Kilner jars

12. SEPTEMBER

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The weather was against me today, I thought it was just a fine drizzle but as the morning went on it changed to light rain and eventually into a downpour. But by this time I was on my way home from the allotment. I had to go there today to pick anything and everything that grew during the time I wasn’t able to go. The harvest started in the greenhouse in the garden, these are Turkish Dolma chillies but they are lovely and sweet, just like peppers.

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Once I got to the allotment I started with courgettes. I shouldn’t have been surprised but they were great, all different colours and sizes.

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After that I did the tomatoes in the greenhouses and outside and at the same time I found a lot of cucumbers as well.

Now I had two very heavy bags and I wanted to bring some of my nice apples home as well .

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Fortunately my wheelbarrow is on the allotment ready for such situations. I loaded it all in, picked some sweet corn and took it all home.

After lunch I started making pasta sauce using all the tomatoes, some peppers, a few courgettes, about three cobs and got it cooking. No water was needed as the tomatoes are very juicy.

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All this reduced down and I’ve got four more jars of delicious pasta sauce. There is some of the sauce left and we’ll have it tomorrow night with pasta.

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27. AUGUST

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Yesterday and today were very busy but also satisfactory. My plan to clear the individual structures continues, I started with a little netted greenhouse that is between my fruit cage and a large net cage. I grew some broad beans there and the fact that they were inside the netted cage stopped the black aphids infestation. The harvest was very good too. In the past years I had some strawberry plants there, my friend Eva gave them to me when she was moving back to Hungary. These got quite strong now and I will be able to realise my other plan – grow strawberries in large flower pots in greenhouses. I will keep my beds too but these are getting old now and don’t produce such good fruit. I pulled the plants all out and took them home. I’m soaking them in a large bucket and will start planting as soon as I get more compost. With this done I tackled the weeds and got a big surprise. First I found one large caterpillar and very soon four more. Beautiful creatures, I had no idea what they were but guessed they must be moth caterpillars. I was right, they are elephant hawk moth caterpillars.

I kept them safe to one side and planned to move them to the net cage where there was more greenery but when I came back today they were gone! In the end I found just one of them on the other side of the structure and moved it as planned. It looked happy when I put in on the ground and started  munching on a leaf.

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After this rescue I continued with some more weeding. I have a narrow path between my fruit cage and the net tunnel and even though I weed it from time to time it was rather overgrown. It was quite challenging but bit by bit the work was done. I’m sure I’ll have to do it again soon enough so I have to keep an eye on it.

And of course it followed that I would tidy the net tunnel as well. Same story there, I did that not too long ago. At least the weeds were very easy to pull out and I had a bonus find – a branch on one of the black currant bushes rooted itself so I just snipped it and planted it in a free space. Gained another bush for free.

After that I decided to call it a day, there is just one more structure to clear out – the fruit cage. That will take at least a couple of days, it is quite a large area. And of course there’s harvesting and watering to be done in between. I’m not complaining, it feeds us, I can’t remember when I last bought any vegetables. The bottling goes on a pace, I’m running out of Kilner jars and storage space is filling up too. This is one problem I don’t mind having.

17. AUGUST

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I had a very different day yesterday. I went with a group of people from Coventry University on a walk through the very old and rather neglected allotments. These are at the back of Blue Coats School, behind the playground. We have been there a number of times because the fruit trees that the gardeners planted all those years ago are still producing fruit. I knew about a couple of apple trees and collected some great apples but the trees are having a rest this year. The reason the University people went there was to find all possible viable fruit trees – mainly apple trees- and see what state they are in and if possible try to take cuttings from them. Our friend Dave Griffiths was there as he is the main person behind getting the Charterhouse itself going and he’d like to restore a part of the old allotments. This is one thing I’d like to get involved in, we shall be thinning the trees, cutting out dead wood etc. But the bonus from yesterday was a large bag of plums I found. They are greengages, not altogether  ripe but perfect for bottling is sugar syrup and for making jam.

