Lemon-Lime Cucumber Spears

Overgrown cucumbers overtaking you? Here's a sweet canning recipe for your tastebuds! I got the idea for this concoction from my mom's cinnamon rings. I figured that if you could  flavor cucumbers cinnamon, then why not lemon-lime? Both are strong flavors. So these are "pickled" with apple cider vinegar and turn out to be a very sweet treat. I will be using some of these at Christmas for gifts.

Lemon-Lime Cucumber Spears
Cucumbers
Apple cider vinegar
Sugar
Lime juice
Lemon juice
Alum
Green and yellow food coloring

Day One
1. Peel and seed cucumbers and cut into spears to fit the size of the jars you will be using. You need about 8-10 cups. Place in large container.
2. Mix one cup pickling lime with about 4 quarts of water to cover spears. Let sit overnight.

Day Two
3. Drain and rinse spears.
4. In saucepan, bring to boil: 1/2 cup apple cider vinegar,  2 tsp alum, and green and yellow food coloring (to desired color) with spears. Simmer at least an hour. Drain. Pack into jars.
5. Begin heating canner for a hot water bath. Have lids and rings ready.
6. In another saucepan, bring to boil: 1 c. cider vinegar, 1 c. water, 5 c. sugar, 1/2 cup lemon juice, 1/2 cup lime juice, and green and yellow food coloring (to desired color).
7. Pour syrup over packed jars, leaving about an inch of head space. Put on lids and rings. Process 10 minutes in boiling hot water bath.
8. Remove jars from hot water bath and let cool until jars seal. Let sit for several days for flavor absorption. Enjoy chilled.

Canning Season Totals 2014

This post may be slightly premature, but I'm SO stoked about how much I was able to preserve this summer, I have to write about it. It's been crazy busy with Ansel, but luckily my mom is here and has helped me with a lot of it. Some I have done bits at a time, while others have been a massive haul in one day. My garden definitely didn't perform like I wanted it to. I planted green beans, zucchini, tomatoes, peppers, peas, cucumbers, a melon, and gourds. The green beans did well until something started eating the leaves off; I canned maybe half of what I did the year before. The peas looked awesome until...something ate them. The zuchinni did great, though they had their share of blossoms and even leaves eaten. The tomatoes are still going, but I swear they are ripening one at a time. (Because of this, I bought 50 lbs at Meijer and used those) Nothing happened with the cucumber or melon, though I have a wonderful friend who gave me some of her too-big cucumbers. A few gourds are growing on the fence. Even with all that, here's the totals:

25 half pints of salsa
8 pints of tomato juice
15 pints of spaghetti sauce
43 quarts of green beans (about half are from my mom's garden; of these she canned some for me)
8 half pints of cinnamon sticks + 5 pints of cinnamon rings
8 half pints + 2 pints of lemon-lime cucumber spears
17 quart freezer bags of shredded zucchini
7 quart freezer bags of strawberries (from my mom's)

I still had some frozen apples and corn left, as well as some green beans and tomato sauces. I'm pretty well stocked. I love knowing what is in my food!!!! I might have a few more items to finish up into fall (apples and tomatoes) but the bulk of it is done. Whew. About time to prop my feet up!

Garden Update

My garden is doing well! I was able to get most of the vegetables planted before I had Ansel, which was a big help. Dad put in the tomatoes for me over the last two weeks. He came over tonight and helped to weed too. Boy, it needed to be weeded! I don't remember the weeds being this bad last year!! Earlier this week I weeded the inside of the peas and around a few zinnia plants, but dad did around the green beans for me today. I still need to get between the rows. It's just so hard to get out there with Ansel and his needs right now! Still, I am pleased.

I have oregano, parsley, and chives in planters, along with some carrots.

The green beans are looking awesome (except for the weeds!)

The zucchini really came up well. I should probably thin it out some more though.

I have a short fence around my peas for them to grow up on. They were doing really well, then I think deer or some other animal got in and bit all the tops off! GRRRR!! Dad suggested putting fabric sprayed with Deer Off on the fence, and it seems to be working. Man, that stuff stinks!! The peas will hopefully shoot up again soon.

I have two pepper plants in the middle to use for making salsa also. 
Along the fence, I planted cucumbers, gourds, and sunflowers. They are slow to start, but hopefully will pick up soon and make use of the fence.

 I won't even post a pic of the tomato plant because you can't really see them yet, and they need weeded like everything else. Hopefully tomorrow afternoon I can really work on that! I also tried to plant broccoli, and never saw anything come up, until dad pointed them out to me tonight. They must have sprung up over the last two days since I checked.

I am feeling pretty good about everything though, and think that canning and processing all of this is going to keep me busy later this summer!

Applesauce

Growing up, I have distinct memories of making applesauce with mom and my sister. The sweet smell of the warm apples and cinnamon were reason enough to spend all that time washing, cutting, and boiling the apples down. Mmm! If you have never had warm applesauce, you don't know what your missing. Even if you try to heat it up in the microwave after the fact, it's just not the same as when it is fresh.

