I still love cooking, with a special fondness for baking and preserving. But I have to say that my stamina and attention span for long involved processes has diminished.
So my favorite tools of the season are the Instant Pot, immersion blender, and food mill.
I've made two batches of marinara by simply throwing everything in the pot. Well, not exactly throwing - there is some rough chopping involved, and the onion and carrot and garlic get a bit of saute in the olive oil first. Then when it's all done and cooled some, I blitz it in the pot.
I've been portioning this out, mostly as one cupfuls for one person's pasta, and freezing it.
But I've had an idea which I hope will turn out to be a bright one. I'm going to make the recipe one more time, subbing peppers, sweet and hot, for the carrot and some of the onion, and using vinegar (sherry?) as the liquid instead of the wine called for in the original recipe guideline. When it's whizzed "to the desired consistency," as the recipes say, I'll have salsa. With my handy pH strips I can see if it's then okay to can, and do that to save a little freezer room.
Oh - and meanwhile I have some roasted small tomatoes, given the immersion blender treatment to use in tomato-herb bread.
Here's the guideline I've been using for the marinara:
https://www.simplyhappyfoodie.com/instant-pot-marinara-fresh-tomato-sauce/
Except with paste tomatoes - I have San Marzanos - using just one 6 ounce can of organic tomato paste to give it a little more backbone.
And https://www.daringgourmet.com/fresh-roasted-tomato-and-herb-bread/
This impossibly long blog entry has a good recipe for the bread, which has never met a cheese it didn't like.
Showing posts with label preserving. Show all posts
Showing posts with label preserving. Show all posts
Thursday, October 10, 2019
Monday, September 16, 2013
Harvest
I've just been looking back over what I have written about gleaning, because I am preparing my midpoint grant report (thank you again, Episcopal Community Services - but what a month for someone involved with ministries of gardening, gleaning and preserving to have to write a report!) and am gearing up to mentor my first senior project (SVUSD) in gleaning.
It seems like an annual occurrence and a perennial problem - getting down to writing about food at the most food intense time of the year!
Two gleaning days this week, and the challenge of placing apples in a year when things are early and plentiful. I've been feeling I must make something every evening with produce - what I call my squirrel complex - and I lost every weekend evening to one event or another - or just tiredness from two many different schmooze opportunities in one week, beginning with the Heirloom Festival. Oh well - I've seen lots of friends and colleagues in the last week - and do have my supply of applesauce in the pantry, and 30 jars of jam and chutney in the hall closet for the holiday fair at Trinity.
Tonight I made pesto for the freezer. I read a recipe that subbed pecans for the worth-their-weight pine nuts, so tried that. Not quite sure what I think. But I wasn't quite sure about sunflower seeds or cashews either. Nothing has quite the combo of sweet and resinous that pignolis do.
At the garden, so far the thieving vandals are ahead of the gophers in reducing the numbers of my winter squash crop. Tomatoes are at their peak now. Every time I do something with three or four pounds, I bring home as many two days later. Mountain Magic, with it's ping pong to golf ball sized fruit, is most productive and has been a hit with everyone I gave a plant to on Rogation Sunday. The romano pole beans have waned, but the late crop of french horticultural beans are racing the waning days to produce - and looking good.
I keep telling myself it's good to be tired because you are surrounded by produce. And that's about as profound a reflection as I can manage...
It seems like an annual occurrence and a perennial problem - getting down to writing about food at the most food intense time of the year!
Two gleaning days this week, and the challenge of placing apples in a year when things are early and plentiful. I've been feeling I must make something every evening with produce - what I call my squirrel complex - and I lost every weekend evening to one event or another - or just tiredness from two many different schmooze opportunities in one week, beginning with the Heirloom Festival. Oh well - I've seen lots of friends and colleagues in the last week - and do have my supply of applesauce in the pantry, and 30 jars of jam and chutney in the hall closet for the holiday fair at Trinity.
Tonight I made pesto for the freezer. I read a recipe that subbed pecans for the worth-their-weight pine nuts, so tried that. Not quite sure what I think. But I wasn't quite sure about sunflower seeds or cashews either. Nothing has quite the combo of sweet and resinous that pignolis do.
At the garden, so far the thieving vandals are ahead of the gophers in reducing the numbers of my winter squash crop. Tomatoes are at their peak now. Every time I do something with three or four pounds, I bring home as many two days later. Mountain Magic, with it's ping pong to golf ball sized fruit, is most productive and has been a hit with everyone I gave a plant to on Rogation Sunday. The romano pole beans have waned, but the late crop of french horticultural beans are racing the waning days to produce - and looking good.
