Tomato Pickle in the Manger and the new semester

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  Brianna shook her head. Claire had gone with Lizzie as escort to attend a birth at one of the farms at the far side of the cove; if the child hadn’t arrived before sunset, they would stay the night at the Lachlans’. 
  “No. She said if she wasn’t back, I was to bring you up some supper, though.” She knelt and began to unpack the small basket she had brought, laying out small loaves of bread stuffed with cheese and tomato-pickle, a dried-apple tart, and two stone bottles—one of hot vegetable broth, the other of cider. 
  “That’s kind, lassie.” He smiled at her and picked up one of the bottles. “Will ye have eaten yet, yourself?” 
  “Oh, yes,” she assured him. “Plenty.” She had eaten, but couldn’t resist a quick look of longing at the fresh rolls; the early faint sense of malaise had left her, replaced by an appetite mildly alarming in its intensity. 
  He saw her glance, and with a smile, drew his dirk and sliced one of the rolls in half, handing her the bigger piece.

 --Diana Gabaldon. Drums Of Autumn 

My tomatoes are ripening faster than I can use them and after a week away from Colorado, there were much more red than green when I got home.  I'd planned to use my own garden harvest to make the relish, but the recipe requires three pounds of tomatoes.  After all my complaining about too many red tomatoes when I returned home, it turned out I didn't have enough.  Figures.  The author had added a note about using grape or cherry tomatoes for the recipe so I added a container of grape tomatoes to mine.

The relish is supposed to be savory, but it's a sweeter savory than I was expecting.  The sweet of the brown sugar and honey aren't brought down by the apple cider vinegar as much I thought.  Last night we tried it on salmon burgers and it was tasty, so today I added a layer to the meatloaf I was having for lunch and 'Jesus H Roosevelt Christ' it was good.  It was hard to believe the recipe only makes one 16oz jar of relish.

As with any of my creations I'll make a change or two for the next batch.  Not sure of all changes yet, but definitely will not use the smaller tomatoes and will make sure they're are riper than what I had.  Directions indicated 1" wedges and the grape tomatoes didn't have to be cut, but using that size tomato has too much skin. The end result lacks meat in comparison.  I'd thought about canning this and giving it away for holiday presents, but the recipe only makes two cups - I'd have to buy half-pint jars.  Oh wait, that's not a bad thing.

The new semester has started!  Physical Health & Nutrition and Spirituality & Aging.  Knowing how much physical health and nutrition matter when trying to escape the jail of dementia I'm excited about the newer information. I like the idea of being the agnostic in the room when talking about Spirituality, so that will be fun too.  I'll write more about this in a few weeks.

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