Okra!

 Vince tells me that every year, I'm in a panic because the okra isn't growing and producing as I want it to do . . and every year by the time that first frost comes along and wipes it out, I'm happy with the okra we got and glad to see the plants go! Okra is the last thing left in the garden . . I guess it's the last thing I really care about at this point. There are still peppers, still lots of those crazy tomatoes Cooper loves and I still have to dig the sweet potatoes. I planted a late crop of cow peas, which may or may not produce but I wanted them mostly to add nitrogen to the soil so I planted those after most everything else was pulled out. 

For the okra, I started out blanching, slicing, flash freezing and putting it in vacuum seal bags. I ended up with about 45 pints. I will use that for "frying". I take the lazy route - add a little oil to the pot, put the okra in and stir it til it's done, add a bit more oil and some cornmeal, lightly brown that and even though each piece wasn't battered and fried, it tastes just like fried okra and is much easier.

There's plenty of freeze dried okra from last year so I'm not freeze drying any of it this year. I did run out of okra in the freezer this year and used some of the freeze dried for rehydrating and frying. 

Saturday I canned 19 half pints of stewed okra. I will use those in soups and gumbo.

Everything I get now I will can in pints and those will be jars I open up, add tomatoes . . or not, and we eat as a side dish.

I have to cut the okra every day and what I got yesterday and today was enough for 7 pints. I'm hoping to get at least 30 pints total before the first frost. I save seeds from one year to the next and I've already got the seed pods for next year. I managed to miss too many pods and they got huge so that will be what I use for next year's seeds.

We both love okra so I will put up all I can get.