The benefits of friends who garden

It's summertime here and with summer comes gardens and fresh produce! Now, I wasn't on the ball enough, or nearly energetic enough to actually plant my own garden. I wish....maybe next year. I do, however, have an awesome friend who planted a HUGE garden and let me come this past week to gather some green beans. I was really excited! Not because I like to eat green beans all that much and neither do my kids. Huh, wonder where they got that from? Anyway, the kids were wondering what all the excitement was over these silly green things. Well, it goes back to my childhood you see. My mom canned these wonderful things she called Dilly beans. (kinda like pickled green beans, only I don't like pickles and I like these) I can remember watching my mom make these and canning them and waiting and waiting and waiting for her to let us open a jar and eat them. I was a very patient child *cough* *cough*. I loved them and could eat a whole jar if she'd let me :) So I gathered my supplies and made a batch yesterday. I was going to make my kids wait and wait and let the beans marinate in the jars just like my mom did. BUT, one of the jars sadly didn't seal. Aw, shucks! Now we have to eat them *wink* I gave one to each of my kids and by the time I got to the last kiddo, there were hands stuck out waiting for more. Hmm, a way to get my children to eat a vegetable! There was a lot of "can I have more?" and some "Mmmm" and even one who said, "I think I'll use my B-day money to buy beans so you can make more.' Hehehe. I think it's great. So I'm going to pass along the recipe just in case there is someone else out there who wants to know. Oh, and a couple pictures of my cute little helper.

Dilly Beans

Snap beans to length and pack loosely in hot, wide mouth, pint jars. To each pint add:

1-2 heads fresh dill

1/2 tsp. mustard seed

1 clove garlic (I used minced from the giant costco jar)

Make a brine (in a 2qt pan) of: (for each pint)

1/2 cup vinegar

1 cup water

1 1/2 tsp. pickling salt (I used reg. salt)

Bring a big pot of water to a boil. Fill hot jars with ingredients then fill to within 1/2" of top with brine. Process in water bath 10 minutes. Serve like you would pickles.

I think these really are best if you wait a couple of weeks before opening, but the ones that we had just the morning after making were still Yumm-O!

And here's my sweet little helper. She cut off the ends of the beans for me, it was very cute :)