It’s time once again for Harvest Monday, where we celebrate all things harvest related. Harvests here are slowing down, and the lack of rain is partly to blame. I’ve been watering the sweet potatoes and the fall greens, but everything else is on its own at this point late in the season. Despite dry conditions, I got a good haul of the Turkey Craw pole beans last week, right at three pounds of them.
Mid September harvest
Turkey Craw beans are triple purpose beans, useful as snap beans, fresh shell beans and as dried beans. Many of these I picked were at the shelling stage, since I had purposely left them on to mature for that purpose. I froze quite a few of these for later use. They make a tasty and nutritional addition to winter soups, or for cooking on their own as a side dish for that matter.
Turkey Craw beans
dried Turkey Craw beans
Despite the dry conditions, the tomatoes aren’t completely done for yet, and last week I got a nice selection of paste types and slicers plus a few of the small fruited ones. I also continue to get modest amounts of hot peppers, enough to make another couple of batches of hot sauce and to pickle a few.
September tomatoes
I got a few more of the Aji Rico peppers last week. This F1 hybrid variety is a 2017 AAS Winner and has quickly become one of my favorite peppers. I will use them for a mixed Aji hot sauce that will include Sugar Rush Peach and some Rainforest peppers that were a freebie gift from one of my seed company orders. I’ve also pickled some of the Aji Rico peppers from earlier harvests, along with the shy-producing Peppadew variety.
Aji Rico peppers
I’ve been making hot sauces as the peppers are available. I make most all of my sauces with ripe peppers, so I have to accumulate enough peppers to make a batch. I also ferment most of the peppers first, which I think adds a lot of flavor plus it helps the sauces keep for a longer period of time. Last week I experimented with a pineapple hot sauce, using mostly fresh Sugar Rush Peach peppers plus a small red jalapeno pepper. I bought a pineapple hot sauce at a farmers market on Maui earlier this year, and I am basing my recipe on their ingredients, which used habanero peppers and onion along with the pineapple. Theirs was a bit hot for my tastes, but I will need to do more experimenting to get the taste and consistency just right for my own version. I also made a chunky chili garlic sauce last week, using my No-Rooster Chili Garlic Sauce recipe.
hot sauces
Harvest Monday is a day to show off your harvests, how you are saving your harvest, or how you are using your harvest. If you have a harvest you want to share, add your name and blog link to Mr Linky below. And please check out what everyone is harvesting!
My summer is nearly over Dave, when do you start your transition to cool weather crops?
I’ve already got the crops planted in the main vegetable garden, and the greenhouse crops will go in next month. We don’t usually get a frost here until mid-October.
IFir some reason it wouldn’t accept my comment until I logged in using Facebook – has something changed?
Our tomatoes are still coming too, No lack of rain here.
I’m not sure what has changed Sue, since I haven’t changed anything on my end. It’s been three weeks since we had a good rain here, and no rain is in the forecast for the coming week.
That’s a good idea, shelling the beans and freezing. Don’t know why I didn’t think of it! I can see that at the mature but still soft stage they would be useful in recipes. I’m sure that even though you substituted Habaneros with Sugar Rush Peach peppers for your pineapple sauce, it would still be plenty spicy! I wonder if you could use an all-natural pineapple juice instead of pineapples themselves. Please give us the recipe when you’ve hit on a version you like.
It is surely spicy Will with the Sugar Rush Peach peppers! The pineapple juice is a good idea. I used a fresh pineapple, but it was lacking in flavor and then I had to strain out the pulp since it was quite thick. I’m sure the folks in Maui had access to a tasty Maui Gold pineapple that made a big difference.