Green Tomato Chutney

I cleaned out my greenhouse on Sunday - 9/28/2021. The garden season in Wasilla, Alaska was shorter and cooler than normal this year with an early frost, so yield was low for everybody. I hate to waste any produce, even if it is not fully ripe. So I stayed up all Sunday night making green tomato chutney.

I got about 30-40 lbs of green tomatoes...

...and about 15 lbs of ripe red ones too.

I washed and sliced lots of tomatoes then chopped in my food processor, along with green apples and onions... this process took me several hours!

Minced green tomatoes ready for chutney...

I don't think I have ever made such a large batch before. I had to use my 5 Gallon canning kettle to mix and cook down all of the ingredients. This took me 2-3 hours stirring and watching so that it did not burn. After cooking down I was finally able to transfer the chutney into two smaller pots and free up my canner for processing jars.

I had to fill jars, and process in batches and I lost count - but I almost ran out of jar lids. I guess you can never have too many canning jar lids - Ha!

With over 30 lbs of tomatoes I had to scale up my recipe and to be honest I simply added spices and sugar-free Swerve sweetener by taste. I think it turned out very good. I used white vinegar because that's what I had and Swerve brown sugar replacement. It cooked down very well.

Green Tomato Chutney
This is a sweet-spicy Indian style chutney. 

Chopping ingredients in the food processor makes prep time go faster. Adjust sweetener and hot spice to your taste. Yield: 4 cups

Ingredients

2 cups chopped green tomato

1 cup chopped Granny Smith apple

1/2 cup Swerve sugar-free sweetener - to taste

1/2 cup raisins

1/2 cup chopped onion

1/4 cup cider vinegar

2 teaspoons grated lemon rind

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

1 tablespoon minced peeled fresh ginger

1 teaspoon Tamarind paste

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon cayenne pepper flakes - more or less

1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom

1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon ground allspice

2 garlic cloves, minced

Preparation

Combine all ingredients in a large saucepan; bring to a boil. Reduce heat, and simmer, uncovered, 45 minutes or until thick, stirring frequently. Fill sterile canning jars and seal. 

Process in water-bath canner for 20 minutes.

Sugar Free Berry Jam

 It is 2021 harvest season in Wasilla Alaska and I needed to make room in my freezer so I made jam from some of the frozen berries I have stored.

5 lbs frozen berries
2 C water
1 C Pyure Organic Stevia sweetener
2 T Ascorbic Acid - vitiman C
5 T Ball brand No Sugar pectin

Mash thawed berries in a stainless steal pot. Add water, stevia, ascorbic acid and bring to a boil. Add Pectin and return to a boil for 1-2 minutes. Pack in jars - seal and process 15 minutes in water bath canner.

Five lbs of berries made 8 pints of jam. I made 2 batches - Raspberry and Gooseberry.

Home Weather Station

My Vantage Pro2 Wireless Weather Station

I have always been interested in Home Weather stations. So during the winter of 2008 I found a good deal at Costco and got one. The weather widget at the top of this blog is displaying my home weather station data. Mobile device users Click Here. I was using a Honeywell model TE831W-2 home weather station. It had 2 remote temperature sensors, barometer, wind gauge, and rain gauge. I was able to monitor the temperature in my greenhouse over the internet while I was at my night shift job. That station worked for a few years and then died and Honeywell quit making them or updating the software.

Old Honeywell Weather Station

This involved connecting the base unit to a computer and required having the computer running all the time uploading my data to the WEB that let me monitor and share my data online. This Software only worked on Windows XP so it is no longer safe to use and there are no updates. The base unit continued to operate and it was interesting to keep an eye on our local weather conditions but I was not able to save data on a computer or share data online. I did gather some good micro-climate data from my property. Time for a new weather station...

Vantage Pro Weather Station

I looked at several weather software options and settled on Davis Instruments and their Vantage Pro 2 weather station.

Davis Weather Wireless Base Station

This came with a wireless base station that connected to my router and allowed me to monitor my station online with my phone or any web browser without running a separate computer. You can find this Davis Weather Station Here on Amazon.

