Thursday, February 4, 2010

Kimchee for the Ketchup Mouthed

I discovered two years ago, that making saurkraut was easy~~at least for me. I've had other remarks from friends and family when they tried out my recipes. 
SO, your mileage my vary.

Ever since I started reading about fermented vegetables I loved the idea of kimchee, cabbage, ginger, garlic, onion, hot peppers. What's not to love? Well, the hot peppers for one, I'm rather a devout ketchup mouth and my tummy is even more rigid in its rules. Too much heat and we're miserable together in one body. So I've never got past smelling commercial kimchees. After getting Wild Fermentation for Christmas I realized I could make kimchee at the mild end of the scale. 

But, we're out of cabbage, so the cabbage was bought along with the ginger and garlic. I forgot to buy a hot pepper that day, so used chile powder. 
1lb cole slaw mix in a bag
1medium onion finely chopped
1 tblsp grated ginger root
5 cloves garlic
1 tsp chile powder 
1 tblsp salt
Put the cole slaw mix in a mixing bowl. 
Peel and chop the onion, add to bowl. 
Peel and grate the ginger root, add to bowl. 
Peel and chop the garlic, add to bowl.
Add tsp of chile powder  and tblsp of salt to bowl.
Mix, then stuff mixture into wide mouth quart jar. 
Pound mixture till juice comes with a wooden spoon.
When the juice comes up over the vegetables, tuck a piece of plastic down on top of the vegetables to mostly exclude air. 
Lay the lid and ring on top of the jar.
Leave it on the kitchen counter and push the vegetables down under the juice every day. In about a week it will ferment and become kimchee. Sour, salty, aromatic, delicious. 
And beautiful.

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Getting Ready for Summer

     
Two weeks ago Monday, Fay had me call back to Miller Tire Co. Finding tires for farm equipment isn't always possible locally, especially for the McCormick-Deering horse mower. We guess it was built 60 to 70 years ago. But in the Midwest there's enough Amish farmers to keep little parts businesses going. Mullet Machinery is another one that has made it possible to keep the old machine in good running condition. You can see that the old tire is not looking too good even on the rim.   
That split on the inside though, the old tire is done. Fay had no trouble getting the nuts off and the rim unbolted.
 
 
Then he rolled the rim and old tire out to the truck, I'd already loaded the new tire and tube.
 
 
  
After an hour and a half and two guys working on the change over at Les Schwab's, the rim was brushed free of rust and the new tire on. At least it wasn't like getting the leak in the hay wagon tire fixed. That took four guys to work on that antique. 
Fay installed the rim and new tire and the mower is ready to roll and mow.