Preservation Link Roundup 3/24/10

Tigress in a Pickle provides the full roundup for the March Can Jam (Can Jam March Round-Up: Allium). A must read, but that pun "can i officially change the name to all-yums?", ouch. ;-)

Keep an eye on Food in Jars for the secret ingredient for April's Can Jam.

All Types of Cooking, and a Whole Lot of Canning Here! explains how easy it is to pressure can chicken (Chicken Breast). Yep! Jane chooses chicken breast because they prefer it. I prefer legs and thighs myself (dark meat is more flavorful, IMHO), but when I can chicken I use breast. White meat seems to can better: less fat and looks better in the jar. Probably that is why you usually see "white meat" in commercially canned chicken.

Big Black Dogs makes a classic flavor combination for a spicy pepper jelly (Savory Cheddar and Pepper Jelly Cookies). There are other ways to go as well. Instead of just flour, use a cornmeal based cheddar cookie. I've made spicy jelly tarts, with a cheesy tart crust - you get a higher jelly-to-crust ratio. Or match the cheese and jelly inside a mini-turnover. There are many, many options for this flavor pairing.

What about a cornmeal cake with pepper jelly filling? It would be an interesting alternative take on a Victoria Sponge (aka Victoria Sandwich), which is a two-layer sponge cake separated by jam. The Atlantic Food Channel provides history, background and recipe for this classic tea cake (Victorian England: Age of War, Politics, and Cake).

In another post related to using home preserved foods Cold Cereal and Toast makes another classic: applesauce cookies (Baking Gems: Applesauce Cookies). Apple sauce is one of those things that should really be a pantry staple as it can be used in numerous sweet and/or savory recipes as well as in baking. And compared to things like marmalades, it is very, very easy to make and can.

Farm to Table has an excellent post on the great health benefits of nettles (Stinging Nettles are Good for You). One thing I didn't know before reading this article was that nettles could be dehydrated.

You can also dry the nettle for tea or tinctures either by hanging bunches of it upside down in a cool, dry place, or by using your dehydrator. Either way, wash the leaves right after harvesting.

If dehydrating, remove the leaves from the stem. Allow the leaves to air dry for about 30 minutes or pat dry with paper towel. Place the leaves in a dehydrator, spreading them out on the rack in single rows, making sure to not pile the leaves on top of each other. Keep enough space between each leaf so there is good air circulation.

Dehydrate for 8 to 10 hours or until the leaves are completely dry (to avoid mold). If necessary, rotate the tray a few times through out dehydrating. Store in an airtight container until ready to use.

Hmmm, nettle tea. Sounds good to me.

Two great posts yesterday on making labels for your jars.

Wendolonia made some Lemon Ginger Marmalade and some very impressive labels to go with it. Now she has generously shared the template for download - and in three color combinations - excellent for orange, lime or lemon-based preserves (Printable Marmalade Canning Labels).

Hitchiking to Heaven gives step-by-step instructions for how she makes some simply beautiful labels (Easy DIY Canning Labels). I'd never thought of using stamps on labels before. What a brilliant idea. She also uses a color wash to add more interest. Again, gorgeous.

Thanks to both for providing their labeling info.

The Kitchn links to a Princeton study that High Fructose Corn Syrup is more likely to cause obesity than regular sugar (Scientists Finally Prove High Fructose Corn Syrup Risks). All the more reason to cook at home and preserve your own foods. Although jams and jellies shouldn't be a major part of one's diet, many commercial versions contain HFCS, while home preserved ones generally don't. The same goes for such things as bread-and-butter pickles and similar. Every little bit helps.

Molecular gastronomy might not be for everyone, but I find the concept of perfect, relatively labor-free citrus supremes quite intriguing. The mad cooking scientists of Cooking Issues use enzymes to remove the pith from citrus, leaving perfect supremes behind, as well as pith-free skin (Enzymatic Peeling? Hell Yes!).

And, finally, the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal picks a canner as their cook of the week (Tupelo, Mississippi, Cook of the Week: Mantachie Mother Makes Time in Busy Day to Preserve).

"Canning and putting up vegetables is my passion," said Moore, who works in the central billing office for North Mississippi Medical Clinics. "I just love looking at them."

Last year, the 45-year-old put up pepper jelly, hotdog slaw, muscadine jelly, raspberry fig preserves, blueberry syrup, canned tomatoes, canned green beans, tomato relish, pear preserves, banana peppers, apple butter and canned okra.

Wow. I'm such a slacker.

Preservation Link Roundup 3/22/10

Yeah! We will soon have another Master Food Preserver in Los Angeles County! Kevin West of Saving the Season is making the long commute to San Bernardino every week in order to complete the Master Food Preserver certification course, which is only offered in three California Counties, two up North and one in SB (MFP). Yet another step closer to reviving the program here in Los Angeles.

Serious Eats highlights a video from Food Curated (highly recommended web series) about an artisan maker of "bacon marmalade" (Bacon Marmalade, from 'Food Curated'). The idea is very interesting and I know people who are making bacon jams. However, I am uncertain of the safety of canning such recipes, as opposed to merely refrigerating them. I was surprised that, near the end of the video (5:56), the artisan was shown merely screwing on the 1-piece lid for the jar with no processing at all. Perhaps there was processing that was not shown, but it is certainly not clear whether they were processed or not.

Wow, hasn't What Julia Ate been busy? She has a new flock of chickens, and still had time to stuff a trout with some tangelo lemongrass jelly which was accompanied by homemade ricotta cheese (a wonderful way to preserve milk) (Trout with Vegetable Hash and Fresh Ricotta Cheese). Wonderful choice. Lemon-y jellies of all sorts (I made a lemon/lemongrass jelly last year) go wonderfully with fish (and chicken). Stuff, as Julia did, use as a glaze, or an accompaniment.

Wendolonia is very happy with the results of her "easy" lemon ginger marmalade - easy because it uses powdered pectin (Actually Easy Lemon Ginger Marmalade). That is one of my very favorite flavor combinations (try it in lemonade). There are a lot of fish dishes this would pair well with.

As you may recall, last week Well Preserved dehydrated some beets, onions and celery root. This week, they used the dried onion and some other homemade spices as a rub for ribs (Homemade Ribs – Preserved Dry Rub Included…). Quite a bit more satisfying (and flavorful) than buying one of those stale rubs at the store.

