tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Apr 23, 2022 17:02:07 GMT 10
Because of the out of date recipes and methods around and the risk of food poisoning, I generally like to follow a recipe or method provided by ball mason or Fowlers vacola, and that’s the system I then use to preserve. They’re quite different.
I love vacola because it is so simple - put the fruit and liquid (uncooked) in clean jars, add the lid and clip, put in the preserver covered in water and switch it on for 1 hour for most size jars. (You can just use a big pot like the ball mason water bath one and watch the temp, so you aren’t relying on the electric preserver, but it is super convenient while available.) Vacola is what I’d use for preserving the berries.
I use ball mason for jams and anything where I want one of their specific recipes. I fine it a lot less convenient because you cook the food first and bottle it hot, then put it into the water bath hot. You cook it in the water bath for a much shorter time but I find it needs my attention for longer due to cooking first. But I love the convenience of the jars.
Interestingly, the reusable mason jar lids remind me a little of vacola lids. Vacola lids are one piece and reusable but have a rubber gasket like the reusable mason ones. You are supposed to use a new rubber gasket each time although many people reuse them I think. Vacola lids don’t screw on - they sit on and are held with a clip during processing and 24 hr after, so like mason you can easily tell if there’s a good seal. So with vacola, the only consumable part is the rubber gaskets/rings.
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bce1
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Post by bce1 on Apr 23, 2022 17:45:10 GMT 10
Great thread.
We have been aiming for 25% of our total food requirements both fresh and preserved. We manage it just! Both us work full time so it’s a mix of hobby and education for the future. What it has done is build an infrastructure and knowledge base that we can hopefully expand if required. We have 18-24 months stored food for 10 and hopefully over that time can ramp up production.
Per my KJs in food thread, the volume of food required is quite daunting!
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dirtdiva
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Email: cannedquilter@gmail.com
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Post by dirtdiva on Apr 24, 2022 21:50:50 GMT 10
Blackberry grows wild on my retreat, so I've been looking at preserving recipes in a book I have from Ball. The recipe calls for a large amount of sugar, 4 cups per 2lbs of berries. This amount of sugar wouldn't be sustainable for me after a collapse. Whilst I have perhaps 80kg of sugar stored, I don't have the abi.ity to produce it. And it isn't grown anywhere near my retreat. Is the sugar necessary for preserving berries? Sugar is not necessary for preserving berries. You can use alternative sweeteners such as honey. As a general rule blackberry jam is made by cooking the berries down with a sweetener of choice and a bit of citric acid and pectin added. once cooked down and thickened it is placed in jars and water bathed in a large pot covered with water in jars for a specified amount of time to seal. Jellies and jams are a good place for beginning canner to learn the basics. I use little jam since I have no small children at home making peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. As someone said earlier blackberries do not dehydrate well whole but mashed they make a decent fruit leather although the wild ones in the U.S. tend to run seedy. I grow blackberries and our favorite uses are fruit leathers and I make a lightly sweetened blackberry syrup where I strain out a great deal of the seeds and cook it down to thicken and can it in jars to eat over pancakes. The kids like it over vanilla ice cream. I do can a few quarts of homemade blackberry pie filling every year for pies and cobblers made with sugar and a product called clear jel. Blackberries like blueberries can be frozen and added to pancakes. I make blackberry wine and brandy with mine also. I froze lots of blackberries when my kids were small and ran the berries through a blender with a touch of honey when they were sick to make popsicles with them. They are used to treat diarrhea and when my kids got stomach bugs and such I used them to keep them hydrated as well. Some people dry the leaves of the blackberry bush for tea for the same purpose. |
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tomatoes
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Post by tomatoes on Apr 25, 2022 1:29:24 GMT 10
The blackberry syrup is a good idea.
