Other attractions at the farm include a hayride, pumpkin patch, pumpkin cannon and trebuchet and petting zoo.  In addition to the gallery we did capture video of the trebuchet in action.

[View with PicLens]

The Corn Maze and Pumpkin Patch are open from September through October.  More information can be found at the Vesperman Farms website.

The Gays Mills Apple Festival occurs on the final full weekend in September to coincide with the apple harvest. Apple Fest includes a parade, carnival, arts & crafts and flea markets as well as an array of music, dancing, food & festivities at Robb Park, the Community Building, the Log Cabin Village, the orchards, the Crawford County Fairgrounds (on the south side of Gays Mills) and many other village locations.

gaysmills.org

The Prairie du Chien Villa Louis hosted the 29th Carriage Classic on St. Feriole Island Saturday and Sunday.

From the Carriage Classic website:

The Villa Louis mansion was, at one time, the centerpiece for a lavish standardbred breeding farm – The Artesian Stock Farm. The estate included stables, paddocks, and a 1/4 mile race track on site.

PdCToday.com contributor Lori Schoenhard took many photos of this year’s event.

[View with PicLens]

Wisconsin Troopers have been ordered to cut mileage by 20 percent in a cost-cutting maneuver that officials say will reduce services and hinder enforcement of traffic laws.

Last Friday DMV offices around the state were closed due to the furlough order.  Today unemployment call centers and the Vital Records office are closed for the same reason.  The Wisconsin DMV was then forced to offer overtime to DMV employees to deal with a backlog of requests.

All Wisconsin state employees were ordered to take 16 unpaid days leave under Wisconsin Executive Order 285.

On a lighter note, not everyone is trading in their clunkers for cash.  In Turtle Lake, Wisconsin, spectators enjoyed a free “redneck car launch” show.

Today we’ll stay in the kitchen with a delicious meal that is pretty easy, looks great, and tastes even better.  It’s great over rice or pasta, and could also work for sandwiches, just leave the sausages whole instead of cutting them up.

Peppers and Sausage:

You’ll require two pans for this, a skillet and a larger saucepan or pot.  In my situation I used a deep electric skillet in place of a skillet on the stove.  It’s one of my favorite kitchen appliances; it’s versatile and easy to clean.

Here is the ingredient list, although I admit you can take some fairly wide liberties with this to tweak it to your liking, especially with the types and amount of tomatoes and other vegetables.

• 1 can (28 ounce) crushed tomatoes
• 1 can (14 ounce) diced tomatoes
• 2 medium onions (1 diced, 1 sliced into wedges)
• 2 cloves garlic (minced)
• dried basil (1 tablespoon)
• Italian seasoning ( 2 tablespoons)
• dried oregano (1 tablespoon) [I do at least 2 tablespoons actually, but I love oregano]
• sugar (1 tablespoon) [tastes great with out this as well, or add an extra tablespoon for a sweeter sauce]
• 4 bratwurst or Italian sausages [I used a pound or so of Piggly Wiggly's rope bratwurst, use whatever your favorite is]
• 3 peppers; red, yellow, or green; cut into strips [Red/orange/yellow peppers look nicer but green peppers are usually quite a bit cheaper]
• 1 jalapeno (optional) [one just adds a little bit of heat, use two for more heat or none if you prefer]
• olive oil (for sauteing)

In your saucepan, saute the onions and garlic in a little olive oil, just until they are soft not brown.

Add the can of diced tomatoes along with the basil, Italian seasoning, oregano, and sugar.

Simmer this for about 20 minutes.  While this is simmering you can work on the sausage and vegetables in your skillet.

Cut your sausages into 3/4 inch pieces or so.  Brown the sausages in a little butter.  Or use beer, I did.

Add the peppers and onions (and jalapeno if you choose) and saute with a little olive oil.

Add the can of crushed tomatoes to your saucepan.  Simmer for a few minutes.

Add your sausage and vegetable mix to the saucepan. At this point depending on how thick or thin you want your sauce you may want to add an 8oz can of tomato sauce.  Mine was looking a bit thick so I did.  Simmer for another 10-15 minutes or so.

Serve over pasta or rice and top with a bit of shredded cheese.  I had Monterey Jack handy.  Pepperjack or mozzarella would be good too.

Severe thunderstorms moved through Grant and Crawford counties on the afternoon of July 24, 2009.  Widespread torrential rainfall and hail cause significant crop and property damage in the area.  Flooding from the rains also closed area roads for a time including Highway 35 south of Lynxville due to a rockslide and Highway 81 between Platteville and Lancaster due to flash flooding.  Hail in excess of one inch in diameter was widely reported including reports from Eastman, Livingston, Stitzer, Fennimore, and Platteville.  Brief tornado touchdowns were also confirmed in neighboring Lafayette County.

The complete NWS report on the July 24 weather can be found at weather.gov/lacrosse.

Severe weather caused several Friday afternoon and evening events to be moved to Saturday when clearer skies and plenty of sunshine looked over the Blakes Prairie Fairground in Bloomington, WI.

Weekend events included a car demolition derby, combine demolition derby, tractor pull, fireworks, midway rides and games, animal judging, meat animal auction, and more.

Friday night will feature wrist wrestling, the crowning of fair royalty, and a demolition derby.  Saturday events include animal judging, a meat animal auction, combine demolition derby, and fireworks at dusk.  Sunday features the parade, FFA chicken BBQ, and evening tractor pull.

