Slicing the Homemade Bacon

Phil found another hunk of our homemade bacon in one of the freezers and took it out to thaw but because he was helping Michelle move furniture in her room last week, he never got around to slicing it so that was one of my jobs today.
I still use that cheap little Oster slicer that I got at the thrift store and it still works great. This hunk of bacon was a bit fatty so it must have been from that second hog who got too big. I sure could smell that plum wood we used to smoke it with from that plum tree that died in the yard. I don't think I'll ever look at a dead fruit tree the same way again, that wood will always be something to save for smoking. That wood from the plum tree had a much better taste than any wood smoking chips that we could get from the store.
This made several packages of bacon for us. I believe we will have breakfast for supper tonight and use some of it up.

In other news, I am still crocheting and knitting and selling what I can...and maybe a little ribbon embroidery just because I had never done it before. These are some fingerless gloves that I made.

Let's see what else....Miss Suzie...well, she turned into Poozie..and that just stuck and no one remembers that her name was Suzie now. So Poozie has gotten big and she is definitely the most challenging of the dogs we have. She manages to get out of the fenced in backyard all the time...either by jumping higher than we thought she could or fitting through smaller spaces than we thought she could. How I wish I had known about Jack Russell behavior when I got her...though I am sure I would have still taken her. the other three dogs are fine as well, just growing older and dealing with what comes with that. 

My chicks have all grown into adults now and all are laying. There are roosters to give away and hens who are stealing nest (viciously!) again. I believe I will have chicks to sell this spring but that will be an interesting venture too, I'm sure.
Spring is coming though this winter has been so mild, it is as if we never had winter. I'm hoping we can find house to buy this year. Will keep you all informed on that as we go along.

Onion Soup

For a long time, I didn't like onions at all. As a kid we hated them but as I have grown older my tastes buds apparently have died off some and I like onions just fine now. I saw a recipe on facebook for onion soup that was very simple and had few ingredients so I thought I would try it. You took 6 large chopped onions (I had some small ones but only did seven because it seemed like an awful lot of onions to begin with), cooked them in butter for a few minutes until they softened, put them in the crock pot and added a teaspoon and a half of Worcestershire sauce and beef broth. I added two 32-oz containers of beef broth. You then just let it cook.
Now, all day this was cooking and I could only think of how disgusting I thought it smelled. It also tasted very bland.

 I read the comments on the facebook video and decided to add salt and pepper as one person on the comments mentioned...it was a bit better...still not good. I really felt that if we were going to have it for a meal....it needed meat. I scrambled up about a pound and a half of hamburger. Then shortly before Phil got home I put a few spoonfuls of hamburger in an oven safe bowl, ladled the soup on it, then put three pieces of sliced French bread on top with a shredded Italian cheese mix on top of the bread. I put it under the broiler until the cheese browned.

I just can't tell you how incredibly wonderful this was. So GOOD! Definitely going to have to make this again.

Too Many Eggs!

For a while I was selling some eggs and that was keeping their numbers down in my refrigerator..but egg prices have gone down again and I got tired of delivering eggs to people so they have been piling up a good bit in the fridge and today I collected these beautiful eggs along with a dozen more of the small bantam eggs and there just wasn't anywhere to put them. Time to do something with these eggs before they go bad and just have to be thrown out. With all the animals I have to feed, there really is no excuse for throwing out eggs. But I started with the dozen or so fresh bantam eggs I had and made Phil some pickled eggs. I haven't made any for a while so I know he is going to like these. It is just the standard recipe: 

3 Tablespoons sugar

1 tsp salt

1 tsp pickling spice 

2 cups vinegar 

2/3 cup water

Boil this for a few minutes and pour through a strainer over boiled eggs. 

So that got rid of a dozen eggs but there were at least ten dozen more in the refrigerator.....so I boiled a pan full, then another very large pan full and peeled, and peeled then cut them up a bit. I fed a plate full to the cats outside. They seemed very appreciative. Then I took two bowls out to the chickens and fed them. These chickens had never had eggs before but they seemed pretty happy and it didn't take them long to finish them. They were all running around snatching pieces from each other.

They don't get much variety here in the winter since I have no real good grass and weeds to pick for them. 

I then, put the rest of the eggs I collected today in the fridge and we have almost 8 dozen....looks like I may need to do this again tomorrow.