A Week of Canning

Generally I think of the busy canning season as being when the garden is producing – early to mid-summer but I think this week, I’ll be canning something almost aevery day.

Cranberry Honey Mustard

Last year I made Cranberry Honey Mustard and that stuff is addictive. I wrote a blog post about it and you can see that here if interested. It’s funny that I posted about making it on November 18, 2020, so it’s been almost a year. I still have one little jar of the mustard left. It’s so good on sandwiches and I liked mixing it with a bit of mayo or yogurt and using it as a dip for carrots or cucumbers.

It’s funny to go find an older blog post and have the picture be something I made after moving back to Missouri.

Last week they had fresh cranberries at Aldi so I picked up several bags of those. I’ll make enough of this to last the entire year and not feel like I’m having to ration it. Once fresh cranberries are gone, what I have will have to last til the cranberries are back.

Green Tomato Relish

It’s been a couple of weeks since I made Green Tomato Relish and we’ve already used one of the jars. We loved it. It tastes almost exactly like sweet pickle relish but not so sweet and, maybe just because I made it, but it tastes fresher. When I made it and got the 9 pints and 2 half pints, I wondered if that would be enough for a whole year but with one pint already used and a half pint almost used, I think I’d better make more.

Green Tomato Salsa

I haven’t tried the Green Tomato Salsa recipe yet but it looks good so I’m going to add it to the list while I have plenty of green tomatoes.

Ground Beef

Not nearly as exciting as the other things but we have quite a bit of ground meat in the freezer. The lady who did our CSA box this year also had ground beef from the cows they raised and she would sometimes have good prices if you bought 10 pounds so I did that a few times, then when we started buying meat at the local meat market, their ground beef is great and Vince bought 10 pounds at least three times there. It’s nice to (1) get some of the meat out of the freezer and shelf stable and (2) It’s so much easier to make something quickly from canned ground beef than from having to defrost it, then cook it. The canned ground beef is great for tacos, enchiladas, meat sauce with marinara – most any where you brown the ground beef prior to using in a recipe. Obviously, we won’t use it for grilled burgers but Chad made these Chopped Cheese Sandwiches last night and I’d like to try those. The canned meat could be used for that.

In fact, since I’ll be browning the meat before canning it, maybe I’ll make these sandwiches the same day I can the ground beef.

If, by this time next week, I’ve canned all I hope to can, I’ll be tired but will feel good about getting it all done.