Orange Jelly and Corn Relish

It's to late tonight and I'm exhausted but tomorrow I will be sharing the new recipes I tried today. Orange Jelly and Corn Relish.

The Orange Jelly is so amazing.....I just can't explain it, really you are going to have to try this recipe out. As a matter of fact I have the same thing to say about Corn Relish.

See you tomorrow and I oh so hope you enjoy these as much as we are!

Mint Jelly (using fresh mint from your garden)

Mint Jelly

Read this recipe all the way through before beginning. I made some adjustments and changes to it as I did mine. You can follow what I did or follow the recipe, whichever way works best for you. Following this recipe is a personal choice, I can't be help responsible for any negative results you get from using it or storing it.

3 cups packed Mint Leaves
Green Food Coloring
4 cups Sugar
1 pkg, powdered pectin




This recipe calls for using Mint leaves, so if you have Mint  in your garden this is a good recipe for it.

Pick and wash fresh mint leaves carefully and bring to a boil with 3 3/4 cup of water.
       (I went a step further with mine and tore my leaves in half)

Steep (leave the leaves sitting in the water off of heat source) for at least 10 minutes. (I let mine sit for about 20 minutes to assure I had a good amount of mint flavoring)

Strain through a double layer of cheesecloth and measure out 3 cups of the mint infusion. (I didn't have cheese cloth but did have one of the wire strainers that has very small holes, it worked great)
 a few drops of green food coloring to get the desired color you want.

Combine the mint infusion and sugar in a large kettle and bring to a boil, stirring constantly until the sugar is dissolved, then continue the boil for 1 minute.

Add pectin all at once, continue to stir constantly and boil for 1 minute.

Remove from heat and skim off foam. (I avoid this step by adding a 1/2 tsp butter, it keeps jelly from foaming and doesn't affect the taste at all)

Pour into hot sterilized jars and seal with parrafin. (I also did not seal mine in this manner I put , mine in the sterilized jars, put seals and lids on them and then ran them for 10 minutes in boiling water in my cold pack canner, worked great)

Additional Notes: Once the jelly was done and one jar cooled I put it in the refrigerator. Once cooled I tried it one a slice of toast and it was okay. Not quite as strong in the mint flavor as I expected but you could definitely taste the mint. I have read often where mint jelly is good for use when cooking lamb. We don't eat lamb but I'm thinking it would be great on pork.

Recipes for Cantaloupe Jelly, Watermelon Jelly, and Zucchini Relish

Cantaloupe Jelly

2 1/2 pounds peeled and diced cantaloupe
2 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 peel of tangerine or orange (I used a zester to remove the peel and it worked out perfectly)

Place cantaloupe covered with sugar in a covered bowl and put in refrigerator for 24 hours.

Drain the cantaloupe, pouring off the sugar and liquid in a large saucepan. Bring to boil over medium heat and boil for 5 minutes.

Add diced cantaloupe, vanilla extract and peel. Insert candy thermometer and simmer, stirring occasionally until the thermometer reaches jelly temperature (220 degrees) Pour into sterilized jars: seal with wax and store in a cool place.

Makes about 2 pints.

Now on a personal note. I did not put my in the refrigerator for 24 hours. I ran mine through a juicer. I then took the juice and sugar and put it into a pot and brought it to the recommended boil and temp. Then in the part of the recipe where it calls for adding the diced cantaloupe I added the pulp that came out when I juiced it. Worked out so well.  I also did not seal mine with wax, I'm paranoid of that method so I went ahead and filled my jelly jars and put it in a cold bath canner for 15 minutes. All sealed and are doing great as I  followed the directions for doing that from another recipe I found. So those are the personal adjustments I made to the recipe. However,following what I did is a personal choice and I can't be held responsible for any negative results you may get.


Watermelon Jelly

2 cups seeded and diced watermelon (again I put mine through the juicer)
3 1/2 cups sugar
3 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice (used bottled lemon juice as it was all I had and it worked fine)
1 package powder pectin (I used sure jell and it did not come out as thick as I thought it should          have been so it's more like a syrup than a jelly which is fine with my family  they are using it on pancakes. I've put it on toast but you certainly wouldn't  want to let a small child handle it, there is likely to be a mess.)

Food process or blend watermelon until completely smooth. That should make about  2 cups of juice.

At this point I strain mine, but you don't have to. (if you run it through a juicer as I did this step is not necessary)

In a 6 to 8 quart Dutch oven combine the watermelon puree, sugar and lemon juice. Bring to a full rolling boil ( a boil that cannot be stirred down) over high heat, stirring constantly.

