2012 Canning Season Starts!

So, yeah, I'm declaring an early start to this year's canning season. The extremely mild winter and my own laziness make this April 7 opener possible, and I'd like to take this opportunity to publicly thank them both...

The garden is already full of onions, potatoes, leeks, and baby salad greens. The greens are from purchased starts—I just can't get it together to make cold frames and start them from seeds—but the onions, potatoes, and leeks are mostly from extras and left-overs from last year's farm box.

However, that's not why we're here...I got lucky and made a couple of excellent scores off the discount shelf at the grocery co-op, picking up two bags of organic tomatillos, and a large bag of 10 Gala apples, all for six bucks. Let's make some shit!

Now that the kitchen's clean, I'm gonna make apple sauce—a good thing, too, since we are OUT. I've got the jars on the stove sterilizing while I core and chop the apples. No, I do not peel the apples. The skins don't bother me or the hubs, so why bother?

When I first started canning, I could never tell how many jars to prep. Now, though, I can eyeball it and come pretty close. Looks like 3, 4 pints to me.

The tomatillo salsa recipe I use calls for 1/2 c. chopped white onion. Which I don't have. So I grabbed a leek out of the yard and chopped that up...Way more than 1/2 c., so I put the rest in a glass pan and popped it the oven to dry. (The dried sprinkles are great on eggs, in soups, and the like. It's still in the oven drying, so it's not in the group photo.)

So, three-and-a-half pints of fresh Gala apple sauce and five half-pint jars of salsa verde for...let's call it eight bucks. I had to go the store for some jalapenos and cilantro—more produce that my yard does not supply. Not too shabby!

A Shameful Lack of Posting

...but I'm back!

Thanks for your patience. The garden's coming along despite its near-abandonment this spring; we thought we were moving. Surprise! We're staying right here.

So we're eating the strawberries and the first three small tomatoes, and lots of lettuce. Even a few potatoes. The garlic's in and cured. I put a little bit of it in today's batch of chutney...because YES, it is plum season.

The camera's out of commission, so forgive the Photo Booth pix.

But the oh-my-gosh discovery of the week? Strawberry-ginger jam!

Let the canning begin.

Sticking it...

How'd I do in '09?

I like this part of the year: nothing to can yet, just enjoy the fruits of last year's labors. And I am doing my best to enjoy them!

Here's what I did last year: 35 jars of tomato sauce, 12 of cranberry sauce, 20.5 of blackberry jam (and we ran out!), 20 of apple sauce (which I am still enjoying), 6 of strawberry jam, a single jar of delicious yellow plum jam and two of nectarine, 4 jars of yummy zucchini pickles, 7 of green tomatoes and 3 of green-tomato relish (thanks, Arcata summer!), 7 jars of jalapeno rings, 9 of lemon marmelade, 8.5 of fruit chutney, 3 of pepper chutney (not as good as the fruit), 5 of pickled lemony green beans, 3 of red-pepper jelly (we just don't eat enough bagels), and a single jar of cucumber pickles.

...a grand total of 147 pints of canned goods. Not too shabby for a gal's first-ever year of home canning!

But as the empties pile up in my pantry I am curious: just how much did I can this year? That was the season I finally took the plunge and bought a pressure canner. And a new enameled pot for hot-water processing. It feels like I went to town...

299!

I guess I did go to town.

(In case you're curious, that was 39.5 pints of bread-n-butter pickles (just barely enough!), 10 of dill pickle spears and rounds, 8 of sweet pickles (a pain to make, but clearly I need to make more as we ran out pronto), 25 of blackberry jam, 7 of peach jam, 34 of strawberry jam (and that's off only 3 6-by-6 beds), ten of lemon marmelade and 3 of lime, 14 of green beans (that taste just like canned green beans from the store; huh), 25 of fruit chutney (way too much as it turns out), 8 of cranberry sauce (which has only lasted into April because it got hidden behind the blackberry jam in the pantry; we only rediscovered it while searching for more sauerkraut), 7.5 pints of New York-style hot-pepper relish (a big hit, so 7.5 pints was not enough), 28 of pickled hot peppers (jalapenos, rajas, etc), 22 of tomato sauce (better from last year, but still not enough to make it to tomato season this year), 9 of whole tomatoes (which helped but still, we will run short), 17 green tomato pickles (plenty), 6 of sweet zucchini relish, 3 of pickled onion (which will be better next year! I have an idea), one of pickled garlic (still thinking about that), 2 of pickled beans, 2 of tomatillo salsa, 2 of pickled zucchini...pickled beets and radish didn't go over well, so I probably won't go there again.)

