Heat processing on hot days . . . .

Yesterday, Monty and I decided to can our green beans and make pear relish, so we set out about 8am to buy the necessities to go with the free pears Rachel gave me (thanks again, Rachel) to make her absolutely unbelievably good pear relish. I went to Walmart and bought celery and lemon juice so I could use my ATM card for $40 cash. Then we went to the Saturday version of the Cattle Sale (really veggies and critters only, no great junk) to buy 12 onions, 12 red bell peppers, 12 green bell peppers, and 2 (or more) hot red peppers. We got all the red bell peppers for $3 (let me repeat $3!!!!!!!), green peppers for the same, onions $10 for 15 huge white onions, and $2 for a big basket of jalapenos. So, I decided we'd make salsa, too, and I bought a BOX of roma tomatoes for $12. Then we left and went to Darlene's discount grocery store and bought 3 jugs of apple cider vinegar - big ones - for $1.75 each, and a big jug of balsamic vinegar for $4.99 - the really good stuff to add to our pickled quail eggs for color and flavor.

We began snapping beans about 11am while Monty located, washed and put in the dishwasher to sanitize about 25 quart jars, 12 pint jars, and 30 or so half pints.

We began packing beans about 2pm, and we put 7 quart jars at a time in the pressure canner. Well, you're boiling about 12 quarts of water and all those beans and jars and it takes a while to get up a steam, then you letter the canner steam about 10 minutes, then you put the pressure gauge on and let the pressure begin to rise. To get to 11 pounds of pressure took about 20 minutes at full blast, then you set the timer for 25 minutes for green beans. So, you're cooking this huge pot of hot mess under pressure at intense heat with the eye on HIGH on the stove for about and hour before you turn the stove off to let it slowly lose pressure and you can open it and put it the next batch. It takes about 30 - 40 minutes to get the pressure back down! So that's about 1.5 to 2 hours of HIGH heat in the kitchen on this one item. And, I had 3 batches to do. And, I'm working on getting pears peeled and cored and chopped for relish.

MEANWHILE, the central a/c has been out for 3 weeks. Yes, that's right. 3 weeks from mid July until now, because we are under a "home warranty." This is fancy terminology for it'll take as long as possible for the chosen contractors to fix anything with the cheapest available part that'll go out again by next summer. That's OK though, because our A/C went out last August for 3 weeks, and we bought window units - one for the back of the house, one for the front - to compensate and to keep from DYING in the ALABAMA HEAT!!!!!!!! So, yesterday, during this intense canning day with major heat being generated in the kitchen, little did we know the window unit in the living room - front of the house with the kitchen - had frozen up and wasn't blowing cold air. By 9pm, the whole front of the house was about 90 degrees, and we were about to DIE of heat! We didn't figure out why until this morning, after the 21 quarts of green beans have been through the process and are sealed up tight and gorgeous.

Also yesterday, while the green beans were processing, Monty and I measured out the ingredients for the pear relish which called for "a peck" of pears. We decided this meant 18 qts, so we took 2 big bowls from the kitchen, measured roughly and pulled out and washed 18 qts of pears and began peeling and coring and chopping them for the relish. We peeled and chopped for 2 movies with the pears, then the bell peppers, then the onions, and the hot peppers. Then I made the syrup and covered all of it in a huge pot and put the cover on to let it sit overnight. I put all the peels and cores on to boil for pear peel jelly as the pressure canner began the last batch of green beans. At 12 something am this morning, I turned everything off, showered, and began to wind down to try to go to sleep. Then I remember; we only cut up the first 18 qts of pears - that's only one recipe's worth!!! OMG!!! We have to peel pears AGAIN today!!!!! Oh, well, I guess we'll have a movie marathon of some sort for this round, too.

This stuff BETTER turn out to be as good as Rachel's!!!