When life gives you lemons, make lemonade, and lemon juice, and lemon curd and.....

I bought my daughter a Meyer lemon tree a few years ago and planted it in the front yard.  Last year was the first year we got a few lemons, but they didn't last long.  This year it has been loaded, and from friends and other locals it sounds like that is pretty common this year.

This was the remaining 30+ lemons after we had already juiced at least ten.

My kids and I went out to pick the lemons today and we must have gotten over 40 off a 7 foot tall tree (I forgot to count until we already started juicing, so this is an estimation).  We made a big pitcher of lemonade and froze two ice cube trays of juice for future use.

Then I started looking for recipes to use.  I found a pretty simple one for a lemon curd and had the other ingredients on hand (eggs from my backyard chickens, sugar, and some butter).  It took two lemons to get the rind and juice needed and took about ten minutes to cook.

Lemon curd in a Pyrex fridgie

I found these recipes that we might try this week.  

Pork Meatballs with Lemon and Thyme

Lemon Braised Chicken and Beans with Mint Pesto

I am sure we will share with coworkers and neighbors as well.

New Chicks on the Block

 

We first got chickens in the fall of 2012.  I had wanted them for a while but it wasn't until I heard a neighbors chickens two doors down that I decided to get some.  Shortly afterward my neighbor came down to tell me that they were moving and wanted to know if we could take her chickens.  I ended up with 7 at one point, but after some predator losses I still have three of the neighbors chickens.  They are no longer spring chickens however, and their egg laying production has started to drop off recently.  It's still enough for our family of four, but they are getting older and I know it won't be enough for ever.

 

They are still useful because they help eat bugs like ticks from our yard. 

But lets face it, these ladies are getting ready for retirement.

 

Back in January I placed and order with My Pet Chicken .  I thought about hatching our own (but what would we do with the roosters) and I thought about buying locally.  However, I really wanted certain breeds, I wanted them to be sexed (female) and I only wanted four.  My Pet Chicken was a good option for this.  So we put in the order and waited.  And waited.  We got supplies ready because you have to be ready with a brooder set up.  The chicks need to stay pretty warm.  For this small operation we borrowed a brooder made by a coworker out of a Rubbermaid tub.  At first I bought the 250w red heat lamp recommended on the web site.  That was too hot for my small operation.  A 75w red heat bulb for reptiles was perfect!  We bought a chick feeder and waterer along with chick feed and some shavings and we were good to go!

 

Monday my chicks shipped.  Tuesday morning I got the call from the post office!  They were here!

This was the most exciting package I have ever received from the post office.

 

I got an Easter egger (lays blue/green eggs), a white leghorn (lays white eggs), a silver cuckoo marans (lays dark brown eggs) and a buff orpington (lays light brown eggs).  My egg basket is going to be really colorful in about six months.

They settled into their little brooder pretty quickly.  I checked each for pasty butt (sounds fun, right?) and gave them each a drink of water and showed them the food.  They are all doing great.

 

 

This age is super cute too, so we are all checking them as we go in and out of the garage and of course getting them used to some handling.  I named this one piccata.  Chicken Piccata.

November is a time for Citrus

Last week two of my coworkers brought in bags of citrus from their trees.  The satsumas that my boss brings in are tasty and sweet and people just eat them as a snack.  I have also used them to make a marmalade in the past.

This year the boss of my boss brought in what she described as northern (frost tolerant) key limes.  I was wondering about this and after doing some searching I think they might be limequats, a cross between the key lime and the cold hardy kumquats.  You can buy a limequat tree at Just Fruits and Exotics in Medart.

I was excited about them and when there were still a bunch left at the end of the week I brought them all home and planned to make a key lime pie with them.  I figured that I could also freeze the juice for future use.

A basket of limequats

 

The recipe I was using was an "easy" key lime pie recipe and it called for 1/2 cup of lime juice.  It took about ten limequats to make that much juice.  Luckily my aunt recently sent me a vintage juicer.

Juicing limequats

I also had to use 5 egg yolks.  My eggs come from my chickens in the backyard.  They are all different breeds and lay different sized eggs.  I am not sure if it mattered that much for egg yolks (even the tiny bantam eggs seem to have regular sized yolks) but the standard egg size in baking is large so if you are using other sized eggs you need to make sure you are using the right amount.  The My Pet Chicken blog has a great explanation here: 

My Pet Chicken Tips for Cooking with Backyard Eggs

 

So, I used my Jiffy Way egg scale (also from my aunt) to make sure the eggs I was using were about the right size, just to be safe.

I love my vintage jiffy-way egg scale.  It makes for great decor and it is useful too!

 

My daughter and I mixed up the ingredients and put it in the pie crust (going the easy way with some local ingredients here).  Then I noticed that the comments on the recipe had some modification recommendations to make sure it filled the pie pan.  Oh well.

Well, didn't quite fit all the way, but I am sure it will be tasty.

 And in the end it was pretty tasty.  My daughter didn't like it (it is very tart) but my husband and I did.

 

The final product with ready-whip.  So I used some local ingredients while still keeping it easy.