Since I was little my family has canned. What is canning? The simplest answer is that it is a process of preserving food items (like jams, pickles, meat, sauces and other items). It is a way my ancestors kept food preserved for year round consumption before freezers were invented.
In some ways Canning is better than freezing. Example: of you freeze a homemade dish it is preserved. .. But once you go to eat it you must thaw it and reheat it. Lots of things can go wrong at that point. If you didn't carefully store it in the freezer or left it in there for an extended amount of time the food may become "freezer-burned" which can taste foul. Or, worse, you could reheat it wrong...ruining the texture. Some items have their texture ruined just by being frozen...for example...I strongly dislike the texture of rice that has been frozen, thawed, and reheated. It does not work for me. You could forget that the item was already sufficiently salted...so you add more and now your dish is a glorified salt-lick...inedible but for the most determined individuals. In comes Canning...the item you preserved is exactly the way you wished it to be. the texture and taste are frozen in time. (admittedly, some flavors mature over time. But still. You can eat the item right out of the Jar...or you can heat up the item, or even chill the item, and it is much less difficult (at least in my opinion) to ruin it. There is a reason that it was the preferred method for hundreds of years. And with the invention of mason jars, in 1858, meant it was ALSO PRETTY! You could now see the deep reds of cherries, the golden delight of peaches, and the green of all those pickles!
In some ways Canning is better than freezing. Example: of you freeze a homemade dish it is preserved. .. But once you go to eat it you must thaw it and reheat it. Lots of things can go wrong at that point. If you didn't carefully store it in the freezer or left it in there for an extended amount of time the food may become "freezer-burned" which can taste foul. Or, worse, you could reheat it wrong...ruining the texture. Some items have their texture ruined just by being frozen...for example...I strongly dislike the texture of rice that has been frozen, thawed, and reheated. It does not work for me. You could forget that the item was already sufficiently salted...so you add more and now your dish is a glorified salt-lick...inedible but for the most determined individuals. In comes Canning...the item you preserved is exactly the way you wished it to be. the texture and taste are frozen in time. (admittedly, some flavors mature over time. But still. You can eat the item right out of the Jar...or you can heat up the item, or even chill the item, and it is much less difficult (at least in my opinion) to ruin it. There is a reason that it was the preferred method for hundreds of years. And with the invention of mason jars, in 1858, meant it was ALSO PRETTY! You could now see the deep reds of cherries, the golden delight of peaches, and the green of all those pickles!
Now there are several types of Canning. There is a thing called Quick Pickling. In which you use the canning jar as a way of holding the items but they are not hermetically sealed. Typically these items are left either in the fridge or placed in cool dark places (if there is enough acid involved to keep the item from going bad). There is the Water Bath method...where a jar is sealed hermetically by boiling it in water for a certain amount of time which creates a vacuum. And then there is Pressure Cooker Sealing. This creates a much stronger vacuum seal that is imperative if you are going to do fish/meat and some veggies and fruit as well. Not sure why certain items won't stay sealed with the Water Bath Method...but there is decades of evidence that they do not. So, if your canning recipe calls for a water bath, go for it. But if it calls for Pressure Cooking...ONLY use the pressure cooker method as the other ones will lead only to sadness or sickness and sadness. Since the whole point of this practice is to create food that is both tasty and preserved it serves no purpose to flaunt the rules and create food that isn't those two things.
I know what you are thinking...this is too rigid a medium for your artistic self to bother with. However, that is simply not the case. Yes, the rules of sealing the jars are fairly rigid. But...other than that there really are few rules! you can make peach jam with peaches and nectarines if you so wish. who is to say no? the jam police? Not likely....and trust me...if it tastes good to you it matters not what they say in any case. You wish to add ginger to your peach nectarine jam? Maybe some cinnamon? Go for it! Want to call it something crazy besides peach nectarine jam...you may give it any name of your choosing it is your creation after all. One year my younger brother Tim made a jam with pears, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, sugar, and pectin. We called it "Trail By Fire" behind his back because it had so much Ginger in it you felt like your tongue was being scalded. He called it his "yummy pear jelly" It lasted YEARS because he, and the few friends he suckered into trying it, were pretty much the only ones who ate it. This is why tasting it before you seal those jars is essential. (as is working with a reliable recipe.) A little common sense helps. Had my brother thought about his recipe he would have probably considered that the 2 cups of Ginger to 6 cups of Pears Might be a bit much...but it sounded legit to him. And, to give him credit, he did eat all of it. Personally, I like to taste my mix before I apply the heat...that way I know it is balanced. Then once it becomes jam (after applying the heat, sugar, and pectin) I can taste it and think...dang, even better than before it was jam! I don't like surprises.
Now, I have been making Jam since i was five. There are pictures of me with my mom surrounded by jars in different stages of canning...everything from preserved peach halves (my arm was all the way up to my shoulder as I layered them carefully inside the Quart jar), there is a picture of my face scrunched in concentration as I carefully wiped the top of the jar off so the seal would stick properly, there is pictures of me leaning over the stove as I stirred the jelly...my face red from the heat and sporting a huge grin. If we do the math, that is several decades of jam making under my belt.