Ground spices, because they have so much surface area, lose their flavor much faster than whole spices. Since a rub is usually mostly ground spices, depending on how long they've stayed in a distribution center or store, commercial dry rubs are often much less flavorful than a freshly ground one made at home. Try it yourself and see the difference.

Just last week I was noting the beautiful rhubarb in the local farmers markets. Hitchhiking to Heaven makes the first rhubarb preserve of the season that I'm aware of (Rhubarb, Pear, and Vanilla Jam). She also explains a little bit about substituting Pomona's Pectin into the recipe.

If you haven't tried rhubarb yet, the simplest thing in the world is to grab a stalk (only! the leaves contain dangerous oxalic acid), dip the end into some sugar and bite. The original sweet and tart. Brown sugar is also an option, or get fancy and dip it into vanilla sugar - makes an elegant, yet simple and fun dessert at your next dinner party.

A few days ago Eugenia Bone shared her recipe for pickled fennel. Now she shares two recipes for using it (Two Recipes that use Pickled Fennel). Use these recipes as inspiration for some of the things you can do with any sort of pickle.

I've been pretty harsh on Slate recently, but they published a good article on a story I've posted about a couple of times here, in this case the ongoing canned tomato scandal (Rotten Tomatoes: Scandal Strikes the Tomato-Paste Industry). The article is the best I've seen yet on the structure of the tomato industry, a brief history and how the scandal fits into all of it. Read the whole thing.

Here is a somewhat lengthy response (for a blog post) to that Slate article I disliked so much from the Ethicurian (Yes We Can ... and We Relish It!). Wow, two puns in a single title. The article is a great description of Preserving Traditions:

Preserving Traditions was begun in February, 2009 in Ann Arbor, Michigan, as a way to keep alive (and re-teach) "traditional" foodways, including preserving and cooking food from scratch.

Very cool.

What is it with knitting and canning? Detroit Knitter made Jalapeño Apple Spread on St. Patrick's Day. - which is what most would call jelly (Jalapeño Apple Spread).

More March Can Jam:

• Putting By makes pickled garlic (Pickled Garlic).
• Cafe Libby isn't so sure how her onion relish will come out (pickles can take a couple of weeks to develop flavor) and cutting all those onions made her cry. (Can Jam: This One Made Me Cry). My favorite anti-crying trick? A sharp knife. Seriously.
• Plot 22 hates onions and is not a big fan of fennel, so let's hope that this pickle changes her mind somewhat (Tigress’ Can Jam March: Sweet Onion & Fennel Relish).

Preservation Link Roundup 3/15/10

The March Can Jam entries continue to roll in.

Mother's Kitchen modifies a tested barbecue sauce recipe to more closely match a favorite of hers (Can Jam: Alliums Barbeque Sauce). Read this post for some great tips on modifying a tested recipe safely.

What Julia Ate makes one of those really involved canning recipes that Slate hates so much (Shallot Confiture). But you know why you go through so much effort for this recipe? This is why:

How can you be so good? To be honest, I haven't really thought of how I'm going to eat this. This is no work horse chutney or every day jelly. This is something that deserves the spotlight. The suggestion is warm or cold, with meats. I'm thinking with a pork roast, or a salad even? On top of ice cream? I don't know, help me out. I'm a little star struck at the moment.

Thinking Out Loud thought she had all the ingredients for her marmalade when she discovered other members of her household sneaking into the dried cranberries and apple juice (Red Onion Marmalade). Luckily, she was able to get resupply and finished her entry in this month's Can Jam.

Serious Eats picks chamomile as a secret ingredient (The Secret Ingredient (Chamomile): Seared Sea Scallops with Chamomile Beurre Blanc). It can be the secret ingredient for jams and jellies too. Lemons, honey, ginger and apricot are some flavors that go well with chamomile.

Leda's Urban Homestead explains how she participated in a food-swapping tea party tweet-up (Food-Swapping Tweet-Up).

The way the gals set up the swap was that we each filled out tags with the name of what we had brought plus our name. Then several other people each wrote one of their items on the bottom of our tag, offering it in exchange for our item. Each of us got to decide which of the items offered we wanted to accept in trade. Kind of like a silent auction for edibles.

Sounds very cool.

Well Preserved has a two-part post on dehydrating beets, onions and celery root (Dehydrating Beets, Onions and Celery Root and What to do with Dehydrated Beets and Celery Root). SPOILER ALERT: They make powders with beets and celery root. Beet powder is one of those ingredients you usually find only in fancy restaurants. And it is so easy to make at home. You an be creative as you want to be with powders. Use them for garnish, or make unique and interesting combinations ... why not try some celery root powder on fresh homemade french fries or potato chips?

The Seattle Times profiles gardener and country living author Lorene Edwards Forkner (Growing Your Own Veggies Fills the Larder and the Soul). She has revised two of Carla Emery's books, Growing Your Own Vegetables: An Encyclopedia of Country Living Guide and Canning and Preserving Your Own Harvest: An Encyclopedia of Country Living Guide.

The Local Beet has a good overview article on all the various means of food preservation, freezing, cold storage, dehydrating, canning and fermenting (Making the Most of the Seasonal Bounty).

Purposefully Mom has some suggestions for using Mason jars for purposes other than canning (Endless Uses for Glass Canning Jars.....).

Finally, a photo for Sara Dickerson: 18 pints of chicken I canned yesterday.

Preservation Link Roundup 3/13/10

The Washington Post's All We Can Eat blog revisits a recipe that is questionable from a food safety point of view because it includes partially dried tomatoes stored in olive oil (Attack of the Killer Tomatoes?). This is an excellent food safety article because it goes into some depth about the food safety issues involved.

Come tomato season, I've gotten a lot of questions about whether you can make your own sun-dried tomatoes (enthusiastic yes) and store them in olive oil (regrettably, no). This article explains why. The options for freezing in oil given in the article is one good option. What I like to do is to simply rehydrate my sun dried tomatoes in olive oil overnight. This is safe because botulism at normal levels needs 5-6 days to reach toxic levels. Another option is to bring the olive oil and tomatoes to a simmer and then allow them to cool and infuse for use later that day. Finally, if you really want sun-dried tomato flavor in your oil, blast the warmed olive oil and sun-dried tomatoes with an immersion blender (or use a regular blender) until completely smooth.

WRBL in Alabama has a story on the resurgence of canning (Having a “Can Do” Attitude Towards Canning Food).

