The vegetables are coming on hard and fast, and it has been a bit stressful keeping up with it all. Just trying to decide what to do with each of them can be a challenge. I grew extra cucumber plants this year because last summer I hardly got any at all. However, this year I have way too many for just the two of us to use.
I did make 12 half-pints of Bread and Butter pickles. Then I turned around the next day and made a cucumber relish.
This is generally picked every single morning. The Roma tomatoes are producing a lot of fruit. I ended up making 6 half-pints of salsa for the pantry with the first ripe ones.
Two days later, I had enough to make 4 pints of pizza sauce as well. First, I roasted the Romas in the oven to make peeling the skins easier.
I like to make a chunky pizza sauce with peppers, onions, and seasoning to have in the pantry. It is so easy to make and nice to have on hand.
The hardest vegetable to keep up with is the zucchini. OMG, my plants have gone crazy, overtaking all the surrounding plants. I have had to keep trimming back the largest leaves to find the zucchini. I did miss a few, and they were huge. After shredding most of it, I put it in the freezer for the winter months, as I shared in an earlier post.
This is the second time I've made a sausage and zucchini casserole for dinner, just trying not to let them go to waste. Also, it is a good way to use up cherry tomatoes, too.
It looks good, right? I'm sure we will have at least one more casserole before gardening season ends.
At the end of the week, I had so many vegetables on the island that I decided to rough chop them all and throw them into a large kettle to simmer.
I had onion, peppers, tomatoes, zucchini, summer squash, sweet potatoes, and seasoning for the soup. Once they all softened, I removed them to a blender to puree. I put the puree into another kettle to bring it to a boil before canning.
I put the soup into pint-sized jars, which will be just enough for both of us to have for lunches.
There was a nice sale on Black Cherries at the local grocery, and I had just seen a recipe in the New Ball Book for Cherry Bourbon BBQ. Well, you know what I processed next, right?
I wish you could smell and taste how wonderful this recipe is. All in all, I got 15 half-pint jars, which should last me quite some time.
I have four more recipes to do this week too, but I decided to take a day off from canning and catch up on other chores, lol. Have a great weekend, everyone.