What did you do in the garden today?

[Liz Birdlover]

I totally agree with you. as for pausing ACV my lucky guess is to avoid addiction. let your body fight without a constant help.

I drink a glass of water with a teaspoon of ACV most days, but probably not every single day, like some mornings I will drink kefir instead. I have a really good batch of ACV with the mother I've kept going & it is easy. I don't always have kifer, but I always have ACV.

As much water I drink & the other stuff I eat in the course of each day, I don't feel this is excessive, for me anyway. I love a glass of sauerkraut juice, too. I love pomegranate & beet juices, it's all delicious to me. Some things agree with us better than others, we're all different.

Ever since they nearly killed me with chemo, my body, blood & immune system have been so dangerously out of whack, so I need to be aware of how I feel & how to get proper balance back. I tried the darn pills they suggested & had some nasty side effects. My entire digestive system, blood level readings & pH work much better with natural remedies. My energy levels & aches & pains, are better as well. I do rotate what I consume, but if I miss ALL of these, several days in a row, the feeling is a steady decline leading to severely run down & ill. The decline is a slow, clogged up system, fog brain, dry skin, fibromyalgia flare ups, constipation, nausea, upset stomach, sinus head pain & mucus issues & overall blah. I'm not saying it's for everyone, but it works for me, along with natural herbal & plant derived supplements. My bloodwork was so bad & damaged bone marrow, they said I had CLL & wanted to put me on more chemo...yeah, that would've finished me off for sure. I discovered the benefits of paw paw, papaya leaf...the oncologists & hematologists are still scratching their heads.

I'm not claiming that all this stuff would work for everyone, but all I know is, when I keep up with taking most of the natural remedies I've discovered & tried, they actually work. And when I stopped them temporarily, just to see, then resumed them, it was reflected in actual bloodwork results & pH saliva tests.

It has been said that everything we need for optimum health is already growing & thriving right here on this amazing planet. I believe it.

https://uniquehealthandwellness.com.au/fermented-foods/

https://www.healthline.com/health/ph-of-saliva

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9104069/

 

[Sueby]

I've never made fermented pepper sauce, but have read about it.

https://peppergeek.com/fermented-hot-sauce/

https://www.chilipeppermadness.com/recipes/fermented-hot-sauce/


My favorite is Tabasco Scorpion sauce. It's very hot, and has a lot of fruity flavor from the habaneros or scotch bonnets, or whatever they use. Adding just a single drop or two adds a lot of flavor to a bowl of chili.

Edited to add:
Oh, I guess it's probably made from Scorpion peppers. Duh!

I fermented my hot sauce one year & DH couldn't tell the difference between fermented & not fermented so it wasn't worth the time, effort & fruit flies. Of course his sauce is so darn hot he probably has no taste buds left so he may not be a good judge.

Whenever anyone says they froze bottles I wonder how it doesn't break the bottles.

Because I haven't been able to can the last couple years after multiple back surgeries I have broth & jams in ball jars in the freezer. I just make sure they are wide mouth & for quarts I fill them a little less, an inch under the shoulder & have not had any problems. I keep them in the tray in the freezer so they don't get jostled around or bumped.

Now I am pondering the garden being put in pots. I think I have enough for everything. Maybe the corn will have to be in the ground but everything else can be in pots.

When we first moved here I did pots till the garden went in, it worked pretty well but it's more work with having to water more often & they require more fertilizer. But no weeding!

More rain moving in tomorrow. I wish I could put an umbrella over my property to let it dry out a bit.

Holy cow, the rain is killing me! It's so squishy out there & more coming over the next few days. But I agree, things are warming up. My strawberries are already greening up & my lettuce & spinach has all sprouted outside.

Inside everything is coming up too. I got another greenstalk ready for when the onions show up. Next up is for the beans which I will direct sow. I'll do them a little early & just throw a cover over them.

 

[Sueby]

When people come on the thread just to complain about it, I'm so happy for the ignore button.

My thought exactly. I was like

 

[Liz Birdlover]

Supposed to get rain later, it's already been cold, windy & cloudy since yesterday morning. After work, if I can beat the rain, I have more chicken maure to spread in a compost area. I'd like to till before rain hits. See if I can make it happen.

 

[Minanora]

View attachment 3782983

This is what we use. I think we bought the 12 ounce size. We fill to just below the shoulder.

Yes, we also do just sweet Italian peppers too- same: chop, freeze, blend with vinegar and salt, age it.


