This week we take a little break and post about non-bridal projects!
If you are like me, your squash plants have been producing like crazy with the high temps and while having lots of produce is certainly a blessing, it can also be a curse. Having given away squash to neighbors and clients and service people, the final alternative is to make it into soup for the winter.
Mr Mole bought this little appliance a while back and it has come in handy. Now, before you all go out and buy this gadget, I have to say while it does a good job turning raw veggies into hot soup in 30 minutes, our particular model will only do this trick once a day as the motor and heating element need a whole day to cool down. If you re-fill it and press all the buttons…all you get is an ERROR message. Maybe this is a good thing as I would try to get into production mode otherwise. Here is one recipe that works well. Take 3 medium squash, 1/4 to 1/2 an onion, cut into 1/2 inch diced pieces and toss into the container:
Add fresh or dried herbs (I have tarragon growing) and chicken stock (I boil the carcass from Costco rotisserie chicken) along with a tablespoon of butter or oil and 1/2 teaspoon of ginger paste. Just to be crazy you can add some garlic powder and/or a small chili pepper.
There is a veggie fill line and a stock/water line. Start the program and watch it whizz around and boil. 30 minutes later, the bell rings and 1.2 quart of soup is ready.
There are many products on the market in various sizes and prices here in the US and Europe and blogs with many cool recipes. Now you have one quart of soup to enjoy or freeze in plastic containers.
A long time client dropped off this “bargain” dress for the next wedding she has to attend. It is salmon poly chiffon layered ruffles and she thought for sure this could be repaired…what do you think? Yes, that is a huge hole right next to the zipper and one smaller above it.
First the zipper is released along the one side.
The ruffle is pulled past the area of damage (see excess under my thumb) and basted into place (see white thread).
The zipper is pinned back into place and the lining will be hand sewn.
Excess ruffle is pinked/trimmed away. Finally the repair is done and no one will know what we started with.
Scuba knit is really quite something….no fraying and interesting cut-out designs. I was asked to narrow the shoulders of a designer jacket.
Marie Gray and her husband started St. John Knits in 1962. This brand is from Marie Gray and her daughter.
After thread tracing the new seam line for the sleeve, I removed the serging from front notch to back notch…OK, there were no notches but you get the idea.
Then the sleeves were re-positioned and hand and machine basted into place. You can see the excess that will be serged off.
What you realize after the basting is done is that there are places where the only thing holding the 2 parts together is a thin row of thread and AIR!
The serging stitches have to be close together enough to form a real tight binding. The final stitching was a 3 step zig-zag. You never know how tough the client will be on seams so it is always wise to use extra secure stitching even when the original garment did not have any. On this occasion, I didn’t want to think that the only thing holding these sleeves on was one row of serging!!!
Wishing all my readers who are experiencing the dog days of summer, some cool shade or chilling A/C and the sound of ice cubes in a tall glass of your favorite drink. Thanks for stopping by!!!
fit for a queen 
How efficient to be planning for a cold winter’s day during the current sweltering heat ! But soup tucked into the freezer will be oh so handy, warming and healthy come February.
The scuba knits seem to be popping up on a regular basis. The one you have altered brings up a question. How easy will it be to accidentally catch those airy spaces and cause the jacket to rip/tear and how to go about repairing it. A customer brought me an unlined suede jacket from Neiman Marcus with sleeve edges and collar punched to look similar to a lacy paper doily. I dared not ask what price she paid, but she was mighty upset when she caught the handle to a piece of office furniture in one of the holes of the sleeve. Once again, manufacturers create a novel design that catches a customer’s eye but proves to be very impractical.
Don’t you just dread the perforated fabrics? Yes, they are edgy but so prone to catching in things…and then what? Oh wait…then it is our problem, Sharon…not so good!
Thanks for the squash soup recipe! I didn’t realize you meant summer squash soup when you posted of it last time. I don’t think I’ve seen a summer squash soup like this, with it all whizzed up into smoothness. I only recall seeing it in chunks with broth, tomatoes and other veggies in chunks and pasta or beans, maybe meat. Next time a coworker brings in their excess, I’ll snag one or two. Yes the internet (and my bookshelf) are loaded with recipes, it’s finding the *good* ones that’s daunting.
I think I’d be fighting the temptation to nudge one layer or the other over just a bit to minimize the amount of sewing air together on that fabric.
I was tempted to scoot the edges together but then I’d have a gathered mess…ha ha! when I went looking for blender soup recipes and blogs…I was overwhelmed so thought I had better start out small and simple. Squash and chicken stock…the result is very creamy without any cream or milk and any of those tiny seeds are just pulverized!
