Re: Canning beans!

I did my first canning of the season on Friday. I finally bellied up and got one of the steam juicers. When it arrived [I bought it off the web; fat chance of finding it in a store here] I loaded it up with acerola and started it off. In about an hour and a half I had four pints of the most beautiful red juice you'll ever see. Can't wait until the fall U-pick tomato season gets here.
Have you ever canned in Weck jars? They of German origin. Old style lids, rubber gaskets, and clamps--but the jars themselves are works of art. All I've used them for is putting up fruit in neutral spirits or rum, although this year I think I'm going to try pickling peppers or lemons in one. 

On Jul 1, 2007, at 2:58 PM, Cyndi Johnson wrote:


Did my first canning of the season yesterday, got 9
jars of italian beans and 4 jars of regular green
beans. Not a great haul but not terrible. I was hoping
for some nice straight green beans to make dilly beans
with, but most of them were too curvy. I want to enter
the dilly beans in the fair and need the straight ones
for pretty presentation in the jars. I'll have another
3 weeks probably before they finish, so we'll see what
I get. Problem is that hot weather tends to make them
curved.
I mentioned before that my husband has been getting
rid of the rabbits in the garden with his pellet gun.
He shot one yesterday too. After I was poking around
in the soybeans and this small critter goes skittering
away...it's a baby rabbit. My heart sank. There were 3
of them and were so small we were able to pick them
up. It felt evil to get rid of them, but in two months
husband would have been shooting them too. I'm not
feeling good about it nonetheless. I sure wish they'd
stay in the front yard where they can munch on grass
and clover to their heart's content.
Picked 11 summer squash and gave most of them away to
my friend, and picked the first ripe cherry tomatoes.
Interesting that there are not many cherry tomatoes on
the plant, usually they are amazingly prolific,
perhaps this variety doesn't like my climate.
No pepper plants to be seen at the stores - Home Depot
had 3 jalapeno plants is all, Lowes had nothing - if I
get out again I might try the nursery but I doubt
there will be anything. Planting season ended here in
mid-May. Still it was worth a look. I will take the
survivors and try covering the good parts of the stems
with dirt, maybe they'll add some roots. Doubtful but
no reason not to try it.

Cyndi
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Island Jim
Southwest Florida
27.1 N, 82.4 W
Hardiness Zone 10
Heat Zone 10
Sunset Zone 25
Minimum 30 F [-1 C]
Maximum 100 F [38 C]

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