It certainly gives me an idea of just how much food a family eats in a year.

Now, I wait for May and what another year of canning will bring me. w00t!

We made it through winter

...with enough to eat; how nice! Seriously, once we figured out that I'd put up enough cans to carry us through to canning season this year, we have been pigging out on pantry yumminess.

It's funny: last year we couldn't get enough of the chutney, green-tomato pickles and jam I made. This year it's pickled peppers, sauerkraut, and straight-up pickles (sweet and bread-n-butter).

Part of my morning routine includes chatting with the folks at the local grocery co-op about all things agricultural. They are a pretty ag-savvy lot! One of the women I like talking to has goats, and yesterday my step-daughter dropped off a quart of fresh goat milk and some home-made chevre from this woman's herd.

I admit to being a little scared of the milk; I know it will have flavor, like all truly fresh food. Will I like it? It still astonishes me that chicken eggs have so much chickeny flavor. Compare the taste of a backyard or farmer's market tomato with its mealy cousin from Safeway and you'll have some idea of the way an egg made by one of our girls tastes.

But back to the goat milk. I don't want to not like it; I might just make fruit smoothies with it and ease into it.

But the chevre; we can't get enough of the stuff. We are very fortunate to have a goat cheese maker right here in town (Cypress Grove) and a store that carries a large selection of NorCal goat cheeses. Since we also have a lot of eggs, what with the longer days, I made us onion-and-chevre omelettes for dinner last night. For garnish we opened a jar of pickled peppers.

It was delicious.

Make what you eat...

...Eat what you make!

I don't know about you, but when I have a spare 45 minutes, I think, What could I can? Today it was cranberries.

Mmm, home-made cranberry sauce! Good on turkey, pork, in a spoon, on ice cream...all year long, too—or as long as it lasts in the pantry.

And yeah, I see I need to wash my windows. Someday.

Frittata Sunday!

So, technically, only the garlic and the eggs in the baking dish came from my back yard. But on this lovely rainy and sunshiney Sunday I made a vegetable-and-cheese frittata and a couple of jars of cranberry sauce. If you want to put some up before cranberries disappear from the supermarket shelves, try this original-to-me recipe:

Suzanne's Cranberry Relish

4 c. whole cranberries
1 c. sugar
1 c. water
1 can pineapple chunks (or crushed pineapple if you don't want a chunky sauce)
juice and zest from one lemon
juice and zest from one orange
1/8 c. fresh grated ginger (or less, to taste, if you are not a ginger fanatic)

Combine it all in a saucepan and cook over medium heat until the cranberries start to pop. Reduce to low/med-low and continue to cook until you can pop all the cranberries with the back of a spoon. You can either can it now, or take it off the heat and refrigerate it overnight, which will jell it up, as it's pretty runny right off the stove. Makes approximately 6 cups.

It's Pickled Peppers Time

...and I'm on it!

Don't worry, scum is normal.

Or so says Mother Earth News in their article on home-made sauerkraut.

I love sauerkraut. The tang, the association with hot dogs (and, by extension, fairs), its working-class, good-natured yumminess. Even though I posted a sauerkraut recipe I saw in the San Francisco Chronicle, I have been strangely reluctant to make any this year. I think I found the recipe, and the concept of home 'kraut as presented in the Food section a little too daunting.

But we got a huge head of Napa cabbage in this week's farm box—either the freebie, abandoned CSA box our neighbor gave us, or the one we subscribe to; I can't remember. Even with the crispy duck Greg brought back from the Bay Area, for two people a whole head of cabbage goes a long way.

All roads were leading to sauerkraut.

So ignoring my previously-posted recipe, I trolled the Internet, landing in short order at Mother Earth News. Over the past two years of canning, I have to say that MEN and Pick Your Own have been my best, most-reliable sources for non-fussy canning. If the accompanying pictures of my food preparation area don't horrify you, you'll probably find something you like on those sites, too. Well worth checking out.

