Dark Days and a bit of snow

Last night's dark days dinner was a one pot meal.  I made a fritatta.  It was pretty good, I started with butter in the bottom of my cast iron skillet.  I sliced some of the last potatoes from the garden and cooked them in the bottom of the pan.  Once they were done, I added some potato sausage from Kelso Meats that was left over from the previous day (already cooked) and topped it with some bean sprouts we grew.  Over this I poured about a dozen eggs (from our back yard).  Baked it in the oven at 350 for approx 30 min until the center was set.  Of course Madilyn had to get in on the picture.  Just in case there were before dinner samples.  Eggs are her favorite thing to eat.

 When I flipped it out of the pan it was not very pretty - but it was very tasty.  James dubbed it egg pizza and picked his slice up and ate it all.  We also had applesauce, plums, pickles and pickled squash to go with the meal.  The apples and plums were gleaned from friends/families yards, the pickles started as cucumbers at Stocker Farms and the squash came from our garden.  The pickled squash is a good way to preserve summer squash for winter months - a blend of tumeric, cinnamon, onions in a sweet and sour brine.  Very yummy!  We also had strawberry smoothies to drink with dinner.  We picked over 6 gallons of berries from a friend in Monroe this year - her patch had run over.  Fortunately she shared her bounty with us.  The kids are loving having so much fruit that is frozen this time of year. 

Daddy stayed home from work today as we have some snow.  Yesterday he went in but more snow is predicted for today and it is not worth having people slide into you just for a day's work.

He has been helping the kids build a snow fort, Madilyn just came in for round one of de-thawing. James and Scott have moved onto making snowmen. 

I enjoyed the fact that I was able to take these pictures from inside, while soaking some beans and starting my dutch oven on the wood stove for dinner tonight - not local but a one pot homemade meal at least.  The neighbors gave us a ham the other day so I am making black beans and ham for both families tonight. 

The plants all have a good layer of snow on them.  This is the Logan berry - I hope the bulbs that were peeking up through the dirt last week will be OK, I found garlic, tulips and chives starting to appear.