Plan to Can: How to eat from your garden year round.

If you've been following my blog for any time at all, you know I like to can.  Not in the "If I could spend a day doing anything, I would can" type of way, but in the "I like to know where the food I feed my family is coming from" way.  It's an effort to spend days putting up food, but it's worth it. 

When I plan my garden - or in this year's case - my trip to the auction, I always go with an idea in mind of what I need to put up for the winter.  Yes, it's fun to make pepper jelly and special relishes but that's not what's going to put food on the table all winter.  The bulk of my canning is for food on the table purposes.  Just a small portion goes to making all those weird but beautiful things you see in the Ball Blue Book. 

Since auction day is coming up in a couple of weeks, I've already started my canning plan.  There's nothing hard about making a plan.  You simply figure out how many quarts of an item you use a week or month and plan to can that much or more.  For example, if I use 1 quart of green beans a week, I plan to can 52 quarts to get me through until the next year.  Now of course, you're always dependent on what your garden has produced or in my case, what is being brought to auction. 

This is my canning plan at this point:

30 quarts of carrots
50 quarts of potatoes
20 quarts of applesauce
20 quarts of peaches
20 pints peach salsa
50 quarts of spaghetti sauce
20 pints of pizza sauce
25 quarts of sauce and peppers (like Oliverio's)
25 pints of peppers
20 quarts of salsa
20 pints of strawberry or tomato jelly (I may be too late for strawberry and believe it or not, you can make tomatoes taste like strawberry jelly by using jello)
10 pints of pepper jelly

I'll also plan on making a turn of vegetable sandwich spread from the ends of all the veggies.  I was given that recipe and the tomato jelly recipe from a patient last year.  One of the best benefits of working home health is getting to meet old farmer's wives who have great canning recipes. 

If there's a great deal of green beans, squash or corn, I'll probably go ahead and can them as well, but I'm actually pretty well stocked with those right now. 

Going with a plan will give me an idea of what I need to pick up at the auction.  Of course, depending on prices, I may get more or less of what my plan is and that's OK.  It's all about being flexible and working with what you can get. 


What are you going to can this year?

Happy Corn Day!

OK, so it's not really corn day, although there probably is a national corn day somewhere in the list of all the weird holidays.  I thought I would give you a peek into how I work up my corn - all 60 dozen ears of it.  Well, give or take a few ears. 

Last night we picked and bagged up the corn.  By we, I mostly mean Ronnie.  I worked over and then ran the boys to their MMA class.  The corn was picked by the time I got home.  (Perfect timing, right?)

The first part of my day was cleaning corn.  Thankfully, my mother in law Marion helped me this morning.  It always makes the work go faster when you have someone to keep you company. 

My plan is to both can and freeze corn today.  Once the corn is shucked, we'll use an electric knife to get it off the cob.  By the way, we save all the cobs for the cows.  They love them. 

I'll start with the canning part so that when I'm sick of canning corn, I can then just start putting it in baggies and freezing it.  If I feel all energetic later, I may can some corn relish. 

Yes, this will take me all day.  I know some of you might think "Why bother with all this when you can just go buy a bag or can of corn?".  Well, because I know what's in my food.  I know the fertilizer used in the ground, I know the type of chemicals sprayed on it (none), and I know where my seeds came from and if they were genetically modified (they weren't).  By the end of today, I'll have one more thing stored up for the coming year to feed my family with that is good, quality food for a fraction of the price of the grocery store. 

To me, that's worth the effort. 

Canning Day (OK, Week) 2011.

It takes a long time to can 35 dozen ears of corn.  Trust me. 

At least having help made the work little easier and a lot more enjoyable.

We met at 9am and started right in.

We had some great little helpers....

And best of all, we had this:

The gigantic, eight burner stove in the church's kitchen. 

We fit all three canners, one large stockpot for water and a small sauce pot for our lids.  I could have easily fit one more canner on the stove top. 

By the way, how happy does Ronnie look to be there?  

The end result of our hard work.......

 Corn!

My end of the week total is as follows:
5 dozen quarts of corn
4 dozen quarts of sauce & peppers
2 dozen jars of pepper jelly
And another 15 quarts of frozen sweet peppers.

I'm finishing up the applesauce today.  Woo Hoo!

Also, Ronnie's new canner that I bought him for his birthday is a beast.  I love that thing.  It can do 17 quarts at a time.

So there you have it. 

Canning-palooza 2011 is outta here.

Canning 101.

I'm noticing more people seem to be interested in learning the art of canning.  My reasons to can remain the same today as they were when I first started years ago -  to have quality organic produce available to my family at a price I could afford.  I like knowing what was or was not used on the food that I serve.  It's the same reason we now raise our own beef - quality and cost. 

I've come up with an idea that I think would benefit both the new canner and myself. 

I'm offering a canning 101 class at my home. 

Here's how it works:

I will have the produce on hand to can. 
You will bring a dozen quart jars with rings and lids, as well as $5 to cover the cost of the food and incidentals (sugar, vinegar, pecitn, etc.)
You will leave at the end of the day knowing how to use both a boiling water canner and a pressure canner, and have knowledge of proper canning techniques.  Best of all, you will have a dozen quarts of home canned goodness to enjoy. 

My plans for the day include (based on what's ready to harvest)
Corn
Peach Salsa
Green beans - if available
Applesauce

What do I get out of it?  Well, as the saying goes "Many hands make light work".  I get help with all the chopping, shucking and peeling. 
And most importantly, fellowshipping with each other really does make the job seem less daunting.

I'd like to do this on Monday 29th from 9am to 2pm.  I'm planning on four to five hours to get everything done, including lunch.

If you're interested, leave me a comment and I'll get in touch with you. 

My Infamous Peach Salsa.

What do you do when you've been canning peaches for so long that you're sticking to the floor and you can't take it any longer?  You search for an easier recipe to use up the rest of your peaches.

That's how Ronnie & I found our absolute favorite new treat - Peach Salsa.

We tweaked it a little based on the produce we had available and the fact that Ronnie & the boys are not fans of anything with too much kick to it.

Last year, we canned our peaches 80% canned and 20% salsa.  I'm planning on doing closer to a 50/50 mix this year. 

Here's the recipe:

4 cups fresh peaches - peeled, pitted and chopped

1/2 cup chopped onion

1/2 cup chopped red bell pepper

4 Hungarian wax peppers, minced

1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin

1/4 cup white vinegar

1 teaspoon grated lime zest

1/4 cup white sugar

1 package pectin

3 1/2 cups white sugar

canning jars, rings and lids



Sterilize jars and lids.
In a large saucepan, combine peaches, onion, pepper, cilantro, garlic, cumin, vinegar, and lime zest. Stir together pectin and 1/4 cup sugar. Bring to a boil, and stir in remaining 3 1/2 cups sugar. Boil for 1 minute, stirring constantly. Remove from heat, and stir for 5 minutes.

Pour peach salsa into prepared jars, leaving 1/4 inch air space. Seal, and process in a boiling water bath for 15 minutes

Serve with chips and enjoy the shouts of your deeply grateful friends and family that you chose worthy to share this with. 

In the past year, if you have gotten to taste this salsa, consider yourself loved by Ronnie.  He is very protective of his golden salsa.  This isn't taken to just any church function.  You must be deemed worthy of the salsa. 

I'm planning on making much more this year, so we can share it.  

It really is a great recipe.