Putting up

[perc-o-prince]

Who here "puts up" food, and what? I've been making refrigerator pickles the last few years and they last months and months in the fridge; half-sours, dill and bread/butter. Froze grape juice from the Concords last year. San Marzano and Roma tomatoes canned for winter use. Unfortunately I lost the quart jar right after the picture was taken. I thought it had sealed but when I went to move it after taking the picture, the button popped up. I looked inside and there was white mold- it didn't seal properly. Damn!

Chuck[this post was last edited: 9/10/2020-17:39]

 

[parunner58]

I make tomato sauce and freeze it. This was last falls batch. I just bought an attachment to my Kitchen Aid to puree the tomatoes, will try it soon.

 

[kevin313]

Rich,

I put up bread & butter pickles and bread & butter jalapenos. Occasionally, I'll also can pickled beets and giardiniera.

 

[dermacie]

I purée tomatoes and jar them. Probably do them on Saturday.

 

[mattl]

I usally can a bushel of tomatoes, give half to a relative in GA, but I still have a fair amnt from last year ans no trip to GA this year. Had intended to make "Tomato Dust" out of the skins I toss but not this year.

May dehydrate a half bushel of Romas, love dried tomatoes in dishes.

 

[appnut]

Mike, let me know how that new attachment works.

 

[xraytech]

I can the following:
Garlic dill pickles
Hot garlic dill pickles
Whole tomatoes
Tomato purée
Tomato sauce with peppers and onions
Apple sauce
Black raspberry jelly
Plum jam
Strawberry jam
Peach jam
Occasionally I’ll can green beans

 

[circlew]

Haven't lately

I used to make black raspberry jelly every summer, and hope to again in the future.

My sister however cans (and freezes) all sorts of things, as they have a very large garden on their farm. Tomato sauce, juice and salsa, pickles of various types, pickled beets, okra, beans, corn, and other things.

 

[retro-man]

Better sealing?

I haven't canned in years but I remember doing it with my mother a lot. After the water bath she would take them out and put a towel on the counter and turn all the jars upside down for 3 or 4 hours while they cooled. Never had a seal leak. Don't know if this helped or not but never loosing a jar except once when I bumped them and one fell over and broke. She was not happy with me. lol

Jon

 

[washerboy]

It's becomming a lost art

I "put-up" a lug of tomatoes, usually green beans and a few purple hull peas every summer. We have a chest freezer and there's really no need to can anything. A friend taught me a few years ago to freeze tomatoes; which I've done and for cooking they are just a good as canned. But I enjoy the process of canning and it brings back wonderful memories of days gone by and loved ones that are no longer here. BTW: I remember my grandmother canning green beans in the oven. There was a process to it and she would place a chair in front of the oven so it wouldn't be opened until the jars had processed and cooled. Apparently if the door was opened during the oven time the jars would bust from the air hitting them...just what grandma said.

 

[gizmo]

"putting up"

I have never heard the term "putting up" to mean preserving.

Here we tend to use the term "preserving" or "bottling."

I make tomato chutney and tomato-based pasta sauce (more or less a Napoli sauce) most years.

I used to make jams but haven't for years.

I didn't do any last year - lost both my parents last year, then had a bad tomato season, so a combination of not enough of a crop and low motivation, it just didn't happen. Hopefully better this year - will be planting tomatoes in a few weeks. (Southern hemisphere...)

[this post was last edited: 9/11/2020-10:32]

 

[perc-o-prince]

Chris,

"Putting up" is an older term for it- something referencing, IIRC, putting things up on a shelf for storage. Nostalgic for me.

Mike- I too freeze some sauce or puree, but it's usually when I've stumbled across a big #10 can of it somewhere and need to portion it out. I like the whole tomatoes because we like some chunks in the sauce, plus there's nothing like stewed tomatoes on a cold winter night!

Jon- I always use the towel so the jars don't hit a cool counter and the draft doesn't get to them. I used to flip the jars over- I forgot about that little bit of finesse! Thanks for reminding me!

Mark- please share the frozen tomato method! I will put stuff (chili, stew, sauce) in jars and freeze it, but they're always cooked.

