Grandma's Cranberry Relish

I just finished making this year's batch of cranberry relish for Thanksgiving. It's one of the only dishes I always make for the holiday. The rest of the meal is whatever I feel like making that particular year. The funny thing is that when I was a kid, I didn't like cranberry relish. Every year Grandma would make a big old bowl of it for Thanksgiving dinner and I would go for the can-shaped cranberry sauce instead. My tastes have certainly evolved over time. I never liked baked macaroni and cheese (despised it, in fact) or lasagna back then either but I do now. And I love the tangy relish too, though I still have a soft spot for uber-processed jelled circular sauce.

The recipe for Grandma's Cranberry Relish is not at all a secret. It's on nearly every bag of fresh cranberries: a bag of cranberries and an orange all ground up and mixed with 1/2 cup of sugar. Her recipe is slightly different, as is mine, in that we include an apple as well. I think she liked using a Granny Smith apple. Sometimes she'd put in a lemon too. This year I had Honey Crisp apples in the fridge, so that's what I used. 

The real secret to making the most amazing cranberry relish ever is in the tools. Years before Grandma passed away, she gave me one of her old Universal meat grinders. This heavy metal tool from the early 20th century is essential for getting the perfect grind. I've never made this cranberry relish with any other tool. The bag recipe says to use a food processor, but I don't think that would work as well. 

Another tool I use in making this relish is not at all necessary but has become a decade-spanning tradition in our household. That is the wide, low stoneware bowl my husband got from his uncle. It fits beautifully under the grinder.

Once all (both) the tools are gathered, the relish takes literally minutes to make. Rinse the cranberries and sort out any bad ones, then thoroughly wash the orange and the apple. Core and slice the apple and cut the orange into wedges. Note: do not peel the orange! Then send everything through the grinder. I like to alternate the cranberries and fruit slices, but that's not necessary. Take your time and listen to the sounds of the cranberries popping, the apples crushing, and the oranges squeaking through the screw drive of the grinder. 

All too soon, you will have a full, beautiful bowl of perfectly ground fruits. This year, the orange was a particularly juicy one, so I drained off a lot of liquid. Then I added just under a half cup of white sugar. I tasted it and added a little more. And that's it! Grandma's Cranberry Relish!

I spooned the relish into two containers and put them directly into the freezer since Thanksgiving is still two weeks away. Grandma would often make gallons of the stuff when the cranberries were on sale for the holiday and fill a dozen frosting containers that she had saved throughout the years. That way, anytime she roasted a chicken or other large chunk of meat, she could pull some relish out of the freezer and make it a festive meal. I don't make a lot of cranberry relish at a time. I really like the seasonality of it. We only use one container for Thanksgiving, however, so the second container is a nice addition to a meal later on.

I really miss my Grandma but I feel her with me every time I make her cranberry relish.

Oh Deer!

We've known from the time we moved into this house, more than ten years ago now, that there's a thriving population of deer in the neighborhood. That's why we built a fence around the garden as soon as we finished filling the new beds with soil. For years, the narrow strips of lattice supplemented with taller plastic mesh was enough to keep the deer out of the garden. (It didn't, however keep out the rabbits as reported in posts from 2015, 2020, and last year.) That changed last year when I noticed hoof prints in the beds for the first time. 

Some prints and nibbles on August 3, 2023

At that time, we didn't do anything significant about the intrusion. It seemed to be a one-time thing and didn't effect our harvest for the season. Then, one year later, I noticed again, that one of our four-hoofed acquaintances had found its way into our garden.

Another incursion August 21, 2024

I had assumed that, like the year before, the deer had found its way into the garden by accident. With the fence, the plants, and the wooden paths, I felt like it hadn't intentionally leapt into the visual noise. But, since it was there, it went ahead and sampled what the garden had to offer. There was evidence of nibbling on most of the plants including the cucumbers and tomatoes. The beast mainly enjoyed the leaves on the bean plants, but not the beans themselves, and the Swiss chard. There wasn't a huge amount of damage so, again, I didn't worry about it too much.

When more and more prints appeared in the beds over the next weeks, we decided to take action. Our entire backyard has a slight slope to the south. We built the garden where an above ground pool had been so the north side of the fence is closer to the ground than the south side. I deduced, therefore, that it was the north side over which the deer had been jumping. Furthermore, we have very tall, very bushy asparagus at the east end of the garden along the fence, so the deer must be coming over the western portion. That's where my husband built increased fortification. 

Notice the extra tall white fencing at the left.

For a few weeks, it seemed as though the deer had been thwarted. Then, in early October, more hoof prints appeared. This time, the creature ate nearly all our remaining chard. I found that particularly annoying as leaf miners had gotten into the chard earlier in the season and I had basically given up on it for the season when, at the end of September, the plants started sending up fresh, new leaves. I had hoped for a late harvest but that didn't happen.