Stir in the pectin all at once. Return mixture to a full rolling boil, boil hard for 1 minute stirring constantly

Take of heat, skim off foam. (I added about 1/2 tsp butter to mine and it makes this step unnecessary and doesn't change the flavor at all, I do this with all jelly/jam recipes)

Ladle jelly into clean hot half pint jars leaving 1/4 in head space. (I used pint jars that way I had one jar not full. I canned the others and put the one that wasn't full in the refrigerator for immediate use)

Process in a boiling water bath canner for 10 minutes. Allow to cool completely away from drafts. I set mine on cooling racks. Then store in a cool dark place. Makes 4 half pints.

I made some changes to this recipe to suit my personal needs,  However,following what I did is a personal choice and I can't be held responsible for any negative results you may get.



Zucchini Relish

10 c minced zucchini
5 c minced onions (I didn't realize I didn't have an onion at the time so I used 2 1/2 c of onions I had dehydrated, worked out very well)
1 c diced celery
3 green bell peppers, diced
2 red bell peppers, diced
1 c pickling salt (I used sea salt, worked great)
2 teaspoons of turmeric
1 tablespoon dry mustard
3 tablespoons celery seeds.
6 c sugar
5 c white vinegar
3 tablespoons cornstarch

Combine zucchini, onions, celery and peppers with salt. Stir well, cover and let stand overnight.

Rinse and drain thoroughly, I did a double rinse on mine, you want to remove all that salt.( I also ran mine through a hand operated food mill, one like you would use to get the juice out of tomatoes and is cone shaped. Sorry I don't know the actual name of it.) You want to be sure you get all the liquid out of it you can, this is important.

In a large pot combine remaining ingredients, add the vegetables and bring to a rolling boil. That is a boil that cannot be stirred down. Then reduce heat and boil gently for 20 minutes.

Ladle relish into clean, hopt pint jars, leaving 1/2 inch head space and seal.

Process in a boiling cold bath canner for 15 minutes.

Yields 8 pints.

If you tasted this without knowing what it was you would think you were eating sweet pickle relish. This is so amazing I won't make sweet pickle relish for my family any more, they loved it. I did make some adjustments to this recipe to suit my needs, However,following what I did is a personal choice and I can't be held responsible for any negative results you may get.

Rain is so needed, Prayers Please!

If  you read this and you are a praying person please pray for rain. Many are starting to if not already in a bad way due to much needed rain. Our ponds are drying up, our cattle need water, our gardens are dying and soon enough they could make us ration water just so everyone has enough to drink.

Thank you

Zuchinni Relish vs Pickle Relish

Oh how I wish you could have a sample taste of the Zucchini Relish through the computer. I have to tell you we are lovers of pickle relish but we will never make it again. I will get the recipe on here for you as soon as I can. The stuff is amazing, simply amazing.

My husband who doesn't like red or green bell peppers loves it. Our daughter doesn't care for it, however, she is not a fan of pickle relish either.

My parents will be over in a bit for a hot dog cook out and we are going to have them try it as well and see what they think.

Hands down in my opinion its far better than pickle relish any day!

Pictures of Jams, Jelly and Zuchinni Relish

I'm so happy to share the following pictures with all of you. Hubby, daughter and I really put in some work on all of this but we are so happy with the outcome. I can't wait to get the recipes on here for you all to try out if you prefer.

I also wanted to add that I'm in the process of making a Zuchinni Relish. I have been told that if I will make this for my family they will never want pickle relish again, so we will see how that turns out.

The short jar on the left is the Mint Jelly. Made out of a Speariment Plant that I've been growing all summer long. Not to worry, the plant was not destroyed and does have a lot of new leaves starting. The Red jar is Watermelon Jelly and the Orange/Yellow jars on the right are Cantalope Jelly

I should have added a touch more green to this to make the color a bit brighter but sure wasn't thinking  about it.

These are jars we had already done. Left is Blackberry Jelly and Right is Peach jam,

This is the start of the Zuchinni Relish. You start by putting in ten cups of Zuchinni, 5 cups of chopped onions. I cheated and used 2 1/2 cups of dehrdrated onions I already had, 3 Green Peppers,  2 Red Peppers and 1 cup of salt. This has to sit overnight and then you finish it up the next day. When I get it done and they have gotten to taste test it I'll let you know how it turns out. They say that once you have this you will never want pickle rilish again.

