All posts tagged preserving

That time of year again

Every year some friends generously allow us to go and collect apples from the old trees behind their house. The trees are tall and there’s always fun and games with a long pole to knock the apples off – they are simply too high up to pick by hand. Every year I completely forget to take photographs, and 2021 is no exception. Anyway, the apples end up a little bumped, but since they are cookers and I process them quite quickly, this is not a problem. The upshot is that every year in late September or October, I end up with a big tub full of apples and several days of work to convert them into a product that will be useable through the coming year. This seasonI have decided that the majority will be stewed and bottled, plus some used for sweet hot chilli sauce. Some years I make lots of juice, but we haven’t been drinking it much lately, so that is not my current priority. Of course, the abundance means that there is lots of opportunity for apple cakes, crumbles and pies, and today we indulged and had them with waffles and cream for brunch.

This old-fashioned approach to storing the the glut and not having to rely on what’s in the shops at any given time of year feels very much like rebellion – a quiet protest against the food system that most of us find ourselves unavoidably bound to. I love the seasonality of harvesting food; I love making use of local produce and exploring inventive ways to preserve it and value it; I love a cupboard full of sealed jars, squirrelled away for use during less productive seasons; and I love the kindness of those who share their bounty freely.

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by The Snail of Happiness on October 10, 2021  •  Permalink
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Posted by The Snail of Happiness on October 10, 2021

https://thesnailofhappiness.com/2021/10/10/that-time-of-year-again/

Currant Affairs

Whilst not quite as prolific as last year, the redcurrants have fruited well in 2021. I’m not a particular fan of blackcurrants, but the red ones I do like – both to accompany game and with yoghurt for breakfast. The vast number that appear all in one go makes it essential to preserve them and, unless I want a large part of my freezer entirely filled with the things, the answer is bottling. Actually, I like bottled fruit because it’s instant – at least when it comes to serving it. The preparation takes a little while, but redcurrants are an ideal candidate for bottling because they are nice and acidic, so preserve well.

Once picked (quite a time-consuming activity), they have to be stripped from their stalks (I use a fork) and any debris removed. This year, I still had some fruit left in the freezer from pervious harvests, so I bottled that with most of the current currant crop and put about a kilo of raw, fresh fruit in the freezer to use in baking in the coming year.

I simply cook the cleaned fruit with a bit of sugar – no need to add water, it’s juicy enough – then ladle into hot Kilner jars. Once the lids have been screwed down, the jars go into a water bath for about 25 minutes. Seals form once the jars are out and cooling, and the crop can then feed me for the coming year.

Redcurrants are one of my favourite things to grow and preserve – they aren’t particularly demanding in the garden and they bottle easily and successfully. I just wish all my crops were this easy!

14 Comments
by The Snail of Happiness on August 1, 2021  •  Permalink
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Posted by The Snail of Happiness on August 1, 2021

https://thesnailofhappiness.com/2021/08/01/currant-affairs/

A fruity post

Over the years I have become fastidious about bottling fruit, so that I have a supply all year round with which to make desserts and breakfasts. It all started with apples given to me by friends and family. With limited space in the freezer, I learned how to preserve the (free) bounty in jars. I progressed on to bought fruit – pineapple, peaches, nectarines, plums… available cheaply and in abundance for limited times of the year.

This year, however, we’ve tried to minimise our travelling (for quite some time we were only allowed to go out for essentials and then ideally only distances less than 5 miles) and so there were few opportunities to acquire exotic fruits (the place we get them from is local for a rural area but many more than five miles away). It’s probably been a good thing, though, because it has encouraged me to use what’s on the doorstep. So this year the jars are once more filled with apples, but there are also red currants (it was a spectacular year for them) and rhubarb. There are still some jars of plums and pineapple, but most of the produce came from our garden or the gardens of friends. I’m currently still working on the 2020 apple harvest and have yet to juice any of them, but the cupboard is looking nice and full, and it will certainly see us through many more months with relatively few food miles.