Well a piece of electrical equipment that has to cool for a full day seems pretty useless/irritating to me. But your soup is super. We love eating veg that are more or less just pureed into soup. Had some lentil for lunch, but red pepper and tomato always works great too. The repair jobs are nice Mrs Mole. And the scuba reminded me of sewing guipure lace before I learnt to back it with organza.
If only I could have snuck some organza in the seam…but no…it always has to look like the original. Just whizzed the fresh tomatoes and red peppers into soup…yummy! Yellow squash and red peppers make a wonderful orange soup and will look like a rainbow in my freezer. If this hot little appliance ever bites the dust, I will replace it with a more powerful one that can handle multiple batches for sure!
Rainbow soup! I will send you a photograph. xxxx
How odd about that appliance needing an entire DAY to cool down…! No soup for you! Looked delicious, though 🙂
So glad to discover a new label – I’d never heard of Grayse until your post. We have Saks, but no L&T, so maybe that’s why…! I love all the laser cuts…but I’ve often wondered how some of them stay together properly.
Another great job – and a nice break for you from bridal, I’m sure!
It is always nice to have to go searching for a spool of colored thread other than ivory! With the pink and salmon hanging in between the white dresses, it really perks up the sewing room!
Just read about ‘scuba fabric’ in the latest issue of ‘Threads’, will have to get some fabric and try working with it.
They have bolts of it at JoAnn’s, I found some when searching for fabric for my granddaughter’s dress.
I’ll have to read up on “scuba”. I don’t know much about it. It certainly looks funny… sewing holes! Enjoy your A/C and your cool drink!
Most of the blogs that show scuba knit are not the “open” types so you really have to think hard about how you want to use it with that unattached feature and how much stress will be on the seams and well you can match your serger thread to the scuba as it shows through the holes.
Good tips!
We love soup but I’m old fashioned and just use a large pan (there has to be enough for extra frozen portions!).
Enjoy your veggies 😃
I’m a “big pot, big soup” girl too but this can make soup without heating the kitchen and with only the pitcher to rinse out…it is a win/win in a hot climate. Green beans are coming next and loads of eggplant and onions and late season raspberries…thank you to Mother Nature!
My excess garden has been green beads and yellow little tomatoes. We have shared with the neighbors on several occasions. I make green bean dinner, lightly cooked and the wrapped in thick cut bacon for 20 min. baking as our meat /main dish. My husband has not fussed yet, but I have only done it twice. The yellow “cherry” tomatoes don’t seem to have as much flavor as the red ones. And the normal sized, (but looking pretty big already) tomatoes are not turning red yet, but will certainly be having tomatoe dinners soon. I wonder how many I can give away off one plant. Still have a quart of fresh beans in the refrigerator this morning, and probably a pound of yellow cherrys.
For the past couple years we have had loads of volunteer cherry tomato plants spring up and all I have been doing is washing them off and tossing is a ziplock bag and into the freezer. Then when I am frying something that needs a little tomato…I crack off a chunk and it melts into the sauce. Freezing intensifies whatever flavor. Have you ever tossed grapes into the freezer? They get so sweet and their flavor is strong, could be the dehydrating function of all the cold air, same for the tomatoes.
Well, that is green beans, not beads for dinner.
How nice to see ‘a little bit of normal’ life for you. You have lovely nails too.
There’s this really great thing for making soup in about 45 mins and it does loads of other things too – it’s called a POT- LOL!
Oh Ruth….but does the pot grind up everything into a liquid? All my soups that need liquidizing have to then go into the blender, without spilling down the side or burning my fingers and then poured into containers. This puppy does it all! I know you have great speedy and larger versions in the UK and Ireland and since you have 220 voltage instead of 110, you could make continuous batches. Nails…when I put polish on them my mother argues with me that they are “not real”…but they are. She also tells her friends that my hair is “not real” meaning I color it.
Try adding some mango powder or a few pieces of diced rhubarb to your squash soup. It is the secret behind the pumpkin soup with walnuts I had many years ago. It took me 12 years to isolate the ingredient that made this soup so. Try it with hubbard butternut acorn squash or pumpkin. The rest of the recipe is pretty much up to you, it is the adition of the unflavoure sour element which makes the soup.
Where does one find mango powder? Or rhubarb in summer? I’m always willing to try anything to jazz up soup. I have 2 plants producing butternut squash right now and we may end up with a dozen or more so the plans are to share with neighbors and soup them up. Thanks, Karen!