Garden Updates and Zucchini Sausage Soup

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My kids and I did the 3rd picking of green beans on Friday evening. First thing Saturday morning I got up and canned them. It was the smallest of our green bean harvest..


But it did yield 6 quarts and 1 pint of green beans. That is the end of the green beans. There may be enough left now for a meal or two but that is it. In total I ended up with 26 quarts and 1 pint canned green beans and 12 quarts and 24 pints of 3 bean salad canned. Not bad for my single row of plants!

I love this time of year in the garden not only for the food it produces but my flowers are starting to bloom. I love planting flowers in the garden. Not only do they bring some beautiful butterflies and bees to the garden but they make the garden so pretty. Here are a few pics of some of flowers starting to bloom..








With the warmer weather finally kicking in my garden has started to produce a lot of summer squash. I have two types of yellow squash planted and two zucchini plants. Amazing how fast they produce! So now the challenge is how to use them up. For many years I have used some by grating them and freezing them for making zucchini bread in the winter. The problem I have with this is that I rarely pull it out to use it. It seems each season has its own types of fruits and veggies to use and the zucchini lay forgotten in the freezer. So it got me thinking of a way that I would be more apt to use it. I thought of soup. We eat lots of soups throughout the year. I came up with a soup that is really tasty! Everyone enjoyed it. Now my plan is to enlarge this recipe and can up the soup. It would also freeze well I am sure. But I really like having my own canned soups ready to go on the shelf. Makes great healthy, inexpensive convenience food! When I get the recipe rewritten for canning and can up a few batches I will post about that. For now here is the recipe I made last night.

Zucchini Sausage Soup


2T olive oil
1 onion, chopped
1 pepper, chopped – this can be a green, red, yellow pepper: your choice
½ lb. sausage
8 cups cubed zucchini, do not peel zucchini
1 can (14oz) diced tomatoes
1 cup sliced carrots
4 cups stock, this can be chicken or beef or vegetable stock
2 cups water
1 t. salt
1 t. seasoning salt
1 t. pepper
1 t. Italian seasonings

In a 6 or 8 quart stock pot heat olive oil on medium high. When olive oil is hot add onions and peppers. Cook until veggies are soft. Add sausage and continue cooking until sausage is no longer pink. Add zucchini and cook for another 5 or so minutes. Add tomatoes, stock, water and seasonings. Turn heat on high and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low, and simmer for 15 to 20 minutes. Serve with French bread or dinner rolls.

Comments

  1. AlanaAugust 21, 2011 at 4:56 PM

    Love your pics and thanks for sharing your recipe. It sounds delicious and I am going to have to try it :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. A Woman that Fears the LordAugust 21, 2011 at 9:31 PM

    I make a similar soup in the winter but I'm glad you posted this so I can use the zucchini I have in my fridge. :-)

    Sounds like you are a busy beaver.

    Ever made zucchini patties?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Catherine MichelleAugust 22, 2011 at 9:27 AM

    THank you for the soup! I'm interested by your canning version too. I make another kind of zucchini soup. I use zucchinis and the canned tomatoes of last year (tomato cubes in their juice with Italian seasoning). I cook them together and process them in the blender. The use of canned tomatoes give a very nice flavour to this soup (very different than with fresh tomatoes) and it helps to finish the last few preserves of last year. I can this soup in my pressure canner.

    ReplyDelete
  4. A Woman that Fears the LordAugust 22, 2011 at 8:54 PM

    You inspired me! I made your soup today and it was yummy. I didn't have Italian seasoning so I added parsley, oregano, basil and marjoram and some chopped garlic. I also added some home canned spicy tomato sauce. It was very good. Thanks again.

    ReplyDelete

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