Sunday, July 29, 2012

Tomatoes and corn--our favorite garden products!

   Country Guy's garden has produced so many tomatoes this year!  Friday I picked three more 5 gallon buckets full.  That is at least 11 buckets of good tomatoes we've picked plus many that were thrown to the chickens because they had spoiled, all from only 12 or 13 plants!  They are beautiful and so full of flavor.  Country Guy thinks the bountiful crop is due to the organic fertilizer he has been using on his garden.  (The horse pasture in on one side of the garden and the chicken coop is on the other so he has lots to choose from.)
     I have been making Spaghetti Sauce (see recipe under Miscellaneous on the Recipes #2 Page above) with some of the extras--3 buckets made about 25 containers of sauce.  My mom & sister used several bucketsful to make almost 30 quarts of tomato juice, and I gave 2 buckets to friends who are going to can them.
     The plants are still producing, so next I am thinking of freezing the tomatoes with green peppers and onions to use on Italian Sausage Sandwiches.  We love those sandwiches!  (Recipe under Soups & Sandwiches on Recipes #1 Page).
     The guys always plant several rows of sweet corn with the planter in one of our fields when they're planting our corn and soybeans so there will be plenty to share. but because of the drought the plants didn't produce this year.  Fortunately, Country Guy planted a few rows in his garden which he watered with the tomatoes so we had corn on the cob for dinner several days.  It was delicious!
    We have discovered a good way to freeze corn.  Every time we cook the ears of corn for dinner we add a few extra ears.  We then cut the corn off the leftover ears, place it in plastic freezer bags and date them.  To me, this is so much easier than doing it all at once, and we end up having several bags by the end of the season.
     I hope you, too, have been able to enjoy the fruits of your (or someone else's) garden this year.  There is nothing as tasty as home-grown produce!

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