About eight years ago, Mary A. Keith advertised a class on home canning and preserving methods.
The food and nutrition specialist at Hillsborough County’s Extension Service got zero takers.
Last fall, she tried again. She filled seven classes of 30 students each, from teen girls completing a home-schooling project to guys who wanted to preserve the venison they bring back from hunting.
“I have five more classes on the books that are maxed out, too,“ Keith says “I don’t have the time to add any more. They won’t fit in my calendar.“

Props to Marisa McClellan and her blog, Food in Jars, for a lengthy mention in the article.

Local Kitchen loves alliums and had a hard time deciding what to make, but finally decided on a mustard for the March Can Jam (Can Jam: Roasted Garlic & Lemon Mustard).

Mustards are wonderful things. I'm planning to discuss them in one of my future weekly emails, but a quick tip. Mustard seeds are crazy, ridiculously expensive if you buy them in the grocery store. Sometimes you can find them at a reasonable price in ethnic grocery stores (Middle East and Latin), but for the best price and volume I go to a wholesaler for mine. I prefer Torn & Glasser near the wholesale produce market downtown.

Moo Said the Mama has a two-part series on making and canning beef stock (Making Beef Stock - Part I - Cooking the Stock and Making Beef Stock - Part II - The Canning Instructions). Although her herbs and spices are a little unconventional (and I would pincé the veg with tomato paste and deglaze with red wine), overall this is a very clear description of making and canning stock (which is usually a multi-day process, though much of that is unmonitored).

Making stock is the key to flavor in the kitchen. Make your own stock if you can. Of course, you can freeze it, but freezers can quickly fill with stock. Having a shelf-stable stock not only saves room in the freezer, but is more convenient, since you don't have to defrost the stock.

Preservation Link Roundup 3/12/10

In addition to my response, there have been a number of other responses to Slate's dismissal of the canvolution:

• Chimpanzee Tea Party: Surprise! Slate Thinks Canning Overrated

  Anyone who's been around the internet a few times knows that Slate has a tendency to be contrarian to point of self-parody... in fact, it's such a well known meme that it has become tedious to point it out. However, since I think the idea of pickling is pretty neat... and have done it once and twice... and hope to try canning/pickling some of the bounty of the Maine garden with Anna and her Mom this summer... I felt a somewhat silly need to respond. A need that's all the more silly, since a read of the critique reveals there is no there there:

• The Baltimore DIY Squad: Is Canning Too Trendy?

  There are some truthful points to the article. Ball jars sure are photogenic. Canning is often a weekend activity that gets blogged about. Organic and heirloom crops can cost more than grocery store food. We foodmakers can sometimes sound self-satisfied when talking about our projects.
  
  But to say "let's be honest: It's not about producing serious food for the future, and it's not about shaking a fist at industrial food" is not just negative, it's downright wrong.

• Molly's Local Food Blog: Home Canning Question

  The article ends with the assertion that the products of home-canning, while not thrifty, etc., are tasty and fun to make. That they are, in the words of Eugenia Bone, an act of optimism. On that I think we can all agree.

• Serious Eats: 'Slate' Forgets That Urban Hipsters Aren't the Only Ones Canning Food
  Be sure to check the comments.

Mimi Holt pointed me to a jam-making excerpt from the new book Forgotten Skills of Cooking in the Guardian (How to Make Jam). Among some other good information, the excerpt includes the traditionally British practice of heating the sugar for jams in the oven in order to shorten cooking times (and make the jams taste fresher).

It isn't tomato season, but Granny Miller (no relation) notes that she didn't can enough tomato juice last year and plans on canning more. She also posts a nice slideshow of tomato canning, including a jar that didn't seal and the contents sent to the freezer (Canning Tomatoes & Making Tomato Juice).

The OC Weekly's food blog, Stick a Fork in It, highlights ripe cherimoya in the farmers markets right now (At the Farmer's Market: Cherimoyas). If you haven't had one yet, give it a try. As for preserving them, they aren't well suited to canning as they can turn brown and bitter. Rather, freeze them with a little bit of lime or lemon to hold the color and add a little flavor. Since the texture is going to be pretty soft anyway, might as well freeze as a purée.

Serious Eats posts a video of a Korean Great-Grandmother making kimchi (Video: How a Korean Great-Grandmother Makes Kimchi). She estimates that she has made kimchi 10,000 times. If you make or are interested in making kimchi, it is a good video to watch. It isn't really a recipe, but gives you a better idea of how it is made.

Destination Eats gets some free, promotional jerky in the mail ("I Want to Send You More Jerky!"). Two packages of sweet & spicy jerky arrive, one flavored with orange, the other with mango. Helpfully, DE lists the other ingredients (which are many of the usual suspects - and you probably already have in your pantry). So why not make your own?

Preservation Link Roundup 3/9/10

Doris and Jilly Cook decide to go a little tropical in the middle of winter; they couldn't resist buying a beautiful 3lb papaya and drying it (Dried Papaya). The flavor was a little cardboardy.

There are several potential reasons for this. One is that it simply wasn't a sweet fruit. Peak papaya season in the Northern Hemisphere is from early Summer to early Fall. The papayas obviously have to travel a long distance to make it to Philadelphia, and there is a good chance they came from the Southern hemisphere. Consequently, it is a fair probability that the papayas were picked unripe and firm. Although they will eventually turn yellow, the flavor and sugars will simply never develop properly. Also, in general, the larger the fruit, the more subtle the flavor.

When ripe, the fruit is soft to the touch, like an avocado. This is the perfect time for drying. Overripe, not so good. Underripe, also not good. A good sweet fruit, properly ripe, is very nice dried all by itself. It is common to soak them in a sugar syrup as well, or to even candy them. What Julia Ate suggested some lime juice, and that is an excellent suggestion, as is a little salt. Add some chile powder to the salt and lime and you have papaya pico de gallo. Delicious, absolutely delicious - fresh or dried.

Papayas work well in fruit leathers in combination with other fruits such as orange, kiwi, passion fruit, mango and pineapple.

And don't throw away the black seeds. Clean them and dry them and they make a slightly bitter substitute for black pepper. Frequently they are used in salad dressings and soups.

Ithacan held a food preservation workshop and over sixty people showed up to learn canning, pressure canning, drying, fermenting and cellaring, reports Ithaca's Food Web (Home Food Preserving Workshop Attracts Interest). Props to the organizers in Ithaca! Keep up the good work!

