Monday, August 27, 2012

Saving for Winter

I'm so happy with my garden right now. The tomatoes are geting ripe! I planted for a fall garden of beans and cucumbers, as the ones I planted in spring are pretty much done right now. It had been really, really hot, but last weekend we got some nice rains. And that lowered the temperatures a bit. So what do I do with this wealth of tomatoes?


 I got myself a food dehydrator! First I dried a whole bunch of basil leaves from the herb garden. It takes about 18 hours or so, with my dehydrator, to dry those wet basil leaves. Then, I cut up some of the tomatoes and put them on the dehydrator screens, sprinkled with the fresh dried basil and some sea salt, to give them some flavor.
 I have four trays for the dehydrator, and it sits on top of the clothes dryer. It's not too noisy, and I just fill it with fruits and vegetables to make dried snacks and un-sun-dried tomatoes.
 I put some of them in olive oil, and they turned out really well. Pretty soon I'll make some spicy tomato chutney, too. Storing the summertime harvest for later, when the tomatoes are just a fond memory, makes me feel very productive!

4 comments:

SummersStudio said...

Our garden went through a bit of a lull in the heat too. But the maters are coming on strong and putting them up for winter is one of my favorite things to do. Doesn't it taste nice in winter when you can cook something you grew in the summer?

Alice said...

I'm already missing garden fresh tomatoes. I don't grow them but my father-in-law grows the best tomatoes I've ever eaten. This sounds like a great way to enjoy them year round.

LLYYNN - Lynn Davis said...

Hello, friends!
I need to get out and take some photos in the garden this week, before the predicted bad weather heads our way, in case anything gets blown over!

I've dried bananas (excellent!) and peaches (super!) and apples (yummy) so far. I've heard that sliced, dried zucchini are like veggie-style chips, but I'm eating the zucchini so quickly I haven't had a chance to try that yet!

I have a patio tomato in the Topsy-Turvey with eight plump tomatoes just waiting to ripen up. I can't wait!

Anonymous said...

That's so neat! I would love to do this sort of thing myself...but first I need to figure out how to even start a garden!