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by The Snail of Happiness on September 22, 2020  •  Permalink
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Posted by The Snail of Happiness on September 22, 2020

https://thesnailofhappiness.com/2020/09/22/a-fruity-post/

Apples of my own

As you may know, our garden isn’t very big. I do what I can with it, but there is only limited space. As a result, I don’t have room (unlike Sister of Snail) for an orchard. However, a few years ago,we were given an apple on a very dwarf rootstock, which now lives with the chickens… which liberally apply fertiliser around it and make it very happy.

The variety is an interesting old one “Ashmead’s Kernel”, which is a good dual purpose variety with a great flavour, although visually it’s not very appealing. It takes a few years to start fruiting well and, apparently , it can be quite pernickety about pollinators, but this year in our garden it thrived. I used some of the fruit in my most recent batch of sweet hot chilli sauce, but this morning I picked the rest of the crop for bottling.

Not the prettiest apples, but maybe the most delicious

It doesn’t look much in the bucket, but once prepared, there were enough apples to make six 500ml jars. I’m so happy to finally be bottling my own apples from the garden. It’s not enough to keep us going through the year, but it sure is satisfying.

Bubbling away

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by The Snail of Happiness on October 18, 2019  •  Permalink
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Posted by The Snail of Happiness on October 18, 2019

https://thesnailofhappiness.com/2019/10/18/apples-of-my-own/

In the limelight

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Excellent books – especially if you don’t want to make huge quantities.

Since Friday I’ve been very busy, on and off, with lime-related activities – zesting, juicing and freezing quite a lot of them. I loved the suggestion (from several of you) about making lime curd, but then dithered over which recipe to use. Finally, I settled on one from Marisa McClellan’s book Food in Jars (which I’m pretty sure was recommended to me by one of you two or three years ago). I chose this recipe because it suggests using a boiling water bath after putting the curd into the jars to extend the life to as long as four months, compared to the usual week or two (not that it’s likely to last four months in this house). Whilst looking for the recipe I browsed through Marisa’s other book Preserving by the Pint and discovered an interesting recipe for something called Caramelized Meyer Lemon Syrup – a sauce that she suggests drizzling over yoghurt or waffles. Basically you caramelize some sugar and then stir in lemon juice and zest – I decided to have a go at a lime version.

So, this morning I set to and zested, juiced, stirred, boiled and bottled and produced two small jars of Caramelized Lime Syrup and two of Zesty Lime Curd:

I was devastated to realize that I’d got slightly too much lime curd for the jars, so I was forced to consume the left-over bit on some toast for my lunch.

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Homemade bread and homemade lime curd, using eggs laid by our own hens.

I still have a dozen limes unprocessed and I think a lime drizzle cake is on the cards for the weekend.

16 Comments
by The Snail of Happiness on February 27, 2019  •  Permalink
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Posted by The Snail of Happiness on February 27, 2019

https://thesnailofhappiness.com/2019/02/27/in-the-limelight/

The fruits of my labours

Knowing what goes into the food that I eat is very important for me. Whilst we do buy a few ready-made foods, I tend to cook most things from scratch and I love using fresh ingredients. Since this isn’t always possible, I work hard over the summer and autumn to fill my store cupboard with bottles and jars of provisions to see us through the year. Today I’ve done the last of the apple juicing for this year and now all I have are a few fresh cooking apples to use over the coming weeks and a bowl of eating apples to enjoy fresh. The preserving is mostly done for now.

So, I’d like to present this year’s store cupboard:IMGP4380Not bad, eh?

