Height of the Season Leaves No Time to Cook

How I am preserving the harvest for later

Now, in the height of the season, I have no time to prepare (and sometimes eat) the luscious vegetables.  With all the outdoor activities that summer allows, I bet you have little time too. Thankfully, with the help of many bloggers, food writers, newspapers and university sites, there's much information on preserving the harvest.  

Various vegetable quick pickles from the fridge

Using ideas from Martha Rose Shulman  quick pickles link and various pickling books, Kamal pickled cucumbers and onions with pickling spice in cider vinegar.  I pickled beets in white vinegar and roasted peppers in oil when cool I put them in a jar with vinegar. 

Lemon basil drying

If I don't use the herbs right away, they are put in a glass of water in the fridge with a plastic bag wrapped around them.  If I know that I won't use them in a few days, I dry them anywhere and everywhere.  Fresh herbs are especially expensive in the winter and dried ones are not that cheap either.

Genovese basil drying in the stairwell

Because I grow them and I can, I use hot peppers in everything.  Kamal gently chided me as I ruined (word and emphasis mine) the subtlety of a gratin. I like my bold flavors.  These are drying on the counter - waiting to dry more and then be put away and crushed or ground with a mortar and pestle for later dishes.

Various hot peppers

I freeze the hot peppers, too.  In the winter, one Hot Paper Lanterns really spices up a dal or rice and beans.

Cooked down green tomatoes

We had some green tomatoes and we blanched them and put them through a food mill to remove the skins.  I have been using this cooked down sauce as body for salsa.  Add lime, garlic and a fresh red tomato, to the green tomatoes and it's a tasty salsa.

Frozen roasted tomatoes in oil

I roasted the tomatoes to be used later to add depth to a soup or sauce.  The simplest way was from Smitten Kitchen.  You may want to adjust how long you roast them.   I found the juicer heirlooms to take longer - five to six hours at 225 F.

Preserving through freezing

I blanched beet greens and chard. Here's a detailed description on blanching from H. Sawtelle.  Then, I froze the blanched greens.  The other item shown is frozen cherry tomatoes. 

Raw carrots

To prove my point, there's the carrots from last week that I must pickle with hot pepper, sesame oil and rice vinegar.