Month: April 2010

Garden Pics – 04/14/2010

Posted on by AuSable

From the way that the main rhubarb plant is growing, it looks like once again I should be able to get two very robust harvests out of the plant. I’m not so much worried about getting stalks out of the other four plants, so those are basically the “in case of emergency” cuttings for friends and family that might want a rhubarb plant.

Once again the centennial is doing gang busters when it comes to vine growth, a couple more days and I’ll finally have to run the new diagonal trellis system to support the centennial off the ground.

I also cleared out an 8′ x 8′ patch of the garden and planted up two kinds of radishes (French Blush & Sparkler), three kinds of beets (Detroit Red, Moneta & Golden) and two kinds of lettuce (Bordeaux and Outredgous.)

Seed Starting – 1st flat – 2010 season

Posted on by AuSable

OK, the first flat of seed were sown last night. And here is the breakdown of what is going into the first flat of 72 cells:

9 cells – Aji Limo
9 cells – El Jefe Jalapeno
6 cells – Bell Peppers
3 cells – Jalapeno “M”
3 cells – Banana pepper – green color
3 cells – Banana pepper – yellow color
3 cells – Banana pepper – orange color
6 cells – Sage
6 cells – Basil
6 cells – Parsley
6 cells – Cilantro
6 cells – Oregano
6 cells – Rosemary

Potato Chip Review – Sabritas – Ruffles – Queso Cheese

Posted on by AuSable

This Ruffles flavor is suppose to be Queso Cheese, and when you open the bag it totally smells like a bowl of queso. But the problem is that is really doesn’t taste like queso. Instead you get a triad of flavors on your tongue: buttery, citric acid(yeah I know, again!),and cheesy. But the the cheesy flavor isn’t a queso cheesy flavor but instead its more of a blue cheese/cheddar flavor.

And then it hit me, these Queso Ruffles are more or less Cheddar & Sour Cream Ruffles that had some blue cheese flavoring added in to make in more “queso” like, heck they even look like Cheddar & Sour Cream Ruffles. Come on Frito-Lay, how dumb do you think I am? If they would have labeled these chips as Blue Cheese Ruffles, it would have been a more accurate description than queso. Once again another let down courtesy of the men and women of Frito-Lay.

Just got my seeds in the mail

Posted on by AuSable

Talk about quick turnaround time. When I got home from work last night, I had a little cardboard box in my mailbox from Johnny’s. So now I’ve got to lay out my seed starting calendar for the next couple of months. The plan so far is to start all the herbs and pepper seeds (jalapeno, aji limo, bell, etc) this week, and then some time next week I’ll start the seeds for all the tomatoes. And then in about two weeks, I’ll start the cucumbers & zucchini inside as well as sowing some of the seeds that need direct sowing (carrots, beets, lettuce, corn, peas, beans, etc.)

When I reviewed all the seeds that I ordered, I noticed an interesting trend with a large portion of the seeds that I ordered. In that maybe two thirds of the seeds that I ordered, are seeds that need to be directly sow into the ground. So really the only seed starting that I’ll need to do this year are for the herbs, peppers, tomatoes, zucchini and cucumbers.

One little tool that I picked up this year, are two seedling heater mats. We’ll see if they are any help in germinating my seeds, since I keep my house right around 63F, so any extra heat to get the seeds off to a strong start is a bonus in my book.

Potato Chip Review – Sabritas – Doritos – Toro Habanero

Posted on by AuSable

What do you get when you take Nacho Cheese Doritos, and add in a mixture of sour (courtesy of citric acid) and habanero flavor. You get Sabritas (Frito-Lay’s) Toro Habanero flavored chips! So on to the critical questions, that being were these chips hot, as in picante and not calinete? Oh yes they were, but it wasn’t an in your face kind of heat with the first bite, it was more of a smoldering heat that almost turns into an inferno of fire in your mouth with almost a hint of a fruity aftertaste while the heat is dying down in your mouth.

Would I get these again, right now I’m 50/50 on the flavor. I kind of wish that they wouldn’t have used so much of the citric acid, even though I understand the reasoning why they did it in the first place (for the acid to enhance the flavor of the habanero, kind of like lime in guacamole) but that is asking a lot out of Frito-Lay. But if you are looking to get your heat fix on, then these are the ticket for you.

Sauerkraut is done!

Posted on by AuSable

After a little bit over two months, I’m pulling the plug on the fermentation phase of this sauerkraut and moving on to the consumption phase of this batch. There was only a couple of things that I did to the sauerkraut before placing it into the fridge.
1) Cleaned and sanitized a 1 gallon glass jar (it was from a batch of pickles I bought last year at Sam’s Club.)
2) I squeezed all the brine out of the sauerkraut, leaving the brine in the fermentation bucket.
3) With the remaining brine in the fermentation bucket. I racked the brine to a stock pot and brought it to a rolling boiling, and kept it boiling for 15 minutes before cooling it down to room temperature in an ice bath.
4) Once the brine was cooled, I poured it back over the sauerkraut in the jar, just until the sauerkraut was covered in brine.

Now its time for me to start making some Reuben sandwiches at home, so I can consume all this sauerkraut. Good thing I didn’t buy more cabbage before St. Patrick’s day when it was $0.09 a lb, to start a second batch of sauerkraut. Since then I really would have had sauerkraut up the wazoo!