This is the second year my mom and I have canned beans and pickles. Before last year, we had never canned anything! There are so many recipes and techniques out there that we were overwhelmed and weren't sure how well our first batch would turn out. Especially because we were trying to make crunchy dill pickles that were like the Claussen ones. Last year's batch turned out pretty good actually! A few of our jars weren't very crunchy though, so we hope that this year we figured out the tricks to make them crunchy.
We also figured out how to actually make them cost effective this year. Bailey's farm in Snohomish has a U-pick field. The pickles are best to pick in about mid-September. Picking them yourself saves a lot of money.
They also have fresh dill and beans you can pick there as well.
Here is the recipe we used for the pickles.
http://woodridge.wordpress.com/2009/08/09/crispy-dill-pickles-just-like-klaussens/
My mom grew gorgous Dahlias in her yard this year and I picked some to take home with me.
We like to make the beans for Bloody Mary's and for turkey roll-ups. Just wrap some turkey slices around a couple of beans and it makes a delicious no-carb snack!
This was our view while we were canning. My mom's kitchen overlooks the Snohomish valley and the hot air balloons were floating by. So gorgeous!
My mom had bought all of the ingredients at the farmers market and also picked up stuff for dinner. She bought fresh oysters that my dad barbecued on the grill, ingredients for salad, red raspberry/lemon white balsamic vinegar, and rainbow salmon. We had never tried rainbow salmon before. The flesh was marbled with different colors and was so good. We used the left over dill and fresh lemons and salt on the fish and barbecued-ed it.
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| Just add a little butter and Tabasco to the oysters. Delicious!! |
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| Rainbow salmon |
