The Big Book of Preserving the Harvest
Kayla recommended that I check out Carol W.
Costenbader's The
Big Book of Preserving the Harvest, and since the text was available at my
local library, I figured I didn't have anything to lose.
With chapters on canning, drying, freezing, jams, pickles,
vinegars, and cold storage, this initially looked like the go-to
reference for every well-rounded homesteader to have on her
shelf. Closer scrutiny, though, showed that the recipes
included are more fancy and less basic than you'd want if this was
your single reference guide.
On the other hand, The Big Book of Preserving the Harvest shines in the chapter
introductions, where Costenbader walks you through all of the
basic techniques for each preservation method. I was
particularly taken with the canning section since I haven't canned
extensively and didn't know that people at higher altitudes might
need to leave more head space (so that's why my peach sauce
erupted!) and that minerals in your water can cause the top layer
of canned food to turn brown or gray even though it's still
perfectly safe.
When I first started
the book-learning part of my homesteading education about 15 years
ago, Stocking
Up seemed like
the best option for an all-around basic preservation guide, but
since then I've mostly gravitated toward websites. What
resources do you use when you want to know how long to blanch your
green beans before freezing and how much head space to leave on
top of your canned tomatoes?
Or explore more posts by date or by subject.
About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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I've got the Ball book, but I find i most often go online to look for something specific, and for basic canning pickyourown.org has canning instructions for just about any fruit or veggie you might want to put in a jar. I dont have very much freezer space, and here in NM, it is paramount, a d maybe even required by law
to have a good stock of roasted green chilis in your freezer, so my freezer space is taken. Canning, and dehydrating are the biggest ways I preserve, also fermenting and pickling. My new favorite is to dehydrate tomatoe slices till they are super dry, then grind them to a powder in The food processor. This powder is a fabulous addition to sauces or soups, and serves as instant tomato paste with the addition of a little water. I throw one of those dessicant packets in ghe jar with my dehydrated stuff, just to keep it really dry.