What a busy day!

Okay I have a few more minutes here to breathe, (lg inhale).

It certainly has been a busy day. Got up at 6:30 am, picked my mom up and we went and picked blackberry's. It was a good thing we went today because they are just about done for this season. I have determined that we are starting a blackberry patch here at the house. We picked on flat for mom and it cost her $30.00.

I understand the concept of having a business and making money, I used to be the regional manager of five retail stores. I do however believe there is a difference in making money and just flat ripping people off. So many people, primarily our children, need to be eating fresh fruits and vegetables, they simply cannot afford it. While waiting for our Tomato's to be ready my mom stopped at a road produce stand and they charged her $5 for three Tomato's. That is just insane! 

If you and I went to Wal Mart, each of us having $200 to spend, one of allowed to purchase only things that are good for you and healthy and the other only allowed to purchase junk food, the person purchasing junk food would have so much more food in their cart. And they wonder why in America we have such a problem with overweight people. The economy stinks, jobs are hard to find and you have to buy to eat what you can afford. (That coupled with the fact that game stations and TVs are the best babysitters, instead of getting kids outside running and playing ) Okay I'm off my soap box now.

After we got her Blackberry's we stopped at a couple of garage sales and then came on home.

Mint Jelly and Cantelope Jam has been made. I started Grand Scale Zuchinni Relish. You mix half of it together and then it has to sit for 24 hours before you can finish it. I had to get out of the kitchen for a few so hubby could make supper and then I'm back in there to finish up the Watermelon jelly, probably two batches of that. Again it's a good deal I have help because this is just too much in one day.

Then once it starts cooling off outside we have to go out and get another bed of green beans and a bed of peas planted. It's a good thing they are only 4x4 beds. I may not even make it out to get that done, hubby may have to do it without me because my CHP is really kicking in. I usually don't take MEDs in the middle of the day but I'm going to have to today and hope that I can get it under control enough to go to Church tomorrow.

I'm going to get the recipes I've been using put on here so that if you would like to try them you can. I won't get it done today, maybe Monday, but I will get them on here.

I'm off of here for now I've decided to lay down and take a little rest. I hope you are all having a wonderful day.

Mint Jelly and Cantelope Jam

I have so many things to catch you all up on but I'm so limited on time today. I took this short break to run in here and tell you that I made a trial batch of Cantelope Jam and oh my goodness you have no idea how good that stuff is.

Everything that went in the jar was all natural, didn't even have to use boxed pectin, and the stuff is just amazing. I'm thinking I may have to start sharing these recipes with you all so that you too can enjoy them.

So far today we have Mint and Cantelope Jelly and Jam made. Next on the agenda is Zuchinni Relish and then Salsa. Thank God for my husband and daughter who are helping me to get all of this done. My CHP would never allow me to stay moving long enough to do it alone. We are going to feel like royalty this winter eating all this yummy food that is taking so precious little to make.

July 5, 2012 Garden Pictures, Really starting to see damage from the heat.

 

For those of you new to the blog these strawberries had to be removed from our large patch. My husband and son have started raising the strawberry patch so the size of it had to change. These plants were in the way so they had to be removed. My daughter and I transplanted them into this container and within a day we thought we had killed them. I cut off all the dead leaves leaving the roots in the soil. Slowly but surely the plants starting come back and we have actually gotten about ten strawberries out of this container. My suggestion if you ever have to transplant strawberries, never give up on them, they are quite the hardy plant.

If you are not aware there are two types of strawberries you can get, the plants we have are called Ever bearing. Ever bearing plants will continue to put out strawberries for most of the summer, the other type puts them out one time and that’s it. Ever bearing Strawberries can get quite large but not as large as the other variety. I would prefer having strawberries all summer over having one batch of very large berries.

This is one of the plants in the container, here you can see that it has a small berry that has turned red. You can also see here that on this plant alone there are three more that are still green. Not to bad for a plant that basically had to start all over and catch up with the others.

The two pictures above are showing the range in sizes of strawberries we have been getting. Some have been smaller while others have been quite a bit larger. The really important aspect to us is they are YUMMY! (I like to use big adult words as often as possible. LOL)

The picture on the left are the Blue Lake Green Beans, in this photo they look very good. In the next set of pictures you will see how the heat has really done a number on them.

In the picture on the right are Bush Green Beans, I’m not certain of the brand of these. They had done quite well and had produced like crazy. Then they started looking really bad when the triple digit heat hit us. I went out to pull them out and start a new batch but when I got close and looked they are producing new leaves under the dry ones on top.

