Out to the garden. We have a thistle bush that we're cutting down, but first, I had to take a picture of one of the thistles. I don't know what it is about thistles, but for some reason, I love how they look!
The garden harvest is slowing down, but I've still managed to get a nice basked of goodies! It even included a small cucumber and two tiny Jalepenos! Wahoo!!!!
When I took the canning class in August, I discovered Tomato Jam. Wow! Is it delicious! I decided that I needed to try a batch myself!
Step 1 - Gather and wash the tomatoes. (I used small tomatoes - the teacher has used grape tomatoes, I used a variety of small salad tomatoes - I didn't have enough in my garden to do this, so I bought them at the Purcellville Farmer's Market.)
Step 2 - cut all the tomatoes into halves or quarters. (Thankfully, there's no need to peel! When I get done, I'll blend it with the emmersion blender.)
Step 3 - Add the spices - mmmm.....cloves, cinnamon, sugar.....lots of goodies!
Step 4 - Stir it all together and then cook it down. Once cooked down, I blended it with the immersion blender and then and poured it into sterilized jars.
Step 5 - Hot water bath all the jars for 15 minutes......and you're done!
And finally, a sunset picture. Not your typical one though - in this case, the sunset was reflecting on the clouds to the east...creating a beautiful backdrop of pinks and purples. (I liked this much better the the orange and yellow that the sun was displaying to the west.)