I may make grape jelly this year depending on how many grapes the birds leave me. I tasted one the other day and they're not quite there, plus there is still a good number of light-colored ones hanging out.

Chuck

 

[iheartmaytag]

From my small garden this year

I canned 15 pints of green beans and 16 pints of carrots.
I wanted to put up some tomatoes, but they just didn't make well this year. There was such a shortage of tomato plants this spring, I was running late in getting things put out. The Roma tomatoes I got turned out to be smaller, more like pear shaped cherry tomatoes. Very good flavor not enough to can.

I planted beets late, hoping for a fall harvest but they didn't come up. I do have some radishes that will be ready for picking in a week or so, cuks are gone, Okra looks about done after that big hot spell we had 102 last Sunday, and then 48 the rest of the week this week.

 

[firedome]

In New England it's "putting up" or "putting

As in Ruth Hertzberg's well known book: "Putting Food By".

We've been canning for 45 years. With 3 kids we had to!
Here in the North East with our good moisture gardening is very fruitful even if the season is short in VT ("Land of the Polar Tomato") and Central NY (we have gardens in both places).

Canning: green beans, carrots, beets, sauerkraut (5 gal crock worth), Roma tomato sauce, Better Boy whole tomatoes, apples.

Root Cellar: potatoes, carrots, onions, Japanese turnips, garlic.

Freezing: minced onions, tomato sauce, pesto, blueberries that birds don't get first even through netting - damn Jays), store bought'n strawberries.

Pickling: cucumbers, red & green cabbage (sauerkraut)

Eaten fresh: all the vegs above plus: summer squash, snow peas, Swiss chard,
fresh mint for Mojitos, all the herbs we also dry (below):

Dried herbs: rosemary, thyme, sage, basil, tarragon, chives.

Our record was 40 quarts of greens beans in 1 day when 3 kids were in the house!

We never grow corn since it's cheap, available, and takes a lot of space in our raised beds.

The USDA bulletins on gardening and preserving have been our "bible" since 1975!

 

[firedome]

oops...

the title should have said "putting up" or "putting by".

PS: My wife Sue is a Cornell Master Gardener, she really gets most of the credit, I just get the beds ready in the spring!

 

[petek]

Haven't in 15 years now. Back on the acreage in Calgary would can a couple of dozen jars of pickled beets (my fave) and baby carrots. I still have all my canning pots etc but just last week gave away my last carton of mason jars and lids to a neighbor . Some people refer to it as putting up, others like me, canning and sometimes "jarring" Maybe a regional thing. As a kid when I heard someone was canning something I imagined them actually putting it into cans, not jars

 

[perc-o-prince]

It was always "canning" with my mother when we were in a suburb of Buffalo (Cheektowaga); I guess I picked up on the "putting up" after I moved to MA in 1987. She always did tomatoes, pickles, peaches, pears, some jams/jellies. Always bought by the bushel at an open-air market.

I was at the store today and grabbed some low-sugar pectin... just in case the grape harvest cooperates!

Chuck

 

[xraytech]

Freezing tomatoes:
In addition to putting up tomatoes I’ll also freeze some for use in vegetable soup.

It’s very simple, just core your tomatoes and put in gallon or 2 gallon Ziploc bags and freeze.
When you want to use simply pull the bag out let it thaw and the tomato skins slip right off.

When I have more tomatoes than we can eat, but not enough for canning I start a bag in the freezer and just add to it as I have the extra tomatoes.

 

[mattl]

I once tried freezing tomatoes and ended up with a lot of tomato water, little if any tomato flesh.

 

[washerboy]

Chris: Freezing tomatoes

It's pretty simple. Dip the tomatoes in boiling water so the jacket will peel off. Cut them into chunk size, drop in a freezer zip baggie and toss in the freezer. I use a pint mason jar for the first couple bags so I can eyeball what makes a glass jar pint.

Matt: Sorry you ended up with tomato juice. Maybe it was the type of tomato. I usually freeze beef steak or better boys..that might be a regional thing..I'm not sure. Happy "putting up"..lol!!

 

[mattl]

Went on the hunt for lids today, no go.  Checked my cupboard and I have 2 dozen lids, but they are all the small mouth type, not sure if I  have many reg. jars left.  Might be enough to do 1/2 bushel of tomatoes.

