The blog entries have been sparse because my time has been spent working, riding my horse, dealing with home-grown produce, and working in the yard. Just as we clean house before company comes, I have to get most of the weeding done before Tim arrives. One good thing about spending a great deal of time working in a flower bed is that solutions to problems present themselves as if by magic. What I have not finished is stacking and covering the wood. That might be a Mom-and-Tim job. And, for the first time all season, this weekend I did not have to mow the lawn. By Wednesday I may regret that, but the weather has been so friendly to growing things that there was no August lawn slow-down and I have mowed every week since Memorial Day.
The green beans and tomatoes were painfully successful. Every other day since around August 15, I picked more green beans and more cherry tomatoes. I put 6 quart bags of green beans in the freezer, and am overjoyed that the beans finally finished up this past Thursday. You can see the winter supply of blueberries (3 bags) peeking out at the bottom of the green bean photo. They’re from a pick-your-own farm.
Sunday every inch of the kitchen counters were full of cherry and full-size tomatoes and I had to do something with them before they spoiled. I had four 1-pint jars of tomato sauce in the freezer from last year – my first attempt, and way too thin. So I thawed those jars, peeled and seeded about 4 more pounds of tomatoes, and put sauce and tomatoes in the giant blue pot along with basil and oregano from the garden, garlic (from the grocery), and home-made tomato paste from oven-dried cherry tomatoes, and cooked everything for about two hours. It thickened nicely, looks great, and there are now 6 jars of much better sauce in the freezer. (One is in the freezer itself, because it wouldn’t fit on the door shelf.)
There are still tomatoes on the counter, and more tomatoes on the plants, but now I know how to make sauce, and can easily make a much smaller quantity in less time and with less effort. I have to put up a couple of jars of sweet-and-sour beets (I only got a few beets, boo hoo, and had to buy some at the farm market). Then I will be done with “the harvest”. There’s still time to plant more lettuce and spinach, but all you have to do with lettuce and spinach is make salad. Or use the spinach in my Favorite Egg Breakfast. So easy. That’s a relief.
Seeing those pretty red jars of tomatos reminds me to tell you that I have been enjoying jars of mystery fruit preserves, AND BEETS, from your cupboard since my visit in June...one was fig, which was heavenly, and I have a strawberry which is almost gone now... if your tomato sauce is as good as your jam, we're in business! Can't WAIT to try it in person :-)
ReplyDeleteLOVE, -Alice-