Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Canning Relish in an RV

 We found this blog over at: http://lifeinanarv.blogspot.com/

Today was relish making day in the ol’ RV. Two weeks ago or so, I put up 27 quarts of dill pickles and decided I wanted to give relish making a whirl. Now, I am not a fan of sweet relish. I mean, it’s ok, but it’s not my favorite. I like dill relish. I found a recipe that looked straightforward enough, click HERE for the link. I wanted to add in some more stuff and I decided to monkey around with the spice measurements.
I started out with 6 pounds of pickling cucumbers.And…I’m not sure what in the hell possessed me to want to chop all this up by hand, but I did :/
Chop, chop, chop…
Slice, slice, slice…I even sliced a bit of finger…not too bad, though.
And, finally, after, literally, 3 hours, I came to the end of the damn cukes. I was really starting to hate those things!
See…6 pounds all with my handy-dandy, rummage sale find cleaver…I love that thing!
Six pounds makes a lot!! This pot was the other rummage sale find, it’s a six-quart.
I had obtained some purple bell peppers from the farmers market on Saturday…I chopped them up, too!
Interesting color combo.
These are “Godfather” peppers…at least that’s what I was told from the guy who runs the produce stand where I buy all my cukes from. I chopped them up, too.
3 good-sized onions got chopped up…
and an entire head of garlic. You can never add too much garlic.
I added 1 cup canning salt to the chopped veggies and let it all set for an hour. Then I drained it and rinsed it well in cold running water.
This is my water bath canner aka Godzilla! It takes 2 burners on the stove inside. I forgot to have Bob set up the camp stove this morning before he left for work, so it was do or die!
This is my relish brine…6 cups of white vinegar, 5 teaspoons EACH dill seed, mustard seed and celery seed, 1-1/2 cups sugar and 1 teaspoon tumeric and that whole head of minced garlic…bring it to a boil…
Add the drained and rinsed veggies into the brine and bring it back up to a boil. Simmer for about 10 minutes.
Sterilized jars waiting to be filled.
Relish is starting to simmer…
Looks good, huh?
I was able to fill 11 pint jars, so I think it’s a safe bet that I will not have to buy relish in the coming year.
I processed the jars for 15 minutes in the water bath. I always flip my jars upside down when they come out. Someone who is far more knowledgeable than I am in the canning department told me to do that, so I do and I’ve never had a jar not seal up for me. I leave them upside down for about 15 minutes. As I am writing this, I can hear PING! PING! PING! I love hearing that sound!
Peace!
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