Kitchen Days

When there is a large garden, there are long days in the kitchen. Friday morning I made vegetable broth with bits and pieces from the refrigerator. It came out particularly dark, which is caused by leaving the onion skins on. I needed it to make potato leek soup for dinner and a rice casserole for tomorrow. It looks like there will be a quart or two extra. Vegetable broth is a staple of our pantry.

I have four crates of tomatoes stacked in the kitchen waiting for disposition. Half of them are plum tomatoes and half slicers. I don’t count the cherry tomatoes in this, but there are plenty of them as well. The plums will get canned as soon as they are fully ripe. I don’t know what to do with the slicers, but maybe pints of tomato sauce.

The best thing about a kitchen day is there is little expenditure of money. A majority of ingredients were grown at home and those bought at the store were at the end of their shelf life and needed to be used up. Living on a fixed income makes non-spending days an important part of the mix.

Being kitchen-focused for a day is one aspect of a living whole life as a pensioner.

I’ve been outdoors several times today and it is gorgeous. I saw the first Monarch Butterfly of the season landing on milkweed. On my trail walk this morning, children were gathering at the bus stop for the first day of public school. Autumn is in the air, although I need a few more kitchen days of summer before it arrives.