Winter Storage

The end of August and beginning of September is harvest time here. The house was not designed to hold a wide variety of winter stores—we do not have a root cellar—so finding good storage places for all of the winter foods can be tricky.  This is where various foods are stashed.

Basement wall, warm and dry:

• All canned and dried goods, in mason jars
• Wheat, oatmeal, and barley in large tin containers (there ones that held Christmas popcorn mostly).
• Beans in mason jars.
• Bulk pasta and teas in the original containers
• Honey in mason jars

Basement by the door, cooler and damper:

• Apple crop, laid on one layer thick in seedling trays

Stairwell of the basement, constant temp:

• Potatoes, sorted by variety in bags and then resting in milkcrates
• Next years seed stock is in bags, tucked way back in so we do not eat them by mistake
• Garlic hangs above the stairs

Larder, which is an insulated space, vented to the outside, accessed in the stairwell:

• Squash and pumpkins
• 60 pounds of onions
• loose garlic
• longkeeper tomatoes
• Fruits waiting to be processed
• Seed tin

As the weather grows colder, the larder also holds:

• Greens from Sunbow
• Leftovers
• Soup for the week
• Box of oranges over Winter Solstice

Garden Beds:

·        Greens

·        Parsnips

·        Leeks

·        Sprouting Broccoli

·        Not carrots—slugs eat the tops and I can’t find them after early November.

 

Late Summer Pasta

Roasted eggplant (cubed, rolled in olive oil, and roasted in 350 oven for about 45 minutes)

Half pint jar of roasted tomatoes (I use the one that did not seal…)

Sauteed onion and garlic

Can of the Good Tuna from Sweet Creek

Fresh basil

Toss them all together and serve over whole wheat pasta with  lots of Parmesan cheese.