# What did you pick this weekend?



## Tammy (Jun 21, 2012)

My garden is not doing well this year, but I did pick a few raspberries, some beans and a zucchini. 
my moms garden on the other hand is doing quite well and my parents are leaving for Europe in a couple days and will be gone for 3 1/2 wks so I'm tending to their garden while they are away. she said to take whatever I want. Her plum trees will be ready for picking and she thinks her grapes will be ready also. So I'm looking forward to a few wks of getting carrots, beans, plum and grapes. Plus, they have blackberry bushes within a quick walking distance of their place that grow along a creek, so they are HUGE berries. I'll be picking a bunch of those too. mmmm, can't wait!

What are you picking and enjoying from your garden right now?


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## stephanie (Jun 21, 2012)

will be thinning and canning beets this week as well as pulling some carrots and maybe some green beans. my corn is starting to form ears and my squash is doing squashy things they are forming and getting big also. I am letting the donkeys and pigs have at the black berries and wild blue berry bushes just because they are doing bad things to my fencing. well the evergreen black berries are hanging all over the pigs fence.have wild blue berries getting ripe, three types of black berries all growing wild,plus black cap wild raspberries going crazy all over have wild strawberries in my lawn. I live in wild berry crazy land it seems.oh forgot about he salmon/thimble berries they are every where too. they all make for a nice snack outside.


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## Tammy (Jun 21, 2012)

let me know how your beet canning goes. Have you canned beets before? 
I've canned them for a few yrs now but after last year I swore I'd never do it again. I pressure canned them and so much of the red comes out of the beets that they are a light pink and really didn't have much flavor at all. have you ever had that problem before? I wonder how the beets you buy in the store that have been commercially canned are still such a dark red. They are pressure canning them also.


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## stephanie (Jun 21, 2012)

to keep the dark red color you have to leave about 2 inches of the stem on them or they bleed out, when you first cook them to prep the beets for canning. I also do a water bath when canning them and they stay dark red. if you save the water off the beets and strain it you can make a real interesting jelly from it but you have to add extra pectin plus some lemon juice and cook it longer, but use the basic berry jelly recipe. I will post my sweet beet recipe for all to enjoy 
I will also do some pics of cooking prep so they retain the dark red color.


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## Tammy (Jun 21, 2012)

Thanks. When I just boil the beets for either prepping for canning or for eating, I do leave some of the stem and the bottom tapered root off to stay red. But then when I'm doing the actual canning in the pressure cooker, that's when the red bleeds out.


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## stephanie (Jun 21, 2012)

try doing a water bath canning instead that may be the difference.


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## stephanie (Jun 21, 2012)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/ todays fresh veggies, dragon carrots and green beans.


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## Tammy (Jun 21, 2012)

num! love those carrots! I planted a packet of mixed varieties this year - so i've been getting some purple, some reddish/orange and some a real light orange. My son seems to enjoy eating them more when they are varied like this! hey, whatever works!! lol


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## stephanie (Jun 21, 2012)

I have noticed the dragon carrots are a lot sweeter than the regular orange ones, they are also a different texture and easier to cut up/slice.


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## Tammy (Jun 21, 2012)

This past Friday I picked veggies from my moms garden again (parents in spain for 3 wks so i'm taking care of the garden) and picked ALOT of beans. so I canned 7 qts of beans for her. also picked some carrots and cucumbers. and from my own garden, I picked enough tomatos to make up a large batch of salsa (fresh pico de gallo style). Only had to buy cilantro for that but otherwise everything came from my garden. I also pulled some beets from my garden and carrots. I planted the multi color variety this year, so although they are not very big, i did get a colorful bunch of yellow, orange, dark orange, red and purple carrots. 

what did you do this wknd in your garden?


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## veggiewhisperer (Jun 22, 2012)

I picked some turnip greens, tomatoes, and carrots last weekend. Those turnip greens grow like weeds.


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