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gz

What have you preserved/bottled/dried so far?

I've dried strawberries so far, not enough pears to do and waiting on the apples for drying and juice.
Just pickled shallots and beetroot.
Beetroot chutney and green tomato chutney made as neighbour's tomatoes were not going to ripen further.
Shared their plum harvest for jam, not enough for bottling/canning as well.
Made blackberry cordial, but our usual patches of blackberries and elderberries have had thin harvests, so no jelly or jam yet.
Keeping an eye on the local hazels...at least one crop that is looking good. Am I right in thinking that they are wind pollenated?

How is everyone's larder looking?

Is climate change and lack of pollenators affecting you?
Shan

Not been around much so I’ve only dried some chillis and tomatoes. I’ve roasted , skinned and frozen peppers.
tahir

Dunno, maybe 150 kgs jam? 10 ltrs elderflower cordial, 20 kgs chilli sauce?

Will be doing more chilli sauce yet, and mince.
tahir

Re climate change, huge impact on everything; plums ripened in a much shorter window. Apples ripened weeks earlier, this affects flavour the key thing that creates flavour in English apples is a differential in daytime and night time temperatures this year last week was the first time we've had that
Slim

People around here have seen more pollinators than in years!
No clue why now
dpack

7 kg of blackberries made into bramble jelly

i am watching for ceps
yummersetter

I have an esteemed plum tree that I should be finishing picking in right now, or at least when the rain stops. It's called Anna Spath and the fruit has a really rich flavour, think prune brandy. In fact they do make delicious prunes and that's what will happen to a lot of them, but this year I've blanched about 50 plums in boiling water, skinned, halved and stoned them and dried them overnight for twelve hours.

They are now tacky on the outside, soft like Fruit Jellies in the middle, and really delicious. I expect they'll go mouldy as they are, so I'll bag them up into packs of about twenty halves and freeze them. Good supplies for long car journeys.
tahir

Good for prunes? I haven't got a single variety that's any good for them, surprising how acid they become. I'll have to hunt it out
Nicky cigreen

the apples and blackberries are noticeably earlier every year.

I've made apple chutney, loganberry jam, I have apples stored in the shed - the squash will be joining them soon.

I mostly freeze to preserve though: raspberries, blackberries, apples, plums, blueberries, pears, courgettes, runner beans, french beans, butter beans, gigantes, haricot beans, baby sweetcorn, tomatoes...oh god all the tomatoes... and the cucumber mountain is steadily being processed into pea and cuke soup - into the freezer.
I guess freezing is less eco than bottling or drying.. though im not sure I would have a lot of use for masses of dried stuff.. and bottling things scares me a tad...
Shan

I semi-dehydrate tomatoes and freeze them. Takes up less space and can be soaked in hot water. Wink
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