Recipes: Grandma Louise's Chili Relish

Grandma Louise's Chili Relish

It takes a lot of tomatoes, and a good 8 hours to cook down, but it is worth every minute of effort. My grandma Louise has been making chili relish since before I was born. She always served it with hamburgers, but I've found it to be great with hot dogs, meatloaf, sandwiches, and my favorite homemade black bean patties.

The recipe for the Chili Relish is copied directly from grandma's own recipe card. The recipe for the black bean patties is one I developed in college.

Chili Relish

18 tomatoes (skinned, cored, seeded, and roughly chopped)
2 green peppers (roughly chopped)
2 medium onions (roughly chopped)
1 1/2 C sugar
2 C white vinegar
2 t salt
1 t ground cinnamon
1/2 t ground cloves
1 t allspice

In small batches, finely chop the tomatoes, onions, and peppers in a food processor. Put in a large heavy pot* and add the rest of the ingredients. Allow the mixture to simmer for approximately 8 hours. When the relish is finished, it will be the consistency of ketchup and will have cooked down to about 1/4 of the original mixture.

When the mixture is nearly finished cooking, sterilize half pint jars and lids. Spoon the mixture into the jars, and seal (process in a water bath for 20 minutes).

Makes around 8 1/2 pints



Here is the chili relish when it is finished. You can see how full the pot was in the beginning. The key to this recipe is slow patient cooking.

* Grandma Louise always makes a double batch and uses her roaster set on low. Patience is key.

Black Bean Patties

1 1/2 C cooked bean beans (or one can)
1/2 C Quick Oats
1 t fresh oregano (or 1/2 t dried)
1 clove chopped garlic
2 T Olive Oil
salt and pepper to taste
5T olive oil (for cooking)

Mash the beans into a smooth paste with a hand mixer or a potato ricer. Add the oatmeal and spices. The mixture will be slightly crumbly. Add the olive oil. The mixture should have the consistency of a stiff dough. Form the dough into patties that are about the size of a hamburger and about 3/4 inch thick.

In a non-stick skillet, heat 5 T olive oil over medium heat. Brown the patties on both sides for about 5 minutes each. As the patties cook, it is useful to press down slightly on each side.

Serve on a bun with Homemade Chili Relish!

Serves 4

Around Our House: Growing Italian Stuffing Tomatoes

Here are a few pics of one of the more unusual tomatoes we are growing this year. It is an Italian Stuffing Tomato. It's mostly hollow (a lot like it's cousin the pepper), and has a very meaty texture. I've been hollowing them out and putting them in the deep freeze to make lovely baked stuffed tomatoes this winter. I'll post a recipe when I feel like turning on the oven again.



The outside is a lovely red with orange streaks.



Here is the inside after having been scooped out.

Around Our House: Garden Booty

Big crop of the week.

In spite of the wilt plaguing our tomatoes, we are starting to get a good crop. I think I might try to can a few this weekend.

Our peppers are super happy. I think it may have been the extra fertilizer we tossed in when we planted them. I actually had enough to freeze about a pint. I usually just get a bag started and add to it until it is full. Seems to work well.

Our zucchini and squash are slowly coming, which is good, we are not yet overwhelmed. I baked a delicious zucchini cake last night and we had sauteed squash and zucchini for supper.

We get about two cucumbers a day which seems perfect for daily consumption, however, I will have to buy cucs to do any pickled this year. We used up the rest of our lime pickles, which are a necessity for chicken or tuna salad. I think I'll make the bread and butter pickles out of zucchini again this year, we tried it last year and worked great!

We also picked a giant bucket full of turnips. Hmmm. I have decided to try to make some Middle Eastern Turnip pickles (those funky bright pink pickles they serve at good falafel places). The recipe is fermented so I'll let you know how that goes!

Here are a few pics of our bounty.

Around Our House: How Our Garden Grows

Let the feast begin!

I just picked the first of our summer veggies. I've gotten a few random tomatoes, peppers, and squash over the last few weeks, but today was the first time I picked enough for a meal!

We've got wilt on the cucumbers and tomatoes again, and we are afraid we will have to deal with it for the next few years. We're monitoring which varieties do the best against it and plan to plant those next year. We have all but completely lost the Poona Kheera cucumbers, but the delikatesse are doing great (so far). I saw a few baby melons and squash today. I just hope they get enough summer to grow fruits.

It's been so cool, we are still picking lettuce, which is good since I forgot to plant chard or collards for summer salads...



Here is the garden a few weeks ago. The pole beans are JUST starting to flower.





The cucumber machine before the Poona Kheeras died.




The greens. And reds. We planted several types of lettuce, red orach, chard, and basil.



The big crop... Guess I don't need to wash the canning jars QUITE yet.

Gardening. Ugh. I hate the weeding but love the harvest. Ah well. We just gave the tomatoes a layer of newspaper and compost and forced their unhappy souls into tomato cages.

We picked out first "june bearing" strawberry today. If I didn't have children, I could tell you how it tasted... Looks like I may get one soon.


We've got three mysterious pole bean black holes. No matter what I plant there, they won't grow. I may have to give in and let one of the volunteer tomatoes take over. Our damn okra won't go either... Guess my thumb isn't yet green enough.

Scott is out here right now erecting our bean tee pees. I am admittedly pretty excited. Although, I have a feeling hunkering down amidst bean plants and all of the pollinating pals may not really float my boat anymore. The kiddos will probably like it.





I froze about 2 quarts of rhubarb. I've already made two batches of Rhubarb Jam. We have one frozen apple pie left from last fall's apple extravaganza. (see kiddos sitting in the harvest). And about fifteen jars of Apple Butter... I am excited for the tomatoes. We finally finished all of the tomato chutney and canned toms, and we have nearly eaten all of the sun dried cherry tomatoes.

Grow Baby Grow...