Fall Projects

 Fall is a busy time of the year. The leaves are beautiful when they display their colors but piled up on my decks, sidewalks and doorways not so much. Daily cleaning with the blower and raking and collecting the leaves to feed the many compost piles is quite a chore. Picking up hickory nuts to keep them from being slung through a window by the mower is another chore. I did manage to get Gypsy my little Scottie bathed and clipped and performed a bumble foot surgery on one of the duck hens. Patient and doctor are recovering nicely. Geez the hats I wear sometimes are just mind blowing.

I have been concentrating on dehydrating frozen fruit to clean out the freezer some. Jars of dehydrated okra, figs and herbs put in jars removing the oxygen with oxygen absorbers or my vacuum sealer. I reuse lids for these and have never had a problem. 

Dehydrated figs are addictive. 

Dehydrated okra is not only great for soups and gumbos but makes a nutty snack out of hand.

I got the last of my retired laying hens butchered and canned in chicken broth. Now all I have are my new batch of young Buff Orphington pullets. These young hens should be laying within the next month or two and I will just have to make do with duck eggs for a bit.  My chicken house and duck house are cleaned out and fresh bedding applied. 

SO I am going into fall with ever growing compost piles, the fall garlic planted, the fall butchering done and canned, and my dehydrating knocked out. I have started gathering and drying okra seeds and my other vegetable seeds are now dried and in the freezer. 

My project for the day is canning blackberry pie filling with a couple gallon of frozen blackberries. O Wise One is cleaning and getting walnuts ready to crack. We did not get a great walnut harvest this year probably due to low rainfall but a few for holiday baking will be nice. 

With the wood shed full winter heat is prepped. While we have a gas furnace we always stockpile firewood for those power outages that seem to always pop up when you least expect them.  So we go into the season knowing that we have done all we can to prepare ourselves for the upcoming winter. While the nation struggles we seem to have worked out the food and heat dilemma for the time being. 

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter

Canning Butternut Soup

 It has continued to be a busy time here in the holler. First frost has come and gone a week early no less and we have had 3 consecutive night of freezing temperatures. We did finally get a small amount of rain but it continues to be really dry for this time of year. Before frost we scurried around picking everything we could. One of those vegetables still out there was Butternut quash. They were growing on vines in various parts of the garden up fences and trellises and left to ripen and the skins harden in the cool weather of fall. Once that frost danger approaches they must be picked though. 

All together I picked about 14 off of 3 vines so not bad for a harvest and plenty for the two of us. This really is one of those plant and forget crops for me. I add plenty of compost when I plant and occasionally train the vines on fences and wires and forget until time to pick. I do prefer to grow the vertically though. 

The first three I picked I peeled then chunked up and covered raw with some rich chicken bone broth then pressure canned for 90 minutes (quarts) at 12 pounds of pressure for my altitude. They turned out beautifully and will be used to make butternut soup once opened, heated and pureed with an immersion blender. Then I will add cream and a flour and butter roux as a thickener for a rich and creamy winter soup. Served with fresh garlic croutons and crumbled crispy bacon bits on top.

The seeds were saved and are drying on paper plates while the largest ones will be used for seed stock to replant for years to come. The extra seeds will be roasted in the oven for snacking. 

With 11 more squash to go I will bake some of these and scoop out the meat to mash and freeze for holiday pies and breads. 

The fall season is beautiful right now with the leaves turning colors and we have been enjoying nightly fires with the cooler temperatures. We have been gathering lots of walnuts and wild persimmons. I still have a bit of canning to do with frozen fruit that was picked earlier in the year. A couple gallon bags of blackberries again need to be made into  pie filling and canned to clear some space in the freezer. We have a pig that is being butchered from a local farmer next month so I need to make room. 

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter

Cocozelle Zucchini

Well we finally pulled up the zucchini before frost. There is too much of a good thing! My favorite variety of zucchini to grow is an old Italian heirloom called Cocozelle. This Italian heirloom was called Cocozella di Napoli in the 1800s. It is a smaller bush but bears prolifically with a sweet and nutty tasting fruit. Flavor wise this is my favorite. It is open pollinated and I save seeds.

Zucchini for me is a pretty no brainer crop and I usually always end up with way more than I need but the chickens love them so they just become food supplements for the chickens and rabbits. 

