More Fun with Abundant Produce

Big Daddy found a recipe for Sweet Potato and Zucchini Bread on Epicurious.com and we decided to try it utilizing the overstock of carrots in our fridge. Below is the result and it is quite tasty. As with all of our new creations, we tried it out on the staff in Big Daddy's office. The bread was gone within the first few minutes. Success!

Carrot and Zucchini Bread

2 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 cups sugar
3/4 cup vegetable oil
3 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups grated zucchini
1 1/2 cups grated carrots
1 cup chopped walnuts, toasted

Preheat oven to 350 F. Butter and flour 9x5x3-inch loaf pan. Sift first 5 ingredients into a medium bowl. Beat sugar, oil, eggs and vanilla to blend in large bowl. Mix in zucchini and carrot. Add dry ingredients and walnuts; stir well.

Transfer batter to prepared pan. Bake until tester inserted into center comes out clean, about 1 hour and 20 minutes. Cool bread in pan on rack 15 minutes. Cut around bread to loosen. Turn out onto rack and cool completely.


This weekend we managed to can 13 quarts of pickles, 1 quart of dilly beans and 5 quarts of green beans. We had a big pot luck party to attend on Saturday night and made summer squash souffle and a giant tomato and cucumber salad. As lots of gardeners were in attendance, there was an abundance of squash and zucchini recipes and at least four dishes involving fresh tomatoes and/or cucumbers. So much for originality on our part, but the feast sure was spectacular.

The party was fabulous. We were invited by my relatively new friend, Kelley to her annual "Thanksgiving in July" party. There were several deep fried turkeys and traditional fixins'. It was a unique concept that worked beautifully. Kelley and I met through a mutual friend when Kelley was looking for a few chickens to start her own backyard flock. She bought four of my little hens. In talking we found out we shared a lot of the same interests and more than one friend. In fact, Kelley and her husband are friends with practically half of the people we've met in the area over the last year. It's odd how that can happen.

What is more amazing is that almost all of these mutual friends are also musicians. They aren't professional musicians (I've known many of those.), but people with other careers - dentist, farmer, engineer, professor... who all have a love of blue grass and get together to play whenever they can. And man, can they play! I'm not someone who generally listens to blue grass, but there is nothing better to listen to on a perfect evening in the North Carolina mountains, under the stars, with a glass of Highland Gaelic Ale in your hand. Thank you Kelley.

Here's to new friends and an over abundance of produce!