The Garden Thread

[Handsome Rob]

[Jamie Jackson]

Looking Good Rob!

That'll be some good eating!

 

My garden has been riding the struggle bus this season what with the heat and the rain...

I have been eating out of it daily and managed to put up some green beans, turnips, and rutabagas though.

I spent the past 2 weekends waterbath canning, Prep takes longer than the actual canning of course.

 

I decided to make some Chow Chow. I had to use store bought cabbage and bell peppers... limited growing space in my raised beds and such. But I got 14 pints put up over 2 weekends,

The onions, carrots, green tomatoes, and jalapenos came from my garden.

I had to resize the canned jars and for whatever reason it tilted the photo. Gravity is not to be blamed.

 

 

[Jamie Jackson]

And Pickles. Kosher ill pickles, Kosher Dill green tomatoes and Kosher Dill mixed vegetables out of my garden.

Disclaimer. I have already shared all of these with friends and family, I had around 28 pints all together.

 

ARRRR another tilted photo. My cyberskillz are weak...

 

[gregintenn]

We put up 40 qts of sweet corn today, along with 20 ears on the cob. Thankfully my dad came by. I sent him home with a trash bag full.

We’ve canned a bunch of green beans, some dill and bread and butter pickles and some relish. Next week we’ll start on the purple hills and maybe tomatoes.

Ours has done pretty good this year.

[Nikiski Dave]

Made 8 quarts of Jalapeno, garlic pickles and 4 pints of hot pickled quail eggs. Dilly beans will be next.

Edited July 24, 2023 by Nikiski Dave

[gregintenn]

May have told you all about this earlier, but in case I didn’t…

Corn salsa

Fresh, uncooked corn

Diced tomatoes

Can of black eyed peas (drained)

Diced onion

Cilantro

Sea salt

You decide the quantities. Serve with tortilla chips. We like Tostito’s hint of lime.

If you’re the imbibing type, a tall Corona or shot of rum pairs well with it too.

Edited July 24, 2023 by gregintenn

[gregintenn]

Picked two five gallon buckets of purple hulls this morning.

:edit:

We made 14 quarts of peas. I shelled peas all friggin day long!

Edited July 26, 2023 by gregintenn

[gregintenn]

I’m making tomato sauce, or a mess, or whatever you call it today.

[peejman]

1 hour ago, gregintenn said:

I’m making tomato sauce, or a mess, or whatever you call it today.

It's less messy in the blender. 

[gregintenn]

26 minutes ago, peejman said:

It's less messy in the blender. 

That’s how I’ll do it next time. Many thanks for the advice!

[peejman]

7 hours ago, gregintenn said:

That’s how I’ll do it next time. Many thanks for the advice!

Some complain about the texture out of the blender if you like the sauce a little chunkier, but it gets cooked, canned, and cooked again, so it's gonna be pretty smooth by then anyway. 

[Jamie Jackson]

As I only have raised beds my volume of production is limited. Even though it's not been the best year of production so far it's not been bad either.

I've been eating out of the garden several times a week for a couple of months now.

I've managed to scald, peel and freeze 6 gallons of tomatoes so far (mostly Roma) with plans to cook them down into a marinara sauce in a couple of weeks. I'd like to have 8-10 gallons so I'll have enough to can.

My bush green beans plants are on their 6 picking now. I usually pick around 1-1.5 gallons a week. I blanch and freeze about 1/2 of them and eat the rest. I agree they are nearly as delicious blanched and frozen as canned though. Just don't have the volume to can...yet. I have two 4 foot sections of pole beans coming up now. Fingers crossed

I did spend the past couple of weekends canning.

I put up a good bit of Kosher Dill pickles and Kosher Dill green tomatoes and some vegetable mix (onions, carrots,green tomatoes, yellow squash and zucchini...all from my little garden).

I bought a head of cabbage and a couple of bell peppers and canned some Green tomato Chow-Chow. It is awesome, but I like such stuff.

Kroger has peaches on sale for $.99/lb right now, so I picked up 15 pounds.

I canned quarts of spiced peaches yesterday. I didn't have any Allspice berries, so I used ground Allspice, cinnamon sticks and whole cloves. The ground Allspice gives the finished product a bit of a darkness to it.