PdCToday.com will be attending to provide video coverage.

Complete schedule and more information can be found at the fair’s website.

The 2009 Twin-O-Rama festival took place this past weekend in Cassville, WI.

The weekend’s festivities included a kickball tournament, bean bag tournament, fireworks, “Kid Again” inflatables, mini tractor pull, hot dog eating contest, live music, Sunday chicken-Q, parade, and of course twin judging and awards.

PdCToday.com was in attendance on Saturday, July 18 and captured video coverage of several events.

Music by Kevin MacLeod of incompetech.com.

Today I will be bringing you my Memorial Day weekend meal consisting of smoked pulled pork, smoked beans, and a Memphis style slaw.  We did have a good breakfast that day as well and I will post a few pictures of that in the photo gallery.

Smoked Pulled Pork:

I picked up an 8.5lb bone-in pork butt from Hi-Vee, I thought they only had boneless left @ $1.99/lb which I was not thrilled about but a lady pointed me to the bone-in for $0.99/lb.  I rubbed it the night before with the yellow and brown mustard and then the rub listed below.

2 TBSP Seasoned Salt
2 TBSP Coarse Ground Black Pepper
1 TBSP Paprika
1 TBSP Red Pepper Flakes
1 TBSP Oregano Flakes
1 Cup Dark Brown Sugar

I got up around 6am to prepare the smoker and get the meat on by 7am. I used hickory because that is what I had, but I would have liked to try apple with this.  We need to preheat to around 220F which in this smoker takes about 20 minutes.

A couple of tips I have found with my electric smoker is it helps to put a couple charcoal briquettes in with the wood chips for smoke.  It also is best to set the element to maximum until it starts to smoke then dial it back down to the desired temp.  Your mileage may vary.

I spritzed every 90 minutes or so with a mix of 1part brandy and 3 parts grape juice.  Normally I would suggest using spiced rum and apple juice, but this is what I had on hand.  This helps form the bark and keep things extra moist.

After about 6 hours, the meat temperature reached 160F.  At this point, I pulled the meat and put it in an oven bag with some of the spritz.  Most folks would double foil here, but I found this to be easier and worked just as well.  It goes back in the smoker and will stay on until it hits 200F.  It will plateau in the 160-180 range, but that is when all the goodness is happening.  Do not try to crank up the heat to move things along.  Slow is the way to go.  Every smoke is different but you can plan on 1.5 hours per pound roughly.

One other thing the smoking experts say to use with pulled pork is a finishing sauce.  Here is what I used.  It is based of a recipe from a smoking meat forum but I skipped the salt and swapped in Schlitz for Killian’s Red.

Finishing Sauce:
3 Cups Apple Cider Vinegar
1 Bottle Schlitz
2 TBSP Red Pepper Flakes
1 TSP Ground Black Pepper
1/4 Cup Dark Brown Sugar

Mix all sauce ingredients in saucepan, bring to boil. Reduce heat to simmer and simmer 30 minutes, uncovered.

Once the meat hit 200 I pulled it, wrapped it in a towel and let it rest for about half an hour. If you needed to keep it longer you can wrap it in a towel and put it in a cooler for up to a few hours and it will stay in a safe (hot) temperature range.

The bone will pull out with two fingers and no effort at all. Pull the pork then mix with finishing sauce.  I just used two forks.  It is so tender it will take no effort at all.

Smoked Baked Beans:

6-8 strips of bacon cut into 1/2 inch squares
1/2 Medium onion, diced
1/2 Bell pepper, diced
1 – 2 Jalapeno Peppers, diced
1 – 55 ounce can Bush’s Baked Beans
1-8 ounce can of pineapple chunks, drained
1 Cup Brown Sugar, packed
1 Cup ketchup

Saute bacon pieces in fry pan until crispy and remove from pan with a slotted spoon. Saute onion, bell pepper and jalapeno pepper until tender.

In a large mixing bowl combine beans, pineapple, brown sugar, ketchup and dry mustard. Stir in bacon pieces and vegetables. Pour into a 12X9 or a deep 9X9 aluminum baking pan. (While mixing if things look dry, add additional ketchup 1/4 -1/2 cup at a time)

Place in smoker for 2 1/2-3 hours (make sure temperature of the baked beans reaches 160F) or place in a 350F oven and bake for 1 hour.

I used sliced jar jalapenos because I had some on hand, and used two 28oz cans of beans instead of a BIG can.

Memphis-Style Slaw:

I pretty much followed the recipe here except again I skipped the salt, and it turned out real real tasty.  Also I used two 1lb bags of shredded cabbage instead of doing that myself.

1 head cabbage, shredded
2 carrots, peeled and grated
1 green bell pepper, cored, seeded and finely diced
2 tablespoons onions, grated
2 cups mayonnaise
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup Dijon mustard
1/4 cup cider vinegar
2 tablespoons celery seed
1/8 teaspoon white pepper
Place cabbage, carrots, green pepper and onion in bowl. In another bowl mix all ingredients. Pour over the vegetables and toss well. Cover and refrigerate for at least 3 hours to meld the flavors.

The final plate and some satisfied diners.  This was well worth the work and the wait!

Original recipe references:

• Smoked Pork culled from Smoking Meat Forums
• Dutch’s Wicked Baked Beans
• Slaw recipe was from a private forum.  This is close to the recipe I was provided.