Canning tomatoes!

For the first time ever, I've done a bunch of canning this year. I've been completely intimidated for years to can anything more than peaches (which I did for the first time last year with the help of my awesome mom). But, I did it!! This year was the year for canning. I canned stewed tomatoes, peaches, bread & butter pickles, sweet pickles, and green beans. I feel very accomplished. This post will specifically be about canning tomatoes. I am so grateful for all of the tutorials that Pinterest has led me to, including this one! If you click on the "canning tomatoes" link, it'll take you directly to directions for that - but I found this whole website so very helpful, that I wanted to make sure you could see it too: http://www.thyhandhathprovided.com/p/preserving.html

Not only does it teach you how to can, but also what you should can, what you should freeze and the recipes that they use for preserving your fruits and veggies. Seriously. I loved this website. It was my lifesaving canning Bible as I slowly let go of the fear of canning and got to it. 

The first thing I did was the stewed tomatoes. Easiest. Canning. Ever. Not even joking. You don't even have to water bath these babies! I didn't ask for any assistance, I just read the post and got busy. I could not be happier with the results. 

I didn't take many pictures as I wasn't sure how this would go and I knew that if it didn't work, it wouldn't be so much of a Pinterest fail as a Heidi-fail for lack of canning knowledge. But, I did it. It worked. And I'd suggest if you are wanting to learn to can - this is a great place to start because it is so very easy. 

Here is the picture of my tomatoes all processed and ready to be eaten or stored. 

The initial investment for canning can be pricey, considering you need to buy jars and lids and the produce and (unless you have an awesome mom or friend or other family member) get a pressure cooker, but once you've done it - the rewards are great and the following year, you are pretty much just paying for lids and produce. Way cheaper! At least that's what I'm telling my husband. hehe. Just kidding, that is what I've heard as well. 

So, this is my post to assure you that canning is not as scary as it seems. Read thyhandhathprovided's website. It will re-assure you and equip you far better than I, a canning novice, could ever do. 

The hardest thing to can was green beans, because it required the pressure cooker - everything else only required a water bath. But, thankfully, I had a terrific friend who assisted me and taught me how to use the pressure cooker and make sure all went smoothly. Plus, she let me borrow her pressure cooker. She was another great resource for me that has helped build my canning confidence. If I can help re-assure or guide you any further, let me know. I totally enjoyed canning and I'm really looking forward to doing it next year!

And, just because I'm so proud of all my canning, here is a picture of the rest of my canned goods.

Green beans 

Bread & Butter Pickles

Peaches

My Aunt Carole's Amazing Sweet Pickles

PS - I found the recipe for canning peaches on Pinterest as well and it is way easy. To see how to do that, check out this blog.

How To Freeze Strawberries

I love produce season in Oregon! I love fresh fruits and vegetables. I love picking them. I love eating them. I love freezing them so I can have more of them later for our yummy smoothies. My husband recently asked me to pick strawberries and freeze them as that tends to be one of our go-to ingredients in our smoothies, so I got to work. I've never actually frozen strawberries before, other than just throwing them in a bag after they've been washed. They generally all clump together when you try to pull them out later and it can be quite frustrating, so I tried a new method this time: a method I, of course, got off of Pinterest. To see how to do this yourself, check out this blog. P.S., this is from some place in Oregon, which I found even cooler!

Mmmm...yummy strawberries

So, I made up my solution of vinegar and water. Seriously, I don't know if there truly is anything vinegar CAN'T do. It's awesome. Then I hulled the strawberries, rinsed them off and let them sit in the water/vinegar solution for about 20 minutes. It looks like in the blog they hulled the strawberries after they let them sit in the solution, but I thought this might be a bit easier and I doubt that it impacted the berries that much. My opinion: do whatever is easiest and most appealing to you. 

The berries taking a bath

As I said, I let the berries sit in there for a while and mixed them up every few minutes, then I pulled them out and placed them on a baking sheet. Another blog I read suggested laying wax paper down first, so I did that as well. I wouldn't recommend this. The berries actually came off of the pan better when they weren't sitting on the wax paper. The wax paper made it harder to pull the berries off the pan without having wax paper attached to them. 

Ready to be frozen

I, thankfully, had just cleaned out my freezer so I had extra room for my strawberries, so in they went. 

Frozen strawberries ready to be bagged

After the strawberries had frozen (I left them in there for at least 3-4 hours), I put them in ziplock baggies, labeled the bags and stuck them in the freezer for later use. 

I did leave about a pint of strawberries out of the freezer for eating with the angel food cake my son and I had made, and they were soft, but very tasty. I'd recommend using the vinegar/water solution whenever you bring home fresh berries - it makes them last longer! To read more about that, check out this blog. And if you are worried about them having a vinegar-y taste - no need to worry - you won't notice it at all, but you will notice that your berries are mold free for longer!

I also picked raspberries to make raspberry jam and washed them in the same solution. This is definitely something I will be doing anytime I get berries now...it seems worth it to preserve the berries we have and make sure they are nice and clean. And now, I must go eat some berries. Ta Ta For Now.

Vinegar Weed Killer

Tis the season for flip flops, sunglasses and weed-pulling! Well, it's actually not quite the season for flip flops, but thankfully we've had a few days that could convince me otherwise. Oh how I love the sunshine! I love being out in the sun. I like to have a reason to be out there though - sitting out there reading (which sounds absolutely delightful on a tropical island or next to a pool) doesn't sound quite as lovely as I look out over a weed-infested yard/driveway. Ok, I don't soak up the sunshine from the driveway unless I'm washing my car - but the weeds are still growing in the cracks of my driveway and it is driving me crazy!

So, I took matters into my own hands, thanks to Pinterest! Yesterday, I made my own solution of vinegar and soap for a weed killer - to see the directions for this, check out this blog. There are so many amazing uses for vinegar - it's pretty much a go-to ingredient for a lot of home cleaners and other remedy-ish type stuff. Very cool.

Photo from Pinterest

I didn't take a picture of the spray bottle or anything, because I'm pretty sure you get the idea - but I filled my spray bottle (a recycled SHOUT spray bottle) full of vinegar with probably a spoonful of dish soap. I would not recommend testing this out on your beautiful lawn as is done in the picture above because as the blog linked above states - the vinegar pretty much kills whatever it's sprayed on - so...unless you want a lovely brown spot - that may not be a good idea. I'd recommend you test it on your neighbor's lawn first if you want to see if it won't ruin your grass. I kid! Don't do that...please.

Anyway, so I gave this a try the other day. Here is a picture of my weed-infested driveway.

Pretty, isn't it? I have not been looking forward to trying to pull those weeds out by the root. I sprayed them heavily with the vinegar solution and noticed a little bit of a difference the next day.

They are starting to die!! Granted - they are still there, but they are withering! Die, evil weeds, die! Die! Die! Ok...got that out of my system. I think I'll try spraying it one more time to see if that takes care of the little buggers - but as you can see - it does work at least a little bit! I bet those weeds will be easier to pull now that they are flourishing with life. hehe.

Anyway, I will continue to use my vinegar solution and be thankful for this great tip on Pinterest. I hope it works out for you as well!