I’ve opted to give them a bit more time to see if they come out of the damage the heat did to them and start producing again. If they should not start looking better soon they will be removed, compost added to the bed and another batch of beans started for a fall picking

I took this picture in an attempt to show you the base of this tomato plant. That is one plant, when it was planted it had one stem. If you don’t pick off the sucker leaves on a tomato plant they will start growing as well. These however are not sucker leaves, the stem actually branched out under ground and came up like this. The base of this plant is small in comparison to some of the others.

These have by far been the most amazing Tomato plants I have ever had the pleasure of dealing with.

This picture taken at a distance doesn’t do justice to how pretty the Loofah plants are. I was attempting to show you the height of the plant. I will have some pictures later on that will show it better. They have reached a height of about 5 ft tall so far.

The two pictures above and the four below are all basically showing the same thing. I am forever amazed at a plants ability to stretch its “arm” out, grab a hold of a supporting object and wrap around it.

Some of these you can see where they had to reach a fair distance, some sent runners one way and then another and yet others just kept wrapping around in the same location.

The plants “knowledge” that it needs to do this in order to support the items it will produce is just something to behold.

I’ve finally gotten my daughter to just sit down and look at plants with me. I mean really look close like this and see the truly amazing things they do.

July 4,2012 Taking a break from the garden

We took a break from working in the garden today to go and have some fun.

Celebrating the 4th is very important to me.  I have the freedom to work my land as I please, to attend the church I wish without fear and to have this blog and say what I wish based on all the men and women who have fought for our freedoms.

My husband and all three of our sons are among those who have gone and fought for our freedoms. Two of them have lifetime issues to deal with because of it. They have no regrets as many of our soldiers don’t. They do what they do for love of God, Family and Freedom.

Grover Park Baptist Church always puts on a very nice public fireworks display. They provide hot dogs, chips and drinks. We were thankful for the drinks as it was unbearably hot out that day.

We met up with friends and had good conversations and laughs.

The Freedom Riders showed up, what a honor it was to see this wonderful group of bike riders. They have done an amazing thing of protecting our military families when loved ones are lost in war. They surround the families and the services to protect them from the ungrateful individuals who protest their funerals.

The Honor Guard was there as well, what a privilege and blessing to see them honoring our flag and country.

The heat got to baby boy a couple of times and he had to lay down and take a little rest. It wasn’t long and he was up and going with more energy than all of us combined. One of the blessings of being a 4 yr. old I guess.

What a special picture this is. Baby boy getting to play and have a good time with his great grandma Shirley.

My  hubby John taking a little rest and relaxing while we wait for it to be time for the display.

I always detest having my picture taken. I look horrid with all my hair pulled back, but had no choice due to the heat. I  had to keep it off my neck and shoulders.

Addie and Grandma laughing and having a good time. There is no telling what those two were plotting.

Baby boy put on a show for us, demonstrating all his fighting or dancing moves. We had a hard time trying to figure out what he was doing and he kept changing his mind about what he was doing.

In the first picture baby boy and mom are enjoying their time with laughter and big smiles.

In the second picture it appears that baby boy and Great Grandma Shirley are dancing, but I’m not sure what they were doing other than having a good time.

I attempted to take a few pictures of the fireworks but either my camera is not suited for such picture taking or I’m just not skilled in taking this type of picture.

I certainly hope you all had a safe and enjoyable fourth of July  celebration.

July 3, 2012 Catching up on picture posts

 

You might wonder what the fish has to do with this blog, but really the fish is quite important. Every time we go fishing we go and buy a box of worms. Once the worms are gone we take the left over “dirt” and pour it into our houseplant pots. It is making a huge difference, they love it.

 

Then once we catch fish that qualify as a keeper we take them home and hubby cleans them for us. What is left over goes out to our compost bin and is therefore recycled and ends up in our garden. No part of the fish is thrown away, we use it all.

Aside from all the uses of the fish we absolutely enjoy going fishing. We go as a family and enjoy our time together. Often times we have a hard time leaving to go home and have been caught walking back to the car in the dark, staying until we have no choice but to go home.

Going fishing started out as hubby’s hobby. Our daughter and I have learned a lot from him about fishing and have worked hard to be good fishing partners for him so that he can enjoy himself instead of always having to take care of our stuff for us.

