Tomatoes have been ripening at a fast and furious pace. Unfortunately, even with the help of spiders and frogs, insects have caused a lot of damage this year so I haven't gotten as many usable tomatoes as I should have. However, the scene in the kitchen yesterday was something like this:
Freshly washed canning jars
Canning and stock pots
I managed to eek out 17 pints of salsa and should get a few more pints next week. So far I have controlled myself and made fairly mild stuff.
The next thing on my list was to get a bit of fruit that we have an abundance of this year. Now, remember that we took out all the fruit trees so this is a bit different fruit than I have dealt with in the past:
See way back in the distance, in the middle of the photo, some tall "weed". This is below the corner of the fence, and I have designated that a "naturalization" area. And boy did it naturalize.
See that tall stuff back behind the hostas? That is my destination to get at the bumper crop of these:
Luscious wild blackberries. The bushes are loaded and I only spent a couple of minutes to get enough to fill a cookie sheet for freezing them. I heard more drop than I actually picked, there were so many! I may actually take a stab at making some jam, but the wild kind have massive amounts of seeds, so may just content myself with keeping a couple of jars of frozen berries around. Besides, I don't know how long before the bear will discover that they are ripe and wipe out the remaining crop!
Another sign that fall is well on its way:
This pumpkin came from a volunteer so I don't know what variety its parents were. It is sitting in full sun and is the only one that has turned orange. The rest of the pumpkins we have are on 2 plants that I actually planted, but the gourds are shaded so they are still a dark green:
This pumpkin is actually quite large (much larger than the orange one), just that everything around it is on a grand scale, so it looks smaller.
The vegetables and fruits are keeping me busy. I also have to pot up the 10 roses I got the other day. On top of that, I still have a whole bunch of shrubs that still need planting (I have made progress, but have at least 12 more to go, plus the roses that are already potted up on the deck). In my spare time, there is pet-sitting - just to keep me out of trouble LOL!
You hit a bonanza with the wild blackberries. Great! I have a hard time picturing your making mild salsa. Does not compute. It won't be long before your fresh produce is a memory, there in NH. Glad you are enjoying and preserving.
Posted by: Cop Car | August 31, 2008 at 11:20 AM
oh wow fresh salsa! i like the hot kind even better than the mild :-) and fresh pumpkins too....mmmm pumpkin pie.
i have quite a crop of blackberries myself bogie and a good crop of pears this year.
Posted by: bod | August 31, 2008 at 11:32 AM
Cop Car - Most of the peppers I grew this year are mild to middling hot. I grew several plants of giant jalapenos that are really mild - those are for making homemade poppers though.
Bod - MMM, pears. I never really got much out of the pear tree when we had it - probably because the ants loved it so much that it was always stressed out. Enjoy the fruits from your gardens!
Posted by: bogie | September 01, 2008 at 07:09 AM
Bod--I'm with Bogie in envying you your pears. So far, in the 8 years since our two pear trees were planted, I believe that I've seen fewer than 10 pears, total. We did have a more prolific tree at our last house; but, it was probably 20 years old before it became so.
Bogie--Wish I remembered what kind of peppers I planted (think I bought them at Atwoods when Elegant Friend and I were after something for her). They are long, light green, and mildish. I've been using one pepper per three tomatoes for fresh salsa this summer. I picked (probably) the last of the crop of the tomatoes this morning--vine wilt, or whatever. Only about 1/3 of the tomatoes was OK--the rest went into composting (one with a tiny slug). Picked a bunch of peppers to go with the tomatoes; but, there isn't enough cilantro. Last batch, I used dried cilantro--a disaster. I'll buy some, this time.
As to our canned salsa, I am severely disappointed in my batch. I think I put so much of the cilantro into EF's batch that I lacked enough in mine.
Posted by: Cop Car | September 01, 2008 at 09:43 AM
According to "The Whole Chile Pepper Book" by Dave DeWitt and Nancy Gerlach, my peppers are wax peppers - varying widely in heat; but, often substituted for jalapenos.
Posted by: Cop Car | September 02, 2008 at 10:02 AM
Mm, salsa! Glad your tomatoes made it past the "rotten" early august weather. We get mysterious volunteer pumpkins too.
Posted by: Amy | September 03, 2008 at 11:42 AM
CC - Wax or Banana peppers were my thoughts by your description.
Amy - This house doesn't function without salsa! Threw away a lot of tomatoes because of some mysterious spotted disease (only on one type of tomato), bug intrusions and such.
Posted by: bogie | September 06, 2008 at 07:11 AM
We got a lot of the spotted disease here, too--on all types of tomatoes. Elegant Friend pulled her vines about a week ago, and I may as well have done. EF pointed out that the leaves and branches were brown and sere, as well. We blamed it on the moisture that we've had most of the season. Guess you'll have to blame yours on the dry?
Posted by: Cop Car | September 06, 2008 at 09:52 AM
Well, we did have a couple of weeks of rain (started just before I left for St. Louis) - then a couple mor weeks of dry. I got the same sere vines, I'm pretty sure that is a seperate virus than the spotting thing. I'll be checking it out online.
Posted by: bogie | September 07, 2008 at 06:24 AM