Around the Farm Part 2

Now for part 2 of this awfully long post. You can find part one here.  Back to all that zucchini. You all are probably getting tired of hearing about zucchini, but this is a first for me and I want to remember what I did with it next year. First, I made stuffed zucchini with the smaller ones. A dear friend had given me some small zucchinis from her garden and I had a few smaller ones as well. So I made greek stuffed zucchini.

I just cut them in half lengthwise. Then I scooped out the insides. I chopped up the insides and cooked them in some oil with salt, pepper, garlic powder, greek seasoning and onions.

I added this to a mixture of bread crumbs. Which I made with my coffee grinder. I love this tool. I even use it to grind my 7 grain cereal that I add to my homemade bread. My hubby doesn't love multi grain bread and the pearl barley hurts my teeth when I bite into it, so grinding it up is a great solution. I like that it doesn't grind it all to powder, we still get some bigger grains. I also added chopped tomatoes, feta cheese and copped frozen lambs quarters. You would use lambs quarters as you would spinach. It is a weed, but it is wonderful. I only picked this one package this year. You can see my post about lambs quarters here.  Then I stuffed the zucchini halves and baked them at 350 degrees for about 35-40 mins. Then I froze them on a cookie sheet and then put them in a zip lock bag.

   

Bread crumbs, feta, tomatoes and "spinach" for stuffed zucchini

I also made a big stock pot full of Italian Beef and Zucchini Soup. I divided it up between 5 zip lock bags and froze them. When we eat this, I will add cooked macaroni.

My favorite thing I made with the zucchini was Sweet Relish.  It is SO GOOD! We go through a lot of relish on hot dogs and hamburgers and this is so much better than the no name stuff I always buy. I have just enough zucchini left to make one more batch, which will make 11 pints altogether. Just enough to last a year. If I knew how easy and good this relish would be, I would have tried harder to grow zucchini other years. I looked on the internet for a recipe and put together one from looking at a few.

This is the recipe I used;

12 c shredded zucchini

4 c onion

5 Tbsp canning salt

Mix all these in a non-metallic bowl. Cover and let sit over night in the fridge. The next day, rinse and squeeze out the water.

Then place the following in a big pot;

1 red pepper, chopped

1 green pepper, chopped

5 c sugar

3 c vinegar

1 Tbsp cornstarch

2 tsp dry mustard (I am going to use mustard seed in my next batch instead)

1 tsp turmeric

2 tsp celery seed

1 tsp pepper

3/4 tsp nutmeg. 

Add the zucchini and bring to a boil. Simmer for 30 mins. Pack in 5 sterilized pint jars and process in a hot water bath for 30 mins. I processed mine for 35 mins because of our higher altitude.

Now onto a new subject.  Our neighbour called and asked if we could use some apples. Well our trees don't have that much on them, so I jumped at the chance to go pick some.  Rebekah is in the picture below peeling an apple. I was able to make 4 apple crisps - one to eat that night and 3 big ones for the freezer. Our neighbour told me that her apples cooked up mushy, so that is why I made crisps out of them. She said we could come get more, which I might do so I can make fruit leather.

The kids and I also went into town to pick chokecherries. They grow along the river there. We picked enough to make 8 cups of juice. I already used 2 cups to make a batch of Crab Apple Chokecherry Jelly- a favorite in our house.

We have had other vegetables from our garden too, such as sweet corn. This corn is so incredibly sweet and it grows so well. I always plant Earlivee corn.  We picked it all and processed it. We only enjoyed 15 corn on the cobs. I wanted to get as much as I could into the freezer for winter. We eat corn about 5 nights per week.  I always cut the corn off the cob first and then boil it. We were able to put up 8 lbs of corn kernels. I have more growing in one of our pumpkin patches, but I'm not sure how well it has done.

Our neighbour that had the apples also had sour cherries. I have never had these before or used them in baking. We picked a box full. I am just pitting them and freezing for now. I think I would like to make some cherry pies.  If anyone has a great pie recipe or any other recipes that use sour cherries, could you leave a comment with a link or the recipe? I would really appreciate it.

So, now we will continue with the harvest. I look forward to pickling my beets and the cucumbers my friend gave me this week.

This post is linked up to Homestead Revival Barn Hop #76