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The jam recipe is a new one, I like the sound of it so I’m trying it.

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This is the fruit all prepared to be continued tomorrow.

 

14. AUGUST

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Another day, another harvest. I went to the allotment with a clear plan about what I’d like to harvest. I knew that in the past years I made a spiced blackberry and apple jam and as we have a glut of blackberries there and my apples are getting ready, today was the day. It didn’t take long to pick the berries and the apples too.

The jam  was easy to  make and I’ve got enough fruit to  make another batch tomorrow.

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Then there were the tomatoes, another large bag of them, also some basil and these were oven roasted and put into Kilner jars and sterilised in a water bath. 

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The carrots and beetroot will be used up tomorrow, I have found a new recipe for soup – beetroot, cabbage and carrot. I’ve got the cabbage here already and it needs just one or two carrots. The rest were steamed and served with chard gratin that we had for tea tonight.

Of course I mustn’t forget the courgettes, they seem to grow overnight so that will be on the ‘to-do’ list tomorrow too, a few more jars of courgette pickle.

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3. JULY

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On Saturday I harvested my red currants. When I put the large pot on the scales it weighed three kilos. I knew I didn’t want to make jam or freeze the fruit because it would have meant de-stringing it.

I decided to make syrup and for that I found a great recipe on a Czech web site. It is simplicity itself – three kilos of fruit, two litres of water and juice of two lemons. Put this in a large bowl and leave for 48 hours. Then let the juice drip through a muslin cloth, add 600 g of sugar, make sure it is dissolved and bottle it. I have filled six Kilner jars and, using my favourite water bath, bottled them. The syrup tastes so much better that any bought one, no chemicals at all. Summer in a jar.

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This recipe was originally for making raspberry syrup but the author said that any currants can be used instead. 

1. JULY

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I have found a lovely recipe for fruit syrup. The original is made from raspberries but it says the same recipe can be made using currants. That was encouraging because I needed to pick my red currants. I have got two bushes in the fruit cage and they are rather easy to pick. The result was an amazing three kilos so as soon as I came home I started the process.

It takes quite a while – first the fruit has to be crushed, water and lemon juice added to it and has to stay for 48 hours like that. After this time I’ve got to let it drip without squeezing it, add sugar to it and the job is done, I’ll bottle it in my Kilner jars, ready for later. I did pick some raspberries as well but these will be for our breakfast, we put them on our porridge.

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As I have my apple trees as miniatures I can comfortably reach every branch so I continued thinning out my Bramleys and Russets. The aim is to have less apples but bigger ones. It should work, I did it a few years ago. This year the trees were laden with fruit so I had to do it again. Of course I’m not going to throw these little apples away, I have cooked them and sieved them, they made a delicious apple puree.

I added another six Kilner jars to my previous two. The collection of bottled goodies for the winter is growing fast.

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The rest of the morning was used to tidy up another greenhouse, the tomato plants were getting too tall so I cut the tops and also took off some of the bottom leaves and now the fruit can ripen much better.

When I wanted to tie up my climbing courgettes and squashes I found that one of them was actually a cucumber and had one lovely cucumber just waiting to be picked.

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The rest were squashes and climbing courgettes and I hope that they’ll grow better tied up.

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I harvested a few courgettes and they’ll make a  very tasty meal tomorrow evening.

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27. JUNE

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My bottling continues. I ‘just’ went to water the plants in all my greenhouses and then I noticed that there are quite a few raspberries so I had to pick them. I don’t want to  make another batch of jam, instead I decided to bottle them. Totally delighted with the result.

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In the next batch I will add a splash of alcohol to each jar – the recipe suggested that but I wanted to see if it actually works. It does so next time ….

