canning sweet relish

I had the sweetest student one year named Mary. It was the year I taught 6th grade. The one and only year I taught 6th grade. 6th graders are interesting. Some are so grown up and others are so still in elementary school. It was a long year. Anyway, Mary was such a good student. If I had a class full of her, I would have stayed forever. I probably wouldn't have cried so much at night either. She lived with her dad who was also super nice. It was the year I was pregnant with Bee. She used to bring me in her dad's canned salsa and sweet relish. Both were so good. When I got into canning this year, I knew both the salsa and relish were on my list. I got in contact with her through facebook and she is going to work on getting me the recipes. She's on vacation right now and I couldn't wait. I found a recipe I thought looked similar on cooks.com. It was super super good. Silly good. I am planning on another batch or two or three.

Sweet pickle relish (from cooks.com)

□ 4 c. chopped cucumbers (4 med.)

□ 2 c. chopped onion
□ 1 c. chopped bell pepper
□ 1 c. chopped red bell pepper
□ 1/4 c. salt
□ 3 1/2 c. sugar
□ 2 c. cider vinegar
□ 1 tbsp. celery seed
□ 1 tbsp. mustard seed

Chop and combine cucumbers, onion, green and red bell pepper in a large bowl. (It's a lot of chopping!)

Sprinkle with salt

and cover with cold water. Let stand 2 hours. (Mom- on my Christmas list is a new large mixing bowl, stainless steal please)

Drain thoroughly. Press out excess liquid. Combine sugar, vinegar and spices. Heat to boiling. (ignore the strong odor!) Add drained vegetables and simmer 10 minutes.

Pack hot into hot half pint or pint jars, leaving 1/4" headspace. Adjust caps. Process 10 minutes in boiling water bath. Yield: 3 pints.

I had a reader ask a few questions about what all the canning jargon means... head-space, caps, process, etc. I will plan to do a basic canning post next week some time. Look at that... all of a sudden I'm an expert. Ha. No, I just like to talk about things that interest me.

So, I plainly remember sitting and eating the relish right from the jar when Mary gave it to me. At the time I blamed it on Bee and all the pregnancy hormones. Nope. Apparently, good relish is meant to be eaten right from the jar. Make this and you will need to come up with your own excuse- you'll want to eat right from the jar too.

I linked this up several places. Here's the list here.