Using up some of the glut

It's been another good week at the allotment -which means far too many cucumbers again.

Time to get out the preserving pan!

First my standard cucumber preserve - jam, or marmalade, maybe, as it's heavily flavoured

with lemon bits and pieces hoarded in the freezer after using the juice or zest (I hate to throw anything away!)

 

That didn't use up enough of the cucumbers though, so I decided to try something new, that would also help me use up other bits and pieces from the allotment - piccalilli.

This didn't go according to plan though...

I got all the veg prepared and ready; small onions not big enough for anything else, runner beans (I already seem to have a freezer-full), cucumber of course, some surplus courgette and a tiny cauliflower barely bigger than a piece of sprouting broccoli.



 All the veg has to soak in brine for 24 hours.....so while it did that, I popped to the shop to get some turmeric, a necessary ingredient for the next bit.




When the time was up, I drained the veg and started making the mustardy sauce - at which point I discovered there wasn't enough mustard powder in the cupboard!!!
Off to the shop again, only to find they didn't sell mustard powder - all I could buy was the ready-made paste. To hopefully get round this, I made the sauce with the full amount of turmeric and about half the mustard, and when it was cooked added a couple of teaspoons of the mustard paste. I've no idea whether this will work, only tasting will tell.

For now, it looks ok though there does seem to be a lot of sauce to comparatively few vegetables. Now it needs to stand for three weeks before the great taste test.....