Produce question

[zachsmomie]

Not sure if this is the right place but since it is kinda budget related (and definitely Disney's fault as this increased gardening enthusiasm occurred after his Behind the Seeds tour), I am hoping you can help.

My husband has always grown tomatoes and cucumbers in the backyard. He's big into square foot gardening. Well, this year he went all out and we have lots and lots of stuff. Peppers, cucumber, tomatoes, green beans and even some corn later(if it keeps going like it is)

Here's my budget question...I know that I can clean and freeze the peppers but what the heck do I do with all those tomatoes? And how do I cook fresh green beans? Is there anything I cna do with them? I have always used canned greeen beans.

I'm a city girl now married to a quasi-farmer. Help!

 

[stitchlilo]

Tomatoes - I prefer canned. You can freeze them just but remove the core first. Put them in a bag and that is it. When you take them out run hot water over them and the skin will peel off. Then put them into a pan and make sauce. You cannot eat them but only cook with them.

Green beans - snap the tip and the stem off. Then snap into the size piece you want to eat. You can microwave them for a few minutes. I like mine still crisp. You can add them to any recipe you want to right from the garden.

 

[tileman]

Our garden is about 75' x 75'

We had a ton of cucumbers and put up about 20 quarts of homemade pickles
with our beans we just picked then cleaned them then Blanched for maybe 5 min or so then cool then freeze.

The tomatoes my wife made about 12 to 18 quarts of diff tomato sauces.

This year we have been trying the Verti-Gro like they have at Epcot and they work great I can post some pics if you want but heres a link to there site
http://vertigro.com/

Heres a few pics of our garden.

Ron.

 

[zachsmomie]

My husband has a hydroponic system that we got after that fateful tour. He has two square foot gardening beds and now two small rows of corn. Last year we have cucumbers - love those-never any left. We had tomoatoes bt some went bad and no corn or beans. I know how to cook/freeze corn but the beans scare me.

I have no idea how to cook green beans. NONE. (My grandma would be rolling over in her grave after all the afternoons I spent "shucking" beans with her - but I never got past the snipping the ends, pulling the string and breaking the bean into little parts. I always went off the play when it was time to cook them.)

I also have NEVER made homemade tomato sauce so I have no idea what I am doing. I know this garden will save us money but not if it goes to waste.

Thank you for your tips so far.

 

[marcyinPA]

I don't know much to do with fresh tomatoes except eat them fresh. I make fresh uncooked tomato sauce in the summer. I just chop up Roma tomatoes from my garden, fresh basil, sometimes some red onion, and toss with cooked pasta, Italian dressing, and cheese. YUM!

As for green beans....my Italian grandmother always cooked fresh green beans in tomato sauce, with Italian seasoning and garlic. Cook them until they are soft. SOOOOO yummy!!!!

ETA: I also make a fresh green bean salad. Cook the beans crisp tender (I usually cut them in thirds first). Toss with thinly sliced red onion, and a dressing made of 1/3 cup olive oil, 1/3 cup cider vinegar, 3 TBS sugar, and 3/4 tsp. salt. Refrigerate 2-5 hours. YUMMY!!!

 

[ceecee]

Can the tomatoes, they are good just diced or you can make them into sauce and then can that. You can also can green beans, but we always froze them. I did freeze some tomato sauce because canning is very involved!
Tileman...your garden is awesome! We have been on that tour countless times and my DH has never been inspired!

 

[tileman]

Tileman...your garden is awesome! We have been on that tour countless times and my DH has never been inspired!


Thank you very much but half the work my wife has helped me with. All the way from putting up the 12' poles for the hot fence to keep the deer out to building the boxs for our raised beds.

Ron.

 

[castmemberb4]

I have some suggestion for things you can do now to use your produce while it's fresh.
For the green bean cut or snap the ends off and steam them until they are just starting to get tender, then toss them in a skillet with a little bit of olive oil and garlic, saute until they are the doneness you like then just before you take them off the heat put in some walnuts and parmesean cheese. Yummy!

For the tomatoes and peppers, we love fresh pico de gillo (don't know that I spelled that right) Just dice up the tomatoes taking out the seeds, add in diced onion, peppers, cilantro and salt as needed. We like jalapeno peppers but you can use what ever you have/prefer. For a more salsa like consistence you can cook the tomatoes a little.

Here's one I had in Spain and have been eating ever since, cut tomatoes in bite size pieces, I use one red and one yellow but use what ever you have, take out the seeds, and one peach cut into bite size pieces, add thinly sliced onion, pinenuts, drizzle with olive oil and top with fresh basil. It's my summer staple.

HTH
Lynn

 

[katie26]

Green beans are delicious stir-fried (in a wok, if you have one) with garlic and red chili flakes or garlic and oyster sauce. To prepare: snap (or cut) the ends off, snap them in half to make them a bit smaller, blanch by dunking them in boiling water for a minute or two (just enough to soften them up a bit - don't let them get dark green and mushy!) and then dry them off and stir-fry. Yum!

You can also skip the stir-frying part and just blanch them, then dunk them into ice water to stop the cooking and put them in salad, or skip the ice water, add butter and salt and voila!

And here's instructions for turning tons of summer tomatoes into tomato sauce, which you can freeze and use during the winter.

Good luck!

 

[flagdaytwins]

I once food-milled tomatoes and simply froze them in ziplocs for future sauce use. Too much work, IMO (my hands itched for days), even though I consider myself a foodie.

If I lived near you I'd be happy to pay a premium for homegrown tomatoes! (hint hint?!).

 

[madge]

the only way I know to cook them involves ham hocks and lard. Not a very healthy option