We even learned to put the worms on our hooks. Mind you we do not like doing that but again we want to be good fishing partners and not be little sissy’s about putting the worm on the hook. LOL

Before we left I got these pictures taken. These are our Radish’s. They really came up good and strong. We tried to thin them out and they didn’t do well. Since the soil/compost mixture is so loose we are just leaving them, we think they will be able to make the room they need to grow.

This is the 3rd bed of green beans that we have started. These are Blue Lake Bush Green Beans. We were so excited about them, but as you will see in the following post’s I’ll be making they are not doing near as well as they started out.

They started out so well and had such huge leaves on them. They did get planted right before the triple digit heat hit and that could be why they are having such a hard time now despite the fact that we are diligent about keeping them watered and taken care of.

This is one of the first beds of green beans we started out with. We thought they were Blue Lakes but we now know they are not. They no where resemble the above pictures. Not sure how we got them all mixed up.

The Tomatoes continue to go crazy. We had one plant that had a tomato on it that got so heavy that it actually broke the branch it was on.

As you can see here the plants are just loaded. In this small space there are 7 Tomatoes.

It’s a bit hard to see in this picture, I’ll try to get a better one. The Strawberry Patch is really doing well. The plants have been sending out lots of runners and really are spreading the plants. I’m hoping by the end of summer this bed will be full and we will need to start another.

The number of Strawberries that these plants are putting out this year is by far our best year ever. It may not sound like a lot but we are getting around 20 per day on average, and they are much larger this year than they were last year.

Our grandson just loves checking on the Strawberry Patch. At 4 yr. old he can tell me if they are new/babies, if they are big and not ready and if they are ready to be picked. He has a sincere love and fascination for the garden’s and their produce. It brings me such joy to watch him and our daughter learn so much about the plants and how to care for them.

This is one branch of a Cherry Tomato Plant. As you can see on this one branch there are 9 Tomatoes showing. Each plant in total has on average about 40 per plant.

We are still averaging about 2 Asparagus coming up each day. Normally they are done by this time of year. Since we changed the way we are watering them and the amount of water we are giving them they have done very well. They continue to produce, it’s impressive. I always like to mention that if you are going to start a patch you must salt the ground.

My sister was telling me yesterday that she loves White Asparagus. I had not seen that before so now I have to see if I can find seeds for those and start a patch of them.

You will always want to maintain your patch. In case you are not aware they will continue to come up each year. Normally you will get your first plants that are big enough to eat in about 3 years time.

The Loofah plants are still doing well. They have continued to climb quite well. We have not seen any blooms yet, I’m starting to get concerned that we may not get any Loofah’s this year. I certainly hope I’m wrong. They are so useful and I have no more left from the last time we grew them.

The Cucumbers are doing quite well also. They are climbing well and really starting to put on the cucumbers. However, due to our heat some of the cucumber starts have dried up on the vine before they could get started well.

This is a side shot of the Cucumbers. Not only are they growing in height but they are nice full plants. That is helpful as they are loaded with blooms and soon we should have more cucumbers than we know what to do with them.

This is another shot of one of the Tomato Plants, as you can see there are so many tomatoes on this plant. They are hard to even count anymore, I gave up trying to figure out how many were on a plant.

This is a picture of our small garden bed, it is located under our Hummingbird feeder. These plants really attract the birds to the area. When we started this bed, in case you didn’t see the pictures of it, it looked terrible. We started with about 15 small plants. It looked so empty but in just a few short weeks it really starting filling out.

Now we are taking advantage of the seed pods that each of the flowers make. We have collected so many seeds from the different flower varieties that we will not have to purchase plants next year. We can plant from the seeds we have.

This is a new rose from our Double Knot Knock Out Rose Bush. I really enjoy this rose bush, it is so pretty and it blooms fantastic. At any given time it will have many blooms at the same time.

This is a group of three Roses on the same plant pictured above.

 

I’m in great hopes that I will soon have very nice pictures of Roses to share with you. We happened to be at Wal-Mart when they had a huge sale going on. We got 2 each of Red, Pink and White Rose Bushes and paid a grand total of $1.25 for each of them.

That put us at a grand total of 6 large Rose Bushes and 4 additional Double Knot Knock Out Bushes that we had pictured a few days before. We took the 10 Rose Bushes and have planted them along our driveway. I think it will end up looking very nice. I’ll get pictures of them tonight so you can see what I’m talking about. They are just about naked though, after I cut off all the dead leaves from them not taking proper care of them. They should spring back quickly.