 

[firedome]

there's been a shortage this year...

due to all the new gardeners, our son & D-I-L couldn't find any lids + bands anywhere, fortunately we'd stocked up and had some for them. Meanwhile beets and kraut are due for canning tomorrow.

 

[foraloysius]

Usually I freeze things, but sometimes when the freezer is rather full I jar some things like tomato sauce or like this week rhubarb. Only three jars, one left. I don't do it for preserving purposes, mostly those jars are empty after a week or two. It's just for fun and also I think food looks better in jars than in plastic containers.

Here's the last jar with rhubarb (cooked with red portwine, honey and vanilla.

 

[chachp]

Tomatoes

<span style="font-family: helvetica;">I remember my Mom every year canning tomatoes.  She would buy two bushels of Roma tomatoes.  She had the KitchenAid strainer attachment.  She would puree one full basket and then she would pack the others halved in the jars and use the puree as the liquid.  She would boil the tomatoes long enough for the skin to pop and then she'd remove the skin and seeds and put them in the jars.  She also put some fresh basil in the jars.  She then boiled them and lined them up, covered on towels to cool.  You could hear the lids pop as they sealed.</span>

 

<span style="font-family: helvetica;">It was quite the production.  And of course like any true Italian Mom she used the kitchen in the basement because it was a messy job.  </span>

 

[mattl]

Not just Itallian mom's. We have a basement kitchen set up too and my folks used it for canning and party prep.Now I just can in the kitchen, don't do that much.

 

[ea56]

My paternal Grandma canned every summer.  My grandparents owned the city lot next to their house in Richmond, Calif. and Grandpa had the entire lot planted with a vegetable garden.  You name it, Grandpa grew it.  He had corn, green beans, peas, lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, beets, carrots, potatoes, cabbage, strawberries, zucchini and every other variety of squash too.

 

Grandma had a dry cleaners in El Cerrito, Calif. and she did alterations there too.  She worked hard all day long, then after dinner in the summer she would can until about 9 pm.  She had two big Presto Canning Pressure Cookers for canning.  And she also made her own sauerkraut and pickles too.  Their basement had two whole walls of shelves filled top to bottom with Mason jars filled with the fruits of her labors.  

 

She also went to fruit farms in Concord and Brentwood, Calif. where she would pick bushels of peaches, pears,  and plums, which she also canned and made jam with the plums.  She even canned mincemeat, which my Mom adored, said it was the best she ever tasted.  <span style="font-size: 12pt;">Her canned green beans were out of this world and every time  we had dinner their they were always on the table. </span>

 

<span style="font-size: 12pt;">And this was a women that couldn’t even cook when she married my Grandpa in 1922.  Grandpa had to hire a neighbor lady to come over and teach her how to cook.  Grandpa said that his Ruthie couldn’t even boil water when he married her.  My aunt told me this was because Grandma’s family was so poor they could affordn’t much in the line of food, other than beans and such,  so she just never learned. </span>

 

Grandma worked very hard all her life.  The Depression was very hard on my Dad’s family and really made both of my grandparents old before their time.   Grandma was only 72 when she died from congestive heart failure.  Too much hard work and poor health care during the Depression and the War took their toll.

 

Eddie

[this post was last edited: 9/12/2020-18:43]

 

[robbinsandmyers]

Dill pickles

I tried canning them last year but didnt get the spices right I guess. Does anyone have a favorite blend they use? I may pick up some tomatoes soon and try canning them for winter.

 

[runematic]

This year I put up 5 dozen ears of local sweet corn and froze a bunch more. I also got a great deal on chicken leg quarters. They were only $0.38 per pound in a 40lb box. So it was like $15.20 for that. I smoked up quite a few quarters then picked them clean. I made stock and canned that. I took the meat and canned that with stock & some veggies. I liked the quarters that much I went back and bought another box and froze them. Should've taken a picture of them. They are huge! These chickens definitely ruled the roost. I then went to a local produce auction and bought 2 big boxes of peaches. Those were canned as well.

Not only are lids in short supply, so are pressure canners. I happened to find one in a small store. I only had a water bath canner leading up to this. I do like the pressure canner now though.