Anyway, on to the sauerkraut. Back when I read the article in the Chron, I did a little surfing looking for real 'kraut crocks. Nice, but pricey! I'd take one if I got it free—it'd look great sitting on my granite-top counters next to my Viking stove...ha!—but I went the poor-(wo)man's route: my lowly crockpot.

A crock pot, a cabbage, some salt, a cutting board and a knife or two. That is all you need.

Well, none of my "small plates" fit inside my little crockpot, so I ended up inverting the lid. That should work, as the 'pot was pretty full. We'll see.

I didn't feel like washing off any large rocks, so I filled a couple of plastic bags with water, then put that in a ziploc bag. Please don't leak!

Here's the recipe I used from Mother Earth News:

Sauerkraut Recipes

By Nathan Poell

Simple Sauerkraut

2 large heads of cabbage (about 5 pounds)
2 to 3 tbsp noniodized salt

Grate 1 cabbage and place in a crock or plastic bucket. Sprinkle half the salt over the cabbage. Grate the second cabbage, then add it to the crock along with the rest of the salt. Crush the mixture with your hands until liquid comes out of the cabbage freely. Place a plate on top of the cabbage, then a weight on top of the plate. Cover the container and check after 2 days. Scoop the scum off the top, repack and check every 3 days. After 2 weeks, sample the kraut to see if it tastes ready to eat. The flavor will continue to mature for the next several weeks. Canning or refrigerating the sauerkraut will extend its shelf life. Yields about 2 quarts.

Preparing for Fall

I hate to say it on any day where it's both sunny and in the 60s, but I can smell autumn just around the corner. In between my job, cleaning my house, and face-time with my family and friends, it's a tight squeeze for canning. I am sadly behind in my blackberry gathering. At this rate we'll run out of jam sometime in February. I did score 5 lbs of late-season pickling cucumbers, and I gave up on getting decent ripe tomatoes so I should get more green tomato pickles, but...sigh. Summer's just a busy season, no doubt about it.

NY Hot Pepper Relish

20-30 peppers
1 or 2 onions
5-10 cloves garlic
2 c. white vinegar
1.5 c. water
1 tb sugar
2 tsp salt

Roast, de-skin and de-seed the peppers, chop and put in a big saucepan or pot. Dice the onion and garlic, add it to the pot. Put all the other ingredients into the pot and bring to a boil. Simmer it for 20 minutes, then ladle into sterilized glass jars. Process the jars. Later, get some good-quality buns and sausages. Invite your friends over and grill up the 'dogs. Top with exotic mustards, perhaps homemade sauerkraut, and this pepper relish. Garnish with a few cold ones and some tunes.

I found the original recipe, posted way back in 2005, on The Cutting Board forum and pretty much used it straight up, except it called for red cherry peppers and I had on hand a mongrel assortment of peppers from the Saturday farmer's market. The poster notes that, "here in upstate NY, when you order sub sandwiches, unless you specify, you will get a sauce like this on them. It's got a good flavor but, IT'S VERY HOT."

Let's hope so. I can hardly wait to try it over a bratwurst.

It's Blackberry Season

You gotta want it.

I wonder how many...

...pints of pickles 14 pounds of cucumbers makes?

Farewell, June

Spent the last weekend in June canning, and looking with anticipation to the high days of summer: peaches are just coming in, and plums, blueberries, and local blackberries (rubus ursinus) are just around the corner. The farmer's market finally has more than lettuce and vegetable starts, so I bought some pickling cukes, picked some strawberries, and started in...



Yum: strawberry jam, peach jam, bread and butter pickles, pickled onion, rajas, pickled beets, pickled radishes.

Tater Tower

Shamelessly stolen from Jane Tunks article in the San Francisco Chronicle:

The landless gardener doesn't have to be limited to window boxes sprouting herbs or containers full of lettuce.

Even apartment dwellers with nothing more than a few square feet of cement can cultivate a small crop. Among the easiest garden projects for a small space is a potato tower, sheltered inside a plastic garbage can or chicken wire. Layering potatoes and soil takes advantage of vertical space, while maintaining a small footprint.

Or the lazy gardener with a weed-filled yard. And a surplus of chicken-wire remnants.

The easy-to-follow instructions are for a garbage-can tower or a chicken-wire tower. See?

