It’s the start of Canning Season
It’s the beginning of summer and the unofficial start of the canning season. It begins slow with strawberries, blueberries, cherries and asparagus in late spring and early summer. By July and August, everything is ready for canning: tomato sauce, bread and butter pickles, red pepper relish, preserved peaches and watermelon rinds. In the fall, it’s time for pumpkin butter, apple pie filling, and pickled pears.
Home Canning allows you to capture the flavor of summer in a jar and enjoy it later on in the winter. For those of you who enjoy weekend long DIY projects, home-canning is perfect for you. And if you’re really on top of it, it’s a great way to stock pile gourmet gifts for the Holiday Season.
Most of the equipment needed for water bath canning, you already have in your kitchen. A large soup pot, tongs, towels. You really don’t need any special equipment other than jars and good information.
For most cooking activities, experimenting and trial and error are perfectly acceptable ways to figure out what you like and how you like to do it. But with home-canning, fermenting and curing, you need books that have been vetted not just for delicious recipes but for food safety. I can’t tell you how often I find home-canning recipes online that don’t account for elevation in processing time or pickling recipes that don’t use enough vinegar in the brine.
These are the 4 books that I use all the time.
No 1: Foolproof Preserving: A Guide to Small Batch Jams, Jellies, Pickles, Condiments and More. America’s Test Kitchen
This is the book I use the most and my number 1 recommendation. It’s smaller and has fewer recipes than some of the other books here but the pictures get me inspired, the recipes always come out perfectly and it’s a great combination of staple recipes and recipes that use more creative flavors.
A thorough, yet easy to read, How-To section and canning science lesson is perfect for beginners and those need a quick refresher. Recipes cover Sweet Jams and Jellies, Savory Jams and Chutneys, Pickles, Tomatoes, Fruit in Syrup and Condiments and Fruit Butters. All the recipes have been thoroughly vetted and tested in the American Test Kitchen.
Fun recipes from this book: Chipotle Pickled Garlic, Pink Pickled Turnips, Bloody Mary Pickled Asparagus, Apple-Shallot Chutney, Jalapeno Peach Preserves, Mulled Cider Jelly, Blueberry Earl Grey Jam and so many more.
No 2: Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving, Edited by Judi Kingry and Lauren Devine
If you take a Home Canning Class from your local County Extension Office (and you should), they will tell you not to veer from credible recipes from Ball and a couple of other sources. I always thought of Ball recipes as the basic canning recipes Grandma used. And they are. These recipes have been tested by generations of home-canners and too many County Fair Competitions to count. What the recipes might lack in excitement and beautiful photos, they make up for in sheer scope. This book covers Jams, Preserves, Conserves, Marmalades, Syrups, Pie Filling, Jelly, Fruit Sauces, Salsas, Relish, Chutney, Pickles, Ketchup, BBQ Sauces, Mustards, Vinegars, Pickles, Tomato Sauces, and more.
This book features 400 tried and true recipes. All tested and safe for home-canning. It contains a very thorough How-To section that walks you through the entire process. The detailed How-To section is a “must read first” if you are new to home-canning. It also makes for a great refresher for those that haven’t canned since last summer.
If you only had one canning book, this one should be it.
No 3: The Joy of Pickling by Linda Ziedrich
The Joy of Pickling features 250 recipes for Fermented Pickles, Vinegar Pickles, Asian-Style Pickles (with rice-bran, soy sauce and miso), Sweet Pickles, Quick Pickles, Freezer Pickles, Chutneys, Salsas, Relishes and Pickled Meat and Eggs.
I love that the recipes feature flavors from around the world. These recipes help me step outside my normal flavor profiles and try new things. There are pictures for some of the recipes.
When it comes to the How-To Section, its a little lighter than the first two books on my list and probably better suited for someone who has canned before.
No. 4: The Preservation Kitchen by Paul Virant with Kate Leahy
This is a beautiful book with lots of pictures and creative and sophisticated recipes. I love that recipes are in volume, ounces, grams and percentages. Some of my favorite recipes from this book are Peach Saffron Jam, Smoked Apple Butter, Maple-Black Walnut Butter, Caramel Cipollini Aigre-Doux.
This book also features sections on Fermenting Vegetables, Curing Meat, and Pressure Canned Preserves. The second half of the book is dedicated to beautiful recipes, organized by season, that use the preserves from Part One.
The instructional portion is pretty limited so I would only recommend this book for people that already know how to can. Some of the recipes feature harder to find ingredients, but it’s great for inspiration and ideas.
Other Sources for Good, Safe Home Canning Recipes and Information
National Center for Home Preservation
If you are looking online for canning information and recipes, this is a trusted source. This is also a great resource for information on freezing, curing, fermenting, storing, and drying food.
Happy Canning
I hope you enjoy these books and have fun canning this season. Do you have Canning books you would recommend? I’d love to hear about them in the comment section!
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