Seasonal Foods: Beet Pickled Eggs

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Julienne the sliced beets for a garnish with the pickled eggs. Reusing pickle juice is a great way to save money and reduce waste.

To make this recipe you can use organic cider vinegar or reuse some sour pickle juice. This is a great way to reuse sour pickle juice that would normally get discarded in most households. Here’s my recipe for Crock Pickles.

To ensure that the boiled eggs are easy to peel, use eggs that are at least a week old. Two week old eggs are even better. If the eggs are too fresh, it will be difficult to peel the eggs without damaging the surface. If the eggs do not peel easily, just make egg salad instead.

2 medium organic beets, peeled, cooked and sliced
24 pastured eggs, boiled and peeled
1tsp organic dill weed (optional)
3-4c organic cider vinegar or sour pickle juice
Peel the beets and slice in half. In a sauce pan, simmer the beets for 10 minute or until just tender. Drain and let cool. When the beets are cool, thinly slice the beets. Add the beets to the bottom of a 2L mason jar.

In a large sauce pan bring 24 eggs to boil in filtered water. Boil for 10 minutes. Remove from heat and pour off the boiling water. Set the sauce pan into the sink and cover the eggs with cold water. Let the eggs cool before peeling. After peeling the eggs, rinse with clean water.

Top the beets with the peeled eggs. Add as much cider vinegar or sour pickle juice as needed to completely cover all the eggs. Refrigerate the eggs for at least one week before consuming. The pickled eggs will keep in the fridge for months.

Seasonal Foods: Frozen Wild Mushrooms

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There is nothing more delicious than wild mushrooms.

There is nothing more delicious than wild mushrooms. Our neighbor Joe Trotta brought over a big box of wild mushrooms for us. Thanks, Joe!

Normally, we saut? the wild mushrooms with some butter and sea salt and eat them right away. With over 20 pounds of wild mushrooms to process, we decided to try Joe’s method of storing mushrooms for winter consumption.

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Cover and cook the mushrooms in butter and sea salt until tender.

8-10c wild mushrooms
1/4c organic butter
1tsp sea salt
Clean and wash off all the dirt from the wild mushrooms and let them dry. In a very large fry pan, cover and simmer the mushrooms in butter and sea salt until very tender. Remove the mushrooms and cool. When the mushrooms are cool, portion the mushrooms into freezer bags suitable for your household needs. The frozen mushrooms are good in soups, stews, omelettes, pizza toppings, side dishes or wherever you normally use canned mushrooms.

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Let the wild mushrooms cool before packaging into freezer bags.

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Package the wild mushrooms in portions suitable for your household.

Lacto-Fermentation Horseradish Condiment

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The Nighshade Family are informally known as the Potato Family. This family includes all potatoes, tomatoes, eggplants, peppers, and tomatillos. These common foods can cause arthritis in sensitive people.

Making fresh horseradish condiment at home is very easy. Making condiments at home saves money and the condiment will be of better quality than any product available from the Industrial Food System. If you have a sensitivity to the Nightshade Family, using horseradish instead of hot peppers is a good substitute. Common symptoms of Nightshade Family sensitivity are the many forms of Arthritis, digestive disorders, and unexplained pain and stiffness that does not go away with treatment. If you would like more information about this topic please read an essay from the Weston A Price Foundation called Nightshades.

2c finely grated and peeled horseradish root
1T sea salt
1/4c live whey culture
extra filtered water if horseradish root is very dry (optional)
Clean and peel the horseradish root. Grate the horseradish root in a well ventilated space or work outside. Or chop up the horseradish into small pieces and grind into a fine paste using a food processor. The vapors that come off horseradish root makes crying from onions seem like a joke! Add the sea salt and homemade whey. Store the horseradish in a glass jar with extra space at the top to take the expansion during fermentation. If you do not know how to make whey please read Making Homemade Lacto-Fermentation Whole Seed Mustard. Let the horseradish sit in a warm place in your kitchen for 2-3 days until you can see many bubbles forming in the condiment. The horseradish condiment will last for months in the fridge. The horseradish?s flavor will continue to ?evolve? and mellow from the action of the live whey culture in your fridge over a number of months. You can serve the horseradish as is, or remove an amount you are going to use that day and add an equal amount of heavy fresh cream. I like it the best this way.