Our dog Skippy's curled up on top of the back of the sofa, watching out the window to see if any other dogs are braving the freezing weather to skid along the icy sidewalk.
Yesterday was the coldest day of the winter, or so a Georgian Bay TV weather reporter said as I was getting ready to leave for last night's Blue Rodeo concert at Massey Hall. Norm and I used to go see Blue Rodeo at the Horseshoe Tavern when we were first dating, as did my sister and the boy-who-left-for-California-and-broke-her-heart.
Massey Hall is a great old concert hall in Toronto, with small seats. At least they seem really small when you're trying to fold yourself in one along with a big sweater and an Arctic Down Parka. My sister and I couldn't wait in the coat check line as we had to pick up her daughter and a friend right after the encore.
I played a Blue Rodeo CD this morning while I tended to the rabbit, which got Bunny Foo-Foo hopping. I'm not sure if she was hopping with excitement over the music or the handful of lettuce.
How I ended up with a lop-eared rabbit is a long story I can't get into now, or I'll never get to Mrs. Daukas' pickle recipe.
As I filled the bunny's water bowl, the eggshells I'd put on the windowsill yesterday caught my eye. I am still debating whether or not I should be saving eggshells this season. The year before last, I had so many egg cartons of seedlings in the kitchen that we couldn't use the table. I promised myself that I would just buy flats of plants in the spring, forever after.
But...my mom and her grandmother before her, always had little seedlings sprouting from eggshells filled with potting soil in the kitchen. They were perfectly placed on the windowsill over the sink, where it was easy to give them a sprinkle of water. When I was little, I'd climb on a chair to check on them, daily.
I loved the way the little sprouts poked through the earth to reach for the sun. So...maybe I will plant some seeds this spring, but just a dozen. And I have a few weeks to decide what to plant.
A love of music and gardening seems to get passed along in my family. When my grandfather (who led a Lithuanian choir) retired, he and his neighbors all tended big gardens. Cucumbers, watered daily with well water and pails carried up a hill from the lake, grew abundantly. Many of the women made their own pickles.
Everyone liked Mrs. Daukas' no-vinegar-added dill pickle recipe, which she made small batch-by-batch as they were eaten up. My grandmother wrote the recipe on the back of a Bell Canada bill envelope postmarked August 1, 1968 (postage was only 5 cents!)
If you want to use the recipe it this summer, plant pickling cucumbers and dill this spring, and go looking for a cherry tree, because you will need some cherry tree leaves.
Mrs. Daukas' Dill Pickles
Fill a sterilized gallon jar with:
- 20 black peppercorns
- 4-5 washed cherry leaves
- 6-7 bay leaves
- 3 bunches of fresh dill (cut off the roots and fold dill into the jar)
- 10-11 small, washed cucumbers (to pack the jar, leaving room at the top to cover cucumbers with salted water)
Boil water. Cool 2 quarts to lukewarm. Add:
- 4 tbsp coarse pickling salt (2 tbsp per quart.)
Pour salted, lukewarm water over cucumbers in the jar.
Let sit on the counter, without the lid, for 72 hours.
Then tighten the lid on the jar and refrigerate.
The new pickles are ready to eat. Keep refrigerated.
