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Originally uploaded by snozzberries

A view of my cabinet sans today's freshly made apple sauce. Alas, I forgot the take pictures when I made more raspberry / strawberry jam last week. The raspberry came out beautifully, although I referred to it as syrup because I didn't think it was actually going to set. I did get a bit lazy with skimming the foam off the strawberry, but it still tastes great. Only two jars of pickles left not including the opened ones in the fridge. I'm still swimming in about 5 jars of salsa. 9 jam,& 5 peaches. So much for this lasting until next year!

Chantale, Ben and I hit up Appleland Station on the weekend to do some apple picking, as I had a hankering to try my hand at homemade applesauce. If you have young kids, I highly recommend you head out there on a weekend morning before the season is over, it's just a few minutes out of London and definitely worth it. Out of all the farms I've been to this year, they were hands down the best organized, most enthusiastic and the train ride was really cute. I'm still unsure as to why the farm mascot is named Urfy, and I'll have to inquire next time.



We ended up splitting a 20lb bag ($16) although I think I ended up with the majority of them! This was my first attempt at apple sauce, after a failed attempt at apple butter two years ago. Much like my vendetta against the peach, I had to show the apple who was in charge.


On a skill level, applesauce is about as easy as pickles. You need two ingredients: apples and cinnamon. If you can boil water, cut apples and use a food processor, then this is for you. Some recipes may call for cooking the apples with the skins on and then using a food mill or grinder, but I just used peeled them and blended. I usually do my canning in really small batches of 6-10 jars, so I don't need a lot of equipment. That being said, I did take advantage of Chantale's handy apple peeler. The steps are pretty simple:

1)Peel your apples
2)Core them (I foolishly used this corer on peaches and tomatoes before and never realized the force I'd need to exert to core apples. I ended up bending and then finally snapping two of the blades off in the process and resorted back to my miracle blades. Whoops!)





3)Put the apple pieces in 1-2 inches of water on medium heat and start cooking them until they're quite soft.
4)Transfer to a food processor and blend, return to a pot on medium/high heat and add cinnamon to taste. I actually had two pots on the go because I don't have a huge processor and I didn't want the apples to go completely brown while I was still chopping.
5)Pour into sterilized jars and boil in BAP for 20-25 minutes.
Fini!



I still have some apples left and I think I'm going to try my hand at apple pie filling tomorrow, time permitting. The jury is still out on re-attempting apple butter, but I'm leaning towards no. I already have some pork chops in the freezer begging to be paired with this and it's all mine since Jay really dislikes most fruit, woohoo!

When the peach and I last met, we disagreed greatly. Apparently they were not prepared to be skinned,canned or make into cobbler, and thus caused me great frustration. We decided to go our separate ways, until I decided to revisit them with a vengeance. These peaches would be canned, or I would die trying. (Well, maybe not, but a spoon would be brandished angrily.)

You don't need very many ingredients, and I had the following on hand:

-12 Peaches
-3 Cups Sugar
-6 Cups Water
-Lemon Juice


I began with a fresh basket of freestone (very important as opposed to clingstone) peaches. Quite a deal at $1.88!


I eyed my prey carefully, and began the process by boiling them in a pot of water, two and three at a time. I then plunged them into a cold water bath and the skins peeled right off.



This is where I was thwarted last time, as my peaches weren't ripe enough and I ended up with peachy pulp instead of slices.The end result? 12 Naked peaches, ready for slicing.


I used an apple corer, which was pretty effective at splitting them into even slices.
As I was cutting out the cores, I began boiling the syrup solution. It consisted of 3 cups sugar to 6 parts water. If you want a slightly lighter syrup, then reduce the amount of sugar to 2 cups.



As the peaches are sliced, it's a good idea to drizzle some lemon juice over them to prevent browning. If you have fruit fresh (basically citric acid) then that would do as well. I started packing them into pre-sterilized half pint jars and found the wider ones worked best. Once they're full of peaches, pour in the syrup and be careful to remove any air bubbles.





After processing the jars for 25 minutes, I was victorious and awarded with 7 1/2 pint jars of delicious peaches. While not millions of peaches, they'll do, and the score is now tied at Kristen 1, Peach 1.

Note: I originally wrote this after I made jam last Christmas. I intend to make it again this year, so I'll post those exploits as well. The pictures are a bit blurry, so hopefully next time around they'll be clearer.

