Happy Thanksgiving!

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It's already Thanksgiving for us in Canada and we wish all our Canadian readers a wonderful weekend with family and friends.

This week has provided us with beautiful sunny Fall weather and crisp cold nights, turning the foliage into a gorgeous spectacle of colours. However nothing says Thanksgiving like the corn, squashes and pumpkins coming from the local fields.

The local markets are loaded with the colourful harvests of Fall.

One of the best corn available in Pelham comes from Bry-Anne Farms. We may be a bit biased here since Bryan grows some of his corn on our property. However, it has to be the sweetest around and Bryan's philosophy is always to serve his corn as freshly picked as possible so that the sugars have had no opportunity to turn to starch.

Nothing like freshly picked corn!

So for us this week, it was an opportunity to start processing some corn for the upcoming Winter. For the most part we have been freezing it. we cut the kernels from the cobs, blanch them and store them in freezer bags.

This was also a chance to make our first corn relish. To do this we used 8 cups of corn kernels, 8 cups of diced red bell peppers and 4 cups of diced red onions. We simply browned the onions and peppers with 2 Tsp of Kosher salt and then added the corn to cook for another 3-4 minutes.

We added 3 cups of cider vinegar and 2 cups of sugar. We then brought everything to a boil. Spicing is up to taste, however we like to use Turmeric for this relish.

The relish can be thickened with corn starch to get just the right consistency.

Our first corn relish

Making corn relish and packing corn for the freezers generated a lot of cobs. By chance, we stumbled on another recipe  from a time when nothing was wasted: Corn Cob Jelly! We had to try this.

We boiled some of our corn cobs for 1/2 hour and simmered the strained water. For every amount of this water, we added a similar volume of sugar. For 2 qts of water, we also added 12 Tsp of lemon juice.

To set the jell, we added 4 Tsp of Apple Pectin.

The result is pleasantly surprising. The jelly is a beautiful translucent pale yellow and at first has the taste of sweet corn however, the finish on the palate is exactly like honey!

Corn Cob Jelly: quite a discovery!

Of course, it would not be Thanksgiving without pumpkin pie. This has been a big seller at the Tea Room and Chef has outdone herself this week by using the most beautiful pumpkins available to make the traditional pie, as well as a pumpkin maple pie, a pumpkin pecan pie and even a gluten-free pumpkin pie.

It's Pumpkin Pie season at the Tea Room.

 We'll end this week with an update on the manor's landscaping. It is all now coming into place and our home is looking less and less like a construction site now that some sod has been laid.

A stone bench on the ridge was created using some finds from the original barn flooring

The canine members of the family are also thrilled now that the courtyard in back of the house is finally completed. We now need to furnish this space but it will definitely be welcomed next Spring.

The courtyard is finally complete.