23 February 2010

Up to my elbows in vinegar

Every time I think I can happily cull the tomatoes and cucumbers from the veggie patch the jolly things go and produce another bucket load of fruit. I'm waiting to get the winter veggies in, they should have gone in two weeks ago. So today I bit the bullet and pulled out five tomato plants and four cucumbers.

But before I pulled them out I carefully went through the bushes and picked all the fruit. Nine cucumbers and twenty-seven tomatoes came off those plants.

I've turned the cucumbers into Pickled Cucumber using the recipe from 5-minute Microwave Bottling. Four big jars now occupy the second shelf in the fridge. I can't wait to try them in a couple of weeks.

Pickled Cucumber
Ingredients:

4 small unpeeled cucumbers
500ml apple cider vinegar
2 green capsicums
250g white sugar

Method:
Slice the cucumbers into thin circles. Cut the capsicums in half, remove seeds and slice into strips.  Dissolve sugar in warmed vinegar. Pack vegetables into clean, warm, sterilised jars. Fill jars to overflowing with vinegar mixture. Cover tightly with lid.

From 5-minute Microwave Bottling by Isabel Webb, The Five Mile Press, recipe on page 109

I cooked the tomatoes up with some diced onion, carrot and celery and two cloves of garlic to make pasta sauce. I had a half a tin of tomato paste in the fridge so that went in too. Goodness it smelled divine while it was cooking. I boiled some spaghetti and we had it with the sauce for tea. A sprinkling of freshly grated parmesan topped it off nicely. And there is enough left for our lunches tomorrow. I love free meals.

Tomorrow is forecast to be fine so I can get into the garden. There is Chinese cabbage, broccoli, beetroot, silverbeet, iceberg lettuce and garlic chives all needing to be planted out. If you've never tried garlic chives, they are just divine in scrambled eggs, rissoles or sausage rolls. And they are very easy to grow too.

I promised to tell you how the pot roast turned out on Sunday night. There were NO leftovers - that says it all! The potatoes and carrots were lovely, the meat melted in our mouths and the gravy was delicious. My thought is that next time I might increase the liquid to make more gravy it was so good.

Pot roast has been added to my menu repertoire.

1 comment:

  1. Where was the recipe for the pot roast from? Can you share it???

    ReplyDelete

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