Hi folks! I’ve been trying to get this post finished for about two weeks now. I finally found some spare time to shoot a few pics I felt were missing. For the majority of the summer I’ve been uploading a smorgasbord of instagram photos documenting my flourishing veggie garden. I can’t tell you how absolutely rewarding it has been growing my own produce. We started out from seed and now you can barely see the dirt in our small 4’x8′ garden.
You probably saw the Pickle post using the cucumbers we grew. They are still hard at work giving and giving, so much so that I had to pawn some of them off on my co-worker. 🙂 The gift that keeps on giving. Seriously, if you don’t have your own garden and have the capabilities to have one, stop waiting and just do it. Sure it is a lot of work and you’ve got to dig gardening quite a bit to keep up with your plants, but it is totally worth it. I dream of the day that I can have an even bigger garden.
Anyway, moving on from my become a self-sufficient gardener plug. Tomatoes are probably my favorite fruit. Yes, tomatoes are a fruit and yes, I do love them more than strawberries. In fact, I eat tomatoes like apples. Possibly the best thing about summer is finding a tomato on the vine; a plump red ruby gently warmed by the sun, and plucking it from the vine, delighting in the pop of flavor and crunch.
Turns out that planting round about 8 tomato plants (both cherry tomatoes and beefsteak tomatoes) yields unlimited tomatoes, for forever. What to do with all my booty? While I assure you I probably ate a plant’s worth of tomatoes while I harvested, there are always oodles more. Chet and I being new expert canners decided to try our hand at homemade garden salsa. He has been growing a variety of peppers which he was kind enough to share to contribute towards the salsa. He is hoarding the rest of his peppers so he can make his own hot sauce. The guy is a hot sauce freak, puts it on practically everything including every t-shirt he owns. I received a wonderful book of canning “Canning For A New Generation” from my sister-in-law for my birthday. It had a salsa recipe which we gave a try. The salsa had great flavor, though it wasn’t as spicy as we’d like. We figure we’ll just add a dash of Siracha to it. Overall it was a good experience. It is always fun to try new things as a cook, and there is always something to learn and improve upon.
Enjoy the series of images!
Charlene Champion Photography 
I love the drip on that gritty chip! Nice softly bright background colors behind the dipped chip which is coming up from light, & dark colors amidst a fluted dish. I loved your comment about gardening being the gift that keeps on giving! Your focus on the tomatoes is unbelievable Charlene! The group of four tomatoes, & the light through the leaves are as pretty as flowers! I wonder what the final shape of that pepper is! I liked the round shapes of light on each fruit of the friendly mound. I’ll bet you both had fun staring at the cooking salsa. Looking at your salsa photo makes me feel like I’m right there cooking!