Wouldn't a community canning center be a great place to host such workshops in Los Angeles?

The Cosmic Cowgirl is surprised that she likes carrot cake jam (Carrot Cake Jam, Wha?).

Do you like dollhouses and canning? Then perhaps you'll like this miniature canning set for dollhouses from Reutter Porcelain (Reutter Miniatures CANNING SET Kitchen Cookware, Dishes). You could probably craft a nice little gift or ornament for your favorite canner from this.

Joe Pastry has put together a great primer on the the science of and making of yogurt. If you are at all interested in making your own yogurt, get thee hence:

• Culture Maven
• The Fresh-Fermented Dairy Tradition
• Yogurt Recipe
• So Where Does Yogurt Come From Then?
• Making Yogurt Step One: Choosing the Milk (best yogurt I ever had was from sheep's milk)
• Making Yogurt Step Two: Heating the Milk
• Making Yogurt Step Three: The Starter
• Making Yogurt Step Four: Fermenation
• Dude, Where's My Lactose? I and Dude, Where's My Lactose? II
• Garden on the Inside

We end today's post on a bittersweet note from Food in Jars, who savors the memories of a Southern California childhood as she finishes off some plum jam (Mourning the End of a Jar).

What memories is your food preservation building for your family (and children, if you have them)? One aspect of eating locally and seasonally that may not get enough attention is that we are building memories of place and time by doing so. How often do we associate holidays with particular foods? If you eat locally and seasonally, then different times of year will be associated with different foods and places in your memory.

Food preservation can let us access those memories through taste and smell, two of the most powerful memory senses as they tie directly into our hippocampus memory center.

I remember when I picked those tomatoes from the backyard. I remember when the orange tree was weighed down by bushels of fruit. I remember ...

Preservation Link Roundup 3/7/10

Fellow Master Food Preserver Delilah Snell will be giving a 1-hour lecture on food preservation at the Spring Garden Show at the South Coast Plaza (Ed Begley and....Delilah Snell ????). Set your calendars for Friday, April 23rd from 2:30pm-3:30pm.

Hungry Passport is a blog dedicated to travel and good food. It is written by a tour professional who, as you might imagine, gets around quite a bit. Recently, she was in Alsace Los Angeles enjoying a rustic French meal at Café des Artistes (Week 25 - Rustic French).

I noted throughout the evening that our meal looked like a study of food preservation methods. Since it was late wintertime, this meal reflected what we'd be eating when we're relying on our reserves of food and awaiting the return of springtime and a new growing season.

Pickles, marmalades, confits, rillettes, pâté and, of course, cheese. What would French cuisine be without food preservation?

Chiot's Run has a good post on using canning jars for freezing (Using Canning Jars in the Freezer). Plenty of good tips:

You may worry about freezing in glass because of the possibility of breakage, but there are a few things you can do to minimize this chance. Do not fill jars all the way, most wide-mouth canning jars have a “freeze fill line” marked on the side of the jar. Using smaller jars also helps, with less liquid you don’t have to worry as much about expansion and the possibility of breaking the jar. The larger the jar the more expansion room you’ll need to allow. I freeze in jars often and have only had a broken jar once, it was my fault for filling it too full and not allowing enough expansion room. (another note, make sure the stock or veggies are cold before putting into freezer)

The "freeze fill line" he is referring to is actually the 1-inch headspace line - good for freezing and most pressure canning.

Hitchhiking to Heaven makes a conserve with dried fruit, Clementine syrup and red wine (Red Wine and Clementine Stewed Apricots and Prunes). What a number of flavors going on; it sounds truly delicious. Conserves just don't get the respect they should.

What do I do with partial bottles of red wine? I pour them into my red wine vinegar jar. What does preservation guru Eugenia Bone do? As she explains on Well Preserved, the Blog, she makes a reduction sauce (Red Wine Reduction Sauce). This can be a sort of secret ingredient that you can take in many different directions and use with all sorts of different dishes. Bone uses it with duck breast, but add some sautéed mushrooms and you've got something that will go well with beef. Add some cherries and suddenly you've got a sauce for pork loin. Stir it into stews, or add it to a tomato sauce for pasta. Your imagination is the only limit.

Earlier in the week I hosted a birthday dinner party for my girlfriend's sister. She had requested a Red Velvet Cake for dessert. Traditionally, Red Velvet Cake is served with cream cheese frosting. I have to be different, of course, so I used a standard buttercream frosting (with ganache between the two layers of cake) and put the cream cheese into the ice cream, instead. Tonight, I had some leftover cherry pie filling from a pastry I made in the morning. Just a little over the cream cheese ice cream was sort of like a frozen cheesecake with cherry topping. Go light on the cherry pie filling, though. Its flavor can overwhelm the ice cream, which has a more delicate cream cheese flavor than a real cheesecake.

When a recipe for a preserve says that it is good on ice cream ... it doesn't mean it has to be a common ice cream.

Preservation Link Roundup 3/6/10

Stony Run Farm provides some very simple instructions for making a solar dehydrator from scraps (An Afternoon in the Garage). It requires a little woodshop skill, an old window and some wood scraps but not that much. If you check around the interwebs, you can find a number of different ways of making solar dehydrators. Just be careful that in our summer sun and heat your dehydrator isn't actually an oven.
via Two Frog Home

The Atlantic's Food Channel has some good suggestions for pantry staples that, when you need to cook out of your pantry, make life a good deal easier (A Southern Pantry for Stress-Free Meals).

The LA Weekly's Squid Ink keeps us up-to-date on seasonal produce, this week highlighting that most delicious of thistles, the artichoke (What's in Season at the Farmers Markets: Artichokes). There is some nice history and a brief discussion of the various varieties.

Artichokes can be pickled. The best artichokes for pickling are the small "baby" artichokes that you can eat whole, usually they are cut in half for pickling, pretty easy. You can pickle just the hearts, but trimming artichokes down to the heart is an awful lot of effort.

For more on what's fresh in the markets, check out Good Food every week (What's Fresh at the Farmers Market This Week). That rhubarb looks darn good.

Wisteria - Wisteria - Wisteria
It's that time of year again! Sierra Madre is hosting their annual wisteria festival Sunday, March 14th (2010 Sierra Madre Wisteria Festival). The Huntington Library also has some fine wisteria as well. The food preservation take? Wisteria makes a fine, delicately floral scented jelly. The violet color is lovely as well. CAUTION: Only the violet wisteria flowers are edible. Not the leaves, vines, roots, and ESPECIALLY not the seeds.

