Preserving the Harvest - PICKLES!

Garlic Dills

1Qt Water
1/2 C Salt
1 C white vinegar
8-12 Pickling Cucumbers
Garlic & Dill to taste

1-2 Quart Size Mason Jars / Jars from Tomato Sauce or any Large container
(I used a plastic container initially and moved them to jars after I found some that would work)

Wash pickles, quarter and put in jars with garlic and dill.
Mix salt, water and vinegar and pour over pickles filling jars. (Any large jars will do.)

Leave pickles at room temperature for 3 days.
Refrigerate after that.

Sweet & Salty Slices (with mixed veggies)
sliced onions
green peppers, cut in strips
Green or Yellow Beans
Daikon Radish slices
AND
Enough sliced cucumber to fill a gallon jar (do not peel cucumbers)
4 c. sugar
3 c. vinegar
1/3 c. pickling salt (not iodized)
1 tsp. turmeric
1 1/2 tsp. celery seed
1 tsp. mustard seed

If you don't have a gallon jar you can also use Quart or Pint sized Mason jars...of course any jars will do as these will not be sealed.

Wash and slice veggies and put them in your jars.
(I made 1 jar with just yellow beans and onion slices, and put a mix of veggies in the other jars)

Mix sugar, vinegar and spices together in a pitcher or bowl with a spout until sugar is dissolved.
Pour liquid over vegetables in jar.

Mixture may not completely cover pickles, that's ok.
Refridgerate.

Ready to eat the next day.
Will keep all winter in refrigerator.
I
n the picture these don't look as yellow as they became later from the tumeric.
They are both very yummy!

The State of Green

As I've mentioned before, most of my garden this year (so far) is in pots on the porch. This has mostly kept wildlife at bay...I'll explain more in another post.
With the rain-laden month of June, a lot of things are still not where they should be...but here is what we've got so far.

This box has parsley and broccoli raab.




Here is the lettuce and our eco-friendly clothes drier.



And, on the steps, we have a tomato, peppers, a cucumber, and a cauliflower, additional squash and cucumber starts...



Bush beans and pole beans are at the bottom on the stoop along with some flowers and herbs.



On the other side there is a big pot of herbs at the top,
more tomato and pepper plants and flowers.



In my last tomato post I mentioned problems...well there are still problems. Some of the tomatoes don't look as healthy as they should, and the ones in the topsy turvy planters didn't even warrent taking pictures of they are so small and stunted. I'm keeping my fingers crossed, but my usual bad-luck with peppers seems to be changing to tomatoes this year and the peppers look pretty good.
I'm really excited about how good the beans look too! Can't wait to pick and eat my own crop of beans! YAY!

Grow Your own Pancakes?!?!?!?!

I subscribe to Organic Consumers Association newsletters.
Today they had an interesting article which has inspired a whole new train of thought for me.
Growing my own grains, albeit on a small scale.

The grab-line for the e-newsletter was as follows:

How to Grow Your Own Wheat and Make Your Own Flour
The process of of making your own flour is a lot easier than most people imagine. Before the advent of the modern flour mill, grinding wheat or corn into flour was a laborious task. For that reason, most Americans still assume flour is made with some sort of magical machinery in a factory somewhere. In actuality, wheat is one of the easiest crops to grow, even if you have limited space. Once you've grown it, you just need to cut an arm-full, flail it a bit to remove the grain, blow the chaff off the grain, and use a device like your blender to make the flour. From there, the cookie, bread, pasta or pancake recipe you use is up to you!

The link to the whole article online is:
http://www.organicconsumers.org/articles/article_18082.cfm


The winter wheat sounds like a good option for me...once harvested, other veggies can be grown in the vacant spaces.....let me know what you think...if you've done this before or plan to try it this year along with me!!