Yesterday’s juice is today’s jelly!
It was a marathon afternoon and the house got to 75 degrees. But the juice turned out to be great jelly and we only had to make two trips to the grocery store. We had one batch that was soft set but otherwise both kinds set up well.
This is 23 pints of jelly and 30.5 half pints. I shared some with my aunt and my dad and still stocked my pantry stores. I still need to make a batch of cherry jam and can some more tomato sauce.
Happy Canning!!
My dad hand picked some grapes from the family farm. I forgot to grab pics of the grapes before we did the cook and crush. But the juice is GORGEOUS!
I got this cooked and filtered and ready to turn into jelly. I think we are going to clear the decks tomorrow and do a big jelly cook. I still have my apple juice in the freezer as well. All I need is a metric poop ton of sugar and lots of boxes of pectin.
Happy Canning!!
I have fallen into the Sonic trend of “dirty drinks” and oh my are they delicious!
My current favorite is old fashioned fully leaded coca cola with caramel cold foam or caramel creamer. It tastes like a coke float and some mornings is WAY faster than brewing coffee.
Anyone else doing these drinks?
I did a freezer restock this past week and had to shuffle around some items. This led to the discovery of some frozen turkey bones. I really needed the freezer space so what better time to use this up. Plus soup season is upon us!!
Into my instant pot went the bones, two kinds onions (they needed used up), chopped garlic, baby carrots, salt/pepper, and a little chicken bouillon to boost the flavor. I pressure cooked this for 90 minutes and then ran everything through fine cheese cloth.
I intend to freeze this so I cleaned and sanitized canning jars for the broth. I made sure to leave lots of room for expansion and popped into the freezer. I think some of this will come out for this Thanksgiving for gravy and the rest will find its way into soups and stews this winter.
Yum!!
I’m not a super duper zero waste person, but I do like to find ways to reduce our footprint around our house. We recycle and use reusable goods where possible. But my kids drive me nuts with how much food we waste. And the leftovers that go bad in the fridge because I’m the only one that eats them and I can’t keep up. So I pooled my Grandma Christmas money with some savings and I got a countertop composter!
I did ZERO research. I just used a basic google search and found a machine I could afford with at least 4 stars on Amazon. And so far it works great! When we are home and cooking I can fill it once a day.
Depending on what goes in, the color is WILD. This was tomatoes, moldy cheesy pasta and coffee grounds. I just empty the bin into our backyard garden bin and start refilling this. It’s quiet and surprising smells good while its “cooking”. It does require filters and maintenance so I don’t know how long it will hold out. But it’s a nice new experiment for us and reducing our trash.
My garden finally woke up and we have started harvesting tomatoes!
The small ones are little Roma tomatoes that I am washing and freezing for sauce and recipes later this winter. The big slicer is destined for BLTs this week! We may get precious little before fall freeze so I am going to watch carefully!
Happy Monday!
My family’s cherry tree did SUPER well this year. The cousins had their fill of eating off the tree, my dad got two full pies and I ended up with a gallon of fresh ripe fruit. They are just soooo pretty!
I don’t really have the time to make pie or jam right this minute so I decided to wash, pit and measure out the fruit so that I can deposit all this into the freezer for another day.
Each bag contains 4 cups (and a little) of pitted fruit. I may make one pie and one batch of jam? For now these can cool their heels in the freezer until I have the time and brain space to deal with this.
Happy Summer!!
The summer garden season is upon us and I needed to clean out my freezer from last year’s tomatoes. I had four bags that were a mix of roma and summer slicers. I got the skins off and thawed out into pots. By 10 am, I had one pot of bubbling tomato water.
By the end of the day, I had half a pot of luscious tomato sauce. I used my immersion blender to smooth out the sauce. I didn’t screen out the seed so there are still some spots. But I mixed in some garlic, onion, salt and pepper to season my red sauce.
The family enjoyed half of this made into tomato soup for grilled cheese sandwiches and the second half is slated for spaghetti sauce. I CAN’T wait!
Happy Summer!!
The hubs and I have been completely ignoring the garden assuming it was done for the summer. And we happened to poke around the foliage and found some surprise tomatoes!
We did know our pepper plants were doing well. We are still harvesting occasional poblanos, lots of jalapenos and some super hot habaneros.
I really really love all the different shades of color we are getting. I think I’m going to let these babies go until first frost, fingers crossed!
My garden is on its last legs but we are still getting some decent veggies. Last night’s picking included some tomatoes, poblanos and jalapenos.
My tomatoes are HUGE and none are smaller than my fist, lol.
Right now we are just cooking what we need for recipes and freezing the rest. I think Jellybean wants to try to make ketchup at some point. But that can be a good mid-winter boredom project.
Happy Gardening!!
Michele plays with yarn, food, and music in Portland
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