LampGoods' shop on Etsy has a cool looking hanging lamp made from a vintage Mason jar (Orono. Vintage BALL CANNING Jar PENDANT made NEW).

What is it with fermented cabbage and soups? Why do they work so well? Serious Eats publishes a Momfuku recipe for kimchi stew (The Momofuku Cookbook's Kimchi Stew with Rice Cakes).

All Types of Cooking, and a Whole Lot of Canning Here! always keeps a supply of home canned tuna on hand. She shares her technique and some good photos (Canning Tuna). I haven't canned tuna myself, but I definitely have it on my list of things I want to can.

I doubt canned tuna is the recipe Creative Canning is excited about canning when her new All American canner arrives soon (All American Canner). But she's right to be excited. The All American is, IMHO, the best pressure canner out there.

Nutrition Know How has a good list of things to do in order to get ready for canning season (Gear Up for Canning Season).

And, last but not least I take the time to go through my canned items. I check for any change in the canned items, and when the item was processed. I try to use all the items canned from the previous year before my next season starts. So if I have items that I have not used from the previous year, I know that I need to plan some menu’s that will include those canned goods before I start canning again.

Finally, it is a bit late in the season, but Slow Food USA has declared 2010 the year of the heirloom apple (Let 2010 be the Year of the Heirloom Apple). So, later this year, let's all can some heirloom varietal apple products. We might find that some of these heirlooms, which aren't great for out of hand eating, are very well-suited to particular canning recipes.

Preservation Supplement to LA Times Food Section 3/4/10

This week's LA Times Food Section is a veritable food preservation special issue.

First off, the cover story is dedicated to smoking food indoors (Slow-Smoking Ribs in the Great Indoors). Smoking is a very old method of food preservation. Although smoking alone will not preserve food (you need to use another method of preservation for that, such as dehydration), it does assist in preservation. More importantly, however, it adds flavor and color.

A little smoke flavor goes a long way towards supercharging flavor and taking standard recipes into a whole new realm. Add some smoked meat to a chili or stew and ... wow. Other ingredients can be smoked ... instead of regular baked potatoes ... why not try smoke roasted potatoes? Or smoke roasted potatoes in a potato salad.

Anyway, if you haven't tried smoking, then read this article. It demystifies smoking and shows how you can do it with very little equipment right inside your kitchen. The article is focused on stove top smoking, but you can also use similar equipment and methods to smoke in your oven. As for me, I'm going to give the Maple-Bourbon Hot-Smoked Pork Belly a try. Mmmmm ... bacon. I've made maple-cured bacon before ... bourbon sounds like a great addition.

Hmmm ... makes me think that some smoky Scotch would be another way to add smoke flavor in different recipes...

Anyway, moving my mind off the island of Islay, Russ Parsons discusses the increasingly popular trend of nose-to-tail cooking and eating. In this case, learning how to butcher and cook whole pigs (In SoCal Restaurants, a New Passion for the Whole Pig).

Learning how to cook nose-to-tail will inevitably lead to food preservation techniques, which were traditional ways of using the whole animal. Curing, drying, smoking, and pickling are all methods commonly used on the less commonly eaten (nowadays) parts of the animal. What's great about this is that not only are we rediscovering flavors and textures that have fallen by the wayside, but reconnecting with where our food comes from and gaining new respect for those who raise the animals and the animals themselves.

This is why I am passionate about food preservation.

In any case, Parsons references that modern classic Charcuterie: The Craft of Salting, Smoking, and Curing and provides a slightly modified version of Pork Belly Confited in Olive Oil. It must be confit week on this blog.

Aging beer gets some respect (Store Beer in a Wine-Like Cave? Southern California Gives it a Try). Although the article is focused on commercial bottles from smaller breweries, some of the most interesting aging that I know is taking place by home brewers who are aging their own brews. Heck, I've got a nice spiced stout (lots of clove and orange peel) I expect will be quite nice come the holidays nine or ten months from now (and almost a year-and-a-half after it was brewed).

"The Find" reviews a place I've been dying to try ever since I heard the words "kumquat chutney dogs" (The Slaw Dogs in Pasadena). I've got to go check them out ...

Preservation Link Roundup 3/3/10

Doris and Jilly Cook experiment with and discuss using commercial-style jars with 1-piece lids (Jars and Lids). There are pros and cons, but you may consider using them if you plan on selling your jars or give them as gifts.

The LA Times' Daily Dish points out a couple of local tomato growing classes starting up this weekend (Tomato Time: As Tomato Season Approaches, a Variety of Growing Classes are on Offer). Growing your own is an excellent skill to learn and a great way to ensure a plentiful amount of tomatoes for canning.

Speaking of tomatoes, the Horticulture Department of Fullerton College is holding its annual tomato and pepper plant sale this weekend (Friday - Sunday) (2010 Tomato and Pepper Sale). Learn how to grow them and then buy them this weekend.

Residents of Richmond and Wayne counties in Indiana are enjoying a series of 100-mile potluck dinners, in which all the dishes are prepared with local ingredients gathered within a 100-mile radius, according to the Palladium-Item (Interest Grows in Locally Produced Food). Given that "it's been months since the last farmer's market", preserved food plays a big role in the local ingredient list.

Much of the food at the February 100-mile radius potluck came from the Baxters' CSA, The Clear Creek Food Co-op or home gardens. Families froze or canned produce during the summer so they could have some in the winter.

At the potluck, Earlham professor Carol Hunter informally demonstrated how she cans her own fruits and vegetables. Hunter learned the skill from her mother, who was a home economics teacher, but noted that the skill is largely being forgotten.

Angela Fraser, an Associate Professor/Food Safety Education Specialist in the Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition at Clemson University has written a brief 20-page introduction to home food preservation (Introduction to Home Food Preservation). It is a great quick overview of the topic.

The cover story for the New York Times Dining section this week is on raising and harvesting rabbits (Don't Tell the Kids). Raising rabbits is not too difficult and can be quite economical, since they breed, like, well, you know. By coincidence (?), Food Curated (an excellent short documentary series on various producers of food on the East Coast) just posted an episode on rabbit breeding (Farming and Breeding Fresh Local Rabbits for New York City Restaurants).

