Zucchini Relish

Back when we had two small children, Ken and I tried our hand at canning. We had a neighbor with a large garden, and he often shared his surplus. We canned tomatoes, green beans, pickles, and zucchini relish. My favorite of these was zucchini relish, which I hadn't thought about for many years...until my friend in town gave me two large zucchini. I couldn't resist ~ found the recipe, fired up the food processor [which we didn't have lo those many years ago when we grated everything by hand], and put together a batch of relish. It's hard to capture the beauty of this particular relish, and I finally resorted to taking a jar outside with the hope that the natural light would shine through the beautiful color ~

I will share the recipe with the caveat that it is sweet. I remembered that after a taste test, when I also remembered that I cut down on the sugar in the days when I made a second batch.

Zucchini Relish (makes 7 pints)

Grate 10 cups of zucchini and 4 cups of onion. In a large pan combine the two and add 5 Tbsp. pickling salt; let sit 8-10 hours.

Rinse and drain.

Grate 2 red peppers and 2 green peppers; add those to the zucchini and onion mix with 1 Tbsp. cornstarch, 1 Tbsp. tumeric, 1/2 tsp. pepper, 5 cups sugar, and 2 1/2 cups white vinegar.

Mix everything and bring to a boil. Simmer 30 minutes. Pack into hot jars and process 15 minutes in boiling water bath.

This is good with anything grilled, and we will enjoy it all winter long as a reminder of the taste of summer.