July garden

In my preparations for Nerd Prom and surgery, I have been neglecting posting about the veggie garden, though I have not been neglecting the garden itself.

I'm mostly growing roma tomatoes this year, since last year I bought tons of them at the farmers market. And we ran out of the pasta sauce I made from them far too early. This variety seems to be quite susceptible to blossom end rot, but I think I've got it mostly managed now.

I've never grown cucumbers before. The one you can see there is about the size of my pinkie fingernail. It'll only get to be the size of quarter. Adorable!

I kept seeds from a mystery variety of winter squash that I got at the end of last year's farmers market. They're incredibly happy. If we can't find Kaylee one of these days, I'll be sure to check to make sure they haven't dragged her in.

Squash flowers at the end of the day.

Dill! I've made two quarts of refrigerator pickles with this dill and cucumbers from the farmers market. It reseeded itself from last year quite happily.

I had an issue with peppers this year. The ones I grew from seed all died. But I got some from Oakland that are doing very well. I like the two little baby ones still in their flowers at the top.

This is Ohio, so I grew soybeans. These are fancy-schmancy black soybeans, though. They're fuzzy-stemmed. I didn't know they'd be like that. Nifty.

Crossing my fingers that it will keep going so well!

Jessica's universal refrigerator pickle juice

This can be used to make refrigerator pickles of just about any sort: cucumbers, cauliflower (shown), green beans, peppers ... Just add a tablespoon of pickling spices of your choice to the bottom of the jar, pack in the veggies, and ...

Ingredients
(makes enough for one quart of pickles)

1.5 cups water
3/4 cups white vinegar
1/4 cup sugar
2 teaspoons kosher or pickling salt

Combine ingredients in small saucepan. Cover and bring to a boil over high heat. Uncover, stir to dissolve sugar and salt and boil for two minutes. Pour over vegetables and pickling spice in canning jar.

Let cool, then close jar and store in refrigerator for at least one week before eating. Eat within two months, if you can manage to keep them that long. This recipe can be doubled or tripled or quadrupled. If you make too much, just keep it in the fridge until you want to make more pickles.

You can vary the the type of vinegar, as long as it's at least 5% acidity. You can up the amount of sugar if you like sweeter pickles. Vary the pickling spices*, either by buying a commercial blend or making your own (both Penzey's and McCormick's are both good).

For dill pickles, put one tablespoon of pickling spice and one dill flowerhead (or one teaspoon dill seed) to a quart jar, then pack jar with either whole canning cucumbers or cucumber slices. Pour pickle juice in and then try to wait a week before eating!

* for a very simple version, try...

5 peppercorns
4 allspice berries
1 tsp whole yellow mustard seeds
1/4 cinnamon stick
1/2 tsp crushed red pepper

for dill pickles, add a dill flowerhead or one teaspoon dill seed