And the list goes on

Zucchini, cucumbers, watermelon, cantaloupe, green beans, purple potatoes, onions, garlic, tomatoes of various sorts, green peppers, habanero peppers (much hotter than I anticipated, even at a very unripe stage), butternut squash, eggplant, pattypan squash, beets, okra, multi-colored carrots...I think that pretty much covers what I've been getting from my CSA subscription and the community garden.  Needless to say, I haven't been buying much in groceries lately except for eggs, milk, and the occasional bag of sugar for canning.  Speaking of which, I bought a half bushel of peaches the other week which I--besides simply canning a large portion of them--made into preserves as well as this delicious peach barbecue sauce (a great recipe that you could simply make fresh).  There are still a few boxes of jars sitting around waiting for an apple-picking excursion followed by applesauce making.  Hopefully they're not bothering my roommate too much!

So what does one do with all the aforementioned produce? Especially when extra, unanticipated zucchini show up on your doorstep?  Well, I've made buttermilk zucchini soup, ordinary zucchini soup, chocolate zucchini bread, pineapple-raisin zucchini bread, cucumber salad, cucumber and basil slush (I was incredibly skeptical of this, but it actually tasted fairly good), ratatouille, roasted root vegetables, sauted squash, okra and tomatoes, and borscht. For the latter (a great soup that utilizes a lot of mid- to late-summer vegetables), Mary and I used a conglomaration of a few recipes, and it turned out well.  We actually only used one beet.  One beet, which yielded 4 cups when grated.  No joke.

The beet which became the borscht:

I hope you're enjoying the bounty of summer as much as I am!

It was bound to happen...

Time for a confession.  Two days ago I bought 96 canning jars on Craigslist.  Yes, 96.  For only $22!  It was actually kind of a hike to get to the folks (45 minutes), but I had to go halfway there that day, anyway, so what's another 20 minutes?  I'd been wanting to learn how to can, so this was the impetus to get going.

Now my friend Mary and I are on a quest to fill said jars.  She'd helped with canning once before; I was a novice.  We mostly used information online, these two sites being particularly helpful:  All About Canning and National Center for Home Food Preservation.

Here is our first attempt--tart cherry preserves (step-by-step instructions on the first website above).  It was successful, we think.  The only difficult part, honestly, was waiting for the water to boil.  My burners have always been incredibly slow, and this involved quite a lot of water, so it was a long process, though fairly easy.

Now to do something with the other 20 lbs. of cherries, as well as the 25 lbs. of peaches ripening in boxes in the spare room.  Peach salsa or cherry butter, anyone?