10-25 Jessica's Squash & Apple Soup

For those who have never tried squash soup.. you are in for a real treat with this recipe.

I will post the recipe at the end of this. Here Jessica is pouring in apple cider.

Here's some of the cooked and peeled butternut squash.

Squash getting pureed.

Pureed squash getting poured into the pot.

Squash Soup Recipe:

• 
  
  1 cube butter
• 
  
  2 granny smith apples (diced w/peels on)
• 
  
  1 large onion (chopped) Saute these items with the butter then puree
• 
  
  add sauted items to pot and add:
• 
  
  3 cups apple cider
• 
  
  1 quart chicken broth
• 
  
  add 8 cups cooked peeled squash puree
• 
  
  1 tsp. cinnamon
• 
  
  1 tsp. salt
• 
  
  1/4 cup brown sugar
• 
  
  simmer and serve or can

Canning Meat Pics

This is Kate's Garden.
It's named after the person who made it possible.
My name is Suzanne. This will be a record of the garden to feed and bless many. We hope to take you through the entire process of planting, canning, and drying fruit and veggies.
~God Bless This Garden~

My daughter, Jessica is cutting up chicken and her friend Crystal, is adding water to the canner. This is Cyrstal's first time canning. All the meat was on sale and was less than $2.00 per pound.
Cutting more Chicken.

Pack the chicken very tightly in the jars. We're using skinless, boneless, chicken breasts, here.

Packing more jars of Chicken. About 2 pounds of meat fits into each tightly packed jar.

Cutting up pork.

This is some really nice pork.

Pack all jars of meat really tight. We used a heavy plastic foot long ruler to pack the meat tight and get all the air bubbles out.

Time for the beef.

Cutting the beef into chunks.

Making some good progress.

We added 1 tsp. each of salt, pepper, garlic powder, and onion powder. Plus, added a touch of A-1 to the beef and a little Sweet Baby Rays BBQ sauce to the chicken and pork.

Add lids and bands and finger tighten after all your seasonings are added. Don't add any water or broth. The meat makes it's own gravy. Then process according to your canner instructions. I processed 90 minutes at 10 lb.s pressure.

Here's the first batch of beef. Mmmmmm. You can see the broth it made. All the flavor and nutrients are trapped right inside each jar. Wonderful!! For a quick and easy meal, make some mashed potatoes or biscuits, or noodles, and pour heated meat and broth over. Add a salad or coleslaw and you have a meal fit for a king. :)

Wow! Just look at all this delicious meat!

It sure makes a body feel good to sit back and look at the end product of all your labor.

Canning 20 Quarts of Meat

I have the first 5 quarts of meat in the pressure cooker right now. I will post some pics later tonight. I am canning chicken, pork, and beef. All the meat was on sale and I paid less than $2.00 per pound.

Time to Can Meat

Well, Folks, the garden is done for this year. We not only had fun growing all the food, but were able to bless others as well. Now it's time to start canning meat. Beef, pork, and chicken. There are some really good meat sales right now, so I plan to go shopping this weekend. I will take pics of the canning as usual and post them here. Blessings.. Suzanne

How to Can Meat, Veggies, and Fruit

Hi Folks.. I personally ordered this DVD set on canning your own food. I truly think it is the best teaching aid I have ever seen. Even if you have never canned before, this will guide you right through the process.. Suzanne

9-20 Peppers, Yams, Berries, Carrots

This is Kate's Garden.

It's named after the person who made it possible.

My name is Suzanne. This will be a record of the garden to feed and bless many. We hope to take you through the entire process of planting, canning, and drying fruit and veggies.

~God Bless This Garden~

Hot Peppers!!
Really, really hot peppers!!

Got carrots?

Lots of red raspberries to ripen yet.

More Carrots.

Sweet potatoes!!

Lots of sweet potatoes. We're leaving the rest to get bigger..

He likes the sweet potatoes raw, too!!

Last but not least.... cabbage!!

9-20 Carrots and Sweet Potatoes

Hi Folks..
There are still a bunch of carrots to be canned. :) Today we will dig around in the sweet potatoes and see how big they are getting. I do soooo love sweet potatoes. I can remember when I was about 5 years old, in southern Calif., there was a huge field of sweet potatoes next to our property. I would sneak out to the field and crawl down the rows pulling up sweet potatoes and eating them raw. :) :) Suzanne

9-7-2009 Pineapple Jam

I had some pineapple left so decided to make some pineapple jam. Never made it before so don't know how it will set up. Looks pretty good, though. :)

9-6-09 Watermelons

James, Annette, and the kids, brought over some watermelons from the garden tonight.
Sooooo.. I traded them some peaches and a jar of peach jam for watermelon. It was delicious!

