Time for Pickles… Yum!
Beau August 19th, 2007
I decided last year to begin canning, and made a batch of pickles from the garden cucumbers. They turned out pretty tasty, but a little soft. This year we have an abundance of cucumbers and I did some more canning last week. Our garden is a work in progress… mostly the progress of weeds! But the cucumbers and tomatoes are very forgiving. Oh, and the jalapeno peppers have grown like crazy, so I canned a few jars of those too.
Aside from almost passing out when I got too close to the simmering broth, it went pretty well. Pickles are probably the easiest… which is good for a beginner like me. Now we have a bunch of jars for winter. But I would love to learn how to can more vegetables, and maybe next year will get a pressure canner. I’ve been a little hesitant to do the pressure canning yet, but we’ll see. I love canned beans and stewed tomatoes, so that’s my goal for next year. But the pickles sure look good!
Somewhere I read that grape leaves help keep the pickles crisp, so we threw in a leaf in each jar, and added some fresh dill and garlic seasoning with the mix. The 6-year old helped with filling the jars… he loves pickles too! Do you can your vegetables? And is it hard to really put up a variety for winter? I’d love to hear from those of you who do a lot of canning!
