Monday, January 25, 2010

Drying chips and carrots...the results

Well the jury is still out on the veggie chips.  Next time I will use 2 eggs and a bit of molasses to bind them.  They got very crumbly.  Not what I expected.


The baby carrots are wonderful.  Slicing them lengthwise has worked out very well.  Each dryer tray holds 1 pound bag.


Yesterday I was able to dry a total of 5 pounds...this is what they look like finished.


Today I've got 8 pounds in the dryer and will do 8 pounds a day until I get them all finished.  Once they are dried I'll put them in long term storage.

Sunday, January 24, 2010

Veggie Chips and Drying Carrots

My dad does a lot of juicing.  A LOT of juicing.  I was thinking about it one day and wondered what happened to all the pulp once he was done.  Apparently there's not a lot of nutrition left in it once the juice is out...but I figured that somehow it could be used.  So I had him save a bit of pulp and I'm experimenting with making some veggie chips for my goats as snacks.


Since the pulp is a little dry, I used an egg as a binder before making it into "cookies"....


We'll see how they dry and how the goats like them.  I'm sure something will like them even if the goats don't; and it's using up something that would have otherwise been thrown away.
Also this week I found a special on those little baby carrots.  I found them for 4 for $1.00!  I bought 40 pounds ($10 worth) and started drying them as well. 
A lot of them are going to the goats as treats, but I will dry at least 30 pounds of them by splitting them down the middle and putting them in the food dryer.  I would can them, except I have already canned a years worth.  I can dry them and vac seal them and they should be good for 5 years or so.


Saturday, January 23, 2010

Kidding season is done!

All of our goat babies are on the ground!  Here is my best effort to get them all into 1 picture. 

Our kid tally for the year was 13 total.  9 bucklings and 4 doelings.  This was the first year we've had a buck year!
The big brown boy in the middle front is going to stay here and be a new herd sire.  His mother is Happy and she has an exceptional udder and is milking over 6# a day already. 


There are 2 does we are planning to keep as well.  One is Happy's girl....we're calling her Ellie Mae


And the other is Tina's girl...we're calling her Cinder Ella....


We are really looking forward to watching these girls grow!


Saturday, January 9, 2010

And then there were 5!!

Our oldest doe, Happy requested a room at the new birthing spa this morning.  She went into hard labor about 11, had a tiny 3# 15 oz buckling at 12:15, a humongo 7.3 oz buckling at 12:19, and finished it off with a 5# 8 oz beautiful doe at 12:23. 

That's right folks....3 kids in 8 minutes!!  Wish they would have all been girls, but I guess that would be greedy.  Still waiting for the placentas, but otherwise everyone is doing great.

The twins born yesterday now have names.....
This is Eclectic Elixir (Lexi)

And her sister Evening Star (Eve)


Friday, January 8, 2010

Yay Daydream!

Our Dreamy Goat had babies today!!  First kids of 2010 and they are BOTH does!

Both mom and kids are doing great!

Thursday, January 7, 2010

Waiting, Chixperiment Update, and Dried Egg Rolls

Still no kids yet.  I think my goats may explode.  The temps are down in the teens now and it's getting rainy...so I figure they are going to go into labor at any moment.  For now, Faith and Daydream are in the kidding stalls in the nice new warm kidding barn.  Happily eating hay, ordering room service, and pooping up a storm.


Daydream is now 2 days late...and here's a shot of her behind after the kids dropped!

I am so thrilled with our new kidding barn....and the fixing up of the kid pen and milking parlor!  Here is the view from my milking parlor.  Check out the great gates my great hubby built!!  The gate on the right goes to the kidding pen and barn, the gate straight ahead goes into the back yard.

On the chixperiment side of things....here is my pick for the rooster that will sire the next generation of our meat birds.  He's a big boy and got a neat personality, plus some really neat spots.  He is about 3 months old and I plan to breed him back to my original 3 cornish cross hens plus a couple of keeper hens from the first breedings.  We'll see if the second generation does as well as the first!


On a final note...I am working on a new food project.  We love egg rolls, and we make them from scratch.  Well, I dry a lot of different vegetables...including cabbage.  I got an idea that I could dry cabbage, as well as the pre-made broccoli slaw, add my dried mushrooms, dried onions, and make a dry mix of vegetables for making egg rolls.  My theory is that once I package the mixture, I can simply rehydrate the mix....add some fresh bean sprouts and water chestnuts, the meat (I use my home canned chicken), seasonings and soy sauce and I will have a quick batch of eggroll filling. 

I catch the broccoli slaw mixture on sale quite often.  If I can dry it successfully, this will be great!  It takes 1 package (plus the other ingredients) to make a big batch of egg rolls.  I got cabbage on sale last week for $.19/lb and bought 10 heads of it.  As long as it stays cool I can keep it fresh...but if the weather turns warm I will be drying it.  I make sauerkraut but I am the only one in the family that likes it, so I don't make much.  Anyway, part 1 of the experiment....

The slaw filled 1 tray of the dryer.  It's a great mixture of julienned broccoli stems, sliced red cabbage, and julienned carrots.  It's a real time saver for making eggrolls, and when I catch it on sale it is a $$ saver also.

Next I slice the cabbage very thinly.  I am cutting down a small head of cabbage to dry.


Once it's all cut up I put it into the dryer...


It should be done tomorrow.  Then we'll see how the slaw mixture dries and how it rehydrates.  If it works, it may be an excellent food storage item!!