What's On Sale Wednesday : Green Beans

This week the local grocery store had fresh green beans on sale for $0.99 per pound.  This was the best deal in the produce section for me.

I bought six pounds of these little lovelies.

I know from past canning that I can fit about a pound of green beans in each quart jar.  Green beans aren't my children's favorite veggie, so six quarts will last us a while.

First step to canning fresh green beans is to cut the ends off.

 

I like to have cut green beans for canning.  I think they are easier to pack in jars when they have been cut.  So, I cut them into bite size chunks.  Then wash them up.  Also, as you are cutting and washing, keep an eye out for any brown spots.  Remember, the higher quality the ingredient is when you can it, the higher quality it will be when you eat it.



Once you have the green beans all cut and washed, pack them into your prepared jars.  Fill to the one inch headspace with hot water.  If you want to add salt, now is the time.  I don't add salt because we prefer to salt individually once everything is cooked.  Wipe the rims and place your lids and rings.
Process at 10 pounds pressure for 25 minutes for quarts.  This batch made five quarts and one pint of green beans.  It would have been six quarts, but I decided to use some of them fresh for dinner that night.

 

**Remember, check the instructions on your pressure canner instructions for your altitude.  All of my instructions are for sea level processing times and weights.**

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Korgan's Granola Bars

These are my son's favorite thing to make on a weekend morning.  He is so proud that he can make breakfast for the family all by himself.  Plus, they are delish!!

1 1/4 cup flour
2 cups oats (we use regular oatmeal)
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup butter (melted)
1 cup brown sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 egg
chocolate chips (approximately a cup)
dried fruit (we use cranberries, I told you we love those little berries!)

Preheat the oven to 350*f.  While the oven is heating up, put the two sticks of butter in a small baking dish and let them melt in the oven.

Mix all the ingredients except the chocolate chips and dried fruit in a nice big bowl until combined.

Take a 9x13 baking dish and line it with aluminum foil.  Make the aluminum foil extra long, that way once you have lined the dish, you can roll up the extra for handles to pull out the granola bars.

Squish all that granola bar goodness into the baking dish.  Then top with the chocolate chips and dried fruit if you want.  Just sprinkle them all over the top.

Bake at 350*f for about 20 minutes.  Remove from the oven and let sit to cool a bit.  Once it has cooled, just grab the aluminum foil handles and remove the whole thing from the pan. 

Cut and serve!

This batch was half with fruit and half without.

I've had this recipe printed and in my binder for years now.  Unfortunately, I didn't print out the URL to go with it, so I have no earthly idea where I got it.  If you know the original post/website, please share so I can give credit where it is due!!

Gardening...attempt number six...

I want to be a good gardener. I dream of luscious vegetable plants ready for harvest. I dream of eating and canning vegetables that I grew. Talk about knowing what went into your food! I really really want to learn this skill. So far, it's just not working for me.

First year of gardening....
I went all gung ho. I cleared a nice large area in my yard. Fought back the ivy and blackberries. Had a friend come down and use his tractor to till it all up for me. Worked in all the compost and good stuff I was supposed to do. I cared for my little plants all summer long. Do you know what I harvested?
Barbie vegetables. I had perfectly formed and ripe green bell peppers that would fit on a quarter. I had carrots that were smaller than my pinkie. The corn never made it past my knee.

Second year of gardening....
This year was going to be better. That last year was just a fluke, right? Well, it was better in some ways.
That year we added chickens into our yard. So, I required a fence around my garden. I did my best and put up a sort of a fence to guard my little plot. It was good! Everything was growing great! I had broccoli and peas and tomatoes all ready to harvest in just a few days. I would go out in the early morning and drink my coffee in the garden. One morning I went out and thought to myself, tomorrow is the day. I will harvest my vegetable garden tomorrow! Do you know what I harvested?
Nothing. That day while we were out of town, my chickens got into the garden. They ate EVERYTHING. I was left with skeletons of the plants. Carnage.

Third year of gardening...
Again, I decided to try with my little garden area in the yard. I would just have to be more diligent and keep those blasted birds out. I had just planted my seedlings and everything was going well. We went on vacation and I had someone come over to water my garden and care for the animals. That year we had record heat for our area. It just wasn't enough water for the garden. Even after I came back and started watering it more, the garden just didn't grow. What did I harvest?
Nothing.

