Picking a Pumpkin

Bass Farms has stacks and stacks of pumpkins.  Come on out and tour our display fields and choose the pumpkin YOU want.  Open daily 10-7; Sunday 10-5; and closed Mondays.

Schedule field trips, birthday parties at the farm, or any fun event.  Make us your destination -- one stop - two shops.

Picking just one pumpkin is hard to do.  Take a red wagon and choose your favorite -- and then choose another.
Big or little or in-between.

Green Tomatoes - CAKE

There's zucchini cake, sweet potato or pumpkin pie -- but green tomato cake?!?!?  YES and it is delicious.  Try it and you'll come back for more.

This Green Tomato Spice Cake is a family favorite.

Preheat oven to 350°.  While the oven is preheating--

Beat together until smooth and creamy:

• 2 1/4 cups sugar
• 1 cup butter, softened (can use vegetable shortening)
• 3 eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla

 Sift together

• 3 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 1/4 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

Slowly blend this dry mixture into the egg and sugar mixture.  And then add:

• 1 cup pecans or walnuts
• 1 cup golden raisins
• 2 1/2 cups diced green tomatoes

Pour into greased 9x13-inch pan or  in a bundt pan. Top with coconut before baking or plan to  drizzle browned butter icing over the warm cake once the cake has finished baking.  Bake for one hour (longer if baking in a bundt pan).  When a wooden pick or cake tester is poked into the cake, and comes out clean the cake is done.  Serves 12.

Browned Butter icing

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
1 cup confectioners' sugar
In a medium saucepan over low heat, melt butter. Cook 6 to 8 minutes, or until butter is lightly browned. Whisk in confectioners' sugar until smooth.  This makes about 1 cup of icing which should be drizzled over the warm cake.  Let cake and icing cool before serving.

Freezes well - uniced (or if baked with the coconut topping - freeze as is). When ready to serve, thaw and warm in a oven for few minutes, and then drizzle the browned butter icing over the warmed cake.
Serve with ice cream, or simply garnish with whipped cream, a cherry or spinkles of ground nuts.

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One Stop - Two Shops

Groups that schedule a visit down the hill at Green Endeavors often schedule a companion visit to our Market.  If we are notified we are pleased to arrange for a tasting session: salsas, special jams and jellies -- and of course, you will be able to pick out fresh fruits and vegetables.  We have an abundance of potatoes (on special this month), and the pumpkin season is just beginning.  Field trips, pick-your-pumpkin days, enjoy the sunshine.
We have a full line of food items, mixes, sauces, jams and jellies.  We are scheduling field trips for school classrooms, boy and girl scouts, home-schooled groups, families.  Call ahead and we'll custom design a visit for your group.

(And if you noticed the creatures on the salsa jars -- those are okra animals. Great fun for those who would rather "play with the okra than eat it.")

Go home with a pumpkin to carve -- or bake and eat. 

Squash Pickles

This recipe is from the Ball Blue Book of Preserving - Thanks to Deanna Nielson for trying  it out and letting us know how delicious the pickles are.

Squash Pickles

Yield: about 4 half-pints

2 pounds summer squash, peeled, seeded and cut into 1/2-inch cubes

1-1/3 cups sliced onions

1-1/4 cups sugar

1 teaspoon salt (pickling or kosher salt preferred)

1 teaspoon dry mustard

1/2 teaspoon turmeric

1/2 teaspoon powdered ginger

2 cups water

1 cup vinegar

Combine squash and onions; set aside. Combine remaining ingredients in a large saucepot. Bring to a boil. Add squash and onions; boil 10 minutes. Pack hot vegetables and liquid into hot jars, leaving 1/4-inch headspace. Remove air bubbles. Adjust two-piece caps. Process 10 minutes in a boiling-water canner.

Potatoes - $1 a pound

This Month's Special

Potatoes are now available.

Potatoes - Potatoes
$1 a pound at Bass Farms -- buy enough to store in your root cellar

Our produce is grown without herbicides or  pesticides.  


Send your favorite potato recipe to recipes@bassfarms.net.

Stuffed Green Peppers

Stuffed Green Peppers

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 pounds lean ground beef
• 1 onion, chopped
• 3/4 cup uncooked instant rice
• 3/4 cup water
• 1 (14.5 ounce) can peeled and diced tomatoes with juice
• 1 (14.5 ounce) can stewed tomatoes, chopped
• salt and pepper to taste
• 6 large green bell peppers
• 1 (16 ounce) jar spaghetti sauce

Directions

1. In a large skillet or medium stock pot, brown the beef and onion over medium heat. Drain fat. Add rice, water, diced tomatoes, and stewed tomatoes. Season with salt and pepper. Simmer until rice is tender. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C).
2. Cut the tops off the bell peppers and clean out the seeds and membrane. (Note: You may have to slightly slice the bottom of the peppers to make them stand up.) Fill peppers with meat mixture.
3. Place in a casserole dish and bake in a preheated oven for 20 minutes or until peppers are as tender as you like. Served topped with spaghetti sauce.

Canning Tomato Juice

Start with 60 pounds of tomatoes -- ripe, tasty tomatoes.
And in 2 hours  you can have two dozen jars of great juice.  All the better to create tasty bases for   soups, and sauces.

September brings bushels of great ripe tomatoes.  Bass Farms stores their freshly picked tomatoes in a large cooler with constantly circulating air.  But once you pick up your tomatoes be ready to process your produce.

Many don't realize that when "shipped in" tomatoes arrive at stores they really aren't ripe - - they are "gassed" to produce a bright red color but are not yet ripe (Check out  what Terry Dunkel has to say about gassed tomatoes).  So when you take those tomatoes home they can sit awhile -- in fact they often have to as they are not ripe (just red in the store).  Freshly picked tomatoes are another story -- foods grown without preservatives need care in storage and in their use.  They are best when red and ripe.

For more about canning see www.bassfarms.org/harvesttable/tomatoes.html