My husbands favorite zucchini recipe is the zucchini bread that I have made for years. I always make up a dozen loaves or so and freeze for winter. 

Zucchini Bread

3 cups all purpose flour

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

3 tsp ground cinnamon

1/4 tsp baking powder

3 eggs

2 cups white sugar

3 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup vegetable oil

3 cups grated zucchini

1 cup chopped walnuts optional

1/2 cup raisins optional

Preheat oven to 350. Sift together flour, salt, soda, cinnamon, and baking powder. Beat eggs. Add sugar, vanilla and oil to egg  and mix well.  Add zucchini to egg mixture. Add dry ingredients, mixing well. Stir in nuts and raisins if desired. Pour into 2 loaf pans. Bake at 350 for 1 hour.. or until tests done. Cool on rack and then remove from pans. May be drizzled with a powdered sugar and milk glaze.  

Or maybe zucchini pineapple canned. 

ZUCCHINI PINEAPPLE

4 quarts zucchini, grated or diced

1 1/2 cups bottled lemon juice (standardized acidity)

1 can ( 46 oz. ) unsweetened pineapple juice

3 cups sugar

Remove peel from zucchini and seeds. Coarsely grate or cube zucchini into small cubes.

Mix all ingredients thoroughly and simmer for 20 minutes, stirring frequently. 

Fill clean hot jars with hot zucchini mixture leaving 1/2 inch head space. Adjust lids an

process 15 minutes for half pints or pint jars. ( Do not put in jars larger than pints. )

Remove jars and allow to cool completely. Test seal and store in a cool dry place. 

 And I even have 4 baseball bat sized ones on the table for seeds.

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter

Heavy Hitter Okra

 

Another overachiever in my garden this year has been the okra. I tried a new variety to me called Heavy Hitter from seeds I purchased 2 years ago from the farmer in Alabama that developed this okra. In the past I have traditionally grown Cajun Cowhorn variety and also Clemson Spineless.  Cajun Cowhorn is an heirloom variety that my parents grew in Louisiana when I was a child and the great thing about that variety is that the pods stay soft and edible even when very large. Heavy Hitter is a variety developed by a farmer over many years by selecting the best producing Clemson Spineless plants in his garden and saving seeds from those specific plants. It is known to be an extremely heavy producer and has lived up to it's name. I see it is available now at Bakers Creek Seeds if anyone is interested in trying it. I will say that it has produced spectacularly for me. We did have an extremely cool spring and it was slow to get started but once started it will produce now till frost. I found the seeds just a tad expensive at first but now save my own so have plenty for years to come. I also maintain a supply of Cajun Cowhorn seeds as well. 

Like any other okra Heavy Hitter makes a beautiful yellow Hibiscus type flower and a large bush. My okra in the garden and around the place tucked here and there are between 8 to 12 feet and some are 4 foot wide so give them plenty of room to grow. They also like rich soil and produce well in heat and even dry conditions to a point. I like to cut my okra pods  from 3 to 5 inches in length so that they are good and tender. 

Right now I am averaging about a gallon of okra a day. I have frozen about 40 vacuum bags with 4 cups each now in the freezer. This we love just tossed with olive oil and sea salt and roasting in the oven.  I have also canned okra and tomatoes in jars for making a dish that starts with a traditional roux with shrimp and onions served over rice. It is just okra, tomatoes and onions in the jars. I also use this in soups as well and sometimes gumbos. I have also frozen okra breaded for frying. 

So for now we are dehydrating okra. My husband eats it straight out of the container as a snack because it takes on somewhat of a nutty flavor. Dehydrated okra will eventually once I am finished go into Mylar bags with an oxygen absorber and be stored in food grade buckets with gamma lids. This way it should keep for years as long as it is dried completely crunchy. Rehydrated okra can be used roasted, in soups or even breaded and fried. It all works and no slime! 

There is also a pickled okra recipe under canning recipes above if you want to give that a try. 

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter

Plentiful Harvests for Autumn

The days of sleeping at night with an open window under a snuggly quilt have returned. The leaves have started to trickle down again from the trees. I picked the first 6 of my butternut squash yesterday. I love the "pumpkin" pies I make from these. In the past I have chunked these up and canned them in jars but honestly I don't like them that way. The meat of the squash tends to be watery preserved that way. My preference actually is to mash the squash up and freeze it. I may play around with dehydrating it into a powder this year and then rehydrating for pies. We shall see since I have plenty to work with. You have to make sure when growing these winter squash to leave them on the vine long enough for that rind to get good and hard. That is the secret to a long shelf life. 

