20 Days to Spring!

Happy 20 days until the Spring Equinox to everyone! I felt urged to celebrate that with y'all! Hope you have a warm-hearted and warm-weathered weekend!

Homemade Breadcrumbs

Homemade Breadcrumbs...Easy as 1, 2, 3!

1. Day old bread (homemade bread, of course)

2. Use your handy-dandy food processor to turn that dry bread into...

3. Breadcrumbs! Store in a plastic container (mine is a cleaned, re-purposed sour cream container) in freezer.

Homemade Sour Cream

I love being able to make what we need in our kitchen! The convenience of being able to make your own sour cream when you run out is spectacular! Plus it's easy and you'll feel like a chemist!

Note: The fast & easy version always works well for me. I have not gotten the on-the-counter-for-24-hours version to set. If you do, let me in on your secret!

Fast & Easy Homemade Sour Cream

Ingredients

• 1 cup milk (heavy cream works best but I've used whole milk and 2%)
• 1/4 cup white distilled vinegar

Fast Directions

1. Combine your 2 ingredients into a glass jar with a plastic lid. 
2. Shake well.
3. Refrigerate for 1 hour (or you can quick freeze the jar, add ingredients, shake and return the jar to the freezer for 3-5 minutes).
4. The cream will have risen to the top! Add a tiny dash of salt if you like and voila! sour cream!
5. Ready to use that night, but do use within 2 days.
6. You can use the liquid left over at the bottom of the jar in recipes calling for buttermilk.

For more traditional, thicker sour cream:

1. Combine your 2 ingredients into a glass jar with a plastic lid. 
2. Shake well.
3. Leave mixture out at room temperature for 24 hours.
4. Store in refrigerator for up to one week.

Healthy, All-Natural Beef Broth

Neck bones & veggie scraps ready to simmer!

Making your own homemade broth is easier than you think, save you money, and way better than the highly salted processed kind from a can or box at the store. I use neck bones and you can actually use one bone through multiple batches. You can use any good beef bones including saving the bones from your crockpot roast, steak, or ribs. Just freeze them until ready to use. You can even include leftover pieces of cooked or raw beef and the cuttings and fat you take off before cooking your meal.

After I make a batch, I put the meat and bones into a dated, labeled bag and stick it in the freezer until the next time I want to make broth. I'm going to see how many batches (my batch makes about 4 quarts) it takes to have the neck bone down to just bone as there is quite a bit of meat on these inexpensive cuts of beef.

Simmered for about 8 hours

You also will need vegetables for your beef broth. Save the skins and tops of onions, the little stem on your garlic cloves, green garlic scapes, the base and leaves of celery, the top and fresh leaves of carrots as you work in the kitchen on other meals. Or I'll use up any of these vegetables that need to be used - like before the carrots get soft. Just toss these scraps into a freezer bag and use them within the next year! When my freezer bag is full, then I know it's time to make broth!

Once the broth is cooked up and simmered for hours and hours, I strain it into clean and sanitized glass quart jars and apply lids and rings then allow to cool to room temperature before storing in the refrigerator. (Use within 5 days or reboil before using or freezing.)

If I haven't use all the fresh beef broth with 5-7 days, I freeze it! Simply fill up ice cube trays with the cold broth, pop into the freezer for 3 to 4 hours, then pop out the cubes into labeled and dated freezer bags or containers. Each ice cube is about one ounce of liquid so if you need just one cube for seasoning or 8-ounces for a recipe, grab out exactly what you need. The cubes will be good for 6 months to a year in the freezer. Mine don't last long! I use them in a combination with water for boiling rice, toss one cube into a pan of stir fry veggies, making sauces and gravies, roasting meats, using in stews and soups, and in any recipe calling for broth or stock.

Just a note, my recipe below can be made with fresh brand new ingredients you bought or grew just for this reason or with your wise, freezer supply of scraps! I indicated celery as an optional ingredient primarily because I rarely have celery as I've never been successful at growing it! 

Okay, ready to make your own beef broth?!

Ramsey Farms Beef Broth

Ingredients

• 2 to 3 beef neckbones
• onion
• garlic
• carrots
• potato
• celery (opt.)
• kosher salt
• black pepper
• fresh herbs: basil leaves, oregano, thyme
• (dried herbs are fine too, just go lightly)
• 4 to 8 oz. wine
• water

Directions

1. Add meet and veggies to large stock pot with lid.
2. Add about 1/2 to 1 cup of wine (opt.)
3. Add enough water to float the veggies. About 3 to 4 qts. You can also use a jar of the previous batch of broth you made!
4. Season with salt, pepper, and fresh or dried herbs to your taste.
5. Bring to a boil slowly over medium heat, stirring as it heats to avoid burning or sticking.
6. Reduce heat to low, cover but crack the lid.
7. When the broth gets to a low simmer, stir, cover completely with lid.
8. Cook for 6 to 12 hours, stirring occasionally.
9. Allow to cook for about an hour, then strain. 
10. Save your neck bones to freeze for your next batch of broth making, but put the veggie scraps in the compost.
11. Pour strained broth liquid into clean, sanitized glass quart-size jars leaving 1" space at the top of the jar. 
12. Add lid and ring. Allow to cool before storing the jars in the fridge. 
13. Use or freeze within 7 days. 

Be sure to check out this article on freezing broth, I got a lot of great ideas from it!

The Top Posts of 2014

Thanks for reading our little blog! The Ramsey Farms Simple Life blog has had more than 2,300 visitors since it was created. I love sharing some of the things that we do with you and perhaps helping others to find a simpler, less stressful way of life. We have guests from all over the world and our top pageviews by country include the US, Malaysia, Germany, France, and Argentina. 

You can read the top 5 posts of 2013 here.

Without further adieu, here are the most read articles from 2014:

#5 - The #5 spot is actually a perfect tie between two of my This Week at Ramsey Farms articles: March 23 and April 6, 2014. Both of these reflect on the weekly activities but remind us that life is short and only we have the power to make changes in our lives where we feel change is needed. 

#4 - 40 Minute Hamburger Buns - This is a great, easy, quick recipe to give you tasty rolls or buns in under an hour! (LOL Katie!) We don't make these much anymore because I feel they are a little too "bready" and have since started making a more "traditional" recipe for our hamburger and hotdog buns, but this is a great one to have on hand for when time is short! Try it if you haven't already!

#3 - This Week at Ramsey Farms March 16, 2014 - Full of an exciting gardening prep week and packed with recipes for edibles and body products! Including my quick and easy salsa recipe and a reminder about cleaning up our own messes and celebrating the ordinary.

#2 - This Week at Ramsey Farms May 20, 2014 - This one was one of my personal faves about busy lives and letting the hectic control us rather than enjoying our lives and about taking care of ourselves first so that we are able to take care of others. There's an Ann Lamott quote in this article that I just love.

And your favorite, most read, most visited post of 2014...

#1 - The Cold Frame - This post is a pictorial view of the building, installing, and growing of our little cold frame we built in January 2014 in the NC garden. I miss it but we have no plans to have a cold frame here in Georgia as of now. 


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This post ranked #2 in our most-read posts of 2015!