25 Comments
by The Snail of Happiness on October 22, 2017  •  Permalink
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Posted by The Snail of Happiness on October 22, 2017

https://thesnailofhappiness.com/2017/10/22/the-fruits-of-my-labours/

Time to ketchup

… apologies for the poor word-play, I’m not feeling entirely myself…

Anyway, after a few days away from the screen, I thought I would return with my latest culinary adventure. You may recall that I had a surplus of mushrooms… I was just going to use them for ‘normal’ cooking, but then Kate Chiconi planted the idea of mushroom ketchup in my mind and the more I thought about it, the more interested I became in making it. So, after not finding anything suitable in my cookery books, I resorted to the internet and located a recipe that seemed promising here at Revolutionary Pie, which looks like a very interesting blog to follow.

The basic method is to chop up your mushrooms and sprinkle them with salt, before mashing them up a bit and then leaving them for the liquid to seep out overnight. The next day, you boil them up with a chopped onion, lemon zest, spices, horseradish and vinegar, then extract the liquid by putting it in muslin and giving it a good squeeze. The liquid is them heated up, bottled and processed in a hot water bath to preserve it. The solids can be oven-dried, whizzed in a food processor and used to flavour soups and stews.

When I told Mr Snail that I was going to make mushroom ketchup, he said that he didn’t think it would be as nice as tomato ketchup on his chips. He was much happier when I explained that it was to use as a flavouring for meats and other dishes (similar to Worcestershire Sauce). Of course, the proof of the ketchup is in the eating, and I haven’t used any yet. However, it was easy enough to make and it lends itself to experimenting with adding all sorts of spices. Also, unlike Worcestershire Sauce, it is suitable for vegetarians.

So, thank-you, Kate for the inspiration – I will report back.

12 Comments
by The Snail of Happiness on August 29, 2017  •  Permalink
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Posted by The Snail of Happiness on August 29, 2017

https://thesnailofhappiness.com/2017/08/29/time-to-ketchup/

Filling the store cupboards

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plenty to choose from

I was planning to spend this weekend doing crafty things, but Friday morning dawned bright and sunny and I decided that it was an ideal time to take a trip to Newcastle Emlyn to buy cheap fruit and vegetables. I’ve written previously about the stall that appears early every Friday morning, and the bargains to be had. I visited a few weeks ago, but I wanted to take advantage of the summer produce once again… especially now I have those new cupboards to fill. So, I bought boxes of tomatoes, mushrooms, nectarines and pineapples as well as a small sack of onions; I added a couple of bunches of carrots, a cauliflower and some garlic to my haul and this is what the back of my car looked like for the trip home:

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no chance of those tomatoes and nectarines escaping!

That was Friday morning and since then I have spent most of my time in the kitchen chopping and peeling, roasting and milling, boiling and bottling. I’ve used most of my purchases, as well as veg from the garden and limery.

Passata

And now I have bottles and bottles of passata, pineapple and nectarines, a big pot of vegetable Bolognese sauce and another (almost – it’s actually still cooking as I write this) of courgette and carrot soup. I’m going to freeze the latter two in portions as I need to keep the rest of my bottles for apples later in the season.

And now I need a good long sit down. Have you had a busy weekend too?

33 Comments
by The Snail of Happiness on August 20, 2017  •  Permalink
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Posted by The Snail of Happiness on August 20, 2017

https://thesnailofhappiness.com/2017/08/20/filling-the-store-cupboards/

Relishing a fruity bargain

Every summer I make a trip or two to buy some exotic fruit and hunt for edible bargains. Early on Friday mornings, throughout the year, a fruit and veg supplier sets up his stall in Newcastle Emlyn and, amongst the standard green grocer’s fare, there are many bargains to be had. You can’t guarantee what he will be selling off cheaply and the best bargains need to be cooked or eaten quickly, but it’s always worth a visit. In the past I’ve bought very cheap nectarines, tomatoes, mushrooms, mangoes… and I’ve brought them home for bottling.

So yesterday, rather than my early morning swim, I had an early morning shopping trip. The best bargain I found was organic pineapples – two for £1. The tops were looking somewhat worse for wear, but the fruits themselves seemed generally sound, and I bought four. I also managed to get some peaches, although they didn’t have any big boxes and I will be returning in the hope of finding some more later in the summer.