So, to my delight, I had a good friend offer to let me pick some apples from their tree. I took two five-gallon buckets worth, and mom and I worked on washing and quartering them, after removing any spots. Then the apples are put on to boil with a little bit (1/2 cup or so) of water in the bottom of the pan. They have to be cooked on low and stirred frequently so they don't burn. When the apples are tender, I just ran them through the Victorio Straino, and SHEBAM, applesauce!! I added about three cups of sugar and 1/4 cup cinnamon for flavor. Maybe I put in more... I didn't exactly measure... just kept tasting until I liked it!

From start to finish, it took about 3 1/2 hours. I still need to divide them out into freezer bags, but the (worst, most time consuming) part is done. I can't wait to enjoy it throughout the year!

 

 

Done with canning... hopefully!

Well, I would like to say I am officially done with canning for the year. I tore up the remaining green bean plants and tomatoes this weekend. The beans were getting rather buggy and unproductive, as were the tomatoes. All in all though, I am pretty happy with my results. I canned about 5 dozen quarts of beans, 3 dozen pints of tomato sauce, 10 quarts of tomato juice, and 2 dozen pints of cinnamon rings (from cucumbers). While I would have liked to freeze corn, the animals got to my few rows and it just didn't happen. I still might do make applesauce, as I found out that a good friend has some trees that I can pick from. Whew, though, it is a big commitment to can! The best part about it, amidst all the hot mess, is that I know exactly what is in each can, and don't have to worry about additives and preservatives. So it is worth it!

(Overgrown) Cucumber Cinnamon Rings

If you have lots of big, overgrown cucumbers, read on! This  recipe is a favorite from my childhood. I'm not sure where my mom got it from, but it is an excellent and tasty way to use those overgrown cucumbers from the garden. It does take four days to complete, but if you are doing a big batch, it's well worth it! The end result is a crisp and sweet cinnamon ring that doesn't even taste like a cucumber anymore. You can serve it as a side dish or garnish, and I recommend them chilled.

Here's the recipe:

Let me add a few notes to the recipe too. The first day is probably the longest and messiest, because you have to peel and core the cucumbers. I think the trick is to have someone peel and then another person core. Try to find some utensil that is round to do the coring also- I ended up using a large icing tip, and it worked pretty well.

Use a LARGE container so you don't have to fight with everything fitting. I think I did about a dozen foot-long cucumbers, and I used a large plastic Tupperware container that was about a foot diameter and 8 inches deep. Even with this size, I didn't have a lot of room.

On the second day, you will need at least a stockpot to fit all the cucumbers. Or, use your cooker canner. Rinse them well to get the pickling lime off! Also, I found that it saves time to prepare and boil the syrup while the cucumbers are simmering for those two hours.

On the third day, all you do is reboil the syrup to bring out the flavor and then dump it back over. On the fourth, prepare your jars and get the hot water bath going while you reboil the syrup and pack the jars. Be sure you have a rolling boil going for 5 minutes, then remove the jars. I found that setting the jars on an old towel and covering them with an old town helps the heat stay in and seal the jars. 

Day One                                    Day Two

 Day Three                             Day Four

Feel free to contact me via the comments section and I can help you with the process!

How to can green beans

Lately I've been canning lots of beans. You can't imagine the nostalgia that this brings about. Except now, I have to plant them, weed them, pick them, snap them, wash then, stuff them in jars, and monitor the pressure cooker all by myself. (Ok, take that back mom did get me started with the first canner) When I was a kid, dad, mom, Beth, me, and Zach all pitched in somehow, and the process seemed less tedious. Still, the work that goes into preserving beans is much more manageable than peas. The thing is, for the amount of pea pods that you pick, not many actually turn out, and it takes a lot longer to shell them! So back to the beans....

To can beans, you should first snap the ends off, in my opinion, and then break the bean into about a 2-3 inch portion so they fit into the jar. Once you have them down to size, you will need to rinse them in water several times to make sure that any dirt is gone. Very important step! Next, I recommend wide mouth Ball canning jars to store them in. Begin to put the beans into the jar, and then use the blunt end of a knife to pack them in as much as desired. (As a kid, we tried to pack them in good to get the most use out of the quart) Put one teaspoon of salt in each jar for flavoring, and wipe the rim of the jar clean of any water or salt.

Meanwhile, fill a stockpot with water and get it boiling. Concurrently, put three quarts of water in the pressure cooker and turn up the heat so it won't take as long to process once you get the jars ready.

In the stockpot of water, place as many lids as you will need into the water, as this helps get the seal ready. Leave them in for 5-10 minutes, then take them out and put them on the jars. Add and tighten the rings to help seal the lids before they go into the pressure cooker. Once the lids and rings are all on, place as many jars as will fit in your pressure cooker. (Mine holds 7 jars)

Place the lid on the pressure cooker. Once you feel steam coming out of the topper, set the timer for 5 minutes. After 5 minutes, place the topper on and watch for the pressure gauge to rise to 15 units. Once it hits 15, set the timer for 15 minutes. Keep an eye on it, because you should adjust the burner heat if the pressure goes higher than 15 units. When the timer ends, turn the burner off and wait several hours at least for everything to cool.

Well, that certainly sounds like a long process, and it is in a way, but the more I do it, the faster it gets. The best part is having homegrown beans any time of the year, without all the extra crap that you find in store beans. They last a long time too! I'm pretty sure I've eaten beans from two or three years ago, and they tasted just the same. So it's worth it, for sure!!