Veggies from Across the State Line

This weekend I went to retrieve a portion of the harvest from my dad's rural Wisconsin garden. He has a reserve stock including 2 chest freezers full of food, a pantry full of canned goods and jars of dehydrated wild mushrooms, herbs and peppers. I wonder where my drive to squirrel away food comes from?! He can't help himself from growing way more than he can eat, so we collaborated in the spring and planned for a bunch of his harvest to be stored in my root cellar. His home doesn't have a cold storage option, so we loaded my car full with the excess carrots, beets, potatoes, butternut squash, buttercup squash and cabbage.

I also spent a few hours picking berries in his raspberry patch. I came away with about a gallon of raspberries and a bunch of scratches. He enjoyed watching me from his perch in the middle of the nearly finished garden. I think he was happy to have me come and pick the patch. It was a good year for raspberries and he had already picked many gallons of berries. He sent me home with some frozen berries, too, so I can make a few batches of preserves as time allows.

We just have to hit up the local farmer's market for a big sack of onions and our root cellar will be stocked full for the winter. It is strange to be doing all of these activities because the weather here has been very summer-like over the past 2 weeks.

I didn't take any pictures, but I also enjoyed an afternoon with my Grandma Shirley. We made a trip to a nearby yarn store where we browsed patterns and talked about yarns. Then we went out for a slice of pecan pie. It was great to get away for the weekend, unplug from computers and cell phones, spend time with family, be outside, make good food and knit. It was a pretty time of year to travel through the forest, as well. And, if that wasn't already enjoyable enough, while I was out of town Paul was hard at work painting the dining room!

Upon my return, I added a few things to my to-do list, including making sauerkraut and canning raspberry preserves. If you have any advice for making either of those things, particularly container suggestions for sauerkraut and/or low-sugar recipes for raspberry preserves, please let me know. I'd love to hear about it.