Canned Tomatoes! Or, How to Save Your Tomato Babies from Flea Beetles.

My friends!
The cat is back...again!  I apologize for my long absence!  No excuses, I've just been doing a lot of things like this:

 And this:

And of course, a whole bunch of working with awesome kids and making music!

So fire up your range, uncork your Cabernet, and let's get to work!

Have you heard of flea beetles?

They are like they sound.  Teeny, tiny, voracious little monsters that devour every tomato leaf in their path (and apparently the occasional kale plant).  Matt and I had noticed a couple of weeks ago that our tomato leaves had roughly one million miniscule holes in them, and thusly were turning brown and falling off.  We thought we had taken care of the issue with some organic blight spray, which didn't work even a little; enter the flea beetles.

Most of you are familiar with my bug issue.  If not: I have a bug issue.  After a few years of being the primary gardener in our household, it's improved slightly, but my general knee jerk reaction to anything with more than four legs is to turn it to putty.  Spare me your lecture of "Blah, blah, blah good bugs versus bad bugs, don't kill the Daddy long legs, blah."  Don't care.  If it's in my hair or on my body it will be dispatched of forth with.

Flea beetles are so little.  Like, so little.  You can't even see them unless you're looking.  Unless, of course, you've made your sweatshirt into a kangaroo pouch and filled it with roughly 30 roma tomatoes, and as you innocently dump them into the sink to be washed, a conservative estimate of 12 billion little black vermin swarm OUT OF YOUR CLOTHING and take over your ENTIRE kitchen counter.  Seriously, no one will ever make me feel bad about smashing ANY bug, ever again. 

The internet and I conspired to kill these hungry little jerks together.  After maybe a solid five minutes of searching, we determined that there IS NO EXISTING PESTICIDE organic or otherwise that will effectively eliminate all signs of flea beetles.  None.  Someone suggested on a forum of equally grossed out gardeners that they don't like chili oil.  Some had found success with garlic.  Not wanting to be perceived as not taking this seriously, I promptly put ten garden chilis, 4 cloves of garlic, water and oil in the food processor.  I smelled it, and about fell over.  For real guys, it still burns when I blow my nose.  It might forever, who's to say?  I figured that applying this directly to the fruit could result in some seriously caustic tomatoes, so I poured it all over the base of 10 tomato plants.  They're not dead yet (the plants or the bugs), so here's to hoping, right?  Also if you come over to my house, maybe don't play in any of my dirt, because it might melt your fingers off of your body.

But I digress... This is just a really long way of telling you that I've been canning all of my tomatoes as soon as they even turn pink on the vine.  The bugs don't seem to care much for the actual tomato fruit itself, but I figure they're bound to run out of leaves sometime, and it could turn ugly.

I have a lot of fond memories of canning with my Mom as a kid.  We made countless jars of pickles and tomatoes.  Occasionally, I'll still get to can with her when I come home for a weekend in the fall.  This is my first year attempting tomatoes on my own, and it's unbelievably satisfying to have those fresh jars all lined up on the counter, so much so that you leave them there for several weeks to admire until your husband suggests that they be given a new home in the pantry.

As far as I'm concerned, the jury is still out as to whether or not canning actually saves you any money, especially for the first couple of years, unless you have a seriously productive garden, or a plentiful stock pile of mason jars.  After your first couple of seasons, all you should really have to purchase are the fresh lids, but until then it's more of a feeling of accomplishment with the added bonus of having preservative free veggies until next year.  While canning, I personally like to envision myself as Xena, warrior farm-woman of the prairie, who's muscular thighs propel her through her fields of plump, ripe tomatoes, while her arms of steel place them into her home spun basket, made from the bones of her enemies.  But that's just me.  My personal experience has been fairly cost effective as I inherited a water bath canner from my Mom's basement, and I don't can it unless I grew it... paying by the pound to put up tomatoes is really only saving you the unnecessary ingredients that they incorporate into canned food from the store.

This is a supply-heavy process.  I haven't really come across any ways to MacGyver canning... the whole risk of botulism thing is kind of a turn off.  You will need:

-A steam, or immersion (water bath-which is what I use) canner WITH A RACK!  If you place the cans directly on the bottom of the pot on the burner, you risk them cracking.
-pint jars (for this particular recipe) with new, never before used lids, and rings.
-A silicone padded jar lifter, or heavy duty oven mitts to lift out your entire rack.
-A small sauce pan for heating the lids.
-A larger stock pot for boiling the skin off the tomatoes.
-A slotted spoon.
-A large colander.

