Hatch Chilis and Other Stuff

I'd apologize for not blogging more this past week (month) but why?  I'm not the only one busy with the garden and food preservation this time of year.  Add the regular chores to that and somehow the entire day... err... week is gone before you know it. This was one picking some day this past week.  The purple hull peas are doing well and I've been getting quite a few peas.  I finally got a whole quart of green beans. Their production this year has been minimal and pretty much just taking up garden space. I'll be pulling out the pole beans in the next couple of days and replant with some Green Peas for the fall.  Maybe I'll have better luck with them.

I'm happy to report that the tomatoes are slowing down now.  They are far from done but I've gone from picking two 5 gallon buckets a day to a little less than one.  If nothing else these plants did extremely well and look like they'll be producing on into the fall months.  I picked these Better Boy tomatoes up from a local nursery and I'll try saving some seed and seeing how they do next year.  Except... I don't think I'll plant nearly as many next year.  lol  These tomatoes have just about kicked my butt this time around.  I've put up whole tomatoes, chopped, quartered, and crushed, Italian and Rotel tomatoes, Salsa (Of course!), tomatoes and onions, and spaghetti sauce.  I've dried load after load of tomatoes as well.  I doubt very seriously if we will run out of them before next year.  Shoot maybe the year after that! 

Sandy and her husband stopped by this past weekend for a quick visit while on their way to T Town.  Such a sweet and thoughtful couple.  I really enjoyed our visit and hope to see them again soon. They brought us some mesquite wood for the smoker!  I've not had mesquite smoked "anything" in what?  Three years now?  That's a down right disgrace for a Texan to have to say. The first thing I did was to pull a chicken out of the freezer for Mesquite Smoked Chicken.  Yumm Yummm. 
Sandy also brought some beautiful Hatch chili's and a whole BIG BAG of dried Hatch Chili powder!  Super awesome! 

 

I ended up roasting all of the peppers and put back some "prime specimen" for Chili Rellanos.  Both were a first for me.   You know, I've processed bunches of different types of peppers and never had any of them burn my hands before. 

 I'm here to tell ya I'm surprised they didn't blister they were burning so bad after getting done removing the skin from those peppers!  Of course, me being the brightest crayon in the box, I handled them again when I made the Chili Rellanos.  LOL No surprise when they started burning again.  All in all though it was worth it!  My neighbor taught me how to make them but this was my first "solo" run for Chili Rellanos. They came out super yummy. (Sorry forgot to get a picture).  

I've never put up Hatch Chili's before so I hit the interwebs looking to see what I should do.  It seems it's best to freeze them from what I've read.  Some of you probably know how I feel about freezing stuff.  I try very hard not to freeze much of anything.  But these yummy peppers deserve special treatment!  I wasn't sure exactly how I was going to package them up though.  Then I had one of those "moments".  Why not put them into an ice cube tray and flash freeze them! 
So I blistered the peppers in the little oven I have for my outdoor kitchen.

 Skinned and chopped them up.

Portioned them into ice cube trays and stuck them in the freezer for a couple of hours.

 

Then packaged them in a ziplock baggie.  I think its an awesome idea!  Now when I want to add Chili's to a dish I can just take out one or two cubes and they are ready to go.

 Well folks I'm off to the garden again.  Those tomatoes don't pick themselves ya know!!