I have been playing around with the idea of canning chicks of this squash in jars with chicken broth and maybe onions. You could open the jar and simply puree the contents and maybe add cream for an almost instant butternut squash soup. I see some more experimenting in my near future. 

Recipe for Amazing Butternut Pie

My eldest daughter "Fred" came to visit recently bring my grandchildren to spend some time. She had recently butchered and brought me meat builder chickens she had raised along with some fresh pork. O Wise One smoked it last week and I used the smoked chicken to make a couple casseroles for the freezer. The chicken bones had a smoky flavor and I made a small crock pot of smoked chicken broth to use to can. That should give something an interesting flavor. With the smoked pork I had some dry pinto beans laying around so I cooked my pinto beans just until soft then added them to jars along with chunks of the smoked pork and some chopped onions then poured the smoked chicken broth over the top to fill the jars to 1 inch headspace. Then I processed these quart jars for 90 minutes at 12 pounds pressure. Talk about good it made quart jars of pinto beans with onions and chunks of smoked pork. Add some corn bread and a sliced tomato fresh from the garden and you have a great meal. The extra broth I put up in 3 quarts also. Just 1 batch of seven quarts but that is seven meals for us out of one piece of pork. Three freezer casseroles ( 8" X 8") with smoked chicken stashed in the freezer and a little extra broth as a bonus. So all together 10 meals for 2 pieces of meat. 

We picked the last of the Red beans from the garden also and canned 6 quarts of Louisiana Red Beans then pulled up the plants for the compost pile. One more crop finished for the year. I had been low on Red beans and concentrated on growing these to replenish my stock. We had made some homemade rope sausage last month and out in the freezer to go with these beans and also to go with my fermented homemade sauerkraut in the fridge. Louisiana Red Beans and Rice are a comfort food from home for me and we managed to can 60 quarts of them this season to add to the pantry. For the two of us that is 60 meals. 

Mama's Red Bean Recipe

Dill Relish Recipe

My cucumbers are also starting to slow down so I made a small batch of 7 pints of dill relish. I use this for tuna, egg and chicken salads for sandwiches in the winter. This should again last us until the next cucumber harvest next spring/early summer. 

Another bumper crop for the year has been yellow squash. 2022 shall be remembered as the year of the squash. I have 5 gallon zip bags of blanched sliced squash waiting to go into vacuum bags for the winter not counting what I have already put in vacuum bags. My plain old yellow crook neck squash was definitely an over achiever this year. These we like to eat with just a touch of bacon and onion smothered in a skillet. Sometimes I may add a sprinkling of shredded cheese over the top. 

I also make a cream of squash soup with chicken broth, pureed squash and cream. A great fall soup to use up those extra squash. For this soup I freeze pureed squash in containers then remove from the containers and vacuum seal to go back in the freezer. Again to free up some freezer space the same idea of canning with chicken broth would work. Another experiment for the future. 

The squash plants too have been pulled up and added to the compost. 

I have 4 giant striped heirloom Italian zucchini named "Cocozelle" on my table awaited to be seeded for seed for next year and the meat I will shred for zucchini bread to go into the freezer. 

So as the temperatures mellow and the leaves begin to fall we start to also forage walnuts from the neighbors walnut tree that we gather every year to put in the freezer for our holiday baking and additions to our morning refrigerator oats. The cycle continues for another year here in the holler. The firewood is stacked, the fall garlic awaits planting next month and the compost piles grow ever larger. Soon shredded leaves will start being added to the compost and they will really swell in size.

Our spring baby ducklings were added to the flock this morning. We kept three little hens. So we now have Tiddly Winks my little pocket duck, Thelma the original hen and Tassy Lou the addition last year from a neighbor. Added to the mix now are Tink, Tilly and Tammy Faye.  Angel is one happy drake with his harem of T's. Angel was named after one of Baby O's past boyfriends. The six little pullets are growing like mad and will replace the hens now in the chicken yard that will be butchered soon as they are at the end of their laying cycle. Their meat and subsequent broth will go into jars for winter meals.

