This Week’s Garden Harvest

This is what I harvested from the garden this week: some cayenne peppers (many more are almost ripe, but not quite there yet), rose hips from my French wild rose, and a handful of snow peas.

I halved the hips and gutted them.  They are now drying.  I tried getting all the hairy bits off but with no success.  That stuff can, apparently, irritate your throat if ingested.  I guess I just have to make sure to use muslin bags for making tea with them.

I haven’t had a lot of time to play in the kitchen and I still have those same pesky preserving projects hanging over my head.  I would truly like to get them finished this weekend.  I need to move on with my writing.  I’m also going to have to clean my house pretty seriously because in a month there are going to be a lot of people in it.  I’m feeling pretty overwhelmed.

Preserving left to do:

sugar up the grape juice to make syrup, and can it

Apple sauce, can it

Quince in vanilla sugar syrup, canned

Shred all the giant zucchinis and freeze them

I have heard from some of my friends that they’re winding their own preserving projects up but are having trouble, like me, getting it all done between work and other responsibilities.  We do it because it’s important but there’s no question that doing a lot of preserving takes time.  What I’m tired of is having jars everywhere, on every surface, and all my equipment out.  I’m ready to put it all away.  But it would be silly to do it before I’m done.

I’m going to go get dressed, go to the Saturday farmer’s market, and then I’m going to get some of this done.  Plus cook a farewell dinner for really good friends who are moving back to Utah.  Boooooo!  We are devastated.  We must feed them so well they will immediately plan they’re first vacation to visit us.

What are you all working on this weekend?  Is your canner finally back on the shelf?  Are you wrapping things up or still in the thick of it?

4 thoughts on “This Week’s Garden Harvest

  1. simply.belinda

    Boy can I relate.

    I remember getting near the end of preserving last year and have my heart sink every time I looked at pots strewn over benches, endless clean jars scattered “decoratively”. I can remember mentally chanting to myself if I get “this” done I can put it all away, cause otherwise I knew I was going to procrastinate and make it worse for myself.

    February when I need to start again I’ll probably be massively sleep deprived and looking for any creative outlet that feels vaguely normal.

    Sending you doing support
    Belinda

  2. Cherish

    Ugh, I thought I was going to mostly wrap things up on Saturday but it all takes longer than I think it will. Still probably about 10 quarts of applesauce to do, have to turn a bag of plums into something, and I committed to pick crabapples so I’ll have to make jelly. Unless someone offers me more (I’m done seeking it out this year!), I’ll be done with canning at that point. I bought 4 pumpkins and after I take a short break to recover, I’ll cook and freeze those.

  3. angelina Post author

    When I had a brand new baby I hadn’t yet reached the levels of food preserving as I do now- in fact it was mostly blackberry jam and some frozen zucchinis. I can’t imagine having to do all I do now with a wee one in tow! I hope you tell stories come February!

    Cherish- you sound like you’re about as buried as I am. I just put 16 cups of shredded zucchini in the freezer, my apple sauce is cooked but still needs to be milled and canned tomorrow, and my quince are diced and cooking in vanilla syrup- but it’s not going how I planned so I’m not sure what will happen with that tomorrow. Crab apples! I’ve never had crab apple jelly but it has always sounded intriguing.

  4. NM

    Finally got applesauce and apple butter canned — whew! And used most of the last of the tomatoes to make a big batch of bruschetta in a jar (Ball named it, I didn’t.) I lie, though; a big box of green and half-ripe tomatoes went bad waiting for me to do something with them. Is it wrong of me to feel relieved? Off to the compost with the damn things!
    Still have a bowl of peppers staring me in the eye. Noooooooooooo. I need to make plum sauce. And do something with the red peppers. I’d throw them in the freezer, if only there were room. Perhaps once I remove the frozen plums for the aforesaid sauce, there will be room. And I should freeze pumpkin puree. If only I can find some room … And I want to make a batch of cranberry apple relish, and get my hands on a few quinces. But then I’m done. Really. I mean it.
    Sorry to hear your quinces were not behaving themselves; hope the situation resolved itself successfully.

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