What a summer of preserving this was! Now that’s it’s officially fall, I thought I’d review the preservation methods I used this summer (and late spring). It was so fun to learn new ones, and refine my skills with the ones I’ve used over the years. And now I have a pantry (and freezer) full of delicious summer food to be used in winter.
There’s something very satisfying to have a pantry full of food you preserved yourself. It’s gathered when in season, so the flavor profile is going to be the best it can be. Having the taste of summer tomatoes, corn, and peppers will no doubt give us a boost when it’s dark and cold outside.
So, here is what I accomplished this year, and what you can accomplish next summer, too.
I thought I’d update you a on my plum shrub syrup. It certainly has changed over the past couple of months. It’s gotten sweeter and less vinegary – that tang is still there, though, but it’s certainly mellower.
I really like how it’s changed – I think it’s much more balanced and actually more syrupy. It goes great in sparkling water; I haven’t tried it with alcohol. When I use it in sparkling water, I find that these days I want to use more syrup than I did at the beginning of its life. When it was younger, a little went quite a long way.
I would say to those who experiment with the shrub and find it way strong for their taste, just wait longer and the syrup will mellow out. And become more delicious, of course.
I’ll definitely be making shrubs again for many summers to come.
This season I’ve been preserving often, and that makes me very happy. The processes are fun, and I love the idea of having food on the shelves/in the fridge that I can enjoy when the food in its natural state would be past its prime. I plan to continue preserving food throughout the summer – my next big project will be canning tomatoes in August or September.
Earlier this year, I was taken by this DIY handbook published by the NY Times. I ended up making Vin d’Orange and Maple Vinegar. I’ve been enjoying the Vin d’Orange all summer, and it really just screams “warm weather” to me. I drink it mixed with sparkling water and it’s very refreshing.
Vin d'Orange brewing
I also made the maple vinegar, which is pretty good. It’s made of raw cider vinegar, maple syrup, and rum. It still has a bit of an alcohol kick to it, which is a bit odd. Still, it’s fantastic as part of a vinaigrette on salad. That’s my favorite way to use it.
As far as this DIY handbook, I still have plans to make the tomato chili jam and the kimchi. I’ve used up most of my preserved lemons, so I’ll need to make some of those again soon.
Apart from that, I’ve made apricot jam from the apricots off the backyard tree. I used a very basic jam recipe, and added some organic orange zest to it. I love that addition. I think in a lot of jams and preserves, the addition of orange is a wonderful flavor contribution.
Apricot jam
As I wrote before, strawberry lemon preserves were made at my home, as part of an event put together by my CSA. I was fortunate to be the recipient of a jar of these preserves by AJ.
The spicy cherry preserves I made are simply amazing. I love the combination of sweet-tart-spicy, and these cherries really deliver on this. I liked the half pint I made so much that I bought more sour cherries at the greenmarket and made another pints’s worth of sour cherry preserves! The cherries with some syrup mixed with sparkling water make for a nice, barely sweet soda.
I also used some of the sour cherries for a liqueur, which is coming along quite well.
I’ve started experimenting with simple syrups and made a very tasty mint simple syrup with the mint on my back deck.
With the last of the first yellow plums of the season, I made plum shrub syrup, which turned out beautifully. I like it in sparkling water, though it could be added to a wheat beer with pleasant results, especially if you like sour beers (I do).
If it’s not evident in this post, I’ll just say it – I love vinegar. So, I’ve made some vinegar pickles out of snap peas. They are very good, but I think next time I’ll make them spicier.
Snap pea pickles
I even did some short term preservation with the peaches and nectarines that were really ripe – sorbet! I sweetened it with sucanat and used a bit of the maturing sour cherry liqueur, and it turned out just so well. Sucanat – an unrefined sweetener – turns things a bit dark, but I’ll sacrifice a little bit of aesthetic beauty for something sweet that doesn’t mess so intensely with my blood sugar.
What a summer of preserving this was! Now that’s it’s officially fall, I thought I’d review the preservation methods I used this summer (and late spring). It was so fun to learn new ones, and refine my skills with the ones I’ve used over the years. And now I have a pantry (and freezer) full of delicious summer food to be used in winter.