Life goes on and we await the imminent first frost sometime next month. 

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter

******* Notation

Barbara asked an excellent question about old hens being tough. These old hens are called stewing hens. A stewing hen is a retired egg layer. Stewing hens are an important component for honoring the life cycle of a farm. After several happy years eating grass and bugs, a hen’s egg laying ability naturally slows down, and she’s no longer a productive member of the flock. In order to keep up with the demand for eggs, farms must cull these older hens in order to make space for new layers. Butchering and selling these hens provides a revenue source for farms and allows the hen to continue to provide nourishment, this time in the form of high quality, pastured meat.

Unlike broilers that are raised for meat and fattened relatively quickly, stewing hens have the opportunity to develop very strong bones, and strong, lean muscles. These bones are incredibly mineral rich, and the fat from these hens is full of fat-soluble vitamins and nutrients. Because of their rich nutritional content, stewing hens make excellent stock. A stewing hen’s lean meat contains a high level of connective tissue, which works wonderfully for slow cooked dishes such as stew, soup, and chicken and dumplings.

Sweet Potato Time

 

Sweet potatoes are a family favorite in our house. I have such fond memories of my father when I was a girl and walking into his workshop and he would put sweet potatoes into the oven that he kept his welding rods in to slowly bake. The smell of baking sweet potatoes even today always make me think of him. He told stories about when he was a young boy taking baked sweet potatoes to school in his lunchbox during the Great Depression. I guess that crop got many southerners through the hard times. 

For me my sweet potato crop started in January with 2 left over sweet potatoes from the year before. Toothpicks were stuck in the sides and they went into Mason jars in the sunny kitchen window.  That was their home until about April as they put out sprouts and grew vines. 

About mid April I started rooting those sprouts in water preparing to set them into beds the first of May when the chance of frost had passed. We had already  prepared wire rings with a lining of black plastic to gather heat and then filled the rings with rich soil and compost. 

By July they had filled in the rings and ran out into the area underneath the two small pear trees I had started last year. We watered occasionally when Mother Nature failed to drop enough rain and other than that we just watched them grow. No fertilizer was added because there was plenty of compost already in the soil in the rings. And the temperatures turned hot and they loved it.

About two weeks ago we dug the potatoes composting all the vines.

And out of those two rings we harvested over 60 pounds of sweet potatoes. The rings were dismantled and the soil spread out to enrich the soil under the pear trees. 

We allowed them to sit on a tarp in the shed for a few days for the skins to harden and dry out. They are now sitting in a corner of the dining room in banana boxes continuing to dry out and season. I check them often to make sure there are no soft ones or rotten spots.

Once I am secure in the fact that they are seasoned I will move them under the bed in the guest bedroom. It is dark under there and cool because I keep the heat turned down in there because there is rarely any one sleeping in there. 

The really small ones or the nicked ones I am saving and will make sweet potato bark with later in the dehydrator. I'll do a post later to show you how. For now that is one more crop down as we head toward winter.

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter 

Royal Golden Watermelon

 We all have things that we have had to learn to deal with and overcome in our lives. For me it is color blindness. One in every 12 men are color blind while one in every 200 women are color blind. The trait is genetic and runs in families. 

 I have also managed to pass my color blindness on to both a son and a grandson. This condition can make it very difficult to tell when vegetables are ripe. I have always especially struggled with watermelons until now. This year I grew an heirloom variety called "Royal Golden" from Bakers Creek. This variety has worked out great for me. While planted and grown just like a traditional watermelon this melon goes from green to yellow when ripe. I can see the difference between green and yellow. So I know when my watermelons look like pumpkins out in the field it is time to pick. Problem solved. The foliage tends to turn yellow also. 

When it first started out it looked like a traditional green watermelon with some yellow spots. As it ripens both the melon and the vine turn a bright golden yellow. 

When it turned yellow I picked them and was pleasantly surprised to find a perfectly ripe and sweet traditional pink ripe melon inside. My watermelons averaged out at about 20 pounds. 

A great old variety for those of you that struggle with telling when a melon is ripe.

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter

Cleaning Out The Freezer

It's been a bit since I posted but I sure have been busy. Summer temperatures have finally gotten here with a few 90 degree days forecasted for next week. Other than that the days have been mild here with cool temperatures and plenty of rain for the garden. With the garden harvest coming in my time has been spent picking and preserving. green onions, peas, turnips and mustard greens. I picked the first of my beets this last week and pickled them and picked my first thinning of baby carrots and canned them. 