Your stove will look like this (minus the salsa because this is an old picture...):

Also, your house will be REALLY hot.  Pick a coolish day to can.

Ingredients:
-As many tomatoes as you want to can.  It takes about six-eight roma tomatoes to fill a pint jar.
-Lemon juice (store bought is fine)
-Salt

Fill your water bath canner approximately 3/4s of the way full.  Put your jars (without lids) in the rack in the pot to sterilize them.  Bring water to boil on high heat- allow to boil until you're ready to use the jars.  This will take approximately forever, so while you wait:  Put the lids with some water in the small sauce pan, bring to a boil, reduce to simmer, allow to simmer until you are ready to use.  Bring water to a boil in the large stock pot.

While you wait for all that water to boil, core and score your tomatoes with an "X" on the bottom.  This is my Mom's favorite part.  She likes to pretend they're the people that frustrate her, which is a totally healthy way to cope with stress.  Fill your sink with cold water for later.  Once your stock pot is boiling, put the cored tomatoes in the water for 30 seconds to 1 minute, until you see the skin just start to crack.  It's helpful to do this in smaller batches (no more than 10 tomatoes at a time).  Take the tomatoes out of the hot water, and put them in the cold.  Repeat until all of your tomatoes are in the cold water.  Remove the skins (they should slide off easily, if not, you can throw them back in the hot water for a second).  Place the tomatoes in the colander.

Obviously those haven't been cored yet, I'm just showing off my Instagram skillz...

When your tomatoes are ready, and your water is boiling in the canner, you can carefully pull the sterilized mason jars out of the canner.  Place on a kitchen towel on the counter near your tomatoes.

For each jar:
-Fill half way with tomatoes (mush into jar).
-For pint jars, add 1 tbsp of lemon juice, and 1 tsp salt.
-Fill the rest of the way, leaving about a half an inch of head room.
-Wipe the rim of the jar, make sure it's really clean or it might not seal!
-Remove lids from simmering water, screw down rings until just barely finger tight.
-Using jar lifter, place jars back in the hot water bath, make sure the lids are covered by about 2 inches of water.

-Cover, wait for water to return to a boil (I know, this takes forever, remember, you are Xena!  Canning war goddess, or God!  To the best of my knowledge, Xena is a gender neutral name!)
-Once water is boiling, keep covered, set timer for 15 minutes.
-After 15 minutes, remove from water, set on towel to cool.
-Any unsealed jars should seal as they cool (you can tell if they're sealed by tapping the top, no sound = sealed), if you want to make double sure, you can turn the cans upside down on their lids after they've cooled for a few minutes.

(For quart jars, use 2 tbsp lemon juice, 2 tsp salt.  Process for 25 minutes instead of 15.)

Voila!  Delicious, preservative free tomatoes!  I've read that shelf life is anywhere from six months to a year, but I know people who say it's fine as long as the jar is still sealed and the contents are unchanged (color, fluid level).  Once opened, refrigerate.  You go, canning Goddess!  You are truly a vision of garden warrior success!

As always, Butterballs, thanks for reading!  Here's to a few more weeks of beautiful weather, delicious food, and time on the water (or boiling it if you're canning tomatoes...)

Best Fishes!
XOXOX

Aye Carumba! Protein explosion Mexi-Casserole!

Howdy y'all, Butterballs!

Holy page views, Batman!  Thanks for the love!  You inspire me to continue, and share the love that is the Raffety family kitchen!  I am also inspired by the fact that Matt is insisting on cooking this evening (twist my arm...), and that I stocked up on a WHOLE bunch of Oak Leaf Cabernet at Walmart the other day.  Fun fact: Did you know that the Two Buck (or closer to 3 bucks anymore...) Chuck people make Oak Leaf ($3.77, but still an acceptable level of cheap for the professionals among us...)?  This is mostly a "fun" fact because Charles Shaw is a completely legit, weeknight wine, so buying 8-10 bottles of Oak Leaf on payday is 100% socially acceptable, and maybe you can pass as a connoisseur having a cost-effective party instead of just tired and cheap and probably drinking this in the company of your cat.  At our local Walmart, they've also started wrapping each individual bottle of wine in a wine shaped paper bag.  For those of us that need to haul 10 bottles out to where we parked our car for carpool going on 12 hours ago, this is clearly a very considerate gesture. 