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So over the last couple weeks people have been asking me about the jam I gave out at Christmas (I'm assuming since they're supplies have been exhausted. And before you ask, no, I don't have any more at home here!) Being the nerd I am, I actually took pictures while I made it. So you can follow along on here and try it yourself. (Meaning that I'm not going to be whipping up a batch any time soon, strawberry season isn't for a few months!) This is pretty long because I tend to ramble, it might be tl;dr for most of you, so just look at the pictures instead =)


Things You'll Need:
1)Strawberries. (Thanks, Captain Obvious) I had two baskets full. It's best to go to a pick-your-own farm, because it would be ridiculously expensive to buy them at the grocery store. I went to the Millar Berry Farm on Longwoods Road and it cost $10, including $1 to get the baskets. (About $1.49/lb)You'll need about 8 cups of raw berries to equal six cups of crushed berries, which should give you 3-4 jars.



2)SUGAR! and lots of it. I didn't use of all of what is pictured. I made about 12 jars and went through 1 1/2 bags of sugar.



(it's a little known fact that the best jam has chinese noodles, corn and stovetop stuffing mixed into it)

3)Pectin: (most stores tend to carry 'certo' brand)I tried the powdered stuff and it wasn't that good, so I recommend getting the gel. It's about $3.50 for the large box of two pouches. If you don't want runny syrup-like jam, plan on getting 2 boxes to make 12 jars. You can adjust the amounts later after your first run.

4)Big Ass Pot (hereafter referred to as BAP) to sterlize the jars, lids and process them after they're filled. I got this from walmart and it was $10, and it came with a metal tray to lift in and out which is very handy. (My first attempt to remove jars last year involved oven mitts, some metal tongs and a plastic cutting board. I don't recommend it).

5)Jars. Try looking at garage sales because almost everyone has some kicking around. I picked up a box of about mismatching 25 jars and rings for $1. You can buy the lids separately very cheaply and should. While the jars and rings can be used again, the lids cannot as the sealing compound on them will not stand up to repeated processing. (learned that the hard way when I gave my mom a jar of moldy jam last year=)

6)Incidentals:a large, deep pan (not pot), a funnel or ladle to scoop the jam (i preferred a ladle, but you'll also see the mess I made), a glass of ice water, a spoon, a wooden spoon, about 3 large bowls.

7)Jam making music. I personally favoured Jimmy Eat World and Queen.

Alright. Let's get started.


Step 1: Put your cat in the slow cooker. She's entirely too curious and nosy and will stick her snout into everything. Nothing says breakfast better than cat hair stuck in your jam. Lull her into an afternoon nap on the keep warm setting.


Step 1a)Hull your berries. Best to do this first before you start boiling anything so you can just grab another bowlful. Never hulled berries? It's easy, cut off the green leaves and scoop out the inside white goop. You'll be making 3-4 jars at a time.

Step 2: Some instructions will vary, but this is what i did. Fill the BAP with enough water that jars can be submerged and start it boiling (3-4 jars). They will need to boil for at least 10-15 minutes to sterilize them. Throw the rings and lids in as well. You'll want a sink full of warm water to put the jars in after they're sterilized. Basically you'll want to have 3-4 empty jars being sterilized in the BAP, 3-4 sterilized jars in the sink ready to be filled and 3-4 jars of jam being processed in the BAP at all times, to ensure that you're not having to overcook the jam.

Step 3: Crush the 8 cups of raw berries into approx six cups and set aside.
Step 4: Add 3/4 pouch of liquid pectin to 1/4 cup of sugar and mix in small bowl.
Step 5: Combine the berries and pectin mix in the pan on medium/high heat.



Step 6: When the mix has reached a full boil, add in the remaining 3 3/4 cups of sugar. (you may find yourself adding some more pectin/sugar to thicken, but this is a start)



Step 7:Bring the mixture slowly to a boil and boil hard for one minute. Skim off the excess foam. You can supposedly reconstitute this into jam, but I'm too lazy to go into that.


Step 8: Grab the spoon that's been in the ice water and scoop a small amount of the jam. Leave it on the counter for 2-3 minutes to see if it has set to the consistency you want. If it's too runny, add more sugar and pectin sparingly and reheat.



Step8a: Remind your cat that the counter is not her personal lounge space and deport her to the living room.



Step 8b: Remind yourself to never turn your back on Peanut. Take a picture for posterity, throw her in the bathroom and google whether a spoon of jam is going to cause digestive problems.



