What to Do with Surplus Garden Produce

Recipes for Pickled Mixed Vegetables and End of Season Relish

Aug 30, 2009 Stephen Allen Christensen

Summer is winding down. The garden is producing more zucchinis, tomatoes, beans, carrots, and cauliflower than any family wants to eat. What can one do with it all?

There comes a time each growing season when gardeners are faced with a cruel dilemma: what can be done with the excess produce that is falling from vines, filling shelves, and stacking up on kitchen counters?

Rather than wasting the excess garden produce that one’s family can’t eat—or missing out on the lowest produce prices of the year at the market—any successful gardener or enterprising homemaker can easily preserve a cornucopia of tasty, nutritious vegetables for a time when they’ll be greatly appreciated.

During the dead of winter, when the summer’s excess has been long forgotten, prying the lid from a jar of colorful vegetables will brighten the bleakest of days.

Although some foodstuffs lend themselves more readily to the canning process, nearly anything a gardener grows can be preserved.

So, if there is enough produce spilling from the garden to feed an army and …

  • If the kids don’t seem to be hungry anymore and mutter about “turning green as grass” as they scuttle out the door at mealtimes…
  • If the neighbors never seem to be home when they hear the now-familiar wagonload of vegetables being wheeled up their driveways…
  • If the specials at the grocery store or local farmers’ market are just too good to pass up (green peppers forty cents apiece, cauliflower a buck a pound, five pounds of carrots for three dollars, a sack of onions for four dollars, etc.)…

Well, it’s time to consider canning those end-of-summer vegetables.

Pickled Mixed Vegetables

Ingredients

  • 6 medium carrots
  • 2 medium heads cauliflower
  • 2 medium sweet red peppers
  • 2 medium green peppers
  • 6 medium onions
  • 6-8 stalks celery
  • 5 cups vinegar (distilled white or 5% acid-strength cider)
  • 3 cups water
  • 6 tablespoons salt
  • 2 tablespoons mustard seed
  • 2 tablespoons celery seed
  • ¾ teaspoon ground turmeric
  • 6 – 8 wide-mouthed pint jars with lids and rims

Method

  1. Peel carrots and slice into finger-length, ¼- to ½-inch-thick strips. Break cauliflower into thumb-sized florets. Blanch carrots and cauliflower in unsalted, boiling water for 5 minutes; drain.
  2. Cut peppers and celery into ½ inch strips; quarter onions.
  3. Combine water, vinegar, and spices in a pot and heat to boiling. Simmer for 2 minutes.
  4. Pack hot jars tightly with a mixture of vegetables to within ½ inch from rim. Pour vinegar solution over vegetables, filling jars to within ¼ inch from rims. Make sure vegetables are completely covered.
  5. Wipe jar rims; place lids.
  6. Process in boiling-water bath or steam canner for 5 minutes (start timer when water has returned to boiling after jars are placed in canner).
  7. Remove from heat, allow to cool; check seals.
  8. Label with date and place on shelves; allow to cure for 6 – 8 weeks.
  9. (Quart jars may also be used, but increase processing time to 10 minutes)
  10. Excess brine (vinegar solution) can be stored in a refrigerator and used for the next batch

End of Season Relish

Ingredients

  • 1 cup cucumbers, coarsely chopped
  • 1 cup chopped green peppers (3 – 4 medium)
  • 1 cup chopped onion (1 large)
  • 1 cup chopped cabbage
  • 1 cup green beans, chopped or sliced into ½-inch lengths
  • 1 cup yellow beans, chopped or sliced into ½-inch lengths
  • 1 cup carrots, peeled and chopped
  • 1 cup celery, chopped
  • 2 teaspoons salt
  • 1 tablespoon celery seeds
  • 2 tablespoons mustard seeds
  • 2 tablespoons ground turmeric
  • 2 cups 5% acid-strength cider vinegar
  • 2 cups sugar
  • 4 wide-mouthed pint jars with lids and rims

Method

  1. Place beans, carrots, and celery with 2 tsp salt in a 4-quart pot and cover with water. Heat to boiling and simmer for 15 minutes. Drain and discard liquid.
  2. Combine uncooked vegetables with cooked vegetables and add vinegar, sugar, celery seeds, mustard seeds, and turmeric. Heat to boiling and simmer another 15 minutes.
  3. Ladle vegetable mixture into hot pint jars, filling to within ¼ inch from rim.
  4. Wipe jar rims; place lids.
  5. Process in boiling-water bath or steam canner for 15 minutes (start processing time when water has returned to boiling after jars are placed in canner).
  6. Remove jars from canner and allow to cool. Check seals.
  7. Label with date and place on shelves. Best if allowed to cure for 6 weeks, but can be used immediately.

There are as many recipes for preserving surplus produce as there are over-ambitious gardeners. Part of the fun of gardening is finding new ways to preserve the bounty.

The copyright of the article What to Do with Surplus Garden Produce in Recipes is owned by Stephen Allen Christensen. Permission to republish What to Do with Surplus Garden Produce in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
Mixed Summer Vegetables, Steve Christensen
Mixed Summer Vegetables
Pickled Mixed Vegetables, Steve Christensen
Pickled Mixed Vegetables
  
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