1. AUGUST

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I knew that today was ‘stay in the kitchen’ day and I was right. The result is wonderful, well worth the time spent chopping and slicing. A few trips up into the loft to collect some more jars for bottling the pickled beans and Kilner jars for the bottling and all is done. The huge lot of jars is rapidly going down, there are no more Kilners there, only the ones I have ready downstairs. Never mind, that can be sorted out.

I used the box of blackberries to bottle them, just packed them in the jars and pressed down, they were so juicy nothing else was needed.

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They will make a perfect desert in the winter.

Next on the list were the beans – I had a lovely mix of different climbing beans so I decided to make something savoury for a change.

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We’ll have to wait a few months to let them mature but they are perfect, very tasty. I might be making some more, there will be many more beans.

The last but not least were the tomatoes, courgettes and a few of the left over beans. My latest favourite product, pasta sauce.

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It was in the middle of the afternoon that I finally did the last lot of washing up and labelled all the jars. 

Tomorrow is another day, I’m sure I will find something else to do on the allotment and harvest more goodies.

29. JULY

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It was back to a hot day today but I wasn’t planning to do anything too strenuous on the allotment. Nowadays I go every other day to water all the tomatoes and peppers in the greenhouses and harvest whatever I can. It was no different today.

As there are so many blackberries that are ripening so fast I pick them every time I go there. Last time I made some jam and today I thought I would try something else. We like blackberry and apple crumble, I had a fair number of apples under my trees so I picked them. When I got home I sat and very painstakingly cut them up, and chopped them into small pieces, mixed with the very ripe blackberries and over a low heat cooked them. The result is delicious, I didn’t use any sugar but I would add some later if needed. I filled four Kilner jars, one pie dish ready for crumble tomorrow and I still have a bowl of them left to have just with a drizzle of cream.

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Of course there were more tomatoes ready to pick and this time I  made a huge pot of tomato soup, just added some basil leaves, no water at all  needed, the tomatoes are beautifully juicy. This made four Kilner jars as well and a bowl left, enough for supper for  the two of us one evening, served with a garlic baguette or some such.20220729_182124

Both lots were put through a water bath, around 15 minutes and I have a ready supply for the winter. Nothing artificial added, just pure fruit or vegetables.

24. JULY

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At last the temperature is a bit easier to work on the allotment, however my activities are rather curtailed. I have great plans on the way there – I’ll do the weeding here, collect the cut branches there etc. It is the same every time I go there and it always finishes in the same way – only a fraction of jobs get done. Take today. I was hoping to get on with watering all the plants in the four greenhouses but when I got to the farm I  noticed that the blackberries had turned black overnight. I wanted to  make some jam so I decided to pick them first and then do the other jobs. This didn’t take too long and I had two full boxes quite quickly.

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As I started watering the greenhouses I realised the tomatoes needed picking as well, even though I had a large bag of them a couple of days ago. Another little delay but well worth it, I could make more pasta sauce because I also picked a handful of sweet chillies in yet another greenhouse.

After that I finally got going with the watering and after that came a few more jobs – cutting off some of the tomato foliage and tying the plants to their sticks, weeding inside the greenhouses and here I thought – how come the weeds always grow so well, even if the plants I want growing are struggling. There must be some kind of logic here but I can’t see it.

I was slowly getting round to all  the jobs I wanted to do, even managed to harvest some runner beans and other climbing beans. I wanted to make more pasta sauce, this time a mix of tomatoes, peppers and the beans. It all together made a huge potful and I have kept one portion for us for tomorrow’s lunch, the rest is already bottled in my Kilner jars. All will be very nice in the middle of the winter.

 

As the last thing in the evening I made the jam. I had more than enough so I got two Kilner jars of blackberries as well as all the jam. I’d better slow down a bit with the jam making, there isn’t much storage space left and I’m beginning to run out of empty jam jars.

There are very dark clouds overhead and I’m hoping we might get some rain at night. I think I will work in the back garden at home tomorrow, and I must catch up.