Friday's Featured Food: Eggs

Old Man Sleichter has a farm
E-I-E-I-O
And on that farm he had some chickens
E-I-E-I-O...

Yep, we've got those too. And aren't they pretty? (FYI that hen is eating an apple peel.)

We have had laying hens for 4 or 5 years now, and are up to 41 hens and 1 rooster. That number has fluctuated quite a bit, especially the first couple years when the coyotes were outsmarting us. Did you know a coyote can climb a 5-foot sheep panel? But, since our chicken yard got a "roof", we have lost very few.

Our chickens are what I would call semi-free-range, but industry would qualify as completely free range. They always have access to the outside yard. Since they love to eat seeds and to peck at bright red fruit, they do have to stay confined when we have new seeds planted or ripe tomatoes. Otherwise, they can go as far as their little legs will carry them. I was surprised to learn that hens will always come "home to roost" around sunset. It doesn't matter how much free space they have to roam, they always venture back to the chicken house in time for the sun to go down.

When they are laying, our hens will produce almost 2 dozen eggs a day. However, they aren't laying right now. Half of our chickens are a year old, and we had separated the young hens from the old, just to make sure our old ones are still laying. But, the door that separated them had glass in it, and someone who shall remain guilty shut the door too hard, breaking the glass, intermingling the chickens and scaring the eggs right out of them. (Actually, it was the stress of the change that made them stop laying for a bit.)

What do we do with all those eggs, when they do start coming again? We sell most of them at the local Farmers Market or through direct sales.

How do the eggs differ from store-bought? The most noticeable difference is the yolk. The yolk of our eggs are a deep, bright yellow, making anything you cook with eggs a bit brighter.

And speaking of cooking, we do eat a lot of eggs around here. L and N (daughters 3 and 4) love scrambled eggs, K loves fried egg sandwiches, and M loves boiled eggs. My favorite is Eggs Benedict, but that takes a lot of work and a lot of butter, so we don't make it too often. If we had to vote on one egg recipe that we all love, it'd be Egg Pie, known to the rest of the world as a quiche.

Quiche Sleichter

Pie crust for a 9-inch pie
8 slices of bacon, cooked and crumbled
1 cup shredded cheese
1 small onion, chopped
5-6 spinach leaves, shredded
4 large eggs
2 cups heavy whipping cream
salt and pepper to taste

1. Heat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Steam the spinach in the microwave, following the directions on a Ziploc steam bag.
3. Prepare the pie crust and put it in the pie shell. I use the Betty Crocker pie crust recipe, because it's easy and delicious.
4. Sprinkle bacon, cheese, spinach, and onion onto the pie crust.
5. Beat eggs.
6. Add cream, salt, and pepper to eggs and beat until well blended.
7. Pour egg mixture into pie crust, covering bacon, etc.
8. Bake the quiche in the oven for 15 minutes.
9. Reduce oven temperature to 300 degrees Fahrenheit. Bake until a knife inserted in the center comes out clean. The recipe I base this off of says it will take 30 minutes, but it always seems to take 45 minutes or more to get it completely done in the middle.
10. Let it stand 10 minutes before serving. That will let it set up just a little bit more.

Friday's Featured Food: Eggs

Time to Make the Jelly

Our jelly inventory is running low, and Farmer's Market starts on Saturday. That means, it's JELLY TIME!

Jay teaches during the day, so 11 p.m. IS jelly time in our house.

Green Jalapeno Jelly is first on the list, made with our peppers, of course.

We do love our new sanitizing dishwasher.

I love how the jelly tastes but my kitchen will make me cough for the next 12 hours. Not as bad as when he makes the habanero jelly, but still....

And, lastly, necessity is the mother of all inventions.


We have talked with some professional food gurus about making the jelly in bulk, about producing it by the hundreds of jars, rather than 6 at a time. But at this point in the game, at this point in our farm, we like doing it ourselves, one small batch at a time. Call it quality control or just wanting to be in control, but it's how our jellies are made.

Time to Make the Jelly

New Additions

Allow me to introduce the newest additions to our farm:

These are Katie's 4-H pigs. She has shown pigs since she was 18 months old, thanks to the open class peewee class at a local fair, but this is the first year she's old enough to have 4-H project pigs, pigs that she takes care of. Not only does she love them, she even loves scooping out their pen. "See, look how good I'm getting at scooping the poop, Mommy!" Oh, how I hope that excitement continues. These piggies get talked to every morning, afternoon, and night, but Katie, Maggie, and Lainie.

This one is named Crazy, because "she just runs around all crazy and tries to get piggy-back rides." Actually, Jay and I are pretty sure she is cycling and just feeling a bit amorous.

The Duroc on the left is Wilbur, and Brownie ("the one with the yellow earring, I mean ear tag") is on the right. All three pigs came from Grandpa Jerry, who has been raising show pigs for many years. I don't know who is more excited about Katie showing this year, her and her grandpa! I must admit, it is so nice to have such great animals to chose from.

We are also lucky enough to have a concrete slab for the pigs to live on, thanks to the generosity of our neighbor. We own about 5 acres, and he owns all the land around us. Just across our property line are two concrete slabs, from back in the day when this was all a pig farm. Instead of tearing them out, he offered them for us to house some 4-H pigs, and we are all very grateful.

We know Katie is a sensitive soul and wondered how she would handle the terminal aspect of this project. She calmed those fears with one simple statement: "Daddy, I think these pigs are going to make some GOOOD bacon!"

How's THAT for a farm girl! :)

New Additions

Moving High Tunnels

We told you how we made moveable the high tunnels; here's a bit more about why.

Early in the spring, we transplanted broccoli into the movable high tunnel that we call M1. By putting them in the tunnel, we were able to plant the broccoli earlier than if we were direct seeding outside, and we could protect it from late winter or early spring storms.

From April 4

From April 19


Now that the risk of a freeze is all but gone, M1 has been moved down the hill, exposing the broccoli to the elements. How did it handle the transition? I'd say "pretty darn good"...and here is the evidence to prove it.

From May 1

On the downside, without the protection of the high tunnel, we had some anxious times this past week. Severe weather moved through the area, with small hail and wind gusts above 60 mph. Thankfully, the worst of it missed us and what we did get didn't injure the outside plants nor the buildings.

Five days and counting to the start of our Farmers Market season! Are you ready? Are we?!?

Moving High Tunnels

A Difference of a Week

It is always surprising, how quickly plants mature. Look at these two pictures of the same building, the first taken on April 14 and the second taken ten days later:

Under the hanging baskets are beets. They are a dual-purpose crop: you can eat the fresh beet greens in salad and eat the beet that is growing in the ground. These beets need about 4 more weeks; the greens we've already been eating.

The hanging baskets aren't looking to shabby, either. We didn't lose any plants in the transplanting, and these baskets will get to go to a new home starting next Saturday... the start of Clay Center's Farmers Market.

A Difference of a Week