It's the end of season time where I have tomatoes ripening at various stages all over my windowsills and basement floors, squash hardening off on my porch, pumpkins making appearances on my doorsteps, eyes always on the look out for the first signs of bittersweet to make fresh wreaths and garlands, and something cozy is cooking down on my stove.
Today, it's spaghetti sauce. Last year I made spaghetti sauce for the very first time, and it was a horror show. I still have one jar of the pure nastiness left over. This year, I think I learned the secret. Well, maybe two. First of all, the tomatoes need to be fully ripe, ripe, ripe. But the biggest trick of all, I think, is that the sauce needs to be cooked down, down, down for hours. Like five plus hours to get the rich, thick, tastes melded together dreaminess that we're looking for.
This just might not be a sauce for sharing...
Recipe tomorrow.
We had two beautiful watermelons make is this year, and we were totally pumped to cut into one of them yesterday. Beauty on the outside. Epic fail on the inside.
However, she still got eaten.
It at least tasted refreshing.
Mamas, little boys, and three chickies still partook.
Up next for my tomatoes will be a batch of fiery Red Hot to give to my two brothers for Christmas. I grew a few hot pepper plants in my garden, as well, and seeing as how just one tiny little pepper goes a long way in this family - let alone four plants with about a jillion peppers per plant - we need to find something to do with the excess. My bros like the heat, so RedHot it shall be.
...May their bathroom breaks be pleasant.
Just sayin'...
After the RedHot, I want to make about a million quarts of applesauce, and then my canning season will be complete. And just like last year, I'm still very much the learner and nowhere near a master, so many things came out delish and others came out in various stages of good-"ish." Not amazing. Not horrible. Just "ish."
But, just like last year, and just like my Grammy, I get such pleasure watching my shelves fill up with gifts for others and food for my little family. We made the tried and true, and we tried some newness. We didn't alter even a tiny bit some of the recipes, and we tweaked and reinvented some others.
Top shelf: Dilly beans, strawberry rhubarb jam, and bread and butter pickles.
(Strawberry rhubarb jam was the "ish" of this row. I tried a completely sugar free recipe. Not so hot).
2nd shelf: Green beans and salsa.
(Should have canned WAY more beans. Not sure what happened. I think I got bored).
3rd shelf: Zucchini relish and green tomato pickles.
4th shelf: Hot and sour dill pickles, Smudge, and hot dog relish.
Floor: Remnants of last year's nasty dill pickles, and the final zucchini of the season to be shredded and put into my freezer.
*****************
1922. Harvest season.
1923. Blessed exceedingly, abundantly, above and beyond.
1924. Shelves lined with food and gifts.
1925. Little hands that helped prepare.
1926. Spaghetti sauce cooking down all day long.
1927. Thankful hearts, happy tummies.
1 comment:
Mmmmmm...we are eating up your dilly beans right now -- they're TANGY -- and Jonah assures me he 'yoves them'...little turkey. You're sweet.
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