I keep telling myself it's good to be tired because you are surrounded by produce. And that's about as profound a reflection as I can manage...
Monday, December 31, 2012
2012 in review
How instructive to look back through my calendar and this blog and see what was accomplished (and not) this year. Seems like I have not been paying as much attention to issues at the national and global levels, but I have also done more than in any previous year locally.
In January I did a late glean of some persimmons, and not much else.
In February the meeting schedule heated up. I planted some peas in my plot and started tomato and pepper seeds inside. Our clergy conference on wellness left a whole lot to be desired from the food perspective. What we ate was pretty good and some local, but the information about diet was devoid of any eco-justice awareness.
In March I began helping with stakeholder interviews for the Food Action Plan, and the communication committee of the Food System Alliance began meeting. Joe Valentine contacted me about his interest in gleaning, and I had a first meeting with Steve Schwartz about interfaith plans. I wondered why there were so few people from ag advocacy and food system organizations at the Volunteer Center's non-profit conference.
In April interviews and communication planning for the Alliance continued, and I gave away lots of plants, mostly tomatoes, for Earth Day at Trinity.
May was meeting heavy. I found myself missing a lot of meetings at my community garden because of so many other Saturday commitments.
June brought the beginning of meetings with folks forming the county Community Garden Network, lots of meetings and interviews for the gleaning project, and some writing of introductory materials for the Food Action Plan.
July was filled with still more meetings, interviews and schmoozing activities to drum up interest in gleaning. We enlisted the support of the Community Center and the Sonoma Valley Granged. I made my debut on Mornings in Sonoma as part of the launch.
In August we finally had an introductory meeting with gleaners and formally launched the Sonoma Valley Gleaning Project - on a way too hot evening for a room with too few fans and no A/C. First gleans were backyard table grapes and model vegetable plots at Cornerstone. August also was the beginning of tabling season, promoting the Alliance and its members at the county fair and Gravenstein Fair. I wrote some quiz questions about Sonoma County ag which we used to attract attention. Meanwhile, we began our preserving parties at Trinity with zucchini pickles and relish.
The first day of September El Dorado County Master Preservers did a demo on canning fall fruit at Trinity, and late in the month we had a jam session. We tweaked the recipe I'd found last year for tomato apple jam, and between church and home kitchens probably made way too much of it! Definitely the food trend of the year among Sonoma Episcopalians. We continued gleaning - mostly apples. I volunteered at the second annual Heirloom Expo. I met with some others in the deacon community and inspired some more gleaning and other food justice efforts around California. The Food System Alliance approved the Food Action Plan. The Interfaith Sustainable Food Collaborative was launched. And I wrapped up the month by cooking for a small retreat in 100 degree weather.
Gleaning moved from late apples to figs and walnuts in October. I created a display for the produce swap at the Sonoma Valley Grange (a partner in the gleaning project) Harvest Fair. The Food Action Plan was approved by the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors. It's hard to say what was the most fun: gleaning on beautiful autumn days, enjoying the harvest from my garden, or attending the sustainable food and wine hearing which State Senator Noreen Evans convened. I looked around that large hearing room at the city offices and, realizing how many I knew, thought, ah, these are my people.
In November the gleaning of harder to place produce began - things like persimmons and quinces. When you have to cook something it is not nearly as attractive to food programs and their clients and guests. I applaud Sonoma Valley Teen Services, where the teaching of cooking and nutrition has educated a group of young people who accept the challenge of trying anything in their small commercial kitchen. November also brought an opportunity to talk with a realtor friend about how the real estate community might cooperate with gleaning efforts around the county. I wonder what will happen with this? I was more successful at connecting folks from Gridley involved with agriculture development in Liberia with Ecology Action interns. Seems significant that this happened at a deacon's ordination. But again, I wait to see what happens next. How will these seeds grow?
As December began I realized that we had completed one full year of Food of the Month at Trinity. I noted today that I didn't always post my copy on each month's item here. We wrapped up November with masa harina, and began again with peanut butter. December is also the season of never leaving home without food - something baked with local fruit or nuts, or a preserve and some local cheese for the cheese board. And as we look to the new year, the Food Action Plan roll out begins to pick up speed as we seek endorsements from municipalities, businesses and organizations.
The Sonoma Valley Gleaning Project ended its first year (five months, really) with 1129 pounds gleaned, by 17 different volunteers, from 16 donors, on 20 occasions, to 6 local organizations.
What a year of local activity. But as I checked just now (could it have changed at the last minute?) the U.S. still doesn't have a farm bill, or even the extension of the 2008 version set to expire at midnight (in which time zone?)
In January I did a late glean of some persimmons, and not much else.
