Glut recipes! (eating or preserving!) - tried and tested!

foreign_correspondent

Hello,

I hope this does not get moved to the OS board, although I have a sneaking suspicion it may...

What I was wondering is, what do you do with a glut of one or two veg at once? I am looking for tried and tested recipes which people know are good for eating up lots of produce, or even beter, for preserving for eating around the year.

A few weeks ago I made about fifty jars of strawberry jam! If anyone want the recipe it is here:
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=813015&page=2

At the moment I have several overgrown courgettes/marrows, and have made some marrow chutney which is excellent. I also made some marrow and broccoli soup which was good.

I pickle small sliced beetroot, but I also have some giant beetroot which are too big to slice and pickle (I cant get the slices into the jars!) so I have made some beetroot chutney, which is also very good (fab with a cheese toastie!)

I have a load of tomatoes and have been making tomato salads all week, with olives, capers and onions - but there are only so many we can eat. I have been advised to skin, chop and freeze for later use. I need to ask my 93 year old gran about bottling them, as she knows how.

I freeze chillies in ziploc bags (just as they are, no prep, and take out and slice from frozen)

In case anyone wants the chutney recipes, here they are - both are very good...

Marrow Chutney from www.allotment.org.uk
Preparation Time: 10 minutes
Cooking Time: 50 minutes
Serves: 4
Ingredients
3lb marrow
1lb onions
1lb ripe tomatoes
1 pint malt vinegar
4 oz dates - I used sultanas instead
2tsp allspice
2 tsp ground ginger - I used a load of fresh grated instead - about 2 tbspn
2 tbsp salt
2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 ½ lb brown sugar

Instructions
1. Peel the marrow and cut into small chunks. Peel and chop or mince the onions. Peel and slice the tomatoes.

2. Put all these ingredients in a pan with half the vinegar. Stone and chop the dates and add to the pan. Simmer gently until soft and pulpy and the marrow can easily be crushed. Add spices, pepper and salt and simmer for a further 15 minutes.

3. Stir in the sugar and remaining vinegar. Continue cooking until thick (No liquid should ooze into the path made by the wooden spoon as it is drawn cross the pan).

4. Pour into warm jars with plastic or plastic coated metal lids.


Beetroot Chutney (from Farmers Guardian website who say...
MRS Gwyneth Evans, of Pont-y-Gof, Botwnnog, Pwllheli, Gwynedd, has sent in this recipe for beetroot chutney. She says it is her favourite chutney recipe and she makes pounds of it every year, to share and to donate to charity sales tables, though she is always on the look out for clean glass jars.)

NGREDIENTS
1,350g (3lb) beetroot
2 small onions
1 tspn salt
600ml (1 pint) white vinegar
675g (11/2lb) apples
450g (1lb) sugar
1/2 tspn ground ginger
I added - ½ tsp alspice, a little extra salt and some ground mixed peppercorns.

METHOD
1. Boil beetroot until tender (always make sure they don't ‘bleed’ before cooking).
2. Chop onions and apples in small pieces and bring to the boil with the vinegar and sugar.
3. Boil for 20 minutes.
4. Add cubed beetroot and spices and boil again for at least 15 minutes.
5. Pot into glass jars with non-metallic lids.

nodwah

these sound good. Hugh fW has a new book on preserves coming out soon.

I've got an american book somewhere called food for when your garden explodes or something like that - must dig it out.

katiel

There are two books I have found really useful:
- "Food From your Garden" Readers Digest, which provides recipes and chapters on freezing, drying, bottling, chutneys etc (looks a lot more expensive on Amazon than on other sites from a quick google)
- Good Food Gardening by Peter Seabrook, which is a gardening book essentially but has given me a well-proven recipe for making grape juice (looks like it's only available second hand)

Waitrose's recipe card for rhubarb crumble cake has gone down a storm amongst friends and family, and the cake is easily freezable. I've also got a recipe for a juicier rhubarb cake, but it's in a book that I doubt anyone would find.

There are some excellent recipes on http://www.allotment.org.uk/recipe/ for soups - which is what I unimaginatively do with my glut of tomatoes, peppers etc etc

And anything I make then goes in the freezer.

nodwah

katiel wrote: »

Waitrose's recipe card for rhubarb crumble cake has gone down a storm amongst friends and family, and the cake is easily freezable. I've also got a recipe for a juicier rhubarb cake, but it's in a book that I doubt anyone would find.

.

Fancy sharing the rhubarb recipes please?

katiel

The Waitrose recipe is here: http://www.waitrose.com/recipe/Rhubarb_Crumble_Squares_with_Orange_Zest.aspx

The other recipe I'd have to copy out and post, which might take up a huge amount of space and be a copyright problem?

nodwah

katiel wrote: »

The Waitrose recipe is here: http://www.waitrose.com/recipe/Rhubarb_Crumble_Squares_with_Orange_Zest.aspx

The other recipe I'd have to copy out and post, which might take up a huge amount of space and be a copyright problem?

HMM, dunno. There was a debate about this on OS thread a while ago, don't know what the conclusion was.

THanks for that one anyway!

foreign_correspondent

I think if you reference it correctly it is fine (for a book, you need to list the name of the book, the author, the publisher and year published) - this is why I put the links in to the places I got the chutney recipes from, I have had my work plagiarised in the past and it was most unpleasant, so I always try and make sure I credit the source for anything I use!

... and just look at what happened to Dr Raj Persaud recently - the problem was not because he had used other people's words, just that he had not credited them to the original author!:eek:

katiel

Re the other rhubarb cake recipe, rather than take up space on this thread I have now put it on http://recipesforgardenproduce.blogspot.com/ with acknowledgement to the publisher. Hope the link works

Rowan9

ok - marrpow chutney sounds fab and I have sourced marrows (I have only grown tomatoes and salad leaves this year as I'm a novice) - I bought some salad stuff from a bottom-of-garden stall and they also have another table with marrows with a sign that says help yourselves and put in what you think right (Into the money box). I bought a yellow one yesterday but now that I want to make chutney I'm going back. What would be the right price to pay so that the gardener and I are happy? Don't want to be greedy.2 for £1? I've no idea how much marrows cost and they had about a dozen on the table.
Thanks if anyone picks this up _ i didn't think it warrants a thread of its own.
w

foreign_correspondent

I have sold a few of my marrows - a quid each but they were huge - about 18" long, so if they arent massive I think 2 for a quid would be ok?!?

Rowan9

foreign_correspondent wrote: »

I have sold a few of my marrows - a quid each but they were huge - about 18" long, so if they arent massive I think 2 for a quid would be ok?!?

Great - these are not as big as that. Will put in £1.50 and be highly delighted.
Thanks
w