Why all the rabbit love on a food preservation blog? Rabbits are excellent for pressure canning (Selecting, Preparing and Canning Meat: Rabbit or Chicken). It was one of the specialties of my great-grandmother.

Anarchy in a Jar uses their jam to make a free-form tart, or crostata (How to Jam #3: Jam Crostata). I find that these are really great for individual sized servings, i.e., making a whole bunch of mini-crostatas. For larger tarts, I prefer a traditional shell made in a tart pan. Still, a large crostata is a beautiful thing. Both pie fillings and conserves are also an excellent filling for a crostata. And for real decadence, why not have a bottom layer of ricotta cheese topped with jam in the crostata?

Might I also suggest brushing the top of the crostata with an egg wash to make it all nice and shiny when it comes out of the oven? Powdered sugar is a nice topping, but a crystallized sugar, like turbinado, sprinkled on top before baking also makes a lovely topping and adds texture.

Big Black Dogs is giving away an Nesco/American Harvest dehydrator (Nesco/American Harvest Dehydrator Giveaway). All you have to do is comment on the blog post. There are also a number of ways to get more entries, such as tweeting a link, following the RSS, etc., etc., etc.

Whether you win the dehydrator or not, you may want to consider reading this brief primer on dehydration from Positively Prepared (Why Dehydrate Food?). Probably the earliest food preservation method, dehydration is not used nearly as much as it can be.

Two Frog Home continues their pantry series with a few hints on using the food in your pantry (Pantry Stocking :: Using It).

Paris-based pastry and ice cream expert David Lebovitz makes an unusual marmalade (Bergamot Marmalade Recipe). Kevin West had some trouble using bergamots as a small part of a more traditional marmalade. I wonder what he would think of this recipe? Will he give it a try?

Preservation Link Roundup 2/25/10

Well Preserved is on a yogurt kick. Last week they drained regular yogurt to make Greek-style yogurt and yesterday they discussed making yogurt in their dehydrator (Making Yogurt in the Dehydrator – the Night Time Stood Still).

I have the best yogurt maker in the world, the Salton YM9 - 1 Quart Yogurt Maker. Unfortunately, it is no longer manufactured - sorry. It is great for making 1 quart of yogurt at a time, usually enough for 3-5 days for me. But when I need to make more yogurt all at once, I turn to my dehydrator.

Well Preserved doesn't mention what sort of dehydrator they have, but almost certainly it is a box type, such as an Excalibur. The Ronco-style round tray dehydrators can be used to make yogurt, but in small tubs, not in large quart mason jars. In a box dehydrator, you just remove enough trays to fit the jars you want and then place them on the bottom. I like pint and quart jars for yogurt, but you could make a whole passel of 8-oz or 4-oz jars if you like pre-divided individual servings. Set to about 115 degrees F, the dehydrator will keep the yogurt at the right temperature for growth.

Ah, dehydrators. So useful. Bonus, after making yogurt with your dehydrator, you can make yogurt leather. Mix 2 parts yogurt to 1 part of your favorite jam, spread 1/4-inch thick on a leather drying sheet (offset spatula, thank you), 130 degrees until leather consistency, pliable, but not sticky. Cut into bite size pieces, my nieces call it "candy" - heh, heh.

Two Frog Home has been doing a great series on stocking your pantry (Pantry Stocking :: Buying in Bulk and Pantry Stocking :: Finding Space). Good tips.

Of course, while taking care of your pantry don't forget the refrigerator (the mainstay of food preservation). The Wall Street Journal has an interesting article on how appliance manufacturers are redesigning their refrigerators so that they are easier to clean and keep organized (Why Won't Anyone Clean Me?). The most important issue, actually, is education - teaching people how to properly store goods in their refrigerator.

People often don't store things properly anyway. Four years ago, in an effort to understand how people organize their fridges, Sub-Zero bought a week's worth of groceries and asked a group of 12 customers to put away the items in refrigerators at the company's research facilities in Madison, Wis.

What ensued was chaos. People put meat and soda cans in the crisper drawers, which have a temperature and humidity meant for veggies. They put their milk in shelves on the door. While the door shelves seem to be a perfect fit for a carton of milk, Sub-Zero says the area is the worst place to store dairy products because it's the warmest part of the fridge.

Read the whole thing. I like this tip:

Ms. Johnson [training manager at Merry Maids] recommends that people explore the depths of their fridges once a week for food that needs to be tossed. She suggests cleaning one shelf at a time so that the task is less overwhelming.

Flying Tomato Farms does something interesting when making homemade bouillon - they roast their vegetables first (Eureka! Homemade Bouillon). Sounds like a real good idea to me. Freeze in a jar or as cubes.

The Foodinista makes a variation on an old-school classic (Baked Brie with Apricot-Rosemary Chutney). If you already have some canned chutney handy, this is ridiculously quick and easy to make. You just need some puff pastry or phyllo, a wheel of brie, 10 mintues of prep, a little oven time and you've got something spectacular when entertaining.

Eleanor Barkhorn of The Atlantic's Food Section cooks from her pantry, where she finds a can of Tuscan white beans and garbanzo beans (After Snowpocalypse, Bean Soup). The bean soup she created was simple and easy and sounds decidedly satisfying. Convenience food from the pantry made with canned beans ... hm, sounds familiar. The only thing is that the soup contains cream and she froze it. Soups with cream that are frozen have a tendency to separate. Better to freeze the soup without cream and add the cream when reheating.

Delilah Snell loves the look of Weck canning jars (Must...Have...These...Jars). If you buy her a case, she promises to give you one back filled with something delicious. Rufus and Clementine also like the jars and have put together a little guide to getting some (In Pursuit of | A Weck Resource Guide). Be sure to use new rubber gaskets when canning, do no reuse gaskets.

The Herald Journal News of Utah publishes an article celebrating eating home canned food in the middle of winter (Home Canner Glory).

Home-canners, this is your moment of glory.

Now is the payback for the weeks of hard labor - hours spent up to your elbows in tomato pulp and peach skins. The foolhardy folks who scoffed at your industry can only dream of the rich fruit of the summer. They’ll ingest the counterfeit meat product and fried starch at fast food restaurants while you dine on colorful bottled treasures from your cellar, one luscious quart at a time.

Heh. There are a few recipes for using home canned goods as well.

Nurse Elizabeth also celebrates her canned bounty (Canned Poached Pears).