One evening, I was in our kitchen making dinner when I happened to look out the window toward our garden. I saw a brown blob inside the fence and knew it was a deer. I grabbed my good camera and quietly rushed outside. I managed to get one picture of the offender - as seen at the top of this post - and a brief video of it fleeing the scene.

I also got a couple pictures of the rogue deer rejoining the rest of the herd in our backyard.

I don't like the example this sets with the little ones.

Several years ago, my husband gave me a game camera for Christmas. I've seen many wonderful animals that I wouldn't have even known were passing through if not for the camera. (check out this compilation I made: "Everyone love the hole under our neighbor's shed") The camera had been facing our middle yard but I moved it into the garden with the hopes of catching a future deer visit. 

When I pulled the memory card a few days later, there were hundreds of images on it. This isn't at all unusual. It actually was fewer images than was typical since there were fewer things moving within the confines of the garden to trigger the camera. We had already cleaned up most of the beds since nearly everything had been harvested at that point. Most of the images were of the remaining plants waving randomly and of squirrels - other frequent visitors to the garden.

Two squirrels at once.

My eyes sort of glazed over as I quickly clicked through the images until a sudden change caught my attention.

!!!

There it was: the trespassing deer staring straight at the camera, eyes all aglow from the infrared flash. And it wasn't just a quick in and out. I have 132 images of the deer wandering through the garden.

At this point, we're not going to enact any new anti-deer measures. We've finally had a frost  - though it wasn't a true killing one - and we've gotten what we want out of the garden. In the spring, when we finish the switchover to new beds, we'll remake the fence as well in the hope that next season the garden will go unmolested. In the meantime, I hope to enjoy more pictures of our backyard wildlife doing their wild things.
 

Strawberry Popcorn

We grew strawberry popcorn this year. It was the corn in our Three Sisters bed. This area is good for corn, but, as a home garden, I wasn't expecting to get much from our little 4-foot by 11-foot bed. I was actually delightfully surprised!

We planted the shiny little red kernels on May 25 with the rest of the garden.

And then we waited. A week later, we had rows of perfect blade-like seedlings.

Two weeks later, the whole bed was really starting to look like something. 

One more week and everything had more than doubled in size.

July came...

...and we just kept waiting. There really wasn't anything else to do. By then, the weeds had slowed considerably so daily maintenance wasn't necessary. When there was heavy rain and/or high winds, we sort of pushed the flattened corn stalks up again, but they more-or-less straightened themselves on their own.

By mid August there was definite progress in ear-development.

Some of the ears seemed odd to me (three in one spot?), but what do I know? This was my first time growing popcorn. A green stink bug seemed okay with it.

As did the bees.

And so there was more waiting as the stalk and ears began to dry.

By early October, I was tired of waiting. Though my patience has greatly improved as I've gotten older, I hit my limit. The majority of the ears were nice and dry so I went for it.

I am now putting shucking popcorn right up there with - well just slightly lower than - shelling beans. It was a beautiful day as I sat on our concrete patio, pulling back the dried husks, and revealing shiny, gorgeous, tiny, red ears of popcorn.

And after shucking ear after ear, I had a lovely surprise: an entirely white ear!

I got 21 shiny ears of strawberry popcorn in all (just the one white one). I strung them up with twine and hung them on our porch so they could dry further. 

I read that it would take about two weeks to fully dry. Of course, that varies by location and weather conditions. So, eight days after hanging the ears, I pulled one down to give it a try.

It was a bit of a struggle to pull the kernels off the cob, so I only did half of the tiny ear.

I put the loose kernels into a paper bag and microwaved them for about two minutes. I could hear tiny explosion but was disappointed by what I found when I opened the bag. The kernels had split open but that was it. My impatience was not rewarded.

So the half-ear of popcorn sat on our kitchen counter next to the last of the season's tomatoes until last night when I decided to try again. This time the kernels practically fell off the cob and made wonderful popping sounds in the microwave. And, lo and behold, we had popcorn!

I plan to leave the other 20 ears hanging on the porch for the next couple of days since we are experiencing 80 degree weather (yuck! The time of summer has past; it's fall now!). If the kernels come off easily, I know they're ready. If not, we'll hang them inside as temperatures will be falling back into the 50s by the end of the week (yay!).

In case anyone is wondering, the corn stalks became fall decor along with some pumpkins and a giant mum I got at my favorite pumpkin-and-mum-buying spot.

The popcorn harvest was just the start of putting the garden to bed for the winter. It's always a bit sad to see the end of fresh veggies, but I'm ready to be done for now. Some locals are not as pleased by the end of our growing season. But that's a story for next time....

Oh Deer!