In February the meeting schedule heated up. I planted some peas in my plot and started tomato and pepper seeds inside. Our clergy conference on wellness left a whole lot to be desired from the food perspective. What we ate was pretty good and some local, but the information about diet was devoid of any eco-justice awareness.
In March I began helping with stakeholder interviews for the Food Action Plan, and the communication committee of the Food System Alliance began meeting. Joe Valentine contacted me about his interest in gleaning, and I had a first meeting with Steve Schwartz about interfaith plans. I wondered why there were so few people from ag advocacy and food system organizations at the Volunteer Center's non-profit conference.
In April interviews and communication planning for the Alliance continued, and I gave away lots of plants, mostly tomatoes, for Earth Day at Trinity.
May was meeting heavy. I found myself missing a lot of meetings at my community garden because of so many other Saturday commitments.
June brought the beginning of meetings with folks forming the county Community Garden Network, lots of meetings and interviews for the gleaning project, and some writing of introductory materials for the Food Action Plan.
July was filled with still more meetings, interviews and schmoozing activities to drum up interest in gleaning. We enlisted the support of the Community Center and the Sonoma Valley Granged. I made my debut on Mornings in Sonoma as part of the launch.
In August we finally had an introductory meeting with gleaners and formally launched the Sonoma Valley Gleaning Project - on a way too hot evening for a room with too few fans and no A/C. First gleans were backyard table grapes and model vegetable plots at Cornerstone. August also was the beginning of tabling season, promoting the Alliance and its members at the county fair and Gravenstein Fair. I wrote some quiz questions about Sonoma County ag which we used to attract attention. Meanwhile, we began our preserving parties at Trinity with zucchini pickles and relish.
The first day of September El Dorado County Master Preservers did a demo on canning fall fruit at Trinity, and late in the month we had a jam session. We tweaked the recipe I'd found last year for tomato apple jam, and between church and home kitchens probably made way too much of it! Definitely the food trend of the year among Sonoma Episcopalians. We continued gleaning - mostly apples. I volunteered at the second annual Heirloom Expo. I met with some others in the deacon community and inspired some more gleaning and other food justice efforts around California. The Food System Alliance approved the Food Action Plan. The Interfaith Sustainable Food Collaborative was launched. And I wrapped up the month by cooking for a small retreat in 100 degree weather.
Gleaning moved from late apples to figs and walnuts in October. I created a display for the produce swap at the Sonoma Valley Grange (a partner in the gleaning project) Harvest Fair. The Food Action Plan was approved by the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors. It's hard to say what was the most fun: gleaning on beautiful autumn days, enjoying the harvest from my garden, or attending the sustainable food and wine hearing which State Senator Noreen Evans convened. I looked around that large hearing room at the city offices and, realizing how many I knew, thought, ah, these are my people.
In November the gleaning of harder to place produce began - things like persimmons and quinces. When you have to cook something it is not nearly as attractive to food programs and their clients and guests. I applaud Sonoma Valley Teen Services, where the teaching of cooking and nutrition has educated a group of young people who accept the challenge of trying anything in their small commercial kitchen. November also brought an opportunity to talk with a realtor friend about how the real estate community might cooperate with gleaning efforts around the county. I wonder what will happen with this? I was more successful at connecting folks from Gridley involved with agriculture development in Liberia with Ecology Action interns. Seems significant that this happened at a deacon's ordination. But again, I wait to see what happens next. How will these seeds grow?
As December began I realized that we had completed one full year of Food of the Month at Trinity. I noted today that I didn't always post my copy on each month's item here. We wrapped up November with masa harina, and began again with peanut butter. December is also the season of never leaving home without food - something baked with local fruit or nuts, or a preserve and some local cheese for the cheese board. And as we look to the new year, the Food Action Plan roll out begins to pick up speed as we seek endorsements from municipalities, businesses and organizations.
The Sonoma Valley Gleaning Project ended its first year (five months, really) with 1129 pounds gleaned, by 17 different volunteers, from 16 donors, on 20 occasions, to 6 local organizations.
What a year of local activity. But as I checked just now (could it have changed at the last minute?) the U.S. still doesn't have a farm bill, or even the extension of the 2008 version set to expire at midnight (in which time zone?)
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Legislation, legislation
There's lots of news out there about the progress of the farm bill through the Congress. Some of it is better informed than others. I've been struck by how little attention NPR pays to the largest agricultural state in their coverage.
Two of our local guys published this op ed piece in the Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-imhoff-farm-bill-20120608,0,7923048.story
but I don't think their voices are loud enough to reach the other coast.