I also received some corn from a relative that came to visit from down south and I canned 21 pints of whole kernel corn. With fruit hanging outside I went through the freezer and decided to take what fruit that was left over from last year that we had not ate fresh from the freezer in cobblers, yogurt, smoothies and oatmeal to put in jars and make room for the new harvests. This will help make room in my freezer for this years crop and make the fruit in there now shelf stable for future use without relying on the freezer. 

In the photo above are corn and baby carrots that I thinned as well as some pickled beets. Also pictured is canned gooseberry pie filling, canned elderberry pie filling, elderberry jam, plum syrup for pancakes and ice cream topping, blackberry pie filling, and a spiced plum syrup with cinnamon and almond flavoring. 

I will post some of the canning recipes individually as I get time to type them up and add to the canning recipes section.  I still have rhubarb, blueberries, gooseberries and strawberries left to deal with. But that is next weeks projects. And the first of the gooseberries are starting to ripen. 

 

The Small green peas are done now and have been pulled and relegated to the compost piles. In their place are tomato plants just in time for this upcoming warm weather. With the last of the peas I made a nice pot of fresh creamed peas and new potatoes for my husband. It is one of his favorites. 

The green onions have all been pulled and chopped and are in freezer bags ready to use throughout the year. I may plant some more for fall. We eat lots of onions, garlic and other herbs and seasonings. I can always dehydrate them for storing if nothing else. 

We also enjoyed lots of baby spinach salads over the spring season and finally pulled the last of it and froze it for soups and such. I have enough turnips in the bottom of the refrigerator for one more scalloped turnip casserole. Another family favorite. The remaining bok choy has been allowed to set a seed head and I left a couple mustard to flower for seeds as well.  As usual the Jericho romaine lettuce is holding up wonderfully and I have one selected to go to seed also. The onions are starting to bulb up and the broccoli is starting to put on heads. The cabbage are huge and have really had very few bugs so far. 

So in a nutshell it has been a cool, rainy and very productive spring in the garden. With rising grocery prices we have preserved almost everything that we have raised so far and will probably plant a bit more than we usually do. 

We remain healthy and active with taking care of the gardens and lawn and keeping up with the canning. I also was notified yesterday that I am up for jury duty for the next 3 months. UGH! I dread it and think I have PTSD from the last jury duty and seeing all those pictures of that 4 year old boy ran over by a tractor. I still have nightmares. Keep your babies close you mamas out there. 

Well I am off for now and will hopefully have a little more time for blogging as I catch up with all this canning. 

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter

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I can also be found at

https://thebackfence.freeforums.net/

More Spring Garden 2022

 

Thursday morning cup of hot tea here as I listen to thunder rumble in the distance. Rain is forecasted for the next 2 days so I will put the garden away and concentrate on some housework and cooking. Thought I would share some more pictures of the gardens. The gooseberries above are swelling now and all the 8 bushes have berries on them now. 

Yesterday I got all my broccoli and cabbage plants in the boxes. They were the perfect size and ready for their permanent homes in the garden. Planting them right before rain will allow them to acclimate for the next two raiy days and not even wilt. Also got some romaine plants in the garden and bok choy. The red beans are breaking the soil.  Garden 2022 is well on it's way.

The black currants are now blooming and the black currant bushes I set out to root have all rooted also. I am sharing some on them with a young neighbor couple. 

And the green peas around the property planted on fences are now blooming. 

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter

Beneficial Insects In The Garden

 

Just a heads up to all you gardeners out there. As you are doing that early spring clean up, pruning and all around gardening be aware of the beneficial insects out there. As I was pruning some winter kill out of my black currant bushes I ran across the above egg sacks of praying mantis. I was careful not to disturb them because I hope to encourage a healthy population of praying mantis in my garden. They are excellent for helping to keep the bad bugs down. 

