Salsa is an excellent option for a prolific chili gardener—it’s endlessly flexible (which is probably why Rosie “has no recipe") and can use up lots of chilies and tomatoes from the garden. Do make sure to follow good canning practices; check out your local ag school for guidelines.

We love this concept. Chard balls: blanched chard and collards, liquid squeezed til dry, vacuum-sealed and frozen into “tennis balls.”

You can similarly store zucchini—barely sauté them with onions and freeze. For a really quick winter side dish, Rosie defrosts and heats the mixture, drizzles it with spices bloomed in hot oil and tops with fresh herbs.

Infused vinegar: how present Rosie gifts future Rosie with a complex vinaigrette. She chooses the flowering herb nasturtium, but you could opt for a number of mixtures—fennel flowers and dill or flowering thyme and oregano.

Rosie's Nasturtium-Infused Vinegar:

16 ounces apple cider or white wine vinegar
2 cups mixed nasturtium leaves and flowers
A few sprigs of two of the following: fresh dill (or two dill heads), rosemary, thyme, or fennel fronds (or two fennel heads)
1 teaspoon black peppercorns
1 teaspoon coriander seeds, whole
1 bay leaf

Equipment:

1 quart glass jar with tightly closing lid, sterilized (5 minutes in boiling water is good), measuring cups and spoons

To make:

Fill jar with nasturtium leaves and flowers, herbs and spices. Pour apple cider vinegar into jar until it covers the dry ingredients. Cover loosely with lid or a piece of cheesecloth anchored by a rubber band. Let sit for at least one week and up to three weeks (tasting until you like the flavor). Pour the vinegar through a fine mesh sieve into another sterilized jar, discarding the solids. Close tightly with lid and store in the refrigerator.

If you’re new to canning, let pickled jalapeños be your entry. Rosie uses Sean Timberlake's recipe, which, in her words, “is easy and always works.”