truck farms last weekend and bought a few bushels to put up. If mine come later, I'll have more to can and that's fine, but I was getting nervous about the few remaining jars of tomatoes in the cellar so this eased my mind.

The cucumbers came on, unfortunately, at the height of the drought and heat. What they produced was warped and mostly bitter. We had enough to eat fresh, but none for pickle making. The second planting doesn't look much better. I made quarts and quarts of them last year, but they were so popular with my family that I now have only 6 jars left out of about 75-100 that I made. I try to keep a two-year supply of everything in the cellar, but the pickles were just too well-liked.

I have made some jam--blackberry, cherry, strawberry and raspberry--and we have plenty left from last year. We also have lots of pears and peaches still in the cellar, but I am waiting anxiously for the apples because the apple butter is almost gone; we didn't make it last year because there were no apples due to frost. I need applesauce too, and cider.

The grapes are hanging heavy and ripening. I am hoping they can hold for another week or more because I will be away at Augusta Heritage teaching storytelling all next week. Being a storyteller is good and bad in the summer. Lots of work, but right in the peak of canning season!

A biggie on my canning list is vegetable soup and beef stew. Those will be on the to-do list when I return from Augusta. We have pulled the onions and they are drying in the shed; I'll cut them up and freeze them when I get home, and I may do some in the dehydrator. My sister Maggie gave me some dried onions a few years ago and I loved them for adding to sauces and soups. The basil will be ready to dry when I get home too; the oregano and peppermint were victims of that bad storm and then the drought finished them off. No peppermint tea this winter <sigh>. The oregano might recover enough to be picked and I still have a good bit from last year.

We are slowly rebuilding our stock in the freezer. I have lots of broccoli, peas and carrots put up this year and have been buying some meats each week to replace what we lost during the power outage.

It's been strange to not be buried in produce this summer but I have to admit it's been a nice break. My cellar is still pretty full even if I don't can another thing, but like most other canners I like to fill every jar by the end of the summer. This might not be the year for that, but we will certainly will not starve. Even in a bad year, there is still plenty and I am grateful for what we have.

Copyright 2012 Susanna Holstein. All rights reserved. No Republication or Redistribution Allowed without attribution to Susanna Holstein.