I also purchased an extra temperature transmitter to put inside my Greenhouse. It is extremely important to monitor and compare the outside temperature with the temperature inside a greenhouse. Any unheated greenhouse will lose heat as soon as the sun goes down, so I can monitor my high and low temperatures 24 hours each day. Plotting on a graph allows me to record my low temperature and frost dates and with many warm sunny days in May at my zone 4a Alaska garden it can be very tempting to move plants out into the garden too early. On clear sunny days it may only be 70 degrees F outside but it can be over 100 F in my greenhouse and by keeping track I will know when to open the door or even add an extra fan if necessary.

3 Day temperature Chart

The above chart shows a 3 day record red = outdoor and green = greenhouse temperature. On May 19th the overnight low was 32 F and probably would have damaged sensitive seedlings if they were planted outdoors. I use a small electric space heater in my greenhouse that will add about 10 degrees F and protect my young plants.
 

I can also look at any past weather data and compare my local micro-climate data with other home weather stations in my area. This can be very helpful to any serious gardener. It so happens that my home micro-climate can be 5-10 degrees F cooler than other stations just a few miles away. A good home weather station is not cheap - but I think it is a very important investment for any serious gardener and is really worth the cost.

BOOK ALERT: Folklore Garden Remedies - What Really Works?

Do you use Epsom Salt on your tomatoes? Do you know why? Are you sure it really works? 

Many garden practices are based in folklore and some remedies simply don't work. I highly recommend that any serious gardener learn the science behind garden folk remedies. Some may work as indicated, some may not do anything, and some may actually cause harm. I suggest a very good book on this very subject : The Truth About Garden Remedies by Jeff Gillman. With graduate degrees in entomology and horticulture, Gillman brings scientific rigor to the topic of commercial, homemade and 'traditional' garden remedies.

The Truthn About Garden Remedies by Jeff Gillman

Reviews 

"Gillman teaches gardeners to think about what they do, know why they're doing it, and observe the results, trusting their knowledge and experience over claims made by companies, 'experts' or garden folklorists." —Publishers Weekly

"The results are fascinating and occasionally disappointing. . . . The Truth About Garden Remedies is a book many of us will want to consult frequently." —The American Gardener 

"Whenever I hear someone offer a solution to a garden problem, I immediately check The Truth About Garden Remedies to see if it will work." —Horticulture

"While entertainingly relating his experiments and his research, Gillman also packs in a wealth of useful information." —The Chicago Tribune

"Although Gillman writes that gardening gurus are necessary to dole out knowledge of plants and the traditions that surround growing them, he also winces at all the superstition and half-truths flying around, hence, this terrific book." - Biology Digest 20060501

Greenhouse String Trellis

Three weeks after transplanting and looking good. These hanging string trellis reels with tomato clips are the easiest way to support my greenhouse plants. Most plants are blooming and I found a few tiny green tomatoes so setting fruit has begun!

TomatoCam 06/25/2021

Setting fruit today!

String Trellis Reel

You can find String Trellis Reels here on Amazon...

Tomato Clip

You can find Tomato Clips here on Amazon...

Moose cage for my currants.

It was a beautiful 2020 Autumn Saturday in Wasilla, Alaska. Sunny and in the 50's so I finished a garden project that I have been planning for a long time and built a moose cage to protect my Black currants. In the past they have been eaten back to the stumps by moose and I had to re-plant a few that were too far gone.

I built a wood frame covered with fence wire to protect my Black currants.

 

Just in time as Momma moose and her 2 calves visited my garden as soon as I was done...

I only hit my thumb once - Ha!

 

On a morning-coffee garden walk on a gorgeous sunny 2021 Summer day in Wasilla Alaska. The moose fence around my Black currents did it's job. No moose damage last winter and the bushes look very healthy.

Paper Sacks for the garden.

I am glad that Wasilla banned plastic grocery bags... but what do you do with all of the paper sacks that you saved? I put them down in my garden and cover with mulch for weed control.

This was my Gooseberry bed early this Spring and it was in pretty poor shape.

After weeding the bed I put down a layer of folded paper sacks and I wet them down to help lay flat.

Then I covered them with 6" of shredded leaves and wet this down again to help settle.

I have used cardboard in the past under my shredded leaf mulch and that works well too. They both seem to break down in 1 - 2 years.