Welcome to the Harvest Forum. It's a little slow right now, but wait until produce starts coming in!! I can answer some of your questions and I'm sure others will be along with more ideas. 1. I cut the kernels off corn cobs with my electric knife (after blanching). Stand the ear on the stem end in a bundt or angel food cake pan and slice away. The kernels fall right into the pan. 2. Haven't grown bushel cukes. 3. Don't do French Onion Soup. 4. You can freeze the peppers after roasting and peeling for use all winter. I don't usually do bell peppers, but I do roast, peel and freeze Anaheims to use in recipes calling for mild green chilis. 5. I eat the garlic in my dill pickles too! I have pickled garlic alone and for us, it's mostly a snack or a way to preserve some of our garlic for later use in cooked dishes (you don't really taste the vinegar). 6. Let's see...I can my peaches (peeled and sliced or halved). They can be used however I want later. I have canned apple slices (peeled, cored and sliced), but they get rather soft. I have dehydrated apple slices and have frozen them raw (quick dip in Fruit Fresh to help prevent browning). We don't eat much pie, so I prefer to just preserve the plain fruit and decide later how I want to use it. 7. Not sure what kind of marinade you're wanting to use to marinate your tomatoes so this is hard to answer. You can sprinkle on herbs, salt, pepper, lemon juice, vinegar prior to drying. Other: Do you have a copy of the Ball Blue Book (often referred to as BBB)? Great source of info and recipes. Small Batch Preserving is another good one. Here's link to the National Center for Home Food Preservation. The information here is reliable and up to date as far as safety. Hope to see more of you around here!!! Deanna (Pacific Northwest) Here is a link that might be useful: NCHFP

Pickyourown.org has some reliable information and some unreliable information. I think that's riskier than a site that's obviously unsafe, as a novice doesn't have the experience to separate out the good stuff from the bad. Since their best information comes from the NCHFP, you may as well go directly to the source and skip Pickyourown.org. The NCHFP is the official repository for USDA information and has a ton of information. In fact, you can read the USDA canning manual on their site, or download it to your computer. The NCHFP also offers a free online food preservation course. I think you would find it very helpful. The other sites I never heard of, but I will tell you that surviving something (like canning butter and then consuming it with no ill effects) doesn't mean it's risk-free. It just means you got lucky so far. Next time maybe not. I can't stress enough that you are taking big risks if you trust what you see online (including YouTube) without specific evidence of reliability and safety. I have never heard of the USDA testing something for free. Resources are very limited and Extension agencies are scrambling for money. I can't imagine they'd have the resources to test every jar that came in. But there is merit in checking your state's or region's Extension agency to see what services they do provide. Carol Here is a link that might be useful: Clickable Map of Extension Services

Newer version of Annie's Salsa - BWB only Annie's Salsa 8 cups tomatoes, peeled, chopped and drained 2 1/2 cups chopped onion 1 1/2 cups chopped green pepper 3 to 5 chopped jalapenos (for milder leave out seeds and ribs) 6 cloves minced garlic 2 tsp cumin (optional) 2 tsp pepper 1/8 cup canning salt 1/4 c fresh cilantro (optional) 1/3 c sugar (optional) 1 cup cider vinegar (see note on subbing lemon or lime juice option) 16 oz canned tomato sauce (to adjust density) 8-16 oz canned tomato paste (to adjust density) Mix all ingredients, bring to a boil, boil 10 minutes. Pour into hot jars, process pints for 15 minutes in BWB. Makes 6 pints. _________ A lot of changes have been made to this recipe over the years. Some people like lemon or lime juice in place of some or all of the vinegar, that's fine. (Note from Sheila - I like half lemon half lime.) Some people leave out the cilantro, that's fine too. Do not increase! Some people add more hot peppers or fewer onions, fine as long as you keep the same total measurements. (Note this is what NCHFP does in their new Choice Salsa recipe.) Some people leave out the sugar, that's fine. You can scoop out the goo in the middle of the tomatoes with your thumbs when I'm peeling and chopping for a less seedy version, so it's 8 cups of chopped tomatoes without the seeds and goo. Most who make it regularly as well as Annie recommend using a variety of different slicing tomatoes, not paste types, for best flavor and consistency. (Note: use the tomato sauce and paste to adjust the consistency of the final product to a "sloshy" consistency.) According to Annie "My salsa is not as thick as Heinz catsup but it's thicker than taco sauce. If you don't like it quite as thick or sweet, cut down the amount of paste. I would add some, then taste. Reducing that ingredient shouldn't affect the safety of the recipe. I use equal amounts of sauce and paste. You can pull it off the heat at any point and adjust for flavor. Before I cook it I check for salt, sugar, check the consistency. Add more pepper or cumin if I want. When I first started making this salsa, tomato sauce and paste came in 8 and 16 ounce cans. Like everything else, they've now been downsized, so now I have to use partial cans." Does anybody have good versions of the other recipes that have weird symbols in them for measurements?

I have actually told vendors at the fair that "This isn't canned properly. You shouldn't be selling this to the public when canned this way because...." I don't care if they get upset. They are the ones who went public with their wares. They are the ones who should have made the effort to learn. They are the ones putting the public at risk. If they ask for more info I give it to them and do it nicely. If they get huffy and indignant maybe they will think about it and investigate more later. Meanwhile at least the other people around have heard me. Then I contact the local extension office rep there since it is their responsibility to make sure this doesn't happen in the first place. That's the bad red devil that sits on one of my shoulders. He figures we should just pick up the jars and then make sure the owner and everyone else there sees you open and dump them in the trash as you explain why. What can I say, he's old and evil. But the angel sitting on the other shoulder (yes, I do have one despite what others may think) always reminds me that there are a lot of folks that don't know enough to even consider the possibility that they don't know enough. You aren't old and evil like me :-) so do what Carol suggested, contact the county extension office (if this was a county fair) or the state extension office and provide them with the necessary info. It is their responsibility and who knows, maybe it will at least make someone down the line think twice. Dave