In Missoula at the moment, it is capital W Winter, with all caps SNOW.  Matt and I are the owners of the world's most useless snow shovel.  It is so useless, that if it snows, I am far more likely to choose to use our broom (formerly known as house broom), to SWEEP AWAY all 8 inches of snow than I am to use this shovel.  Matt recently informed me that "it works way better" if you flip it over, and shovel upside down.  Our neighbors already think that we are completely inept 12 year olds (in fact most 12 year olds are probably intelligent enough to abandon a shovel this useless...), so making a show of shoveling upside down would only further cement this perception into their minds.  Long story short, I moved all of our snow off of our hard outdoor surfaces today using an O'Cedar floor broom, then cursed and swore at our shovel, all while still in my dress from taking our 4th graders to the orchestra today (obviously this seems counter-intuitive... don't worry, I changed my shoes).

After you've already had your fill of shoulder toning shoveling, and your dog's belly is two inches below the surface of the snow, making a good walk somewhat of a moot point, what you really need is more protein than a professional body builder consumes in a week.  I have a history of intolerance for Mexican-themed pasta... I can't rationalize it per se, maybe it's my love of pasta combined with mozzarella, who knows?  I scan Pinterest and see a plethora of recipes for lasagna rolls smothered in enchilada sauce and think... well, no thanks.  You could use orzo, or another small pasta as a substitute for the quinoa, because... variety is the spice of life?  Sure.  I just always feel like quinoa is rice's exotic Spanish cousin, and casserole is pasta's cozy Italian bestie, so naturally the two should meet.  Lord knows I love me some CHEESY, CHEEESSSSYYYY casserole.

You will need:
1 and 3/4 to 2 cups uncooked quinoa (you can boil this in equal parts water til all the water absorbs)
2 chicken breasts, seasoned with taco seasoning (another weeknight shortcut, you can sub your own blend, cumin, garlic and salt are most important), cooked through and cubed
1 medium can tomatoes, chilies and onions mixed
1 medium onion, coarsely chopped and browned in olive oil
1 can black beans, drained
1 cup (or more, YOLO, right?  P.S. This is the correct use of YOLO, or "You Only Live Once", as opposed to, "Drank 12 Four Locos and lit my porch on fire today... made s'mores, YOLOOOO!!!) Mexican blend cheese
Parley
Taco Seasoning
Pepper
Chili Flakes (to taste, 'mo spicey, 'mo betta in my book...)
One swirl of Sriracha (because why not?) all around the pan (of course that's a measurement, who asked you?)

Once you've boiled the quinoa and cooked the chicken and onion, you can mix up all the ingredients, minus the cheese in a large pan.  Heat until most of the tomato juice has reduced.  Spoon into medium, round baking dish, cover with cheese, and bake at 375 degrees for 30 minutes, or until cheese starts to bubble and brown slightly.  Serve with guacamole, see http://cookingwithbutters.blogspot.com/2011/10/hooray-for-fiber.html for my recipe!  Matt also likes a dollop of sour cream.

I forgot to take a picture, but the thing about pictures of casserole is that they just look like dishes with cheese on top, so here's a picture of Dexter wrapped in Matt's apron:

As always, love and best fishes!  Mwah!

Tis the Season for Peachy "Quin" Jambalaya!!!!!

Howdy Butterballs!
Long time no eat!  Turns out that teaching keeps you a little bit busy, but don't feel singled out!  Not only have I not cooked for you in months, I haven't cooked for the husband or myself either.  When you spend all your time at work or passed out in exhaustion on the couch, you cook things like spaghetti sauce, tacos, spaghetti sauce, or McDonald's.  The beauty of all of these things is that they all pair beautifully with cheap red wine.  This laziness also has a tendency to bleed over into weekend days.  I find that if I can't put it in the Crockpot with wine, garlic and an onion and expect reasonably tasty results, I will make Papa John's (which would not be so bad, except I would rather pay the $3 delivery fee than walk the block and a half from my house to their storefront to pick it up). 

