September 2, 2009: Is It Winter Yet?

Is it winter yet? Well, if it isn't, it had better hurry and get here! I am out of pint size canning jars again, and the cucumbers and tomatoes just won't slow down. This morning I gave my neighbor, Pat, all of the tomatoes I had sitting on my counter from earlier pickings, then picked another three pounds for her, and another seven pounds for me. I was happy to see the Kellogg's Breakfast are beginning to ripen again. I had to give three varieties another taste test, and I was pleased the Early Girl are better now than when the first ones ripened. Earlier ones had really hard cores, but these seem just fine. The Better Boy, on the other hand, weren't quite as tasty as the earlier ones.



I sent all my extra cucumbers to the low income apartments, then picked another big bag full this morning. I ended up making yet another batch of pickles, and had to put them in quart jars.




We opened a jar of the bread & butter pickles that I'd made a couple of days ago. I've tried three different recipes this year, and have yet to taste the first two, but I must say we do love these! They are much sweeter than any other bread & butter I've ever tasted, and I am a sweet pickle lover. The recipe has gone into my favorites file, and will be my pickle of choice again next year. I don't think we'll have any trouble using up these quart jars!


Granny's Favorite Bread & Butter Pickles

4 quarts sliced medium cucumbers, about 6 pounds
1 1/2 cups sliced onions
1/3 cup salt
2 quarts crushed ice or ice cubes and water
4 cups 3 cups sugar (they were too sweet after sitting in the jars for a few weeks)
1 1/2 teaspoons celery seed
2 tablespoons mustard seed
1 tablespoon ground ginger
3 cups vinegar

Wash cucumbers thoroughly. Slice unpeeled cucumbers into 1/4-inch slices; discard ends. Add onions. Sprinkle salt over top; cover with ice and water; let stand 3 hours. Drain thoroughly. Combine sugar, spices and vinegar. Heat just to boiling. Add drained cucumber and onion slices and return to boil. Pack hot pickles loosely in clean, hot pint jars to 1/2 inch of top. Adjust jar lids. Process in boiling water bath for 10 minutes. Yield: 7 pints. *If I have leftover liquid it can be used for refrigerator pickles. Just store it in a covered container in the refrigerator until ready to use, then heat it again, slice the cucumbers into a jar and pour the hot liquid over them and store in refrigerator.




The peppers are still producing well, and I put a half gallon of multi-colored strips in the freezer. I had a lot of red jalapenos, but they still haven't developed any heat. They are just as sweet as the red bells, so I sliced them and included them in the bag of pepper strips. I took a little taste of each one, and only one had a tiny bit of heat beginning to develop. There are so many of those jalapenos left to pick, but all these peppers will taste pretty good in our fajitas this winter, when the ones in the stores are $3 each!



The strawberries are just delicious, and I think they are getting more abundant and a bit larger now that the weather has cooled down a few degrees. Monday night we had strawberry shortcake, and it was so good!

I was joking about "is it winter yet?", since it's still in the mid to high 90s here, but it's not that far off for me. In just 45 days I'll be packing up and heading for Arizona! I have just enough time to plant a few radishes, and maybe a bit of lettuce and spinach, but I'll mostly be doing garden cleanup from now on. I have the pumpkin/squash patch all cleaned out now. It looked really empty, so I moved a bucket of cantaloupe from next to the garden shed. The plant isn't looking a bit happy in its new location, so I might be sorry I moved it.

My neighbor got a new grass catcher for her lawnmower, and I told her I could use a few clippings for my garden paths. The wood chips I had on them has all but disappeared through the year, and I don't like having muddy feet. I think her gardener got a bit too generous with the clippings, though. I had a virtual mountain of them in front of the garden gate, and they all have to be spread into the paths. I wanted to take photos of the September garden this morning, but I think I'll wait until I get the clippings taken care of. The garden isn't at its best right now anyway, as it's just been baking in the heat for the past two months.