I prefer to make jam in the winter...when i take the berries I froze during the spring and summer and create my jam recipes...I used to follow strict recipes passed down from my mother, her mother, her mothers mother, my dad, my dad's mother, and so on. But, for the past six or so years I have been branching out. Sure, I keep the Blackberry Jam the same. There is nothing better than it...but the pear...I have experimented (this year I am going to try a pear rosemary jam for some savory sweet dishes I have in mind for winter) and I have become rather found of my mango peach cherry combo...not to mention the cherry strawberry. Those weren't flavors my family used together...but, I use them, because I love them...and having them together is wonderful to me. And honestly, what is the point of just doing strawberry. I could buy strawberry or peach, even pineapple or mango, at a well stocked store...but, my "special" combos are not so easily found. In fact,. I have never found some of them. I also like to use Vanilla sugar (which is easy as can be to make yourself...just drop a vanilla bean into your sugar container and wait a week and POOF you have vanilla flavored...and scented...sugar.) in my jam...and some spices. I find peaches and cinnamon to be a classic combo for me. I can stretch my artistic wings with my flavor combinations. I can also decide if I want to make a jam, a jelly, or a fruit preserve...same basic idea...but the execution is different. Jams are just that...you jam it all together and heat it and jar it...there is some texture,but fairly small. jelly's are strained and made to look pretty...usually clear without fruit chunks. Fruit preserves are like jam...but there are bigger chunks of fruit and they seem sweeter to me for some reason. Now, I find jelly too high maintenance and I don't prefer to eat fruit preserves...so, I make Jam. not because I haven't made the others or that I fail at making the others, but simply because I get more joy out of jam in both the making and the eating.
Occasionally, I get the urge to make jam in the summer. This is what is happening this year...however, it is too oppressively hot to sit in front of a hot pot stirring fruit until it becomes jam. So, what is an artist who is in the mood to create and preserve yummy tasting food supposed to do? Some might say, as my mother has frequently been doing, that I should just forget about it until winter when it will be more comfortable to do the jam. And I agree. Jam is simply out of the question. But, I come from stubborn people (as the jam making should have tipped you off to. Any set of people determined to keep food good despite what nature intended is too stubborn by half. And probably accidentally killed family members before perfecting their knowledge and craft. But I digress) So, fine. No Jam as it is too hot...that doesn't mean there aren't other items I cannot make. Now it is true I don't really like pickles and I haven't really got the space to indulge in quick pickles that would remain in my fridge. However, there is still things I can quickly create, that I wouldn't mind eating, that would also not create so much heat in my kitchen but would still make me feel like i was using my creative "preserving" juices...if you will. Because, let's face it...I am not yearning to just use my artistic skill...I wish to make something that I can eat in a few months time...and until I eat it I can look at it and think how wonderful I am because I created a way to preserve this tasty item for later.
Solution: find recipes that are small, require very little heat, and can be kept in my pantry without the aid of a refrigeration.
Item A: sweet pickled garlic cloves. Supposedly they are great for boosting one's immune system and they taste great to boot. Not sure, as it takes a month for them to be completely pickled. The best thing is that the recipe called for few ingrediants and was quick to make...and used NO heat! (I got the recipe from Pinterest)
Ingrediants: Garlic cloves, Honey, White Vinegar, a pinch of Salt.
Method: Fill a jar with peeled garlic cloves 3/4th of the way full, put in honey (I used raw wild flower honey as i love it and have a lot of it about) to about 1/3 of the way up the jar, drop in a pinch of salt (I used pink Himalayan salt even though the recipe called for kosher because I was mysteriously out of kosher salt...of course i found it later...someone had misplaced it) and then fill with white vinegar. Stir vigorously. then set aside in a cool dark place for 30 days. shaking or stirring every few days. (pictures of current progress so far shown below)
Verdict: these things are fantastic! And bizarrely crunchy! I have eaten then straight from the jar and added them to stir fry, and the meat and onions I use in my 15-minute-taco recipe, and they retain their crunchy bite. Added to the taco meat they gave a deep cherry - like flavor to the beef. I had difficulty NOT eating all of it for myself. I am so glad I made a gallon jar of them!
Item B: Balsamic Pickled White Button Mushrooms (this was from Pinterest too, but it is highly modified as there was ingredients I was allergic to in it before)
Ingrediants: button mushrooms, lime juice, balsamic vinegar, cider vinegar, salt, honey, and a pinch of garlic per jar
Method: put mushrooms in a pot of water with the lime juice and bring to a boil. let boil at a rolling boil for one minute (mine strangely smelled like coconut!). drain mushrooms well. in another pot bring to boil balsamic vinegar, cider vinegar, honey, and salt. once it is at a full boil cover, turn down, and let it simmer for 10 minutes. Pack half pint jars with mushrooms, leaving 1/2 inch head space. once vinegar mix is cooler pour over mushrooms. add one pinch of garlic per jar. Use water bath method for sealing jars (it should be noted that my mother really feels i should have used the pressure cooker method at this point even though the recipe said water bath). (photos below)
I am excited to see how everything turns out. Part of me is happy I did such small batches because they are now individual gems in my pantry. But, if they turn out to be scrumptious I will wish I had made more. This is a constant feeling in my life. I make a batch of glorious jam and adore it...then wish I had made more of it...but, honestly, i truly believe that the small batches are better. I might dislike making jam if i did a huge batch...and what if it didn't turn out...or worse...it was great but I got bored with the flavor after 12 jars of it...So, for me: Small artistic batches are great. it allows me to stretch my creative wings, keeps me from getting bored, and preserves a small delicious taste of summer to be eaten and relished even on the coldest and darkest of winter days.
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It's Autumn now...my personal favorite season. Still hot out...But it is bearable to make jam (and thank goodness it is as I am quickly running out of room in my freezer as it is so full of frozen jam bases! My family has threatened mutiny--start making jam or they will start tossing my bases out...luckily it is cool enough that this travesty can be avoided!
So, the last couple of weeks I have been jamming as if it was all I lived for. My days have gone like this: wake up, lay out jam bases to thaw, go to work, spend lunch planning which recipe I will use for jam, work more, get home, eat my dinner, make jam, water bath jam, put jam under towel to cool, go to bed, wake up, label and put jam away, lay out more bases, go to work.....and so on.
I am excited though. Jamming, quilting, and crafting oh my!
Happy Crafting, Seckmea.
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