Meanwhile, I learned that a bill on preparing food for sale in the home could result in relaxing prohibitions on doing so in California as has been done in 30+ other states. AB1616 the California Homemade Food Act is making its way through the state legislature. It has cleared the Assembly, came to the full Senate, and was referred to the Senate Health Committee on June 7. This would allow, under certain guidelines, the preparation for sale of foods that do not need refrigeration. Baked goods that don't include cream fillings, meat and the like, for example, plus preserves of a certain pH or lower. Will it become law in time for this year's preserving season?
Two of our local guys published this op ed piece in the Los Angeles Times
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-imhoff-farm-bill-20120608,0,7923048.story
but I don't think their voices are loud enough to reach the other coast.
Meanwhile, I learned that a bill on preparing food for sale in the home could result in relaxing prohibitions on doing so in California as has been done in 30+ other states. AB1616 the California Homemade Food Act is making its way through the state legislature. It has cleared the Assembly, came to the full Senate, and was referred to the Senate Health Committee on June 7. This would allow, under certain guidelines, the preparation for sale of foods that do not need refrigeration. Baked goods that don't include cream fillings, meat and the like, for example, plus preserves of a certain pH or lower. Will it become law in time for this year's preserving season?
Friday, July 3, 2009
Food activity
I've been doing more with food lately than writing about it. I got my annual box of stone fruit from the Fruit Group in Cotati, and there are just a few nectarines left. The rest have been turned into salsa, conserve, jam and some unjarred goodies along the way. And I froze some to go into a crisp or cobbler with blackberries in a few weeks. It won't be long now for the free bounty of creekside berries - the fireworks I can hear as I type this are my first clue as to just what time of year it is.
In the garden we wait for tomatoes to ripen. I have lettuce, annual herbs, summer squash and beets, and I harvested my garlic. It's drying in the garage. Since the garages are somewhat loosely connected, I'm sure my neighbors wonder why they can smell garlic when they go to get their cars and motorcycles. I find the smell, the look, everything about it one of the more satisfying things I've done. It just did its thing underground from Thanksgiving to July 1 - et voila!
The one thing I have been thinking about is the opportunity to speak about food issues at Epiphany West at CDSP the last week in January. John Jeavons and I are going to be doing a three hour workshop, focusing on the boom in community gardens and the importance of small scale ego-agriculture. And I will have an opportunity to offer my CALL course on food and faith again in the spring of 2010. Seems like with increased interest in these things and the tie in to Epiphany West, we ought to be able to make it go.
And the one thing I have been writing, if you can call it writing, is compiling my tried and true preserve and condiment recipes from their various sources - scrawled over clippings and books with pages stuck together with jam! I was feeling the need to have them all in one place - for myself, and for some at the garden with whom I may share them.
In the garden we wait for tomatoes to ripen. I have lettuce, annual herbs, summer squash and beets, and I harvested my garlic. It's drying in the garage. Since the garages are somewhat loosely connected, I'm sure my neighbors wonder why they can smell garlic when they go to get their cars and motorcycles. I find the smell, the look, everything about it one of the more satisfying things I've done. It just did its thing underground from Thanksgiving to July 1 - et voila!
The one thing I have been thinking about is the opportunity to speak about food issues at Epiphany West at CDSP the last week in January. John Jeavons and I are going to be doing a three hour workshop, focusing on the boom in community gardens and the importance of small scale ego-agriculture. And I will have an opportunity to offer my CALL course on food and faith again in the spring of 2010. Seems like with increased interest in these things and the tie in to Epiphany West, we ought to be able to make it go.
And the one thing I have been writing, if you can call it writing, is compiling my tried and true preserve and condiment recipes from their various sources - scrawled over clippings and books with pages stuck together with jam! I was feeling the need to have them all in one place - for myself, and for some at the garden with whom I may share them.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Ahead of the trend
For more than a year - ever since a community gardener described to me his ill-conceived experiments in canning and I wondered why he wasn't dead - I have been thinking that we need to do much more to revive canning and preserving knowledge - in a word, reskill. I wanted to do a tomato canning party in the Thanksgiving Lutheran church kitchen last year, but the produce and an opportunity just never coincided. And just last week, thinking about teaching others, I realized I need to pull together my favorite canning and preserving recipes.
Well the New York Times has caught on. If home and community gardening are booming, so is doing something with that produce. Today's suite of features focuses on Eugenia Bone, a New Yorker who has written a canning cookbook.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/27/dining/27cann.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&ref=dining
The advice in the article seems pretty good to me, and there are references to other cook books in the "Dos and Don'ts" article.
I'd add to them an older title on my book shelf, Helen Witty's Fancy Pantry - which seems to have anticipated by a few decades the trend toward preserving for taste, not just frugality. But hey - there's no reason to trash simple canning either. I also picked up a book last summer with lots of good ideas - The Complete Book of Small-Batch Preserving.
