In the midst of the hustle and bustle of the last week and a half, I found time to do some canning. One of my dreams is to have a large, walk-in pantry in our house. We had a butler’s pantry in one of the houses we rented and I loved it. And, even though we don’t really have a pantry here, I’m certainly attempting to fill all of our space with homemade yumminess this year.
First off, I made peach and apricot jam. I think the peach set a little better, but time will tell.
Then, I made watermelon rind pickles. I think these will end up more like a candied fruit rind crossed with a pickled fruit. My mind can’t help going to dill pickle taste, but with watermelon. Not good. They smelled good though.
Then Steve got a note from one of his former students offering us free blackberries. There was no way we could pass that up! So I made 8 pints of blackberry jam (and we still have blackberries left over)!
All the recipes came from the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving. If you’ve got a good jam/jelly/sauce/pickle recipe, please feel free to pass it my way.
I have visions of canning lots and lots of tomatoes (whole, crushed, tomato paste, ketchup, and bbq sauce), but I need to find a place to get lots of tomatoes at once. We shall see.
adventures in knitting and mommyhood 