Earlier in the year we were served pineapple and chilli relish at a restaurant and I had managed to recreate this at home with tinned pineapple (which, until then, I hadn’t bought for years). The fresh ones, along with the current abundance of home-grown chillies meant that it was the perfect time to make a larger batch of this relish. I simply chopped the pineapple, added a little sugar (to help with the preservation) and water, and cooked it up with chillies. First I added a Hungarian black, then a Romanian yellow and finally two lemon drops before I reached the desired heat. The addition of three chopped red chillies that have no heat (a disappointment from 2015 and stored in the freezer) added a little colour and also a visual signal of the contents (lest we should accidentally mistake it for something to eat for dessert). Into hot 0.25l Kilner jars and twenty minutes in a hot water bath, and the relish was ready for storage. Very easy.

This morning I bottled some of the peaches. The flesh is pale, but the syrup is a beautiful pink colour:

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bottled peaches

And finally I’ve making a few jars of peach, lime and red currant jam. We are not big jam-eaters, but it is nice in a Victoria sponge. We’ve got loads of red currants this year and still haven’t used up all last year’s crop, plus I found some lime halves in the freezer with their zests removed (having been used in a lime drizzle cake a while ago),  so I thought I’d do something creative. Peach jam does not set without the addition of pectin, so I am hoping that the currants and lime will be sufficient.

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peach, red currant and lime jam

I love food preservation – opening one of these jars in winter will be like bringing summer into the house.

21 Comments
by The Snail of Happiness on July 22, 2017  •  Permalink
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Posted by The Snail of Happiness on July 22, 2017

https://thesnailofhappiness.com/2017/07/22/relishing-a-fruity-bargain/

Those pesky pesticides

Having written, the other day, about growing your own food to avoid unwanted chemicals, I’ve been doing a little more thinking. A friend asked me whether washing vegetables in dilute vinegar would help reduce pesticide residues more than washing with water alone. My initial thought was that, even if this did work, it would only help with surface residues, not pesticides that the plant had absorbed. I did do a bit of reading around and I didn’t find an answer to the original question but I did come across an interesting piece from Cornell University, entitled Can you wash pesticides off your fruits and vegetables? They note that various heat treatment (e.g. pasteurisation, canning and frying) have been found to reduce pesticides, as have milling, brewing, baking, malting and wine-making, but that drying and dehydrating can increase pesticide levels. Their conclusion:

Washing your produce certainly removes pesticide residue from the outside, but there’s no clear data showing whether it reduces pesticide exposure compared to consuming organic fruits and vegetables.

So, it does seem that the safest option is to grow or buy fruit and vegetables that have not been exposed to pesticides in the first place. At this point, it’s worth noting that some pesticides are acceptable in organic systems, so buying something that is labelled ‘organic’ does not necessarily mean that it is pesticide-free.

With home-grown produce, you need not worry about pesticides if you know you have not applied any. This means that when it comes to preparation, cooking and storage, you can relax and do what you like.

Since my (pretty-much chemical-free) garden is now at the beginning of its most productive period, I’ve already started preserving some of the bounty. I’ve made mint sauce, I’ve frozen some of the raspberries I’ve picked and I have some oregano hanging up to dry in the limery. There’s a small bowl of tomatoes in the fridge ready for conversion into passata, which I freeze if it’s only a small quantity or bottle if I have large amounts.

I love all the potential at this time of year. I know that by the end of summer I will be sick of courgettes, but now as I watch the first fruits swell, I can hardly wait for my first harvest. How about you? Is there something you love to grow and eat?

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2017 Courgette #1

21 Comments
by The Snail of Happiness on June 27, 2017  •  Permalink
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Posted by The Snail of Happiness on June 27, 2017

https://thesnailofhappiness.com/2017/06/27/those-pesky-pesticides/

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