With the holiday season upon us, music teachers find themselves faced with an additional seasonal task of preparing and executing the annual holiday program.  As this is the very first program I will be preparing entirely on my own, I find myself flying into a logistical obstacle course.  I am so lucky to have the amazing students that I do.  They are enthusiastic, adorable and eager to show off their seasoned woodblock skills, and I am already exhausted and we are still 10 days out.  The lack of cooking going on in my house has also resulted in a complete lack of left-overs for lunching purposes.  Luckily my room has a closet that I keep filled to the brim with goldfish crackers, fruit and bags of popcorn, or I would probably be SOL, and no, not a needle pulling thread (Ha!  10 points for a superfluous Sound of Music joke... anyone?).  I recently came to the conclusion that this will probably not improve anytime soon, so I made the addition of dried fruit, little baby hummus cups from Costco and these super fancy quinoa chips!  Hopefully this will prevent me from developing rickets. 

In the spirit of this busy holiday season, I bring you good tidings of all things spicy.  As we go deeper into the wrapping paper, plastic tree and cookie abyss, I find that one more hearty stew or pot roast will likely push me over the edge.  I love a good bourguignon as much as the next American, but I also find more and more everyday that cooking with wine is nice, but makes me wish there was more wine left for me when I am finished (greedy, greedy beef shank...).  This fact coupled with the feeling of deep and utter dread I felt upon coming home faced with the prospect of yet another dinner made out of some nondescript animal's "burger" sparked within me a rebellious revolution.  So naturally, I turned to burger's sassy porcine cousin, sausage!  I also was fortunate enough to have in my possession, one bag of frozen jumbo shrimp.  Pasta was out, so I settled on our Costco tub of quinoa.  Even I was surprised with how good this turned out, considering that I had no vegetables to speak of and was feeling selfish about my cooking "liquid".

To make my faux jambalaya you will need:
1 lb fresh or frozen shrimp, jumbo works best (if you choose frozen, allow extra reducing time for the extra water the ice will add to your sauce)
1 lb pork sausage
1 small onion
1 12 oz can diced tomatoes (I prefer no salt added)
3 tablespoons tomato paste
1/4 cup dry red wine (yep, I thought the sausage looked thirsty too...)
2 12 oz cans of chicken stock
1 cup (dry) plain quinoa (DO NOT use the kind that is pre-seasoned, this is a mistake I have made and hope never to repeat...)
2 cups fresh spinach
Chili flakes to taste (about 1 teaspoon will give you a medium-spicy result)
1/4 teaspoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon coriander
1 tablespoon dried parsley
cracked black pepper and salt to taste

For the quinoa:
Heat 2 tablespoons-ish of olive oil in the bottom of a medium sauce pan.  Finely chop your smalll onion.  On medium-high heat brown onion, and add quinoa to toast it.  Once your quinoa is golden brown, add one can of chicken stock. Cover and let liquid absorb.  Repeat process with more stock until quinoa is tender.  Season lightly with salt, pepper, and cumin (to taste, not the 1/2 tsp. listed above).  Add in a handful of spinach at a time, allow the previous handful to wilt before adding another.  Cover and keep on warm until your shrimp and sausage mixture is done.

For the jambalaya:
In a separate pan, brown sausage, adding chili flake and powder to taste.  Add in tomatoes, tomato paste, cumin, celery, coriander, and roughly a half a can of stock, and red wine.  Add in shrimp (if raw, allow them to cook in sauce until pink and sauce is reduced, if frozen allow to cook in sauce until it is nicely reduced, and dare I say it, roughly the thickness of spaghetti sauce).  Once reduced, salt and pepper to taste, and fold into quinoa.

Here's to variety most certainly being the spice of life!  This time of year, allow yourself to reflect on what really matters most.  Whether it's your fat cat, your loving family, a warm home, enthusiastic students, great co-workers, good friends or fine wine, find what makes you happiest and celebrate it!  True thankfulness for what we have is the best gift we can give ourselves.

As always, happy cooking, happier eating, love and best fishes, Butterballs!  May Santa find your bellies full, glasses empty, and pants delightfully too tight!  Mwah!