The blogs mentioned in the articles seem pretty sound - but I've noted in the past that web preserving recipes vary widely, and some are simply not safe. If the acid content of a recipe seems low for water bath canning, compare it with a similar one in something standard and safety tested, like Putting Food By or the Ball or government recipes and guidelines on-line.
On my wish list for this summer is a rack for my 8 quart stock pot - like the one shown in the photos in the Times - so when I do four jar batches I don't need to get out the spackleware behemoth.
Well the New York Times has caught on. If home and community gardening are booming, so is doing something with that produce. Today's suite of features focuses on Eugenia Bone, a New Yorker who has written a canning cookbook.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/27/dining/27cann.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&ref=dining
The advice in the article seems pretty good to me, and there are references to other cook books in the "Dos and Don'ts" article.
I'd add to them an older title on my book shelf, Helen Witty's Fancy Pantry - which seems to have anticipated by a few decades the trend toward preserving for taste, not just frugality. But hey - there's no reason to trash simple canning either. I also picked up a book last summer with lots of good ideas - The Complete Book of Small-Batch Preserving.
The blogs mentioned in the articles seem pretty sound - but I've noted in the past that web preserving recipes vary widely, and some are simply not safe. If the acid content of a recipe seems low for water bath canning, compare it with a similar one in something standard and safety tested, like Putting Food By or the Ball or government recipes and guidelines on-line.
On my wish list for this summer is a rack for my 8 quart stock pot - like the one shown in the photos in the Times - so when I do four jar batches I don't need to get out the spackleware behemoth.
Friday, September 26, 2008
a conversation I could have had
I don't always listen to our local foodie radio program - in fact, I don't listen much - but this one caught my attention. Host Michele Anna Jordan and organic gardener Wendy Krupnik talk about preserving the harvest.
http://www.krcb.org/Podcasts/Radio-content/Podcasts.html
Just scroll down to "Mouthful" and listen to the September 21 program.
There's some sort of weird dialogue and music at the beginning, but hang in there.
I've been concerned, with the resurgence in home gardening, about all the people with no experience in home canning. Perhaps the best advice they give is to be sure to get a good reference book.
Like Wendy, I don't do pressure canning and I do have a passion for seedless blackberry jam - but my jars don't seem to come back at the same rate as hers do.
Like Michele, my best applesauce is gravensteins laced with zinfandel.
I do have one comment for both of them - the latest edition of the Joy of Cooking has restored the chapter on food preserving and some of the traditional recipes. The edition they are griping about is the one before this, I think.
My latest trick - not energy efficient, I am sure, but so much easier - is to roast tomatoes and assorted other vegetables tossed in olive oil, then just puree with the immersion blender. Instant thick sauce for pizza or pasta, which I can freeze in one person sized containers (re-used). Tonight I simmered some mushrooms in wine until all the wine was evaporated and added them to the tomato and veg puree. Now I've got to go heat it through one more time before packing it for freezing.
http://www.krcb.org/Podcasts/Radio-content/Podcasts.html
Just scroll down to "Mouthful" and listen to the September 21 program.
There's some sort of weird dialogue and music at the beginning, but hang in there.
I've been concerned, with the resurgence in home gardening, about all the people with no experience in home canning. Perhaps the best advice they give is to be sure to get a good reference book.
Like Wendy, I don't do pressure canning and I do have a passion for seedless blackberry jam - but my jars don't seem to come back at the same rate as hers do.
Like Michele, my best applesauce is gravensteins laced with zinfandel.
I do have one comment for both of them - the latest edition of the Joy of Cooking has restored the chapter on food preserving and some of the traditional recipes. The edition they are griping about is the one before this, I think.
My latest trick - not energy efficient, I am sure, but so much easier - is to roast tomatoes and assorted other vegetables tossed in olive oil, then just puree with the immersion blender. Instant thick sauce for pizza or pasta, which I can freeze in one person sized containers (re-used). Tonight I simmered some mushrooms in wine until all the wine was evaporated and added them to the tomato and veg puree. Now I've got to go heat it through one more time before packing it for freezing.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
I'm ready
for tomato jam
http://video.on.nytimes.com/?fr_story=bd8e5a5ef313aa789fb3e09fce707fd3760cec13
I will probably use the recipe in Fancy Pantry by Helen Witty, a cookbook I've relied on for 20 years. (I've already made the annual batches of seedless blackberry jam - with wild blackberries gathered from behind the community garden - and peach preserves with rum - with a gift of peaches from a parishioner's backyard tree in Ukiah.)
