Preserving the summer lusciousness

by Colleen

Sometimes there are gluts of goodies from the vegie patch, and sometimes I just want to keep something to use later. Going way back to my early days of growing my own food, orchards etc. I've made marmalades and other jams. When I was younger I'd simply preserve using the deep freeze but in my single, more simplified lifestyle now, I don't have a deep freeze other than the top of the frig.

Over the past year I've made lots of different preserves, including the yummy zucchini chutney, beetroot relish, lime marmalade, cape gooseberry syrup, green tomato relish, ripe tomato relish. I've done so many preserves I can't remember them all!

Check out the jars above, from left: picked cumquats, mulberry preserve, lime and ginger marmalade and cape gooseberry sauce.

Last week I harvested the rosellas that grew over summer. Rosellas are a variety of hibiscus, best grown in warmer climates, but reasonably successful in my temperate zone garden. They produce large flowers with a crimson enlarged calyx. I used the fleshy red calyx, without the green seed pod to make my jammy syrup. After stripping the calyxes from the seed pods there wasn't a huge quantity of fruit to work with and I've finished up with about 750mls of the syrup. The colour is fantastic, bright red and the taste is a bit cranberry-ish. This is a keeper and I'll make sure I plant out more seeds next year for more fruit. I'm keeping the syrup to use for sauces with meat etc. And there's also the possibility of a rosella cosmopolitan cocktail for a special occasion.The recipe below is an experiment. If you were to use rosellas for jam, it's best to tie the seed pods into a muslin bag and cook along with the fruit to extract the pectin.

Rosella syrup:

200g rosella calyxes

200g white sugar

a little water

Poach the rosellas until tender, which surprisingly, doesn't take long, then gradually add the sugar, stirring until dissolved and cook gently until thickened. Bottle in sterilised jars while still hot.

Another garden experiment this year were the purple heirloom tomatillos. I'm guilty, I'm afraid, of not looking after these bushes as well as I could have and as a result lost a lot of the fruit. I'm sorry now I didn't pay more attention and harvested the fruit to be used ongoing, for instance like tomatoes.

What attracts me to these little darlings are the papery husks they grow in, similar to but larger than the beautiful husks of the cape gooseberry.

Roasted tomatillo and capsicum salsa

A few tomatillos roasted under the griller until brown

Two large capsicums (peppers) - one red and one green, charred under the griller. Place in plastic bag and when cooler, rub off the skins.

Zest of one lime

Finely chopped red onion

About a cup of chopped coriander

Salt and pepper

Blitz the tomatillos, capsicums, lime zest and coriander in a kitchen whiz, then add to a bowl with the chopped onion, salt and pepper to taste.

This salsa is delicious with steak or other grilled meats, and I also used it as a pasta sauce one night.

That's about the end of the summer crops, with autumn really kicking in now with its chilly mornings, crisp sunny days (sadly no rain) and cool evenings. I sowed garlic and shallots yesterday, along with some onion seedlings. Later today I'll plant out some broccoli and spinach seedings and sow broad bean, sugar snap pea and japanese turnip seeds.