New and experienced climbers over 50 #36

Al and I crushed some plastic this morning while we got at least an inch of rain here in downeast Maine. Maybe next time it will be on some granite!

M Mwrote:

Al and I crushed some plastic this morning while we got at least an inch of rain here in downeast Maine. Maybe next time it will be on some granite!

Volta?  Nice place. Not the same as Great Head or Precipice, but fun.  My in-laws live 15 minutes from there (Ellsworth), so we've been a fair bit.

Hope tomorrow is better. We're hoping to get to Farley tomorrow after we hit the climbing gym to escape all the rain this morning. 

GO

I logged in the rain today and made a fish chowder out of the leftovers from the monster trout that some kid gave me at the lake the other day as a tip for my sunset busking. 

So glad to see you East Coasters getting out together.  

Helen? Are you around?  I wanted to make sauerkraut today but then realized I don’t have a crock.  My daughter referred me to a pickling kit which includes Mason jars, “pickle pipes”??? And some kind of burping mechanism.  WTF?

Pickle pebbles?  And Pickle Packers?    

This sounds like some kind of cult.  Anyway I couldn’t work up the will to garden this year but I have a lot of enthusiasm for cooking and canning.  Saw the first apricots and black plums today at the Farmers Market.  But first, what to do with this ginormous head of cabbage?  

Are we getting near the end of this one? Kind of sad the OP is not participating. If you want to come up and climb w us the offer is there. 

City of Rocks is too far for me. I hear it's really great though. 

GabeOwrote:

Volta?  Nice place. Not the same as Great Head or Precipice, but fun.  My in-laws live 15 minutes from there (Ellsworth), so we've been a fair bit.

Hope tomorrow is better. We're hoping to get to Farley tomorrow after we hit the climbing gym to escape all the rain this morning. 

GO

I doubt we will have dry rock tomorrow but maybe just maybe it will clear enough for the predicted strong northern lights tomorrow night after a day of splitting wood in the yard.

Let me know if you want to get away from the inlaws next time you visit them, just don't plan on climbing weekends,  this is 9 out of 10 rainy weekend so far this season. I'll almost always meet at Volta but usually put the membership on hold for a couple months every summer.

Lori Milaswrote:

So glad to see you East Coasters getting out together.  

Helen? Are you around?  I wanted to make sauerkraut today but then realized I don’t have a crock.  My daughter referred me to a pickling kit which includes Mason jars, “pickle pipes”??? And some kind of burping mechanism.  WTF?

Pickle pebbles?  And Pickle Packers?    

This sounds like some kind of cult.  Anyway I couldn’t work up the will to garden this year but I have a lot of enthusiasm for cooking and canning.  Saw the first apricots and black plums today at the Farmers Market.  But first, what to do with this ginormous head of cabbage?  

Geez....

Sauerkraut is super easy. Just get a big glass jar, or, that classic ceramic crock. It's not a half year thong, it's a week or two. Part of the point of making your own, or buying it from a refrigerated section, is that it has NOT been canned, i.e. heated and pastuerized. It's live still.

So.

Thinly slice some cabbage. Toss it with a generous amount of salt. Pack it into a glass or ceramic vessel of some sort. A "pickle packer" in my house looks remarkably like my right hand. Pack it in. It will start making it's own brine fairly quickly. If you don't have much brine, just mix salt and water and add it.

Add something to weight it down. Ceramic plate, with a closed glass jar for weight. Again, this could be a glass mixing bowl and stoneware plate, and glass jar, for example. I had a crock, and found a plate just the right size for it. Then, just a quart jar for the weight.

Cover with a dish towel to keep debris or whatever out, then put it someplace coolish. On the floor, is what I had, so that's what it was. Once a day, take a peek, and skim off any foamy stuff.

EDIT to add, you want the veggies completely submerged in brine, but there's always gonna be a bit floating around. Packing it tight, helps, and also starts squeezing out brine. 

After about 5 days? Taste it. Want it stronger? Leave it longer. I liked about 10 days, if memory serves.

Then pull it out, enjoy, and start some more. It can stay krauting along for a long time though, and some people just keep adding more whatever to the brine, keep it going. I just made it a couple times, and plowed straight through, honestly. It's pretty darn tasty, even cold. 

An old Bulgarian lady I met at our farmers market would ask for small cabbages in the fall. A standing order. She would simply core them, fill the core with salt, and stack them up in a big barrel she had for just this.

She said that was her salad for the winter.

Once you get over being scared of it? Then it's super fun to brine other things. Recipes that are salt brines, not vinegar. Dilly beans, dilly asparagus, and my favorite, corned beef, or, if you can get hold of it, corned elk. The brined meats look ugly, for me, because I don't add the stuff that keeps them bright pink. So they're grey brown. But geez, tasty tasty.

Wild fermentation, by Sandor Katz, or something like a Ball's big book of preserving (canning recipes) are good resources. Online has plenty, but I have books, I'm so old.

Vinegar pickling is even easier. You don't have to use it as a can the whole year's worth of garden stuff. You can just make a quick little pickle of whatever to have for dinner. Just slice super thin, and toss together.

Jam, well, there's a stupidly easy way to make little batches fresh, and, 100% fruit, no sugar at all, if you want. Chia seeds magically gel stuff. So just mash up fruit, stir in chia seeds, and voila, jam. It isn't a preserving for a year kinda thing, just a fun thing to have fruit binge on toast....without sugar.

