We’re watching over my sister’s garden while they’re enjoying vacation time on the coast… We were supposed to join then for a few days but I have a few Doctor appointments that have gotten in the way… They’re all leading up to a dual pacemaker and an ablation – along with the removal of an implanted loop recorder towards the end of the month…
The grape tomatoes are going crazy and the peppers are, as well, so Friday we both went over and I picked tomatoes while Victor did the watering.
Saturday, Victor went over on his own and watered and picked a few peppers. I stayed home and watered our garden and picked a few large tomatoes – the majority are still green but when they finally do ripen, we’re in for a huge harvest!
Anyway… when he got home he found me on the kitchen floor after just having another syncope – the reason for all the Dr appointments and pacemaker and stuff. I recover quickly from them, but Victor said he was going to cook dinner. For a nano-second, I almost protested, and then the head cleared and I quickly agreed. I’m not passing up dinner being cooked for me!
He ran down to our local bread bakery and picked up a couple loaves of bread – we very rarely bake bread in the summer – and made a simple pesto pasta with grape tomatoes and peas.
Totally delish and just what the Doctor Ordered! It proves that totally fantastic meals do not need to be elaborate creations – a few simple good-quality ingredients are all ya need!
He had made the pesto a while ago and froze it in ice cube trays. Perfect portioning!
This morning – feeling my normal cantankerous self – while Victor went to water, I watered our garden and then pickled peppers and tomatoes!
I’ve done a ton of peppers in the past, but this is my first go at doing grape tomatoes. I used the same brine on both – white vinegar, water, sugar, and salt – but added some black pepper and mustard seeds to the tomatoes – and a couple of buena mulata peppers for added heat to the peppers. (Buena Mulata peppers are a purple cayenne pepper…)
I did refrigerator canning – not heat – so they are not shelf stable. We’ll let ’em set until Friday and they’ll probably be gone by the weekend.
Our big canning this summer is going to be San Marzano tomatoes in pint jars. We have two plants that are so over-laden that they are staked within an inch of their lives…
Our other goal is more Homemade Tomato Paste.
It’s pretty unbelievable…
