Well here we are in the middle of autumn and still no rain for the south-west of Western Australia! To say the least it is quite dismal and on the verge of desperation. The mornings have been heavy with dew and thick fog, and as the fog lifts the skies hold promise of rain – but alas only a teaser, by mid-morning we have beautiful southern blue skies.
The garden along with the herb-patch, we have had no choice but to let go and as far as the veggie-patch is concerned, oh well… alas, the bulk of winter produce needs to be in now or very soon, but with no rain and non in the foreseeable few weeks... Just as well we have a wonderful fruit and veggie shop “Newy’s Veggie Patch” not far away, where the girls work on the week-ends and during the holidays that grow their own fruit and vegetables (spray free) for us to enjoy – and to be honest, far better than our humble offerings, but it is the fun of having your own veggie patch – successful or unsuccessful.
On that note, the girls came home with two crates of capsicums that were left over. Unfortunately, I do not have a great success rate with pickling capsicums they always seems to ferment on me! After much hinting and begging from Victoria I made some pickled capsicums and ensured that I got every bit of the skin off, believing may be that was the cause of my previous failures. We had capsicums under the griller, in the oven, on the cooktop flames blackening those skins. What took all day to utilise just over 1/2 a crate of capsicums and to blacken, peel, de-seed, and cut, ended up only making one large jar! What a lot of work for one jar!! Hence, time to seriously look for some different capsicum recipes.
I found a number of capsicum chutney, pickle recipes, all I must say needed those blessed skins removed. After two days of blackening, skinning etc. the very last recipe I tried which was the easiest, ended up being the most delicious! Oh typical!! So for all you pickles and jammers out there I have listed it here for you and hopefully save you all some time.
Unfortunately I cannot remember which site I got it off now, either Taste.com.au or BestRecicpes.com. All I can tell you is the chef is Sally Wise and thank you Sally!
Roasted Capsicum Relish
2 large red capsicums
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 onion, chopped finely
12 teaspoons grated green ginger
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup vinegar: white wine or balsamic is best
Remove the seeds and core from the capsicums. Place under a hot grill until the skin blackens. Then remove, wrap individually in cling wrap and leave for several minutes to ‘sweat’. (I did not wrap them individually but put them all in an oven bag – though plastic bag will do and let them sweat and cool down a little – it worked perfectly well). Peel the skin off the capsicum and chop the flesh.
Add them to a pot with all the other ingredients. Bring to the boil and cook for 30 minutes, or until a chutney-like consistency is reached.
Pour into sterilised bottles and seal.
Well, smells like my hot-cross buns are ready in the oven mmmm…. the last batch look a little – shall we say – toasted and I had better not destroy this batch. So to all of you, have a safe and blessed Easter (what’s left of it).
Until next time
Country Blessings x
2 comments:
My vegie garden was a disaster this year too even though it had lots of care. Nothing grew very well.
My son did manage to make a few jars of tomato chutney and I have cut up and frozen a heap of sweet capsicums to use over winter. Maybe your capsicums fermented because they had sugar in the recipe? That's what happened to my beetroot last year. This year I cooked and sliced them then put them in jars with vinegar only and stored them in the fridge. Did the trick. Have a lovely Easter. xx
Thanks Jackie, so lovely to hear from you. Tomato chutney, one of my favourites! Will keep the sugar in mind - wonder if it affects the acidity? We had a wonderful Easter and hope you enjoyed yours. Until next time... xxx
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