It's stupid hot here today, so all activity has come to a halt. But, it's supposed to be more reasonable again tomorrow, so tomorrow will be back to the hard work of closing out an entire house of stuff. I'm hoping to have it pretty much ready for a huge sale, mid June....but before we leave for City Friday. Friday!! Yay!!!

Helen

Happy birthday, Ed! Gosh, you guys look great!

Thank you so much, Helen! I was hoping you would be around to save the day. I’m really trying to eat more sour and fermented foods. My goal has been to have just a bite of something … Yogurt, Kiefer, sauerkraut, etc. a few times a day. My burning question is if I were to take some of that sauerkraut and throw it in the pot with corned beef have I just ruined its nutritional value completely?

The farmers market was looking good this morning. I pulled out my canning jars and canning pot, I’ve never used a pressure cooker.  But I’d be willing to try.  I

I miss Jeremy so much. This was one thing we did together every summer. We pull all the plums off the tree and God they were good. The last summer I was there I canned 400 pounds. So it was not a small venture. And lately I’ve been lazy and maybe stingy and only canned a couple jars of apricots and I always regret it later because they’re magnificent year-round. And loaded with vitamin A!  My plan is to fill up my car with both from the Sacramento co op and then hurry home and start canning .
A few months ago, I attempted to marinate some asparagus in an olive oil mixture. I wasn’t happy with it. The olive oil hardened up and kind of tore up the asparagus.

What say you on cherries? If I got a crate of cherries do I have to pit them one by one?  That would be a major undertaking. But I love cherry jam!  

In the alternative we can just swing by your house and you can feed. :-)

We have a pretty good crop of apricots on our tree this year. Getting very close to ripe.

Old lady Hwrote:

A "pickle packer" in my house looks remarkably like my right hand. Pack it in. 

Helen

Old lady H!

Nick Goldsmithwrote:

I logged in the rain today and made a fish chowder out of the leftovers from the monster trout that some kid gave me at the lake the other day as a tip for my sunset busking. 

Right on, Nick!

:D

I got out to Bald mountain twice and gym bouldering twice this week.  Gym bouldering has helped my outside bouldering way more than outside bouldering has helped my gym climbing.  

Lori, you should go out to Solid Gold with Bob.  You would do just fine on it.  It isn't that far of a walk and the stone is beautiful.

Back at the Funny River fish camp. Kenai Mts across Brown’s lake

Afternoon light

The next few months are the bountiful time. Give thanks for the upcoming harvest. Got a mama moose and two calves hanging around. Eating my birch saplings. This is why spruce take over the neighborhood…

Brandt Allenwrote:

We have a pretty good crop of apricots on our tree this year. Getting very close to ripe.

My goodness, Brandt!  That’s a beautiful tree. Has it produced fruit every year? If there’s a chance that it would grow, I will plant one too!  I would probably have to hire someone to dig a hole in our backyard because I could not shovel down that deep.  

I met this little guy on my walk this morning— quite a few this year, very shy, won’t let me get too close.    

This desert is a peaceful place.

—-

thank you Jan for the recommend of solid gold.  I think we’ve put off going to Wonderland because it’s questionable if I would have the energy to hike there climb, and hike back. I’m guessing Bob is not in the mood to carry me.  But now I'm  feeling probably ready. I see that there’s another Houser route just a few routes over, an 11d.  So, wow!  

So here’s the question I’m pondering this morning. The last route I was on on turtle rock the crux move required digging in on a very sharp edge and I couldn’t take the pain. That reminded me that I got shut out on dog day afternoon primarily because I couldn’t tolerate some very sharp edges.  And I see the reviews on solid gold, if there are any negative ones, it’s about the sharp edges of pitch one.

So how do you toughen up your fingers so you can handle those edges?  No point going until I can toughen up my fingertips.

Climb more sharp edges. Embrace the pain.

Lori - The apricot tree is somewhere around 10 years old. Last year it had very little fruit, I think because I didn't give it enough water early in the season. This year I made sure to water it in late Feb and through March and April, and it's doing much better. Paula will be making apricot jelly, if the birds don't get too much of the fruit first.

It doesn't take much of a hole to plant a 5-gallon apricot tree. I'd be happy to come over and dig one for you.

Lori, Though it has been a very long time since I've been in there, my recollection is that the actual walk itself into the Superdomes isn't bad at all, just the route finding that can be an issue--but you'd have Bob along so that shouldn't be a problem. However, the holds on the first pitch of Solid Gold are indeed pretty sharp--I like crimps but found them a bit demanding. Still it is a 'wonderful' place just to see and the route is very much worth a little digital discomfort.

Lori can’t you just tape your fingers? I don’t mind sharp crimps too much I’m pretty good at crimping but if they’re sharp just tape up!   

Lori, sorry for the confusion, but this is Paula and me at Ed’s 70th party.  I deleted it because I had second thoughts about calling him out on his advanced age.  He always told me: “Don’t get old Ward!”  We are only at the youthful ages of 64 and 62 respectively!

Paula went outside today on a couple of Farley 5.12s. She is recovering from her broken hip and didn’t send either, but did one hang Bandwagon (12a/b) so she is recovering well.

I had Ella and her friend in the morning, so I had to do a gym session despite today it being cool and somewhat dry outside.

I like the set boulders (and it helps that the grades are soft),  but I need to be all kilter board all the time. Three sessions at 50 degrees so far, WAY harder than the set routes but I need to embrace the suck. I did manage to flash two V4s, almost flashed another and full on couldn’t touch a couple others.  Maybe I should take more than one rest day in between, that might help lol.  I have five months before heading back out to my Arizona project and I think that the Kilter at 50 is the missing piece.