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Post by Stealth on Apr 25, 2022 9:37:13 GMT 10
Per my KJs in food thread, the volume of food required is quite daunting! It really is, isn't it. For now we're relying 99% on store-bought produce. We probably have enough for a couple of months if we rely on nothing but the long term pantry. I'd absolutely like to have more stored but we simply don't have the room for it in our current house. We're hoping that when we buy the new place we'll have the ability to put a storage pantry in the yard. We'll probably use a garden shed upgraded to be pest resistant and hopefully pretty environmentally sound (ie. stable temps etc) until we can buy our forever home at some point. It IS difficult though because I'd love to stock up on heaps of dried produce now but then we'd have to move all of it when we leave. I can leave a heap of it with family that's close by so it won't be wasted that's for sure. But I'm now putting some cash aside each pay so that when we do move we can stock up quickly. Hopefully that'll be by December and if we're lucky we'll be able to get in before the inflation gets TOO drastic. Hopefully. |
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malewithatail
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Location: Northern Rivers NSW
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Post by malewithatail on Apr 25, 2022 9:52:41 GMT 10
Look at making a shed from used refrigeration panels. They slot into each other and are insulated as well. Not very environmentally sound as the insulation is usually sytrofoam, but better you use it than go to land fill. Often a add in the local rag can bring forth some, or a recycling yard. We have made a caravan annex out of them and its really nice to sit in. They are easy to work with and once the walls are done, just mix some concrete up and pour it in to make a floor. (Plastic under neath the concrete to make a vapor barrier, otherwise it will always be damp from the ground.) You can get roof paneling as well, but its not as easy to get, so a conventional galv iron rood with sislation under it works well enough as you arnt making a cool-room, just a storeroom. Close fitting doors and even windows are available as well. The primary aim is to make it vermin proof.
Stealth, I don't want to upset you, but you better get your act together, things are speeding up towards the collapse. We feel drawn to work even harder now and are pushing ourselves to get more gardens planted out.
Now we are using above ground gardens for winter vegies as the ground is just too wet at present for cultivation, even assuming I could get the tractor onto the vegie patch. This wet spell has made us rethink our gardens a bit.
The solar power systems seem to be working OK with only a little sun, especially the main one still can boost the hot water on a dull day, saving us from lighting the stove. (Its solar heated as well as electric boosted from the main solar power system).
Amazing how well pumpkins grow after the seeds have been through the pigs. The pigs are not for eating, but to turn over gardens before planting.
You know you own an old tractor when.....You find yourself explaining the functional improvements provided by what looks like to others as bailing wire and scrap metal.
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Post by Stealth on Apr 25, 2022 10:17:39 GMT 10
Stealth, I don't want to upset you, but you better get your act together, things are speeding up towards the collapse. We feel drawn to work even harder now and are pushing ourselves to get more gardens planted out. Oh I agree 100%. It's definitely getting hairy and the idea of not being able to add more now when we have the free access is uncomfortable to say the least 😶. We've got quite a lot of stock that will be able to be moved because it's still sealed so that's something. But we're absolutely pushing our timelines to the left to try to get things at least a little more stable. I'd much prefer to have excess food stored than excess cash because the cash won't achieve much when food isn't there to be had. |
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peter1942
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Post by peter1942 on Apr 25, 2022 11:01:01 GMT 10
We use the standard twist top jars that have previously contained a great variety of products at the supermarkets. Most of our jars are either given to us by friends or recovered from the local recycling centre. We use the sizes ranging from 300 grams up to about two kilograms and we also use the one, one and a half and two litre bottles that previously contained fruit juices. Over the years we have standardised the sizes and designs of the containers we use for different products and in doing so our storage facilities are now made to suit the different sizes better.
We purchase the lids from Plasdene (plasdene.com.au) which are about 13 to 15 cents each for the sizes we use. When purchasing the is a minimum purchase of $150.00 which is a lot of lids and they will keep a long time. The lids are normally shared amongst our group which means we share the load so to speak. We find that we can use the lids up to five times depending on what they have been used for prior.
The lids taken from commercially made and bottled products normally have a coloured ring where the contents have been in contact with it. That colour is made up not from the fruit or vegetables that were previously contained but from chemicals mixed with the product, normally to hide the fact that some of the contents were well past their use by date and colouring is added to make it more palatable to the consumer. Do not reuse a lid that has been on a commercially produced product.
It is very rare for us to find a jar of spoiled preserves and we have in the past used products that have been in the jars for up to seven years with no loss of taste or other side effects.
Make sure you label each jar as it is made with the contents and the date. Our storage facility is set up so that the new seasons preserves go on the right so we first use the ones on the left so we can keep an check on what needs to be used first.
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