Return to the garden
I was gone from home for 4 days for an annual metaphysical fair that happens every summer up here in the copper country. I got back home on Tuesday night, so I didn't get out into the garden until Wednesday.
This is what I found.
They weren't that big when I left...
I spent all afternoon and early evening peeling and cutting them into chunks for canning, I got all but the 2 biggest ones taken care of. Today was the day to can them. I chose to go with quart jars for them because they tend to cook down a bit when you can them, and I use them in my crockpot meals. Most of my quart jars are wide mouth jars, so it's fairly easy to fill them up with the chunks of zucchini.
I finally got my canning kitchen set up out in the greenhouse, so this was the first run for the new setup. I have 2 large cast iron burners and a camper stove that I bought a couple years ago for a different project.
The jar heating pot is the bottom half of an old pressure canner that had a bad lid. I cut it in half and put the handles back on it. It holds as many jars as my current pressure canner, so this way I only need the one pot to heat up the jars before they go into the canner. I have 6 quart jars in it here. I could get 7 jars in it, but they'd be tight. The coffee pot is for boiling water to fill the jars, and the small pot has the lids in it, being heated up.
When the water in the canner was hot enough, the jars went into the canner.
During the cool down phase of the first batch, after the 30 minutes at 10 pounds pressure, I prepared the second batch of jars for canning. It takes about 45 minutes for the pressure to drop to 0 after the burner is turned off, so I have plenty of time to fill and heat the jars for the next batch.
The first batch is out and the second batch is in the pressure canner.
The second batch is done and out of the canner.
You might have noticed that there's 11 jars on the towel. That's because I lost the 12th jar while it was under pressure. I've only had this happen a few times, but it does occasionally happen. The bottom of the jar broke off while under heat and pressure. I saw it when I took the lid off the canner. There's not much you can do about it when it happens except clean up the mess.
One more look at my canning setup in the greenhouse. I had to use the flash for this picture, the light of day was fading to night outside.
So, that's my canning adventure for today. Next, I have to catch up on the tomatoes, and then the beans.
Thanks for stopping by and checking out my post, eh!
As always, feel free to leave a comment or question, or even an upvote.
And remember,
I love your canning station! I dread learning to can....
If you get the Ball book of canning, they give you all the information that you need to learn how to can most things. It's really not difficult, just a bit time consuming.
I would love a pressure canner some day. May I ask why you peeled the zucchini?
I peel the zucchini because I don't like to eat the outer surface of zucchini. I know that a lot of people eat it with the skin on, but I prefer it peeled. That's the only reason.
It's a valid one. I love the peel, that's why I asked☺️
Makes sense to me. :-)
It's hard to get away for a few days in the summer when you're growing zucchini and cucumbers. I had our dog watcher picking stuff for me in July when I was running to the Jersey shore.
Good idea!
veruy cool! storing fodis so fun! its like a vieo game!
if this is a simulation, its agreat simulation because food plants ar so magical they take soila nd convert it to eatable food
its so perfect, but we should all be growng more food, i am gona go buy some mango and papaya and avocado trees soon
Spiffy set up and I like the flow of the work stations. This is the first time I've seen canned zukes, tho. I've always figured they were mostly a 'use em or lose em' proposition - unless you could maybe freeze them. Nice to have another option!
Yes, most people that I know freeze them to use for baking zucchini bread. I'm not into baking, but I do like them in my stew. There are other ways to use them, like breaded and fried, or stuffed, but I'm kind of lazy about that. :-)
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This is so valuable.
Very informative.
This is sensational.