I'm not mad at Mr. H now. We went out to dinner to celebrate our 47th anniversary last night, and he said my dinners were so much better than what we paid $42 (plus tip) for. How can I stay mad after that? But it still might be a long, long time before he gets a pumpkin pie ;-)

20 comments:

  1. I made up some B&B pickles with the left over cukes I had for dill pickle making. I have yet to try them though. The recipe came from a library book and I wish I had saved it to compare. I will have to get it again. Is that big yellow one Kellogg's Breakfast? It looks excellent!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Dan, yes the yellow one is Kellogg's Breakfast. Do I dare save seeds from it? It's from my tomato "jungle".

    ReplyDelete
  3. Congratulations on your anniversary! And congrats to Mr H for redeeming himself in such a nice sweet way haha!

    ReplyDelete
  4. The Kellogg's Breakfast would be a good one to save seed from. It is an open pollinated variety and is regular leafed so there should not be any problems with cross pollination.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Oh yeah, Happy Anniversary! :-)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Congrats on your 47th anniversary!!
    And didn't I tell you he would do something cute/sweet/adorable to get in your good graces again?? Men are all charmers. Thank goodness for that!!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Thank you for posting one of your Bread & Butter Pickle recipes. I have never made pickles before because I don't like them. But K does, so I want to try a small batch this weekend. I was just googling various recipes last night but yours will be the one I will try.

    Your peppers look so pretty all mixed up. I will need to start harvesting mine soon and will also be freezing them....I was hoping to get some color, but I am running out of summer fast.

    ReplyDelete
  8. So do you travel south to escape the cold? I don't think of WA as having very cold winters, but you say eastern WA and I always think of the coast.

    Those Kellogg's Breakfast tomatoes look so pretty. I just wish they were shorter season tomatoes so I could grow them.

    ReplyDelete
  9. I wish others in my house would enjoy sweet pickles. I like them but prefer traditional dills better - but it's nice to have some sweets now and then too. Unfortunately, my husband won't touch them and my daughter would do a courtesy one piece try and that would be the end of it. So no sweet pickles ever get made here.

    I have loads of jalepenos peppers that need harvesting. Mine are pretty mild too - not completely sweet but not significantly warm either. I think I will pick enough this weekend to do some pint jars of pickled jalepeno peppers.

    ReplyDelete
  10. I am jealous! My tomatoes are just about done (I think)! I got plenty canned and sauced, but now I would just like a ripe one daily for salads or burgers and the few I have left have been green for so long I think they are kaput! What do you do with all your frozen produce over the winter? Do you pack it in coolers for your move or just leave it for spring?

    ReplyDelete
  11. Congrats on 47 years!! I'm glad to hear Mr H is back in good favor.
    Wayne made pickled okra this weekend. The neice and nephew eat that like candy.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Hi, I just found your blog and want to say hello. I'm glad to see the sweet pickle recipe. I didn't have a garden this year, but still have pickles canned from last year...I think I need a better recipe...for next year!! Great work on your veggie garden...is it organic? We did organic last year and had a big harvest except for squash which got attacked by squash bugs...I tried fighting them off, but in the end the squash succumbed...so sad!! Anyway, thanks for making me laugh, about the "pumpkin pie", I totally understand how you must feel!! ;-)
    Peace, Stephanie

    ReplyDelete
  13. Marrissa, Thank you. Mr. H knows what side his bread is buttered on, it just takes him a while to figure it out ;-)

    ********
    Dan, thank you. I'll go search your blog for the directions on seed saving, and get them from a big perfect KB!

    ********
    Sue, thank you...and yes, that's why I've kept the old f**t around for 47 years. He's usually a pretty good boy.