Tonite, in the dead of winter, I ate a perfect October pear, frozen in time. YUM. You can’t even get that at Whole Foods right now!

And to me, Canned Poached Pears is, to date, the most awesome thing I have ever made in my kitchen. Not because of the taste, though. Don’t get me wrong, it is a delicious, savory dessert. But the idea that I am preserving fruit when it is just perfect, then poaching it while it is already sealed in the jars (preserving the alcohol content-YES!), then cracking a jar open for an elaborate, special occasion dessert 6 months to 2 years after I made it is, to me, nothing short of awesome.

They have citrus up in Canada? Who knew? The Toronto Sun has three recipes for marmalade, plus good tips for making and canning it (Making Marmalade).

Preservation Supplement to LA Times Food Section 2/18/10

This week's LA Times Food Section's cover story this week is on a very important issue: local food politics (Food Politics in L.A.: Hungry for Change).

One of the most interesting things about food politics is that so much of what is important and what can be done, can be done and should be done at the local level. Although there are national policies that are important (*cough*more federal funds for school food*cough*), much more can be done on the local level, taking into account the local foodshed. Many of the issues involve access to better food, whether through better markets in poor neighborhoods, more support for food banks, farmers' markets and community gardens, or restricting access to edible-food-like products such as fast food moratoriums and banning soda machines in schools.

Most of these issues are best dealt with at the local level. Much more can be said, and should be ... I'll touch on these topics as I blog.

Of course, I have a pet project of mine: a community canning center. Such a canning center would support local food banks, community gardens and farmers' markets. It could be used by entrepreneurs and local restaurants. I want local restaurants to rely more on the local foodshed, and one way they can do this is to do some food preservation themselves. A community canning center would have the space and specialized equipment that might not be feasible for a restaurant. It would also be an education space, for adults and school children and a base of operations for a Master Food Preserver program.

I could go on, but that is my pet project for local food politics. If you're interested in helping, let me know.

Yesterday, at the Wednesday Santa Monica Farmers' Market, I met David Karp, aka the fruit detective. His "Market Watch" column highlights what's best in the farmers markets (Fennel Showing Up at Farmers Markets). This week he highlights fennel (preserve it pickled or pressure canned in a soup), mandarins (preserve it in marmalade, segments canned in syrup, or dried), and wild chanterelles (preserve through drying).

Wow, this week both reviews feature restaurants that make and use preserved foods.

"The Find" heads to San Gabriel for the cuisine of Liuzhou at Happy Kitchen (A Happy Union of Chinese Flavors). Liuzhou cuisine not only includes pickles and smoked goods, but the signature dish of Happy Kitchen is luosifen, a snail-broth soup that includes preserved cabbage. Preserved cabbage and soup ... a classic combination in many cuisines.

S. Irene Virbila is 3-star impressed with the Lazy Ox Canteen near Little Tokyo and, after reading her review, I'm impressed too (Magic in the Air at Lazy Ox). According to the review, Chef Josef Centeno is putting out incredible small plates, with many specialties - many featuring preserved foods. "He pickles...He cures. And God knows what else....He even makes his own stoneground mustard." There is housemade sriracha and quince mostarda.

I can't wait to try it ... sounds like a perfect place to stop before heading to the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.

Preservation Link Roundup 2/17/10

More carrots? Absolutely. Plan on seeing more carrots in this space for the rest of the month ... thanks to the Carrot Can Jam for the month of February.

All Types of Cooking, and a Whole Lot of Canning Here! makes carrot pickles (Carrot Pickles). She uses the cold pack method, in which you place the vegetables in the jar cold and pour boiling brine over them. It's easy, and allows you to make pretty jars, with the vegetables artfully arranged. One note: when cutting the vegetables to fit the jar, don't forget to take into account the headspace. I usually cut one stick to the proper length and use that as a measuring stick for the rest of my carrots (or asparagus, green beans, etc.).

Big Black Dogs solves the cutting the vegetable issue by using those "baby carrots" you buy in bags at the supermarket (Pickled Carrots). I say "baby carrots" in quotes because they are actually mature carrots industrially processed into the convenient "baby" shape. Still, they make a great pickle. From Big Black Dogs' photos, it looks like they fit the 4oz jars pretty darn well.

This isn't for the Can Jam, but Well Preserved dehydrated some orange taproots and was quite happy with the results (Dehydrated Onions and Carrots). You know, if it wasn't such an old method of preserving food, quite possible the oldest, dehydrated foods would probably be a fashionable example of molecular gastronomy. The textural changes can be a fantastic opportunity for using familiar ingredients in new ways. Why not try using those dried onions in a breading, for example?

Now for something non-carrot related.

It is lucky that I have access to as many kumquats as I can use because good kumquat recipes keep coming down the pike. Case in point, Tigress in a Pickle's Indian-style fermented kumquat pickle (Rajisthani Kumquat Pickle).

Barefoot Gypsy Blog is quite frugal. She buys partially used candles at yard sales and then melts them together into new candles. She was torn about using canning jars for her recycled candles, but decided they looked so good that it was okay to use them for candles instead of food (Recycled Candles in Canning Jars). The instructions are quite good.

Re-Nest has some handy advice for buying and storing bulk foods (How to Buy and Store Bulk Foods). I knew how to store bulk foods, but I definitely learned some things about buying them. Good, helpful tips.

Preservation Link Roundup 2/15/10

The Foodinista makes sunchoke pickles (Here Comes the Sunchoke). This isn't a canning recipe, but it is a great idea nonetheless. I've been planning on doing some research for a tested canning recipe for sunchokes or developing one.

If you haven't tried sunchokes yet, I highly recommend it. Raw, they have the crunchy texture of jícama, but with an earthy, delicate flavor of true artichoke hearts. They're great roasted or steamed. Purée them into soup (with stock and/or, mmmm, cream), or into a mash. A gratin is also a good idea. Bonus, they are native to North America.

Last week, Kevin West made the case for pickles with barbecue (BBQ & Pickles). Today, Coconut & Lime shows how jams and jellies can be used with barbecue as well (Blueberry-Balsamic Slow Cooker Pork):

I [Coconut & Lime] love using jams as a short cut to flavor in quick barbecue sauces, it adds a not too sweet, fruity flavor without a lot of effort or adding sugar. Not to mention that adding jam helps me use up all of the jams I seem to accumulate/compulsively buy but since I don't actually eat jam or jelly or preserves on toast or bread or whatever people eat jam on I end up with piles and piles of them, unopened and wasting their potential.