Fourth year of gardening.....
This year I wasn't going to do the whole garden thing. The grass had taken over my garden area. We had more birds than before. Plus, we had vacation planned for the middle of summer again. Let alone I hadn't had any success yet. I was a bit discouraged to say the least. I wasn't going to do a garden.
Then my hubby brought home twenty four tomato plants! I had a virtual tomato jungle on my back porch. This was before I knew how to can anything besides jelly. I could cook with them, and hubby likes to eat them raw. We gave them away and many rotted right there on the plants. What did I harvest?
Tomatoes. Lots of tomatoes.

Fifth year of gardening...
I actually had success with the tomatoes in containers on the back porch. So, I decided maybe container gardening was the way to go. I planted my seedlings into three big pots on the back deck. One pot had peas and radishes. The next had green beans and carrots. The third had strawberries. The first to die was the green beans. I don't know why. They just died. Then I didn't realize it, but the radishes went to seed. Evidently, this will give you rock hard woody radishes that you can't chew and taste like wood pulp. The carrots seemed all good. Until I pulled them up. Barbie vegetables again! The strawberries sent out little shoots everywhere. This was a good thing and I let them. I didn't expect to get much fruit off them this year. I wanted those shoots for new plants. The peas actually did well! What did I harvest?
Enough peas for my family to eat fresh off the vine, but not enough to actually cook. We also got a handful of tiny strawberries.

This will be my sixth year gardening. I am trying the garden space again. My hubby will be building a real fence for me this time to keep the birds out. I've started my seeds a bit earlier in the hopes that the plants will have more time to mature on the garden. I still dream of bountiful harvests with enough normal sized vegetables that I can actually can some of the produce. Here is a picture of my garden to be. What will I harvest this year?

***Update***
Hubby and I discussed it yesterday, and we decided to make the garden space even larger!  We are going to do the entire side yard.  That will effectively quadruple my garden space.  Anyone want to come help me move sod?

 

 

Turkey or Chicken Broth

I use a lot of chicken broth in my cooking.  I use it in soups, cooking rice, cooking beans, cooking noodles, and lots of different casseroles or one dish meals.  I don't like buying broth because I don't know how much salt or other additives are in it.  This is one of the things I really looked forward to making and storing when I bought my pressure canner.

Broth is one of those things that every home cook should have on hand.  The best news about this, is that broth is SO EASY to make!!!  Make your dinner, put all the bits you don't want to eat in a pan, fill it with water and let it simmer.  This works with chicken, turkey, beef, ham, and vegetables.  I'll tell you my whole process for turkey broth.

Cook a turkey dinner for your family.  Enjoy the dinner of slow roasted turkey and all the fixings.

Once your done eating, pick all the meat off the carcass.  The meat will go into your freezer, jars, or whatever you want to do with the leftover meat.  While you are picking the meat off, put ALL THE REST into your crockpot or stewpot.  I mean EVERYTHING.  Skin, fat, bones, all of it.  Fill the crockpot up right to the rim with water and set on low.  I let mine cook over night.

The next morning, take a skimmer or slotted spoon and take out as much of the bones and bits as you can.  Then put the crockpot into the refrigerator for at least a few hours.  The reason I do this is because I like to skim off the fat.  When it's cold, the fat all floats to the top and you can skim it off easily.

Once you have skimmed off the fat, it's time to heat it back up.  After you have heated it back up, you want to put it through a wire mesh strainer to get all the bits out of it.  The finer the mesh, the more clear your broth will be.

After the broth is heated back up to boiling, put it into your clean/hot jars for processing.  Quarts are processed at 10 pounds for 90 minutes. 

The only issue I have run into is that the ham broth came out very salty.  I am sure this had to do with the smoking process or other chemicals used in the ham.  I still use it, I just water it down and use it with things that taste better with salt (beans, potatoes, etc.)

Liquid Gold

Do you know what this is?

That, my dear readers, is blackberry cranberry juice.  This stuff is AMAZING.  I followed the same recipe as I did for the Cranberry Juice.  One cup of berries in each quart jar.  Top it off with hot water and add sugar.  I did reduce the sugar from 1/3 cup per jar to 1/4 cup per jar.  It still is a little more sweet than I would have liked, but it is delicious.  I am so excited by the idea of making my own juice at home.