But the tomatoes are finally coming in - in this patchy weather year which slowed everything - and I'm ready for a new tomato turn.
http://video.on.nytimes.com/?fr_story=bd8e5a5ef313aa789fb3e09fce707fd3760cec13
I will probably use the recipe in Fancy Pantry by Helen Witty, a cookbook I've relied on for 20 years. (I've already made the annual batches of seedless blackberry jam - with wild blackberries gathered from behind the community garden - and peach preserves with rum - with a gift of peaches from a parishioner's backyard tree in Ukiah.)
But the tomatoes are finally coming in - in this patchy weather year which slowed everything - and I'm ready for a new tomato turn.
Friday, September 14, 2007
tomato tyranny and zucchini exuberance
I've been neglecting writing because I seem to be spending too much time with my own harvest and (literal) gleanings. As long as I have the oven on to bake zucchini muffins, I might as well roast the excess grape tomatoes for the freezer - that kind of thing.
I've also made muffins with the first pumpkin and grated some zucchini for the freezer, for more muffins later. And frozen some single portions of marinara and giardiniera sauce.
And as long as I have enough green tomatoes and a donation of some backyard pears, why not say yes to an ad for free apples? So tomorrow I can make and can green tomato mincemeat.
But I might have to make applesauce, too - there are so many. They are a beautiful variety - pink pearl (no, no - not erasers, apples) and would make beautiful sauce - or a galette or kuchen.
And with the apples came some tomatillos - and the poor woman was so tired of canning, I could not say no, take them home! No more produce! So instead of sitting with my knitting and watching a ballgame this evening, I made a small batch of salsa verde.
The apples also came with a copy of a recipe for zucchini relish. Frankly, I don't eat much relish - but I suppose it could be a novelty for the fantasy league reunion next winter. But as long as I can find anybody to take zucchini and crooknecks - still producing like their lives depended on it - and, of course, they do (since summer squash are harvested immature, they keep making new ones in pursuit of seeding the next generation) - I think I will keep giving them away.
One of the wonderful things about the garden project is the happy responses of people to whom I give extra produce. I don't know which is more edifying - to look at a colorful basket of tomatoes you grew yourself, or to see the happy smiles of people with whom you share them.
But really plants - time to slow down, and relax into fall, so I can get out of the kitchen in the evenings before the 10:45 weather report. I do want to extend the harvest, with local food put by to enrich winter meals. But I don't want to be building bigger barns.
I've also made muffins with the first pumpkin and grated some zucchini for the freezer, for more muffins later. And frozen some single portions of marinara and giardiniera sauce.
And as long as I have enough green tomatoes and a donation of some backyard pears, why not say yes to an ad for free apples? So tomorrow I can make and can green tomato mincemeat.
But I might have to make applesauce, too - there are so many. They are a beautiful variety - pink pearl (no, no - not erasers, apples) and would make beautiful sauce - or a galette or kuchen.
And with the apples came some tomatillos - and the poor woman was so tired of canning, I could not say no, take them home! No more produce! So instead of sitting with my knitting and watching a ballgame this evening, I made a small batch of salsa verde.
The apples also came with a copy of a recipe for zucchini relish. Frankly, I don't eat much relish - but I suppose it could be a novelty for the fantasy league reunion next winter. But as long as I can find anybody to take zucchini and crooknecks - still producing like their lives depended on it - and, of course, they do (since summer squash are harvested immature, they keep making new ones in pursuit of seeding the next generation) - I think I will keep giving them away.
One of the wonderful things about the garden project is the happy responses of people to whom I give extra produce. I don't know which is more edifying - to look at a colorful basket of tomatoes you grew yourself, or to see the happy smiles of people with whom you share them.
But really plants - time to slow down, and relax into fall, so I can get out of the kitchen in the evenings before the 10:45 weather report. I do want to extend the harvest, with local food put by to enrich winter meals. But I don't want to be building bigger barns.
Monday, June 11, 2007
Open season for canning
I've ordered a box of apricots from the Fruit Group in Cotati which I hope to pick up on Thursday. This is a fairly sweet deal - a family with orchards over in the Valley who take orders and then provide the fruit in quantity for those of us who like to make preserves, etc. , and don't grow our own here in this coastal county. Last year the nectarines I bought were actually ripe, far better than supermarket fruit for less than $1 per pound. I gave some away, ate some, and made chutney and preserves.
I finally read Barbara Kingsolver's paean to home canning tomatoes in the May-June Mother Jones. (Haven't afforded the book yet, and there are more than 200 people on the waiting list at the library.) She's right on about a couple of things, and says them better than I would have.