    ********
    GrafixMuse, You're welcome. I hope he likes them really sweet, because these are. I actually used less sugar than the recipe called for, it was supposed to be 4 1/2 cups. I had to add a few drops of green food coloring too, just because sweet pickles should be really green....my mother-in-law's always were ;-)

    This is the first year my peppers have colored like they should. I don't know if it was the varieties or the weather....but the weather has been pretty normal. I will most certainly grow those big red ones next year!

    ********
    Daphne, we normally don't have really cold winters here, but much colder than on the west side. The temps here are usually about 20 degrees colder than our AZ residence, year round. We're also not in the warmest area of AZ, and usually get a few freezing nights in January. Some years it just barely freezes, but other years has been down as low as 17F.

    The KB really weren't much later than the Early Girls! I'm going to save some seeds, I can send you some if you want to try them.

    ********
    KitsapFG, It's just the opposite in my family. Mr. H likes dill relish on his burgers once in a while, but also likes sweet. Dill pickles all go to my daughter, she's the only one who eats them. I asked how these turned out, and she said they are not really crunchy, but the flavor is good. I thought Mrs. Wages would put something in the mix for crunch, but I guess not.

    Next year my jalapenos will grow in pots of not-too-fertilized soil, and be set in an area where I have to hand water them only when they wilt. Then I'll have some hot peppers! Mine really are as sweet as the red bells! Only the ones in the pot by the shed were hot.

    ********
    Erin, my tomatoes stalled out on me for a couple of weeks. Now they are picking up speed again, and I expect they will bear quite well until they freeze, or until I have to rip them out...whichever comes sooner.

    I've not grown a garden that produced this much in years, so I've not had excess produce to can or freeze, just planted what we could use for fresh eating. There is no way I'd get much down to AZ, especially this year, as we are taking our car instead of the pickup. With two dogs, a rabbit in a cage, a cooler full of rabbit and dog food...well, there won't be much room left for us! I'll just leave my freezer plugged in and the heat set at 45F in the house, then eat everything when we get back.

    ********
    Thank you, MissyM. I'll bet pickled okra is good, I've never eaten it. Do you use dill or make it sweet?

    ReplyDelete
  14. Shawn Ann, Thank you!

    ********
    Stephanie, welcome to my blog! My veggie garden is a mix of organic with a bit of non-organic. I begin my year with an application of a pelleted fertilizer, like Osmocote, but that's it. No sprays for the bugs, and just some applications of fish fertilizer when plants need a boost.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Hi Granny,
    Thanks for the sweet pickle recipe. Got it filed!

    You've enjoyed such a wonderful harvest this year!!!

    What will you ever do after the 45 days?

    Glad to hear that you and hubby are reconciled... and there's nothing like being appreciated for home cooked meals topped with pumpkin pie!

    ReplyDelete
  16. Toni, I have no idea what I'll blog about once I get to AZ! Last year we had the four wheel drive pickup, so I blogged about trips out in the desert. Then I started a tiny SFG, just two 3x3 boxes, so I blogged about them and the container grown veggies, but I wasn't very successful with the gardening. This year we're taking the car instead of the pickup, so what will I blog about? My trips to Walmart? That will be about as exciting as it will get this winter :-(

    ReplyDelete
  17. Happy anniversary to you and Mr. H! I'm making relish and jelly when I get back from the beach! Yay!

    ReplyDelete
  18. WOW! HAPPY ANNIVERSARY! You're just shy of the big 5-0 too!! Excellent! I am always so envious of your garden. I had to get a napkin to wipe the drool off the keyboard. I love that you have so much that you can't even eat it all. That's amazing and awesome and impressive too.

    ReplyDelete
  19. EG, Thank you. I hope you have a great time at the beach. Our temps are supposed to plummet this weekend, from the mid to high 90s all the way down to 74! And nights from the high 60s down to 49....brrrrr.

    ********
    Kate, thanks. He's a lucky man, huh?

    The garden seems to be slowing. Or maybe it's me and the pruning shears ;-) This week I got carried away....just call me Jack the Ripper-outer!

    ReplyDelete