Canning Pickled Banana Pepper Rings and Okra

The last thing I've done this weekend is to make some pickled banana pepper rings to eat with pizza. Huzzah! I was amazed I got 12 half pints of pickled rings from the peppers Jill brought me, in addition to making white bean soup, eating a few with meals, and I've still got a bit I'll dehydrate.

Before I did the banana peppers though, I did up the okra Uncle Charles brought me. They turned out lovely. I've been sitting on pins and needles hoping I'd get okra to pickle. I used a recipe Jill gave me that comes from her husband's family. They've used it for decades. It's been a long time since I ate some of Joe's pickled okra, but I remember it was good. Well, if he wouldn't have put the red peppers in it (ducking and running.)













Following is Joe's Pickled Okra recipe. It can be used for all sorts of pickling. I used it on the banana peppers, and Jill says they've done Giardiniera (carrots, cauliflower, celery, peppers, onions, zuchinni). This IS NOT a USDA-approved canning recipe. It is a very old recipe from before the days of food scientists and litigation. One can't assume this recipe is absolutely safe for use, especially for people who live in states with high loads of botulism spores (west of the Rockies.)

1 quart white vinegar
3 quarts water
1/4 - 1/5 cup canning, pickling or kosher salt
1/8 tsp alum per pint jar

Optional: add garlic, dill or hot peppers to taste

1. Sterilize jars. 
2. Mix vinegar, water, and salt in pot and bring to boil.
3. While waiting for solution to boil, pack sterilized jars with fruit or vegetable of choice.
4. Pour boiling solution over packed jars and let cool enough to handle.*
5. Pour liquid in jars through a strainer back into solution in pot on stove and return to boil.
6. Do this four (4) times. According to uptake of solution by produce, 3 times may suffice.
7. On the last time, add 1/8 tsp alum to each pint jar.
8. Top with canning lid and ring.
9. Let seal and cool overnight. Remove ring and rinse jars. Date and store.
10. Let jars sit for 1 month before eating.

*When I can handle the jar this way, it's cool enough. I don't want to get burned doing this.

A/C and Salsa for Jill

Hallelujah! The air conditioner is working. OMG, it is the best thing in the world today. The HVAC guy arrived Monday at 7:00 p.m. Again, the problem was a fuse. Argh, this old house and it's buss fuses. The last time it was a fuse outside of which I had no knowledge. Being a little wiser, this time I tried to check all the fuses.  I flipped the outside switch to no avail. Went into the basement and looked at all the fuses. None were broken, except there was one double one that I couldn't tell because you couldn't see an obvious failure device. That little fellow turned out to be the evil culprit. You have to have a meter to tell if those have failed. Wahhh! I want an electrical system with little switches that pop off and all you have to do is flip them back.

So the HVAC guy hosed the A/C down to clean it a bit and put a new fuse in. The $85 house call and half hour of work hurt a bit, but, hey, I'm glad to pay for his knowledge. You have to remember it's not the ease of the work you're paying for, it's the education and experience that you just don't have that you're paying for.

Uncle Charles tried to kill me Monday by offering a mess of purple hull peas if I picked them. Of course, I couldn't turn that down. I think I sweated a bucket and was just about sick to my stomach by the time it was done. However, I got about 2 cups of lovely peas for supper, and my fingers aren't purple today.

Then he made up for the assassination attempt by gifting me a lovely mantle clock. The spring is wound too tight, and it needs a visit to a clock shop. We have one only a block from the house in Memphis, so that's no problem. He strapped it in the back seat of the car, and all the way home I kept thinking my cell phone was getting messages until I finally figured out it was the clock lightly singing to me. Lovely sound.

He'd just pulled all the cucumber vines from his garden, and declaring they had all the pickles they wanted, gave me the last of the harvest. I hope you're okay with that Aunt Agnes.  He opined that some of the pickled squash and green tomatoes I'd given him had too much vinegar. I agree that the first batches did. However, I've reduced the amount I use to about as little as I dare. Maybe the last of the ones I've made won't have too much vinegar for him. I suspect they will, but I'm not sure about reducing the vinegar anymore than I already have. Today before I go home tomorrow, I'm going to put up the last of the cukes. That will end the pickling season.

