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.
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| 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