Those bulk-bin bag ties cluttering my bottom drawer? Perfect for closing the chicken wire. And for attaching it to the chicken wire fence for support.

I raked up all the old straw laying around the yard for the dry mulch, grabbed some of the pea/vetch mix from the fallow raised beds for the green mulch, and used the old pile of potting soil growing weeds and cat poop for the dirt. Oh. I also had a box of very old, very sprouted potatoes sitting in the mud room. Sometimes it pays to be untidy.

The finished Tater Tower. (That's the duck pond to the left; I refill it with clean water once a week.) Oh, and please don't think I bought the Compost Tumbler in the background—heavens, no! A friend gave it to me; it was too small for his yard. (!)

It was so easy I built a second one before I got distracted. But I still have chicken wire (and straw and green mulch and poop-enriched dirt) so I think I'll build a few more.

Pickled Asparagus

8 c vinegar
8 c water
4 t sugar
2 t pepper
8 t salt
2 t dill
1-2 cloves garlic per quart
2 or more dried Japanese red peppers per quart

Wash asparagus in cool water. Cut into spears (6" for quarts, 4" for pints)

Combine vinegar, water, sugar, salt, pepper and dill. Heat to a boil.

Pack asparagus tightly into jars with tips down. Put 1-2 cloves of garlic and 2 or more red peppers into each jar (the more red peppers the hotter the asparagus). Cover with boiling brine to within 1/2 inch from top of jar. Clean the rim of each jar and seal with lid.

Process in boiling water for 10 minutes.

It's asparagus season! What are you waiting for? (Recipe courtesy of katewood, a commenter on sfgate.com)

Brined Snap Beans

Makes 1 gallon

Total time: 2 weeks

More subtle than vinegar-pickled green beans, this recipe is adapted from "Joy of Pickling," by Linda Ziedrich (Harvard Common Press, 1998), who says to use the freshest green beans you can find. Alicia Preston likes to make this recipe with trimmed asparagus as well.

• 2 pounds tender young snap beans, trimmed
• 6 small dried chile peppers
• 6 garlic cloves, chopped
• 12 black peppercorns, crushed
• 6 dill sprigs
• 1/2 cup pickling salt or 3/4 cup kosher salt
• 3 quarts water

Instructions: Layer beans, chile peppers, garlic, peppercorns and dill in a 1-gallon jar. Dissolve salt in the water and pour enough brine over the beans to cover them. Push a freezer bag into the mouth of the jar and pour the remaining brine into the bag. Seal the bag. Store at room temperature with the top of the container loosely covered.

Within 3 days you should see tiny bubbles rising. If scum forms on top of the brine, skim it off daily and rinse off the brine bag.

Pickles should be ready in about 2 weeks, when the bubbling has stopped and the beans taste sour. Remove brine bag, skim off any scum, and cap the jar. Refrigerate.

(sfgate.com just keeps spreading the love.)

Peach Chutney

Makes 1 quart

Total time: 1 1/2-2 1/2 days

This recipe for spicy, fresh chutney is adapted from "Full Moon Feast," by Jessica Prentice (Chelsea Green, 2006). It can also be made with unpeeled chopped tomatoes. It's great with roasted meats or Indian dishes.

• 2 teaspoons fenugreek seeds
• 1/4 cup boiling filtered water
• 8 to 10 peaches, peeled and cut into small dice
• -- Juice of 1 lemon
• 1 tablespoon whole cumin seeds
• 2 teaspoons black or brown mustard seeds
• 1 teaspoon fennel seeds
• 1 4-inch piece of ginger, peeled and grated
• 1 teaspoon powdered turmeric or one 1-inch piece fresh turmeric, peeled and grated
• 1 tablespoon Sucanat or rapadura (see Note)
• 1/4 cup yogurt whey (see Note)
• 4 teaspoons sea salt
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne (optional)

Instructions: Put the fenugreek seeds in a small bowl and pour the boiling water over them. Let them soak overnight or for at least 6 hours.

Put the peach pieces in a large bowl. Drain the water from the fenugreek seeds and add the seeds to the peaches. Squeeze the lemon juice over the peaches.

In a small cast-iron skillet, toast the cumin, mustard and fennel seeds over medium heat until they begin to smell fragrant. Add the seeds to the peaches with the ginger, turmeric, Sucanat, yogurt whey, salt and cayenne. Stir thoroughly and taste. The mixture should be salty.