The Little Pumpkin That Could(n't)

Last fall, I bought a wonderful white pumpkin striped with orange and green at a farm stand near my job at the time. I had never seen anything quite like it. I got it just for decoration rather than for eating, so at the end of the season I bashed it apart on my concrete patio and put the pieces along the tree line at the back of our property as a seasonal treat for the deer and other woodland creatures who frequent the area. I saved a bunch of the seeds for myself with the hope of growing my own lovely, unique pumpkins.

When I started my herb seeds this spring, I put three of the saved pumpkin seeds in the starter tray. I learned that this variety was called One Too Many, which seemed like a good sign. Out of the three seeds I started, one plant grew. Boy did it grow. It was the reason I needed to keep raising the grow lamp. I also planted three Long Pie pumpkins seeds, with one actually germinating too. But Long Pie is just a side character in this story. One Too Many is our protagonist.

May 5: One Too Many on the left, Long Pie on the right.

May 23: One Too Many on the left, Long Pie on the right.

I had really good feelings about my pumpkin seedlings when I transplanted them out into the garden on Memorial Day weekend. Of the two, I gave better odds of survival to One Too Many. Long Pie was a nice seedling but kind of spindly. I know pumpkins can be resentful of transplanting, but I was confident that sturdy One Too Many would be fine. 

May 25: One Too Many in the center of the bed in the background. Small but proud.

I planted arugula in the bed with One Too Many. I like to put fast spring crops with larger later plants. I put Pak Choi in the bed with the zucchini and radishes with the beans. There is also a sweet basil plant in the corner of the bed, which grew beautifully and made tasty pesto but has little bearing on this tale. 

I feel like the arugula may have somewhat overwhelmed One Too Many. As the little spicy leaves flourished, the pumpkin just kinda sat there, not growing much but not giving up either.

June 22: Arugula making a run for it and going to seed with One Too Many at the left.

June 22: After the arugula was harvested giving One Too Many some breathing room.

I will admit that at this point, I was a bit concerned. Pumpkins have long growing seasons and One Too Many was pretty much the same size as it had been when it went into the garden a month earlier. Would there be time to make fruit? I considered adding something else to the bed to use the space. Each year I have to decided how to best use the very limited space I have. I don't like empty ground in my beds. But I decided to give the little pumpkin a chance and in just a few weeks, it was really doing its thing.

August 11 - One Too Many filling the bed.

August 11: A pumpkin!!

August 18: And another! (certainly not one too many, though)

I was excited to find the first tiny pumpkin. Then another larger one appeared a week later. After finding the second, more robust pumpkin, I debated taking off the smaller. That would funnel more resources to the larger and give it a better chance of growth. That made some sense, but I didn't want to limit the pumpkin potential. All your eggs in one basket, etc., etc. So, I left them both be and the plant ended up self-selecting the larger pumpkin anyway.

August 31: Looking fine.

The pumpkin began putting on weight and its stripes began to develop. It was slow and steady for weeks as I watched over it. By mid-September, I began thinking about when I should pick my one and only One Too Many pumpkin. It was not growing any bigger and the orange webbing on its white skin had really darkened to a lovely shade. One of the many squirrels in the neighborhood (the bane of my garden, which haven't really been too terrible this season actually) had sampled the pumpkin. It was only a little nick, though. I could bring it in now but I didn't want to cut it from the vine too early. There were still several weeks left in the season. So, I left it where it was.

September 21: Look at those stripes!

Spoiler alert, I should have picked it. This last week was very rainy. There weren't any torrential storms, just near-constant rain and perpetual gloominess. I did cursory checks of the garden each day. I picked a bucket of grape tomatoes on one dryer day but otherwise did little to the other plants. The sun finally came out at the end of the week so I could do a more in-depth inspection. When I looked at One Too Many, I did not like what I saw.

September 29: hmmm

The squirrels had been sampling again. While frustrating, it wasn't the end of the world. We weren't planning on eating this pumpkin. It was just for display. The missing chunk was unsightly but maybe it was still salvageable. Looking closer, though, it seemed like the pumpkin had sunk slightly into the ground. Perhaps it had rained heavily enough for the dirt underneath it to wash out. Well then, I had better pull it out of the mud and put it back on solid ground. So, I gently lifted it up...

Sad trumpet sounds.

Well crud. The pumpkin hadn't sunken into the soft ground. The underside had completely rotted and it collapsed. So much for One Too Many's lone pumpkin.

I hate to leave a story on a sad note. Remember side character Long Pie? Our spindly little friend produced three pumpkins. We plan on eating them. And I still have a bag of saved seeds from last fall's decorative pumpkin so I can try again next year.

Three Long Pie pumpkins just waiting to be part of the fall feast.

Not the nibbler but still a squirrel (photo from last summer)