10.07.2011

Jam I'm good

I decided that this year I would learn to put up food.  This decision is a year in the making.  I tend to move a bit slowly on new things because I usually have 70 gazillion other things going on in my life at that exact time.

I bought a book on canning and preserving last year.  Read through it and put that book on a shelf.

Then this year, I took a class on canning.  Baby steps.

The class, (pause for effect) was a bit of a waste.  I certainly could have learned all of it on youtube.  And had already learned most of it in my book.  And it was a bit pricey.

The important thing is that I am learning to try and trying to learn.  Let that sink in for a while.

My goal was to can tomatoes.  I have been using so much store bought canned tomato this year.  I thought to myself, "how much tastier would my own canned tomatoes taste!"  Plus, I am kind of thrilled by the fact that people used to live without processed food of any kind.  They had to live off the land.  (Hence the CSA). They had to put hard work into living.  Holy crap that's amazing!  So, I kind of like the idea of having a larder in my basement (which right now is a Bank of America) where I keep all sorts of preserved foods for the lean winter months.

No tomatoes have been canned and my larder is not at this juncture a "thing".  I did manage to put up some jam with a friend.  Here are some pics and some things I learned.
First Lesson.  This is a lot of fucking fruit.  Do not think that you will can this much fruit in one day.  We only got through the grapes, peaches and plums.  And we were literally canning for 8 hours straight.


2nd lesson: Concord grapes are sweet and need lemon juice added to them to balance the sugar you will be added.  We did two sets of grapes.  Our first batch without pectin, our second batch with.  Bizarrely, the batch without pectin set and the batch with pectin did not.  Which means I have grape syrup that needs a purpose.

Our grapes we did with cloves.  Grapes + cloves = delicious.



Lesson number 3: Plums pair very well with rum, peaches with bourbon.  The Peach/Bourbon is by far the best thing ever made by a human being and can be enjoyed on ice cream and yogurt or a spoon.

This was most of our yield:

Lesson number 4: DO NOT!!!!!!!!  And I am serious here, do not try to use regular tongs to can. 

You will burn yourself, on your arm, your chest and your eyeball.  Serisouly.  This little lady can no longer be the shoulder model she has always wanted to be because of improper tong use.
They make special tongs, just for canning. 
You can buy them for $11.  It is well worth it.  Amazon will deliver them straight to your door.  Get some.

As my dad would say, Prior Proper Planning would have Prevented this. 

More on the canning misadventures at a later date.  And perhaps I will actually teach you how to can.

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