Step 9: Remove the pan from heat. Grab a sterilized jar from the sink and ladle the jam in. Place the lid on and screw the lid on tight. Place it back in the BAP and leave it there for 10 minutes. If you're sloppy like me, this will get rather messy.



Step 10: Remove from BAP, wipe down and leave to cool on a towel. Test the lid by pressing it down. If it 'pops', then you haven't sealed them properly. Unscrewed the lid, re-tighten it and put it back in the BAP to process it again. Some sites say you can reheat the mixture and reprocess it in a new jar, but that's kind of dicey. Put it in the fridge and eat it within a week, and you're fine.


Last Step: Label your jam with some obscure pop culture reference that only you and a small handful of people are likely to find humourous. (I'm partial to Jam the Man)

While I think the salsa went off without a hitch, my first attempt at BBQ sauce is worthy of a first class cabin on the failboat. I have three jars of it, and they stand lonely in the corner behind the drying rack as I've no idea what to with them. I think my first inkling of trouble was when I was attempting to puree the ingredients (including celery, onion, green/red pepper, tomato) and was greeted with a substance that had the consistancy of chunky applesauce. No matter how often I pulsed the food processor, it never was fully pulverized. Never would my creation resemble the lovely deep orange sauce that the recipe promised me I would be enjoying. I think it may finally be time for me to geek out and get a food mill. I would just try to pass it off as spaghetti sauce, but I was going for a sweet recipe and used copious amounts of brown sugar. Thankfully, I divided the recipe in half and wasn't left with a huge amount. J has come into the kitchen several times to see me gnawing on my lip as I tilt the jar back and forth in thought, before placing it back in the corner behind the dishrack. (Yes, this is the only time it's permissible to put Baby in the corner). I'm puzzled over what to do with my 3 quarts of lumpy, red, mystery sauce. I don't want to admit defeat and empty them, but with apple season coming around the corner, I'll probably need the jars. Thoughts?

Last week I took a trip out to Ferket's Tomato Farm, which is about 20 minutes south/west of London. I was on a mission: grab myself a bushel of their famous paste tomatoes that I would decimate in a frenzy of salsa and BBQ sauce creations. I was not disappointed! The picture above is my bushel of tomatoes, which only cost $8 for U-Pick , or $12 Pre-Picked. That's an incredible price given the fact that field tomatoes are bottoming ou at .69c/lb in most grocery stores, and the hot house ones were trending about 1.99/lb until about 5 weeks ago. I also picked up some green peppers, onions and jalapenos, the total cost of which was about $4.00.

This is my second time making salsa, but I'm not experienced enough to throw recipes and caution to the wind as of yet. The ever present fear of botchulism still hovers over all of my creations and my friends laugh at first, but then pause when I might be just a little bit serious about it.

I kid, I kid. In all fairness, no one has died from eating my preserves. Yet.

Still here? The threat of following instructions from someone who is earnest about her lack of short term food poisoning victims isn't a deterrant? Good.

There are a couple of key points I gleaned from my first attempt at salsa that will save you some time and heartbreak in the kitchen:

1)Paste, Paste, Paste tomatoes. Sure, they look smaller and don't get the superstar recognition that say, the chubby quintessential beefsteak will. It's tempting to reach for the hulking linebacker of the tomato world, but you'll come to regret your choice midway through when you realize that they're mostly pulp and seeds and your bowl is woefully empty of useable bits. Case in point:



I still had to weed through all of this red pulp to get usuable bits and what I was left with was pretty small in comparison to what I started with. Here is what you end up with when you use paste tomatoes: (an added benefit is that you can use an apple corer to slice them and they're left relatively intact)


2)Blanch your tomatoes until the skins split. Instructions on the internet seemed to vary. Some would say that I should boil the tomato for 20-30 seconds and absolutely no longer. I'd fearfully remove my tomatoes and attempt to peel them, only to be scraping skins off because they didn't split. The times you read online are a guideline. I'd throw 4 in at a time, wait until the skin was visible split, and then core them while I waited for the next batch.

3)Don't blindly reach for a spice jar and assume that because it is red, it is chili powder and not cayenne pepper. Your tongue and your family will thank you in advance.

4)Wear comfortable slippers and take a few sitting breaks. I'm still new at this, so it's a slow going process for me. Between all the vegetable dicing, blanching, boiling and cleaning, it probably took me a good 4.5 hours from start to finish.

