Tag: preserving

January 4, 2024 – Did You Get Anything Cool For Christmas, I Did

January 4, 2024 /

As you know, I am not a fan of Christmas. I am not a great gift giver and most of the things that I want are very expensive. Gifts are often a disappointment. It is not that I don’t appreciate a nice, new flannel. In fact I was thinking of buying one as I was wrapping up our Christmas shopping. I didn’t want to spend the extra money at the time, but it is just not fun.

I have wanted a fermenting crock for many years. The older I get, the more I appreciate sour and bitter flavors. In fact, I have made my own sauerkraut before. They are not terribly expensive, about fortyish dollars and I almost bought a handmade one at the state fair this year. I meant to, I just didn’t want to carry it all night and then I forgot by the time we left.

Honestly, this one is a little large. It is three gallons. That is a lot of fermented vegetables. They are meant to be out on the counter. If you think about it, how many pickles are you going to eat in one setting? You take one out each day and this is a way to get those beneficial probiotics. I think a more practical size is one gallon for that purpose. I would call this more of a production size.

Probably like all things, it is one of those things that one is not enough. In reality, you want one fermenting while eating out of one. So, maybe in the future, I will get a one gallon size for that reason. As I said, they are not that expensive. I also have been saying, start where you are. It doesn’t matter how many things you have if you don’t use them.

Sauerkraut, kimchi and pickles are definitely on the agenda. This time of year, there is not a lot of surplus, so I will start with store bought vegetables and small. As much as I like this stuff, it will be hard for me to get everyone onboard meal after meal. Start slowly and see how it goes.

What is nice about a store bought fermenting crock is the accessories. It has a properly sized weight for the vessel and an appropriately fitting lid. This can be done in a pot or a bucket, I have done both. This process is not about the tools, it is more about the acceptability of your spouse. Having a vessel that is approved to stay out on the counter makes it much more likely that it is going to bet used.

End Your Programming Routine: This quarter’s Backwoods Home magazine is all about fermenting. I am looking forward to reading that. It will be inspiration for my new element of fermenting. I would like my first project to be pickles, but I think it is probably going to be kimchi instead.

September 27, 2021- Making Pesto

September 27, 2021 /

Harvest season is still going strong although I think that we are over the peak. Making pesto has been on my list for a couple of weeks now as my basil has started to flower. It is pretty easy with a couple of ingredients and a food processor. It stores well in the freezer for later.

I trimmed the majority of the stems off of the plant. I do leave some in case the plant wants to grow again or I have a little basil to use for a short while before the plant gives out. Strip the leaves and rinse them off. Gather the rest of the ingredients.

  • Parmesan cheese
  • garlic
  • Pine nuts (or walnuts)
  • olive oil
  • salt

Here is a rough recipe that I use.

  • 2 cps, loosely packed basil leaves
  • 1/2 cp shredded Parmesan cheese
  • 2 tbs nuts
  • 1/4 cp olive oil (approx.)
  • 1 clove garlic
  • salt to taste

Here is the process that I used minimizing cleanup with the food processor.

  1. Determine the amount of basil leaves so that I can scale the recipe proportionately
  2. Shred the cheese
  3. Add the nuts to the cheese
  4. When the nuts have been broken down with the cheese, add the basil and process as much as possible.
  5. When the mixture stops moving, add olive oil to the active mixture and additional chopping will begin to occur.
  6. Keep processing to achieve uniform mixture
  7. Add garlic
  8. Taste for salt

If you eat pesto, then you probably have an idea about how much you use per serving. I would say that we use for about a 1/2 cup of pesto for a family of four’s pasta. I would suggest that portion is how the batch gets distributed for storage. That way, when you pull it out to use, then you have the proper amount for the meal.

End Your Programming Routine: Basil is easy to grow, it likes hot weather. I used some from the plant throughout the summer but the majority went to make this pesto. Pesto is easy to make and delicious. It’s great this time of year, but it is also great in the middle of winter for some reminder of the flavor of summer.

September 7, 2021 – Putting up Green Beans

September 7, 2021 /

My weekend wasn’t as good as it could have been but it was much better than the previous one. Friday and Saturday were spent going through my father in laws effects trying to get ready for my mother in law’s trip back to Texas next week. Sunday was the annual family day at the state fair. And Monday was doing a lot of things around the house including grilling some ribs and corn.

My parents came over on Thursday and brought me some things out of their garden. We got cabbage, corn on the cob and green beans. My mom likes to eat raw green beans, I do not. For my tastes, I want some minimal amount of cooking to get the ‘squeaky’ out of them. If you ever tried to eat green beans that were fresh, then you probably know what I am talking about.

It was probably around 10 pounds of green beans. There was definitely too much to eat, so I needed to get them processed for storage. When I was in college, I used to spend my summer working at a frozen food processing plant. One of the things that we did most of the summer was green beans. Not only growing up canning beans, but my knowledge of how they were done on a truck load scale is helpful in knowing what to do.

  1. Inspect the beans and remove both tips
  2. Wash the beans and heat up the water

3. Blanch the beans for about five minutes.

4. Drain the water and quench the blanching process using ice

5. Fill up the freezer bags and evacuate.

That is it, that is all there is to it. I made seven packages of ready to use green beans. That means each one is about a pound and a half give or take. Probably my favorite recipe to use them is a stir fried green beans with black bean sauce. If you are more of a meat and three then you can eat them that way or however you like.

This probably took me an hour and a half to do including cleanup. If I had more than 10lbs, it wouldn’t have taken that much more time. What takes time is heating up the water for blanching. I considered breaking out the propane burner to do this faster, but I only needed one batch. Another thing to consider is I used all of our ice, so you might need to have some additional ice ready if you were doing more.

End Your Programming Routine: This is the harvest season, I have some plans for plum wine, we need to put up peaches and pears and I am wanting to make some sauerkraut. I really don’t know if I will be able to do all that while my wife is gone, but we will see. I am going to do what I can to take advantage of the season.