Fall Blessings

These are four of my favourite people. We had the honor of hosting Debs friends as they embarked on magnificent journeys. T and N were heading out to New Brunswick to begin a new chapter in life, and My daughter D and her friend R were heading out for a one month cross North America trip.

D and R heading out with Cali on their minds, a convertable, and full bank accounts.

We heard from them from various points across Canada and they made it to the west coast.

Last I heard, they were in Portland Oregon.

We are on a constant search for firewood. We scored some at Aunt T's cottage.

Double blessing as they have been needing to clean up, and we have insatiable appetites for wood.

If I keep the home fire burning, the oil furnace doesnt kick on.

Sue finally processed the last of the pumpkins. We have a number of frozen pies and loafs in the freezer, and we have been eating lots of pumpkin seeds!

Sue went out yesterday and picked the last of the brocolli and colrabi. She then made an awesome dip and served it with Pita. Late season brocolli is really good. Our Kale is still growing despite the heavy frosts and we hope for at least one more feed. When I build the greenhouse, that will significantly extend the growing season.

I took some trout out of the freezer and thawed it out. When I opened the package, I realized that we had left the skin on and that we had intended to smoke these. Since the trout was thawed, I made a brine and let the fish soak for another 24 hours. In the meantime, I got to work on a smokehouse.

The bottom box has a propane burner with a pot of woodchips/shavings and barks that we save from our firewood processing. The burner causes the wood to smoke. I intend to use a smaller burner and put racks in side the box. I want to also explore using wood rather than Propane. 

I cut a hole in the top of the box, and built a stone oven on top of the box. I put my pepper seasoned fish on a small grill and put it in the stone smoke oven for 4 hours. I put some homemade maple syrup on top of the fish at hour 2. When it came off the grill, we feasted on the best smoked trout I have ever eatin! I s**t you not...THE BEST! 

These are just some of our Fall Blessings.