Canning 2013

Every summer when I was a kid, we went to my Grandma's house and helped her can and freeze the produce from their huge garden. A few years ago, Chase and I decided we wanted to start canning. The thing we love to can the most is tomato sauce. We season it and everything so all we have to do is open the can and toss it in whatever we are cooking! Canning is fun, but exhausting. We've gotten a little smarter over the years and learned from our mistakes, so it has gotten a bit easier. This year we did 50 lbs of tomatoes, 20 lbs of pears and about 10 lbs of pickles. Here are the pictures of our hard work!

Miles just had to be part of the action

Pears!

50 lbs of tomatoes

Peeled tomatoes

Tomato sauce

Finished Product

Cucumbers!

Canning set up for pickling

Pickles!

The pickles take a bit of time before they are ready to eat. When they were sitting on the counter, Chase wanted to eat them everyday so we put them away in the closet for awhile. We haven't broken into the tomatoes or tomato sauce yet because we can still get tomatoes at the farmers market and our tomato plant finally started producing quite a bit! The pears are really good though! Pears were a lot easier to do than peaches.

I really wanted to do green beans this year to try out the pressure cooker that I got from my Grandma when she passed away. However, I'm not sure I'm up for it this year. Canning takes a ton of time! Plus we don't have a huge garden of our own this year, so I have to buy the vegetables anyway. Next year we hope to rent a space from the PNNL community garden. You can rent a 15X15 plot for 10 dollars for the whole year! You can winter garden here as well since it stays above freezing most of the winter. You have to replant after the summer crops and plant heartier more robust plants like kale or winter squash. Still pretty cool and so different from the midwest!