Canning, Drying, Putting By

This is what my kitchen table looks like recently, well, presently. It is quite the mess, but that is not even half the story. I've got the not quite ripe toms ripening, a pineapple for grilling, some bottled hot pepper oil, a few pimentos and Anaheims, an Avocado for salad, tomato seed saving jars, a chair full of books and jellies for Ava, and a ziplock bag for picking beans and stuff.

My best friend is an morning person. If she were a robin, there would be no more earthworms for the other birds. Ava works the way 75% of the world works, she is on a dawn to dusk schedule. By contrast, I am not a morning person. I've got plenty of reasons/excuses, but suffice it to say that I go to be late and sleep till almost noon. It is hard for me to get to sleep, but it would take a nuclear weapon to wake me up. I can get up, but it is difficult and doesn't feel natural at all. Thank God I have Ava to call me and put a boot to my butt to get me out of bed in the summer, because otherwise I'd be working solely in the heat of the afternoon.

Two days ago, Ava and I, partners in crime, went foraging for elderberries and harvested quite a few. We got a few other things, too, rocks, ornamental grasses and the like, stuff from old homesteads and roadsides. Today, we made jam, jelly, and a special elixir.

I have about 2 quarts of elderberries drying on a large window screen in my spare bedroom. They will be for tea or muffins or bread or whatever I decide to put them in. I took a pint of fresh berries and the first thing we made this morning was an Elixir to be taken as medicine in the event of the flu or swine flu or whatever virus comes down the pike. It was super simple. I mashed some berries with the back of a spoon, put them in my pint jar, squirted the juice of a lemon in there, and made a mixture of 2 parts brandy to one part honey, of which I poured that over the macerated elderberries. I did not seal it or anything. Alcohol and honey keep almost indefinitely. This Elderberry Elixir should be used by the dropperful. I got the recipe and instructions from this article.
http://www.wellsphere.com/complementary-alternative-medicine-article/into-the-forest-exploring-elderberry/373317
Secondly, we cooked down 2 quarts of elderberries using the vinegar recipe in the BBB. I wasn't satisfied with the thinness of the jam, so I decided to add half a pack of pectin. It tastes great, but the jam did not set well, so I think I will rework this batch, adding another box of pectin, OR maybe I will just strain it and make syrup. I dunno.

After the elderberries were done, we started on making grape jelly. This was my first foray into jelly making, but it won't be my last. About 3 years ago, I planted a Catawba grape in my garden, and this year, I got almost 5 pounds of grapes from the vine. I was psyched. I planted this variety specifically for juice and jelly, Concord likes NE, Catawba likes the South. It is very Concord like in appearance and use. Anyway, this turned out wonderful-it was so good, I was licking all the utensils, even the plate I sat the spoon on. I saved a swig of juice for Skyguy to try, and he loved it, so the Catawbas are definitely a valuable crop now. I'd like to get 10 pounds from that vine next year.

After the now purple kitchen was cleaned up, thanks to Ava who gave me a break from washing dishes, we decided to finish another project that I had been working on. Ava was fired up and worked like a dog. She's ten years my junior and worked circles around me today and I actually felt a bit old. In my own defense, I've been dealing with this vertigo like dizziness for a couple of days, along with a low grade fever and an ear ache. Obviously, it is an ear infection, else I have some kind of foreign object or bug inside my ear! During allergy season, I sometimes have ear problems, and if I don't stay on top of it, it just gets worse. Additionally, I've had a lot of stress in my life in recent weeks, and that has caused a psoriasis flare AND and RA flare. Today was the first day my jaw(from TMJ) was back properly aligned....but I digress. The point is, that I feel old and Ava was working circles around me. I had started making hot pepper oil this week and had the oil infusing in a large dutch oven inside of a black gas grill. I usually do the straining with coffee filters, but Ava came up with the idea to use the other jelly bag. What a timesaver! So, that project was finished quickly as I already had the bottles ready to go.

After Ava left-I decided that I needed to toss the elderberry waste and hope that I get a tree or two to come up on my property. Thinking 'full sun-moisture', I walked my property and tossed out seeds and seed heads in certain locations. JohnnyAppleseed reborn as Beverly Elderberry. Behind the house, where our greywater is treated(by canna, jewel weed, privet,elephant ears, and now elderberry), I happened to look back over towards the house to the fig trees and see another tree full of golden and purple figs. Ava and I had just picked them a few days ago and she made fig preserves from them. Since I wasn't up for more canning today, I grabbed a bowl and just started picking figs. I sneered at the nearby cardinal family that were yammering on at me while I picked. I came in, removed the stems, and sliced them in half vertically. They are now on the dehydrator. After a few hours of drying, I lightly sprinkled each fig with confectioner's sugar, like it really needed that, but it sure tastes good! So far so good. I'm hoping that I can substitute these dried figs for dates in my date bread recipe. If anyone knows what kind of fig these might be, I'd like to know. I cut one of these open and made an inset so you can see the inside. The quarter, of course, shows scale of the whole figs. The inset, sliced fig, is the one on the left. Anyway, the trees are 40+ years old. I've cut them down to the ground before, and they came back just as strong. I will be hard pruning them again this year. They are on a slope and the trees are taller than the house and it is difficult to harvest. Harvesting will be easier and safer if the trees are smaller.

So then, I realized that I had not been out to the garden today, so I grabbed a few bags and buckets and headed out there. I moved my mother hen and her chicks(only 2) to the chicken tractor, and cleaned up the mess out there where I had them sequestered. There is always some distraction around here first the figs, then chickens,,,,at any rate, I began picking tomatoes and tomorrow I will be canning tomatoes again. It seems to work out that every third day I can tomatoes. This time, I am drying some, along with the figs, the tomatoes are for pizza and whatnot, and will be making a few more jars of stewed toms. There are quite a few slicers in this batch, so I may end up cooking it into sauce, but we will see.

So while I was out there picking tomatoes, I happened to notice more beans that needed to be picked. I realized it had been a few days, so I started picking beans, too. Another gallon, and they are in a lull of sorts, but the flowers are picking up again, so it won't be long until I have more than I know what to do with.

Speaking of that, I am starting to get more and more okra. Skyguy wants fried okra, but I want to pickle it. I tried it for the first time and OMG, I kept eating it and eating it. Okra is so good for lowering cholesterol, and I know the vinegar is healthy. Thanks to my neighbors, Pat and Crystal for bringing me a jar of this wonderful stuff. I'm now addicted! I traded them a bottle of hot pepper oil...good trade, I think.

So after picking tomatoes and beans, and snacking on pickled okra, I blanched and froze the beans, did some laundry, took a shower, and called it a night. Skyguy cooked THE best dinner tonight. It was a Southwestern style grilled chicken salad with our cherry toms, scallions, avocado, romaine, feta, pine nuts, and the world's best lime and olive oil dressing. This salad was to die for!!

'Tis canning season. Tomorrow, we will be reworking some apple jelly and fig preserves that did not jel well. I should probably take my elderberries down there and rework them, too. We'll see how it goes. In the meantime, I'll be dreaming of pickled okra and stewed tomatoes!