July 2021 – How Would You Do It?

Go, Go Yogurt!

This year with more time, I restarted making my own yogurt. Golly, I’d missed it, and was delighted to get that first batch made. Since then, when there’s only one jar left I scoop a glob aside to make the new batch before gobbling the contents.

To start the fermentation I needed some new culture, the stuff I had in the freezer had been there WAY too long. The easiest way is to just add a glop of one from the store. They used to make the ‘fruit on the top’ kind so getting down to the plain yogurt was easy. To compensate, I used strawberry flavor as I put a spoonful of strawberry preserves in the finished jars anyway.

To begin, heat up half a gallon of fresh milk, 185 degrees F. I let mine set at that temp for 30 minutes because I like it thick. The let it cook to 115 degrees F and mix that reserved spoonful into it. Then put it in the clean jars to ferment!

Oh, the yummy-ness! Add a dab of of any preserves or such you like and enjoy something that’s actually GOOD for you at that afternoon snack time!

My Apple Odyssey

Green Apple Bonanza!

I planted my apple trees a few years ago and became accustomed to them just being trees. Lo and behold! Two of the four dwarf trees were loaded with apples this year! I kept waiting for the apples to start turning red, but when they got bright yellow, they began falling off the limbs. Duh, yellow apples, not red ones!

Naturally I had not adequately planned what to do with them yet. Weren’t apples supposed to get ripe in the fall? Well, I use apples in muffins, pandowdy, crumbles and such so I peeled, cored and sliced about 40 of them and mixed them in a great big pot with a generous slop of cinnamon and nutmeg, a little milk and flour, and simmered them until they got to about 40% of their original volume. Ready for anything!

Freezer Bagged! — Seasons, Simmered and Stored!

Now they’re in the freezer, awaiting the next cobbler…pandowdy…pie..

Bear Necessities

I been in an all-out tumult this year! How about you? I had a ton of terrible anxiety at work last year that culminated in getting fired two days before Christmas – Ho-Ho-Ho! I can’t go into it, non-disclosure statement, but let’s just say it was both a magnificent relief to be away from there and also a new mega-anxiety. At my age, a woman has little chance to get a good job. I was at the old place 11 years and got bonuses every year but the last couple. No way can I hire in around here for even half of what I was making there. Where’s here?

Unpack: I bought a fixer-upper in the city to be nearer to work and not have to drive a couple hours to-from each day. Had to sell it this spring too cheap and try to move all my stuff out in my Subaru. Anything I could not stuff in, tie on or take apart stayed. Now all that plunder is piled in the cabin out here in the 100-acre forest. I’m trying to upgrade my online bookstore inventory from about 900 books to 3000. I have an account with ABE Books who harbors independent booksellers from all over and my monthly account is for 0-3000 books. As the Old Lady Who Bookstore, I have about 1500 books in the inventory now and strive onward, often with books I have collected over the last few decades. Some are even worth much more than I bought them for as they’re 1^st editions and some have become rare! Speaking of books, I finally did get all my Elise t’Hoot Galactic Adventure series into print…took a while to get the covers right.