DID YOU WIN THE GIVEAWAY?

Thanks to everyone who entered my giveaway for the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving.  I wish I had one to send to everyone.

The actual winner is Amanda Perez.  I have sent an email to her and hopefully she will respond soon.  If I don't hear from her, I will pick another random number and let you know if that person is you.

Thanks again and I hope you all keep canning. 

WHAT TO DO WITH THOSE GIANT ZUCCHINI

Have you ever grown zucchini and one day you go out to check on them and you find a giant one!  How in the world do they grow so fast?

Well, don't toss them out.  They are still very good.  I make several batches of zucchini bread from them.  You can make zucchini cake, bread, cookies and muffins. 

My brother is the one who is growing the zucchini this year and I asked him to let some of his get big for me to use.

Nope, not for anything I have already mentioned.  I wanted to can zucchini pineapple.  That's right!  You read that correctly. 

So what is zucchini pineapple, you ask?  Well, it's zucchini that taste just like pineapple and you can use it just like you would any pineapple.  It's also a wonderful way to use up all that zucchini and get your kids to eat it without even knowing.

Want to learn how to make it?  OK, then read on.

You need to peel you zucchini.  I cut mine up in smaller sizes as it's much easier to handle.

I used a knife but I guess you could use a potato peeler if you wanted to.

Now, take out all the seeds.  A mellon baller is easy to use for this.

Then cut up your zucchini into the size you want.  If you want to have "crushed pineapple" then just grate it up. 

I wanted chunks.

In a large pot add 46 oz. canned unsweetened pineapple juice, 1 1/2 cups bottled lemon juice and 3 cups of sugar.  Then add your zucchini.

Bring it to a boil and then simmer for 20 minutes.

Fill your hot, clean pint size jars with the zucchini and liquid.  Leave 1/2 inch headspace.  Adjust your lids and process in a water bath for 15 mins.

Remove and wait for the ping sound.

The recipe actually calls for you to use 4 quarts of zucchini but I only used the one large one so I had extra liquid left over and I only got 4 pints of zucchini pineapple. 

If you use the 4 quarts of zucchini you should get 8-9 pints.

If you are like me and don't use all the zucchini you will be left with at least 1/2 the liquid and you can make jelly from it by adding pectin to it.  

I couldn't wait to taste this so I left one piece out to cool off and eat.  I was so shocked that it really does taste like you are eating pineapple and it even looks like it too.

Hope you will try this too and let me know what you think.