From My Garden


My garden is causing me a bit of stress lately.  I'm afraid the heat has been too much for my tomato plants and they are refusing to bear fruit.  One plant doesn't even have blossoms.  However, they are so tall that they have slumped over their cages and 3 of my 6 plants have snapped off major branches.  My cucumber plants is still laden with blossoms, but squirrels have been eating every teeny tiny cucumber they can find.  Bummer.  My zucchini plant is getting even huger and has 3 or 4 little zucchini growing, but my pepper plants (all 5 of them) do not have a single pepper growing on them them.  I may be over-fertilizing them, so from now on, they are getting  no extra TLC from me.  

Luckily, our church opened up some land for a community garden this year and I decided to plant some things just in case my backyard garden was a flop.  Thank goodness!  So far my tomato plants are loving the sun out there and I have 2 acorn squash plants that are full of tiny baby squash.  I planted 2 pickling cucumbers and although they went through a bit of transplant shock, one of them had 2 huge pickle-sized cukes waiting for me this morning after church.  I sliced them up and tried a new recipe for refrigerator pickles.




Refrigerator Pickles

2 cups sliced cucumbers
1/2 tsp salt
1/3 cup apple cider vinegar
1/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup chopped red onion
1/4 cup chopped green pepper

Sprinkle salt over sliced cucumbers and let them set for 1 hour.  In a small saucepan, boil the vinegar and sugar together and cool.  After cucumber have set for 1 hour, mix the remaining ingredients and place in an airtight container.  Refrigerate overnight.





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