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter

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I can also be found at 

https://thebackfence.freeforums.net/

Waiting On Spring and Canning Carrots

 

I personally think this is the hardest time of the year when spring is right around the corner yet winter wants to linger a bit longer. With a warm spell last week I got my bulb onions, carrots, beets, green peas, turnips, mustard greens and spring onions planted. My garlic is sprouting that was planted last fall and I even have a small patch of potatoes planted that sprouted in the pantry and rather than waste them just stuck them out. Now that I have had a taste of warmer weather it just makes it that much harder to wait on those warm spring days. It kind of reminds me of the torture of that last 2 weeks of pregnancy. And to top things off it is now rainy so I am stuck inside again. With snow showers in the forecast for the end of the week I will just have to cool my heels a bit longer. 

I got finished with my quilt that was on the frame and will spend the next couple of days binding the edges. Then I have a baby quilt that is next on the agenda. I am going to take my frame down though as I think I will just quilt it on the lap hoop. That will be two unfinished projects completed and 2 more quilt tops to go. Good lord willing and the creek don't rise I hope to finish them all this year as I have some quilt top patterns I want to try but am forcing myself to finish these first. So many beautiful patterns and so little time. 

One thing is with the price of gas I will have plenty of time at home to work on quilting the way it looks. 

At a recent trip to Walmart I found a great deal on carrots. Five pound bags for $0.74 cents. I bought 4 bags to can which is 20 pounds of carrots for $2.96. I love running across those little bargains and they help to keep my jars full year round even when the garden is not producing. 

I put them in pint jars so that averages about $0.09 cents a pint jar. That will definitely work. I used my Harvest Guard reusable lids and seem to be getting the hang of using them. While I was at Walmart I found more Ball lids and picked up some more of them for my stash as well. I try to pick up some every time I run across them now. A few boxes here and there makes a big difference but I always try to leave some for others. 

I have noticed that my forsythia bushes are just about to bloom, the daylilies are coming up and the cornelian cherry and Nanking cherry are blooming. The plums are also loaded with blooms as well. It's a toss up as to what the late frosts will get but we play this game of Russian roulette  every year with the frosts so time will tell the outcome this year. We always seem to manage to get enough though and we try to remain thankful for what we do get. 

Can you believe my Christmas cactus is still blooming. That thing has been a trooper this year. We remain warm ,healthy and sassy as ever and hope you all do as well.

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter

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I  can also be found at 

https://thebackfence.freeforums.net/

The Big Rainbows Are Here

Those of you that have been around for awhile know that every year I anxiously await the ripening of my favorite tomato Big Rainbow. It is a bicolor heirloom slicer that gets huge, is prone to splitting and cat facing and is just down right ugly most times. But I have grown it religiously for almost three decades with my original seeds coming from Seed Savers Exchange way back in the beginning. 

They are indeed ugly most times until you taste it! My favorite way to eat them other than standing in the middle of my garden with the warm sweet juice dripping off my chin is the traditional southern tomato sandwich. Just soft white bread as fresh as possible, mayo and a big thick slice of tomato and a sprinkle of salt. Heavenly on a BLT. 

 

As most of you know Tennessee has gotten record rainfall in many places with ensuing flooding with both loss of life and property. I have received several wellness check emails and yes we are both fine. I am feeling the love people! Please keep those less than fortunate in your prayers. 

 I have been canning green beans and doing lots of dehydrating and freezing. I still have 2 plantings of green beans to go. The ones I just picked are having some foliage issues from excess moisture so hoping to at the least get one more picking off those bushes before they are composted. 

Picking lots of basil and freezing basil bombs. 

Peppers are rolling in also. Just traditional bells. 

Blackberries and a few blueberries are ripening despite the rain. 

Okra slowed down with all the cloudiness. Hoping now that the sun has returned it will pick up again. 

We are a bit soggy but resilient and ever thankful as always. 

I have put O Wise One to work shelling more peas. They are loving the rain and heat and are still blooming to beat the band. 

A couple tips on harvesting with heavy rains like this if your tomatoes are even close to ripe and you know there is a big rain imminent pick them and allow them to complete their ripening on a table or porch. They will absorb moisture faster than the skin can accommodate the moisture and they crack. 

Same thing with fruits if they are ripe pick them if possible prior to rain. The less moisture they absorb the less has to be cooked out if making sauce in the case of tomatoes or dehydrating in the case of drying fruits or even making jam. The more water the more difficult to set gel stage.  

Blessings from The Holler

The Canned Quilter

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I can also be found at

https://thebackfence.freeforums.net/