I used the peach peeling to boil down and made peach jelly from them. They all Set!!! (That's a big deal if you make jelly! ).

Curious. No matter what 360 orientation I set my photos they seen to load in a cockeyed orientation. sigh

 

 

[Jamie Jackson]

Oh yeah. Jalapenos are doing well. So Friday afternoon I decided I needed to eat a few.

Thankfully I had cream cheese, Mexican cheese and bacon on hand.

 

Any suggestions of the photo thing?  Drat!!!!

Edited July 31, 2023 by Jamie Jackson
photo problems

[gregintenn]

The anti acid is a nice touch. Sounds like you’ve been busy.

[Jamie Jackson]

3 minutes ago, gregintenn said:

The anti acid is a nice touch. Sounds like you’ve been busy.

The antacid is a necessary condiment! Those peppers are nice and hot

Thank you Sir.

[Sleep profit]

4 hours ago, Jamie Jackson said:

Oh yeah. Jalapenos are doing well. So Friday afternoon I decided I needed to eat a few.

Thankfully I had cream cheese, Mexican cheese and bacon on hand.

 

Any suggestions of the photo thing?  Drat!!!!

Gosh that looks good 

[peejman]

6 pickings on beans?!?! I've never seen worthwhile yield past 2.  How'd you do that?

Our garden has been very mediocre so far this year, we got a late start. Tomatoes, okra, cucumbers, and zucchini should be coming in soon. The jalapeños are in and quite hot, possibly owing to the cayenne right next to it. 

[Jamie Jackson]

Crazy isn't it?

I normally get 4 pickings.  The volume is diminishing,  but the suckers are still producing. 

I normally cut them down at 4.

I guess these just want to live  

[Jamie Jackson]

@peejman

The green beans are Landreth's Stringless Bush Green Bean.

I've been using them for a couple of years and they definitely have produced more and for longer than any other green beans I've tried.

I get the seeds from https://victoryseeds.com/

Everything I've tried from them has had good germination and production.

[gregintenn]

I picked 3, 5 gallon buckets of purple hills today. We canned one and gave the other two away. I didn’t get half way through them. 
 

Anybody close to Macon County that would like some?

[Jamie Jackson]

Yesterday I cooked down around 30 pounds, maybe more as I didn't weigh them, but 6 gallon bags of previously skinned tomatoes.

I added sauteed bell peppers, onions, and squash to the mix and fresh herbs for the garden.

It took around 6 1/2 to 7 hours to reach the desired consistency for marinara sauce or spaghetti sauce, about 1/2 of the original volume.

I was able to pressure can 10 pints and put 3 pints into the freezer. I'll vac seal the frozen sauce later this morning.

It was well worth the time and effort imho. Nothing beats homemade!

I'll try and attach pics using my phone as my photos wanna load sideways using my computer...

 

Greg. If I was anywhere close to Macon county I would have taken you up on your generous offer! Purple hull peas are delicious!

 

[Jamie Jackson]

Can't figure out the rotated photo thing...

 

 

 

 

[Jamie Jackson]

 

Well my green beans, at least the first bed, have ended <sigh>, but did well for their limited space. I pulled them and planted speckled butter beans in that 4x8 bed.

I'll probably cut the other bush bean bed and plant it with something else. Maybe more carrots as they seen to do well in that particular bed.

I have 1/2 white runners (pole beans) spreading out and up in 2 different beds, 4x4 areas each. 

Planted some more turnips and carrots as well. So time will tell.

[Sleep profit]

Well Green peppers Banana peppers and tomatoes are still producing. But I think rest of Garden is done we have had a lot of rain here won’t be long before I will till it under and wait to next year lol 

[gregintenn]

1 hour ago, Sleep profit said:

Well Green peppers Banana peppers and tomatoes are still producing. But I think rest of Garden is done we have had a lot of rain here won’t be long before I will till it under and wait to next year lol 

That’s about where we are. We’ve had a very good year garden wise. There is still a great balance g watermelon that hasn’t got ripe yet. I’m looking forward to that.