What to do with all the zucchini the garden produces each year? You can let it go to waste, or you can preserve it, so the crisp taste of your garden can be with you long after the season is over. The challenge for most people who garden is how to preserve your harvest, so it can be enjoyed and till next year’s harvest. Zucchini has been a particular challenge and my wife has so many useful zucchini recipes, she could write a book.
Zucchini is the most bountiful vegetable in our garden alongside our tomatoes and potatoes. Zucchini is so versatile, but it is also seasonally bound unlike the potatoes, which can store in a dark space all winter long. My wife and I were trying to think of ways to keep the harvest longer in our pantry and all answers lead to canning and preserving.
The zucchinis are now ready to be canned.
The Zesty Zucchini Pickle recipe is just one of our remedies for our prolific zucchini production. Join my wife Krista on this canning adventure in which she demonstrates how to make her Zesty Zucchini Pickles and helps you to think of new ways to preserve the flavor of your garden.
Zesty Zucchini Pickles are great with relish servings, hamburgers, salmon burgers, salads, burritos, cold cut sandwiches, huevos rancheros, hot dogs, as a hors d’oeuvres, but not on ice cream.
I also want to include some links to Ball’s Complete Book of Home Preserving that Krista uses to help you in your canning adventures. I am going off the beaten path to share links to bookstores that are not Amazon. I figure we did not purchase our book from there and Amazon does not need any more help in dominating the market, so why not support a different bookstore.
Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving : 400 delicious and creative recipes for today. Edited by Judi Kingry and Lauren Devine, Robert Rose Inc., 2006.
Active on 8/1/2019
https://www.abebooks.com/book-search/isbn/0778801314/
https://www.powells.com/book/-9780778801399
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/ball-complete-book-of-home-preserving-judi-kingry/1100154062#/
Living a Sustainable Dream 
My grandfather used to joke that the only time he locked the door on his car was during zucchini season. He said that if he left the car door unlocked, a basket of zucchini would be waiting for him when he got back to the car. 🙂
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Oh….my local Ace hardware store in the big city has the Ball book on the shelf. And, when I’ve gone into a hardware store in rural areas…there is the Ball book on the shelf, along with a plentiful supply of canning supplies.
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Ace Hardware has done very well for rural communities. We loved our local Ace Store when we lived in Pacific City, Oregon. Ace steps in where big box stores won’t because of sales projections based on population.
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Krista, I have NEVER Canned anything… But after watching this video… (which I loved) I know why I don’t. Hahaha! They are beautiful and I wish I could grow a garden like yours… but I guess I’m gonna have to continue to let the store can mine. 🙂 I loved the lesson though. ❤
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The taste of garden fresh beats a store anytime. You should try it for fun and taste.
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Omg! Awesome video Krista! Never had pickled zucchini. Save us some 😉
Totally going to do this once we have an abundant garden!
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Want to know a secret? This video was filmed late summer 2017. I finally got done editing it. We just harvested our first 2 zucchini for 2019 this evening.
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Lol! Better late than never. That is funny though.
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And, yet another thought….free (well, taxpayer paid) home canning publications.
https://nchfp.uga.edu/publications/publications_home.html
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Nice, never heard of a government food canning site before. This should go viral.
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