"I think of canning as fast food, paid for in time up front."
and, of frozen tomatoes,
"Having gone nowhere in the interim, they will still be local in February."
http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2007/05/seeing_red.html
Extending the season of our local food supply is what preserving is all about, to add variety when all that's in the market are root vegetables and apples. That's the way it was in my New England childhood before supermarkets stocked air freighted produce. Summers were punctuated by family parties to get the bumper crop of green beans or strawberries or tomatoes into the freezer. A task I took on around age 12 was foraging for wild strawberries, blueberries, thimbleberries, beach plums, rosehips, etc. - anything that I could make jelly or jam out of.
There's a persistence in this. In a month or six weeks I will go out in the hedgerows after one of the few things that are free in Sonoma County, blackberries, and love every moment of the tedium of making old fashioned seedless jam from them.
My mother didn't actually do much canning, as both she and her mother were always fascinated by new ways of doing things, and preferred freezing. Certainly the quality of some things - like the green beans, for example - were better preserved with proper freezing in a 0 degrees chest freezer. But canning, for those things that can easily and safely, and drying for some things, work okay, and are less energy intensive in the long run than freezing. When you can or dry, all the energy inputs for preservation are up front, and then things last a long time without losing quality.
The season for apricots is fleeting. I can buy good quality dried California apricots year round, but I'm fantasizing about just what kind of preserves or condiments I will have handy in my pantry to brighten meals next winter.
I finally read Barbara Kingsolver's paean to home canning tomatoes in the May-June Mother Jones. (Haven't afforded the book yet, and there are more than 200 people on the waiting list at the library.) She's right on about a couple of things, and says them better than I would have.
"I think of canning as fast food, paid for in time up front."
and, of frozen tomatoes,
"Having gone nowhere in the interim, they will still be local in February."
http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2007/05/seeing_red.html
Extending the season of our local food supply is what preserving is all about, to add variety when all that's in the market are root vegetables and apples. That's the way it was in my New England childhood before supermarkets stocked air freighted produce. Summers were punctuated by family parties to get the bumper crop of green beans or strawberries or tomatoes into the freezer. A task I took on around age 12 was foraging for wild strawberries, blueberries, thimbleberries, beach plums, rosehips, etc. - anything that I could make jelly or jam out of.
There's a persistence in this. In a month or six weeks I will go out in the hedgerows after one of the few things that are free in Sonoma County, blackberries, and love every moment of the tedium of making old fashioned seedless jam from them.
My mother didn't actually do much canning, as both she and her mother were always fascinated by new ways of doing things, and preferred freezing. Certainly the quality of some things - like the green beans, for example - were better preserved with proper freezing in a 0 degrees chest freezer. But canning, for those things that can easily and safely, and drying for some things, work okay, and are less energy intensive in the long run than freezing. When you can or dry, all the energy inputs for preservation are up front, and then things last a long time without losing quality.
The season for apricots is fleeting. I can buy good quality dried California apricots year round, but I'm fantasizing about just what kind of preserves or condiments I will have handy in my pantry to brighten meals next winter.
Friday, April 27, 2007
Moderation in all things...
including moderation. attributed to Mae West
Two articles in this Wednesday's New York Times have prompted me to do a little preaching on this theme.
The first article is about organic and related movements among grape growers and wine makers. "When the Wine Is Green" discusses the movement toward sustainability in the vineyards. Since I live in the wine country and care about the health of the land, I am all in favor of sustainable grape growing. I think sustainable is actually more progressive than organic, though it's generally understood that sustainable is a label used by those who don't want to go through formal organic certification. What I mean is - if you are organic and haul in manure from miles and miles away, that's not necessarily sustainable.
What I think is outlandish is "biodynamic" grape growing. I do know, having grown up on the Farmer's Almanac, that those who work the land have traditionally planted and done other tasks according to the phases of the moon. I think at some level this may make sense - though I don't know why. Since the moon does have a measurable effect on any body of water, it can affect weather patterns, etc.
But doing all one's gardening astrologically has to come under the heading of woo-woo science.
Steiner, who brought us biodynamic gardening, also brought us Waldorf schools. I love the fact that they teach knitting, but find their spirituality questionable, and wonder why any Christian parent would send their child to a Waldorf school. But then, I know many church folk aren't very reflective or questioning about pop spirituality in its various manifestations.
I'd also like to file a comment about organic wine. Organic grapes, si; organic wine, non. Organic wine is like home canning, only more risky, and someone else is doing it and expects you to pay a premium price for it.
The other article was on the locavore movement. Or loco-vores or yokel-vores as I learned are variations. If you can't get local grains or flour, and you like bread, go ahead and buy some. Do no be like the woman described in this article who bought local grain even though it had mouse droppings in it, and sieved them out. My word, hasn't she heard of hanta virus? dangerous strains of E.coli?