Now on to the gritty details. I used the following recipe from pickyourown.org. I don't have a scale, so I converted the lbs/quarts into cups.

Chunky Tomato Salsa:

-15lbs tomatoes (about 13-14 cups)
-3 cups chopped onion
-6 jalapeno peppers
-24 oz can tomato paste (note: I couldn't find this in 3 stores to save my life, so I used crushed tomatoes in lieu, which will make it runnier)
-2 cups bottled lemon juice
-spices: black pepper, cumin, oregano, chili powder, salt, sugar (optional)

Start by preparing your tomatoes. Get them simmering in the pot and throw all of your other diced vegetables / seasonings in there as you go and simmer for 30 minutes. You can play w/ the amount of seasonings, I tend to go a bit heavier on the cumin/oregano and lightly on the chili powder since I'm notorious for overusing it to nuclear proportions. (When I'm not mistaking cayenne pepper for it) Then pour into pre-sterilized jars, leave 1/4 inch of headroom in jar, twist rings tight (not so hard that you have to grab the jar and exert all your strength!) and process for 15-25 minutes in a boiling water bath, depending on your height above sea level. (PYO.org has a handy chart for each recipe)



The end result: what I like to call "Shazam, it's Salsa!"

Costs:-Tomato Bushel: $6.00 (It was 8.00, but I used 1/4 of it to make bbq sauce)
-Peppers/Onions:$2.50
-Spices: Already Had
-Tomato Paste: Free! (Used my PC Gas Superbucks)

Total Cost: $8.50/8 Jars =$1.07/jar. It would be even cheaper if you grew your own veggies. Compared to the average price of $2.99/jar, I'd say the time expended was worth the savings. (Again, those of us without cable have to amuse ourselves somehow)

Every day when I drive into work in St.Thomas, I pass several farms on the way in. One of those farms is the Thomas Bros. Market. A few weeks ago, they changed their roadside signs to proclaim that cukes and dill had arrived, fresh from the field, and I found myself steering my car into the parking lot.
I've never tried making pickles before and was fearful that I'd be up to my elbows in fermenting brine and wondering if I was brewing a biohazard! I was pleasantly surprised though, to find that it was hands down, the absolute easiest item to can.

The infamous cheese and pickle tray often displayed at holiday meals is a storied item in my family. Often times, it never even made it to the table! I think my mom liked to pretend that she didn't see my brother and I sneaking into the fridge over the course of the afternoon to grab a few dills or sweet pickles while the turkey was cooking. It was of course, a mystery when dinner time came and the tray was brought to the table almost completely empty. It became a family tradition to then make a 'snacking' tray that could be foraged upon during the day, and then one that was refilled later at dinner.

With that in mind, I toddled on over to pickyourown.org (so far, my canning bible) to download one of their handy dandy pdf how-to files. It was unbelievably simple! I started w/ a bag of cukes, some sugar and prepackaged dill and sweet pickle mix.





Before you even get started on this, you'll want to start a hot water bath in your Big Ass Pot (BAP)and get your jars washed and sterilizing. If you have a dish washer, you can also throw your jars in there for a quick cycle. I also get a small pot of water ready that I throw my rings and lids in for a quick boil and set aside.
I brought the sweet pickle mix and sugar to a boil according to the package directions while I started dicing the cukes.




(Side note, if you're planning on making two types of pickles, it's probably in your best interest to pay attention to what you're doing, instead of dancing around to Jimmy Eat World while you dice). Otherwise, you'll end up with sweet pickles that are shaped like dill spears and not the traditional round chunks. Whoops.
Once the cukes are diced and the mix is boiling, grab your pre-sterilized jars, tightly pack with cukes and ladle in the boiling pickle mix.




Throw those bad boys into your BAP and leave them for 15-20 minutes based on how high you are above sea level. Leaving them in the BAP for too long could result in mushy pickles, which then result in sad pandas, so we want to avoid that. Let them cool in a dark place for 24 hours. After that, sit back and enjoy your perfect bounty of pickles! Try to let some of them make it to the dinner table next time.






Breakdown of Costs:
-Bag of Field-Fresh Cukes $2.99
-Dill and Sweet Pickle Mix $6.00
-Jars/Lids/Rings - Already Had


Yield: 8 Jars ($1.13/Jar)

What I'd Do Differently: I'd buy the pickle mix in bulk at bulk barrel for a fraction of the cost for the boxed mixes.