Peppery Pear Salsa Recipe

Sweet juicy pears combined with red and green peppers to create a carnival of colours in this tantalizingly spicy salsa. It can be used as a dipping sauce, breakfast condiment with eggs or just on its own with chips. Also works great with grilled meat and chicken.

Ingredients:

1 cup white vinegar
8 cups coarsely chopped, cored peeled Garside's Fruit Farm Bartlett Pears
3 red bell peppers, seeded and coarsely chopped
3 green bell peppers, seeded and coarsely chopped
1 cup of granulated sugar
2 tbsp salt
2 tsp dry mustard
1 tsp ground turmeric
1/2 tsp ground allspice
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper

Directions:

1. Prepare canner, jars and lids.
2. In a large saucepan, combine vinegar and pears. Add red and green peppers, sugar, salt, mustard, turmeric, allspice and black pepper. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring constantly. Reduce heat and boil gently, stirring frequently, until slightly thickened, about 5 minutes.
3. Ladle hot salsa into hot jars, leaving about 1/2 inch of headspace. Remove air bubbles and adjust headspace if necessary. Wipe rim. Center lid on jar. Screw band down until resistance is met, then increase to fingertip tight.
4. Place jars in canner, ensuring they are completely covered with water. Bring to a boil and process the jars for 20 minutes. Remove canner lid. Wait 5 minutes, then remove jars, cool and store.

This recipe makes approximately six - 250 mL jars or three - 500 mL jars.

Tip: To prevent the pears from browning, it is recommended measuring the vinegar into the saucepan before preparing the pears. As the pears are chopped, drop them into the vinegar, stirring to ensure all surfaces are covered. When all have been chopped continue with Step 2.

Our delicious Bartlett Pears are ripening up nicely and we anticipate to start picking them at the end of August/beginning of September. If you wish to order any products send us an email or give us a call to place your advance orders. Our Organic Bartlett Pears are available for $0.75 per pound

The fruit is ripening up!

We are pleased that the fruit is ripening up nicely. We anticipate to be picking our crab apples starting next week! We then hope to start picking the gravenstein apples, bartlett pears and prima apples soon after. We are also excited to be offering our Italian Prune Plums for sale this year, after a few bad years in a row.

It has been decided that we will be offering two weekend U-pick dates for our blackberries at the farm this year. Dates to be announced this weekend! If you would like to come pick blackberries with ease of no traffic zipping by, no road dust and who knows what other chemicals on the berries let us know!! We will be offering picked blackberries also if you are interested in that drop us a line.

Prices for our early season fruit are:

Crab Apples: $1.00 per pound
Gravenstein Apples: $1.25 per pound
Bartlett Pears: $0.75 per pound
Bramley Apples: $1.25 per pound
Prima Apples: $1.00 per pound
Italian Prune Plums: $1.25 per pound
Picked Blackberries: $4.00 per pound
U-pick Blackberries: $1.00 per pound

If you would like to put in any advanced orders for any of our products or have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us at garsidesfruitfarm@shaw.ca or 604.556.4273.

Next recipe to come...... Peppery Pear Salsa!!

Crabapple Butter recipe!

As promised here is a crabapple butter recipe.

Ingredients:

4 lbs of Garside's Fruit Farm Crabapples, stems and blossom ends removed, and quartered
1 cup of water
Grated zest and juice of 1 orange
2 cups of granulated sugar
1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1/2 tsp ground ginger

1. In a large saucepan, combine crabapples and water. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat, cover and boil gently, stirring occasionally, until crabapples are getting soft. (Approximately 20 to 30 minutes.)

2. Transfer crab apple mixture to a food mixer and puree, just until a uniform texture is achieved. Do not liquefy. Measure out 6 cups of crabapple puree.

3. In a large saucepan combine crabapple puree, orange zest and juice, sugar, cinnamon, cloves and ginger. Stir until all the sugar is dissolved. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat and boil gently, stirring frequently until mixture thickens and holds its shape on a spoon.

4. Meanwhile prepare canner, jars and lids.

5. Ladle the hot butter sauce into hot jars, leaving a 1/4 inch (0.5 cm) of headspace. Remove air bubbles and adjust headspace if necessary by adding hot butter. Wipe rim, and place lid on, and screw band down till resistance is me, then increase to fingertip tight.

6. Place jars in canner, ensuring they are completely covered with water. Bring to a boil, and process for 10 minutes. Remove canner lid. Wait 5 minutes, then remove jars, cool and store.


Our Crabapples are looking great this year! They will make a delicious batch of Crabapple Butter or anything you choose. They are available for $1.00 per pound, and we anticipate beginning to pick them in early to mid August. If you would like to order any of our products, please do not hesitate to contact us via email garsidesfruitfarm@shaw.ca or by phone at 604.556.4273 anytime. We look forward to hearing from you.

SOLD OUT!

We are officially sold out of our sour cherries for the 2010 season. If you would like to be put on the list for next year, please let us know.

Whats next for fruit you ask... We have crab and gravenstein apples coming up soon. As well as Bartlett Pears and Blackberries.

We may be offering two saturday u-pick dates at the farm for blackberries this year. If you would be interested in that, please contact us and let us know!!

Next recipe to come is......Crabapple Butter!

Recipe for the week - Cherry Pie

Cherry Pie (With a 9" pastry shell)

Ingredients:

4 cups of pitted Garside's Fruit Farm Sour Cherries
1 1/4 cups of Sugar
1/4 cup Flour
2 Tbsp Butter

Preheat oven to 425 F. Combine sour cherries, sugar, flour, toss together lightly to mix. Pour into pastry lined pan. Top with a crust. Bake till juice is bubbly for 30 - 35 minutes.

As a side note, we still have a few pounds left of our sour cherries. If interested, email or give us a call as soon as possible as these won't last long.

Last Chance for Sour Cherries

We are picking the last of our Sour Cherries in the next few days!! If you have not ordered any yet you better hurry as we are selling out fast.

They are $3.00 per pound.

If you wish to order some, give us a call at 604.556.4273 or email us at garsidesfruitfarm@shaw.ca , they won't last long!!

Sour Cherries!

Our sour cherries are in the final ripening stage and are looking delicious. We will be starting to pick them this Wednesday. If you have preordered them already, we will be calling you in the next few days to let you know when you can pick them up or have them delivered.

Our Crab Apples are looking great this year. If you would like to preorder any please let us know. They are $1.00 per pound. Great for jellies, wine, and baking.

If you have any questions or would like to preorder any of our produce, please do not hesitate to contact us via email: garsidesfruitfarm@shaw.ca or by phone at 604.556.4273.

Keep checking our website for updates!