When I attended the local harvest fest in Willits last fall, I overheard someone say, "After all, the spice trade has been going on for millennia." Amen. Do as much of your food sourcing locally as you can, give up the produce flown in from Chile in winter - but if you need to buy salt or flour or whatever, just do your best to find out where it's from and make your peace with it. This is about consciousness, not about purity codes!
One other thing I was reminded of in Willits: preserving food is a lost art, but we would all have a lot more variety from our local sources if we revived it. A member of the LDS church, where, especially in rural areas, such traditions have been kept alive, had some demos and lots of information there in Willits. And while some may say, "get a freezer" I'd like to point out that freezing is the most energy intensive method of long term food preservation. Freezing requires energy inputs from the beginning of the process until you take the fish you caught last summer out to thaw. Canning and drying are energy intensive at the beginning, but then not. And properly canned foods last longer than frozen.
It's not practical for most of us to do pressure canning, and animals really do best, at least for modern tastes, with freezing (well, maybe drying/smoking works for some of it). But I regularly can applesauce and tomatoes, make the occasional batch of ketchup, and make jams, butters, chutneys of unwanted fruit. It's easy, and it sits on the shelf not requiring anything until I use it to liven up dull meals in seasons when there's not much variety in fresh produce.
I was fortunate to have a grandmother and mother who knew how to do these things, and to be around rural elders working for the church in Nevada who did, too. If you don't know how, find someone to teach you before it's too late.
Two articles in this Wednesday's New York Times have prompted me to do a little preaching on this theme.
The first article is about organic and related movements among grape growers and wine makers. "When the Wine Is Green" discusses the movement toward sustainability in the vineyards. Since I live in the wine country and care about the health of the land, I am all in favor of sustainable grape growing. I think sustainable is actually more progressive than organic, though it's generally understood that sustainable is a label used by those who don't want to go through formal organic certification. What I mean is - if you are organic and haul in manure from miles and miles away, that's not necessarily sustainable.
What I think is outlandish is "biodynamic" grape growing. I do know, having grown up on the Farmer's Almanac, that those who work the land have traditionally planted and done other tasks according to the phases of the moon. I think at some level this may make sense - though I don't know why. Since the moon does have a measurable effect on any body of water, it can affect weather patterns, etc.
But doing all one's gardening astrologically has to come under the heading of woo-woo science.
Steiner, who brought us biodynamic gardening, also brought us Waldorf schools. I love the fact that they teach knitting, but find their spirituality questionable, and wonder why any Christian parent would send their child to a Waldorf school. But then, I know many church folk aren't very reflective or questioning about pop spirituality in its various manifestations.
I'd also like to file a comment about organic wine. Organic grapes, si; organic wine, non. Organic wine is like home canning, only more risky, and someone else is doing it and expects you to pay a premium price for it.
The other article was on the locavore movement. Or loco-vores or yokel-vores as I learned are variations. If you can't get local grains or flour, and you like bread, go ahead and buy some. Do no be like the woman described in this article who bought local grain even though it had mouse droppings in it, and sieved them out. My word, hasn't she heard of hanta virus? dangerous strains of E.coli?
When I attended the local harvest fest in Willits last fall, I overheard someone say, "After all, the spice trade has been going on for millennia." Amen. Do as much of your food sourcing locally as you can, give up the produce flown in from Chile in winter - but if you need to buy salt or flour or whatever, just do your best to find out where it's from and make your peace with it. This is about consciousness, not about purity codes!
One other thing I was reminded of in Willits: preserving food is a lost art, but we would all have a lot more variety from our local sources if we revived it. A member of the LDS church, where, especially in rural areas, such traditions have been kept alive, had some demos and lots of information there in Willits. And while some may say, "get a freezer" I'd like to point out that freezing is the most energy intensive method of long term food preservation. Freezing requires energy inputs from the beginning of the process until you take the fish you caught last summer out to thaw. Canning and drying are energy intensive at the beginning, but then not. And properly canned foods last longer than frozen.
It's not practical for most of us to do pressure canning, and animals really do best, at least for modern tastes, with freezing (well, maybe drying/smoking works for some of it). But I regularly can applesauce and tomatoes, make the occasional batch of ketchup, and make jams, butters, chutneys of unwanted fruit. It's easy, and it sits on the shelf not requiring anything until I use it to liven up dull meals in seasons when there's not much variety in fresh produce.
I was fortunate to have a grandmother and mother who knew how to do these things, and to be around rural elders working for the church in Nevada who did, too. If you don't know how, find someone to teach you before it's too late.
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