chutney first!

 

A few months ago we bought an expensive tomato plant (£4.99!) which was on a grafted root 'for higher yield'. For the first week or two we thought we'd been sold a dummy as it really struggled, but

soon it flourished and now has about 400 fruits - small plum tomatoes. The trouble is they were ripening faster than we could eat them so we needed a solution. Chutney! I've never made chutney (or anything else much) before, but I thought I'd give it a try.

Growing your own is only part of the process of becoming food self sufficient. You also need to know how to preserve stuff to get you through the winter. Pickling, drying, storing, smoking ... chutney. And the time to learn is now, so you can keep practising until you get it right! And of course if it goes wrong for now at least there's always the local shop to buy from ...

 

I picked 750g of the tomatoes, all the red ones in fact.

 

Chopped 'em.

 

Then to our cooking apple tree that's fruited for the first time this year, and picked 5.

Peeled!

 

 

Supermarket ingredients added! Raisins, muscovado sugar, green pepper, onion and cyder vinegar.

 

Boil for 40 minutes - great fun!

 

Then into the Kilner jar!

 

Success - and if I can do it anyone can!