One thing to consider when choosing a jam to use in this method is to think about what sort of wine you want to pair with it, and choose the fruit that best pairs with the wine. I'm thinking cherries with a tempranillo.

Food in Jars celebrates more than a year of serious canning with a return to marmalade - funny how the seasons return like that (Three-Citrus Marmalade Recipe). She uses a serrated peeler, which is normally for soft fruit (i.e., tomatoes, peaches). I would recommend a better non-serrated peeler. The problem with serrated peelers is that they will peel a soft fruit very well, and the skin on your fingers and thumbs is a lot like a soft fruit. It is much easier to injure yourself with a serrated peeler.

You know, when someone is doing a home harvested meal and they break out the moose steaks, wild leeks and crab - you begin to wonder if you are living in the right place - nah, Southern California still rules. Nevertheless, I have to say I'm impressed when Well Preserved's moose steaks weren't butchered properly to enjoy on the grill and they had to improvise with a stir fry instead, getting all the ingredients from their pantry (The Joys of a Pantry). Stir fries are always a great way to cook from your pantry.

Well Preserved also has gotten a lot of use out of their dehydrator: pineapple, apple and citrus (Adventures in Dehydrating - Pineapples and Apples). Dried fruit makes a great snack, of course, but it is also very useful in cooking. There are a lot of recipes where you want to add flavor, but not too much more moisture, indeed, you might want to reduce the moisture. Dried fruits and vegetables are great for that.

Kevin West initiates a series of guest bloggers with a wonderful piece on cooking for romance, from your pantry by baker/author Amanda Miller (Guest Blogger Amanda Miller's Salt-Preserved Lemons). Gee, aren't preserved lemons useful?

Sauerkraut, is there nothing you can't do? The LA Times People's Pharmacy recommends sauerkraut for curing canker sores (Sauerkraut as a Remedy for Canker Sores):

Trauma to the mouth from sharp food can trigger a canker sore (aphthous ulcer). So can immune suppression or a deficiency of folic acid, vitamin B-12 and iron. A 1930s remedy recommended swishing sauerkraut juice in the mouth several times a day. Perhaps the bacteria that ferment cabbage into sauerkraut provide helpful nutrients.

A shout out to my friend Alexandra Agajanian who gave me a beautiful can of sauerkraut on Sunday. It looks fantastic ... can't wait to try it.

Preservation Link Roundup 2/11/10

Homegrown.org points out that the Smithsonian Institute has an incredible collection of vintage seed catalogs, which they then use to turn into gorgeous homemade seed envelopes (DIY Seed Envelopes: Museum-Quality). Why not use some of these images to make jar labels?

Couponing in Critical Times has a post that not only shares local bargains (if you live in Knoxville, TN) but, if you scroll near the bottom, has a very nice set of tips for using dehydrated fruits (Stockpiling, Emergency Preparedness, and Food Security). For example,

Most recipes call for you to rehydrate the foods in a warm liquid. Instead of using water, try to use a more flavorful liquid. For fruits use warm juice or if you prefer wine or brandy. For vegetables, use the cooking liquid from your soup or a stock or broth.

Food preservation guru Linda Ziedrich discusses her experiment with curing her own olives, one batch with brine, one with lye (Cure Your Own Olives). She uses the University of California's Olives: Safe Methods for Home Pickling - ANR publication 8267 [PDF]. Another note, she lets us know that you can buy raw olives online, if you don't have a tree readily available, or want to try different varieties.

Preservation Supplement to LA Times Food Section 2/4/10

I'm starting a new series in which I look at the LA Times' weekly Food Section (now published on Thursdays) from a food preservation point of view. I plan on looking at the articles and seeing what sort of food preservation twist can be drawn from them.

For example, the cover story this week is on chili, tied to yesterday's Super Bowl (Who Dat?!) (Chili: A Bowl of Red-blooded American Heaven). The article goes a bit into the history of the dish and a recitation of some of the variations, including somewhat modernized takes such as a Moroccan-inspired chili featuring harissa and Merguez sausage. Chili, of course, is a classic when it is pressure-canned. True homemade convenience food, and versatile in the ways it can be used. Here is a basic recipe from the National Center for Home Food Preservation: Chili con Carne. There are also recipes for home canned harissa.

A related article profiles the Dolores Canning Co. (Chili Bricks Built a Family Business). I've seen the bricks and I've eaten the chili (a classic SoCal flavor), but what I didn't know is that the company got its start with the paterfamilias canning menudo for sale. The chili was canned as well, but really took off when they switched to freezing. Moreover the name, "chili brick," comes from a dehydrated form of chili:

The unusual name, a reference to the the chili's shape when packaged and frozen, isn't just a clever marketing gimmick. The term hails from the earliest dehydrated chili "bricks" made by Texas cowboy cooks around 1850. Drying a mixture of pounded beef, chile peppers and salt and shaping it into stackable rectangles that could be easily rehydrated with boiling water came in handy on Mid-western cattle drives and Gold Rush treks to California.

Wow, a food preservation hat trick; three types of preservation in a couple of paragraphs.

A little later the article notes that the "family ... produces a handful of jarred pickled products, including jalapeño-laced pork rinds and pig's feet spiced with red chile peppers." Canning, freezing, drying and pickling; this company wouldn't exist without food preservation.

The article also includes some good cooking tips. The chili itself contains ground beef hearts along with ground beef, "to give it a more robust, meaty flavor." And Philippes uses stock to rehydrate the chili, for additional flavor. Rehydrating dried or condensed goods with a flavored liquid is a wonderful trick for all sorts of dried ingredients.

Finally, a there are a couple of brief paragraphs on the opening of Forage, a new Silver Lake restaurant that is aggressively local and seasonal (Restaurant Opening: Forage in Silver Lake Calls All Home Gardeners). So aggressive, in fact, that they encourage local gardeners to bring in their own produce, where the restaurant will turn it into something delicious:

Central to the restaurant's concept is its "foraging program," through which [chef-owners] Bacon and Kim, along with the help of a friend named Eugene Ahn, encourage diners to bring in fresh fruits and vegetables from their gardens. Then, Kim and Bacon will create a dish, pastry or drink around those ingredients.

I sure hope they make some preserves with the bounty they are likely to get.