We also picked some okra while I was there. I was going to pickle it, but decided instead to do an experiment with a way of canning it I'd seen on the internet. It calls for 6 tblsp of vinegar and 2 of salt to a gallon of water, boiling for 6 minutes, sealing, and mentions no processing time. That makes me a bit nervous, but I wanted to try it. They said you could even bread and fry it. The jar sealed well, looks lovely, and the okra stayed a bright green. It doesn't appear to be at all soft. They said the okra stayed good for months. That said, I wouldn't at all trust it for long-term storage, but doubt it would be terribly unsafe for a season.

I also made a batch of salsa. Jill and I were talking about different salsas, and we both opined we liked the watery kind you get in the restaurants. I've always made that kind fresh, but she hadn't. So last night I made up a batch of salsa and canned it. I couldn't find any fresh jalapenos, but substituted 2 cans of chopped green chilies. Since I despise cilantro, I used fresh chopped parsley from the patio planter. Mine isn't nearly as hot as Jill would like, but it's about as hot as I enjoy.

The Latest Canning - Okra, Dill Relish

Uncle Charles gave me a sack of okra the other day. I was looking forward to pickling some, but these were a tad too large for that, so I canned them for gumbo. Yum. The seed pods turned brown, and I wonder if I had added a bit of vinegar or lemon juice that wouldn't have happened. Anyone know?

Okra is such a funny vegetable. So many people are turned off by the slime and won't try it or only eat it fried. Yet there are ways to get rid of the slime, and it helps with thickening a good gumbo, which I absolutely love. I also love popping the little seeds.

This is the way I got turned onto eating okra that wasn't fried, because I was a slime avoider, too. When I was in the Air Force, my best friend was a teeny petite gal, with white blonde hair, named Dove. Perfect angel material you'd think. She actually could beat a sailor in a cursing contest. Anyway, one day Dove declared she couldn't wait to get home and have some buttered okra. Stopped me dead in my tracks. Dove wanted to eat slimy okra in butter? So she drug me to her house after work and showed me how to lightly steam it to just barely done, bathe it in butter and lightly salt it. I was a convert and haven't looked back. Delicious stuff, that okra.

Another thing I made was a batch of dill cucumber relish. I like dill relish on a hot dog better than sweet relish. I found a recipe to adapt and made this by shredding the cucumber and onions on a grater. Right at the end of cooking it, I added a couple of tablespoons of cornstarch and thickened it a bit.

You'll likely notice some glaring things the USDA would have cows over with my dill relish. First thing is that I used non-approved, previously-used jars and lids. This is another one of those things that "my mother did for years and none of us have died" that sends the food scientists into fits. DO NOT get the idea that I am encouraging anyone to do this. It's my own personal choice.

Shredded cucumber and onion

The second thing I did was add a little thickening by adding cornstarch. There are density issues in canning thick foods that can cause problems down the road. I also think cornstarch is not supposed to hold up well in the long run. I didn't add more thickening than I've seen in recipes vetted by the Ball Blue Book.

I'll just have to wait and see how well the cornstarch holds up since this is the first time I've tried it. The author of the recipe I mostly followed didn't make any comment about thickening breakdown, but I have no clue as to his/her experience with the recipe. Too many times people post things on their first try and never follow up if they realize later it was a flop. Since the relish tasted so good, I really hope it does age well.

Another batch of canned goods I've done courtesy of Uncle Charles is a batch of garlic dill pickle spears. They are so pretty in the jars my mouth waters just looking at them. I added a handful of green pepper and onion slices to each jar. These are the treat of the jar. You never add enough to take away the joy of getting some. There should always be a skirmish over the rare treats in pickled things, ya know!