Transfer to a 2-quart jar and gently weigh down the top of the chutney so the liquid rises above the solids by filling a small, narrow jar with water and setting it inside the other jar so that it gently pushes the chutney down but allows the liquid to come to the top.

Ferment at room temperature at least overnight. If it is hot, 24 hours may be enough. If it is cool or just warm, ferment for 48 hours. Chutney can be eaten immediately or can be refrigerated for up to 1 month.

Note: To make yogurt whey, take 2 cups of live-culture whole milk yogurt and pour it into a colander or strainer lined with cheesecloth set above a bowl or pot. Let drip for up to 8 hours in the refrigerator. The whey will be in the bowl and the yogurt in the cheesecloth can be used like cream cheese.

Sucanat and rapadura are both types of unrefined cane sugar that can be found at natural foods stores such as Rainbow Grocery in San Francisco.

Per 2 tablespoons: 25 calories, 0 protein, 5 g carbohydrate, 0 fat, 0 cholesterol, 268 mg sodium, 1 g fiber.

(Another recipe courtesy of sfgate.com. Way to go, folks!)

Sauerkraut

Makes 3-4 pints

Total time: 2 weeks

This delicious sauerkraut is from Kathryn Lukas, adapted from a recipe in "Nourishing Traditions," by Sally Fallon (NewTrends Publishing, 2001). Lukas' general rule is to use 1.5 percent by weight of salt in proportion to the cabbage. Serve with all kinds of meats and sandwiches, or toss into salads for a crunch and a slight tang.

• 1 medium head green cabbage (about 2 pounds)
• 1 to 2 teaspoons caraway seeds
• 1 1/2 to 2 tablespoons coarse sea salt

Instructions: Clean 3 to 4 wide-mouth pint jars and canning lids and rings in sudsy water.

Quarter the cabbage, then remove the core. Reserve 4 flat pieces to top each jar of the kraut. Thinly slice using a large sharp knife, mandoline or food processor.

Place in a large bowl with the caraway and 1 1/2 tablespoons salt and let sit for at least 20 minutes. Squeeze the sauerkraut, while tossing, to help break it down and release juices.

Taste the sauerkraut; it should be very salty. If needed add more salt.

Very tightly pack the sauerkraut into the jars, using a clean fist or a wooden spoon to push the cabbage down as far as it will go. Fill to no more than 1 inch from the top and cover with any juices in the bowl. If there are not enough juices to completely cover the cabbage, add a little bit of water. Cover each jar with the reserved cabbage leaf, then close the lid tightly.

Place jars on a plate in case they overflow slightly and put in a cool cupboard or pantry; the ideal temperature is 60°-64°. If liquid comes out, open the jars and add a bit more filtered water. Check and taste after 1 week then again after 1 1/2-2 weeks. If it's sour enough for your liking, refrigerate or eat immediately. Or, let sit another week or less to increase the sour flavor. Keep refrigerated.

(Recipe courtesy of sfgate.com. Thanks, guys!)

Strawberry Jam

4 c. mashed strawberries
1/2 c. sugar or to taste
2 tsp calcium water
2 tsp Pomoma's Pectin

Sterilize your canning jars and lids in a vat of boiling water. While that's on, slice, dice, food process or otherwise mash the strawberries*. Put the fruit in a pan with the calcium water that comes with Pomona's Pectin and heat over medium-high until it reaches a boil.

(If you don't have a prolific-enough patch to give you several cups of fruit at a time, you could pad it out with strawberries from the store, or add a second type of fruit (pineapple, rhubarb, mango), or just use little jars.)

In a separate bowl combine the sugar and the pectin. Add all at once to the boiling fruit and stir well. When the fruit again reaches a boil, take it off the heat and pour it into the sterilized glass jars. Seal, heat in a water bath for ten minutes, and let cool.

Jars, jars, jars!

We all know I'm cheap. I prefer to get my canning jars for free or for well under the dollar they cost me retail.

But for gift-giving it's nice to have a fancy jar. Or a jar that will pass through airport security. I decided to take a look online at what was available.

Bormioli Rocco Quattro Stagioni canning jars

SKS hexagon canning jars

Weck Deco canning jars

(although I can't tell from the website what kind of lids they use!)