Summer is coming!

With summer around the corner, I'm beginning to think about what we'll be cooking, canning, and growing this season. I've just reorganized the extra freezer and our garden is in and growing. On top of all of this, I start a new teaching contract in a few weeks for the summer. We're going to be busy!

So, what's on my agenda/wishlist for the summer? Well, I'd like to work on doing a better job of using and saving more of the food that we buy. It's so sad to find a soggy bag of carrots down at the very bottom of the crisper. So, that's priority number 1. In addition, I loved the little amount of canning I did last year (jams and the pickled beans). I even made a small batch of strawberry-lime-vanilla jam a few weeks ago! But, we don't go through as much jam as I like to make, so I'd also like to work on making things OTHER than jam! Where does this leave me? Well, I'm not entirely sure. We made yogurt a few weeks ago which was fun. Chickadee found it a bit too sour, so I might try making some lightly presweetened next time. We've also been prepping more beans and freezing them, which I like to do. In fact, there's a big batch of pinto beans in the fridge right now that I need to break down and freeze. And I started a pot of tomato sauce this morning while working from home that I'll also freeze. I also have a bunch of chicken breasts in the fridge (buy one get one at the store) that I think I want to cut up and freeze in different marinades. I've found that we like some of the TJ versions and why not make our own and save some money. And I'm also intrigued by the idea of relishes. I keep seeing recipes on line for them so that's definitely something I'd like to investigate. Alas, I also need to figure out if there are something we'd regularly eat because, as much as I love canning, it seems silly to can things we won't eat.

The garden will be providing us some nibbles soon. We picked a snap pea each on our way to school this morning for an early snack! And we can probably start taking some early potatoes from the plants as well. There are two teeny, tiny zucchini on the plants but no patty pans yet. And the eggplants are looking a little sad. The beans and edamame are about 10 inches high now, but I don't think we'll have enough of either to save, just enough for some meals in late summer. However, we ought to have LOT of tomatoes of all shapes and colors. I'm super excited about those!

Plums! Again! Eeek!

More plums have arrived! Our neighbor gave us two more bags of plums that I've now turned into plain green plum jam (6 jars) and plum-cinnamon jam (4 jars). Then, another neighbor brought over the bag of plums he had originally given HER because she didn't know what to do with all of the plums! So, now I have yet another bag of plums (and each bag entirely fills my colander) to deal with. This last bag I think will turn into a Plum Converse with nuts and raisins. Then, Sofia and I will deliver some jars of each type back to the neighbors to share the bounty.

I'm almost out of jars now and I'm entirely out of sugar, so I'll need to remedy these things to be able to finish the putting up of the plums. I still don't have any tomatoes preserved, but we have a lot of plums!

Yellow and Green Plum Jam

Our neighbor across the street gifted us a giant bag of lovely yellow and green plums from the trees in his yard. We ate some and then I looked at the giant bag and realized that I needed to figure out something else to do with them before they rotted away. Jam was the answer!

But. I struggled to find a yellow or plum jam recipe that sounded like what I imagined in my head. This led to my first ever experiment with making up my own jam recipe! My reading told me that plums have lots of natural pectin and thus adding more was not necessary (and convenient since I didn't have powered pectin at home). The ratios of sugar to fruit varied but about half the amount of sugar as fruit seemed common so that's what I did.

I halved and quartered the plums, removing the pits (the green ones were a free stone while the yellows were cling) and tossed them with the sugar (about 3c to about 6ish c of fruit) and let them sit while working. I also thinly sliced a small (like really small) apple as a backup extra pectin supply and tossed that to. I also added lemon juice from the lemon in thefridge because the recipes all said to.

Eventually I needed a break and started the jam. Fruit and sugar into a pot on the stove while sterilizing the jars in the waterbath pot. I also put some plates in the freezer as many of the recipes suggested. The fruit cooked down dramatically - reducing by more than half and turning a lovely golden color with streaks of red from the apple. I added some lemon zest and vanilla extract after tasting along the way. I did a few tests and around 30 minutes of cooking found that the jam had set up. Into jars and waterbathed for 10 minutes.

I ended up with 5 half pints and an extra bit for the fridge.

Thoughts
The jam seems a bit too sweet to my taste. Since he just dropped off another bag (this one of just green plums) I think I'll try reducing the sugar a bit to get a less sweet flavor. I'm also wondering about add-ins. Maybe ginger? The jam is firmly set - it's probably a bit overly cooked in fact.

Chile Dilly Beans

As I was hoping, I made the pickled green beans that my mom used to make last week. Sofia and I picked green and yellow beans from the garden and I supplemented with some green beans from the produce stand down the hill.

I followed the old recipe from The Oregonian (by Jan something) but ended up with 6 jars rather than 4. The last jar (of the tops and ends) didn't get quite enough vinegar so it went straight into the fridge after processing. We opened them last night and they were still a bit too crunchy - I'm not sure if I didn't let them sit long enough before opening? Will have to try another jar in a few more weeks. I'm still hoping to try canning tomatoes if I can find some at the farmers market this week or next. And maybe put up some more peppers in the freezer and nay more fruit. 

The Garden

Our tomatoes are starting to get hit hard by the powdery mildew and I just picked off a green tomato with the blossom end rot. I'm hoping that this is a solitary problem! Still no red tomatoes, but lots of orange cherry tomatoes and the large tomatoes are getting big - but still green. Next year we just have to start plants earlier and probably keep them covered longer. It's only getting up to the mid 60s, low 70s during the days now and chilly at night. Not the best tomato weather. The beans are still producing and happy, and the hot peppers are going gang busters. There's one lonely eggplant on the eggplant plant, almost as big as the plant itself. And the sweet peppers have a few fruit, but not much. I'm going to try to winter those over and see if that helps. Carrots and beets are doing fine when they aren't being dug up by the neighboring cat. And I planted a second crop of potatoes because we had some sprouted potatoes in the house - don't know if they will actually do anything this late in the year. The figs are almost done - we've enjoyed those greatly. And, well, that's the garden! 

Putting things up

I've been enjoying being back in the Northwest and using my "free" time to start putting things up. Last week saw the addition of 10 new jars to our cupboards. I made 7 1/2 pints of blackberry jam (and have now given 2 away), one jar of brandied cherries, one jar of blueberry-basil vinegar, and one jar of blackberry infused gin!

In addition, the rest of the flat and a half of blackberries is resting the freezer along with about a quart of frozen blueberries, 3 or 4 containers of red beans, and 2 containers of chicken broth. Oh! and also 2 portions of carnitas. And rosemary salt!

On my putting up wish list...
- apricot-rosemary jam (using our rosemary outside)
- pickled dilly beans (at least one whole batch, maybe 2)
- huckleberries if I can get them
- peaches? plums? either to freeze or turn into jam
- limoncello (we gave away all of our before moving away from Iowa) I have 2 bottles of Everclear waiting so maybe also an arancello?
- bags of frozen shredded chicken for enchiladas etc
- bagels (frozen)
- par baked bread (frozen)
- yogurt (I guess you don't really put this up... but I miss the taste of homemade yogurt)
- marmalade (I keep reading recipes for this and want to try)
- dried hot peppers from the garden, and maybe a small batch of hot pepper jelly?
- something with the massive quantity of tomatoes soon to arrive... freezing? drying? canning? tomato jam?