Ashley Burkhart Walker
Special to the Hiawatha World
Spring break couldn’t have finished out any more beautiful than it did, and for that I am super grateful. We had a bit of running several days of spring break and the rest of the days just didn’t scream “perfect afternoon weather to finally plant your potatoes” until Sunday afternoon. Sunday overall, was just a good day. I finished something pressing on Saturday, and once you get certain things off of your plate, it really just lifts a weight off of you, allows you to breathe and move forward easier. So, Sunday I woke up ready to tackle things I needed to do. I am not one to go play in the garden when it’s chilly out, I require sunshine and warm weather for gardening, so that was the afternoon plan. We got milking done, ate breakfast, then I skimmed cream off of 7 jars of milk just so I could fit the morning’s milk in the fridge after cooling down in the freezer for a couple of hours. That cream will be churned into butter in the earlier part of this week, which I am kind of excited about. Winter butter takes so long to churn, but since the cows have been finding some green grass in the pasture, churning should go much faster, and the butter will start to get some nice yellow color back to it with the beta-carotene the cows are consuming through the green plants. After skimming, I asked the husband what kind of sweet treat he’d like sent with his lunches during the week, cookies or brownies. The brownies won out, so I made brownies with fresh milled flour for the first time. I finely milled some soft white wheat for them, and they turned out amazing, no odd texture or taste to them even with the whole wheat. We’ve been switching out all-purpose flour in every recipe for freshly milled flour, no complaints or issues, just enjoying reaping all the benefits of fresh milled flour, especially in brownie form!
The brownie making drove me to another much needed to do task. Just to get to a brownie pan, I needed to move my new stack of 5-gallon buckets in the pantry. I bought wheat seed, oatmeal, and etc. in bulk and just got my food-safe 5-gallon buckets to store it all in this past week. They do not fit well into my narrow pantry unfortunately. One thing about a bulk ingredient household, is you need a place to store it all, and have it halfway organized at that. I pulled all of my buckets out of the pantry after popping the brownies in the oven and started deciding how I could maximize storage in my pantry that was decently packed to the brim already with everything it takes to do my 50 hobbies. I pulled my oldest in with me to stare at it all as well. Together, we decided on some skinny shelves to hopefully move all of the half gallon jars that I store dry beans and ingredients in to, thus being able to make some room for 5-gallon buckets. I ran out and asked the husband to manufacture a couple of shelves for me when he got time. He made them for me right away, because even though I say “when you have time” he knows I usually don’t want to wait at all, lucky me! The pantry has a long way to go, but at least I have what I need to get started now.
When the wind died down, I grabbed the seed potatoes, onion sets, and kids, couldn’t forget the kids with all the dirt work we needed to do! We gathered hoes and started some nice big rows to plant potatoes down. Once my oldest found a toad we lost the help and focus of my youngest but pulled her back into gardening when it was time to actually plant the seed potatoes. I lost track of how many pounds of potatoes we had to plant, but the husband came out and put them in the ground too, which made it go a bit quicker. We laid out where the onions were going next and I set the kids to it by themselves while the husband and I went to milk after I gathered Georgi the Brown Swiss from the pasture, she tends to like grazing over coming and waiting for me at the gate with the spring grass coming up. The kids didn’t have many onions left to plant after I made it back out after putting milk away. They wished they would have counted how many holes they made once done planting, there were lots of little onion bulbs, but not so many that they didn’t fill the entire space I had for them. When I told them I would be buying more, they said I’d have to plant them by myself, ha, but they slowly came around to it not sounding like such a bad idea.
We still have an asparagus patch to start along with planting an assortment of other cool weather things, but I was so happy to have it all started, as I was feeling behind!
Once my son was finished hoeing a row, he stated he “needed a glass of milk”. A little raw milk, sunshine, and time in the dirt makes for a healthy, healing day, oh, and don’t forget those brownies.
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It may not be a prime time to include a recipe with an abundance of eggs in it with egg prices, but if you have your own chickens, then their laying will have picked up and you may have plenty of eggs and I love a recipe using both eggs and milk! This egg custard is an old-fashioned dish and a simple one at that. It’s perfect any time of day!
Egg Custard
Ingredients:
5 eggs
½ cup sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
½ teaspoon salt
4 cups whole milk
Nutmeg for topping
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and lightly grease an 8×8 baking dish
In a large bowl, beat together the eggs, sugar, vanilla, and salt.
In a small saucepan, heat the milk to about 180 degrees F or just before it starts to simmer (Do not boil).
Very slowly pour a stream of the hot milk into the egg mixture while continuously whisking until fully combined. Whisk the final mixture for one additional minute.
Pour into the prepared baking dish and sprinkle nutmeg over the top if desired.
Fill a larger baking dish with water until it is about 1 inch deep. Place the dish of custard into the larger dish of water, careful not to splash.
Place the doubled dishes in the oven and bake for 45-50 minutes or until an inserted knife comes out clean, custard will still jiggle. Be careful not to overbake as the custard will curdle.
Serve warm or chilled, and top with whipped cream, fruit, or additional spices. Refrigerate any leftovers.