Pots are great, but they also dry out quicker, so they seem higher maintenance in the heat. But, we use pots to grow some veg or greens on the deck.


Yes!

I freeze lots of my mason jars. Yeah, I've ruined some lids learning, but I haven't broken a single jar. I freeze a lot of chicken stock that I make. I make batches every month or so and I absolutely have no desire to get the pressure canner out to process it. So I make sure to leave plenty of headspace in the jars, and leave them cracked like I would for canning, (I stand the jars upright in a standing freezer) so I can freeze it all. I also freeze my refried beans in jars. Because we eat them so fast there's no point in pressure canning them either.

Eventually I'll get a huge stock pot so I can make more at a time, but that'll be a learning curve as well I'm sure. I also refrigerate my jars before I put them in the freezer. Cold jars freeze better than room temp. Slightly less expansion and less frost on the top of the liquid in the jar.

And.... another one of my semi-related rambles! We also preserve a lot of peppers, onions, garlic and green tomatoes with salt and olive oil, I do those in Mason jars and they get stored in the outside fridge for quite a while. We eat them a lot so they don't last a year. We harvest olives for pressing oil every year at my MILs house. Our family is pretty much it's own co-op... Eventually I want to plant an apple/grape orchard out at our big property to make more vinegars for preserving. We currently use grapes from my home, my sister's, and Mom's. At my house we make wine, meads, beers, and ciders so making vinegars is easy with our setup. It just doesn't currently make enough to process allllll of our pickling projects every year and the timing has to be right. We usually have to buy more vinegars in bulk. We get together and have canning parties most years. Mimosas, outdoor camp stoves running the water bath pots, children running around trying to eat all the fruit we cut up, men washing and sterilizing jars and barbequing. It's a great time!

This is why we garden!

 

[Sally PB]

I'm not saying it's for everyone, but it works for me, along with natural herbal & plant derived supplements.

I checked out the links you posted. Very interesting!

I truly believe that "let food be thy medicine" is a great way to treat a lot of ills. YES, there are times when that won't work, but I'll leave that for now.

I had some severe gut pain a few months ago. About 2" below my sternum. Ok, Dr. Google... what could that be? An ulcer seemed the most likely culprit.

Weeks, probably, to get to see my doc, where everything has to start for insurance purposes, unless it starts in the ER. Referral to another doc, and tests. Maybe it'll resolve on its own...?

Natural treatment for an ulcer... hmmm... several links say cabbage juice. NOT cabbage, the juice. (The pulp is a lot of fiber which might aggravate the issue.)

Recipe was along these lines:
Cabbage, apple with skin, ginger root, some added honey. Water, whiz in the blender and strain well. Drink it down, and repeat for a week.

I added a cup of ginger tea instead of water. Did it for a week. Felt MUCH better on the third day, but kept going for a week. Problem (pain) gone. No idea if I had an ulcer, but if the pain comes back, I will buy another head of red cabbage. I liked the color.

 

[WthrLady]

Varieties of Sweet Corn

• Genetic Types of Sweet Corn
• Standard Sugary (su)
• Sugary Enhanced (se)
• Shrunken-2 (sh2) or Supersweets
• Synergistic (syn)

That said, I don't bother growing my own sweet corn. Here it takes too much space. I'd need a massive stand of it to have it self-protect against wind, and the amount of water vs yield is a no-go on my hill. The ranch downhill a mile or so from me grows a large stand, is on a pivot with his field corn, and I simply purchase from him, or do a swap for tomatoes and horseradish.

 

[WthrLady]

We dropped down to 12'F last night.
::grumble::

 

[fuzzi]

Lots of wind here today. Also one heavy downpour, but that only lasted about half an hour.

I'm waiting for Thursday when I can go out to play in the dirt again!

It's starting to rain. We're expecting 2" this afternoon and evening, 2" more on Thursday.

 

[fuzzi]

View attachment 3782983

This is what we use. I think we bought the 12 ounce size. We fill to just below the shoulder.

Yes, we also do just sweet Italian peppers too- same: chop, freeze, blend with vinegar and salt, age it.


Pots are great, but they also dry out quicker, so they seem higher maintenance in the heat. But, we use pots to grow some veg or greens on the deck.


Yes!

When we're expecting a hurricane or tropical storm I fill up the freezer with bottled water, laid on their sides. I've never had one rupture.

If the power goes out the frozen water helps to keep the freezer cold. And in a pinch we can drink the water.