0-6-09 Peach - Pineapple Jam

This is Kate's Garden. It's named after the person who made it possible.
My name is Suzanne. This will be a record of the garden to feed and bless many. We hope to take you through the entire process of planting, canning, and drying fruit and veggies.
~God Bless This Garden~

Jim, at Pure Prairie, got in some peaches from Colorado, so I decided to make some peach jam.
I used 2 cups crushed pineapple, 6 cups peaches, 10 cups sugar, 1/4 cup lemon juice, 1 tblsp. butter, and 2 boxes sure-jell.

I got 6 pint jars of jam from one batch. It sure smells good in here right now! :)

8-22-09 Think I was kidding about grasshoppers?

• Grasshopper infestation forces livestock sales

8-16-09 Canning Bean Soup Pics

Jessica lifting some canned jars out of the pressure cooker. I have all these pics of canning soup in the wrong order but haven't figured out yet how to move them. :)

Bean soup is ready to eat. All finished and canned.

Here's the bean soup simmering in the pot.

Annette adding the lids and rings.

Ready to can as soon as lids and rings are on.

Some cut-up onions, celery and bell peppers for the soup.

The market had some great looking smoked ham shanks for the soup.

Here are the beans (about 5 or 6 lbs.) soaking in a huge bowl.

Getting the carrots sliced up for the soup. Folks, I wish you could all be in my kitchen to smell this soup cooking tonight, but I barely fit in my kitchen. :) The smell is incredible!! Be sure to follow your canners instructions. I canned at 10 lb.s for 90 min.

8-16-09 Canning Bean Soup

I'm canning bean soup, folks.. I should have some pics up either tonight or tomorrow. We're using shelled Great White Northern beans, smoked ham shanks, carrots, onions, garlic, celery, bell peppers, tomatoes, and bay leaf. I can't imagine who wouldn't LOVE this hearty soup. Better figure on tomorrow for the pics as I will probably be canning all night.. :) This is some really good stuff!!

8-13-09 Attack of the Grasshoppers!

Dear Folks... please pray for the garden. There are thousands of grasshoppers!! I had planned on sharing the garden, but NOT with bugs!

8-13-09 Poor Folks Recipes

Hi Folks.. I just opened a new forum called Poor Folks Recipes. If any of you would like to contribute some recipes, please do. Here's the link. http://lit4ever.org/poorfolksrecipes/index.php

8-03-09 Melons & More

This is Kate's Garden. It's named after the person who made it possible.

My name is Suzanne. This will be a record of the garden to feed and bless many. We hope to take you through the entire process of planting, canning, and drying fruit and veggies.

~God Bless This Garden~

Jessica took a few pics today of melons, etc. These cantaloupes are looking good.

Here's a blue hubbard squash.. Known to be the worlds ugliest squash but ohhh they taste good.

This balck diamond watermelon is the size of a basketball.

The raspberries are really growing. Next year we will have bunches of them.

8-02-09 Canning Veggies

This is Kate's Garden. It's named after the person who made it possible.
My name is Suzanne. This will be a record of the garden to feed and bless many. We hope to take you through the entire process of planting, canning, and drying fruit and veggies.
~God Bless This Garden~

Using the Victorio food strainer for the tomatoes. We ended up canning in my tiny kitchen again as the canners won't fit on Annette's stove.. :)

Pushing the tomatoes down with the plunger.

Just core the tomatoes and then quarter them and dump them into the hopper of strainer and then turn the crank handle. It shoots the juice and pulp out one place and shoots the skins and seeds out another. Sooo easy!!

Pouring the tomato juice and pulp into canning jars.

More juice and pulp..

Adding green beans to the jars.

Today's bean snappers.. :) We set up a small white folding table in my livingroom to use for some of the veggie preparations since there is NO room in my kitchen for it.. :)

Annette peeling potatoes.

Adding green beans, zucchini, carrots, and bell peppers to the jars.

Adding potatoes until jars are full. I added 1 tbs. of worcestershire sauce to each jar along with 1 tsp. salt and 1 tsp. onion powder. Add enough water to fill jars to proper level. Wipe off the rims of the jars and place lids and rings on the jars.. Do not over tighten the rings.

My canner calls for 2 1/2 quarts water in it so Annette is adding that here.

Place the jars of veggies in the canner. Process the jars according to the directions that came with your canner.

Voila.. the finished product...

Another pic of the finished jars of veggies.