Mama's salsa

The last few days have been kitchen days.  I've been canning like crazy!

A week ago today we drove to Moscow ID to look at a used combine and on our way through Pullman we noticed a sign that said, WSU Horticulture Club fruit sale.  We pulled in and found they had beautiful apples and pears.  We didn't need apples, thanks to Larry, but I was very happy to find some lovely Barlett pears.  We loaded up a couple boxes and were on our way.

Wednesday I canned the pears and ended up with 26 quarts.  Pears are Reynald's favorite so he will be happy all winter.

26 quarts of pears for winter eating.

I save the peelings from the pears and cooked them down and am now in the process of making pear butter.  This is another family favorite!

The fixin's for pear butter.  Pear peelings that have been cooked down and an old sieve that was my grandma Eleanora's.

Put a cup of the peels in this sieve when they are still warm.

Roll the wooden mallet around to squish the pear pulp from the skins.

Not much left but the thin pear skins.

You can see that this still has a fair amount of liquid so I'll slowly cook this down until some of that evaporates.   It is so sweet, just from the fruit, that I won't even add any sugar. 

And, today was salsa day!  I didn't make any last year, and we were almost out, so I turned most of the box of tomatoes that I picked from the garden a few days ago, into salsa.  Also used onions, garlic, and hot and sweet peppers from the garden.  It took the better part of today to chop, and chop, and chop some more!

Salsa ingredients from the garden.  Sweet peppers in the basket, hot peppers in the box behind,  a head of garlic, tomatoes, and onions.   I learned the hard way to use latex gloves when chopping the hot peppers! 

Salsa slowing bubbling on the stove.

Now both the pear butter and the salsa are cooking down on the stove top.  It smells so good in the house tonight.

Last night there was a beautiful sunset.  And the wheat around the house is growing like mad and so pretty.  It's good to live in the country!

Winter wheat growing south of the house.  It's happy and so are we!

October 8, 2015 sunset........here's hoping one year from this day, the sunset will be equally as  beautiful, the day that the kids get married!